Quantcast

Paradise Drive by Rebecca Foust

April 2, 2015 by

Source: Press 53
Paperback, 114 pgs
I am an Amazon Affiliate

Paradise Drive by Rebecca Foust, selected as the 2015 winner of the Press 53 Award for Poetry, is a collection of contemporary sonnets in which a pilgrim tackles the challenges of the modern world, including debt, divorce, addiction, and more.  Sonnets are one of the more challenging forms of poetry because of their rhythms and rhyme schemes, but Foust is never shy in her word choice nor the selection of each poem’s topic.  Her pilgrim is like Dante in the Divine Comedy, who searches for truth, beauty, and love, but unlike him, those concepts can manifest in very different ways.  In Foust’s modern version, the Pilgrim comes from a place of instability in which her father “smelled like failure because/he could not pay the bills.” (“The Prime Mover,” pg. 15)

From the seven deadly sins overheard at a party to party etiquette, the shallowness of Pilgrim’s cloud is seen through judgmental eyes, even as the Pilgrim seeks solace in the bathroom with the newspaper.  She buries her head in the sand to avoid the realities of the world around her — the lack of depth and mindfulness — and she’s paralyzed with fear and inaction.  The juxtaposition between her upbringing with the new life of high-end parties, among the elite with their own yachts and mansions, is stark.

From “Wrath, Talking about ‘The Change'” (page 10)

‘Menopause is a bitch and, trust me, not
one in heat. Black cohosh and primrose,
soy, and those compounded creams
you rub on your belly. Yuck, and none of it
works–I still hot-flash like a neon sign
in a full grand mal fir, I still rail

From “Indentured” (page 14)

Pilgrim’s own teeth, like her parents’, are soft
as chalk and will not bleach quite white.
She recalls how her father used to swoop
into the room, vanting to suck her blood,
his bridge boiling Polident blue in a cup

The search for more begins as a slow burn as Pilgrim recognizes the folly of the high-end Fifth Avenue “subway coat” and the use of the Escalade to drive the kids to sports.  There is the danger that she will fall in love with that life and all that it offers, even if it is shallow and unfulfilling.  With references to Hamlet and other classics, Foust has created a ripe mixture of classic and contemporary poetry within a classic form, which readers can and will spend hours ruminating over.  The urgent need to undergo a pilgrimage is tempered by Pilgrim’s awareness that the journey will take an emotional, spiritual, and moral toll.  In spite of those challenges, she sets off.

Paradise Drive by Rebecca Foust is a masterful work about the search for meaning in meaninglessness and the search for fulfillment in a world abound with distractions and shallowness.  Foust is a rare talent and her sonnets are masterful, but modern and fresh.

About the Poet:

Rebecca Foust‘s book Dark Card, won the 2007 Robert Phillips Poetry Chapbook and was released by Texas Review Press in June 2008, and a full length manuscript was a finalist in Poetrys 2007 Emily Dickinson First Book Award. Her recent poetry won two 2007 Pushcart nominations and appears or is forthcoming in Atlanta Review, Margie, North American Review, Nimrod, Spoon River Poetry Review, and others.  She also is the new Poetry Editor for Women’s Voices for Change, which will feature a different woman poet (over the age of 40) each week in its “Poetry Sunday” column.

Check out this interview with Rebecca in SFWeekly.  Here’s another review.  For your viewing enjoyment, Foust reads “the fire is falling.”

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Filed Under: ARC, challenges, Events, national poetry month, New Authors Challenge, poetry, Poetry Reading Challenge, Read in 2015, reviews Tagged With: , , ,

A Peculiar Connection by Jan Hahn

March 30, 2015 by

Source: Meryton Press
Ebook
I am an Amazon Affiliate

A Peculiar Connection by Jan Hahn is a Pride & Prejudice variation that will have readers guessing until the very end, biting their nails as they hope for a happy ending for Mr. Darcy and Elizabeth Bennet.  Lady Catherine de Bourgh shows up on the Bennet doorstep with an ominous warning, that a union between Darcy and Elizabeth would be “a sin against Heaven itself!”  Lizzy’s world is shattered, but she’s unaware how shattered it will become as she’s thrown into Darcy’s path repeatedly and his determination refuses to let what Lady Catherine exposes be reality.  Is he on a fool’s errand to uncover a family secret long buried or is his resolve just what Elizabeth needs to keep hope alive?

