The Loaded Bookshelf

When I first heard about SHADES OF MILK AND HONEY -- a Jane Austen-esque novel with a touch of magic in it -- I knew it'd be a must-read for me.  Mary Robinette Kowal's Glamourist Histories series has it all:  romance, intrigue, an original and interesting magical system that is easy to understand and doesn't overwhelm the story, and an integration with the history of the Regency period that gets better book after book. 

Realized this morning that, completely unintentionally, I chose THE 100 by Kass Morgan as my 100th read this year!  How appropriate!

It looks like I'm well on target to meet my usual goal of 120 books per year.

I love the fall.  The anticipation of the holidays, rich fall food (pumpkin muffins, yum!), the scents of cinnamon and pumpkin spice, everything about the season is satisfying.  Growing up in Southern California, a place with only summer and winter, I had no idea of the beauty of the fall colors, the joy of moderate temperatures after a hot and humid summer, and the comfort of crisp, cool days spent inside reading a nice long book. 

For me, the fall is time for a certain kind of book.  I've kicked things off with Fingersmith by Sarah Waters, a 19th-century-set  tale abundant with long-buried secrets, con artists, twists and turns, and Dickensian touches.  It has accompanied me on train rides to and from work that are increasingly dark as the daylight shortens.  The fall is a time for dark things, I think, and this was the perfect book to launch the season.  I also hope to return to Westeros in A Feast for Crows and finally read Gone Girl, which I've been quite tardy about.  Finally, I'm quite looking forward to the new novella by Diane Setterfield, whose masterful Gothic novel The Thirteenth Talecaptivated me entirely.

But I can't read ALL dark things!  So I'll sprinkle the season with other anticipated reads, or authors I need to catch up on.  Earlier this year I LOVED A Discovery of Witches, so it's about time to move onto the sequel.  And Lookaway, Lookaway sounds like a fun, snarky examination of life in the American South.

What will YOU curl up with this fall, accompanied by apple cider or a pumpkin spice latte?

I belong to a book club.  Do you?  Why?  I joined because I'd moved to a new location and didn't really know anybody, and was eager to combine new friends with my favorite hobby: reading!

We formed the book club with a few rules. 1. The book had to be shorter than 500 pages, to increase the chances of everybody's finishing it. 2. The book had to be out in paperback, so it would be easier for everybody to find and carry, and cheaper if they wanted to buy. 3. Nobody can have read the book before. This rule makes every month was a clean slate. If the book is great, fantastic! If nobody liked it, well, who could have known? Nobody had read it. 4. Each month is a dictatorship. As long as nobody's read the book, the designated chooser can pick whatever she wants, and we rotate who gets to choose every month. This way everybody gets to read her top pick every so often.

Though we've definitely had a few duds, I love that book club has forced me to read a lot of wonderful books I'd never heard of or may not have picked up on my own. For instance, I really didn't want to read THE GIRL WITH THE DRAGON TATTOO--yet I ended up loving more than anybody else in the group! I also loved NOTHING TO ENVY by Barbara Demick, a reportage non-fiction about North Korean defectors, another book I likely wouldn't have chosen to read for pleasure.

Above are a few books that were successful book club reads in that either I really enjoyed it, the club in general enjoyed it, or it provoked a lot of discussion.

What books have been successes in your book club?  Pass on the recommendations!

For a really long while I thought of True Crime as being a seedy genre, written by low-brow "journalists" who mostly cared about shock value rather than truth and analysis, and read by weirdos who probably wrote fan letters to famous prison inmates. Not sure why I thought this, but I really did.

I was drawn into the genre by a couple works of literary non-fiction: DEVIL IN THE WHITE CITY (which is only really half true crime, the other half being just narrative history) and THE SUSPICIONS OF MR. WHICHER by Kate Summerscale.  The former was a selection of my book club. The latter I read because I have a particular interest in 19th-century novelist Wilkie Collins, whose novel THE MOONSTONE was partially inspired by the crime at the heart of Summerscale's book.  Both these works of narrative history are fascinating, utterly compelling, and read with the pace and excitement of a novel.  These were my intro into true crime.

Though as with any genre there is a qualitative spectrum, I've found that there is a lot of truly wonderful true crime out there.  Recent favorites included PEOPLE WHO EAT DARKNESS, a fascinating account of a contemporary crime in Japan, and MIDNIGHT IN PEKING, a historical true crime.  On my TBR list are LOST GIRLS and COLUMBINE, both of which I've heard are really insightful and enlightening (though ironically, the crimes at the heart of LOST GIRLS have not been solved).

