The student surpasses the teacher

Over the past few months, two books I've been eagerly awaiting were released.  The first was An Echo in the Bone, the seventh in Diana Gabaldon's Outlander series.  The second was Endless Forest, the fifth, and final, book in Sara Donati's Wilderness series.  I have mentioned both of these books before in anticipation of their publication, but just finished Endless Forest and have now had some time to process both. 


I first started reading the Wilderness series because it had been recommended to me as something I would like if I liked Outlander and I still make that recommendation if someone is looking for a book like Gabaldon's.  I read the Wilderness books because I liked the Outlander books.  In the latest installments, though, something switched.  I think the Wilderness series, on a whole, has surpassed the Outlander series.  (I will now pause as I duck all the objects being thrown at me by you Outlander fans, because I know that we are a loyal and devoted bunch -- bear with me as I try to explain.)  It seems to me that over the course of the Outlander series, the story has become too big.  There are too many characters Gabaldon wants to write about, there are too many historical events she wants to include, and there are too many times and places she wants her story to be.  Particularly with the last installment, I have had an increasingly hard time feeling emotionally vested in the characters.  She's still an incredibly gifted writer and story-teller but, from my perspective, the people are less important to the story now.  Donati's books, on the other hand, have gone in the opposite direction.  While there's still historical information, her books have become less about place and time and more about the people involved. 


Endless Forest is definitely the end of the Wilderness series, while An Echo in the Bone is definitely not the end of the Outlander series. Donati is actually a pen name for Rosina Lippi, a former linguistics professor who writes more literary novels under her own name, but she has opened the possibility of telling the stories of some of Wilderness's secondary characters as Donati.   Either way, I'm eager to see where each of these two authors go from here.

Still Alice

I've been accused once or twice of becoming too engrossed in and empathizing too much with characters in books.  Not long ago, as my husband walked into the room, I promptly gave him specific instructions about what to do in the event that I ever don't recognize him or our children.  He looked at me, sighed, and asked, "What are you reading now?"  The answer was Still Alice, by Lisa Genova.  I had heard about this novel when it was chosen for the Strong Starts Great Books list and was intrigued. 

Still Alice tells the story of Alice Howland, a 49-year-old cognitive psychology professor at Harvard who is diagnosed with early onset Alzheimer's disease.  The book chronicles her descent from a mentally acute, highly intelligent professor of cognitive psychology through the rapid progression of the disease.  The author has a PhD in neuroscience and is a columnist for the National Alzheimer's Association. She uses her knowledge to craft a complete, compelling story told from Alice's perspective.  I felt a bit devastated as Alice learned that she had potentially passed on the gene for the disease to her children, as her marriage began to show the effects of her disease, and as she began to fail to recognize the things and people she valued most.  It wasn't an emotionally easy read, but it was informative, compelling, and one I highly recommend.

2010 Edgar Award Nominees

The Mystery Writers of America have announced the 2010 Edgar Award nominees.  Each year this organization awards the very best in the mystery genre from the past year.  There are four categories: Best Novel, Best First Novel By An American Author, Best Paperback Original, and Best Critical/Biographical.  Check out some of the nominees below.

Best Novel
The Missing by Tim Gautreaux
The Odds by Kathleen George
The Last Child by John Hart
Nemesis by Jo Nesbo
A Beautiful Place to Die by Malla Nunn

Best First Novel By An American Author
The Girl She Used to Be by David Cristofano
Starvation Lake by Bryan Gruley
The Weight of Silence by Heather Gudenkauf
A Bad Day for Sorry by Sophie Littlefield
Black Water Rising by Attica Locke
In the Shadow of Gotham by Stefanie Pintoff

Visit the Mystery Writers of America website for information about the awards and more of the nominees.

3rd Annual Black Quill Awards

Dark Scribe Magazine is a free, web-based publication that focuses on all aspects of dark genre literature.  This includes horror, suspense, thrillers, dark fiction and non-fiction. 

Every year for the past three years they have given out the Black Quill Awards for everything from Dark Genre Novel of the Year to best Cover Art and best Trailer.  There is an editor's choice award and a reader's choice award in each category.

Try one of the following winners and embrace your "dark side".

Dark Place by Gillian Flynn

Drood by Dan Simmons

Poe: 19 New Tales of Suspense, Dark Fantasy, and Horror Inspired by Edgar Allan Poe edited by Ellen Datlow

To get more "dark" reading ideas check out the Good Reads section on the library's website.

