Bookish links for Saturday, May 5, 2012

Posted on May 5, 2012 by CarrieK

I apologize for the lack of a links post last Saturday – I had a very busy week and no blogging mojo left come Saturday morning. :) As a result, some of these links are a couple of weeks old – and may be old news – but I still wanted to highlight the ones that stood out to me. Happy clicking!

(Also, don’t forget, I still have a copy of The Demi-Monde: Winter by Matt Rees up for grabs – first commenter gets it!

Author news:

~ NY Times: And the Winner Isn’t… – Ann Patchett explains why the Pulitzer committee’s decision not to choose a fiction Pulitzer winner means we all lose.

~ Neil Gaiman interviewed Stephen King for the UK Sunday Times Magazine, and since readers have to pay to see the content, he has graciously posted the interview for us to read.

~ Gaiman also shares his reading habits in the New York Times Sunday Book Review.

Discussion starters:

~ The Boston Bibliophile: Should adults read adult books?

Reviews and blog posts that have me adding to my to-read list:

~ Everything in This Country Must by Colum McCann, reviewed by Arti at Ripple Effects

~ A Land More Kind Than Home by Wiley Cash, reviewed by Sandy at You’ve Gotta Read This

~ Wonder by R.J. Palacio, also reviewed by Sandy

~ Absolution by Patrick Flanery, reviewed by Marie at Boston Bibliophile

~ The Language of Flowers by Vanessa Diffenbaugh, reviewed by Kathy at Bermudaonion

~ A Beautiful Place to Die by Malla Nunn, reviewed by Wendy at Caribousmom

~ Eve by Anna Carey, reviewed by Michelle at Galleysmith

Book to movie news:

~ Jennifer Lawrence is in talks to star in the film adaptation of Jeannette Walls’ brilliant memoir The Glass Castle.

~ Check out some of the first pictures from the set of Ang Lee’s adaptation of Life of Pi. I’m in the minority in that I didn’t like the book, but I’m still interested in seeing how it comes across in film.

~ Steve Kloves, the screenwriter of most of the Harry Potter films, will write and direct an adaptation of Rudyard Kipling’s The Jungle Book.

~ Henry Selick, who directed Coraline, will direct an adaptation of Neil Gaiman’s The Graveyard Book – which, coincidentally, was inspired by The Jungle Book.

Other bookish links:

~ Jennifer at Literate Housewife posted the results of her Favorite Male Narrators poll. I was glad to see that Simon Vance, one of my very favorites, made the list.

~ This “Pearls Before Swine” comic on what makes a book a classic had me chuckling.

Posted in audiobooks, movies | Tagged , , , | 12 Comments

Audiobook Review: An Impartial Witness by Charles Todd

Posted on May 3, 2012 by CarrieK

Title: An Impartial Witness
Author: Charles Todd
Genre: Mystery, historical fiction
Publisher: Harper Collins
Rating: 4 out of 5 stars
Source: Audiobook from the public library
Audiobook reader: Rosalyn Landor
First line: As my train pulled into London, I looked out at the early summer rain and was glad to see the dreary day had followed me from Hampshire.

Cover blurb: It is the early summer of 1917. Bess Crawford has returned to England from the trenches of France with a convoy of severely wounded men. One of her patients is a young pilot who has been burned beyond recognition, and who clings to life and the photo of his wife that is pinned to his tunic.

While passing through a London train station, Bess notices a woman bidding an emotional farewell to an officer, her grief heart-wrenching. And then Bess realizes that she seems familiar. In fact, she’s the woman in the pilot’s photo, but the man she is seeing off is not her husband.

Back on duty in France, Bess discovers a newspaper with a drawing of the woman’s face on the front page. Accompanying the drawing is a plea from Scotland Yard seeking information from anyone who has seen her. For it appears that the woman was murdered on the very day Bess encountered her at the station.

Granted leave to speak with Scotland Yard, Bess becomes entangled in the case. Though an arrest is made, she must delve into the depths of her very soul to decide if the police will hang an innocent man or a vicious killer. Exposing the truth is dangerous—and will put her own life on the line.

