What is Susan Woodring reading?

The current featured contributor at Writers Read: Susan Woodring, author of Goliath.

Her entry begins:

I am almost finished reading the Hunger Games trilogy and am completely obsessed! I first heard of these books a few years ago, when the first book came out. A friend recommended it, but I was reluctant to dive in. The premise was interesting to me, but not interesting enough. I read for character rather than plot. Don't get me wrong--I love a good story--but what really makes me feel invested in a novel or a story is being able to identify with the characters, at least on some level. To really enjoy a book, I need to feel like I, as the reader, am getting to see something really spectacular or horrifying or heartbreaking about the characters. And, so, I was at first skeptical about a book that seemed, at first glance, to be so much about what happens instead of who it happens to.

When I finally did pick up The Hunger Games, I...[read on]

About Goliath, from the publisher:

When Percy Harding, Goliath’s most important citizen, is discovered dead by the railroad tracks outside town one perfect autumn afternoon, no one can quite believe it’s really happened. Percy, the president of the town’s world-renowned furniture company, had seemed invincible. Only Rosamond Rogers, Percy’s secretary, may have had a glimpse of how and why this great man has fallen, and that glimpse tugs at her, urges her to find out more.

Percy isn’t the first person to leave Rosamond: everybody seems to, from her husband, Hatley, who walked out on her years ago; to her complicated daughter Agnes, whose girlhood bedroom was papered with maps of the places she wanted to escape to. The town itself is Rosamond’s anchor, but it is beginning to quiver with the possibility of change. The high school girls are writing suicide poetry. The town’s young, lumbering sidewalk preacher is courting Rosamond’s daughter. A troubled teenaged boy plans to burn Main Street to the ground. And the furniture factory itself—the very soul of Goliath—threatens to close.

In the wake of the town’s undoing, Rosamond seeks to reunite the grief-shaken community. Goliath, a story of loss and love, of forgiveness and letting go, is a lyrical swoon of a novel by an exceptionally talented newcomer.

Learn more about the book and author at Susan Woodring's website.

The Page 69 Test: Goliath.

Writers Read: Susan Woodring.

--Marshal Zeringue

Five best novels on women in search of themselves

Anna Quindlen's most recent book is Lots of Candles, Plenty of Cake: A Memoir.

For the Wall Street Journal she named a five best list of novels about women in search of themselves, including:

The Pursuit of Love
by Nancy Mitford (1945)

It's inevitable that there will be a sharp division of opinion about a novel with the sentence, "My uncle Matthew had four magnificent bloodhounds, with which he used to hunt his children." Thus it is with Nancy Mitford: Serious people get a pinched look at the notion that her work is worth reading. They're wrong. Mitford's portrait of a chaotic family and the unformed young woman at its center is an indelible story. Linda Radlett first marries a pompous conservative MP, then a handsome communist who "only cares for ideas." But it is an accidental meeting with a French duke that brings her to life. Biography has always overshadowed this book; Nancy was the eldest of the now-mythic Mitford sisters, who have become the literati equivalent of the Kennedy family. And the Radlett family is the Mitfords down to the ground, including the child hunts. But this is a witty, always knowing novel about sleepwalking through life and then coming awake, with an arch, airy tone ultimately belied by the reader's tendency to burst into tears in its final pages.

Read about another novel on the list.

--Marshal Zeringue

Zoë Marriott's "Shadows on the Moon," the movie

Now showing at My Book, The Movie: Shadows on the Moon by Zoë Marriott.

The entry begins:

Shadows on the Moon is hard to cast because it is set in Tsuki no Hikari no Kuni, or The Moonlit Lands - a fairytale version of Japan. All the main cast are Asian, and the male romantic lead is black. Sadly, even today you don't often see young Asian or black romantic leads in Hollywood! But I would still love to see a film of this book. The lush beauty of Japan isn't celebrated on film nearly as often as it should be, and my heart would thrill to see the imaginary world I created spring to life on screen.

In order to cast Suzume - the sheltered child of a poet who transforms first into Rin, a humble, fear-stricken drudge, and then Yue, a supernaturally beautiful courtesan who is desperate to avenge the death of her family - I need to look abroad. The Japanese actress who most brings Suzume to mind is...[read on]

Learn more about the book and author at Zoë Marriott's website and blog.

Writers Read: Zoë Marriott.

My Book, The Movie: Shadows on the Moon.

--Marshal Zeringue

Coffee with a canine: Debbie Dadey & Bailey, Skippy and Shadow

The current featured guests at Coffee with a Canine: Debbie Dadey & Bailey, Skippy and Shadow.

The author on which actors should do the voices if her dogs could speak in a movie about her life:

Bailey would be a female Morgan Freeman, Skip would be William H. Macy and Shadow would be Tim Allen after three cups of coffee....[read on]

About Trouble at Trident Academy, the first book in Dadey's new Mermaid Tales series:

It's MerGirl Shelly Siren's first day at a new school and she is nervous from the tip of her head to the end of her sparkling mermaid tail. How will she ever fit in at the prestigious Trident Academy? Everyone there is so smart and so pretty and so rich. She and her best friend Echo are in the same class, but so is Pearl, a spoiled know-it-all, who only wants to make trouble for Shelly; Rocky, a MerBoy who loves to tease everyone; and Kiki, a shy MerGirl, new to Trident City. At first Shelly and Echo have lots of fun: eating lunch together, trying to make grumpy Mr. Worm smile, and joining after-school clubs. But when Shelly and Echo have an argument about their very first school assignment, Pearl comes between them and Shelly wonders if she and Echo will ever fix their undersea friendship.

Visit Debbie Dadey's website, like her Facebook page, and check out her Twitter perch.

Read--Coffee with a Canine: Debbie Dadey & Bailey, Skippy and Shadow.

--Marshal Zeringue

Pg. 99: David Clay Large's "Munich 1972"

The current feature at the Page 99 Test: Munich 1972: Tragedy, Terror, and Triumph at the Olympic Games by David Clay Large.

