Merry almost Christmas, fellow book lovers! The Coronavirus and my Crohns really put a damper on my productivity this year, in terms of reading and reviewing books. I found myself often getting caught up in Netflix series, Amazon series and CBS All Access's Star Trek Discovery (and the Mandalorian on Disney+), when I should have been reading books from my growing TBR piles. So I'm going to have posted 42 instead of 52 times this year, more's the pity. That said, with the coronavirus vaccine on the horizon (I'm slated to get mine early next year), 2021 will doubtless be better, and I will hopefully be able to work harder on my blog, which should reach 800 posts by the end of next year!
This sounds fantastic, though I am not sure I've read the book yet.
TV: The Seven Deaths of Evelyn Hardcastle
Stuart Turton's Costa Award-winning debut novel, The Seven Deaths of Evelyn Hardcastle http://www.shelfawareness.com/ct/uz3642037Biz46803162, will be adapted as a seven-part series for Netflix UK. Sourcebooks published the U.S. edition, The 7 Deaths of Evelyn Hardcastle, in 2018. The series is created and written by Sophie Petzal and produced by House Productions.
"I'm so excited to have the chance to bring Stuart's exhilarating, original and mind-bending novel to life on Netflix," said Petzal. "From the moment I read the book, I knew it could make the most extraordinary television series and I'm so grateful to be a part of the incredible team setting out on this journey."
Turton added: "I'm absolutely delighted that The Seven Deaths of Evelyn Hardcastle is coming to the screen, and wish to offer my apologies to the wonderfully talented Sophie Petzal--who has the mind-destroying job of adapting it. When I set out to write a time-travelling, body-hopping, murder mystery novel, I never imagined it would end up on the telly, and I can't wait to see how it unfolds."
Iowa was, unfortunately, one of the Midwestern states that didn't take precautions for the coronavirus by mandating masks or social distancing or closing down businesses. That's why they've had a huge surge in the number of cases of COVID 19 that are coming into hospitals, with most cases being fatal. This worries me as my mother and brother still live in Iowa, and are succeptable to the virus due to age and compromised immune systems. That is why though it's sad that our only poet laureate is dead, I am not surprised. Iowans need to think long and hard about where their devotion to ignorant and prejudiced republican leadership has gotten them.
Obituary Note: Marvin Bell
Poet Marvin Bell, the first Poet Laureate of Iowa, a National Book Award Finalist and professor of literature, died on December 14 in Iowa City, Iowa, Copper Canyon Press reported http://www.shelf-awareness.com/ct/uz3642037Biz46842188. Bell was 83.
Over the course of his career Bell wrote more than 20 volumes of poetry. He published his first collection, Things We Dreamt We Died For, in 1966 with the Stone Wall Press. His most recent volume, Incarnate: The Collected Dead Man Poems, was published in 2019. His 1977 collection Stars Which See, Stars Which Do Not See, was a finalist for the National Book Award in Poetry.
His poems were known for "mining the intersection of philosophy and poetry," and they brought "meaning and discovery to daily life." His work featured a recurring character known as the Dead Man, an all-knowing trickster who addresses "the joys as well as the catastrophes of the personal and the political."
Michael Wieger, Bell's editor at Copper Canyon Press for more than 30 years, wrote: "He was one of the first poets I met when I started at the Press, and while I always recognized him as a tremendous and imaginative poet, he was also an unrelenting friend and advocate for poetry. Bell made certain to support the oddball originals and always strived to push poetry forward. I will miss his stories, his trivia and his faithful friendship. The Press is indebted to his generous influence."
Bell taught at the Iowa Writers' Workshop for 40 years and was the Flannery O'Connor Professor of Letters when he retired in 2005. He held a BA from Alfred University, an MA from the University of Chicago and an MFA from the University of Iowa. He was named the state's first ever Poet Laureate in 2000.
Though I am not a huge fan of Elliott Bay Bookstore, I am glad to see that they're still doing business and making sure to follow coronavirus protocols.