An Impartial Witness seemed to get off to a bit of a slow start for me. In order to solve the mystery, Bess needed to be in England, but, as an army nurse, it would not be realistic to have her home on continual leave for weeks on end. There was a lot of back-and-forth, as Bess returned to duty in France, and then accompanied the wounded back to London. I like the scenes where she is nursing, and so would like to see a future entry into the series take place completely out in the field – I’m sure there were plenty of intrigues that happened on the front lines.

Once I reached about the halfway point, though, the mystery took off, and I had no difficulty finding time to keep listening. The best thing about this second book is the further exploration of Bess’s relationship with Simon Brandon, a man who served under her father when he was in the military and continues to act as aide to the family and friend to Bess. As the series progresses, I have a feeling that we’ll see their relationship deepen into more than friendship, and I look forward to those developments.

The other thing I enjoyed was that I was kept guessing until almost the very end of the book as to who the murderer was. I was absolutely convinced it was one person in particular – a character who was truly a despicable person – but the authors still managed to surprise me in the end.

While I didn’t like this second book in the Bess Crawford series as much as I liked the first one, it was still an engrossing mystery that I enjoyed very much. I will definitely be reading or listening to the rest of the books in the series.

Posted in audiobooks, historical fiction, mysteries | Tagged , , | 11 Comments

Book Review: The Midnight Gate by Helen Stringer

Posted on May 2, 2012 by CarrieK

Title: The Midnight Gate
Author: Helen Stringer
Genre: Middle grade fiction, fantasy
Publisher: Feiwel and Friends
Rating: 4 out of 5 stars
Source: Review copy from the author
First line: “Mr. Evans!”

Goodreads blurb: It’s been two months since Belladonna Johnson discovered she was the Spellbinder, and she’s full of questions about her powers. When a ghost finds Belladonna and her classmate, Steve, and gives them a mysterious map, the friends don’t know if they should be looking for or hiding from the one person who holds the answers to Belladonna’s powers: the Queen of the Abyss. Throw into the mix that Belladonna’s parents, who are ghosts, have disappeared and that her brand-new and maybe even sinister foster family seems to know more than they’ll let on, and you have a sequel made of high adventure and intrigue, seasoned with affecting characters and topped with a dollop of wit.

Disclaimer: Even though we have never met in person, I consider the author, Helen Stringer, a friend. We have conversed via e-mail and Facebook, and I enjoy our interactions very much. I always promise to give you, my readers, an unbiased review of every book I feature here on Books and Movies, but I know that my personal feelings may blur the lines a bit, and wanted to make sure I give full disclosure. I really did love the book – and think you will, too – and I’m pretty sure I’d still feel that way even if I didn’t know Helen was a truly wonderful person.

Two years ago, I read Helen Stringer’s Spellbinder aloud to the kids (the link will take you to my review) and we all enjoyed it very much. Last year, Helen sent me a copy of the sequel, The Midnight Gate, but it took a while for it to rise to the top of our read-aloud stack, and the kids wouldn’t let me read it on my own. I’m so glad I didn’t, because we enjoyed the experience together.

Belladonna and Steve are characters that any child could relate to. Belladonna is different, and struggles in all the ways you would expect. Steve, who is more popular, is a bit embarrassed by his friendship with Belladonna, and unsure of what exactly his responsibilities are as Paladin. At first, the boys were quite perturbed with him, and the way he was treating her, but when things get scary, Steve steps up in support of his friend. Steve’s dialogue provides much of the humor in the book, and it’s of the type that my boys find hysterical. They especially loved the scene where he tries dragon milk. :)

There are also some great antagonists in The Midnight Gate: the Proctors are truly evil and very creepy. And then there is the Queen of the Abyss, the woman Belladonna and Steve must seek out in their quest to keep another Dark Time from descending on their world. Is she good or evil? Why is everyone in the Land of the Dead afraid of her? When the pair finally meets this mysterious woman, the reveal was fantastic – the boys were surprised and found it very funny.

While the first book definitely left room for a sequel, The Midnight Gate ends on a tiny bit of a cliff-hanger, and you know that a third book is definitely called for. The boys were disappointed to find out that it isn’t written yet, but we will be anxious to read it when it is released.

