friday april 04
April is National Poetry Month; Earth Day 2008 is April 22. There are lots of poetry books that celebrate Spring and the Earth on the library bookshelves.
The 2006 Caldecott Honor book Song of the Water Boatman & Other Pond Poems (2005) by Joyce Sidman makes a lovely connection between Earth Day and Poetry Month. Beckie Prange's gorgeous hand colored woodcuts pull together the poetry and scientific information on pond life.
Pat Mora and Steve Jenkins' This Big Sky (1998) brings us to the desert Southwest in words and pictures. Katharine Boling's New Year Be Coming!: A Gullah Year (2002) is illustrated with Daniel Minter's fascinating linoleum block prints illustrating the Gullah life of the Southeast coast, so closely tied to the earth and seasons.
Marilyn Singer's Turtle in July (1989) is a collection of poems about animals, stunningly illustrated by the great Jerry Pinkney. Fireflies at Midnight (2003) by Marilyn Singer, illustrated by Ken Robbins, also celebrates animals and insects.
Pause and enjoy these charming tributes to our Earth. The simplicity and uncomplicated joy will refresh you, and make you realize how universally appealing "Children's" poetry can be.
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tuesday march 11
Move over Emmy, Tony, and Oscar. Make room for the Edgar, the literary award that is given annually by the Mystery Writers of America. Named for Edgar Allan Poe, who managed to be a quite a mystery in his own right, the award honors the best mystery writers of the year in a wide variety of categories: Novel, First Novel, Paperback Original, Critical/Biographical, Fact Crime, Short Story, Young Adult, Juvenile, Play, TV Episode, and Motion Picture, plus five 'special awards'. The Edgar Award Ceremony will be held in New York City on May 1.
This year's finalists were just announced, and for mystery lovers it makes for a fine reading list. The nominees for 'best novel' are all available at the Library:
monday february 25
The On The Same Page 2008 title selection for Teens - as chosen by a group of eleven very cool teen readers - is Bronx Masquerade by Nikki Grimes. Named a Coretta Scott King Award Winner in 2003, Ms. Grimes’ novel portrays a high school English class as they discover ways to express themselves through 'Open Mic' poetry. For the next several weeks, branch libraries will hold Open Mic sessions for teens; some will be led by the dynamic performance poet Benjamin Hughes.
Participating in this year's program are classes from Northwest High School, LaSalle, St. Teresa in Covedale, Mt. Notre Dame, Aiken HS, and Ursuline Academy, to name a few. Leading in to National Poetry Month in April, teachers can continue to request book collections for use in their classrooms.
Anyone who has a creative streak would have to admire author Nikki Grimes, as she expresses herself via many art forms: writing, fiber arts, music, and jewelry-making. Fans of all ages can meet her at Joseph-Beth Booksellers in the Rookwood Pavilion on Wednesday March 26 from 7:00 to 8:00 p.m.
friday february 22
Turning the Page had the opportunity to conduct an interview with Robert Olmstead, author of Coal Black Horse, Cincinnati’s 2008 On the Same Page novel for adults. We asked Mr. Olmstead some general questions, because we wouldn’t want to include spoilers for those of you who haven’t yet read this gripping tale of a young boy seeking his father across the landscape of the Civil War.
But once you have read Coal Black Horse, be sure to bring your own questions to the book-signing with Mr. Olmstead at the Main Library on Sunday, February 24, or to one of the other events at which he’ll appear. Meanwhile, check out the official Web site for the book.
TTP: Where did you get the inspiration for Coal Black Horse?
RO: In the 1980’s I was living in Pennsylvania not far from Gettysburg. Visiting the battlefield for the first time was a powerful experience. I didn’t know that much about the Civil War, just the usual stuff. So living there, walking that ground, it is my way that I wanted to know as much as I could. And of course everything I learned simply made me all the more curious to learn even more.
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thursday february 14
In an entry dated January 10, I promised to follow up with the final list of award winners in the first annual Essence Magazine Literary Awards. In a glittering ceremony in New York City, the awards were announced on February 8, and the Essence website offers a photo gallery of many of the honorees. Lifetime Achievement Award winner Terry McMillan was looking very stylish as she announced that she is working on a sequel to her big breakout novel from 1992, Waiting to Exhale. Describing the impact of a life immersed in books, McMillan said, “I don’t know where I would be without words and stories.”
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monday january 14
The American Library Association (ALA) today announced the top books, video and audiobooks for children and young adults - including the Caldecott, King, Newbery, and Printz awards - at its Midwinter Meeting in Philadelphia.
The following is a list of all ALA Youth Media Awards for 2008:
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thursday january 10
Essence Magazine has long been the source of bestseller lists for African-American readers. The winners of the first annual Essence Literary Awards will be announced on February 8, 2008, and the list of nominated titles is impressive. In addition to books in eight categories, there are two special awards: A Lifetime Achievement Award for Terry McMillan, and a Storyteller of the Year Award, which readers can vote on through January 15. Up for the Storyteller Award are Tanarive Due, L.A. Banks, Lori Bryant-Woolridge, Trisha R. Thomas, and the sensational Eric Jerome Dickey.
