Hey there, book lovers and friends of the page, and any other ink stained wretches to happen to stop by, WELCOME!
It has been nearly a fortnight since I refreshed this blog with new reviews and tidbits, but I've discovered that taking care of my husband, who is extremely ill and nearly bedridden is more than a full time job, it requires two people working in tandem otherwise things won't get done, because my time and energy (and Spoons) run out fairly quickly, as does my back, which has constant painful spasms. But! With the help of my son and his friend Sera, I've managed to deal with the challenges that present themselves nearly every day.
Anyway, enjoy the tidbits and reviews, folks.
Everyone in Iowa knows that The Music Man's tiny town of River City was actually based on Mason City, Iowa. So it's always great to hear news of something new opening there. I envy those who will get to be there at the grand opening of this well-named bookstore (I'm a fan of the Bronte sisters and their works)
Three
Bells Books Coming to Mason City, Iowa
An all-ages, general-interest bookstore
called Three Bells Books will open in Mason City, Iowa
https://www.shelf-awareness.com/ct/x/pjJscFfcxu4I6ahhck9xSA~k1yJoKXv-hs8x6iQDsempoMLg-gVdw,
this fall, KIMT3 reported.
Owners Molly Angstman and Jake Rajewsky
have found a 1,200-square-foot
space at 14 S. Commercial Alley in
downtown Mason City. They're eyeing a
November opening for the bookstore,
which is named for the Bronte
sisters and will feature books for
children, teens, and adults in a
variety of genres. In addition to
books, there will be gifts,
accessories, and a rotating selection
of drinks. The store's event plans
include book clubs, author talks, and
more.
Angstman will be the bookstore's CEO
and will work on-site, while
Rajewsky, who works at Fat Hill Brewing
in Mason City, will handle the
beverage side of the store as well as
some behind-the-scenes business.
"I want to create a warm,
welcoming place where all these bookworms can
browse, read, get to know each other,
and have fun with book culture,"
Angstman told KIMT3. "Reading is
traditionally a solitary activity, but
it doesn't have to be!"
Angelina J is going to make history with this musical adaptation of the famed "Outsiders" novel. Oh how I wish I could see it on Broadway!
On
Stage: The Outsiders Musical
Oscar winner Angelina Jolie (Girl,
Interrupted) will be a lead producer
of the Broadway-aimed new musical The
Outsiders
https://www.shelf-awareness.com/ct/x/pjJscFfcxu4I6ahhck9_SQ~k1yJoKXv-hs8x6iQDsempoMLg-gVdw,
Playbill reported. Based on the classic novel by S.E. Hinton as well
as Francis Ford Coppola's movie, the stage adaptation features a
book by Adam Rapp with Justin Levine and music and lyrics by
Jamestown Revival. It had
its world premiere at the La Jolla Playhouse earlier this year.
"I feel very fortunate to be a
part of this special production," said
Jolie, who joins a producing team that
also includes the Araca Group,
American Zoetrope, Olympus Theatricals,
and Sue Gilad, and Larry
Rogowsky. "I studied at the Lee
Strasberg Institute where I realized my
first love, as a performer, was the
theatre. I had not found a way back
until now. I hope to be able to
contribute while continuing to learn
from this amazing team, who I have been
working with since my daughter
brought me to see the show at La Jolla
Playhouse."
The Araca Group's Matthew Rego added,
"We are so thrilled Angelina has
joined us as a lead producer on this
journey to bring The Outsiders to
Broadway. Her remarkable career as a
storyteller makes her a perfect
partner for this project. We are so
grateful for the invaluable insight,
experience, and commitment that
Angelina brings to the development of
this new musical."
This really is exciting! I'm thrilled that a new bookstore is opening in Cedar Falls, where my penpal Jen lives.
The
Nook in Cedar Falls, Iowa, Expanding into New Space
The Nook, a mini bookshop in Cedar
Falls, Iowa, featuring popular adult and YA books, will move
https://www.shelf-awareness.com/ct/x/pjJscFfelr0I6ahgIk8gSw~k1yJoKXv-hs8x6iQDJf1poMLg-gVdw
from its current small space in the Cob Mercantile market to a larger
space by November. K92.3 reported that co-owners Abby Olson and
Brandon Conrad are "embarking on a whole new adventure
together... expanding and moving their business into their very own
storefront" at 216 Main Street.
The Nook's owners posted on Facebook:
"Big news! We're moving into our own storefront! A bookstore is
finally coming to Downtown Cedar Falls! Eeeek! The news is
bittersweet because we're moving into Miss Wonderful's location. Ann
was the first person to give us a chance on Main Street. Brandon
walked into Miss Wonderful last spring (2022) with a box of candles
to see if she'd be interested in carrying them in her store and she
said yes! We were SO excited. Ann helped our business take a huge
step and now she's helped us take an even bigger one. Ann is the
loveliest and most supportive person and we are so incredibly
grateful for her. We're overjoyed (and terrified) to bring a
bookstore to Main Street."
