Princess Diaries 3 Movie, South Korean Writer Han Kang Wins Nobel Prize, Trevor Noah is Indies Spokesperson, Oprah Picks From Here to the Great Unknown, Robert Gray's Book Pilgrimage to Shakespeare and Company in Paris, Gwen and Art Are Not in Love by Lex Croucher, Broken Light by Joanne Harris, Murder at King's Crossing by Andrea Penrose and The Next Best Fling by Gabriella Gamez

Hurrah for Autumn! It's actually too warm for October out there (today it will reach 70 degrees here in Maple Valley), but I'm still all in for the cozy reading vibes with the big chair/bed and blankets and a cuppa hot tea, a good book and some chocolate to keep me reading into the wee hours. I'm excited for all the new fall books as well, and I'm looking forward to birthdays and Christmas, which in my household are all in November and December, when hopefully I will get gift cards to bookstores so I can buy a bunch of new novels to start the new year! Meanwhile, here are some tidbits and four reviews for your reading pleasure. 

 

I'm a big Anne Hathaway fan, especially of her turn in The Devil Wears Prada, which is one of those classic movies that will be watched and enjoyed for decades to come (I mean, it has the perfect cast! La Streep, chilled to icy perfection! Hathaway at her most winsome and willowy! Stanley Tucci at his most sarcastic and lovable gay icon-ness! Emily Blunt at her b*tchy best!) so I can't imagine this movie will be anything but rom-com joy. I hope they get the original cast (including Julie Andrews, pretty please) to join up soon!

 

Movies: Princess Diaries 3

Anne Hathaway is returning for Princess Diaries 3,

based on Meg Cabot's bestselling YA and adult Princess Diaries book

series, Deadline reported. Hathaway, who confirmed her return on

Instagram: https://www.shelfawareness.com/ct/x/pjJscVWPxLkI6a42Khl_Gg~k1yJoKXv-hs8x6mSXcXxpoMLg-gVdw, first played teen Mia Thermopolis in the original Princess Diaries film (2001), and

followed that up in 2004 with The Princess Diaries 2: Royal Engagement.

The new movie will be directed by Adele Lim, who wrote Disney's animated

feature Raya and the Last Dragon (2021), made her directorial debut with

Lionsgate's R-rated comedy Joy Ride (2023).She also wrote the Jon Chu-directed rom com Crazy Rich Asians, based on the book by Kevin Kwan. Flora

Greeson is writing the screenplay. Other original cast have not yet been

confirmed to return to the third installment.

This is splendid news! A woman of color finally won the Nobel! 

 Once the frenzy to read her book has died down, I plan on getting a copy from the library ASAP.

South Korean Writer Han Kang Wins Nobel Prize for Literature

South Korean writer Han Kang has won the 2024 Nobel Prize for Literature

https://www.shelf-awareness.com/ct/x/pjJscVWAlOsI6a42KhF-SQ~k1yJoKXv-hs8x6mSUpWjpoMLg-gVdw, announced this morning

by the Swedish Academy in Stockholm. Kang was cited for "her intense

poetic prose" that "confronts historical traumas and invisible sets of

rules and, in each of her works, exposes the fragility of human life.

She has a unique awareness of the connections between body and soul, the

living and the dead, and in her poetic and experimental style has become

an innovator in contemporary prose." She is the first Korean to win the

Nobel Prize for Literature. She receives 11 million Swedish kronor (just

over $1 million).

Kang is best known in the English-speaking world for The Vegetarian,

translated by Deborah Smith (Hogarth), which won the Man Booker

International Prize for fiction in 2016 and was made into a movie.

The Swedish Academy commented: "Written in three parts, the book

portrays the violent consequences that ensue when its protagonist

Yeong-hye refuses to submit to the norms of food intake. Her decision

not to eat meat is met with various, entirely different reactions. Her

behavior is forcibly rejected by both her husband and her authoritarian

father, and she is exploited erotically and aesthetically by her

brother-in-law, a video artist who becomes obsessed with her passive

body. Ultimately, she is committed to a psychiatric clinic, where her

sister attempts to rescue her and bring her back to a 'normal' life.

