Book of the Week #52

Living Oprah: My One-Year Experiment to Walk the Walk of the Queen of Talk by Robyn Okrant (New York : Center Street, 2010.)

"I was very curious...as Oprah frequently urges her viewers and readers to “Live Your Best Life,” I wondered what would happen if one of us committed ourselves whole-heartedly to her lifestyle suggestions. Would the financial and time costs of living as Oprah prescribes be worth the results?"

I read this book this past summer and loved it. I am a fan of books about experiments people undertake to improve their lives (Julie & Julia is one of my all time favorite books), but they don't usually have a connection to NH so I don't get to write about them on this blog.

Robyn Okrant spent a year following all the advice Oprah gave out each day for a year and tells us all about it in this book. The window that presented into the life that Oprah promises, and the analysis of how that ideal of life relates to the reality of a Chicago artist/yoga teacher (who grew up in NH!) makes for a really interesting book. If the impending new year has inspired you to take on an overhaul of your life you might want to read this book as a cautionary tale. Even if such plans are not on your horizon, this book is worth reading.

Book of the Week #51

Journal of a Flatlander: Poems by Don Kimball (Georgetown, KY: Finishing Line Press, 2009)

Don Kimball was one of the poets featured in our National Poetry Month Celebration a few years ago and is the leader of the monthly open mic poetry night at Gibsons.
This chapbook was in my original cataloging pile this week and is a lovely collection of Don Kimball's work. I especially liked the poem "Overbooked" -- I have the same trouble.

Overbooked
Often I find that where I take a book
out of my bookcase -- Plato, Proust, Plotinus
some epic I ought to read -- another tome
leans in to take its place. My bookish pride
gets pushed aside by other books I've bought;
still sprouting Post-its, like disheveled hair,
books do what books are bound to do, they claim
their dusty lairs. And while my appetite
for buying more provokes my wife, books plot
on either side, prepare to slap a lien
on the vacant spot, until I shove
into place a new-bought book; those daunting stacks
I sought to read -- now, age-old hardbound bores --
still hang around, displaced, on couch or floor,
demand I read or tote them out the door.

Poem reprinted here with the permission of the poet.

Book of the Week #50

Baby by Joseph Monninger (Asheville, NC: Front Street, 2007)

Joseph Monninger has published eleven novels and three non-fiction books and lives in New Hampshire. This young adult novel was awarded the 2008 award for best children’s literature from the Peace Corps Writers. It was also chosen as a top ten book by YALSA, a division of the American Library Association.

"The girl's first-person voice, the backdrop, and the details work together well to set this story apart from the many in which troubled teens find solace in animals." —Booklist

"The prose style is spare, evoking the harsh winter landscape." —Kirkus Reviews

Baby is a teenager in trouble, and her last chance is a foster home with a couple whose idea of fun is dog sledding. Still, it beats going to the juvenile detention center. Over time, Baby comes to love the dogs and takes naturally to sledding, but when her old boyfriend, Bobby, shows up, she can't stop herself from running off with him, accidentally taking a puppy along. In no time at all, life with Bobby goes bad and Baby has to make some hard decisions about what she's going to do.

Book of the Week #49

Live Free or Die: A Granite State Mystery by Jessie Crockett (Mainly Murder Press, 2010)

Jessie Crockett is a nearly life-long resident of NH and has set her novel in the fictional village of Windslow Falls, NH.

"The way she sees it, volunteer fire chief Gwen Fifield’s life is about as good as can be. Sure, she’s gained twenty pounds and her property taxes increased just in time for Christmas. But, her basement didn’t flood with the fall rains for the first time in years and the general store has started delivering pizza. Yup, by Winslow Falls, NH standards it’s pretty darn good. That is, until an arsonist lets loose in the village and Gwen finds a body sizzled like a sausage in the smoldering remains of the local museum." (Publisher's blurb)

The book-of-the-week is selected each week from the various books that cross my desk (some literally, others virtually) This one popped up in an email this morning. Laura Lucy at White Birch Books sent this to her email list today:

"If you want to have a little fun tonight - we've got just the thing. Our Mystery Book Club is having their holiday party at the store and they'll be discussing Live Free or Die by Jessie Crockett. The book was a perfect fit because it is set in New Hampshire and it has a holiday theme. Well, 'tis the season for serendipity! I got a call from the author earlier in the week and she had heard we were discussing her book and wondered if she could come. I said, that would be awesome.
To recap - a traditionally fun night has just become "funner." If you've ever been interested in the Mystery Book Club, curious about it, or just want to come say hi and meet some new people - come on down tonight at 6! We'll see you there."