About the book, from the publisher:

Set against the backdrop of the turbulent late 1960s and early 1970s, this compelling book provides the first comprehensive history of the 1972 Munich Olympic Games, notorious for the abduction of Israeli Olympians by Palestinian terrorists and the hostages’ tragic deaths after a botched rescue mission by the German police. Drawing on a wealth of newly available sources from the time, eminent historian David Clay Large explores the 1972 festival in all its ramifications. He interweaves the political drama surrounding the Games with the athletic spectacle in the arena of play, itself hardly free of controversy. Writing with flair and an eye for telling detail, Large brings to life the stories of the indelible characters who epitomized the Games. Key figures range from the city itself, the visionaries who brought the Games to Munich against all odds, and of course to the athletes themselves, obscure and famous alike. With the Olympic movement in constant danger of terrorist disruption, and with the fortieth anniversary of the 1972 tragedy upon us in 2012, the Munich story is more timely than ever.

Learn more about Munich 1972 at the Rowman & Littlefield website.

David Clay Large is professor of history at Montana State University. He has also taught at Berkeley, Smith College, and Yale University. He is the author of several acclaimed histories, including Nazi Games: The Olympics of 1936, Where Ghosts Walked: Munich’s Road to the Third Reich, and Berlin.

The Page 99 Test: Munich 1972.

--Marshal Zeringue

Ten of the best trials in literature

At the Guardian, John Mullan named ten of the best trials in literature.

One entry on the list:

L'Étranger by Albert Camus

Meursault has shot an Arab man on the beach and is put on trial for his life. The prosecuting lawyer presents the court with evidence of his lack of grief at the recent funeral of his mother. Meursault fails to contradict this account or to express the remorse demanded of him. Sentenced to death, he anticipates his public execution with a kind of relish.

Read about another novel on the list.

The Stranger is on Seán McGrady's top 10 list of philosophers' novels and R.J. Ellory's five best list of French noir fiction. Meursault is one of Marcel Berlins's six top literary killers.

--Marshal Zeringue

Pg. 69: Ed Lin's "One Red Bastard"

The current feature at the Page 69 Test: One Red Bastard by Ed Lin.

About the book, from the publisher:

In One Red Bastard, Ed Lin's thrilling sequel to the highly acclaimed Snakes Can’t Run, “reminiscent of Elmore Leonard… Compulsively readable” (Don Lee), it’s the fall of 1976. New York's Chinatown is in turmoil over news that Mao's daughter is seeking asylum in the U.S. The series hero Robert Chow is a neighborhood detective in training, and he is thrilled when his girlfriend Lonnie scores an interview with the Chinese representative of Mao's daughter. But hours after the interview, the man is found dead. Lonnie, the last person to see him alive, is the main suspect.

As Lonnie is subjected to increasing amounts of intimidation from his fellow policemen, who want to close the case, Robert is tempted to reach into his own bag of dirty tricks. Will he stay on the right side of the law, or will his loyalty to Lonnie get the better of him? Find out in this exciting and fast-paced mystery set in one of New York’s most fascinating neighborhoods.

Learn more about the book and author at Ed Lin's website and blog.

The Page 69 Test: Ed Lin's Snakes Can't Run.

The Page 69 Test: One Red Bastard.

--Marshal Zeringue

What is Nick Dybek reading?

The current featured contributor at Writers Read: Nick Dybek, author of When Captain Flint Was Still a Good Man.

His entry begins:

I haven’t read enough fiction lately, mostly because I’ve been researching a project that takes place in the aftermath of World War I. Luckily, many of the books on the subject are astoundingly good. I just finished Peter Englund’s The Beauty and the Sorrow, which completely knocked me out. The book focuses on the wartime experiences of a handful of people from all over the world—soldiers in Italy, Turkey and the Middle East; nurses in Russia, Poland and Greece; school children in Germany; bureaucrats in France. Some survive the war and some don’t.

Many of the stories are, for lack of a better word, amazing. I found myself reading entire pages aloud to my wife, and cutting off friends at dinner as I recounted the scenes. In one passage a British officer in Africa takes cover from enemy fire only to be attacked by the angry bees whose hives have been shot out of the jungle canopy. In another passage a starving Russian prisoner digs through a heap of hospital refuse for a filthy crust of bread. When a nurse takes pity on him and feeds him a bowl of soup his stomach explodes and he dies almost immediately. In yet another passage a soldier wakes from a near-death experience in an Italian hospital, certain that...[read on]

About When Captain Flint Was Still a Good Man, from the publisher:

Every fall, the men of Loyalty Island sail from the Olympic Peninsula up to the Bering Sea to spend the winter catching king crab. Their dangerous occupation keeps food on the table but constantly threatens to leave empty seats around it.

To Cal, Alaska remains as mythical and mysterious as Treasure Island, and the stories his father returns with are as mesmerizing as those he once invented about Captain Flint before he turned pirate. But while Cal is too young to accompany his father, he is old enough to know that everything depends on the fate of those few boats thousands of miles to the north. He is also old enough to feel the tension between his parents over whether he will follow in his father's footsteps. And old enough to wonder about his mother's relationship with John Gaunt, owner of the fleet.

Then Gaunt dies suddenly, leaving the business in the hands of his son, who seems intent on selling away the fishermen's livelihood. Soon Cal stumbles on evidence that his father may have taken extreme measures to salvage their way of life. As winter comes on, his suspicions deepening and his moral compass shattered, he is forced to make a terrible choice.

Visit Nick Dybek's website.

Writers Read: Nick Dybek.

--Marshal Zeringue

Five of the best books on newspaper owners

Amanda Smith is the author of Newspaper Titan: The Infamous Life and Monumental Times of Cissy Patterson.

At the Wall Street Journal, she named a five best list of books about newspaper owners.