As with all British books, I find myself a bit mystified by some of the language and cultural items. It was great having Helen as a resource. The biggest question the boys had was about Belladonna’s favorite candy, Parma Violets. They weren’t too excited about the idea of a candy that tastes like flowers. :)

Posted in children's fiction, fantasy, read-alouds | Tagged , , , | 3 Comments

Book Spotlight and Giveaway: The Day the World Ends by Ethan Coen and The Demi-Monde: Winter by Rod Rees

Posted on May 2, 2012 by CarrieK

I have two review copies to give away today. After reading a little bit of both books, I realize they’re not my cup of tea – but may just be the books that one or two of you are looking for. I’ll be happy to mail each book to the first US or Canadian commenter to request it – one per person, please.

The Demi-Monde: Winter by Rod Rees: The Demi-Monde is the most advanced computer simulation ever devised. Created to prepare soldiers for the nightmarish reality of urban warfare, it is a virtual world locked in eternal civil war. Its thirty million digital inhabitants are ruled by duplicates of some of history’s cruellest tyrants: Reinhard Heydrich, the architect of the Holocaust; Beria, Stalin’s arch executioner; Torquemada, the pitiless Inquisitor General; Robespierre, the face of the Reign of Terror. But something has gone badly wrong inside the Demi-Monde, and the US President’s daughter has become trapped in this terrible world. It falls to eighteen-year-old Ella Thomas to rescue her, yet once Ella has entered the Demi-Monde she finds that everything is not as it seems, that its cyber-walls are struggling to contain the evil within and that the Real World is in more danger than anyone realizes.

The Day the World Ends: Poems by Ethan Coen: Ethan Coen’s screenplays have surprised and delighted international audiences with their hilarious vision and bizarrely profound understanding of human nature. This eccentric genius is revealed again in The Day the World Ends, a remarkable range of poems that are as funny, ribald, provocative, raw, and often touching as the brilliant films that have made the Coen brothers cult legends.

Posted in giveaways | Tagged | 6 Comments

Book Review: Deadline by Mira Grant

Posted on May 1, 2012 by CarrieK

Title: Deadline
Author: Mira Grant
Genre: Science fiction, zombie fiction
Publisher: Orbit
Rating: 4 out of 5 stars
Source: Print copy from my personal library
First line: Our story opens where countless stories have ended in the last twenty-seven years: with an idiot – in this case, Rebecca Atherton, head of the After the End Times Irwins, winner of the Golden Steve-o Award for valor in the face of the undead – deciding it would be a good idea to go out and poke a zombie with a stick to see what happens.

Goodreads blurb: Shaun Mason is a man without a mission. Not even running the news organization he built with his sister has the same urgency as it used to. Playing with dead things just doesn’t seem as fun when you’ve lost as much as he has.

But when a CDC researcher fakes her own death and appears on his doorstep with a ravenous pack of zombies in tow, Shaun has a newfound interest in life. Because she brings news – he may have put down the monster who attacked them, but the conspiracy is far from dead.

Now, Shaun hits the road to find what truth can be found at the end of a shotgun.

HUGE SPOILER WARNING: This review will have spoilers for Feed, the first book in the series. Normally, that is all the spoilers I would give in a review, but I really want to talk about some things that happen in Deadline, and so there will be spoilers for this book, too. Consider yourself warned.

When I read Feed, I discovered that Mira Grant knows how to rip you freaking heart out! First, Buffy is killed, and Shaun and George discover that she had betrayed them. Because the book was a trilogy, and Buffy was a fantastic character, I was bummed. But I at least figured that Shaun and George would make it through all three books. Wrong! At the end of the book, George is shot with a dart dipped in the virus that turns people into zombies and Shaun is forced to shoot her to stop her from converting. I was so traumatized that I wasn’t sure I wanted to keep reading! I would never have thought a zombie book could make me cry that hard.

Of course, I had to keep reading, because the world that Grant has created is amazing, and I’d been assured by other bloggers that it was really good. And it was. These books are more political thriller than zombie fiction, and I like that. The zombie virus is just a part of the world that Shaun lives in, and the action and mystery occur against that backdrop.

