Friday Finds (1.6.12)

 Hosted by Hosted by MizB at Should Be Reading

 What great books did you hear about/discover this past week? Share with us your FRIDAY FINDS!

 

All is Song by Samantha Harvey (UK) January 5 

Interest in reading: I enjoyed her first novel The Wilderness**** 2009, about Alzheimers. Orange Prize Shortlist, Booker Prize Longlist, Guardian First Book Award Shortlist, Betty Trask Prize.

Book Description:

"Set against the backdrop of growing national unrest, tabloid frenzies and an escalating fuel crisis, "All Is Song" is a novel about filial and moral duty, and about the choice of questioning above conforming. It is a work of remarkable perception, intensity and resonance from one of Britain's most promising young writers."
 

 

The Orphan Master's Son by Adam Johnson (US)  Jan 10

Interest in reading: Set in North Korea, that's enough for me.

Book description:

"Part breathless thriller, part story of innocence lost, part story of romantic love, The Orphan Master’s Son is also a riveting portrait of a world heretofore hidden from view: a North Korea rife with hunger, corruption, and casual cruelty but also camaraderie, stolen moments of beauty, and love. A towering literary achievement, The Orphan Master’s Son ushers Adam Johnson into the small group of today’s greatest writers."

Let's hope they're even half right.

The Angel Makers by Jessica Gregson  Dec.6 2011

Interest in Reading: Husband and his family are from Hungary. He recognized the name of the town the story is set in when I mentioned it to him. It's based on historical events and is one of a kind (one hopes).

Book Description:

"When the men of a remote Hungarian village go off to war in 1916, the women left behind realize their lives are much better without them. Suddenly, they are not being beaten; they have time for friendships; they even find romance with the injured Italian soldiers staying just outside of town.
For Sari, an intelligent girl who's always been an outcast (her fellow villagers suspect her of being a witch because of her medical knowledge), it's the first time in her life she's had friends. When the men return at war's end, the freedom Sari and the others have enjoyed is suddenly snatched from them, and they realize they need to do whatever it takes to hold onto it. Sari puts her medical knowledge to use to off her husband. Then she helps one of her friends. And another. When the word spreads, she realizes her problems are only beginning. This creeping and hugely readable first novel is based on a true story."

"In truth, between 45 and 300 people were intentionally poisoned in Nagyrév, Hungary, over 15 years during and after WWI. Gregson's version of events is horrifically plausible and psychologically astute, and Sari makes a surprisingly sympathetic narrator." --Mari Malcolm

Friday Finds

Hosted by MizB at Should Be Reading

What great books did you hear about / discover this past week? Share with us your FRIDAY FINDS!

I look forward to reading this literary mystery:

The Broken Teaglass by Emily Arsenault
Hardcover: 384 pages
Dell Publishing (September 29, 2009)
ISBN - 10:0553807331
ISBN - 13:9780553807332

Product description:

The dusty files of a venerable dictionary publisher . . . a hidden cache of coded clues . . . a story written by a phantom author . . . an unsolved murder in a gritty urban park–all collide memorably in Emily Arsenault’s magnificent debut, at once a teasing literary puzzle, an ingenious suspense novel, and an exploration of definitions: of words, of who we are, and of the stories we choose to define us. In the maze of cubicles at Samuelson Company, editors toil away in silence, studying the English language, poring over new expressions and freshly coined words–all in preparation for the next new edition of the Samuelson Dictionary. Among them is editorial assistant Billy Webb, just out of college, struggling to stay awake and appear competent. But there are a few distractions. His intriguing coworker Mona Minot may or may not be flirting with him. And he’s starting to sense something suspicious going on beneath this company’s academic facade. Mona has just made a startling discovery: a trove of puzzling citations, all taken from the same book,The Broken Teaglass. Billy and Mona soon learn that no such book exists. And the quotations from it are far too long, twisting, and bizarre for any dictionary. They read like a confessional, coyly hinting at a hidden identity, a secret liaison, a crime. As Billy and Mona ransack the office files, a chilling story begins to emerge: a story about a lonely young woman, a long-unsolved mystery, a moment of shattering violence. And as they piece together its fragments, the puzzle begins to take on bigger personal meaning for both of them, compelling them to redefine their notions of themselves and each other. Charged with wit and intelligence, set against a sweetly cautious love story,The Broken Teaglass is a tale that will delight lovers of words, lovers of mysteries, and fans of smart, funny, brilliantly inventive fiction.