One title on the list:

The Chief
by David Nasaw (2000)

When David Nasaw published his fittingly monumental biography of William Randolph Hearst in 2000, no major study of the newspaper magnate had appeared for four decades. With the unprecedented cooperation of both the Hearst Corp. and the Hearst family, Nasaw gained access to the Chief's previously unavailable business and personal correspondence. The result is a splendid, subtle portrait of the media mogul that allows the reader to see far beyond the "Citizen Kane" caricature. Hearst emerges not simply as a trustbusting, anticommunist, isolationist, king-making yellow journalist; or as a stupendous hoarder of paintings, mansions, newspapers and magazines; or even as a devoted husband to his wife, father to his children and long-term companion to his mistress. David Nasaw's William Randolph Hearst is all of those things but also plainly human—and more likable than expected. "The Chief" is an engrossing read that will likely stand as the definitive Hearst biography for years to come.

Read about another book on the list.

--Marshal Zeringue

Richard Harland's "Liberator," the movie

Now showing at My Book, The Movie: Liberator by Richard Harland.

The entry begins:

For the film of Liberator, the one thing I’m definite on is my director. David Fincher! Sorry, Hollywood, I just won’t accept anyone else. When Se7en came out, it blew my mind away, and I’ve admired almost everything Fincher has directed since: The Game, Fight Club, Panic Room, Zodiac, The Social Network, The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo. That’s an awesome list by any count! And Fincher has exactly the right talents for my brand of steampunk fantasy. I need his skill with action (for some huge action scenes in Liberator); I need his use of sound to create ominous atmospheres (for all the dark, brooding scenes); and I need his ability to maximise shock and surprise (for many moments of jaw-dropping revelation). Most of all, I need his visual imagination. Se7en blew me away because it used colour effects I’d never seen before in a movie: dark, glinting, metallic colours, steel and bronze and copper. Other directors have followed the same path since, but there’s still no one who can do it better than Fincher. His visual imagination is just crying out for the steampunk industrial settings of Liberator.

Seriously, I reckon steampunk is a gift to any movie director. So much amazing imagery: gaunt machines, smoke and steam, fire and sparks—and in the case of Liberator and its predecessor, Worldshaker, sheer vast scale. As in, mobile juggernauts three miles long! Think what Martin...[read on]

Learn more about the book and author at Richard Harland's website.

Writers Read: Richard Harland.

My Book, The Movie: Liberator.

--Marshal Zeringue

Pg. 99: Edward Humes's "Garbology"

This weekend's feature at the Page 99 Test: Garbology: Our Dirty Love Affair with Trash by Edward Humes.

About the book, from the publisher:

A Pulitzer Prize–winning journalist takes readers on a surprising tour of the world of garbage.

Trash is America’s largest export. Individually, we make more than four pounds a day, sixty-four tons across a lifetime. We make so much of it that trash dominates America’s place in the global economy—now the most prized product made in the United States. In 2010, China’s number-one export to the U.S. was computer equipment. America’s two biggest exports were paper waste and scrap metal. Somehow, a country that once built things for the rest of the world has transformed itself into China’s trash compactor.

In Garbology, Edward Humes reveals what this world of trash looks like, how we got here, and what some families, communities, and other countries are doing to find a way back from a world of waste. Highlights include:
• Los Angeles’s sixty-story garbage mountain, so big and bizarrely prominent that it has spawned its own climate, habitat, and tour business.
• The waste trackers of MIT, whose “smart trash” has exposed the secret life and dirty death of what we throw away.
• China’s garbage queen, Zhang Yin, who started collecting scrap paper in the 1990s and turned it into a multibillion-dollar business exporting American trash to make Chinese products to sell back to Americans.
• Artisan Bea Johnson, whose family has found that generating less waste has translated into more money, less debt, and more leisure time.

As Wal-Mart aims for zero-waste strategies and household recycling has become second nature, interest in trash has clearly reached new heights. From the quirky to the astounding, Garbology weighs in with remarkable true tales from the front lines of the war on waste.

Learn more about the book and author at Edward Humes's website.

Humes is the Pulitzer Prize-winning author of 12 nonfiction books, including a trilogy of environmental works: Eco Barons, Force of Nature, and Garbology: Our Dirty Love Affair With Trash.

The Page 99 Test: Force of Nature.

The Page 99 Test: Garbology.

--Marshal Zeringue

What is Zoë Marriott reading?

The current featured contributor at Writers Read: Zoë Marriott, author of Shadows on the Moon.

Her entry begins:

I'm the sort of person who inevitably leaves half-read books lying around everywhere, in the same way that a snail cannot help producing a silvery trail of slime. You can trace my path though life in piles of books on the stairs, stacked up next to my bed, balanced on the edge of the bath, forgotten between pots of herbs on the kitchen windowsill.

I recently finished reading - in one sitting no less! - an ARC of Sarah Rees Brennan's new YA novel Unspoken, which is a kind of modern Gothic mystery with added humour and fantasy elements. It had all the things I love about Diana Wynne Jones, like intriguing and subtle magic, jokes, twisting characterisation, and all the things I love about...[read on]

About Shadows on the Moon, from the publisher:

Sixteen-year-old Suzume is a shadow weaver, trained in the magical art of illusion. She can be anyone she wants to be -- except herself. Is she the girl of noble birth, trapped by the tyranny of her mother’s new husband, Lord Terayama? A lowly drudge scraping a living in the ashes of Terayama’s kitchens? Or Yue, the most beautiful courtesan in the Moonlit Lands? Even Suzume is no longer sure of her true identity. But she is determined to steal the heart of the Moon Prince, and exact revenge on her stepfather for the death of her family. And nothing will stop her. Not even her love for fellow shadow weaver Otieno, the one man who can see through her illusions...

Set in a faery tale version of ancient Japan, Shadows on the Moon shakes up the Cinderella story with its brave, resourceful and passionate heroine.

A powerful tale of magic, love, and revenge set in fairy-tale Japan.

Visit Zoë Marriott's website and blog.

Writers Read: Zoë Marriott.