Here is a sampling of the great books that have been nominated:
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wednesday january 02
You don’t really need me to tell you about Anne Enright’s The Gathering, since it won this year’s Booker prize. But I just read it in one big gulp, and I can’t resist telling you how gorgeous it is. And I have another book to suggest while you wait for your copy to be available.
The Gathering is a story of family and memory. An Irishwoman mourns her brother’s suicide while calling up the intensely tangible memories of him and their childhood and youth together, memories that coalesce around the year they spent living with their grandmother and what happened to them there.
Enright writes so beautifully, so specifically, evoking the dense physicality of memory and family emotions, that readers will be seduced with every perfect word and scene.
Continue Reading…
friday december 21
Fans of the audio versions of the Harry Potter books by J.K.Rowling are already familiar with my favorite audio book narrator, Jim Dale. According to his web site he has been nominated for a 2008 Grammy Award for Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows!
I did a little research and discovered that Jim Dale has a widely varied background on the stage and in movies in addition to audio book narration. For example, much to my surprise and delight I discovered that he was the "bad guy" in the movie Pete's Dragon, a favorite of my kids when they were little.
The list of his awards and accomplishments is too long for my limited space here, but I was probably the most impressed by his Tony Award for his creation and performance on Broadway of the main character in Barnum! OK, did you know Jim Dale wrote the lyrics to the song Georgy Girl?? Neither did I!!
What a gift he is, this talented multi-faceted man who has touched so many lives with his award-winning performances, not the least of which are the Harry Potter books.
tuesday november 06
Publisher’s Weekly has selected it’s choices for the Best Books of the Year 2007. The Children’s titles are wayyyyyy down at the bottom of the list. The categories are Children’s Picture Books, Children’s Fiction (which includes titles for teens), and Children’s Nonfiction.
I’ve listed their Children’s Picture Book and Children’s Nonfiction choices below and included a brief plot summary for each.
Children's Picture Books
At Night by Jonathan Bean is a beautifully illustrated, rhyming story about a girl's difficulty falling asleep in her urban house.
In Jon Agee's Nothing, shoppers vie to buy the latest "nothing" in this wry spin on The Emperor's New Clothes.
Mother Goose Numbers on the Loose by Leo and Diane Dillon is easily the best number oriented concept book of 2007. Personified numerals join hands with elaborately costumed characters in this inventive, visually dazzling interpretation of favorite nursery rhymes that feature numbers.
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wednesday october 17
The finalists for the 2007 National Book Awards in Young People’s Literature have been announced. What a great slate of candidates, including some of my absolute favorites for the year so far!
In his first book written for teens,
The Absolutely True Diary of a Part-Time Indian, bestselling author Sherman Alexie tells the story of Junior, a budding cartoonist growing up on the Spokane Indian Reservation. Soon after the start of his freshman year, Junior leaves the troubled school on the reservation, boldly transferring to a school in a tiny town 22 miles away, where the only other Indian is the school mascot. It is a funny and poignant look at one adolescent’s attempt to break away and make his own future.
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wednesday october 10
The word “haunting” has shown up in virtually every review I’ve seen of The Tenderness of Wolves, Stef Penney’s debut historical, which won the 2006 Costa first novel award (formerly the Whitbread).
Partly, that may be because of the book’s ending, which isn’t entirely resolved—fair warning if you like to close a book and have things wrapped up. But mostly it’s because the book is so eerily atmospheric. Fair warning number two: don’t read this book in February.
Dove River is a nineteenth-century settlement in Canada’s Northern Territory. Despite its tenderly peaceful name, it’s a harshly isolated place dominated by the majestic, menacing subarctic winter.
Mrs. Ross, one of the settlement wives, finds the murdered body of Laurent Jammet, a Hudson Bay voyageur turned hunter. She rouses the authorities, but then realizes she has a stake in the investigation—her seventeen-year-old son, Francis, Laurent’s friend, has disappeared and is soon a suspect in Laurent’s murder.
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wednesday september 19
“On the first day of my teaching career, I was almost fired for eating the sandwich of a high school boy. On the second day I was almost fired for mentioning the possibility of friendship with a sheep. Otherwise, there was nothing remarkable about my thirty years in the high school classrooms of New York City. I often doubted if I should be there at all. At the end I wondered how I lasted that long.”
So begins Teacher Man, Frank McCourt’s final memoir in his trilogy that starts with Pulitzer Prize-winning Angela’s Ashes and continues in ‘Tis.
In the classroom, McCourt tells stories of his childhood spent in poverty in Limerick, Ireland. He instructs one class to compose homework excuse notes (“A man died in the bathtub upstairs and it overflowed and messed up all of my homework"). He makes another read cooking recipes to music.
His lessons may be unconventional, but his students discover the beauty of the English language and learn to always think for themselves.
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tuesday september 11
I was one of those kids who left the library each week with a new stack of books, getting carsick on the way home because I couldn't wait to start reading. From Frances Hodgson Burnett's The Secret Garden to C.S. Lewis' The Lion, the Witch, and the Wardrobe, my childhood books usually involved misfits and hidden worlds of one kind or another.
Madeleine L'Engle passed away last week at the age of 88. She wrote more than two-dozen works of fiction as well as volumes of poetry and non-fiction.