“Circumstances can shatter expectations as easily as dropping a china cup upon a slate floor splinters its beauty into misshapen shards of pottery.”

The playful banter between them continues in Hahn’s book, as Lizzy and Darcy try to maintain propriety and adjust to their new reality.  And despite the challenges they face, both are determined to meet the challenge head on, though in different ways.  Lizzy is hopeful that she can learn to accept the revelations of Lady Catherine, while Darcy is determined to disprove them.  Hahn utilizes some of Austen’s iconic characters in new ways and weaves in new characters into a seamless narrative.

“‘You are clever enough.  I believe you will select a name for me.’

‘I suppose there is always “Fitz” or “Fitzy.”‘ I cut my eyes at him to see how he responded to my mockery.

‘I call my cousin “Fitz,” and no one shall ever call me “Fitzy.” I forbid it.'”

A Peculiar Connection by Jan Hahn will take readers on a journey into the illustrious past of Pemberley, through the country and city, and even on a sea voyage to Ireland.  Hahn has done a beautiful job demonstrating the tensions a secret of this magnitude would create between Darcy and Elizabeth, who have only recently become aware of their romantic feelings for one another and begun to hope.  She dashes those hopes quickly, but takes them on a realistic journey that tests their faith in love, romance, and themselves.  It is one of the best variations I’ve read in a long time.

Jan Hahn headshotAbout the Author:

After leaving a long career in the world of business, Jan Hahn began writing stories based on Jane Austen’s Pride and Prejudice in 2002. Her first novel, An Arranged Marriage, was published in 2011 by Meryton Press and won Best Indie Novel from Austen Prose that year. Her second novel, The Journey, was selected by Austen Prose as one of the Top Five Austen Inspired Historical Novels of 2012, and it won the Favorite Pride and Prejudice Variation/Alternate Path award from Austenesque. In 2014, Austen Prose listed Ms. Hahn’s third novel, The Secret Betrothal, among the Best Austenesque Historical Novels. She is a member of JASNA and lives in Texas. Visit her Facebook, her Blog, Meryton Press, and on Goodreads.

APCBlogTourBanner

 

 

 

 

 

Filed Under: ARC, challenges, fiction, New Authors Challenge, Read in 2015, reviews Tagged With: , ,

Dorothy Must Die by Danielle Paige

March 26, 2015 by

Source: Public Library
Hardcover, 452 pgs
I am an Amazon Affiliate

Dorothy Must Die by Danielle Paige is a twisted rendition of The Wizard of Oz, with a lot of references to the classic movie of the same name starring Judy Garland.  Paige has brought Amy Gumm to Oz the same way that Dorothy arrived, but unlike the happy ending in the story Amy knows, Oz has found itself sapped by Dorothy’s lust for magic.  Given that this is book one in a young adult trilogy, readers can expect that despite the title, obstacles are greater than they first appear and the story will drag on.  However, Paige keeps too much information close to the vest, leaving the main protagonist and the reader too much in the dark.  With the pacing bogging down in parts for extra long training sessions and discussions about things that don’t advance the plot or characterization much, readers may find their mind wandering and wishing Amy would just get on with her mission from the Revolutionary Order of the Wicked.

“I first discovered I was trash three days before my ninth birthday — one year after my father lost his job and moved to Secaucus to live with a woman named Crystal and four years before my mother had the car accident, started taking pills, and began exclusively wearing bedroom slippers instead of normal shoes.” (page 1)

Amy is a young woman with image issues and someone who has spent too much of her young life being an adult when her mother wallowed in her self-pity.  When she arrives in Oz she may seem tough to the munchkins and others, but on the inside she’s unsure of just about everything.  Consistent reminders not to trust anyone force her to rely on herself and her own instincts, which in some cases prove not to be so good.  This journey story is rife with twisted characters from Oz, magic, and indecision, but it also creates an alternate universe that will leave readers wondering what happens next because this is not the story they remember.