--Marshal Zeringue

Pg. 69: Ceri Radford's "A Surrey State of Affairs"

The current feature at the Page 69 Test: A Surrey State of Affairs by Ceri Radford.


About the book, from the publisher:

Constance Harding's comfortable corner of Surrey is her own little piece of heaven. She lives in a chocolate box house complete with an Aga and a parrot, her bell-ringing club is set to dominate the intercounty tournament, and she is sure she can get her son, Rupert, to settle down if she just writes the perfect personal ad for him. Naturally, things turn disastrous rather quickly. And she's about to learn that her perfect home conceals a scandal that would make the vicar blush.

Her Lithuanian housekeeper's undergarments keep appearing in her husband's study and her daughter is turning into a Lycra-clad gap-year strumpet. As her family falls apart, Constance embarks on an extraordinary journey. From partying in Ibiza to riding bareback with a handsome Argentinean gaucho whose only English words are "Britney" and "Spears," Constance is about to discover a wider world she thought it was too late to find.

Hilarious, inventive, and ultimately heartwarming, A Surrey State of Affairs will appeal to fans of Major Pettigrew's Last Stand and the novels of Alexander McCall Smith.

Visit Ceri Radford's website and like her Facebook page.

The Page 69 Test: A Surrey State of Affairs.

--Marshal Zeringue

Coffee with a canine: Kate Quinn & Caesar

This weekend's featured duo at Coffee with a Canine: Kate Quinn and Caesar.

The author, on Caeser's role in her writing:

He's a crucial part of the creative process. I do all my writing cross-legged on the couch with a laptop balanced in my lap, and Caesar's job is to curl up against me, carefully positioned for maximum cuteness while at the same time making it almost impossible to reach either the mouse or any of my research books. It's a hard job, but he's...[read on]

Kate Quinn is a native of southern California. She attended Boston University, where she earned a Bachelor's and Master's degree in Classical Voice. A lifelong history buff, she first got hooked onancient Rome while watching "I, Claudius" at the age of seven. She wrote her first book during her freshman year in college, retreating from a Boston winter into ancient Rome, and it was later published as Mistress of Rome. A prequel followed, titled Daughters of Rome, and then a sequel--the newly released Empress of the Seven Hills--written while her husband was deployed to the Middle East.

Learn more about Empress of the Seven Hills and its author at Kate Quinn's website and blog.

Writers Read: Kate Quinn.

Read--Coffee with a Canine: Kate Quinn and Caesar.

--Marshal Zeringue

Ten of the best books about zippers

Christian Science Monitor contributor Molly Driscoll assembled a list of ten great books about zippers, including:

Zipper by Robert Friedel

Gideon Sundback, a native of Sweden who came to America in 1905, is today best known for his creation of the zipper. While working as an employee at the Universal Fastener Company in New Jersey, he expanded upon research done by other inventors such as Elias Howe into the creation of a device like the zipper. Because of his work, Sundback was given the Gold Medal of the Royal Swedish Academy of Engineering Sciences. While the engineer created a fastener in 1913 that didn't fall apart and was brought together by a single metal piece, he himself did not come up with the name "zipper" – the term was coined by the company B.F. Goodrich when they decided to put the zipper on the boots they sold as a fastener in 1923.

Friedel's book follows the history of the humble zipper, from its beginnings as a somewhat distrusted device – early models would occasionally fail or open, to the displeasure of their wearers – to its current place as one of the most memorable inventions of the twentieth century, as pop culture figures like Marlon Brando and the Rolling Stones brought it into the average American home.

Read about another book on the list.

--Marshal Zeringue

J.T. Ellison's "A Deeper Darkness," the movie

Now showing at My Book, The Movie: A Deeper Darkness by J.T. Ellison.

The entry begins:

I’ve never started a book with a preconception of the actors who may play the parts in mind, but that wasn’t the case for A Deeper Darkness. I picked the actors before I wrote the story, mostly because it’s a new series for me, with lots of new characters, and I wanted the visuals for the main characters so I could more easily identify with them in the story. I took to Pinterest to build a board of the novel, complete with important images, and even more importantly, the cast. It’s an all-star, blockbuster group, but these were the people I was imagining as I wrote the story.

Dr. Samantha Owens – Natalie...[read on]

Learn more about the book and author at J.T. Ellison's website and blog.

The Page 69 Test: A Deeper Darkness.

Writers Read: J.T. Ellison.

My Book, The Movie: A Deeper Darkness.

--Marshal Zeringue

What is Augusta Scattergood reading?

Today's featured contributor at Writers Read: Augusta Scattergood, author of Glory Be.

Her entry begins:

I'm most excited because today's mail brought an ARC (Advanced Reader's Copy) of one of my favorite author's newest middle-grade novel. On the Road to Mr. Mineo's by Barbara O'Connor has a great cover. A one-legged pigeon! Can't wait to begin. It just went to the top of my large stack.

I'm also reading...[read on]

About Glory Be, from the publisher:

A Mississippi town in 1964 gets riled when tempers flare at the segregated public pool.

As much as Gloriana June Hemphill, or Glory as everyone knows her, wants to turn twelve, there are times when Glory wishes she could turn back the clock a year. Jesslyn, her sister and former confidante, no longer has the time of day for her now that she’ll be entering high school. Then there’s her best friend, Frankie. Things have always been so easy with Frankie, and now suddenly they aren’t. Maybe it’s the new girl from the North that’s got everyone out of sorts. Or maybe it’s the debate about whether or not the town should keep the segregated public pool open.

Augusta Scattergood has drawn on real-life events to create a memorable novel about family, friendship, and choices that aren’t always easy.

Learn more about the book and author at Augusta Scattergood's website and blog.

Writers Read: Augusta Scattergood.

--Marshal Zeringue

Pg. 99: Denise McCoskey's "Race: Antiquity and its Legacy"

The current feature at the Page 99 Test: Race: Antiquity and Its Legacy by Denise McCoskey.