How Bookstores Are Coping: Juggling 10 Balls at Once
In Seattle, Wash., Elliott Bay Book Company http://www.shelf-awareness.com/ct/uz3642037Biz46842174 is limited to 25% capacity, reported general manager Tracy Taylor. For a store of Elliott Bay's size, that means a maximum of 56 people are allowed in at a time. In a normal year, at this point in December, the store would typically have 150-200 people in-store "at any given time"; Taylor noted that there are still long lines in the store, but that's because of social distancing.
The store hires around 10 seasonal workers each holiday season to help with things like gift wrapping, and normally they're "all packed into a tiny little room." Elliott Bay hired roughly the same number of seasonal workers this year, but the store's landlord has allowed Taylor and her team to use the empty retail space next door, which is about 12,000 square feet, for the month of December. That has become a gift-wrapping and shipping warehouse, and provides plenty of space for everyone to "distance out."
The bulk of the store's current business is online orders, which consume a "large portion of staff time." At the same time, they have to navigate customers calling in for curbside pickup or mail order, as well as customers browsing in-person. Remarked Taylor: "It's like juggling 10 balls in the air at once, and none of us are jugglers."
Elliott Bay Book Company encouraged customers to shop early, and Taylor noted that the same message was "going out across Seattle from all retailers." Shoppers were definitely receptive, with the store seeing much higher sales in early December than the same time last year. Taylor and her team have been watching stock levels very carefully, and though they haven't been able to get some titles back in stock, things haven't been too bad in that regard.
Throughout the pandemic Elliott Bay has had a lot of success with its subscription boxes. While they've always had a first novel subscription, they've created poetry, true crime and graphic novel subscriptions, which have all "started to sell pretty well." The team also created themed book boxes that feature a selection of books and theme-appropriate sidelines. There is a Japanese Vacation Box, which features four Japanese books and three types of Japanese snacks, and the Whodunnit Box, which comes with four mystery novels, a canvas totebag and a mini magnifying glass, all wrapped in crime scene caution tape. Those have been doing really well, with people sometimes buying seven or eight at a time.
Jigsaw puzzles, Taylor added, have sold extremely well throughout the pandemic. Over the summer, after receiving so many e-mails from customers about how much they missed being in the store, Elliott Bay created a puzzle featuring the bookstore. That puzzle in particular has been "flying."
Wayward Souls by Devon Monk is an ebook and the start of a new series (YAY) called Souls of the Road that combines magic and mystery in new and exciting ways. This series was inspired by Monk's vacation motoring along old Route 66 with her husband last year. I'd imagine, since Monk is probably quarantined like the rest of us and can't scratch her travel itch, that she found writing this first book in the new series cathartic. Here's the blurb:
Lovers Lula and Brogan Gauge have dealt with magic, monsters, and gods for eighty years. Bound to travel the lonely roads of Route 66, Brogan’s a spirit with no chance of leaving the earthly realm while Lula, neither human nor monster, is only half-alive.
Their search for a way to break their curse might finally come to an end if the ghost in Illinois is telling the truth about a magical journal.
Lula and Brogan aren’t alone in wanting the journal. If they don’t get to it first, their chance at freedom might just turn into the fight of their un-lives.
Monk's prose is pure gold, as it is in all of her books, and the plot purrs along like a well oiled engine on a classic automobile. I was particularly fond of the protagonist Lula, who, though she could only talk and not touch her husband for most of the book, still managed to communicate with him and keep their love alive. This reminded me of the cursed lovers on the wonderful movie "LadyHawke" where the lovers were doomed to only see one another at dawn and dusk. Romantic and frustrating and beautiful, all at once, I loved Brogan and Lula's relationship and how well it worked. As with most of Monk's books, I could not put it down once I'd begun, so I will have to give this feast of an ebook an A, and recommend it to anyone who enjoys cursed romances and legendary road trips.
Help Wanted by J. Emery was another ebook I read, mainly because it was cheap. It was also a YA fantasy that sounded like it would be interesting. While it wasn't bad, it also wasn't good, so I guess you get what you pay for. Here's the blurb: Em is confused about a lot of things: who she is, what she wants, how
she’s going to pass Alchemy when she’s awful at it. The one thing she’s
not confused about is how much she wants to buy her best friend (and
college roommate) the best birthday present ever. Luckily the local
magic supply shop is hiring.