“Relying on a rat to guide me through a magic maze pretty much summed up my last twenty-four hours.  I felt out of control, isolated, and uncertain where I was headed.  I plunged forward regardless.  Sometimes the path was narrow and claustrophobic, the hedges so high I couldn’t even see their tops.  Then I’d turn a corner into a sweeping cobblestone boulevard where the topiary walls were short enough that it seemed like I might be able to dive over them with a running start.”  (page 384)

Dorothy Must Die by Danielle Paige, our March book club selection, was an interesting twist on a story many of us already know, and while the book’s twisting of characters worked better for characters like the Scarecrow than they did for the Lion, Paige has built a believable construct from a world consumed by greed.

About the Author:

Danielle Paige is a graduate of Columbia University and the author of Dorothy Must Die and its digital prequel novellas, No Place Like Oz and The Witch Must Burn. Before turning to young adult literature, she worked in the television industry, where she received a Writers Guild of America Award and was nominated for several Daytime Emmys. She currently lives in New York City.

What the Book Club Thought:

We discussed this one and our February pick, The Immortal Life of Henrietta Lacks, at the same meeting.

Everyone seemed to enjoy Skloot’s book and we had a great discussion about medical ethics and privacy as well as whether we’d want our names to be known if our cells ended up helping cure disease or wipe out the human race.  It was a lively discussion, even with those who did not have a chance to read the book.

Most people liked Dorothy Must Die for the most part, though several said the pacing was off and a couple members mentioned that the best drawn of the characters was the Scarecrow.  Some expressed an interest in reading the second book in the series, but we’ll have to wait until next month’s nomination period to see if that happens.  Otherwise, some will likely read the second book on their own.

Filed Under: borrowed copy, challenges, fiction, Harper Collins, New Authors Challenge, Publishers/Publicists, Read in 2015, reviews, young adult fiction Tagged With: , ,

Ella by Mallory Kasdan, illustrated by Marcos Chin

March 17, 2015 by

Source: Viking
Hardcover, 56 pgs
I am an Amazon Affiliate

Ella by Mallory Kasdan, illustrated by Marcos Chin, is a cute story about a six-year-old girl who lives in a hip hotel and who has a male nanny.  Ella is precocious and smart, but she’s also curious and mischievous.  She’s clearly a handful for her male nanny, and I don’t think that would be any different for any other nanny.  Kasdan packs in a lot of information in short lines and images, with Ella engaged in recycling and using technology on a regular basis, but she also loves to jam and create music.  Chin’s images are alive with character and musicality through his use of color and shape.  The book is visually and verbally engaging, and what’s best is that the words used throughout the book are easy to follow for readers who are just learning words by sight and reading with their parents.

Kasdan’s story may seem a little fanciful, especially as Ella does things that many 6 year olds wouldn’t be able to do or even be allowed to do.  To think that she wouldn’t is false, however, given that children are inquisitive and adventurous, willing to go with the flow and try anything they find interesting.  As long as kids are engaged, they are all about the task at hand and even tasks that are not necessarily for them.

Ella by Mallory Kasdan, illustrated by Marcos Chin, is a fun read for little girls that have big dreams, and I hope that there are more books on the horizon with this quirky, fun, and intelligent little girl.  A lot of what goes on and the characters she meets are more than their appearances convey, and that’s a great lesson for kids to learn.

About the Author:

Mallory Kasdan is the author of ELLA, which will be published by Viking Children’s Books in January of 2015. The grooviest six year old since Eloise ruled The Plaza in the 1950’s, ELLA lives at The Local Hotel with her Manny, her pets and her scooter.  She is artsy, of course.  

Mallory is also a professional voice actor for television and radio, represented by Don Buchwald and Associates.  She writes essays about parenting and has produced arts & culture pieces for public radio. Once upon a time Mallory was a book publicist and accompanied RuPaul on a 5-city book tour. Mallory lives in Brooklyn with her family, not in a hotel and with no room service to speak of.  

About the Illustrator:

Marcos Chin is an illustrator living in Brooklyn. His drawings have appeared inmagazines, book covers, and advertisements in the USA and around the world. Whenever possible he tries to sneak his two dogs, Shalby and Rita, into his drawings. Marcos teaches illustration at the School of Visual Arts in New York. Visit his website.

