Three flavors of Apocalypse

Categories Science Fiction & Fantasy , Fiction

I've had this eerie relationship with apocalyptic fiction ever since I found Nevil Shute's On the Beach as a 11 or 12 year old kid. I'm not entirely sure how to describe what this unbearably grim story did to my young mind. Needless to say I had trouble getting to sleep for a week or two and spent the next year or so worried that the Russians were going to drop the bomb on us before I even got my first kiss. Luckily, after that year the Berlin Wall fell, and soon after that the Soviet Union split up, and then I got my first kiss, so there were a few less worries to plague my young mind. However, my thirst for fiction that proposes the worst began at that point and has never quite left me.

Any Requests Part III

Categories Mystery & Suspense , Rediscoveries , Staff Picks , Nonfiction , Fiction

Here are the rest of the titles I previewed last week. 

The political love story is Letter to Lorenzo, by Amanda Prantera.  Julia, the English wife of a wealthy young Roman, is devastated when she is told that he has been killed by a car bomb.  Her agonizing grief for her husband is complicated by her bewilderment:  why would Red Brigade terrorists kill her husband when the two of them were known for their own socialist convictions?  It must be a neo-fascist plot to discredit him.  But careful, relentless interrogation by the investigating magistrate reveals that the police think her husband was a terrorist transporting the bomb himself.  Julia’s world is turned upside down again.  Her grief is powerfully portrayed, and her painfully honest attempts to understand her marriage and her politics are utterly persuasive, as is the subtle characterization of the magistrate who forces her into this possible reconsideration of everything she believed.

Any Requests, Part II

Categories Romance , Rediscoveries , Science Fiction & Fantasy , Staff Picks , Nonfiction , Fiction

Last week I dug through my piles and files of books and reviews to post about some titles I thought you might have missed. 

I got a little bit of response, including a few emails, from people who were curious about what the titles might be (no guesses, though!).  No one commented about what kind of books they'd like to see more of in these posts, though, so I just want to repeat--don't be shy if there's something you're looking for.  There's always more where these came from! 

Anyway, read on if you were curious about any of the little blurbs and what the titles were.   Did any of you recognize these titles?

How to Cook a Turkey

Categories Cookbooks

Thanksgiving is almost here, and so is the stress of preparing a delicious meal for your guests (insert turkey horror stories here).  Thankfully, the editors of Fine Cooking Magazine have just published How to Cook a Turkey: And All the Other Trimmings, a handy guide and cookbook to help you make it through the day.

How to Cook a Turkey provides tips (to keep your sanity) and illustrated answers to all your pressing poultry questions, from which bird to buy (and how big) to how to carve it properly once cooked to perfection.  There are also over 100 recipes for appetizers, turkey, stuffing and gravy, vegetables, potatoes, pies, and other autumn desserts.  Plus, a whole chapter on what to do with those leftovers…

The Mapmaker's Opera

Categories Fiction

It's not really an opera, rather more of an often-told story from a grandmother to her grandchildren.  And in the telling of the story, she manages to convey the ethos of cultures from long ago and far away, and to plant in the childrens' minds an unshakeable memory of herself.  The Mapmaker's Opera is a charming story that winds from the crocus fields of La Mancha in rural Spain to the streets of Seville, and across the Atlantic to the Yucatan of Mexico.  In the tradition of Gabriel Garcia Marquez, where a single glimpse at one's true love can lead to a lifetime of sacrifice and suffering, this novel involves "forbidden love, unbearable grief, one country lost and another one found."  Author Bea Gonzalez, a native of Spain who now lives in Toronto, writes with a true appreciation for the beauty, pathos, and subtle humor that can be found in the classic novels of her homeland.  This is a delightful gem of a story, highly recommended.

Paranoid Park

Categories Entertainment , Movies & Books , Staff Picks , Fiction

A suburban teen skater is haunted by the gruesome death of a security guard in Blake Nelson's tense little novel, Paranoid Park.  Marketed to teen readers, the book has just as much appeal for adults, and has recently been made into a film by director Gus Van Sant.  The film debuted at Cannes film festival in 2007, and is scheduled for limited release in the United States in March 2008. 

The story takes place in a downtown skate park in Portland.  The narrator hesitates to get involved with a street kid who tries to befriend him, and when a dare goes wrong, the narrator's life changes forever. You can't help but be drawn in by the guilt-ridden complexity of this teen's situation.  Recommended for skaters and non-skaters alike.

Any Requests?

Categories Rediscoveries , Staff Picks , Nonfiction , Fiction

I knew a regular library user who carried a tiny notebook in his jacket pocket.  It was the latest in a long line of notebooks he had kept over the years, stretching back to when he lived in Shanghai in 1945, neatly recording all of the books he had read since then.

I was always somewhat awestruck by this, but I couldn’t help but feel it was Too Late for me to follow his example, even if I weren’t Too Lazy to keep it up. 

The wonderful LibraryThing, a website that lets you catalog your library and share it, is the modern equivalent (and much more!) of those notebooks, but even that strikes me as Too Exhausting when I look around at all of the books I’d love to add to it.

Still, looking around at all of those books does make me want to share them with you. 

So here’s my question.  What kind of books would you most like me to post about?