Book of the Week #48

The Journey that Saved Curious George: The True Wartime Escape of Margret and H. A. Rey by Louise Borden; illustrated by Allan Drummond (Boston: Houghton Mifflin, 2005)


The New Hampshire Humanities Council has awarded a major grant to The Margret and H.A. Rey Center in Waterville Valley for The Wartime Escape: Margret and H.A. Rey's Journey from France. The project, which includes and exhibit and several programs, begins with a visit from author Louise Borden on Saturday, December 18, 2010 at 7 pm at the Rey Center.

"The legendary tale about the Reys' 1940 flight from Paris on bicycles just before the Nazis stormed the City of Light comes into clear focus here, thanks to Borden's diligent research and lucid writing. Reproductions of Hans Rey's diary entries, letters from publishers and photos many taken by Margret lend the book authenticity and immediacy. Drummond's watercolors add a spirited splash of color to the handsomely designed paper-over-board volume. His illustrations display a whimsy and energy appealingly reminiscent of the Reys' art, while still uniquely his own; the artist also effectively conveys the somber side of this extraordinary story. ... A stirring, uplifting and elegantly packaged saga." (from a review in Publisher's Weekly)

Book of the Week #47

Lie After Lie: The True Story of a Master of Deception, Betrayal, and Murder by Lara Bricker (NY: Berkley Books, 2010)

This just released book by New Hampshire author Lara Bricker is the fascinating story of the unravelling of the mysterious death of Julie Keown.

"Julie Keown had a great job, financial security, and a perfect husband who was attending Harvard Business School. But after Julie suddenly died, and doctors discovered she's been poisoned with the main ingredient in antifreeze, her parents began to suspect that her husband, James, was not so perfect. This blow-by-blow account shows how investigators and state police unraveled James Keown's chilling web of deceit." (Publisher's materials)

On Monday, November 29, 2010 Lara will be at River Run Bookstore at 7pm along with Jon Bailey, the lead investigator in the case.

Book of the Week #46

From the Box Marked Some Are Missing: New & Selected Poems by Charles W. Pratt (Brookline, NH: Hobblebush Books, 2010)

This volume, by Charles Pratt a longtime resident of Brentwood, New Hampshire, is the inaugural volume in the Granite State Poetry Series.

"This rich collection of new, selected, and previously uncollected poems delights the intellect as well as the senses. Pratt is a sneaky formalist catching the reader up in his narrative and then brightening the page with the most unobtrusive, often slyly slant, rhymes that tickle the ear with their gratifying rightness. This book deserves a wide readership." -- Maxine Kumin (from the back of the book)

Charles Pratt will be reading from his work, along with Becky Sakellariou (her book, Earth Listening, is the second title in this series) at Toadstool Bookshop, Peterborough on Saturday 11/20/2010 at beginning at 2pm. They will also be at Water Street Bookstore on Tuesday, 11/23/2010 at 7pm.

Book of the Week #45

Extreme New England Weather by Josh Judge (SciArt Media, 2010)

WMUR meteorologist Josh Judge was recently interviewed on WRKO Radio about his new book Extreme Weather.

"New England Weather contains 212 pages (24 in stunning full-color!) and over 350 images from Maine, New Hampshire, Vermont, Massachusetts, Rhode Island and Connecticut. Told in images and stories from both celebrities and ordinary people, this book hits with impact, imparts knowledge and delights with humor. For his second book, Josh’s distinctive voice is joined by featured contributions by his colleagues from Storm Watch 9, a flurry of other meteorologists and weather scientists and others from every state in New England. It also includes Josh's Judge-ment for The Top Ten Weather Myths and how to keep your family safe in eXtreme New England Weather! Also, a previously unreleased interview with the late Don Kent, interviewed by NH author Eric Pinder." (from publisher's blurb)

Reading & signing events for this book will be held at several local bookstores this month:

• Saturday, 11/13/2010, 2pm at Barnes & Noble, Portsmouth
• Sunday, 11/14/2010, 2pm at the Toadstool Bookshop, Milford
• Saturday, 11/20/2010, 2pm at Borders, Concord
• Sunday, 11/21/2010, 2pm at Barnes & Noble, Nashua

Book of the Week #44

Palazzo Inverso by D. B. Johnson (Houghton Mifflin Books for Children, 2010).

