Welcome! It's the 31st anniversary of our arrival in Seattle, after a 10 day journey driving diagonally across the country from Florida. So Memorial Day has a special significance for Jim and I, and I always look forward to the sunny skies and warmer temps that are usual at the end of May in the PNW.
It doesn't deter me from curling up somewhere comfy and reading a good book, however. I've been falling in love with a couple of series of urban fantasy and fantasy romance hybrids that I've been reading on my Kindle Paperwhite in ebook format this month. So while I've been eagerly gobbling those ebooks, I've also tried to slow down my reading of regular paper books a bit to make time to savor them, and to stream some movies or TV series, and get some more medical tests out of the way. In the words of the wise and wonderful Robert Gray of Shelf Awareness: "Reading is a journey, not a race. With that in mind, enjoy this long weekend, the first taste of summer before summer officially begins. And slow down if you're reading too fast." Amen to that!
I absolutely LOVE these photos of the famed Margaret Atwood trying to burn her non- flammable book with a huge flamethrower...it's just AWESOME, and it makes me want to send it to all the anti-choice politicians with the cutline "Do NOT piss off feminists, or any woman, really!"
'Unburnable' Edition of The Handmaid's Tale to Be Auctioned for Anti-Censorship Fundraiser
To raise awareness about the proliferating book banning and educational gag orders in some U.S. schools, Margaret Atwood and Penguin Random House have partnered to create The Unburnable Book, a fireproof edition of Atwood's prescient--and often banned--novel The Handmaid's Tale, featuring imagery by designer Noma Bar. In the launch video https://www.shelf-awareness.com/ct/x/pjJscAOMlegI6apuch0iSw~k1yJoKXv-hs8x6jEXpSgpoMLg-gVdw, Atwood can be seen "testing" a prototype with a flamethrower.
The one-of-a-kind edition was created using fireproof materials and will be presented at auction by Sotheby's New York, with proceeds going to PEN America to support the organization's work to counter censorship. The opening date for the Sotheby's exhibition is June 3, and it will close with the auction on June 7.
This single-copy special edition of The Handmaid's Tale was produced by creative agency Rethink and fabricated in Toronto by the graphic arts specialty and bookbinding atelier the Gas Company Inc. The Unburnable Book was manufactured by print-and-bindery master craftsman Jeremy Martin. Fireproof materials and processes were researched and tested by Doug Laxdal.
PRH CEO Markus Dohle said: "We are at an urgent moment in our history, with ideas and truth--the foundations of our democracy--under attack. Few writers have been as instrumental in the fight for free expression as Margaret Atwood. To see her classic novel about the dangers of oppression reborn in this innovative, unburnable edition is a timely reminder of what's at stake in the battle against censorship, and Penguin Random House is incredibly proud to support Sotheby's auction of this one-of-a-kind book to help fund PEN's crucial work against these forces."
Atwood commented: "I never thought I'd be trying to burn one of my own books... and failing. The Handmaid's Tale has been banned many times--sometimes by whole countries, such as Portugal and Spain in the days of Salazar and the Francoists, sometimes by school boards, sometimes by libraries. Let's hope we don't reach the stage of wholesale book burnings, as in Fahrenheit 451. But if we do, let's hope some books will prove unburnable--that they will travel underground, as prohibited books did in the Soviet Union."
PEN America CEO Suzanne Nossel added: "In the face of a determined effort to censor and silence, this unburnable book is an emblem of our collective resolve to protect books, stories and ideas from those who fear and revile them. We are thankful to be able to deploy the proceeds of this auction to fortify this unprecedented fight for books."
This has GOT TO STOP, people. Yet another mass killing of elementary school children in Texas happened this week, with 20 children and a few adults getting gunned down by yet another mentally ill teenage white boy who was able to purchase huge rifles and guns without a background check, online or at a gun show or out of someone's truck. Our politicians are all in the pocket of the NRA, and they're allowing gun violence and mass shootings to continue unabated. Some thing has to give, here, it's disgusting that so many families are heartbroken and so many lives lost due to the greed and thirst for power of the NRA and republican politicians in Washington DC. These are the same people who are trying to ban all abortions, saying that they're pro-life, when they do NOTHING to try and save the lives of children once they're out of the womb...then they're not nearly as valuable to the so-called pro lifers, who are really just pro-misogyny and want to control women through forced pregnancy and childbirth.