About the book, from the publisher:

The very ubiquity of race and racial discussions encourages the general public to accept the power it exerts as natural and to allow the process by which it has assumed such authority to remain unquestioned. In this study, Denise McCoskey explains the position of race today by unveiling its relation to structures of thought and practice in classical antiquity. This study thus attempts both to account for the role of race in the classical world and also to trace the intricate ways Greek and Roman racial ideologies continue to resonate in modern life. McCoskey uncovers the assorted frameworks that organized and classified human diversity more fundamentally in antiquity. Along the way, she highlights the noteworthy intersections of race with other important social structures, such as gender and class. Underlining the role of race in shaping the ancient world, she ultimately turns to the influence of ancient racial formation on the modern world as well, an influence mediated by the receptions and appropriations of classical antiquity, borrowings that serve to shore up modernity and its continuing, albeit complex, juxtapositions of past and present. In this deft study, McCoskey provides a touchstone for thinking more critically about race's many sites of operation in both ancient and modern eras.

Read more about Race: Antiquity and Its Legacy at the Oxford University Press website.

McCoskey is Associate Professor of Classics and an affiliate in Black World Studies at Miami University, Ohio. She has written extensively on the politics of race in antiquity, and in 2009 she won the American Philological Association Award for Excellence in Teaching at the College Level.

The Page 99 Test: Race: Antiquity and Its Legacy.

--Marshal Zeringue

Top 10 books on shopping malls

Ewan Morrison is the author of the novels Distance, Swung, and Ménage as well as the collection of short stories, The Last Book You Read.

For the Guardian, he named a top ten list of books about shopping malls, including:

The Cave by José Saramago

A late work by the Nobel prize-winning Portugese author of Blindness and The Gospel According to Jesus Christ. The mall in the story is a vast structure called The Center, in which people live while at the same time it sucks the life from the surrounding countryside and towns. Cipriano Algor, an aged potter, is put out of work by the mall and forced to abandon his livelihood. He discovers mysterious sounds of digging beneath the mall and goes on a secret journey to discover their source. What he finds is an ancient cave, hidden for millennia, with terrifying contents, which threatens to shatter the edifice on which The Center is built. A powerful allegory of the decline in community values and the dignity of human labour, by one of the great imagists of the 20th century.

Read about another novel on the list.

--Marshal Zeringue

Pg. 69: Susan Woodring's "Goliath"

The current feature at the Page 69 Test: Goliath by Susan Woodring.

About the book, from the publisher:

When Percy Harding, Goliath’s most important citizen, is discovered dead by the railroad tracks outside town one perfect autumn afternoon, no one can quite believe it’s really happened. Percy, the president of the town’s world-renowned furniture company, had seemed invincible. Only Rosamond Rogers, Percy’s secretary, may have had a glimpse of how and why this great man has fallen, and that glimpse tugs at her, urges her to find out more.

Percy isn’t the first person to leave Rosamond: everybody seems to, from her husband, Hatley, who walked out on her years ago; to her complicated daughter Agnes, whose girlhood bedroom was papered with maps of the places she wanted to escape to. The town itself is Rosamond’s anchor, but it is beginning to quiver with the possibility of change. The high school girls are writing suicide poetry. The town’s young, lumbering sidewalk preacher is courting Rosamond’s daughter. A troubled teenaged boy plans to burn Main Street to the ground. And the furniture factory itself—the very soul of Goliath—threatens to close.

In the wake of the town’s undoing, Rosamond seeks to reunite the grief-shaken community. Goliath, a story of loss and love, of forgiveness and letting go, is a lyrical swoon of a novel by an exceptionally talented newcomer.

Learn more about the book and author at Susan Woodring's website.

The Page 69 Test: Goliath.

--Marshal Zeringue

What is Kate Quinn reading?

The current featured contributor at Writers Read: Kate Quinn, author of Mistress of Rome, Daughters of Rome, and the newly released Empress of the Seven Hills.

Her entry begins:

Fear by Michael Grant. I've never been hugely enthusiastic about YA dystopian novels, but I dipped into Grant's Gone series on a whim and was instantly glued. Think Stephen King's Under the Dome crossed with Lord of the Flies - a small southern California town finds itself in turmoil when an impenetrable dome slams down around it, expelling the adults and leaving only the 15-and-under crowd inside. Chilling, inventive, and harsh; with some thought-provoking things to say about...[read on]

About Empress of the Seven Hills, from the publisher:

From the national bestselling author of Daughters of Rome and Mistress of Rome comes a tale of love, power, and intrigue spanning the wilds of the Empire to the seven hills of Rome.

Powerful, prosperous, and expanding ever farther into the untamed world, the Roman Empire has reached its zenith under the rule of the beloved Emperor Trajan. But neither Trajan nor his reign can last forever...

Brash and headstrong, Vix is a celebrated ex-gladiator returned to Rome to make his fortune. The sinuous, elusive Sabina is a senator's daughter who craves adventure. Sometimes lovers, sometimes enemies, Vix and Sabina are united by their devotion to Trajan. But others are already maneuvering in the shadows. Trajan's ambitious Empress has her own plans for Sabina. And the aristocratic Hadrian-the Empress's ruthless protégé and Vix's mortal enemy-has ambitions he confesses to no one, ambitions rooted in a secret prophecy.

When Trajan falls, the hardened soldier, the enigmatic empress, the adventurous girl, and the scheming politician will all be caught in a deadly whirlwind of desire and death that may seal their fates, and that of the entire Roman Empire...

Learn more about the book and author at Kate Quinn's website and blog.

Writers Read: Kate Quinn.

--Marshal Zeringue

Top 10 vampires in fiction and popular culture

Will Hill is a former publishing professional who lives in London. His books include Department Nineteen and The Rising.

For the Guardian, he named his top ten vampires in fiction and popular culture.