This book was part of the Rapid Reviews: 30 Books in 30 Minutes program at the New Hampshire Library Association meeting this week. I had seen this book before -- it is very cool -- and was happy to be reminded of it just as I was looking for the 200th book-of-the-week to write about.

Author D. B. Johnson is a Granite State resident and the illustrator of Bear's Picture by Daniel Pinkwater, a past Ladybug Picture Book Award nominee.

"With the enigmatic work of M.C. Escher as his inspiration, Johnson puts brush to paper to imagine a startling world that changes on every page. A grand Palazzo is under construction, and young Mauk, restricted to sharpening the Master's pencils, has mischievously shifted the building drawings. As a result, carpenters now stand on their heads, painters hang from the ceiling, and fountains spray down instead of up. With everything in disarray, Mauk races through the now-distorted Palazzo with the Master in close pursuit. Viewers can track his adventure through the running text at page bottom, which, with the help of an arrow, directs them, at the final page, to turn the book around. The story then continues with, of course, an appropriate shift in perspective, and readers soon find themselves back at the beginning-or are they at the end? Children will delight in discovering Mauk in a variety of places and poses and will be intrigued with the inverted architectural details that Johnson supplies. With the help of brown-and-white multishaded drawings, the illustrator provides a never-ending loop of clever optical trickery." (School Library Journal review)

Book of the Week #43

Live Free or Undead by Diverse Hands and edited by Rick Broussard (Concord, NH: Plaidswede, 2010)




From the press release:

"An anthology of short fiction in a horror vein written by local authors and set in the familiar locations of New Hampshire will appear in bookstores just in time for Halloween. “Live Free or Undead: Dark Tales from the Granite State” is being released by Plaidswede Publishing of Concord and should be available across the state by Oct. 14. The book presents 20 spine-tingling tales, some by first-time writers and some by such well-known New Hampshire authors as Rebecca Rule, Brendan Dubois, David Elliott and Hugo Award winner James Patrick Kelly. The book cover is illustrated by Dover artist Marc Sutherland and the whole project was edited by New Hampshire Magazine Editor Rick Broussard."

Last Friday night I attended a reading for this book --as part of the Concord Literary Festival-- where many of the contributing authors were in attendance and read to us from their story. Becky Rule and James Patrick Kelly both read their entire stories, everyone else left the audience at a cliffhanger. Luckily the books were available for sale at the event so I didn't have to wait long to find out what happened in the various stories.



If you weren't able to be there Friday, you have several more opportunities coming up to hear the stories read by the various authors:

• Double Midnight Comics, Manchester, is planning a double dose of zombie fun as the creators behind the hit comic anthology Zombiebomb join some of the creators behind the new NH short story anthology Live Free or Undead to sign their books!
  
• A horror-fiction reading event at Rye Public Library, Wednesday October 27th, 2010 at 7 pm
  Selections from the new collection Live Free or Undead with guest authors Brendan DuBois, Michael DeLuca, Elaine Isaak, and Andy Richmond.
  
• On Saturday, October 30, 2010 at 11am Toadstool Books, Peterborough will host a reading from this brand new collection of spooky tales edited by Rick Broussard and featuring a story from local author Seth Blake and stories from Joyce Wagner, Kristopher Seavey, & Lorrie Lee O'Neill who will be there to read and sign.
  
• At 7pm on Saturday, October 30, 2010 Toadstool Books, Milford will host Lorrie Lee O'Neill, David Elliott, David O'Keefe & Gregory L. Norris reading their contributions to Live Free or Undead.

Book of the Week #42

The Sibley Guide to Trees written and illustrated by David Sibley (NY: Alfred A. Knopf, 2009)


Did you ever see a tree and wonder what kind of tree it was? David Allen Sibley -- who has written lots of books to answer the question "what kind of bird it that?" -- has written this book to help you identify trees.


