Trailer Thursday: American Rose

American Rose: A Nation Laid Bare: The Life and Times of Gypsy Rose Lee - Karen Abbott

This is the gripping and expansive story of America's coming-of-age--told through the extraordinary life of Gypsy Rose Lee and the world she survived and conquered. America in the Roaring Twenties. Vaudeville was king. Talking pictures were only a distant flicker. Speakeasies beckoned beyond dimly lit doorways; money flowed fast and free. But then, almost overnight, the Great Depression leveled everything. When the dust settled, Americans were primed for a star who could distract them from grim reality and excite them in new, unexpected ways.

Enter Gypsy Rose Lee, a strutting, bawdy, erudite stripper who possessed a preternatural gift for delivering exactly what America needed. With her superb narrative skills and eye for compelling detail, Karen Abbott brings to vivid life an era of ambition, glamor, struggle, and survival. Using exclusive interviews and never-before-published material, she vividly delves into Gypsy's world, including her intensely dramatic triangle relationship with her sister, actress June Havoc, and their formidable mother, Rose, a petite but ferocious woman who seduced men and women alike and literally killed to get her daughters on the stage. American Rose chronicles their story, as well as the story of the four scrappy and savvy showbiz brothers from New York City who would pave the way for Gypsy Rose Lee's brand of burlesque. Modeling their shows after the glitzy, daring reviews staged in the theaters of Paris, the Minsky brothers relied on grit, determination, and a few tricks that fell just outside the law--and they would shape, and ultimately transform, the landscape of American entertainment. With a supporting cast of such Jazz- and Depression-era heavyweights as Lucky Luciano, Harry Houdini, FDR, and Fanny Brice, Karen Abbott weaves a rich narrative of a woman who defied all odds to become a legend--and whose sensational tale of tragedy and triumph embodies the American Dream.

Question of the Week

What book made you want to travel?

Adriana Trigiani's The Shoemaker's Wife tells the story of Enza and Ciro.  It spans the first few decades of the 20th Century.  Ciro is orphaned by the death of his father and his mother's subsequent inability to cope emotionally.  By chance, he meets a girl named Enza, who comes from a large and loving family.  The two have an immediate connection.  Fate and serendipity play a part in the rest of the story.  And what a story! 

This literary journey begins in the Italian Alps, traverses the Atlantic Ocean, meanders through the streets of Little Italy, spends several nights at the opera with none other than Enrico Caruso, then treks to Minnesota's mining country.  Along the way, intrepid travelers Ciro and Enza take readers to the highest peak and the lowest valley.

Buon viaggio!

Don't you just love a happy ending?

Ann Cleeves' Shetland Quartet series about Shetland native policeman Jimmy Perez is a particular favorite of mine, though I doubt the endings would be termed "happy."   

The series begins with Raven Black, the first winner of the Duncan Lawrie Dagger Award for the best crime novel of the year.  In it, Jimmy Perez is called on to investigate the murder of a teenage girl.  She's found by Fran, an aspiring artist and single mother.   Fran is alerted to the presence of the body by a splash of color on the snowy ground and a murder of crows (the collective noun for a group of crows) circling the area. 

I've been putting off reading the fourth book in the series.  Why? Because I didn't want to come to the end of this gritty, suspenseful series. I got a lovely surprise when I discovered there will be a fifth in the newly-dubbed Shetland series.   Now that's a happy ending.

Question of the Week

Do you ever go back and re-read books you've enjoyed in the past?

If you're like me, you have a stack of books a mile high waiting to be read - and no time to get to them all!  There have been certain books that I've revisited over the years, but the one that really got me was Watership Down by Richard Adams.  I've read it five times!  Other books I've gone back to read a second time, but the classic tale of rabbits fighting for survival against human encroachment and evil rabbits drew me back again and again.

What favorites have you been compelled to read again and again?

Trailer Thursday: Existence

Want to know what humanity's future looks like? Pick up a science fiction novel to find out. This genre gives readers many possible futures to ponder. Here's one such novel: 

Existence - David Brin
Gerald Livingston is an orbital garbage collector. For a hundred years, people have been abandoning things in space, and someone has to clean it up. But there’s something spinning a little bit higher than he expects, something that isn’t on the decades’ old orbital maps. An hour after he grabs it and brings it in, rumors fill Earth’s infomesh about an “alien artifact.”

Thrown into the maelstrom of worldwide shared experience, the Artifact is a game-changer. A message in a bottle; an alien capsule that wants to communicate. The world reacts as humans always do: with fear and hope and selfishness and love and violence. And insatiable curiosity.

Graphic Non-fiction

I'll be honest - my first introduction to graphic novels was Japanese manga, and to this day I'm just not interested.  The art style is so unappealing to me that I'm not willing to consider the stories either.  I pretty much wrote off graphic novels as a format that I'd want to read.