Shaun is still grief-stricken over the loss of his sister, George. He has had to fight his adoptive parents, who want the rights to George’s published and unpublished work. He hears George talk to him – and talks to her back, often loudly – to the chagrin of his team of bloggers and techies at After the End Times. He has no desire to go out and poke zombies for fun and ratings anymore, and so he runs the blogging syndicate from the comfort of his apartment.

When a doctor from the CDC shows up – a doctor who is supposed to be dead – and has information on the conspiracy that led to George’s murder, Shaun finds a new purpose. He and his team are determined to follow the trail, no matter where it leads, and after the losses sustained during their last venture, they have no fantasies that they will come out of this one unscathed.

Again, Grant has written a total page-turner of a novel. She has peopled the book with fantastic characters, and easily made me care about them as much as I cared about Buffy and George. The conspiracy is intriguing, and the stakes are high, and I can’t wait to see what happens in book three.

But, Grant threw in a couple of plot twists, and that’s where the spoilers come in, because I just HAVE to talk about them.

First, it is revealed that George and Shaun had a sexual relationship. When I read that particular revelation, I literally shut the book and sat on the couch, stunned, for a good five minutes. Then I e-mailed Amy and asked, “Did she really just go where I think she went?” Now, in the author’s defense, Shaun and George are not biologically related. They were adopted from two separate families by the Masons when they were small. But they were RAISED as brother and sister from that time on, and so this really creeps me out! I know their upbringing was completely dysfunctional – the Masons used them as nothing more than ratings boosters, and they had no one but each other – but I still think this is just too weird.

Second, the book ends with the revelation that George is still alive. Only, she can’t be, because Shaun blew her brains out. With the introduction of the issue of cloning in this book, though, it is obvious that the George speaking at the end of the book must be a clone. Not sure what I think about this twist, because I talked myself out of being too grossed out over the Shaun/George relationship because I knew it wouldn’t be an issue in the last book, as George is dead. Only now she’s not, and so will that be a plot line in book three? I’m really not sure how I feel about that.

If you’ve read Deadline, what did you think of these developments?

Posted in science fiction | Tagged , | 6 Comments

Winners of Bloggiversary Giveaway

Posted on April 30, 2012 by CarrieK

I didn’t forget, I promise! I just realized that I never put a deadline on my bloggiversary giveaway, but I figure two weeks have gone by, and that’s long enough. Here are the lucky winners:

…Anita Yancey, who wins her first choice: My Name is Mary Sutter by Robin Oliveira.

…Sandy, who wins her first choice: The Sherlockian by Graham Moore.

…Irene, who wins her third choice: Major Pettigrew’s Last Stand by Helen Simonson.

Congratulations! The books should be showing up in your mailboxes soon. :)

Posted in giveaways | Tagged | 5 Comments

Final read-along discussion: The House at Tyneford by Natasha Solomons

Posted on April 30, 2012 by CarrieK

Title: The House at Tyneford
Author: Natasha Solomons
Genre: Historical fiction
Publisher: Plume
Rating: 5 out of 5 stars
Source: Print copy from my personal library
First line: When I close my eyes I see Tyneford House.

Welcome to our final read-along discussion of The House at Tyneford by Natasha Solomons. (Read our previous discussions: part one, part two, and part three.) Spoiler warning: We will be discussing the The House at Tyneford in detail, both in this post and the comments section.

Wow! First, let me acknowledge that I was wrong in the prediction I made in the third discussion post – at least, in part. I was not surprised that Mr. Rivers and Elise ended up together – but I was surprised that they actually got married and made it last until their old age. I wasn’t bothered by the age difference, especially because of the way they were thrown together. Elise lost yer youth and innocence very quickly in the face of the war, and their common grief forged a bond that was stronger than the one that Elise and Kit had.

As you can see from my 5-star rating above, I thoroughly loved this book. I know that the character of Elise was divisive, with some people really disliking her, but I liked her character. I understood why she was a bit spoiled at the beginning, and the source of some of her poor decisions. And yet, she showed a strength and determination – in her own will to survive and her hope to bring her parents to Tyneford – that I couldn’t help but admire.