After I read about L'Engle's death, I immediately retrieved our copy of her most celebrated book, A Wrinkle in Time. This book has some of my favorite misfits and hidden worlds. Meg is a high school student (or junior high? We're never given an exact age) who never seems to work to her potential. She wears glasses and braces and is belligerent toward adults and other students alike. Charles Wallace, Megs brother, didn't start talking until he was four; he now speaks, at age five, in complete sentences with perfect diction. Calvin is one of the popular kids in high school, but only because he pretends. The three of them--with help from Mrs Whatsit, Mrs Who, and Mrs Which--embark on a journey through time and space to find Meg and Charles Wallace's father.
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friday september 07
If you're looking for a new mystery series to delve into, I highly recommend Laura Lippman's Tess Monaghan series. The Baltimore-based series began in 1997 with Baltimore Blues. Tess, an ex-reporter-turned-PI, enjoys rowing, food, and arguing with her large extended family. In this, her first case, a fellow rower asks Tess to investigate his fiancee, whom he believes is having an affair with her boss. When the boss, a prominent lawyer, ends up dead, Tess must fight to find the real killer and clear her friend's name. Tess is nothing if not a dogged investigator and has a habit of putting herself into dangerous situations. A statuesque redhead with a quick temper and fierce loyalty to both her boyfriend and slightly wacky (not to mention slightly corrupt) family, Tess is one PI you won't want to miss. If you enjoy Baltimore Blues, you'll want to read all of Tess's adventures, including the latest, No Good Deeds.
Lippman has won many awards for her work, including the Edgar, Shamus, Agatha, and Anthony awards. She is also the author of three stand-alone thrillers: What the Dead Know, about the disappearance of two sisters; To the Power of Three, about a school shooting; and Every Secret Thing, about the murder of a young child by two adolescents.
tuesday august 07
The winners of the career-making Eisner Awards were announced the last weekend in July at Comic-Con 2007 in San Diego. These awards, named for legendary innovator Will Eisner, are determined by a panel of five judges; this year, they included librarian Robin Brenner, creator of the excellent reader’s advisory site No Flying No Tights.
In addition to the winners listed below, check out the nominee list for more great graphic reading.
Best Graphic Album – New: American Born Chinese by Gene Luen Yang. See my post about this first graphic novel nominated for a National Book Award.
Best Graphic Album – Reprint: Absolute DC: The New Frontier, by Darwyn Cooke. The Library has the original edition.
Best Reality-Based Work: Fun Home by Alison Bechdel. See Jennifer’s post.
Continue Reading…
tuesday july 24
In Pharaoh’s Army: Memories of the Lost War is the sequel to This Boy’s Life, Tobias Wolff’s classic coming-of-age memoir about growing up with an abusive stepfather in the 1950s.
A National Book Award finalist, In Pharaoh’s Army chronicles Wolff’s decision to join the Army and ultimately, the Vietnam War. Wolff’s voice is painfully honest, rendering the horrors of war and its casualties (including his good friend Hugh Pierce) with both sensitivity and shattered illusions. He is equally hard on himself, examining his own close calls and survival amidst the loss of so many others.
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wednesday may 30
How about a little suspense?
I’m looking back at a whole stash of good, nailbiting suspense novels and nice, twisty mysteries that I’ve read in the past few years, and I think my next several posts are going to be about those genres.
Maybe it’s the hot sunshine we’ve been having lately that has put me in a noir mood—I once read a definition that said a true noir movie had to have a shot somewhere in it of broken light slanting in through venetian blinds.
I don’t think my first title quite fits that definition, since it takes place in Glasgow. But it sure fills the bill for gripping suspense.
It’s Denise Mina’s award-winning 1999 debut, Garnethill.
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friday may 25
Cincinnati has a wonderful tradition of welcoming spring and summer with magnificent singing – first the May Festival, held during two May weekends, then the opera season with four productions in June and July.
This tradition has a very long history! The May Festival, established in 1873, is the oldest continuous choral festival in the Western hemisphere. Music Hall was built to house it. Cincinnati Opera, founded in 1920, is the second-oldest opera company in the United States.
The Library will join the celebration this year by unveiling treasures from the Cincinnati Opera Archives, which were entrusted to the Art & Music Department last year. The exhibit Highlights from the Cincinnati Opera Archives, on view in the department from June 13 through September 2, will showcase photographs of the many legendary stars who performed with the company, along with historic programs, posters, scrapbooks, and other documents.
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wednesday may 23
News of the death of children’s writer Lloyd Alexander last week sent me to the bookshelves to reread his Chronicles of Prydain. It's one of my all-time favorite works of fantasy, whether for children or for adults, a splendid work of high fantasy based on Welsh legend. Have all of you Lord of the Rings and Harry Potter fans discovered it? The first volume is The Book of Three.
In quiet Caer Dahlben, the sheltered farm of the great enchanter Dahlben, orphaned Taran tends the oracular pig, Hen Wen, and helps out in the fields and the smithy.
But what he really longs for is to be a hero. Glory and grandeur fill his dreams—he’s sure he could do noble deeds, given the chance.