Have you ever been surprised to enjoy something you thought wouldn't be to your taste?

Hello Booklikers!

I'm hoping you all can help me out.  I'm interested in seeking out more adult fantasy novels.  Though I read a fair amount of YA fantasy, I've been slower to find adult fantasy.  Among the authors I really like are Patrick Rothfuss, Brandon Sanderson, George R. R. Martin, and Lois McMaster Bujold.  I also like romantic fantasy authors like Catherine Asaro and Maria V. Snyder.  Any recommendations?

A few caveats:

1. I'm squeamish about a few sex things--I'm turned off by a lot of promiscuity by the protagonists or spouse swapping, or anything else that could be construed as "icky." Very technical term, I know. For instance, from what I've heard, Jacqueline Carey's books aren't for me.

2. I'm not big on fairy tale re-tellings, though I do appreciate some.

3. If it's really unrelentingly dark, I need to be warned. I can deal with it if I have some idea what to expect.

4. Commercially published works only, please!

Reader, I married him. 

My fiancé, that is.  I married him last weekend, and it was a wonderful time.

The hubs and I aren't religious, so we had a completely original ceremony designed just for us.  And when something is customized to fit me, you KNOW it'll involve books, and the way we decided to include bookish things was in our two readings:

The Road Goes Ever On from The Hobbit by J. R. R. Tolkien

Roads go ever ever on,

Over rock and under tree,

By caves where never sun has shone,

By streams that never find the sea;

Over snow by winter sown,

And through the merry flowers of June,

Over grass and over stone,

And under mountains in the moon.

Roads go ever ever on

Under cloud and under star,

Yet feet that wandering have gone

Turn at last to home afar.

Eyes that fire and sword have seen

And horror in the halls of stone

Look at last on meadows green

And trees and hills they long have known.

A quote from Jane Eyre by Charlotte Bronte

"I have for the first time found what I can truly love - I have found you. You are my sympathy - my better self - my good angel; I am bound to you with a strong attachment. I think you good, gifted, lovely: a fervent, a solemn passion is conceived in my heart; it leans to you, draws you to my center and spring of life, wraps my existence about you - and, kindling in pure, powerful flame, fuses you and me in one."

How have you incorporated your favorite books into other parts of your life?

How many have you read? 

I'm not a HUGE reader in this genre, but was still surprised to find I've read 10 of this list (I figured it would be like, three or something).  I definitely have quite a few books to add to my TBR list!

Earlier this week I read a wonderful YA book that I knew was perfect for criminally underrated Friday!

The novel has a basic Breakfast Club-like set-up:  teens who normally wouldn't interact in regular social discourse are forced together, and the results are awesome.  Declan and Neilly couldn't be more different.  Declan is into death metal and violent video games.  Neilly is one of the popular kids.  And they're about to become step-siblings.

NOTES FROM THE BLENDER is a seriously feel-good, funny, and poignant work of contemporary YA fiction.  Declan in particular has a wonderful voice, but both teens and their problems are portrayed realistically and appealingly.  And if their dialogue seems a little sophisticated, I can forgive it.  I especially love that the book illustrated teens who have complicated but overall loving relationships with their parents--no evil parental figures here.  If I have one complaint about the book, it was that Neilly wasn't quite as rounded as she could have been.  Unlike Declan, she didn't have any interests or hobbies, and this made her seem a little flat to me.  But overall, I was thoroughly charmed by NOTES FROM THE BLENDER.

Recommended for fans of the Dairy Queen series, and readers who are tired of fantasy / dystopia / apocalypse and want a good ol' contemporary read.

A month from today, I'm getting married.  Holy moly, it's come up fast.  But it made me think of some of my favorite love stories.  Yes, some of them are old or old-fashioned, and use plot devises no author would get away with today (case in point, if you've read LED ASTRAY, you will know that the hero does something that would be totally NOT OKAY in real life).  But I don't care!  I love these all anyway.

What are your favorite love stories?

I love planning books to take on vacation, though whether or not I get around to reading them is a different story.  I'm about to embark on my summer vacation for July 4th, and have chosen these books to accompany me on my travels:

A FIERCE RADIANCE -- this is a pick for my July book club meeting (it's my pick, so I really should make sure to read it).  A historical work about a female reporter covering the invention of penicillin, I'm hoping this will have a great period feel.