One bloodsucker on the list:

Claudia (Interview With The Vampire by Anne Rice)

Living forever is one thing. Living forever in the body of a six-year-old is quite another. And that's the future that faces Claudia, a young girl orphaned by the plague in 18th century New Orleans and taken in and transformed by Lestat and Louis, an ancient vampire and his recently-turned companion. Together they form the vampire "family" that lies at the heart of Anne Rice's gothic classic. But her desperate desire for independence and control over herself, even as she remains tragically, eternally young, gradually threatens to tear the family apart.

Read about another literary vampire on the list.

Interview With The Vampire is one of Lynda Resnick's six best books.

Also see: Kevin Jackson's top 10 vampire novels and Lisa Tuttle's critic's chart of top vampire books.

--Marshal Zeringue

Pg. 99: Robert Burt's "In the Whirlwind"

The current feature at the Page 99 Test: In the Whirlwind: God and Humanity in Conflict by Robert A. Burt.

About the book, from the publisher:

God deserves obedience simply because he’s God—or does he? Inspired by a passion for biblical as well as constitutional scholarship, in this bold exploration Yale Law Professor Robert A. Burt conceptualizes the political theory of the Hebrew and Christian Bibles. God’s authority as expressed in these accounts is not a given. It is no less inherently problematic and in need of justification than the legitimacy of secular government.

In recounting the rich narratives of key biblical figures—from Adam and Eve to Noah, Cain, Abraham, Moses, Job, and Jesus—In the Whirlwind paints a surprising picture of the ambivalent, mutually dependent relationship between God and his peoples. Taking the Hebrew and Christian Bibles as a unified whole, Burt traces God’s relationship with humanity as it evolves from complete harmony at the outset to continual struggle. In almost every case, God insists on unconditional obedience, while humanity withholds submission and holds God accountable for his promises.

Contemporary political theory aims for perfect justice. The Bible, Burt shows, does not make this assumption. Justice in the biblical account is an imperfect process grounded in human—and divine—limitation. Burt suggests that we consider the lessons of this tension as we try to negotiate the power struggles within secular governments, and also the conflicts roiling our public and private lives.

Learn more about In the Whirlwind at the Harvard University Press website.

Robert A. Burt is Alexander M. Bickel Professor of Law at Yale Law School.

The Page 99 Test: In the Whirlwind.

--Marshal Zeringue

Coffee with a canine: Chris Pavone & Charlie Brown

Today's featured duo at Coffee with a Canine: Chris Pavone & Charlie Brown.

The author, on Charlie's literary pedigree:

I was a book editor before I was a book writer, and Charlie appeared in one of the books I edited. Back when he was a puppy, I hired a well-known pet photographer named Jim Dratfield—who had published a few books of animal photos—to take some portraits of our puppy; this was my birthday present to Madeline. During the shoot Jim and I got to talking about a new project, which I ended up publishing as Underdogs—a book about non-purebred dogs—a decade ago. And even though Charlie is a pure cocker spaniel, Jim and I both wanted his photo in the book. So to avoid clashing with the book’s premise, we put Charlie’s portrait in the Acknowledgments, where he is thanked—by name!—for his role in bringing the project to fruition. All his friends were...[read on]

Among the early praise for Chris Pavone's The Expats:

“I often thought I was reading early works of Ken Follett, Frederick Forsyth, and Robert Ludlum. Smart, clever suspense, skillfully plotted—The Expats is a lot of fun to read.”
—John Grisham

“Smartly executed ... Pavone is full of sharp insights into the parallels between political espionage and marital duplicity ... Thoroughly captivating.”
—New York Times Book Review

“Bristling with suspense and elegantly crafted, The Expats introduces a compelling and powerful female protagonist you won’t soon forget. Well done!”
—Patricia Cornwell

Learn more about the book and author at Chris Pavone's website.

The Page 69 Test: The Expats.

Read--Coffee with a Canine: Chris Pavone & Charlie Brown.

--Marshal Zeringue

Meg Donohue's "How to Eat a Cupcake," the movie

Now showing at My Book, The Movie: How to Eat a Cupcake by Meg Donohue.

The entry begins:

It would be so fun to see How to Eat a Cupcake on the big--or little!--screen. I think America Ferrera would be a great Annie Quintana—she’s Latina, is winsomely feisty, and can be very funny. I think January Jones does a fantastic job playing an ice princess on Mad Men and she is a classic, Grace...[read on]

Learn more about the book and author at Meg Donohue's website and blog.

The Page 69 Test: How to Eat a Cupcake.

Writers Read: Meg Donohue.

My Book, The Movie: How to Eat a Cupcake.

--Marshal Zeringue

What is J.T. Ellison reading?

The current featured contributor at Writers Read: J.T. Ellison, author of A Deeper Darkness.

Her entry begins:

I’m reading two fantastic, and very different novels right now. The first is Game of Thrones: A song of Fire and Ice by George R.R. Martin, the epic fantasy series that is currently enjoying a smashing run on HBO. I watched the first season of Game of Thrones and was mesmerized, then a friend told me I needed to read the books. He warned of the graphic violence and the way women are used as everything from chattel to a path to the throne, but that didn’t sway me. I’ve often found that the women in these stories are clever and conniving and stronger than first blush indicates. But I turned my Dad onto them first, and he spent a month in his chair, engrossed. I’m so...[read on]

About A Deeper Darkness, from the publisher:

Into the Flood Again...

As a medical examiner, Samantha Owens knows her job is to make a certain sense of death with crisp methodology and precision instruments. But the day the Tennessee floods took her husband and children, the light vanished from Sam's life. She's pulled into a suffocating grief no amount of workaholic ardor can penetrate—until she receives a peculiar call from Washington, D.C.

On the other end of line is an old boyfriend’s mother, asking Sam to do a second autopsy on her son. Eddie Donovan is officially the victim of a vicious carjacking, but under Sam’s sharp eye the forensics tell a darker story. The ex-Ranger was murdered, though not for his car.