Over the last few years however, there have been more and more non-manga graphic novels published and I have grown to really enjoy them.  Graphic novel is sort of a catch-all term used to describe these works, but that's not quite right because there are a lot of graphic non-fiction works as well.  This is where it really gets fun for me, because I enjoy reading non-fiction and I'm a pretty visual person.  I've read memoirs, biographies, science, and even true crime in graphic form.  That's right, true crime!

Here are three titles I've particularly enjoyed.

My Friend Dahmer - Derf Backderf

You only think you know this story. In 1991, Jeffrey Dahmer--the most notorious serial killer since Jack the Ripper--seared himself into the American consciousness. To the public, Dahmer was a monster who committed unthinkable atrocities. To Derf Backderf, "Jeff" was a much more complex figure: a high school friend with whom he had shared classrooms, hallways, and car rides. In My Friend Dahmer, a haunting and original graphic novel, writer-artist Backderf creates a surprisingly sympathetic portrait of a disturbed young man struggling against the morbid urges emanating from the deep recesses of his psyche--a shy kid, a teenage alcoholic, and a goofball who never quite fit in with his classmates. With profound insight, what emerges is a Jeffrey Dahmer that few ever really knew, and one readers will never forget.

 Feynman - Jim Ottaviana

Richard Feynman: physicist . . . Nobel winner . . . bestselling author . . . safe-cracker. In this substantial graphic novel biography, First Second presents the larger-than-life exploits of Nobel-winning quantum physicist, adventurer, musician, world-class raconteur, and one of the greatest minds of the twentieth century: Richard Feynman. Written by nonfiction comics mainstay Jim Ottaviani and brilliantly illustrated by First Second author Leland Myrick, Feynman tells the story of the great man's life from his childhood in Long Island to his work on the Manhattan Project and the Challenger disaster. Ottaviani tackles the bad with the good, leaving the reader delighted by Feynman's exuberant life and staggered at the loss humanity suffered with his death. Anyone who ever wanted to know more about Richard P. Feynman, quantum electrodynamics, the fine art of the bongo drums, the outrageously obscure nation of Tuva, or the development and popularization of the field of physics in the United States need look no further than this rich and joyful work.

Marbles: Mania, Depression, Michaelangelo, & Me - Ellen Forney

Cartoonist Ellen Forney explores the relationship between "crazy" and "creative" in this graphic memoir of her bipolar disorder, woven with stories of famous bipolar artists and writers. Shortly before her thirtieth birthday, Forney was diagnosed with bipolar disorder. Flagrantly manic and terrified that medications would cause her to lose creativity, she began a years-long struggle to find mental stability while retaining her passions and creativity. Searching to make sense of the popular concept of the crazy artist, she finds inspiration from the lives and work of other artists and writers who suffered from mood disorders, including Vincent van Gogh, Georgia O'Keeffe, William Styron, and Sylvia Plath. She also researches the clinical aspects of bipolar disorder, including the strengths and limitations of various treatments and medications, and what studies tell us about the conundrum of attempting to "cure" an otherwise brilliant mind. Darkly funny and intensely personal, Forney's memoir provides a visceral glimpse into the effects of a mood disorder on an artist's work, as she shares her own story through bold black-and-white images and evocative prose.


See - even the reviewers have a hard time letting go of the word "novel" when they describe these books!

Trailer Thursday: Obsidian Prey

Sometimes the animals companions steal the show in a book. This book trailer features one such creature, Vincent the dust bunny.

Obsidian Prey - Jayne Castle
Three months ago, amber tuner and independent prospector Lyra Dore made the find of the decade in an underground rain forest: amethyst ruins. But the very man she was dating stole her claim--and her heart. At least she has her artistically talented dust bunny, Vincent, to comfort her.

Amber Inc., CEO Cruz Sweetwater never meant to hurt Lyra. His affinity for obsidian amber gives him the ability to sense that she is his true love, but the ruins have mysterious powers, putting everyone involved with the project in danger. Only by trusting their psychic instincts will Cruz and Lyra survive--and surrender to the desire that binds them.

Question of the Week

What was the last book you read that made you want to drink?

Mine was a double! 

  The Drunken Botanist by Amy Stewart.

I loved this romp through trees, bushes, herbs, etc.  I will never look at a forest the same.  My favorite?  Bison Grass Cocktail!

  Champagne: A Global History by Becky Sue Epstein 

I also love bubbly.  Or, more precisely, the history of it.  I am now convinced that I must learn the art of sabrage...opening up a champagne bottle with a sabre!

Reading Out Loud

We probably can remember at least one fond memory of having someone read to us when we were a child...either a bedtime story by a parent or a new chapter by your second grade teacher. 