NIGHTSHIFTED -- A nurse works on a hospital ward where the patients aren't quite . . . natural.  I didn't think I'd get this in from the library until after vacation, but it's waiting for me now, so I'll pick this up as my "guilty fun" read.

HAPPIER AT HOME -- I loved Rubin's first book THE HAPPINESS PROJECT.  Though I haven't undertaken a happiness project of my own, I find her insights and examples useful, and think I've drawn some benefit from reading her books even if I haven't put what I've learned into organized practice.  Also, I sometimes find it easier to read non-fiction on airplanes than fiction.

What books are you taking on vacay?

HOW did it escape my notice that it's the 200th anniversary of the publication of Pride and Prejudice??

It seems a great ball was thrown at Chatsworth House, England in celebration of this momentous event.  From the pics, it pretty much looks like the best party ever.  Take a look!  Enjoy!

Though I'm as into popular, bestselling books as the next gal, I think it's a special feeling to discover an underrated gem, an author or book that didn't break out and land on everyone's radar.  Every Friday I will post about one of mine.

Elizabeth Gaskell

I always make it a goal for myself to read a certain number of classics throughout the year.  There are just so many worthy and fab-sounding books in the canon that for whatever reason I missed out on in English class, and I'd like to fill in those gaps.  I often get too distracted by new and shiny books to pick up a classic, but periodically I manage it.  And sometimes, what I find is a great treat.  Elizabeth Gaskell is the perfect example.

I should begin by saying that a lot of people DO read Elizabeth Gaskell.  But I have a feeling that it's NOT ENOUGH people for how fabulous she is.  Though I can't substantiate this with a ton of proof, I'm guessing that most casual surveys of Victorian English literature exclude Gaskell at the expense of the other great women writers of the time (the Brontes and George Eliot, primarily), and I can't really argue with that choice because time is obviously limited.  But if you like Victorian lit or classic women writers and want to probe further, I heartily recommend Gaskell.  I particularly love NORTH AND SOUTH, her novel set during the tumultuous time of the Industrial Revolution.  It's probing and beautiful and romantic and tragic.  Also, there is a wonderful BBC miniseries of the novel starring the yummy Richard Armitage.  Shouldn't that be reason enough?

Have you ever found an author you really really liked who just seemed to vanish off the face of the earth? Who wrote one or two books and then never produced again?

I always wonder why. Did the author die? Is it a case of writer's block? Is writing fiction just not a profitable enough endeavor for them to devote time to? Or maybe that author only had one book in him in the first place and never had much of a story to tell again. Sometimes I'm pleasantly surprised by a new release, but some authors really do disappear for good.

Above are some of the authors I wonder about the most. Each produced his or her last work several years ago, and there's no sign of an upcoming work. As far as I know, all are still alive. So where are they? All I can do is cross my fingers and hope that another book is in the cards. And if not, I guess I have no shortage of other things to read anyway.

Did any of your favorite authors pull a vanishing act?

Just as with adult jackets, YA book jackets play a big role in encouraging me to pick up or learn about the book.  The problem with YA:  I really dislike the generic "girl looking sad/wistful/seductive/powerful" jackets.  These are apparently quite successful, though, as publishers keep using them.  Alas.

GRACELING -- I've always found the colors and image on this jacket beautiful, even though I think overall the design looks a bit "young" for the actual story.

CINDER -- This is a jacket of such perfection I don't even know what to say.  It captures the premise of the book exactly, conveying not only with the title but the image that the story will bear a loose relationship to the classic fairy tale Cinderella, but showing with the machinery outline under the flesh that this will be no ordinary retelling.

EARTH GIRL -- I know I said I hated girls on jackets, but I just really like this one, I think because the overall image of the girl resting on the world is so . . . weird.  It somehow conveys a fragility in both the girl and the earth.

WICKED LOVELY -- this cover led me astray, because I didn't care for the book all that much (haven't found a faerie book I liked yet, so it seems faeries just aren't for me).  I liked the blue-ish/purple color scheme and the mystery of the flower that looks frozen or dusted or something.

DIVERGENT -- I'm a fan of the big symbol books -- HUNGER GAMES, LEGEND, and the like, that depict something symbolic rather than people.  It conveys the epic scope of the plot.

ROT & RUIN -- Isn't this one freaky?  The red-rimmed, wide eye and the gray-ish flesh conveys the horror of the novel, but the bright green eye helps the image stand out.

What are your YA jacket favs?