Filed Under: challenges, children's fiction, New Authors Challenge, Penguin, Publishers/Publicists, Read in 2015, review copy, reviews Tagged With: , , ,

Doll God by Luanne Castle

March 6, 2015 by

Source: Poet Luanne Castle and Poetic Book Tours (my online tour company)
Paperback, 82 pages
I am an Amazon Affiliate

Doll God by Luanne Castle reflects on the passage of time and the impressions we leave behind.  Imagine the dolls you or your sisters or friends had as children and how much they were loved and cared for … imagine the stories that were created for them and the lives they shared.  Now, imagine what has become of those dolls, where are those talismans of hope and joy?  Are they buried in an attic or a closet, were they left behind in a field to become so much detritus?  Is that all they are?

from “Debris” (page 57)

And now, I can’t get the image
out of my mind:
dried paint chipping,
the spread of mold pockmarks,
velour paper edges fraying, canvas rips, a gradual
flaking into sand, then dust sifting down
to be layered over by debris
of another generation
always the shifting sand
like a dust storm

Castle asks these questions and more in her collection, seeking answers to how our pasts are shaping us even now and how those pasts have faded with the passage of time.  From large toddler dolls to doll gods, Castle evokes an adult sensibility within a child-like wonder, and the anxiety that raises up in the verse is tangible, just as the fear of time passing too quickly can hit us when we least expect it.  She causes us to reflect on our triumphs, our past joys and innocence, as well as to let it go into the ether to be rewritten by future generations.

This emotional collection will take a toll on its readers, but the journey will leave them changed in terms of perspective and renewed in that they will want to live more fully and enjoy each moment in the moment.  Reading these poems once will reflect one meaning, but upon subsequent readings, the poems leave readers to ruminate on their own lives.  Doll God by Luanne Castle is multi-layered, with bright spots in the darkness of loss.  Castle has a wide range and more great things are sure to come from this poet.

About the Poet:

Luanne Castle has been a Fellow at the Center for Ideas and Society at the University of California, Riverside. She studied English and Creative Writing at the University of California, Riverside; Western Michigan University; and Stanford University. Her poetry and creative nonfiction have appeared in Barnstorm Journal, Grist, The Antigonish Review, Ducts, TAB, River Teeth, Lunch Ticket, Wisconsin Review, The MacGuffin, and other journals. She contributed to Twice-Told Children’s Tales: The Influence of Childhood Reading on Writers for Adults, edited by Betty Greenway. Luanne divides her time between California and Arizona, where she shares land with a herd of javelina.  Follow her on Twitter.

 

 

 

 

Filed Under: challenges, New Authors Challenge, poetry, Poetry Reading Challenge, Read in 2015, review copy, reviews Tagged With: , ,

The Immortal Life of Henrietta Lacks by Rebecca Skloot (audio)

February 25, 2015 by

Source: Public Library
Audiobook, 12.5 hours
I am an Amazon Affiliate

The Immortal Life of Henrietta Lacks by Rebecca Skloot, narrated by Cassandra Campbell and Bahni Turpin, was our February book club selection.  Henrietta Lacks was a black woman who felt something was wrong, some lump was growing insider her, and that lump she had was eventually diagnosed as a kind of cervical cancer.  Her treatment commenced, but she bore it all on her own, telling very few in her family about it.  She also continued to bear children throughout the process.  Lacks has since become immortal in that her cancerous cells were collected and cultivated by scientists and renamed HeLa.  Those cells were used in the fight against polio and a number of other diseases.  While she was unable to see the fruits of her cells’ labors, she is in a way immortal.

Rebecca Skloot injects herself into this narrative, which becomes part memoir as she recounts her interactions with Lacks’ children, especially Deborah.  Skloot discovered that this family had been bombarded by requests for information long before she decided to write a book about Lacks and her cells, which had made them less than willing to speak to her.  Despite the many set backs and the paranoia that often ruled Deborah’s reactions to her questions, Skloot made headway and even took family members on road trips in ways that brought the true past of their mother back to the family.  In many ways, this is not just a story about Henrietta Lacks, how her cells helped science and cured disease, or about medical ethics, but it also is a story about a family regaining its connections and its past.