Her plan to get a job there would be
working perfectly if not for her coworker Phineas who is in turns
aggravating and endearingly awkward. She’s not sure if she wants to date
him or wants to be him. The more time they spend together the more she
thinks it may be both.
Help Wanted is an 18,000 word novella with
a gender and sexuality questioning f/m romance. It is the first in a
new series about students at a contemporary magic college.
I loved that the characters had questions about their sexuality, and that there were some interesting magic implements discussed. However, the book read like it was written by an amateur, and the prose and plot were as wobbly as a bowl full of jello. While it's certainly not the worst ebook I've read, it's also not the best. I'd give it a C, and recommend it to anyone who is looking for a quick distraction.
Interlibrary Loan by the late Gene Wolfe was the second book in a series that I've only recently heard about on a book website. The first book in the series, A Borrowed Man, sets up the conceit of having clones made of dead authors who are then able to discuss their books with patrons who "check them out" of the library as a resource. Because reclones, as they're called, are made in batches, they're not considered fully human, though they have the same needs as humans, like the need to eat and drink and sleep and use the bathroom. Yet they're treated like the lowest form of life, like slaves but with less empathy for their needs, and patrons who are supposed to use them for their knowledge of books instead abuse the female reclones for sex and the males for a variety of things they're not supposed to do, like amateur sleuthing. Here's the blurb: Interlibrary Loan is the brilliant follow-up to A Borrowed Man: the final work of fiction from multi-award winner and national literary treasure Gene Wolfe
Hundreds of years in the future our civilization is shrunk down but we go on. There is advanced technology, there are robots.
And there are clones.
E.
A. Smithe is a borrowed person, his personality an uploaded recording
of a deceased mystery writer. Smithe is a piece of property, not a legal
human.
As such, Smithe can be loaned to other branches. Which he
is. Along with two fellow reclones, a cookbook and romance writer, they
are shipped to Polly’s Cove, where Smithe meets a little girl who wants
to save her mother, a father who is dead but perhaps not.
And another E.A. Smithe… who definitely is.
As the last book Wolfe wrote before he died, this book is touted as something great, when in reality it feels very loose and unfinished. In fact, the end is not even an ending, but more of a pause in the middle of a paragraph. Wolfe's prose is sturdy and his plot is okay until about two-thirds of the way through the book, when it unravels like a poorly knitted sweater. And EA Smithe comes off as a sexist/racist bastard for much of the novel, a troublemaker in the worst sense. I was not aware that Wolfe was a misogynist until reading this book, where women are most valued for their looks and sexuality/desirability. Readers never actually find out what happens to all the characters and reclones in the end, so I can't really give this book anything beyond a C, and recommend it only to those who are into making sure they read every book by any given author.
Written in the Stars by Alexandria Bellefleur is a lesbian romance that, while funny and bold, left me frustrated by the lack of boundaries that the main characters fail to set with their families. Two very different women, Darcy and Elle, are matched up by chance when both decide, after a rough first date, that they're tired of being set up on blind dates by their families, so they "pretend" to be dating so as to get the family off their backs for at least the holidays. Anyone who has ever watched a Hallmark Channel movie or a regular rom-com film can see where this is going...of course they actually fall in love, despite being so different and trying to keep the whole 'fake dating' thing professional. Here's the blurb:
With nods to Bridget Jones and Pride & Prejudice, this debut is a delightful #ownvoices queer rom-com about a free-spirited social media astrologer who agrees to fake a relationship with an uptight actuary until New Year’s Eve—with results not even the stars could predict!
After a disastrous blind date, Darcy Lowell is desperate to stop her well-meaning brother from playing matchmaker ever again. Love—and the inevitable heartbreak—is the last thing she wants. So she fibs and says her latest set up was a success. Darcy doesn’t expect her lie to bite her in the ass.
Elle Jones, one of the astrologers behind the popular Twitter account Oh My Stars, dreams of finding her soul mate. But she knows it is most assuredly not Darcy... a no-nonsense stick-in-the-mud, who is way too analytical, punctual, and skeptical for someone as free-spirited as Elle. When Darcy’s brother—and Elle's new business partner—expresses how happy he is that they hit it off, Elle is baffled. Was Darcy on the same date? Because... awkward.