Eagle Harbor on Bainbridge Gives Bookseller Response to Most Recent Mass Shooting.
21 Children and a few adults were killed in a mass shooting at an Elementary School in Texas this week. On Instagram, Eagle Harbor Book Co., Bainbridge Island, Wash., posted a series of pictures of staff holding books and wrote: "Our booksellers have been talking about what our response should be to what's happening in this country. We've decided we want to share what we know best: book recommendations. If you are able, please consider making a donation to Everytown https://www.shelf-awareness.com/ct/x/pjJscAOOluwI6apudx10Gg~k1yJoKXv-hs8x6jEXJekpoMLg-gVdw for a cause we feel very passionate about."
I used to watch the Six Million Dollar Man (and the Bionic Woman) with my brothers on TV when we were kids, so I can easily recall the sound effects and opening theme that Robert Gray is talking about here. I totally agree with his take on reading and savoring books more slowly, though there are books that are like snacks, or treats to be devoured quickly, while other books are a feast of deliciously sensual prose that you have to enjoy deliberately, otherwise you miss all the layers of flavor.
Robert Gray: The Six Million Dollar Bionic Reader
As the long holiday weekend begins and languorous summer nears, my brain is stuck on a troubling image. In the opening sequence for the 1970s ABC TV series The Six Million Dollar Man , former astronaut Steve Austin (Lee Majors) crashes his experimental jet and is subsequently--literally--reconstructed.
"Gentlemen, we can rebuild him," the voiceover intones. "We have the technology. We have the capability to make the world's first bionic man. Steve Austin will be that man. Better than he was before. Better... stronger... faster." Then we see him running at what is meant to be superspeed, though initially--and often later he seems to be hyper-sprinting in slow motion.
Why am I thinking about this? Blame HuffPost, which clued me in recently to "a new hack for speed reading doing the rounds on Twitter right now. It's called 'bionic reading' and it's really dividing people."
Bionic Reading https://www.shelf-awareness.com/ct/x/pjJscAOOluwI6apudx1wTw~k1yJoKXv-hs8x6jEXJekpoMLg-gVdw's website describes the strategy as "a new method facilitating the reading process by guiding the eyes through text with artificial fixation points. As a result, the reader is only focusing on the highlighted initial letters and lets the brain center complete the word. In a digital world dominated by shallow forms of reading, Bionic Reading aims to encourage a more in-depth reading and understanding of written content."
BR "revises texts so that the most concise parts of words are highlighted. This guides the eye over the text and the brain remembers previously learned words more quickly." Founder & owner Renato Casutt observes: "Future needs origin. I'm a typographic designer from Switzerland with 25 years of experience. Passionate about what I do and full of joy to be able to help other people. Growing with Bionic Reading and breaking old patterns has been driving me for years."
I suspect I'm not the target audience for BR. Speed reading innovations have never appealed. Evelyn Wood Reading Dynamics long ago promised to teach me how to determine my current reading rate, then increase it immediately. "Your reading speed will double--guaranteed!... Polish off entire books in one sitting. Plus, there's an advanced comprehension and retention system that will help you understand more."
No thanks. I've always been rubbish at fast reading, not least because I have no interest in the concept beyond curiosity. I could be a poster child for the Slow Books movement. By nature and temperament, I'm a patient and deliberate reader, though the pace increased measurably when I took a bookseller's job in the early 1990s. Before that, I lingered over pages, paragraphs and sentences of the books I loved. I underlined and committed excessive marginalia. I read passages aloud to people I liked, saying, "Listen to this...."
But I can't really say I read dramatically faster than I used to. As a bookworker, I don't always have a vested interest in the titles that land on my desk, though I begin each with hope. Page one is always full of possibility.
Books remain irresistible. Can I read
them all? No. But within the considerable limitations of my ability, time and
attention span, I'm reading as fast as I can. Except, of course, when I read...
slowly. Reading is a journey, not a
race. With that in mind, enjoy this long weekend, the first taste of summer
before summer officially begins. And slow down if you're reading too fast. As
Arden Reed observes in Slow Art: The Experience of Looking, Sacred Images to
James Turrell, "slowness is also essential to grasping the experience of
modernity--if only because the hallmark of modernity is speed." --Robert
Gray, contributing editor, Shelf Awareness
Dead Calm and Dead Shift by Annie Anderson are the 3rd and 4th books in the Grave Talker series, by an author who knows her way around witty repartee and snarky come-backs. Her prose is dialog heavy and made for blazing fast reading, while Anderson's plots run straight and true by keeping her characters busier than Arnold S in an action movie. Here are the blurbs: #3:
There's not enough coffee or tacos in the world to deal with Darby Adler's family.