So when the war bands of the terrible dark lord Arawn threaten Caer Dahlben, causing Hen Wen to run off in a panic, Taran doesn’t think twice. He dashes off after her, plunging himself into perilous adventure.
Continue Reading…
monday may 21
Newbery Medallist Lloyd Alexander, often credited as the father of children’s fantasy, passed away Friday morning at the age of 83 after a long illness.
Alexander began his groundbreaking Chronicles of Prydain series in 1964 with the publication of The Book of Three. The five-volume series details the adventures of Taran, who is awarded the honor of Assistant Pig Keeper, but dreams of being a hero. The series, loosely based on Welsh mythology, follows Taran’s coming of age. The first two books form the basis of the Disney animated film, The Black Cauldron. The concluding book of the series, The High King, was award the Newbery Medal in 1969.
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friday may 11
“The In-Between World of Vikram Lall” is a fictional story of an East Indian living in Kenya during the days of the Mau Mau revolution. The narrative begins with Vic living exiled in Canada because of a bounty on his head. He recounts his once idyllic childhood in Africa where he, his sister Deepa and his friends Njoroge (an African), Annie, and Bill (English expatriates) play without discrimination until a tragedy rends them apart.
As Vic comes into adulthood a new Kenya emerges, but the heartbreak of the past reflects upon the decisions of the adult Vic and turns him into one of the most corrupt men of the country.
Writer
M.G. Vassanji writes a beautiful, picturesque tale of life in Africa.
‘The In-Between World’ explores the relations between whites, blacks, and Asians, what nationality means for those who are native born but not of the same skin, and the impact of colonialism.
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thursday may 10
An update for those of us who were not able to attend: the annual James Beard Foundation Awards Gala was held in New York City this past week. Think, 'Academy Awards for the restaurant industry'. The menu for this event is enough to send any foodophile straight into Nirvana; my favorites being the Peekytoe Crab Cappuccino with Lemon Verbena, followed by a taste of Chocolate Diablo Panna Cotta with Amarena Cherries and Cocoa Nibs. To quote Dave Barry, I am not making this up. My imagination simply cannot stretch that far.
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monday april 09
On March 27 it was announced that
Haruki Murakami won the
Kiriyama Prize for his latest book,
Blind Willow, Sleeping Woman. "
Blind Willow" is a collection of short stories that have appeared in various magazines over the last 20 years.
The Kiriyama Award was established in 1996 as a way to recognize books about the Pacific Rim and South Asia with the purpose of creating an understanding of the peoples and cultures of that region. The award honors both Fiction and Non Fiction books. Greg Mortenson won for his autobiographical book Three Cups of Tea, which tells about his building a school in a small Pakistani town.
Other Finalists include:
friday april 06
As a browser of fiction bookshelves, I have often been intrigued by the works of Cormac McCarthy and have felt I really should know more about him. Or her. Who is this author, anyway? As it turns out, he is one of those "I'll let my work speak for me" kinds of authors who actively shuns the spotlight. Until now, anyway. On March 28, Oprah announced the selection of The Road, McCarthy's most recent novel, for her book club. And a brighter spotlight than that would be tough to find.
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If you’re a Grey’s Anatomy fan like me, you know all about Meredith Grey, McDreamy, McSteamy, and the rest of the surgical staff at Seattle Grace Hospital. But you might not know about a heart-pounding book called Complications: A Surgeon’s Notes on an Imperfect Science by Atul Gawande.
In this collection of essays--a National Book Award finalist—Gawande candidly admits that doctors make mistakes because medicine is a human endeavor, and humans make mistakes. We follow Gawande making his rounds as a surgical resident at a Boston hospital: fumbling a central line or an emergency tracheostomy; missing a deadly aortic aneurysm. His own missteps and those of others illustrate his central theme--that medicine is not a perfect science but one full of uncertainty, guesswork, intuition, and oftentimes, mystery.
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thursday march 29
If you talk to a group of young adults in Cincinnati for any length of time, someone is sure to come out with some sort of grand plan for getting out of here. Usually they talk about moving to some very cosmopolitan place like New York, San Francisco, or even Seattle. This isn't just one conversation, ever since the most recent census there have been articles in Citybeat and the Enquirer bemoaning the situation. Even I, though I'm mostly quite happy to live here, sometimes wonder "How would my life be different if I lived in New York?"
A partial answer was just provided to me by Lucky by Gabrielle Bell. Lucky is a collection of the three minicomics plus a special bonus section. Lucky Number #3, one of the included titles, won an Ignatz award in 2004. This graphic novel details the everyday life of Bell including her struggles to find a job and acceptable housing. It's made me grateful to live in Cincinnati, if only for the large cheap building that I call home.
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tuesday march 27
No “Irish History Month” would be complete without a tribute to the Easter Rising, the 1916 rebellion against Great Britain that failed, but sparked the astonishing victory of the War of Independence (1919-1921). William Butler Yeats, a contemporary, was the first writer to make great literature of the story. His poem “Easter, 1916” commemorates the 16 rebel leaders whose executions roused the country to revolution:
MacDonagh and MacBride
And Connolly and Pearse
Now and in time to be,
Wherever green is worn,
Are changed, changed utterly:
A terrible beauty is born.
