I had an enormous amount of fun putting together a list of things to make you smile in our last Five Book Friday. So I’m doing it again, because it’s snowy and February-ish, and…why not?
1) Heart and Brain Dealing With Snow:
2) The Calming Manatee. Go to calmingmanatee.com for some more words of wisdom:
3) This ridiculously beautiful poem by Nabokov…about the refrigerator making noise in the middle of the night, which contains the following lines:
a German has proved that the snowflakes we see
are the germ cells of stars and the sea life to be…
4) A quote from one of my favorite human beings, Nikola Tesla:
Of all things I liked books best.
5) New Books! Here are five new books that have scampered onto our shelves this week. Enjoy!
Travelers Rest: A genre-bending haunted house story, Keith Lee Morris’ third novel is part family saga, part science-fiction, and part horror, all set in the confines of one very weird Idaho town. While taking their troubled Uncle Robbie home from yet another stint in rehab, the Addison family find themselves caught in a freak blizzard, and are forced to stop in the derelict town of Good Night, Idaho, and its forlorn hotel, Travelers Rest. But inside the hotel, it seems that the laws of physics hold no sway, and the town itself is full of secrets. Will the Addisons be able to find their way home, and together, or will they become one of the ghastly souvenirs of Good Night? Publisher’s Weekly gave this one a starred review, saying “Expertly refurbishing an old structure, this haunted-hotel novel generates some genuine chills . . . Morris handles the spooky materials deftly, but his writing is what makes the story really scary: quiet and languorous, sweeping steadily and inexorably along like a curtain of drifting snow identified too late as an avalanche.”
Jane and the Waterloo Map: Fans of Stephanie Barron’s Jane Austen mysteries will be delighted to hear that her thirteenth tale is ready for circulation today–and it is high time that new readers discover this clever series. Written in the form of the great Miss Austen’s diaries, this adventure sees Jane finishing the proofs for Emma, while staying at the home of her beloved brother, Henry. While touring Buckingham Palace, Jane stumbles upon a dying man whose last words are “Waterloo Map”–and the stage is set for an investigation that delighted the readers at Library Journal, who noted “Barron deftly imitates Austen’s voice, wit, and occasional melancholy while spinning a well-researched plot that will please historical mystery readers and Janeites everywhere. Jane Austen died two years after the events of Waterloo; one hopes that Barron conjures a few more adventures for her beloved protagonist before historical fact suspends her fiction.”
The Firebrand and the First Lady: This book, a ground-breaking work that details the friendship between Eleanor Roosevelt (a woman whose lineage allowed her into the Daughters of the American Revolution) and a writer-activist (whose grandfather was a slave), took Patricia Bell-Smith twenty years to research and write, but its very clear that the results are worth the lifetime of effort. Pauli Murray met the Eleanor Roosevelt in 1933, at the housing camp where Murray was living, but it was the letter she wrote five years later, protesting racial segregation in the American South after she was denied admission to University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill (a school that prided itself on its socially-progressive policies) because of her race that brought the two women together. Murray would go on to co-found the National Organization for Women, and become the first African-American Episcopalian Priest, while Eleanor Roosevelt would go on to become the first chair of the UN Council on Human Rights, but this book shines a light on their personal relationship, and how it changed both their lives. Booklist gave the book a starred review, hailing it as a “sharply detailed and profoundly illuminating . . . Bell-Scott’s groundbreaking portrait of these two tireless and innovative champions of human dignity adds an essential and edifying facet to American history.”
The High Mountains of Portugal: It’s been fifteen years since Yann Martel published The Life of Pi, but, all signs point to the fact that this second novel was well worth the wait. The setting this time is Lisbon, in 1904, and our hero is Tomás, who discovers an old journal that may very well help re-write history, if he can track down the artifact described within its pages. While Tomás sets off in one of the first automobiles ever made, the story speeds ahead fifty years to a grieving Canadian diplomat, who has arrived in Portugal following the death of his beloved wife. You’ll have to check out the book itself to understand how the two narratives are linked, and what magic tricks Martel will pull off in the midst of it all, but the Wahington Post has no qualms in ordering everyone to ““Pack your bag…Yann Martel is taking us on another long journey….but the itinerary in this imaginative new book is entirely fresh. . . . Martel’s writing has never been more charming, a rich mixture of sweetness that’s not cloying and tragedy that’s not melodramatic. . . . The High Mountains of Portugal attains an altitude from which we can see something quietly miraculous.”
Coconut Cowboy: Tim Dorsey’s beloved Serge Storm is back in this wild road trip across the Florida panhandle in a search for the American Dream, as he attempted to finish the journey begun by his freewheeling heroes, Captain America and Billy, which was cut short after their murder. Along with his side-kick, the drug-riddled Coleman, trivia-nerd and Florida aficionado Serge are on the road again in a tale full of their hallmark weirdness and oddly touching friendship. The Tampa Bay Times raved about this latest installment, saying “The Serge books are often hilarious, but there’s always something serious underpinning the antics”, while the Providence Journal cheered that this is “one of his funniest and most deftly plotted yet.”