But, as an adult, we don’t often have the pleasure of listening to a story read to us unless it is on CD or an MP3 player.  While audiobooks are great -- I often have one going in my car -- it isn’t the same as a friend, partner or spouse reading to you, a whole story from cover to cover. 

Recently, I was reading in bed and just fell in love with a sentence that I had to share.  My husband, who was brushing his teeth at the time, was my target.  “Hey listen to this,” I yelled.  He, the smart spouse that he is, listened and admired it appropriately.  Surprisingly he then said, “What did he say after that?”

And, we were off!  What a joy for both of us.  We do not share the same interest in books...me of the Austen ilk and he of the sports biography.  But, that is part of the fun...listening to a book you probably would never read.

So, my husband got to hear The Chemistry of Tears by Peter Carey and right now I am hearing Giants Among Men by Jack Cavanaugh. 

 

 

Trailer Thursday: Red Rain

R. L. Stine writes creepy novels. I adored his Fear Street series as a teen, and one of his horror novels for adults, Superstitious, is still one of the scariest books I've ever read. He recently wrote a new horror novel...

Red Rain - R. L. Stine
Travel writer Lea Sutter finds herself on a small island off the coast of South Carolina, the wrong place at the wrong time. A merciless, unanticipated hurricane cuts a path of destruction through the island and Lea barely escapes with her life. In the storm’s aftermath, she discovers two orphaned boys—twins. Filled with a desire to do something to help, to make something good of all she witnessed, Lea impulsively decides to adopt them. The boys, Samuel and Daniel, seem amiable and immensely grateful; Lea’s family back on Long Island—husband Mark, a child psychologist, and their two children, Ira and Elena—aren’t quite so pleased. But even they can’t anticipate the twins’ true nature—or predict that, within a few weeks’ time, Mark will wind up implicated in two brutal murders, with the police narrowing in.

Question of the Week

What book made you laugh out loud?

I love it when a book causes a reaction like that. Even though I might grin while reading something like Bossypants, for example, it’s rare for me to laugh loud enough for people around me to hear. I recently read a fiction book that made me laugh in horror at the circumstances in the story. In Care of Wooden Floors by Will Wiles, a British copywriter agrees to housesit in an eastern European country for his uptight, perfectionist composer friend. The instructions he receives upon arrival are to under no circumstances let anything happen to the precious wooden floors that were installed in the flat. Over the course of a week, the housesitter endures one disaster after another in this quirky tale. What books have made you laugh out loud?

 

 

 

Top Chef

I have to admit I don't cook. It's much less stressful for me to go to a restaurant or pick up something pre-made at the grocery store; however, I am completely hooked on cooking shows and competitions. I would love to be able to make the creative dishes I see on tv. Maybe someday soon I’ll take a cooking class, but in the meantime, I’m content to read books by chefs and to envy the skilled competitors on my shows. My favorite cooking show is Top Chef, and the 10th season was my favorite because it took place in Seattle.



 

The finale aired last week. Did you watch it? Are there other cooking shows that you prefer? Sno-Isle owns books by each of the Top Chef judges--Tom Colicchio, Padma Lakshmi, and Gail Simmons--as well as the new book by Richard Blais, winner of Top Chef All Stars.

 

 

 

 

Revisiting the Classics

Publishers Weekly has a great article this week called 10 Classic Books You Read in High School You Should Reread by Kevin Smokler, the author of the new book Practical Classics: 50 Reasons to Reread 50 Books You Haven't Touched Since High School (we don't have this yet, alas).  I think it is pretty flattering to most of us that he thinks we made it through 50 classics while in high school.  Maybe I hit that many by the end of college, but I wasn't tearing through them like crazy as a teen.

But I think he has a good point.  Just because you checked a classic off your list a few years/decades ago, doesn't mean you should be done with it forever.  I am not a fan of rereading books...there are so many new ones I want to tackle!  But the times I have taken the time to go back and revisit classics, I'm amazed by how different they are than I remember.  And that is because when you reread you bring new things to the book...your own broader perspective and gained experiences.  The two books that come to mind for me that I loved even more when I reread them as an adult:

To Kill a Mockingbird by Harper Lee.  As a teen this was pure history to me, oldy time things happening to oldy time people.  Now I read it with enormous respect for Atticus Finch as a character and a father, and someone I hold in high esteem.  I worry more for the kids in the book, and I have more context for the struggles and evolution their culture is going through.

A Room with a View by E.M. Forster.  I distinctly remember picking this up as a teen because it was short and I heard it was romantic.  Both these things remain true, but what really surprised me was just how funny this book is...it is filled with quiet humor that went completely over my head the first time around, but was just delightful when I listened to it on audiobook (I've linked to the cd here).

What classics have you re-discovered in your grown-up years?  Which books have you been meaning to re-read, but just haven't gotten around to it?