This book is filled with more than 4,100 beautiful color drawings of the leaves, and the flowers, the bark, etc. so you can examine a specimin and compare it to the picture. It also sorts trees into their taxonomies with all related species grouped together and provides maps to show where various trees will be found.


As part of the Concord Literary Festival, David Sibley will be at Gibson's on Saturday. October 23, 201o at 3pm to discuss and sign his work.

Book of the Week #41

We Are All Welcome Here by Elizabeth Berg (Random House, 2006)

"Against the backdrop of the civil rights movement, this novel features a thirteen year old girl living in poverty in Tupelo, Mississippi in the early sixties. Her mother, a single parent, is severely handicapped by the polio she contracted when she was nine months pregnant with her daughter, and she relies
heavily on the assistance of an African-American caregiver named Peacie, with whom her daughter has a love-hate relationship. A lot of issues are looked at in this book, including the notion of what freedom really is, and whether or not it is fair for a child to be intimately involved in caring for a parent so mightily compromised." (summary from author's website)

This title was chosen by Nashua Public Library for their 2010 One City, One Book project. On Sunday, October 17, 2010 the library will present Beyond the Book: An Afternoon with Elizabeth Berg. On Thursday, October 14, 2010 at 7 pm the Nashua Public Library will host a discussion of the novel in the NPL Theater.

Here are the details on Elizabeth Berg's visit:
Thanks to support from the Friends of the Library and TD Charitable Foundation, author Elizabeth Berg will be on hand to talk about We Are All Welcome Here and answer your ques­tions. Toadstool books will bring copies of Elizabeth’s books for sale and signing. Before the presentation, a private wine and cheese recep­tion with the author will be held in the Dion Center Board Room. Bring your book group, and enter our drawing for a bag of up to 12 copies of next year's Nashua Reads book! Other door prizes will also be awarded. Tickets are $5, or $25 for entry to both the private reception and presentation. Avail­able at the Nashua Public Library circula­tion desk, or print this form and mail in your order. Sunday, October 17, 2010 at Rivier College, Dion Center, 16 Clement Street, Nashua, N.H. Private reception: 1 pm; Public presentation: 2 pm.

Book of the Week #40

Year of Wonders: A Novel of the Plague by Geraldine Brooks (NY: Viking, 2001)

"I used to love this season. The wood stacked by the door, the tang of its sap still speaking of forest. The hay made, all golden in the low afternoon light. The rumble of the apples tumbling into the cellar bins. Smells and sights and sounds that said this year it would be all right: there'd be food and warmth for the babies by the time the snows came. I used to love to walk in the apple orchard at this time of the year, to feel the soft give underfoot when I trod on a fallen fruit. Thick, sweet scents of rotting apple and wet wood. This year, the hay stooks are few and the woodpile scant, and neither matters much to me." (p. 3)

This gripping historical novel is based on the true story of Eyam, the “Plague Village,” tucked in the rugged mountain spine of England. In 1666, when an infected bolt of cloth carries plague from London to the isolated settlement of shepherds and lead miners, a housemaid named Anna Frith emerges as an unlikely heroine and healer. Through Anna’s eyes the reader follows the story of the plague year, as her fellow villagers make an extraordinary choice: convinced by a visionary young minister they elect to quarantine themselves within the village boundaries to arrest the spread of the disease. As the death toll rises and people turn from prayers and herbal cures to sorcery and murderous witch-hunting, Anna must confront the deaths of family, the disintegration of her community, and the lure of illicit love.

Year of Wonders was a New Hampshire nominee for the 2003 IMPAC Dublin Literary Award. On Saurday, October 9, 2010 Geraldine Brooks will be visiting our state as she will receive the 2010 Sarah Josepha Hale Award at the Newport Opera House at 8pm.

Book of the Week #39

Turn and Jump: How Time and Place Fell Apart by Howard Mansfield (Camden, Maine: Down East, 2010)

"Before Thomas Edison, light and fire were thought to be one and the same. Turns out, they were separate things altogether. This book takes a similar relationship, that of time and place, and shows how they, too, were once
inseparable. Time keeping was once a local affair, when small towns set their own pace according to the rising and setting of the sun. Then, in 1883, the expanding railroads necessitated the creation of Standard Time zones, and communities became linked by a universal time. Here Howard Mansfield explores how our sudden interconnectedness, both physically, as through the railroad, and through inventions like the telegraph, changed our concept of time and place forever."