About the Author

Emily Arsenault has worked as a lexicographer, an English teacher, a children's librarian, and a Peace Corps volunteer. She wrote The Broken Teaglass while living in rural South Africa, to pass the long, quiet evenings in her mud brick house. She now lives in Shelburne Falls, Massachusetts, with her husband.

Friday Finds

Hosted by MizB at Should Be Reading




A Time To Dance A Time To Die by John Waller

Hardcover: 267 pages
Publisher: Icon Books (January 2008)
ISBN-10: 1848310218
ISBN-13: 978-1848310216

Product description

"In July 1518 a terrifying and mysterious plague struck the medieval city of Strasbourg. Hundreds of men and women danced wildly, day after day, in the punishing summer heat. Their feet blistered and bled, and their limbs ached with fatigue, but they simply could not stop. By the time the epidemic subsided, heat and exhaustion had claimed an untold number of lives, leaving thousands bewildered and bereaved, and an enduring enigma for future generations. This book explains why Strasbourg's dancing plague took place. In doing so it leads us into a largely vanished world, evoking the sights, sounds, aromas, diseases and hardships, the fervent super naturalism and the desperate hedonism of the late medieval world. Not only a fascinating historical detective story, "A Time to Dance, A Time to Die" is also an exploration into the strangest capabilities of the human mind and the extremes to which fear and irrationality can lead us."

About the Author

John Waller is an historian of medicine at Michigan State University. Educated at the universities of Oxford and London, he is the author of several other books, including The Real Oliver Twist (Icon, 2005), The Discovery of the Germ (Icon, 2002) and Fabulous Science (OUP, 2002). He lives with his wife and daughter in Michigan.

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I just know I'll be in the mood one day to read something other than my usual literary fiction and this should be fascinating.

Is this something you'd read? If you have please let us now what you think. What did you find in the way of interesting books this week?

Today's other Post: Haiku

Friday Finds

Hosted by MizB at Should Be Reading.

This week's finds:

Remember the first book? I thought I'd found a copy cat cover until I saw the author's name. It's her new novel.

Gourmet Rhapsody by Muriel Barbery

Paperback 160 Pages
Europa Editions (Aug. 25, 2009)
ISBN 10:1933372958
ISBN 13:9781933372952

From the Publisher:

"In the posh building made famous in The Elegance of the Hedgehog, the greatest food critic in the world is dying. Revered by some and reviled by many, Monsieur Pierre Arthens has been lording it over the world's most esteemed chefs for years, passing judgment on their creations, deciding their fates with a stroke of his pen, destroying and building reputations on a whim. But now, during these his final hours, his mind has turned to simpler things. He is desperately searching for that singular flavor, that sublime something once sampled, never forgotten, the Flavor par excellence.
Gourmet Rhapsody is a charming voyage that traces the career of Monsieur Arthens from childhood to maturity across a celebration of all manner of culinary delights. Alternating with the voice of the supercilious Arthens is a chorus belonging to his acquaintances and familiars-relatives, lovers, a would-be protégé, even a cat. Each will have his or her say about Monsieur Arthens, a man who has inspired only extreme emotions in people."

Muriel Barbery was born in 1969 in Casablanca . She studied philosophy at the Ecole Normale Superieure and worked for many years as a philosophy teacher in France . Her New York Times bestselling novel The Elegance of the Hedgehog (Europa Editions 2008) has been published in over twenty languages. Barbery now lives in Japan and is working on a third novel.

I enjoyed The Elegance of the Hedgehog and I'm looking forward to reading this one too.