Forced to confront the burning memories and feelings about yet another loved one killed brutally, Sam loses herself in the mystery contained within Donovan’s old notes. Leading her to the untouchable Xander Whitfield, a soldier off-grid since his return from Afghanistan, and then to a series of brutal crimes stretching from that harsh mountainous war zone to this nation’s capital, the tale told between the lines makes it clear that nobody’s hands are clean, and that making sense of murder sometimes means putting yourself in the crosshairs of death.

Learn more about the book and author at J.T. Ellison's website and blog.

The Page 69 Test: A Deeper Darkness.

Writers Read: J.T. Ellison.

--Marshal Zeringue

Five top books on the 18th century sexual revolution

Faramerz Dabhoiwala is lecturer, tutor, and Senior Fellow in Modern History at Exeter College, University of Oxford, and is a member of the Royal Historical Society. His new book is The Origins of Sex: A History of the First Sexual Revolution.

With Toby Ash at The Browser, he discussed five top book on the 18th century sexual revolution, including:

The Journals of James Boswell
by James Boswell

James Boswell is probably best known as the author of The Life of Samuel Johnson. What do his diaries tell us about sex in his times?

Boswell’s diaries are extraordinary, and may be one of the most underappreciated set of diaries in the English language. They are in 12 volumes, and cover the period from the 1760s all the way to his death in the 1790s. What’s astonishing about them, first of all, is how incredibly self-conscious he is about everything that he does. It’s like being inside the mind of someone who is not just acting but always reflecting on what he’s doing and why he’s doing it. He does it with a very light touch – he’s a fantastic writer. Second, he is an incredibly libidinous man. He spends his life seeking out women and sexual pleasure. So his diaries give us a first-hand view of the sex life of an 18th century gentleman with a rather powerful sex drive. That in itself is fascinating.

And third, because he’s always so self-reflecting about what he’s doing, he is constantly talking to himself about having sex and what it means – why he’s so constantly attracted to these women and what he does to seduce them. He’s often attracted to women until he seduces them and then he turns away in disgust. He is fascinated by this aspect of his character, and by his inability once he’s married to contain himself. He talks about what his adulteries mean and whether he – or any man – is meant to be monogamous. The diaries are full of sexual adventure but also fascinating reflections on what sex means, and what the relationship is between sexual pleasure and the purpose of life.

The diaries contain a memorable letter he wrote to a friend in 1767 about a night he spent in a “bawdy house” with “a whore worthy of Boswell, if Boswell must have a whore”. I love that line, and I think it says a lot about the man.

The other thing about Boswell is that he knew everyone who matters in 18th century England. It’s a wonderful kaleidoscope. Through his diaries you meet all these other fascinating people, and they are all described with great immediacy. So it’s not just about Boswell, it’s about his entire society.

With his confidence and libido, how unusual was Boswell for his times? Was he a member of an elite, literary class who enjoyed pushing the social boundaries, or was the manner in which he lived more common?

He’s entirely typical of an upper class man of his time. But one of the themes of my book is the strong and increasing division of sexual morality by class and by gender. Different standards are increasingly being applied to men and women of different classes in terms of what is considered OK and what is not. So in that respect he’s not typical, because the upper classes were a tiny proportion of the general population. But he’s also typical of men more generally. This is a point in history where the old idea that women are the more lustful sex – which dominated western culture until the 17th century – is suddenly overturned and replaced by exactly the opposite presumption, that men are naturally promiscuous and can’t help it, and women are more chaste and naturally asexual. That’s another part of the great sexual revolution that happens at this time, which Boswell also epitomises.

Read about a novel that Faramerz Dabhoiwala discussed at The Browser.

--Marshal Zeringue

Pg. 99: Mary Alice Haddad's "Building Democracy in Japan"

The current feature at the Page 99 Test: Building Democracy in Japan by Mary Alice Haddad.

About the book, from the publisher:

How is democracy made real? How does an undemocratic country create new institutions and transform its polity such that democratic values and practices become integral parts of its political culture? These are some of the most pressing questions of our times, and they are the central inquiry of Building Democracy in Japan. Using the Japanese experience as starting point, this book develops a new approach to the study of democratization that examines state–society interactions as a country adjusts its existing political culture to accommodate new democratic values, institutions, and practices. With reference to the country's history, the book focuses on how democracy is experienced in contemporary Japan, highlighting the important role of generational change in facilitating both gradual adjustments as well as dramatic transformation in Japanese politics.

Learn more about Building Democracy in Japan at the Cambridge University Press website.

The Page 99 Test: Building Democracy in Japan.

--Marshal Zeringue

Pg. 69: Rosamund Lupton's "Afterwards"

The current feature at the Page 69 Test: Afterwards by Rosamund Lupton.

About the book, from the publisher:

The school is on fire. Her children are inside.

Grace runs toward the burning building, desperate to reach them.

In the aftermath of the devastating fire which tears her family apart, Grace embarks on a mission to find the person responsible and protect her children from further harm. This fire was not an accident, and her daughter Jenny may still be in grave danger. Grace is the only one who can discover the culprit, and she will do whatever it takes to save her family and find out who committed the crime that rocked their lives. While unearthing truths about her life that may help her find answers, Grace learns more about everyone around her -- and finds she has courage she never knew she possessed.

Powerful and beautiful, with a riveting story and Lupton’s trademark elegant style that made Sister such a sweeping success, Afterwards explores the depths of a mother’s unswerving love.

Learn about the book and author at Rosamund Lupton's website.

The Page 69 Test: Afterwards.

--Marshal Zeringue

What is Ginger Strand reading?

The current featured contributor at Writers Read: Ginger Strand, author of Killer on the Road:Violence and the American Interstate.

Her entry begins:

I always have two stacks of books. The one by my desk is books for my current projects. These include The Swamp, a history of the Everglades by Michael Grunwald, a biography of the physicist Irving Langmuir called The Quintessence of Irving Langmuir, Men and Volts, the classic history of GE by John Winthrop Hammond, and everything by and about writer Kurt Vonnegut. Yes, everything. I had a lot of it already, but I had to fill out my collection at the local indie bookstore and when I walked up to the counter with an armload of recently reissued books, the clerk said, “Whoa. That’s a lot of Vonnegut.” He said it like it was maybe a bad idea. Time will tell.