This also sounds thrilling...I imagine I will be glued to the screen once it premiers on Netflix.
TV:
The Fall of the House of Usher
Netflix released first images from and
announced an October 12 premiere
date for The Fall of the House of Usher
https://www.shelf-awareness.com/ct/x/pjJscFfekL4I6ahgIR52GQ~k1yJoKXv-hs8x6iQDJH2poMLg-gVdw,
its eight-episode limited series from Mike Flanagan. Deadline
reported that in the project, based on Edgar Allan Poe's classic
story, "ruthless siblings Roderick and Madeline Usher have built
Fortunato Pharmaceuticals into an empire of wealth, privilege and
power. But past secrets come to light when the heirs to the Usher
dynasty start dying at the hands of a mysterious woman from their
youth."
Starring Bruce Greenwood, the cast also
includes Carla Gugino, Mary
McDonnell, Carl Lumbly, and Mark Hamill, among others.
My favorite town in Iowa is getting a big chain bookstore in a new location! Celebrate this, my fellow Iowans and DBQ booklovers.
Grand
Opening Set for BAM's New Location in Dubuque, Iowa
The Books-A-Million store in Dubuque,
Iowa, has relocated to a new space
not far from the location inside
Kennedy Mall
https://www.shelf-awareness.com/ct/x/pjJscQGIlekI6ahgIBp-Eg~k1yJoKXv-hs8x6nGWpShpoMLg-gVdw
that it has occupied since 2012. BAM Dubuque will hold a grand
opening celebration at the new site on August 26, featuring giveaways
and fun activities.
Located next to HuHot Mongolian Grill,
the updated and modern space "is
an inspired new home for
Books-A-Million's characteristic assortment,
offering a bright, convenient, and
curated shopping experience," the
company noted. BAM operates more than
200 stores in 32 states.
From
Island Books (on Mercer Island) Bookstore Blog, an interview with
author Erica Bauermeister:
Miriam:
In your opinion, what separates Island Books from the big bookstores
and popular websites?
Erica: I
love the serendipity of finding books that I didn’t know existed
but which feel as if they were written just for me. Exploring the
Staff Recommendations is one way, but my favorite is what I call The
Bookseller Game. Rather than thinking about books in genres—literary,
mystery, women’s fiction, dystopian, etc—you consider the feel of
the books you most like to read. Are they plot or character driven?
Do you gravitate toward long and luxurious sentences or short
declarative ones? Is setting important? Do you like the puzzle of
multiple narrators or the immediacy of a single, first-person
narrator? Do you need a burning question at the center (who did it?
why did this family fall apart? will the couple fall in love?) or do
you relish just living in a different world for a while?
Then
you bring your answers to an indie bookseller and see what they
suggest. For example, the first time I played, I said I was
looking for a wicked-smart novel with beautifully written sentences
and an unreliable narrator. The bookseller suggested Gone,
Girl.
I said I didn’t read thrillers (completely forgetting the point of
the game). She said “oh, you will now.” She was right, and I read
more widely now because of her.
I
suppose it’s possible to play this game with an algorithm, but I
find algorithms bland and predictable. They know only what you have
read, not what you could. The surprises happen at the smaller stores
where the booksellers know their inventory. And my favorite part is
watching a bookseller’s face light up and hearing their enthusiasm.
At its core, reading is about human connection, and the booksellers
at Island Books are really, really good at it. It
takes an extraordinary amount of work to create a bookstore that
feels as if it was made just for you. This
is the special magic of Island Books. The tables at Island Books
tempt me to read memoir, history, non-fiction, beach reads and
mysteries. I find books in categories I might not otherwise, because
I am tempted by the obvious care in the selections. And I am
grateful for the dedicated people who put these books in my life. To
have an independent bookstore that is 50 years old and operates at
such a high standard is amazing.
Zorrie by Laird Hunt is an old, short novel that is more meditation on living a hard life as a woman during the Depression in Indiana, than it is literary fiction. The prose is lyrical and mesmerizing, but the subject matter is too gritty and grimy to keep the plot from dragging with sorrow and tragedy. Here's the blurb: From prize-winning, acclaimed author Laird
Hunt, a poignant novel about a woman searching for her place in the
world and finding it in the daily rhythms of life in rural Indiana.
“It was Indiana, it was the dirt she had bloomed up out of, it was who she was, what she felt, how she thought, what she knew.”