However, Yeong-hye sinks ever deeper into a psychosis-like condition

expressed through the 'flaming trees,' a symbol for a plant kingdom that

is as enticing as it is dangerous."

Her other titles published in English include The White Book, translated

by Deborah Smith (Hogarth), which was shortlisted for the Man Booker

International Prize in 2018; Human Acts: A Novel, translated by Deborah

Smith (Hogarth); Greek Lessons, translated by Deborah Smith and Emily Yae Won (Hogarth); and We Do Not Part: A Novel, translated by Emily Yae Won and Paige Aniyah Morris (Hogarth).

YAY! Go Trevor! I love his humor and I enjoyed his book Born a Crime.

 I love that he's trying to improve access to education for young people in South Africa.

Trevor Noah Is this Year's Indies First Spokesperson

Comedian, author, producer, political commentator, actor, and TV host

Trevor Noah will be the official 2024 spokesperson for Indies First, the American Booksellers Association's national campaign of activities and events in support of independent bookstores that takes place on Small Business Saturday, November 30.

"Independent bookstores connect readers to ideas and stories, and they

are the rare physical places in our communities where we can connect

with each other," he said.

Noah is the author of the bestselling book Born a Crime: Stories from a

South African Childhood, which won the 2017 Thurber Prize for American Humor. In addition to his success as a comedian, he was the host of the Emmy Award-winning The Daily Show on Comedy Central. He has served as the Grammy Awards host for four years in a row, and currently hosts What Now? With Trevor Noah, a Spotify original weekly podcast.

In 2018, Noah launched the Trevor Noah Foundation to improve equitable

access to quality education for underserved youth in South Africa. His

vision is a world where education enables youth to dream, see, and build

the impossible.

I can hardly believe it has been over 100 books that Oprah has recommended and elevated over the past decades. She has been a great booster for the publishing industry, at a time when they've been desperate to keep America reading books.

This one looks especially interesting, as I'm a fan of Riley Keough, Elvis's grandchild.

Oprah's Book Club Pick: From Here to the Great Unknown

Oprah Winfrey has chosen From Here to the Great Unknown: A Memoir by

Lisa Marie Presley and Riley Keough (Random House) as her 108th Oprah's

Book Club Pick: "Born to an American myth and raised in the wilds of Graceland, Lisa Marie Presley tells her whole story for the first time in this raw, riveting, one-of-a-kind memoir faithfully completed by her daughter, Riley Keough."

"I have great love and admiration for Lisa Marie Presley, and was so

moved that her daughter Riley, through her grief, was able to help her

finish a beautifully touching memoir that allows us to see her mother at

her most honest and vulnerable," Oprah said. "This is an intimate look

at what it was like growing up as heir to one of America's most famous

families." "I was just a few pages into this book, recognizing that it was going to

be your voice and her voice, and then I thought, 'Oh, I have to choose

this for the Book Club,' " Oprah told Keough in a CBS interview. "It's a

lot of brave work you did in this book."

I've made no secret of the fact that I have planned and executed a once a year pilgrimage to Powell's City of Books in the heart of downtown Portland, Oregon. If I were lucky enough to be able to travel to Europe, however, I know that I'd want to stop at Shakespeare and Company, the iconic bookstore that I've read about in so many famous books. Robert Gray's musings on bookstore pilgrimages are, as usual, fascinating.

Robert Gray: What Was Your 'Must-visit' Bookshop Pilgrimage?

Here's a story we all can tell; the variations are nearly infinite. It's

a tale about finally making a pilgrimage to the bookshop that has been

on your "must visit" list for a long, long time. It's about being there,

browsing the stacks, buying a book or two or three; savoring the moment

and then, years later, being able to recall that moment at will.

If you're reading this, you've had the experience. I know you have. Tell

me about it sometime. What was your "must-visit" bookshop pilgrimage

like?

A couple of things triggered thoughts about this recently. The first was

an article ("Why I always visit a local indie bookstore on my travels")

I read in the Straits Times.