Darcy begs Elle to play along and she agrees to pretend they’re dating. But with a few conditions: Darcy must help Elle navigate her own overbearing family during the holidays and their arrangement expires on New Year’s Eve. The last thing they expect is to develop real feelings during a faux relationship. But maybe opposites can attract when true love is written in the stars?
First of all, Darcy needed to quit being such a wimp and tell her meddling, rude and pushy brother to take a hike and let her be alone, if that is what she wants. For him to constantly push her into dates and emotionally manipulate her and then tell everyone about it to keep the pressure on Darcy to succeed is abusive, period. Meanwhile, Elle's family is extremely unsupportive and, while that's not good, her mother is the real problem, because mom is a control freak who wants Elle to live the life that she wants instead of the life that will make Elle happy. Again, Elle is a big baby and can't seem to tell her mother to STFU or get a life, and set up strong boundaries until the very end of the novel. These are two grown ass women! WHY can't they have the balls to tell pushy relatives to shove off?! The whiny excuses and stupid avoidances and work arounds always cause more trouble than they're worth, as both Elle and Darcy discover. I found their childishness cringe-inducing and frustrating. That said, the romance itself is sensual and sweet, and we learn a lot about the characters internal burdens while we wait for them to catch up to the realization that they're in love. The prose is clean and crisp and keeps the plot frolicking. A solid B, with the recommendation for LBGTQ readers to dive in if they are looking for a bit of fun distraction.
A Cuban Girl's Guide to Tea and Tomorrow by Laura Taylor Namey is a Reese Witherspoon YA book club pick of the month. This is one of those YA novels that has gotten a ton of accolades and good ink from celebrities and news outlets alike. I suspect that is because it's about a Latina gal who is almost 18 and a young 18 year old English boy who lives in Winchester, a small village near London. So it's yet another "opposites attract" type of romance, this time with tons of descriptions of Cuban foods that will have your mouth watering after the first chapter. Namey's prose is crystal clear and strong, while her plot flies along on swift wings. Here's the blurb: Love & Gelato meets Don’t Date Rosa Santos in this charming, heartfelt story following a Miami girl who unexpectedly finds love—and herself—in a small English town.
For
Lila Reyes, a summer in England was never part of the plan. The plan
was 1) take over her abuela’s role as head baker at their panadería, 2)
move in with her best friend after graduation, and 3) live happily ever
after with her boyfriend. But then the Trifecta happened, and
everything—including Lila herself—fell apart.
Worried about
Lila’s mental health, her parents make a new plan for her: Spend three
months with family friends in Winchester, England, to relax and reset.
But with the lack of sun, a grumpy inn cook, and a small town lacking
Miami flavor (both in food and otherwise), what would be a dream trip
for some feels more like a nightmare to Lila…until she meets Orion
Maxwell.
A teashop clerk with troubles of his own, Orion is
determined to help Lila out of her funk, and appoints himself as her
personal tour guide. From Winchester’s drama-filled music scene to the
sweeping English countryside, it isn’t long before Lila is not only
charmed by Orion, but England itself. Soon a new future is beginning to
form in Lila’s mind—one that would mean leaving everything she ever
planned behind.
Though she's an expert in Cuban cuisine, and a fine pastry chef, I found Lila to be more than a bit domineering and high handed, only realizing late in the book that both her boyfriend and her best friend felt controlled and smothered by her need to have them do whatever she deemed fit, regardless whether they wanted to do so or not. Her "plan" she'd set up for herself required that everything and everyone around her snap to it and not change course. Then Lila's beloved grandmother dies, her best friend escapes her clutches to become a medical missionary and her boyfriend decides to dump her because he has "lost himself," (meaning he had no agency in their relationship) and Lila's response is to nearly run herself to death in the Miami heat. Hence her mother, father and sister send her to her auntie in England to help her grieve her losses and get some perspective. Lila's journey of self discovery was pretty routine for YA novels, but the delicious Cuban treats described in the book lend it some spice so it doesn't become boring. Also, Orion and Lila don't even get together fully until the final pages, which was way too late for an HEA, in my opinion. So I'd give this spiffy novel a B+ and recommend it to fans of the "opposites attract" rom coms.
No comments:
Post a Comment