After I finished the book, I was perusing the author’s web site and came across some reading group questions. I thought I would post those for our final discussion. Feel free to either answer these questions, write your own thoughts, or write a review to wrap things up – just be sure to leave a link in the comments section below. And thank you so much for reading along with me – it made the experience more rewarding than it would have been if I’d read on my own.

What is your opinion of where Mr. Rivers and Elise’s relationship ends up?
I already answered that one above.

As you see it, what events led to Tyneford’s fate?
One of the scenes that impacted me emotionally was when Mr. Wrexham tells Elise that she still has her job, even after the crazy stunt she pulled at Kit’s birthday party. Wrexham tells her that she will be the downfall of Tyneford. After finishing the book, I don’t believe it was Elise that brought about the end of that way of life, but the war itself. Without the war, Elise would never have been there, they wouldn’t have lost most of the serving staff, Kit wouldn’t have been killed, and they wouldn’t have ultimately lost the house and grounds to the government.

What significance did Tyneford have to Elise, Kit, and Mr. Rivers?
Tyneford seemed like so much more than just a house or piece of property. Because it was secluded on the coast, the whole village was like a country unto itself. In many ways, it was a way of life, a livelihood, and a family. In post-war England, I don’t think it was something that would ever exist again in the same way.

Can a place like Tyneford exist in today’s world?
Oops – already answered that! I will add that I think today’s technology has made everyone so connected with everyone else – and that would make an insular community like Tyneford nearly impossible.

Why do you think the novel in the viola blank?
I have to admit that I am completely stumped on this. The only thing I could think of was that Julian wanted to give Elise something of his that would give her hope, and that was all he could think of. I did really hate the way Margot reacted to Elise after she told her about the novel – and then that the novel was blank. In the face of the war and the loss of their parents, I would think that Margot would have wanted to hold on to the only family she had left. Instead, she let something relatively minor come between them for years and years. All that wasted time makes me sad.

Posted in historical fiction, read-alongs | Tagged , | 8 Comments

The Sunday Salon – April 29, 2012

Posted on April 29, 2012 by CarrieK

Six more weeks until summer break – and it can’t come fast enough! We are all at the point in our school year when we simply want to be done, to have a break from systems of equations and dividing fractions and dangling modifiers and persuasive essays. Things will ease up a bunch in three weeks, when their enrichment classes through CVA are finished, although the end of those classes will bring a round of performances to attend.

As far as the non-homeschooling part of my life goes, everything is pretty much the same, so I don’t like to dwell on it. Kevin is still unemployed – not for lack of trying! – and our future as homeowners is still up in the air. Most days, I’m able to place it in God’s hands and walk away. Other days, I’m wringing my hands or having stress-induced dreams. I know there are people in much worse positions than we are, and so I try to be grateful for what we have and not borrow worries from the future. I’ll let you know how that’s working! ;)

I finished two “me” books this week: An Impartial Witness by Charles Todd on audio (the second in the Bess Crawford mystery series), and The Red Book by Deborah Copaken Kogan. I really liked one of them; the other – not so much. You’ll just have to wait for my reviews to find out which is which. (Or you can cheat and look at the ratings on my Books Read in 2012 page.) The boys and I also finished our current read-aloud: The Midnight Gate by Helen Stringer. It was a huge hit all around.

Today, after church, I am attending a Demarle at Home party hosted by a friend. After that, I hope to come home and get some reading time in, but we’ll see how it goes. I may just veg out in front of Frasier episodes on Netflix instead. If I do read, these are my current choices:

In print:
~ Pure by Julianna Baggott
~ Tuck Everlasting by Natalie Babbitt
~ Jayber Crow by Wendell Berry (my bedtime book)
~ Fear by Michael Grant (our new read-aloud)

On audio:
~ The Replacement Wife by Elizabeth Goudge
~ Anne of Green Gables by L.M. Montgomery (a re-read)

What are you reading this last Sunday of April?

On the blog this week:
~ Book Review: The Shoemaker’s Wife by Adriana Trigiani
~ Film Club: Babette’s Feast
~ Mini-reviews: The Little Stranger by Sarah Waters and Before I Go to Sleep by S.J. Watson
~ Confession time: I hate ambiguous endings

Posted in sunday salon | Tagged | 20 Comments