As a girl, Zorrie Underwood's modest and hardscrabble home county was the only constant in her young life. After losing both her parents, Zorrie moved in with her aunt, whose own death orphaned Zorrie all over again, casting her off into the perilous realities and sublime landscapes of rural, Depression-era Indiana. Drifting west, Zorrie survived on odd jobs, sleeping in barns and under the stars, before finding a position at a radium processing plant. At the end of each day, the girls at her factory glowed from the radioactive material.
But when Indiana calls Zorrie home, she finally finds the love and community that have eluded her in and around the small town of Hillisburg. And yet, even as she tries to build a new life, Zorrie discovers that her trials have only begun.
Spanning an entire lifetime, a life convulsed and transformed by the events of the 20th century, Laird Hunt's extraordinary novel offers a profound and intimate portrait of the dreams that propel one tenacious woman onward and the losses that she cannot outrun. Set against a harsh, gorgeous, quintessentially American landscape, this is a deeply empathetic and poetic novel that belongs on a shelf with the classics of Willa Cather, Marilynne Robinson, and Elizabeth Strout.
“It was Indiana, it was the dirt she had bloomed up out of, it was who she was, what she felt, how she thought, what she knew.”
As a girl, Zorrie Underwood's modest and hardscrabble home county was the only constant in her young life. After losing both her parents, Zorrie moved in with her aunt, whose own death orphaned Zorrie all over again, casting her off into the perilous realities and sublime landscapes of rural, Depression-era Indiana. Drifting west, Zorrie survived on odd jobs, sleeping in barns and under the stars, before finding a position at a radium processing plant. At the end of each day, the girls at her factory glowed from the radioactive material.
But when Indiana calls Zorrie home, she finally finds the love and community that have eluded her in and around the small town of Hillisburg. And yet, even as she tries to build a new life, Zorrie discovers that her trials have only begun.
Spanning an entire lifetime, a life convulsed and transformed by the events of the 20th century, Laird Hunt's extraordinary novel offers a profound and intimate portrait of the dreams that propel one tenacious woman onward and the losses that she cannot outrun. Set against a harsh, gorgeous, quintessentially American landscape, this is a deeply empathetic and poetic novel that belongs on a shelf with the classics of Willa Cather, Marilynne Robinson, and Elizabeth Strout.
Men who write female protagonists always end up making them either androgynous or ultra female in a sexist way, so they only serve as a cautionary tale or a cartoon. I've never understood why male authors choose to do this, when the results are always mixed at best, ludicrous at worst. SPOILER: readers follow poor Zorrie through her trials, only to discover that she has a somewhat obscure death...we're never actually told if she dies of radiation poisoning or of age, or a broken heart. This is a life seen through a haze of metaphor, and after the first 20 pages of the book it grows tiresome and tedious. I'd give this novel a C+, and recommend it as a sleep aid for travelers who like fiction that seems to go nowhere at a snail's pace.
Mistborn by Brandon Sanderson is the first book in a fantasy trilogy that my son has been badgering me to read for months now. He even bought me all three books as brand new mass-market paperbacks. Because he listened to these books on his way to work for months, he felt strongly that this fantasy series would resonate with me as much as it did with him. The prose is straightforward, but rather too embellished with establishing character history and background of their political/social system. The sturdy plot manages to hold up throughout this long (like over 600 pages long) tome and still leave the reader wanting to know what happens next. Here's the blurb: Now with over 10 million copies sold, The
Mistborn Series has the thrills of a heist story, the twistiness of
political intrigue, and the epic scale of a landmark fantasy saga.
For a thousand years the ash fell and no flowers bloomed. For a thousand years the Skaa slaved in misery and lived in fear. For a thousand years the Lord Ruler, the "Sliver of Infinity," reigned with absolute power and ultimate terror, divinely invincible. Then, when hope was so long lost that not even its memory remained, a terribly scarred, heart-broken half-Skaa rediscovered it in the depths of the Lord Ruler's most hellish prison. Kelsier "snapped" and found in himself the powers of a Mistborn. A brilliant thief and natural leader, he turned his talents to the ultimate caper, with the Lord Ruler himself as the mark.
Kelsier recruited the underworld's elite, the smartest and most trustworthy allomancers, each of whom shares one of his many powers, and all of whom relish a high-stakes challenge. Only then does he reveal his ultimate dream, not just the greatest heist in history, but the downfall of the divine despot.
But even with the best criminal crew ever assembled, Kel's plan looks more like the ultimate long shot, until luck brings a ragged girl named Vin into his life. Like him, she's a half-Skaa orphan, but she's lived a much harsher life. Vin has learned to expect betrayal from everyone she meets, and gotten it. She will have to learn to trust, if Kel is to help her master powers of which she never dreamed.
This saga dares to ask a simple question: What if the hero of prophecy fails?