Heart of Darkness

I'm excited: one of my favorite authors, Peter Straub, has just released his latest novel, A Dark Matter, and I can hardly wait to get my hands on it! Hopefully that'll be soon, though I may just save myself the torture of waiting and buy it. Now if you've never read Straub, or, heaven forbid, you've never heard of him (shame on you!), then you really don't know what literary goodness you've been missing. Straub is the perfect example of a horror author--heck, an author period--who does everything right, one who takes such care with his words and who layers his dark narratives with such meaning that his books actually transcend the horror genre. "...I was conscious that horror had a great literary history," Straub points out. "Hawthorne, Henry James, Poe, many others had found a depth and seriousness in it which made horror, to me anyhow, more valid, more interesting and worthy, than the general run of mystery fiction." Straub continues the literary tradition of his forbears with A Dark Matter. Publishers Weekly calls it a "tour de force" that is "brilliant in its orchestration and provocative in its speculations....one of the finest tales of modern horror," and horror-meister himself, Stephen King, writes, "Put this one high on your list." The gist? Well, I haven't read it yet, so you'll have to make do with this:

The charismatic and cunning Spenser Mallon is a campus guru in the 1960s, attracting the devotion and demanding sexual favors of his young acolytes. After he invites his most fervent followers to attend a secret ritual in a local meadow, the only thing that remains is a gruesomely dismembered body—and the shattered souls of all who were present.

Years later, one man attempts to understand what happened to his wife and to his friends by writing a book about this horrible night, and it’s through this process that they begin to examine the unspeakable events that have bound them in ways they cannot fathom, but that have haunted every one of them through their lives. As each of the old friends tries to come to grips with the darkness of the past, they find themselves face-to-face with the evil triggered so many years earlier.  


Sound good? Mm-hmm.

Great Books - More Strong Starts

The focus on Strong Starts (great books by first-time authors) continues this month.  While you're checking out first-time books by authors, don't miss local author Martha Moody's visit.  She'll be at the Centerville Library at 7:00 p.m. on February 10.  Her first novel was Best Friends.

Some other great first novels to check out include:

The Kite Runner by Khaled Hosseini

Amidst the religious, social, and political turmoil of Afghanistan from the 1970s to the present, two young boys from different backgrounds grow up together.

To Kill A Mockingbird by Harper Lee
Six-year-old Scout Finch observes the reaction when her father defends a black man accused of raping a white woman in Depression-era Alabama.

The Story of Edgar Sawtelle by David Wroblewski
When mute Edgar is unable to save his father from death-or to prove his uncle’s culpability for it, he is forced to flee to the woods that surround his family’s dog breeding farm.

For a complete list of Strong Starts, check out the featured list here.

Nonfiction that reads like fiction

Like I mentioned in my last post, I wanted to highlight some nonfiction titles that read like fiction.  Even though I have been branching out, my first love is still a good nonfiction work.  Before you say, "Wait!  This blog is for fiction!  Get out of here!" just hear me out.  There's nothing like reading a good story and being amazed by the fact that it is actually a true story.  Here are a few to consider:

In The Zookeeper's Wife, Diane Ackerman tells the amazing story of Jan and Antonina Zabinski who sheltered 300 Jews in the Warsaw Zoo during the Nazi occupation.  Ackerman uses journals written by Antonina to write the story of these amazing people and those who helped them.

A personal favorite is Founding Brothers: The Revolutionary Generation by Joseph J. Ellis.  Ellis tells six tales that helped shape our nation.  For instance, one chapter focuses on the famous duel between Alexander Hamilton and Aaron Burr, what led to that event and how accounts of that event are different.  Another famous chapter deals with the friendship between John Adams and Thomas Jefferson, the falling out over political differences and the inevitable renewal of their friendship.

David Grann follows in the footsteps of Col. Percy Harrison Fawcett and travels to the Amazon in search of the city of Z.  The Lost City of Z: A Tale of Deadly Obsession in the Amazon deals largely with Fawcett's obsession which led to his disappearance in 1925 and Grann's later obsession with Fawcett's original mission.  This story is part character study and part mythology.

What are your favorite nonfiction books?  Feel free to post a comment and let us know!

Great Books - Strong Starts February 2010

The Great Books Great Libraries celebration continues this month with a new featured list.  February's focus is Strong Starts, highlighting great books by first-time authors.  As with all of the featured genres this year, a paper booklist is available at the Readers' Advisory table at each library, and an expanded list is available online.

Occasionally, an author bursts onto the scene with a book that makes people take notice, whether it's because they become overnight success stories or because the books is high-quality writing that brings with it the promise of many great books to follow. Several of the books selected for this month are considered classics and have been read for decades. Others are more recent but are modern-day classics sure to be read for decades to come. Finally, we've included some that slipped under the radar, but we think are great books by first-time authors that we encourage you to give a chance.

Three of the headliner books this month are:

The Alchemist: A Fable About Following Your Dreams by Paulo Coelho

When a Spanish shepherd boy dreams of a treasure in the Egyptian pyramids, he decides he must follow the trail to his dream and learns many lessons along the way.

The Gargoyle by Andrew Davidson

When the unnamed narrator’s world goes up in flames and he must spend months recovering in a burn unit, he meets Marianne Engel, a sculptor who claims they first met in medieval Germany.  (This is the book that will be discussed at the Page Turners book discussion group on February 10 at 1:00 at Woodbourne Library.) 

When the Elephants Dance by Tess Uriza Holthe
“When the elephants dance, the chickens must be careful” explains the father of a Filipino family hiding with neighbors in a basement as they attempt to ride out the final days of World War II.