Here are a few reasons to celebrate today:
1) Yesterday was the 365th anniversary of the founding of the City of Boston, which clearly calls for a celebratory Dunkin’ Donuts.
2) Today is the 206th birthday of the Royal Opera House in London (the first performance was Shakespeare’s Macbeth, a number of versions of which you can check out this weekend, too!)
3) It is also the birthday of Dr. Samuel Johnson, who gave us the first dictionary of the English language in 1755
4) It is also Greta Garbo‘s birthday, though she was 196 years younger than the good Dr. Johnson (but you can check out her films at the library, as well!)
5) It’s Friday, which is always a call for a celebration, and an excellent reason to come and see the new books we have in stock for your weekend! Here are five suggestions to get you started:
Did You Ever Have a Family: Debut author Bill Clegg’s small-scale epic novel, which was long-listed for the Man Booker Prize, is now available in the US, and is currently being smothered in positive reviews from outlets as varied as Buzzfeed to the Library Journal. June Reid’s life was forever changed by a sudden disaster that killed her entire family on the eve of her daughter’s wedding. With nothing left, June begins driving aimlessly across the country, encountering people similarly touched by tragedy, running from their pasts, or united in a shared heartbreak. By alternating chapters between June and the people she encounters on her journey, Clegg is able to examine each character’s pain and humanity in a way that Booklist calls “delicately lyrical and emotionally direct…offering consolation in small but meaningful gestures. Both ineffably sad and deeply inspiring, this mesmerizing novel makes for a powerful debut.”
The Art of Natural Cheese-making: I’ll be honest, finding this book did induce a momentary Wallace-and-Gromit-esque exclamation of joy that earned me some odd looks, but I don’t mind, because David Asher’s book is well worth the effort. The creator of the Black Sheep School of cheesemaking, Asher’s gift for teaching comes through in these pages as clearly as his love for his craft. Most impressively here is Asher’s reliance on fairly-easy-to-find ingredients and techniques that actually make the idea of producing your own delicious cheeses a possibility, even for novices. Richard McCarthy of SlowFoodUSA has called this a “a breakthrough book. …The more we remove the mystery to manufacturing even the simplest of cheeses at home, the more we will come to admire the craftsmanship that dairy farmers and artisanal cheesemakers bring to their work, to make life better and tastier for the rest of us.”
Two Years Eight Months and Twenty-Eight Nights: Salman Rushdie’s newest collection of short stories was a best-seller before it’s actual release, and now it is also the selection for the library’s months Sci-Fi Book Group (give us a call for more information!) In a collection that showcases Rushdie’s seemingly boundless imagination, the descendants of Dunia, princess of the jinn, have been let loose on the world, each playing a part in a coming war between light and dark. These stories harken to the grand Thousand and One Nights, as the title implies, but Rushdie’s twist on the title may give you some indication of just how atypical this book really is. The Washington Post cheers, “Rushdie conjures up a whole universe of jinn slithering across time and space, meddling in human affairs and copulating like they’ve just been released from twenty years in a lamp. . . . Two Years Eight Months and Twenty-Eight Nights translates the bloody upheavals of our last few decades into the comic-book antics of warring jinn wielding bolts of fire, mystical transmutations and rhyming battle spells.”
House of Thieves: Architect Charles Belfoure’s debut novel is being lauded by fans of historic mysteries as a near-perfect blend of period detail and complex sleuthing. His hero, John Cross (also, not too surprisingly, an architect) has been forced to pay off his son’s enormous gambling debts by using his professional knowledge, and arranging break-ins that no police detective will be able to solve. Cross’ personal and professional lives are both in jeopardy in this page-turner that has already been making the rounds of our staff, and which earned a Starred Review from Publisher’s Weekly, which said, “Belfoure’s sly, roguish writing opens a window to those living both gilded and tarnished lives… Best of all, Belfoure holds together each and every thread of the novel, resulting in a most memorable, evocative read.”
The Year of Fear: Machine-Gun Kelly and the Manhunt That Changed the Nation: Though I’ve grown a little wary of books that talk about how ‘the nation’ was changed, this book seems to be the real deal. First-time author Joe Urschel, the Executive Director of the Law Enforcement Museum in Washington, D.C., has penned a story of the Depression, when gangsters were hailed as heroes for bringing down the wealthy. In 1933, Machine-Gun Kelly and his wife Kathryn, were planning to kidnap noted oil tycoon Charles Urschel (bizarrely, no relation to the author). J.Edgar Hoover had his FBI lawmen had been given sole authority to chase gangsters across state lines, but when he bungled the arrest of the Kelly’s, a 20,000 mile road-chase ensued across 16 states that made headlines across the nation. The Library Journal gave this real-life historic thriller a starred review, and the Associated Press raves, “the narrative reads like the most nail-biting thriller imaginable — yet it’s all true. . . . Urschel does an amazing job chronicling a time in history that was rough for those that lived it while making the events extremely readable.”
So there you have it, beloved patrons. Happy reading, and happy weekend to you all!