"I always plan a visit to a local independent bookstore early into my

travels to find my bearings and pick up a book related to the place,"

Shawn Hoo wrote. "A city without bookstores is a nightmare for a

traveler like me--it is like visiting a city without maps."

Then, a couple of nights ago, I was listening to a Shakespeare and

Company interview, recorded live at this year's Edinburgh International Book Festival. It featured Adam Biles, literary director at the legendary Paris

bookshop; Lauren Groff, author and owner of the Lynx bookstore, Gainesville, Fla.; and author Neel Mukherjee in "a wide-ranging discussion that takes the temperature (and the pulse!) of the book industry, from bookshops, to publishers, to prizes,to festivals."

Biles opened the program by wondering, "when a volume chosen from a

million-strong catalog can be fired through your window by a drone

barely an hour after you've ordered it, or when the very same book,

searchable, resizable, updatable, shareable, can appear on your e-reader

in a matter of seconds, what good do the dusty, inefficient,

brick-and-mortar relics we call bookshops still serve?"

A conversation starter if there ever was one, and the panel's discussion

is well worth a listen, but a slightly off-topic comment during the q&a

sent my mind in another direction.

A woman mentioned that the last few times she'd been in Paris, she

wasn't able to get inside Shakespeare and Company due to the long queue:

"I'm wondering how you manage the fact that you are essentially a

tourist landmark/bookshop between the sales of books and trying to sell

books, but also having to deal with people who might want to visit the

shop and not necessarily buy something."

Biles replied, "It's been harder and harder to manage, and we're a small

bookshop in a 17th-century building. We took the decision to have a

queue because we wanted the experience once you're inside to be as close

to being in a normal bookshop as possible. And to anybody in the room or

anybody listening, I should say that the queue does move pretty fast.

But one of the very gratifying things is that people do buy books.

"And one of the things that actually drives me mad is every so often you

will see comments on Google or things like that, and people say, oh,

it's just a tourist attraction full of young women who want to take

photos for their Instagram accounts. And the first thing you should say

is that without young women, the book industry is dead. They are the

people who buy books, who read books, who engage with books more than

any other demographic.

"And these young women are not just coming to take photos. They come,

they buy the books and they buy serious, engaging literature,

philosophy, politics, much more than the men they bring in with them,

actually. And I'm sure much more than the men who are writing these kind

of comments online."

For many years, Shakespeare and Company was my "must-visit" bookshop,

and since listening to the podcast, I've had pleasant flashbacks to my

pilgrimage there about a decade ago.

There was no queue outside Shakespeare and Company that day, and

inside, a blissful near silence. We browsed for a long time, exploring

the ground floor stacks as well as the library upstairs.

We bought several books, of course.Eventually, we carried our new treasures, stamped with Shakespeare and Company's iconic logo, outside and strolled across the Pont au Double, a bookish pilgrim's path if there ever was one, to Notre Dame cathedral.--Robert Gray

Gwen and Art Are Not In Love by Lex Croucher is a delightful LGBTQ rom com that takes place after the Arthurian era, in the part of England that still worships, sometimes literally, the old tale of King Arthur and the Knights of the Round Table. Here's the blurb: Heartstopper meets A Knight’s Tale in this queer medieval rom com YA debut about love, friendship, and being brave enough to change the course of history.

It’s been hundreds of years since King Arthur’s reign. His descendant, Arthur, a future Lord and general gadabout, has been betrothed to Gwendoline, the quick-witted, short-tempered princess of England, since birth. The only thing they can agree on is that they despise each other.

They’re forced to spend the summer together at Camelot in the run up to their nuptials, and within 24 hours, Gwen has discovered Arthur kissing a boy and Arthur has gone digging for Gwen's childhood diary and found confessions about her crush on the kingdom's only lady knight, Bridget Leclair.

Realizing they might make better allies than enemies, they make a reluctant pact to cover for each other, and as things heat up at the annual royal tournament, Gwen is swept off her feet by her knight and Arthur takes an interest in Gwen's royal brother. Lex Croucher's Gwen & Art Are Not in Love is chock full of sword-fighting, found family, and romantic shenanigans destined to make readers fall in love.