Among recent literary accounts are two superb novels by award-winning writers: Jamie O'Neill’s At Swim, Two Boys (2001) and Roddy Doyle’s A Star Called Henry (1999), which follows the story through the revolution and the subsequent civil war. The approaches of these native Dubliners couldn’t be less similar.
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thursday march 15
I’ll be after the wearin’ o’ the green in this space during March, which makes a fine Irish History Month. It’s not just the St. Patrick’s Day that’s in it; rain and spring air recall the Emerald Isle, so fertile that the Sassenach (English, or “Saxons”) kept it “the most distressful country that ever yet was seen.” Bad as it could be to have a thriving neighbor, it was even worse for Protestant England to have Catholic harbors next door from which other Papist countries could (and did) try to launch invasions.
“They are going, going, going, and we cannot bid them stay.” My ancestors came to America over the past 300 years of increasing crisis in the homeland. The most fortunate ones were 18th-century refugees from the anti-Catholic penal laws. The Meade family and Stephen Moylan (first president of The Friendly Sons of Saint Patrick) fought alongside George Washington. Thomas Riley, one of the “wild geese” who found work as mercenaries, arrived in Lafayette’s Irish regiment to whack the Sassenach over here.
At the other extreme were my Toohey great-great-grandparents, who disembarked dead in New Orleans from a "coffin ship" during the Famine of the mid-19th century. In True History of the Kelly Gang, a Man Booker Prize-winning novel about the Australian outlaw Ned Kelly, Peter Carey makes a beautiful immigrant song out of the lives of the luckless exiles, especially in a passage that intones the names of convict ships like Homer’s catalogue of ships in the Iliad.
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saturday march 10
“One hundred nations descend upon us. The armies of all Asia. Funneled into this narrow corridor, their numbers count for nothing. They shatter with each advance.”
300, the film based on Frank Miller’s graphic novel about the 480 B.C. Battle of Thermopylae (“hot gates”), opened this week here and across the country. Typically for Miller, whose talents and concepts are equally extreme, the movie has drawn praise for its power, but also diatribes against its historical and (perceived) political content, as well as Miller’s trademark violence.
The book is certainly a fine example of Miller’s potent, “artful” storytelling, and the story itself can’t be told often enough. Stationing themselves in a narrow mountain pass, 300 Spartans faced certain death to hold the gigantic army of the Persian Empire at bay, enabling the Greek city-states to marshal their forces and eventually rebuff the invaders.
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wednesday march 07
When you wonder how in the world Peter O’Toole missed winning an Academy Award for Lawrence of Arabia and then discover he lost to Gregory Peck in To Kill a Mockingbird, the famous gaps in Oscar honors seem less shocking. But – Rocky beating Taxi Driver? Best Picture and Best Director? Actually, Martin Scorsese wasn’t even nominated for directing Taxi Driver.
Oscar history is so full of surprises that it was painful to watch the aged O’Toole sitting among mere mortals at this year’s ceremony, hoping to end a record series of losses: seven fruitless nominations at the start of the evening, eight by the end. Fortunately, he had received an honorary award in 2002.
I saw the nearly four-hour Lawrence of Arabia four times during its initial run in 1963, when I was 13. Before I try to explain myself, some cover from Roger Ebert: “I've noticed that when people remember Lawrence of Arabia, they don't talk about the details of the plot. They get a certain look in their eye, as if they are remembering the whole experience, and have never quite been able to put it into words.”
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friday february 23
The Horror Writers Association has announced that Thomas Harris will receive the Lifetime Achievement Award at the Bram Stoker Awards Banquet at the end of March during the annual HWA Conference that will be held in conjunction with the 2007 World Horror Convention in Toronto.
Harris hasn't written a lot of books, but his fiction is very finely crafted and creepy. He is, of course, recognized for his perfectly written saga of Hannibal Lecter, the compelling psychopath from Red Dragon, Silence of the Lambs, and Hannibal.
The latest and final installment, Hannibal Rising, is actually the first installment, starting with Hannibal as a young boy in Eastern Europe during World War II. It offers the reasons for Hannibal becoming the way he is.
Harris wrote the screenplay for the movie at the same time as the novel. Hannibal Rising is available in audio as well as print, and as a digital audio book for download from the Ohio eBook Project.
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tuesday february 06
The Sundance Film Festival closed in Park City, Utah, on January 28, releasing onto the market a great many fine independent movies, to judge by the number that won at least one award. The festival, produced by Robert Redford’s Sundance Institute, screens 125 dramatic and documentary feature films and more than 70 short films each year.
The Grand Jury Prize winners were the documentary Manda Balla (“Send a Bullet”), the first feature film directed by Jason Kohn, and the drama Padre Nuestro (“Our Father”), a Spanish-language film by first-time writer/director – and Fort Wright, Ky. native – Christopher Zalla.
Padre Nuestro follows the struggles of a Mexican boy to reach New York City and find the father he has never met, bearing as sole proof of his identity a locket and letter from his deceased mother. Manda Balla is a portrait of contemporary Brazil, focusing on its diversity, socioeconomic extremes, and a growing culture of violence and corruption.