The audio production was well done, especially differentiating between Deborah’s thoughts and that of the author, making them easily discernible.  This audiobook also included an interview with the author about her research and her interactions with the Lacks family, as well as her writing process, which was fascinating.  And although the story shifts from the past to the current research, the book’s narrative flows well and is immediately engaging for those with an interest in science, medical research, and the history of HeLa.  But even then, this is a human interest story about how a family struggles to learn about their mother and her cells and what happened in the past.

The Immortal Life of Henrietta Lacks by Rebecca Skloot, narrated by Cassandra Campbell and Bahni Turpin, packs a punch — hitting the heart of medical research and the debate about who cells belong to, what rights patients have to their own cells, whether there should be more restrictions on their use, and whether compensation should be offered to those who donate their cells.

About the Author:

Rebecca Skloot is the author of the #1 New York Times Bestseller, The Immortal Life of Henrietta Lacks. Her award winning science writing has appeared in The New York Times Magazine; O, The Oprah Magazine; Discover; and many other publications. She specializes in narrative science writing and has explored a wide range of topics, including goldfish surgery, tissue ownership rights, race and medicine, food politics, and packs of wild dogs in Manhattan. She has worked as a correspondent for WNYC’s Radiolab and PBS’s Nova ScienceNOW.

Book Club had to be postponed due to a snowstorm, but I cannot wait for the discussion in March!

Filed Under: audiobooks, borrowed copy, challenges, New Authors Challenge, nonfiction, Publishers/Publicists, random house, Read in 2015, reviews Tagged With: , , , , ,

The Trigger by Tim Butcher (audio)

February 19, 2015 by

Source: Public Library
Audiobook, 10 hrs.
I am an Amazon Affiliate

The Trigger: Hunting the Assassin Who Brought the World to War by Tim Butcher, narrated by Gerard Doyle, is a mixture of travelogue and a sort-of-biography of Gavrillo Princip, the man who killed Archduke Franz Ferdinand and set the wheels in motion for World War I.  Princip has been considered a radical in many texts, but Butcher seeks to remedy that image and bring to life a more rounded view of the assassin, who eagerly sought the unification of the Slav people in a single nation of their own.

Butcher travels as Princip had traveled from his days growing up and in school and until he joins a group aimed at creating a unified nation free from foreign rule.  Moving from the feudal frontier village of his birth through the mountains in the northern Balkans to Belgrade and Sarajevo where Ferdinand was murdered.  While the story of Princip is engaging, the constant reflections on Butcher’s life as a war reporter in the 1990s during a more modern war in Bosnia draws parallels while pulling readers out of the story about the assassin.  Butcher meets some well-meaning people on his journey and some have no information about Princip, while others have pre-formed perceptions of the teen.

Doyle does an excellent job narrating and maintains the readers attention with his inflections and enthusiasm for the subject.  Butcher’s reminiscences about growing up in Britain after WWI and reporting on modern war are distracting.  The most interesting parts of the story are obscured by the travelogue for the most part and could have been reduced significantly to ensure the history shines through.  Readers interested in the history of the region and why Princip assassinated Ferdinand would be better served by another account of the man’s actions.  The Trigger: Hunting the Assassin Who Brought the World to War by Tim Butcher, narrated by Gerard Doyle, takes too much time outlining the travels of Butcher and his past, focusing merely one-third on Princip, how he was shaped, and why he assassinated the archduke.

About the Author:

Tim Butcher is a best-selling British author, journalist and broadcaster. Born in 1967, he was on the staff of The Daily Telegraph from 1990 to 2009, covering all major conflicts across the Balkans the Middle East and Africa. Recognised in 2010 with an honorary doctorate for services to journalism and writing, he is based with his family in the South African city of Cape Town.
Filed Under: 2015 War Through the Generations - Read Any War, audiobooks, borrowed copy, challenges, New Authors Challenge, nonfiction, Publishers/Publicists, Read in 2015, reviews Tagged With: , , , ,

Scent of Butterflies by Dora Levy Mossanen

February 17, 2015 by

tlc tour host

Source: TLC Book Tours and Sourcebooks
Paperback, 288 pgs
I am an Amazon Affiliate

Scent of Butterflies by Dora Levy Mossanen is a novel of vengeance as an Iranian Jewish woman, Soraya, convinces her husband, Aziz, to let her go to America on an assignment.  As with many revenge tales, Soraya spends a great deal of time building her trap, complete with sweet nectar, only to find herself ensnared in her own web.  Readers will be holding their breath as she weaves her garden of plants in America, making it lush and beautiful to attract her prey.  She spends most of her days cultivating the land around her and taking photographs of American and Iranian men to make her husband jealous.