“Fun and genuinely funny, with lovely friendships and first-rate dialogue. Gwen and Art may not be in love, but I fell for both of them.” - Rainbow Rowell

 

I completely agree with Rowell, this is a book that will have you laughing and crying and loving all the snappy dialogue between the two protagonists, both of whom are gay and definitely not in love with each other. the prose is witty and helps the plot move along at a fantastic fast pace...you'll be at the end before you realize it. I'd give this wonderful re-told tale an A, and recommend it to everyone who ever wondered how LGBTQ people would manage their love lives in ancient England.

 

Broken Light by Joanne Harris is a suspense-filled supernatural or paranormal thriller that will keep you on the edge of your seat from the first page onward. I found myself hoping that the story would become a little less like Stephen King's Carrie and more like Harris's Chocolat, her most famous romantic novel, but though it skirted the line between thriller and horror a few times, ultimately it reigned in the ugliness to produce a somewhat sad but satisfying ending. Here's the blurb:

A bold and timely novel that explores how women can feel invisible as they grow older—and what happens when they decide to take back control.

Bernie Moon's ambitions and dreams have been forgotten by everyone, even Bernie herself. At nineteen she was full of promise, but now, facing fifty and going through the menopause, she's a fading light.

Until the murder of a woman in a local park unlocks a series of childhood memories, and with them, a talent that she has hidden all her adult life.

What happens when the frustrations and power of an older woman are finally given their chance to be revealed?

Filled with growth and redemption, revenge and visibility, friendship and self-discovery, Broken Light is an explosive new thriller that challenges our notions of womanhood and power.

Being a woman over 60 myself, I could identify with how lost and broken and invisible Bernie felt, especially by her cold and nearly autistic husband who seems to pine for "the girl of his dreams" from high school, who was Bernie's best friend until she became popular and decided to pretend her mental powers no longer existed in order to "fit in". Now Bernie is feeling isolated and alone, until she finds a group of feminist runners and decides to empower herself by getting in shape, doing some good with her telepathic powers, and by building a good life for herself without her husband. I can really relate to Bernie, as my marriage situation is also difficult and isolating. Though I don't have Bernie's power to "redirect" bad male behavior, I wish that I could show men how their misogyny affects not just the women in their lives, but women and girls everywhere...it's toxic and frightening, as Harris points out, that women have to constantly be in fear for their lives while in public or at home with men who are supposed to love them, not hurt or kill them. The last time I checked with the FBI database, one in three women/girls will be sexually harassed and/or raped/murdered in this country. As it stands now, I don't know any women who haven't experienced sexual harassment, which is disgusting and terrifying all at once. It seems every day now I read about a supposedly feminist "ally" in the entertainment or publishing business, whom I previously looked up to, who now has more than a few women accusing them of sexual harassment or rape...like Neil Gaiman, whose works I've loved over the years. It makes me angry and sad for the wives and daughters of these men, who have sunken to the level of beasts with their cruel and criminal behavior. That said, this book provides a clearer view into the hate-filled minds of these men, whose egos are so fragile and who think of women as expendable servants at best, slaves at worst. I'd give this thought-provoking work an A, and recommend it to any woman over the age of 50 who wonders what it would take to get her life back.

 

Murder at King's Crossing by Andrea Penrose is the 8th Wrexford and Sloane historical mystery. Having read them all, I can honestly say that this novel doesn't disappoint. The found family of Lord Wrex and Lady Charlotte is, as always, charming and fascinating, and the sidekick characters always on hand to provide help in gaining clues in the case. Here's the blurb: For fans of Miss Scarlet and the Duke and Bridgerton—a masterfully plotted mystery that combines engaging protagonists with rich historical detail, plus a touch of romance that readers of Amanda Quick and Deanna Raybourn will savor.