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thursday february 01
The Mystery Writers of America recently announced their 2007 Edgar Award nominees. There are twelve categories, including Best Novel and Best Fact Crime. This year, Stephen King will receive the Grand Master Award (past recipients include Mary Higgins Clark and P.D. James). I was happy to see many of my favorite mysteries from the past year receiving nominations, including Gillian Flynn's Sharp Objects, a novel that I recently blogged about, which received a nomination for Best First Novel By An American Author. Some of my other favorite nominees:
- A Field of Darkness by Cornelia Read--Syracuse journalist Maddie Dare delves into a 20-year-old unsolved double murder in which her cousin is the prime suspect.
- The King of Lies by John Hart--In rural North Carolina, criminal defense attorney Work Pickens struggles first with his father's disappearance and then, a year later, with the discovery of his murdered body.
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wednesday january 31
For a first novel, this little book made it big—the author of Fields of Glory, Jean Rouaud, went from selling newspapers to being the 1990 winner of the most prestigious French literary prize, the Prix Goncourt.
I read the book in its English translation by Ralph Manheim in 1992, and it’s one of the books that have stayed with me over many years. It’s tiny (only about 150 pages) and gently effortless to read, but it’s indelible.
The unnamed narrator, one of the grandchildren of a family in a little Loire Valley town pays tribute to his eccentric elders—his grandparents and his Great-Aunt Marie—whose lives were long ago altered by the Great War.
At first, the humorous stories of their oddities charm and amuse. There’s Aunt Marie’s card catalog of saints and their specialized responsibilities, Grandmother’s martyrdom to Grandfather’s notoriously dangerous driving, and so on. But gradually the stories become more poignant.
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wednesday december 27
Ghosts and spooky happenings have always been interesting topics for books and stories.
Edgar Award winner Phillip DePoy has created a well-written fiction series about a folklorist named Fever Devlin who returns to his Appalachian roots and whose investigations delve in just short of the paranormal: The Devil's Hearth (2003), The Witch's Grave (2004), and the recent well-received A Minister's Ghost (2006).
Cree Black, Daniel Hecht's fictional paranormal investigator, explores haunted houses and weird happenings in City of Masks (2003), also available as a digital audio book; the series continues with Land of Echoes(2004) and Bones of the Barbary Coast (2006).
Another good ghost story is Jodi Picoult's Second Glance; it is one of those stories with characters and time playing tricks on the reader.
Some other books with a paranormal story line are the International Horror Guild's award winning Fogheart by Thomas Tessier, John Passarella's Kindred Spirit, and Charlie Price's Dead Connection.
tuesday december 12
Gene Luen Yang’s American Born Chinese has made history as the first graphic novel nominated for a National Book Award. Although it didn’t win, the book joins Art Spiegelman’s Pulitzer Prize-winning Maus as a graphic novel honored by a major awards organization outside the comics industry.
Yang’s art is charming and beautifully full-colored by Lark Pien. The book’s multi-thread narrative relates three clever, absorbing tales: the adventures of the legendary Monkey King, the struggles of a Chinese-American boy to fit in at school, and the trials of a European-American boy shamed by his visiting Chinese cousin, who is a study in racist clichés.
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wednesday november 29
One of my favorite parts of my job is talking to people about what they’re reading. Watching people light up when they tell me about something really, really good, and listening to their voices become urgent when they tell me “you’ve just got to try this”—I find that absolutely irresistible.
And of course, if it’s something I’ve read, we get to do that “isn’t he an amazing writer” and “wasn’t it wonderful when” and even “ooh, if you liked that, you have to read.”
I love writing for this blog, because of course I get to do the “you’ve just got to.” (You can probably tell from some of my much-too-long entries how enthused I can get.)
But it’s not one-way. It just occurred to me that everything I have out on my card right now and everything I currently have on hold was recommended to me personally by a library user or another librarian.
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thursday november 16
Robert Sabuda, the premier paper engineer pop-up artist around, is coming to Cincinnati!
We have exciting plans for this Saturday, Nov. 18: A Pop-Up Party with Robert Sabuda from 1-3 in the Main Library Atrium. It will be fabulous fun: a talk with slides from Mr. Sabuda, pop-up crafts for everyone, exhibits of his work throughout the library, and opportunities to get Robert Sabuda's real live signature in your copies of his books (available at the Friends Shop)!
Every book by Robert Sabuda is a glorious work of art. My favorite, Winter's Tale, is a gorgeous white and sparkly depiction of winter, from the first pop-up of a soaring pure white owl to the last twinkly forest clearing.
I have written before about the appeal of pop-up books. Remember: definitely NOT just for kids!
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thursday november 02
Elmer Kelton has won prize after prize from Western writers’ associations and regional literature competitions. Fans of Westerns will recognize his name, but readers of all kinds of historical fiction should give his work a try.
His marvelous historical novels of the American West are written with deliberate simplicity, but there’s a lot of art in that unadorned, pared-down prose. The novels give a vivid picture of life on both sides of the frontier between Native American culture and the westward settlement push.
Slaughter follows a ragtag group of whites as they scratch a dwindling living hunting the last of the buffalo south through Texas. They know their way of life is dying out with the herds. A disbelieving and finally desperate clan of Commanches watches them arrive—the destruction of the buffalo means the wholesale destruction of the Commanche way of life, too. Tragedy is inevitable.