____________________________

Lacuna by Barbara Kingsolver

Hardcover 528 pages

Harper Collins Canada (November 3, 2009)

ISBN 10:1554684757

ISBN 13:9781554684755

From the Publisher:

"Born in the United States, reared in a series of provisional households in Mexico, Harrison Shepherd is mostly a liability to his social-climbing flapper mother, Salomé. From a coastal island jungle to the unpaved neighborhoods of 1930s Mexico City, through a disastrous stint at a military school in Virginia and back again, his fortunes never steady as Salomé finds her rich men-friends always on the losing side of the Mexican Revolution. Sometimes she gives her son cigarettes instead of supper.

Life is whatever he learns from servants putting him to work in the kitchen, errands he runs in the streets, and one fateful day, by mixing plaster for famed Mexican muralist Diego Rivera. Making himself useful in the household of Rivera, his wife Frida Kahlo and exiled Bolshevik leader Lev Trotsky, young Shepherd inadvertently casts his lot with art and revolution, and the howling gossip and reportage that dictate public opinion.

A violent upheaval sends him north to a nation newly caught up in the internationalist good will of World War II. In the mountain city of Asheville, North Carolina, he remakes himself in America's hopeful image. Under the watch of his peerless stenographer, Violet Brown, he finds an extraordinary use for his talents of observation. But political winds continue to throw him between north and south, in a plot that turns many times on the unspeakable breach-the lacuna-between truth and public presumption.

This is a gripping story of identity, connection with our past, and the power of words to create or devastate, unfolding at a moment when the entire world seemed bent on reinventing itself at any cost."

Sounds like an exciting and intriguing story.

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The Museum of Innocence by Orhan Pamuk

Hardcover 560 pages

Knopf (October 20, 2009)

ISBN-10: 0307266761

ISBN-13: 978-0307266767

From the Publisher:

"A sweeping, emotionally charged novel of the nature of romantic attachment and the strange allure of collecting- this is Orhan Pamuk’s greatest achievement. It is Istanbul in 1975. Kemal is a rich and engaged man when he by chance encounters a long-lost relation, Fusun, a young shopgirl whose beauty stirs all the passion denied him in a society where sex outside marriage is taboo. Fusun ends their liaison when she learns of Kemal’s engagement. But Kemal cannot forget her: for nine years he tries to change her mind, meanwhile stealing from her an odd assortment of personal items, which he collects and cherishes- a “museum of innocence” that he puts on display to tell the heartbreaking story of a love that shaped a life."

This is Orhan Pamuk's first novel since being awarded the Nobel Prize in 2006. I have read Snow and enjoyed it very much. And I've recently acquired a copy of My Name is Red, which won the 2003 IMPAC Dublin Literary Award. I hope to enjoy The Museum of Innocence soon.

What did you find that's got you excited about reading?

Friday Finds

Friday Finds is here.

Tinkers by Paul Harding (Jan.1, 2009)

"Tinkers is truly remarkable...It confers on the reader the best privilege fiction can afford, the illusion of ghostly proximity to other human souls." Marilynne Robinson, Pulitzer Prize-winning author of Home, Gilead, and Housekeeping.

That's good enough for me.

The Lieutenant by Kate Grenville (Feb.5, 2009)

I have read The Secret River***** and The Idea of Perfection****, both award winning novels by this Australian writer. One of my favourites. This is her new book.

All Other Nights by Dara Horn (Apr.2, 2009)

"A gripping epic about the great moral struggles of the Civil War.How is tonight different from all other nights? For Jacob Rappaport, a Jewish soldier in the Union army, it is a question his commanders have answered for him: on Passover in 1862 he is ordered to murder his own uncle, who is plotting to assassinate President Lincoln.
After that night, will Jacob ever speak for himself? The answer comes when his commanders send him on another mission this time not to murder a spy but to marry one."

What are you looking forward to reading?

Friday Finds

Friday Finds is hosted by MizB at Should Be Reading.

What great books did you hear about, or add to your TBR list this week?




The Cradle by Patrick Somerville

Fiction (found at Bermudaonion's Weblog)

The Suicide Collectors by Oppegaard

Fiction, (found at Oklahoma Booklady)










The City of Dreaming Books by Walter Moers

Fiction, (found at Oklahoma Booklady)








A Mad Desire to Dance by Elie Wiesel

Feb. 17, 2009 from Knopf