Howard Mansfield, a NH resident, will be doing readings around the state this fall including one on Wednesday, 9/29/10 at River Run and on October 7, 2010 at Gibson's.

Book of the Week #38

Born to be Giants: How Baby Dinosaurs Grew to Rule the World by Lita Judge (NY: Roaring Brook, 2010)

Lita Judge, author and illustrator, lives in Peterborough, New Hampshire. Her books have been chosen as Junior Library Guild selections, ALA Notable Books, Smithsonian Notable Books for Children, and have been nominated for various state book awards. Born to Be Giants fills the author's lifelong dream to investigate paleontologists' understanding of baby dinosaurs and their parents.

This book will be featured by the Center for the Book at the New Hampshire table in the Pavillion of the States at the National Book Festival in Washington, D.C. this Saturday.

Book of the Week #37

Tinkers by Paul Harding (New York: Bellevue Literary Press, 2009)

Tinkers, a first novel from a small and unheralded press, beat the odds to win the Pulitzer Prize for Fiction. It was also nominated by the NH Dublin Committee for the 2011 IMPAC Dublin Literary Award.

This week the author, Paul Harding, will be at Gibson's on Thursday, Sept. 16, 2010 at 7 PM. He'll be reading, signing, and taking questions from the audience.

"An old man lies dying. Confined to bed in his living room, he sees the walls around him begin to collapse, the windows come loose from their sashes, and the ceiling plaster fall off in great chunks, showering him with a lifetime of debris: newspaper clippings, old photographs, wool jackets, rusty tools, and the mangled brass works of ntique clocks. Soon, the clouds from the sky above plummet down on top of him, followed by the stars, till the black night covers him like a shroud. He is hallucinating, in death throes from cancer and kidney failure. A methodical repairer of clocks, he is now finally released from the usual constraints of time and memory to rejoin his father, an epileptic, itinerant peddler, whom he had lost 7 decades before. In his return to the wonder and pain of his impoverished childhood in the backwoods of Maine, he recovers a natural world that is at once indifferent to man and inseparable from him, menacing and awe inspiring. Tinkers is about the legacy of consciousness and the porousness of identity from one generation the next. At once heartbreaking and life affirming, it is an elegiac meditation on love, loss, and the fierce beauty of nature." (publisher's description)

Book of the Week #36

Roads Less Traveled: Visionary New England Lives by John Walters (Concord, NH: Plaidswede Publishing, 2009)

In the course of his work as a writer and radio personality, John Walters has interviewed some of the most extraordinary people in New Hampshire and Vermont. For Roads Less Traveled he has written profiles unconstrained by the the time or word counts imposed by radio shows and magazine articles. As Walters explains in his introduction, "The people I write about are visionaries--not necessarily in the sense of a believer or prophet (although some of them are), but in the simpler sense of having a vision and pursuing it. I am inspired by their example."

John Walters is a writer, editor and radio journalist. He was the creator and host of The Front Porch, an award-winning interview show on New Hampshire Public Radio. He is a former resident of Elkins, N.H., and now lives in East Montpelier, Vt. He is the managing editor of The Bridge, a weekly newspaper, and is the 2009 winner of the Donald M. Murray Outstanding Journalism Award presented by the New Hampshire Writers’ Project.

John Walters has readings scheduled at several local bookstores:

• Tuesday, September 14, 2010 at Water Street Bookstore at 7pm


• Wednesday, September 15, 2010 at 7pm at White Birch Books


• Wednesday, September 22, 20100 at 4:30pm at the Village Book Store

Book of the Week #35

July and August: A Novel by Nancy Clark (NY: Pantheon Books, 2008)

It seems to me that an upcoming long weekend requires a really good book to read. I think this one should fit the bill nicely. Nancy Clark lives in Wilton, NH and began the saga of the Hill family with The Hills at Home. This novel makes a trilogy and is recently available in paperback.