For a thousand years the ash fell and no flowers bloomed. For a thousand years the Skaa slaved in misery and lived in fear. For a thousand years the Lord Ruler, the "Sliver of Infinity," reigned with absolute power and ultimate terror, divinely invincible. Then, when hope was so long lost that not even its memory remained, a terribly scarred, heart-broken half-Skaa rediscovered it in the depths of the Lord Ruler's most hellish prison. Kelsier "snapped" and found in himself the powers of a Mistborn. A brilliant thief and natural leader, he turned his talents to the ultimate caper, with the Lord Ruler himself as the mark.
Kelsier recruited the underworld's elite, the smartest and most trustworthy allomancers, each of whom shares one of his many powers, and all of whom relish a high-stakes challenge. Only then does he reveal his ultimate dream, not just the greatest heist in history, but the downfall of the divine despot.
But even with the best criminal crew ever assembled, Kel's plan looks more like the ultimate long shot, until luck brings a ragged girl named Vin into his life. Like him, she's a half-Skaa orphan, but she's lived a much harsher life. Vin has learned to expect betrayal from everyone she meets, and gotten it. She will have to learn to trust, if Kel is to help her master powers of which she never dreamed.
This saga dares to ask a simple question: What if the hero of prophecy fails?
Though Sanderson is an excellent storyteller, he shows his biases and misogyny by having the heroine, Vin,become just like any other female protagonist who yearns for the love of a man to truly fulfill herself as a woman...ugh. Vin had been through years of abuse and torture, starvation and brutality, only to suddenly become all weak and "womanly" when she meets the rich and handsome Elend, who is an idealist and scholar, and who eventually becomes king. So now that Vin has done all the hard work of vanquishing/killing the evil king, Elend just steps up and takes his place, and then gives broken-legged Vin a hug, which was, Sanderson writes "All she ever really wanted." Barf. All that pain and suffering for a hug from a rich dude? Seriously? It makes Vin seem like a particularly dim witted teenage wannabe princess, instead of a tough and scrappy warrior and allomancer. Sanderson needs to learn the phrase that "women need men like a fish needs a bicycle." For that reason, and for his overblown prose that should have been edited down by at least 200 pages, I give this book a B-, and recommend it to those who like Hallmark Channel style fantasy, where women are happy to give up everything for a guy.
The Traveling Cat Chronicles by Hiro Arikawa is a lovely short fantasy ebook that was cheap enough to pique my interest of having a cat as the narrator of a novel. Arikawa's prose was strong and lithe enough to allow his voice to come through the translation process without skipping a beat. The plot was a bit twisty, but became clearer as the book moved along on it's heroes journey. Here's the blurb: We take journeys to explore exotic new
places and to return to the comforts of home, to visit old acquaintances
and to make new friends. But the most important journey is the one that
shows us how to follow our hearts...
An instant international bestseller and indie bestseller, The Traveling Cat Chronicles has charmed readers around the world. With simple yet descriptive prose, this novel gives voice to Nana the cat and his owner, Satoru, as they take to the road on a journey with no other purpose than to visit three of Satoru's longtime friends. Or so Nana is led to believe...
With his crooked tail—a sign of good fortune—and adventurous spirit, Nana is the perfect companion for the man who took him in as a stray. And as they travel in a silver van across Japan, with its ever-changing scenery and seasons, they will learn the true meaning of courage and gratitude, of loyalty and love.
Though Nana the cat is prideful and grouchy and stubbornly loyal to Sartoru, her owner/companion, by the end of the novel you can't help but empathize with his refusal to leave the side of his terminally ill owner, even when said owner is trying to give him away. The characters are so tenderly rendered by the author that midway through the novel I was already tearing up. I'd give this bittersweet story an A, and recommend it to all cat lovers out there, particularly ones who rescue feral or stray cats.
An instant international bestseller and indie bestseller, The Traveling Cat Chronicles has charmed readers around the world. With simple yet descriptive prose, this novel gives voice to Nana the cat and his owner, Satoru, as they take to the road on a journey with no other purpose than to visit three of Satoru's longtime friends. Or so Nana is led to believe...
With his crooked tail—a sign of good fortune—and adventurous spirit, Nana is the perfect companion for the man who took him in as a stray. And as they travel in a silver van across Japan, with its ever-changing scenery and seasons, they will learn the true meaning of courage and gratitude, of loyalty and love.
Though Nana the cat is prideful and grouchy and stubbornly loyal to Sartoru, her owner/companion, by the end of the novel you can't help but empathize with his refusal to leave the side of his terminally ill owner, even when said owner is trying to give him away. The characters are so tenderly rendered by the author that midway through the novel I was already tearing up. I'd give this bittersweet story an A, and recommend it to all cat lovers out there, particularly ones who rescue feral or stray cats.
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