“Humans get buried under earthquake rubble, break their bones in tornadoes, drown in stormy seas.  Butterflies, despite their fragility, are hardly affected by most of these natural disasters.  Not only that, they are capable of migrating unimaginable distances.  They simply float with the wind, staying on track with uncanny tenacity until they arrive at their intended destination, just as my friend did.”  (page 50)

Growing up in Iran and enjoying certain freedoms, Soraya is taught to become independent, but once those freedoms are taken away following the revolution, she has little choice but to obey the strict tenants of her religion.  Her Baba has called her an artist since she was a little girl, but like many things in her life, there is an undercurrent of deception.  As she flees Iran and her pain, she tries on new identities before settling back into her own.  Readers will be at once baffled by her actions and heartbroken for her, but will they understand that this passionate woman has lost her entire world when her husband betrays her with another woman?  Sympathy from the reader can be a tough balance in a story of revenge, but Mossanen has created a character bucking the repression of her culture and the tumultuous nature of a country with conflicting identities.

Scent of Butterflies by Dora Levy Mossanen is complex and a lush novel for the senses that will have readers debating how far a woman scorned would go to right a betrayal and how far she would go to retain her freedom.  Very well written and absorbing, readers will be attracted by the decadent honey in Soraya’s web.

About the Author:

Dora Levy Mossanen was born in Israel and moved to Iran when she was nine. At the onset of the Islamic revolution, she and her family moved to the United States. She has a bachelor’s degree in English Literature from the University of California-Los Angeles and a master’s in Professional Writing from the University of Southern California.

Dora is the bestselling author of the acclaimed novels Harem, Courtesan, and The Last Romanov. Her fourth and most provocative book, Scent of Butterflies, was released January 7, 2014. She is a frequent contributor to numerous media outlets including the Huffington Post and the Jewish Journal. She has been featured on KCRW, The Politics of Culture, Voice of Russia, Radio Iran and numerous other radio and television programs. She is the recipient of the prestigious San Diego Editors’ choice award and was accepted as contributor to the Bread Loaf Writers’ Conference. Dora Levy Mossanen’s novels have been translated into numerous languages world-wide.

Filed Under: challenges, fiction, New Authors Challenge, Publishers/Publicists, Read in 2015, review copy, reviews, sourcebooks, tlc book tours Tagged With: ,

Puckster’s Christmas Hockey Tournament by Lorna Schultz Nicholson, illustrated by Kelly Findley

February 10, 2015 by

Source: LibraryThing Early Reviewers
Paperback, 24 pgs
I am an Amazon Affiliate

Puckster’s Christmas Hockey Tournament by Lorna Schultz Nicholson, illustrated by Kelly Findley, is a story about reaching your goals and remembering that family and friends are the most important parts of our lives. Puckster helps out Canada’s National Junior Team, organizing their sticks and water bottles to ensure they are prepared for the game.  He’s getting ready to travel with the team for the championship game, and his family and friends are to meet him there on Christmas day.

While the message is good and clear, children who are unable to read the story on their own may find there is too much text to follow.  While the pictures are cute, there is little action in the story and a lot of exposition.  My daughter listened to the entire story, though I would stop reading the text to have her identify the animals in the pictures to keep her attention on the book.  She said after reading it that she didn’t like when Puckster pretended to be Santa Claus by pasting wet paper towels to his face.  She said that was not nice, though she may not have understood that he was trying to do something nice for his friends.

Puckster’s Christmas Hockey Tournament by Lorna Schultz Nicholson, illustrated by Kelly Findley, is a cute little book about what family and friends mean to us and how they should always be important.  This book, however, is a little bit beyond what my daughter is ready for, but would be good for kids ages 5+.

About the Author:

Lorna Schultz Nicholson is a full-time writer who has published over 20 award-winning books, including Roughing! and Northern Star. Her nonfiction book, Home Ice, was on the Globe and Mail bestseller list for many months and was a top selling sports book during the 2010 Olympics in Vancouver. Lorna divides her time between Calgary and Penticton, where she and her husband share their homes with their crazy Mexican dog, Poncho,and a whiny bichon-shih tzu Molly.