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wednesday october 25
The winners of the Ignatz Awards – named for Krazy Kat’s nemesis mouse in the George Herriman strip – were announced on October 14 at the 2006 Small Press Expo in Baltimore. The mission of the annual event is “the exhibition of independent comic books and the discovery of new creative talent.” A panel of five cartoonists sets the ballot, and the attendees at SPX decide the winners.
Some of the Ignatz honorees will be familiar as winners or nominees from the Eisner and Harvey Awards given earlier this year (see my post about the Harvey Awards). It’s been a very good year for Alex Robinson, Andy Runton, and especially Charles Burns, whose legendary Black Hole collected all three prizes for best collection/graphic album.
Outstanding Anthology or Collection
Black Hole by Charles Burns
Castle Waiting by Linda Medley
Drawn and Quarterly Showcase #3
The Push Man and Other Stories by Yoshihiro Tatsumi
Squirrel Mother by Megan Kelso
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monday october 23
There are some books I return to over and over. Kate Wilhelm’s Welcome Chaos is one of them—I reread it this weekend, and it pulled me in again, though it’s hard to define why it’s so appealing to me.
It’s a hard book to blog, too, since the plot involves a secret. Do I tell you the secret to convince you to pick up the book? The book jacket does, though the author doesn’t for several chapters.
Let me start by saying that the novel was written when the major threat to world survival was the superpowers’ arms race. That makes it seem almost innocent, dated by our knowledge of all the other dangers that threaten our peace and our planet.
But in ways that makes it even more powerful, as it’s a thoughtful novel about civilized people deciding how far to go, balancing the lives of millions to save the world.
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monday october 16
On October 10, the
Man Booker Prize for Fiction was awarded to the Indian-born writer, Kiran Desai, for her memorable second novel,
The Inheritance of Loss. Described by the Chair of the judges as “a magnificent novel of humane breadth and wisdom, comic tenderness and powerful political acuteness,”
The Inheritance of Loss explores issues of cultural identity and displacement through the tribulations of a small community in the Indian foothills of the Himalayas and an illegal alien in Manhattan.
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friday october 13
The 2006 Nobel Prize in Literature was awarded to Orhan Pamuk, Turkey’s leading novelist and its best-known writer internationally. Pamuk’s approach to fiction is highly literary and postmodern, whether the setting is contemporary Istanbul, as in The Black Book and The New Life, or historical, in intrigues of the Ottoman Empire: My Name Is Red and The White Castle.
Literary suspense and murder mystery forms are employed in Pamuk’s explorations of metaphysical connections among characters, and to engage themes of loss, identity, and the influence of memory on the traditions of art and storytelling. These dense, sophisticated, philosophical novels reflect the enigma inherent in Istanbul's situation, history, and culture: the uneasy tension between East and West.
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wednesday september 13
For a crisp, fast-moving mystery with appealing characters and snappy dialogue, you can’t beat Don Winslow’s 1991 debut, A Cool Breeze on the Underground. It got an Edgar nomination for best first crime novel.
Neal Carey, an investigator for a very discreet New England firm called Friends of the Family, was brought into the business at age eleven, when he tried to pick the pocket of New York-Irish p.i. Joe Graham. Graham took Neal under his wing, trained him in investigative techniques, and arranged for the firm to get him an expensive education. Now Neal just wants to finish his degree in English lit (specializing in Smollett), but the firm has a job for him. The daughter of Vice-Presidential hopeful John Chase is missing. Not that Chase really cares, but he needs her for the photo ops.
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tuesday september 12
The 2006 winners of the Harvey Awards were announced Saturday during the Baltimore Comic-Con. Named for Harvey Kurtzman, who is best known for founding, writing, and illustrating MAD magazine, the Harveys have great prestige as the only awards voted exclusively by comic book professionals.
Here’s a list of the nominees, with winners in boldface. Congratulations to Carol Tyler, Cincinnati resident and Library program participant, whose Late Bloomer was nominated in the category Best Graphic Album – Previously Published Material.
Best Graphic Album - Original
Combat Zone by Karl Zinsmeister (Marvel Comics)
The Lone and Level Sands by A. David Lewis (Caption Box) – on order
Night Fisher by R. Kikuo Johnson (Fantagraphics Books) – on order
Tricked by Alex Robinson (Top Shelf)
Wimbledon Green by Seth (Drawn & Quarterly)
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tuesday august 29
The RITA (Romance Is Treasured Always) Awards were presented at the 26th Annual Romance Writers of America National Conference in Atlanta on July 29. Although they tend to be overshadowed by other more “literary” awards, the RITAs are a big deal in romance publishing circles.
This year’s winners include:
- Romantic Suspense: Survivor in Death by J.D. Robb
- Inspirational Romance: Heavens to Betsy by Beth Pattillo
- Short Historical Romance: The Texan’s Reward by Jodi Thomas
- Contemporary Single Title: Lakeside Cottage (Susan Wiggs)
- Novel with Strong Romantic Elements: Lady Luck’s Map of Vegas by Barbara Samuel
- Long Historical Romance: The Devil to Pay by Liz Carlyle (this book is on order—keep your eye on the catalog, it should show up shortly)
- Paranormal Romance: Gabriel’s Ghost by Linnea Sinclair (this one is also on order)
You’ll find the complete list of winners on the Romance Writers of America website.