If it's not her death-dealing father, her back-from-the-dead mother, or her ghost grandfather, it's her long-lost siblings and their bid for power.
With the ABI radio silent and her siblings to
find, Darby's got a major problem on her hands--especially when the
local coven figures out that her father is no longer bound.
Can Haunted Peak, TN handle this family reunion?
#4:
Detective Darby Adler is about to hand in her badge.
After inadvertently taking the mantle of Warden of Knoxville, Darby has painted a huge target on her back. With bridges burned and the ABI on her tail, she’ll have to decide between staying a small-town detective or leaning into her new role.
It’s not only her job on the line—it’s her life.
Who says small towns are boring?
Dead Shift is the fourth book in the Grave Talker Series. If you enjoy foul-mouthed heroines, dark humor, and enemies-to-lovers, then then this is the series for you.
Darby Adler is an irresistible combination of Gilmore Girls Lorelai Gilmore and Seanan McGuire's Toby Daye with some Tiffany Haddish, Melissa McCarthy and Ali Wong thrown in for good measure. She doesn't suffer fools at all, she eats and swears like a truck driver and she strongly believes in good and doing what is right, even if it negatively impacts her life in some extreme ways. I love that she can talk to the dead, while at the same time having a lust for life that manages to shine through the fog of nightmares that she constantly traverses. The prose, as I've mentioned, gleams along the vibrant plot(s) and the characters are full bodied and most are fascinating. I'd give these page-tuners an A, and recommend them to anyone who likes paranormal romantic mysteries with unforgettable heroines.
Cold Burn of Magic and Dark Heart of Magic by Jennifer Estep are books 1 and 2 in a YA paranormal fantasy series that I found delightful, if written with an eye to the younger teenage crowd. the prose was clean and clear, if sometimes a bit too "children's book g-rated" for my tastes, while the plots were straightforward and provided an easy and fun read. Here are the blurbs: Cold Burn: It’s not as great as you’d think, living in a tourist town that’s
known as “the most magical place in America.” Same boring high school,
just twice as many monsters under the bridges and rival Families killing
each other for power.
I try to keep out of it. I’ve got my
mom’s bloodiron sword and my slightly illegal home in the basement of
the municipal library. And a couple of Talents I try to keep quiet,
including very light fingers and a way with a lock pick.
But
then some nasty characters bring their Family feud into my friend’s pawn
shop, and I have to make a call—get involved, or watch a cute guy die
because I didn’t. I guess I made the wrong choice, because now I’m stuck
putting everything on the line for Devon Sinclair. My mom was murdered
because of the Families, and it looks like I’m going to end up just like
her.
“An adventurous ride you will never want to get off.”—Jennifer L. Armentrout
Dark Heart: As a thief, I stick to the shadows as much as possible. But when
the head of the Sinclair Family picks me to compete in the Tournament of
Blades, there’s no escaping the spotlight—or the danger.
Even
though he’s my competition, Devon Sinclair thinks I have the best shot
at winning what’s supposed to be a friendly contest. But when the
competitors start having mysterious “accidents,” it looks like someone
will do anything to win—no matter who they hurt.
As if I didn’t
have enough to worry about, mobster Victor Draconi is plotting against
Devon and the rest of my friends, and someone’s going around Cloudburst
Falls murdering monsters. One thing’s for sure. Sometimes, humans can be
more monstrous than anything else.
Fairy tale magic mobster families combine with gladiator games and intrigue in this series to create some real page turners that will keep you up until the wee hours. Lila Merriweather is a delightful protagonist who checks all the YA fantasy heroine boxes, from bravery and insane combat skills (check!) to being an orphan with a tragic backstory who now has some great found family and has been able to live on her own as a street rat/thief (double check!). She also checks the box for unresolved issues and magic powers that she has to hide, for fear of them being taken from her by evil forces. Kind of like Harry Potter with a lot more combat skills and a cool sword. Also like HP, these books are so readable that you'll find yourself saying the booklovers mantra of "Just one more page/chapter!" over and over, until the book is read and you've lost the last 24 hours. Hence, I'd give this series an A-, and recommend it to fans of romantic fantasy novels with kick butt heroines.
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