Filed Under: challenges, children's fiction, Library Thing Early Reviewers, New Authors Challenge, Publishers/Publicists, Read in 2015, review copy, reviews Tagged With: , , , ,

WET by Toni Stern

January 29, 2015 by

Source: Wiley D. Saichek Publicity
Paperback, 76 pgs
I am an Amazon Affiliate

WET by Toni Stern begins with poems close to home and the latter half of the collection is about the wider world as the narrator explores contemporary life.  Some of these poems display humor, like in “Greetings Issa!” where the narrator speaks to a spider and assuages her fears that she could be squashed with a broom.  In “Turn Off,” the narrator laments the deaths of insects she watches flying into the lamp even as she continually attempts to get engrossed in a book that is clearly not grabbing her attention.  Other poems read like lyrics from songs, which makes sense given her history as a songwriter with Carole King.

From "Natural Resources" (page 58)

In this winter of 2013-14
California's stricken,
a drought-ridden
Eden.

Edible California,
I am your homegrown daughter,
I fill my mouth with water,

bittersweet.

Stern’s verse is vivid on the page and lyrical, particularly in “Jamming” — a poem that could remind readers of The Beatles more whimsical songs like “I am the Walrus.”

From "Jamming" (page 38)

Ragged euphorbias
tall as a man,
weather this tight-fisted,
iron-poor land.
Pink floribundas
jockey for space,
poise and predation
adorn every face.

Stern is open and honest in her poems, and had fun with her verse and rhymes. Each poem brings a freshness to its subject. “True Love” was one of my favorites because it demonstrates in so few words what true love ought to be.  WET by Toni Stern is delightful, fun, and energized.

About the Poet:

Born and raised in Los Angeles, Toni Stern enjoyed a highly productive collaboration with singer/songwriter Carole King. Toni wrote the lyrics for several of King’s songs of the late ’60s and early ’70s, most notably “It’s Too Late,” for the album Tapestry. Listed among Rolling Stone’s “500 Greatest Albums of All Time,” the top-selling album of its day, Tapestry has sold more than 25 million copies worldwide, received numerous industry awards, and, in 2012, was honored with inclusion in the National Recording Registry to be preserved by the Library of Congress. Rolling Stone named “It’s Too Late”—Tapestry’s biggest hit—as one of the “500 Greatest Songs of All Time.

In 2013, King performed the song at the White House. “It’s Too Late” also features in the hit Broadway show and soundtrack album Beautiful: The Carole King Musical. Stern’s music has been recorded by many artists, including Gloria Estefan, Barbra Streisand, Faith Hill, Amy Grant, Andy Williams, the Carpenters, the Isley Brothers, the Stylistics, Helen Reddy, Dishwalla, Drag On, and many others. She has published several illustrated books and has also enjoyed success as a painter, studying with Knox Martin at the Arts Students League in New York. Wet is her first volume of poetry. She lives with her family in Santa Ynez, California. Photo credit: George Scott

 

 

 

 

 

Filed Under: challenges, New Authors Challenge, poetry, Poetry Reading Challenge, Read in 2015, review copy, reviews Tagged With: , ,

The Year of Reading Dangerously: How Fifty Great Books Saved My Life by Andy Miller (audio)

January 28, 2015 by

Source: Audible
Audio, 9+ hours
I am an Amazon Affiliate

The Year of Reading Dangerously: How Fifty Great Books Saved My Life by Andy Miller, narrated by the same, is a memoir about reading and books.  It begins with the “List of Betterment,” on which he lists books he has talked about in the past or claimed to have read, but has not.  These books reflect the type of person he envisions himself to be. He reads 12 of the 13 books completely and is awed by them, but to complete the list and be “like” Mr. Darcy and have integrity, he must complete Of Human Bondage as his penance, or so he tells his wife.

“It would be a good thing to buy books if one could also buy the time to read them; but one usually confuses the purchase of books with the acquisition of their contents.”