Celebration is in the air at Wrexford and Charlotte’s country estate as they host the nuptials of their friends, Christopher Sheffield and Lady Cordelia Mansfield. But on the afternoon of the wedding, the festivities are interrupted when the local authorities arrive with news that a murdered man has been discovered at the bridge over King’s Crossing, his only identification an invitation to the wedding. Lady Cordelia is horrified when the victim is identified as Jasper Milton, her childhood friend and a brilliant engineer who is rumored to have discovered a revolutionary technological innovation in bridge design. That he had the invitation meant for her cousin Oliver, who never showed up for the wedding, stirs a number of unsettling questions.

Both men were involved in the Revolutions-Per-Minute Society, a scientific group dedicated to making radical improvements in the speed and cost of transportation throughout Britain. Is someone plotting to steal Milton’s designs? And why has her cousin disappeared?

Wrexford and Charlotte were looking forward to spending a peaceful interlude in the country, but when Lady Cordelia resolves to solve the mystery, they offer their help, along with that of the Weasels and their unconventional inner circle of friends. The investigation turns tangled and soon all of them are caught up in a treacherous web of greed, ambition, and dangerous secrets. And when the trail takes a shocking turn, Wrexford and Charlotte must decide what risks they are willing to take with their family to bring the villains to justice. 

Though I do enjoy reading about the latest scientific engineering feats being created in the early 19th century, the math/science explanations about bridges and roads became tiresome as they're repeated throughout the book, and it slowed the plot down considerably. That said, the prose was sterling, and most of the plot chugged along like a steam engine, or the "Puffing Billy" as they called it at this time in history. The weasels made several appearances and I was glad when Peregrine was released from the odious racist Eton boys boarding school and returned to Wrex and Charlotte for private tutoring and expeditions to help solve mysteries. All in all, I'd give this book a B, and recommend it to anyone who enjoys Regency era mysteries.

 

The Next Best Fling by Gabriella Gamez is a romantic comedy with a plus sized Latina protagonist and an engaging "fake dating" plot to rival some of the great TV movie rom coms, like The Proposal with Sandra Bullock and Ryan Reynolds. Here's the blurb: 

Two broken hearts decide that the best way to get over their first loves is with a no-strings-attached relationship in this spicy and charming debut romance.

Librarian Marcela Ortiz has been secretly in love with her best friend for years—and when he gets engaged, she knows it’s long past time to move on. But before she gets the chance, she has a bigger problem to contend with in the form of Theo Young, ex-NFL player and older brother of the man she’s in love with. When she discovers Theo's plans to confess his feelings for his brother’s fiancée at their engagement party, Marcela is quick to stop him—despite how tempting it is to let him run away with the bride-to-be. She manages to convince Theo to sleep off his drunken almost-mistake at her place and when they arrive at a family brunch the next day together, everyone wrongly assumes they hooked up.

Since Theo needs a cover for his feelings for the bride and Marcela needs a distraction from her unrequited feelings for the groom, they decide to roll with the lie. Until one late night at a bar, they take it a step further and discover a layer of attraction neither realized existed. Soon, they find themselves exploring the simmering chemistry between them, whether in library aisles or Marcela's bed. There are no boundaries for the rebound relationship they form—just a host of complicated feelings, messy familial dynamics, and uncovered secrets that threaten to tear them apart before they can even admit to themselves that their rebound is working. Maybe a little too well.  

I loved the fact that Marcela was a librarian, and that Theo set up a special date night for her in the library, using electric or battery powered fake candles so as not to endanger her beloved books. Marcela is a huge fan of YA fiction, so that puts her in my good graces right away (I am a huge fan of YA as well). Theo also buys her an entire box of books that she's missing for her collection, which endeared him to me more than any description of his good looks. Any man who supports a woman's book habit is a keeper, IMHO. Anyway, their journey to sloughing off their manipulative and mean crushes and allow their love for one another to flourish is deliciously satisfying in the end. Gamez's prose is light and sweet, and her plot swift and engrossing...this book is a page turner that will keep your eyes glued to the page until the final scenes. I'd give it a B+, and recommend this spicy romantic novel to anyone who has fought hard to find someone real to share their life with.