My second stack of books tends to...[read on]

About Killer on the Road, from the publisher:

Starting in the 1950s, Americans eagerly built the planet’s largest public work: the 42,795-mile National System of Interstate and Defense Highways. Before the concrete was dry on the new roads, however, a specter began haunting them—the highway killer. He went by many names: the “Hitcher,” the “Freeway Killer,” the “Killer on the Road,” the “I-5 Strangler,” and the “Beltway Sniper.” Some of these criminals were imagined, but many were real. The nation’s murder rate shot up as its expressways were built. America became more violent and more mobile at the same time.

Killer on the Road tells the entwined stories of America’s highways and its highway killers. There’s the hot-rodding juvenile delinquent who led the National Guard on a multistate manhunt; the wannabe highway patrolman who murdered hitchhiking coeds; the record promoter who preyed on “ghetto kids” in a city reshaped by freeways; the nondescript married man who stalked the interstates seeking women with car trouble; and the trucker who delivered death with his cargo. Thudding away behind these grisly crime sprees is the story of the interstates—how they were sold, how they were built, how they reshaped the nation, and how we came to equate them with violence.

Through the stories of highway killers, we see how the “killer on the road,” like the train robber, the gangster, and the mobster, entered the cast of American outlaws, and how the freeway—conceived as a road to utopia—came to be feared as a highway to hell.

Learn more about the book and author at Ginger Strand's website.

The Page 99 Test: Killer on the Road.

Writers Read: Ginger Strand.

--Marshal Zeringue

Top 10 "on the move" books

Segun Afolabi was born in Nigeria and brought up in the Congo, Canada and Japan. His stories have been published in various literary journals including Granta, the London Magazine, Wasafiri and the Edinburgh Review. He was awarded the Caine Prize for African Writing 2005 for his short story, 'Monday Morning'. His collection of stories, A Life Elsewhere, including the prize-winning story, was published in 2006. Afolabi's novel, Goodbye Lucille, followed in 2007.

In 2005 he named his top ten "on the move" books for the Guardian. One title on the list:

The Grapes of Wrath by John Steinbeck

The story of the Joad family from Oklahoma, driven off their farm due to soil erosion. They, along with thousands of other migrants, are forced to journey west in search of the promised land - California. A tale of the struggle between the powerful and the powerless, of hopes dashed and broken dreams, and of the search for a place to call home.

Read about another book on the list.

The Grapes of Wrath also appears on Mark O'Connell's list of the ten best songs based on books, John Kerry's list of five books on progressivism, Stephen King's five best list of books on globalization, John Mullan's list of ten of the best pieces of fruit in literature, and Honor Blackman's six best books list. It is one of Frederic Raphael's top ten talkative novels.

--Marshal Zeringue

Joseph Olshan's "Cloudland," the movie

Now showing at My Book, The Movie: Cloudland by Joseph Olshan.

The entry begins:

I feel lucky to have had at least one of my books made into a movie (Clara's Heart that starred Whoopi Goldberg) and perhaps less lucky to have had the story-line of another book stolen by a Hollywood studio and made into a television movie that was so bad I couldn't bring myself to start a legal proceeding. As Cloudland makes the rounds of the movie studios, I am imagining it as a film.

The casting of the main character, Catherine Winslow, is the most crucial because she is the one who will carry the film. Catherine is in her early forties, a seasoned yet disillusioned journalist who has given up her high-powered career to live in rural Vermont and write a household hints column. She is a highly intellectual yet damaged soul who reads voraciously and who dares to have an affair with a former student 15 years her junior. Because Kate...[read on]

Visit Joseph Olshan's website.

The Page 69 Test: The Conversion.

The Page 69 Test: Cloudland.

Writers Read: Joseph Olshan.

See--Joseph Olshan's 6 favorite books.

My Book, The Movie: Cloudland

--Marshal Zeringue

Coffee with a canine: Dan O’Malley & Sally

Today's featured duo at Coffee with a Canine: Dan O’Malley and Sally.

The author, on how he and Sally were united:

The O’Malleys are big on Westies. They are our kind of dog. Different branches of the O’Malley family, on different continents, have, without consultation, all acquired Westies. So, it had to be a Westie. Finally, there was one available at a breeder down on the coast. So, my Dad and I went on a man trip, driving for hours down steeply switch-backing roads, through rainforest, passing through tiny, strange hamlets, to...[read on]

Among the praise for O’Malley's The Rook:

“The Rook is just outrageously good. It gives us a rich secret world to play in, and a sympathetic, superpowered and frequently hilarious heroine to play in it with. What more can you ask from a novel? Reader, The Rook will capture you.”
—Lev Grossman, bestselling author of The Magicians

“Harry Potter meets Ghostbusters meets War of the Worlds. The Rook is a scintillating supernatural swashbuckler, replete with spores, slime, and unrelenting suspense — and with three intrepid heroines (two of them sharing the same body!). Daniel O’Malley’s debut is refreshingly unique in the realm of fiction.”
—Katherine Neville, author of The Eight and The Fire

“The Rook is hard to pin down — it defied my expectations at every turn. A supernatural thriller wrapped around a mystery wrapped around a cleverly constructed story of self-discovery.”
—Charles Yu, author of How to Live Safely in a Science Fictional Universe

“The Rook is a wildly inventive and at times startling hilarious debut. Part Bourne Identity, part X-Men and with a hefty dose of Monty Python, this genre-bending debut is a refreshing addition to contemporary fantasy. I can’t wait to see what surprises Daniel O’Malley comes up with next.”
—Jaye Wells, author of Red-Headed Stepchild

Visit Daniel O'Malley's website and blog.

Writers Read: Daniel O'Malley.

The Page 69 Test: The Rook.

Read--Coffee with a Canine: Dan O’Malley and Sally.

--Marshal Zeringue