There are a number of footnotes in the book, which the audio calls attention to with an audible ding so that readers do not become confused.  However, because of these footnotes, it may be easier for readers to see them on the page, but I didn’t mind the alerts and digressions since most of us digress in traditional conversation and that’s what many of these footnotes seemed to be.

“A love of books and a love of reading is not the same thing,” Miller says, but even so, he is seriously enthralled and expands his list of books. Of particular interest to me were his comments on One Hundred Years of Solitude, which is the first book I quit after not quitting any books in 2014. His comments rung true to me, though he also piqued my interest in the overall meaning of the novel and perhaps renewed my interest in returning to it at some point.

The Year of Reading Dangerously: How Fifty Great Books Saved My Life by Andy Miller, narrated by the same, is a fantastic read on audio or in print or ebook for any book lover and reader. Many of us are reading to escape our lives, but what if we read deliberately? Would we be able to achieve our goals and what books would be on your list of betterment?

About the Author:

Andy Miller is a reader, author, and editor of books. His writing has appeared in numerous publications, including The Times, The Telegraph, The Guardian, Esquire, and Mojo. He lives in the United Kingdom with his wife and son.

 

 

 

 

A list of betterment (or books I wanted to read):

  1. Persuasion by Jane Austen (read in 2014)
  2. Mansfield Park by Jane Austen
  3. Northanger Abbey by Jane Austen
  4. The Sound and the Fury by William Faulkner
  5. Travels With Charley: In Search of America by John Steinbeck
  6. Mrs. Dalloway by Virginia Woolf
  7. Agnes Grey by Anne Bronte
  8. Villette by Charlotte Bronte (I started this in a read-a-long, had a baby, and never got back to it — it’s been 3+ years; I may have to start over!)
Filed Under: audiobooks, challenges, Harper Collins, memoir, New Authors Challenge, Publishers/Publicists, Read in 2015, review copy, reviews Tagged With: , ,

Texts From Jane Eyre by Mallory Ortberg, illustrated by Madeline Gobbo

January 27, 2015 by

Source: Diary of an Eccentric
Hardcover, 240 pgs
I am an Amazon Affiliate

Texts From Jane Eyre: And Other Conversations by Mallory Ortberg, illustrated by Madeline Gobbo, provides the right amount of literary humor from classics like Jane Eyre to modern characters like Katniss and Peeta from the Hunger Games.  Readers can turn to this little gem again and again for a good laugh.  Text messages are sometimes completely off the wall, but totally in character with either the fictional people or the authors who send the texts.  However, readers will garner more enjoyment from the conversations if they are familiar with the books and authors involved.

From “Wuthering Heights” (pg 114-119 ARC)

“i love you so much i’m going to get sick again
just out of spite

i’ll forget how to breathe

i’ll be your slave

i’ll pinch your heart and hand it back to you dead

i’ll lie down with my soul already in its grave

i’ll damn myself with your tears

i love you so much i’ll come back and marry your sister-in-law

god yes

and i’ll bankroll your brother’s alcoholism

i always hoped you would”

Some are visited more than once in text conversation, particularly Hamlet, and those conversations are fantastically done.  It’s fun to see Regan and Goneril fighting via text, as it is also humorous to see Heathcliff and Cathy profess their love for one another in the most Gothic ways possible.  There are others that could have been better, like the one for William Carlos Williams.  While readers will see the intent to play off of his famous poems, the text conversations could have been more inventive.  And the text conversation with John Keats was uninspired, though it recalled his famous poem Ode on a Grecian Urn.

What readers will love about the book is the use of modern technology and text-speak as classical writers and characters could use them with both their antiquated notions and points of view mixed with a more modern sensibility in some cases.  Ortberg has clearly given her imagination free reign here, and while in most cases, it pays off with a chuckle or a snicker, there are some cases where it falls flat. Texts From Jane Eyre: And Other Conversations by Mallory Ortberg, illustrated by Madeline Gobbo, is a fun little bit of humor to cheer you up on a gloomy day.

About the Author:

Mallory Ortberg is a writer, editor, and co-founder of the feminist general interest site The Toast. She previously wrote for Gawker and the Hairpin, where she met Toast co-founder Nicole Cliffe.

Filed Under: ARC, challenges, humor, New Authors Challenge, Read in 2015, reviews Tagged With: , , ,