"This is a funny, bittersweet, wonderfully peopled family saga of beginnings and endings, couplings and uncouplings, of new friendships and old alliances. Great-aunt Lily’s gracious pile of a house in Towne, Massachusetts, is the gathering place for her far-flung Yankee clan of grandnieces and grandnephews--all in town for the months of July and August--and with their arrival comes a high summer of comedy and drama. Brooks and Rollins, the uncommonly successful software entrepreneur brothers, turn the heads of the locals with their supermodel dates. Lily herself has made an unexpected success of a new business venture. Sally, the youngest of the clan, is having the time of her life with Cam, a charismatic Towne kid; between them they prove that in some corners of the world, children can still go out to play gloriously unsupervised and come home safely. Cousin Julie announces her wedding to a man no one has met, whose delayed arrival gives rise to a mystery. And in the single developing sorrow, the family faces the possibility of a final leave-taking by the once fiery Aunt Ginger, who continues to dish up crucial life wisdom (whether it’s sought or not) while reclining on a lawn chair in the sun.As July and August unfurls, the cousins scheme and new romances and confidences bloom. Even Aunt Lily, who presides over it all with her hard-won equanimity, has secrets to divulge before the season is done. Throughout, Nancy Clark gives us a beautiful exploration of the ways that a family evolves over time--and the ways in which it remains the same--in this rich summer story of love lost and found." (Publisher's material)

Book of the Week #34

The Jon Daniels Story with his Letters and Papers, edited with an introduction by William J. Schneider (NY: Seabury Press, 1967)

On August 20, 1965, Jonathan Daniels, a seminary student and volunteer civil rights worker who had grown up in Keene, NH, was shot to death in broad daylight by a white deputy sheriff in Hayneville, Alabama. This volume was compiled after Daniels' death by his friend William J. Schneider, an Episcopal Chaplain at Harvard and Radcliff. It includes a brief biographical sketch of Jonathan Daniels as well as his collected letters and papers. If you are interested in further reading about Jonathan Daniels you might also consider Outside Agitator: Jon Daniels and the Civil Rights Movement in Alabama by Charles W. Eagles (University of North Carolina Press, 1993) and American Martyr: The John Daniels Story, edited by William J. Schneider (Morehouse Publishers, 1992)

Jonathan Daniels is the subject of a play by local playwright Lowell Williams, Six Nights in the Black Belt which opens tonight (8/26/10) at the Amato Center in Milford, NH and runs through 8/29/10. Performances are at 8pm on Thursday, Friday and Saturday and at 2pm on Saturday and Sunday. There will be formal talk backs after the Saturday matinee and Saturday evening shows. The show is being presented by M&M Productions and tickets are $15.

Book of the Week #33

The T206 Collection: The Players and Their Stories, 100th Anniversary Commemorative Edition by Tom Zappala, Ellen Zappala, with Lou Blasi (Portsmouth, NH: Peter E. Randall Publisher, 2010)

"The T206 Collection: The Players & Their Stories is a tribute
to the men featured in the greatest baseball card collection that has ever existed. This book is for baseball fans, hobbyists, and history buffs. The brief biographical narratives along with the personal and professional statistics of each player offer you a peek into the developing world of baseball during the early part of the 20th century. The stories of the amazing array of T206 players from all walks of life with dramatically different skill levels will give you a real sense of how our national pastime was shaped by the events and players of that era. The last chapter discusses the value and grading system of this storied collection and brings the reader full circle. You will learn how a card like Kitty Bransfield’s with the Sweet Caporal back is graded and valued. In addition, elsewhere in the book, you will learn about the “Bransfield Curse” and what it meant to Pittsburgh Pirates fans. This commemorative edition celebrates the 100th anniversary of the very special T206 collection. Along with the 38 Hall of Famers that make up this set, there are another 353 players who contributed to the evolution of the great game of baseball." (from publisher's
materials)

The authors will be at events in New Hampshire in the next few months -- including this weekend.

• Saturday, August 21, 2010 - Tom and Ellen will be signing copies of The T206 Collection - The Players & Their Stories at The Well Read Book Store in Plaistow from 11am to 2pm
• Saturday, November 13, 2010 signing at Barnes & Noble, Nashua from 2 to 4 pm.