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The Great World is a war novel without battle scenes and a POW novel with only a few chapters set in a prison, but quietly and obliquely it conveys the devastation of war through the story of two men drawn into reluctant lifelong friendship by their shared experiences in Malayan and Thai POW camps during World War II.
Digger Keen, a quiet, steady man with an eidetic memory, lives in the house he grew up in in a backwater Australian town. Apart from the war, he has hardly ever left, and for twenty-six years he has kept in his memory the roll call of his fellow soldiers and their fates that he memorized during his years in the prison camp.
Visiting him now and then (more frequently as the years pass) is Vic Curran, who had a hard-luck childhood but has become wealthy in the years since the war. He fastened onto Digger’s close group of buddies in the service and ended up in the prison camp with him.
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thursday august 24
The Man Booker Prize for Fiction is the U.K.'s top literary prize, and according to a recent article in the London Times, "arguably the world’s top premier literary prize." The longlist for this year's prize was recently announced, and consists of 19 novels. It will be whittled down to a shortlist in mid-September, and the winner will be revealed on October 10th. Past winners of the Booker which have become favorites on this side of the Atlantic include Life of Pi, The God of Small Things, and The Remains of the Day.
I have discovered many gems on previous longlists for the Booker- authors and novels I would have otherwise never known of or been inspired to read. Since the Booker is not an American prize, the novels are not always immediately available in the States. The library owns a number of the books on this year's longlist, and others are probably not far behind. Those in the library's collection include:
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wednesday july 12
I was in the eighth grade in 1968 when I first read Frank Herbert's novel Dune (1965). I told everyone I knew that it was the best book I had ever read, and probably the best book ever written; I am not ashamed to admit that I uttered those words again as recently as last week.
This fabulous Science Fiction story won the Hugo Award and the Nebula Award. It is an ecological cautionary story about dependence on energy and political control, about ecological change and disaster, about people's need for leadership and the temptations of corruption, and mostly about one remarkable man: Paul Atreides, whose fate it is to become Maud'Dib, the leader of millions.
Dino de Laurentis made a truly terrible movie based on the book; the SciFi Channel made a better mini-series adaptation in 2001.
Fremen...Bene Gesserit...House Harkonnen...sand worms...Spacing Guild...planets Arrakis, Geidi Prime, and Caladan. Come join us in the universe of Dune.
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friday july 07
Recently I fell under the spell of an audiobook: Jonathan Strange & Mr. Norrell by Susanna Clarke. I found it browsing, and am still not entirely sure how I missed hearing about it when the book came out. Reviewers have compared Clarke's novel to Jane Austen and "Harry Potter for Adults" but after hearing it myself I'm not sure an easy comparison exists for this book.
The title magicians, Johnathan Strange and Mr. Norrell, are both given unique strong personalities by narrator Simon Preble. The book explores the "sorcerer's apprentice" style relationship between Norrell and Strange while touching on English history, magical history, and the manners of the 19th century. With a plot that unfurls gradually, this title might not be paced for those who demand page-a-minute action. The characters and landscape, however, are so well drawn that it's well worth a listen anyway.
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wednesday june 21
In Newark, NJ, at their annual conference this past weekend the Horror Writers Association announced the best in Horror Writing for 2005. The members voted on a long ballot of worthy award recipients competing for the Bram Stoker Award in such categories as Novel, Short Story, Anthology, and Poetry. Yes, Horror Poetry.
There was a tie for Best Novel this year. Creepers by David Morrell and Dread in the Beast by Charlee Jacob. Creepers follows a group of urban explorers into a huge abandoned hotel built in 1901 where OF COURSE they find more than old furniture and bats. Creepy.
I am sorely disappointed that I did not get to be there this year to see one of my favorite authors, Peter Straub, receive the Lifetime Achievement Award.
Peter Straub has been writing exceptional horror fiction since 1976's Julia. His latest books, In The Night Room and Lost Boy Lost Girl, are exemplary novels, fascinating in their twisted representation of reality and unbelievable word craftsmanship. You might recognize his name from his partnerships with Steven King (Black House, etc).
Congratulations to all of the award winners!
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tuesday june 13
The winner of the 2006 International IMPAC Dublin Literary Award is The Master, by Colm Toibin.
And we nominated it!
Libraries around the world are invited to submit up to three titles to be considered for this award, which is the biggest-money literary prize (100,000 euro) given to honor a single work of fiction. And out of the 132 nominees sent in from 43 countries, the book that our library nominated (well, our library and 16 others worldwide) was the winner.
Toibin's superb character study of the classic novelist Henry James got this comment from the judges:
"In The Master, Colm Tóibín captures the exquisite anguish of a man who circulated in the grand parlours and palazzos of Europe, who was astonishingly alive and vibrant in his art, and yet whose attempts at intimacy inevitably failed him and those he tried to love. It is a powerful account of the hazards of putting the life of the mind before affairs of the heart."
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friday june 02