Book of the Week #47

Think Like a Dinosaur and Other Stories by James Patrick Kelly (Golden Gryphon Press, 1997)

Another book by James Patrick Kelly recently received the NH Literary Award for Outstanding Book of Fiction. At the award reception I asked Mr. Kelly which of his books was his favorite and he identified this one, the title story of which won the Hugo Award, as a sentimental favorite.

"Standing in Line with Mister Jimmy" (c1991) is also in this collection and is a variation on the theme of "Live Free or Die." It also presents a bizarre vision of the future where people wander around wearing earbuds that feed music and chatter into their brains.

Book of the Week #46

Louisa May Alcott: The Woman Behind Little Women by Harriet Reisen (NY: Henry Holt and Co., 2009)

Harriet Reisen will be at Gibson's Bookstore in Concord, NH on Thursday, November 19 at 7pm. Ms. Reisen will be joined by Nancy Porter, the director of the American Masters film on PBS based on the book. This will be a "cannot miss" evening for all lovers of Louisa May Alcott.

Kirkus Reviews described this book as

"A deliciously palatable biography of the iconic writer whose life was “as full of plot and character as any [she] invented.” Inspired by research from her documentary of Alcott (1832–1888) for the PBS series American Masters, Reisen delivers an in-depth portrait of the spirited, sentimental, imaginative,
realistic woman whose childhood vow was to “be rich, famous, and happy.” Reisen draws extensively from Alcott’s prodigious output of literary works, travel sketches, articles, journals and letters, as well as the recollections of her contemporaries. Born to bohemian intellectuals, the young Alcott grew into a moody, passionate girl much like her famous character, Jo March. Her parents kept the company of transcendental luminaries like Emerson, Thoreau, Fuller and Hawthorne, but experienced material poverty. The utopian nightmare of her father’s experiment in communal living, her youngest sister’s death and her older sister’s engagement became defining events in Alcott’s life, leaving her determined to shoulder family financial and household burdens. Under the pseudonym A. M. Barnard, Alcott churned out pulp-fiction thrillers, generating income and sating her thirst for adventure. She followed the phenomenal success of Little Women in 1868 with six other popular children’s novels, but was tormented by a culture of celebrity and ill health until her death. Reisen deftly weaves the story of Alcott’s life into the rich social, cultural and historical fabric of mid-19th-century New England. The author’s insightful examination reveals Alcott as a compulsive writer who peppered her stories with external details and internal currents of her life; an ardent abolitionist who served as a Civil War army nurse; a self-espoused spinster who cherished her independence but harbored a schoolgirl romantic attachment to Thoreau and a midlife crush on a young Polish pianist; a thoroughly modern feminist who wrote about the power struggle between the sexes and championed women’s suffrage; and a middle-aged woman who relied on opiates to cope with her failing health. An absorbing portrait of the protean author whose “life was no children’s book.”

Book of the Week #45

The Weight of the Ice: The Northeast Ice Storm of 2008 by Dave Eisenstadter (Keene, NH: Surry Cottage Books, 2009)

On December 11, 2008 an ice storm hit New England and left 1.3 million households without electricity, many for weeks. This book, by Keene resident and Monadnock Ledger-Transcript reporter Dave Eisenstadter, brings together images and stories of that historic storm.

This Saturday, November 14, 2009 Mr. Eisenstadter will be talking about his book at Toadstool Bookshops. He will be in Keene at 11am and in Peterborough at 2pm.

Book of the Week #44

Pennies for Elephants by Lita Judge (New York : Disney/Hyperion Books, 2009)

This book by Peterborough author Lita Judge was chosen to receive the 2009 NH Literary Award for Outstanding Work of Children’s Literature.

"As she did in One Thousand Tracings, Judge weaves a compelling tale based on a true, heartwarming incident...Warm sepia tones lend atmosphere, too, and splashes of bright red, blue, purple and yellow in the children’s outfits echo their sunny, can-do demeanor." Publishers Weekly, 6/22/09

Book of the Week #43

Following the Water: A Hydromancer’s Notebook by David M. Carroll (Houghton Mifflin Harcourt, 2009)

It has been an eventful month for writer, naturalist, and artist David M. Carroll, a resident of Warner, NH. This book, according to the jacket copy, is "the intensely observed chronicle of Caroll's annual March-to-November wetlands immersion." It is also a 2009 finalist for the National Book Award. Mr. Carroll was also selected as the 2009 recipient of the New Hampshire Literary Award's Lifetime Achievement Award. This past summer Mr. Carroll was interviewed by Yankee Magazine.

"At the earliest openings of the ice in the overwintering niches of the spotted turtles, as minute glimmers of quickening water appear in acres of wetlands still locked in ice and snow, I forsake my winter paths: the worn floor
by the kitchen table and fireplace; the even more worn threshold of the narrow doorway to the Oriental-carpeted passage down the back hall, the narrow gallery hung with paintings and drawings above agreeably overburdened bookcases, lined along the floor with stacks of more books and empty frames; the footwarn stair treads up to my studio workrooms, with their slender passageways among bookcases, drawing and writing tables, and shelves, all impossibly piled with papers, notebooks, pencils, pens, and paintbrushes. With the opening up of the earth and water I go beyond my few, close-to-home outer trails of the cold season: my way to the woodshed, as trodden as an ancient deer path, and my modest snowshoe circlings through the back filed and bordering woods. At thaw I begin to walk a wider way again, beyond house and gardens, in places every bit as home to me as those." (p. 1)