Wednesday, September 30, 2015

What is Ruth Galm reading?

Featured at Writers Read: Ruth Galm, author of Into the Valley.

Her entry begins:
I just finished Colin Winnette’s Haints Stay, which staggered me. It’s often a brutally violent book, but that was fine with me because I loved how this rash physicality and the shifting identities and protagonists unsettled me. This jarred and unsafe feeling also twines with a way the novel, for all its use of genre, lifts us out of any known world into a kind of dreamscape, or “voidscape” maybe; I deeply admired this effect. (I read an interview with Winnette after I finished and learned the term “acid Western” for the first time; now I realize I’m a sub-genre fan.) And also Winnette’s stark, recursive sentences sometimes floored me: “Things changed in town. They changed often. There was no use fighting it. What they did was, they found a way and worked it until they worked a new one.” I will...[read on]
About Into the Valley, from the publisher:
Ruth Galm’s spare, poetic debut novel, set in the American West of early Joan Didion, traces the drifting path of a young woman as she skirts the law and her own oppressive anxiety.

Into the Valley opens on the day in July 1967 when B. decides to pass her first counterfeit check and flee San Francisco for the Central Valley. Caught between generations and unmarried at 30, B. doesn’t understand the new counterculture youths. She likes the dresses and kid gloves of her mother’s generation, but doesn’t fit into that world either.

B. is beset by a disintegrative anxiety she calls “the carsickness,” and the only relief comes in handling illicit checks and driving endlessly through the valley. As she travels the bare, anonymous landscape, meeting an array of other characters—an alcoholic professor, a bohemian teenage girl, a criminal admirer—B.’s flight becomes that of a woman unraveling, a person lost between who she is and who she cannot yet be.
Visit Ruth Galm's website.

Writers Read: Ruth Galm.

--Marshal Zeringue

Eight of the best fictional travel companions

At B & N Reads, Jenny Kawecki tagged eight fictional characters who would make the best travel companions, including:
Merry and Pippin (The Lord of the Rings series, by J.R. R. Tolkien)

With Merry and Pippin on your trip, you’ll never get bored. In between pulling pranks on each other (and you) when things get a little slow, you know they’d be finding all of the best places to eat and drink along the way. And because they, like you, understand the importance of every meal (including elevensies), you’d never have to feel guilty about wanting to stop for a snack. Besides all that, with their cheerful dispositions, they’d never complain about the weather or the lines or the dingy motel rooms—and definitely not about the lack of legroom.
Read about another entry on the list.

The Lord of the Rings also made Kimberley Freeman's list of five books that changed her, SF Said's top ten list of unlikely heroes, Nicole Hill's top eight list of notable royal figures in fiction, Becky Ferreira's top seven list of bromances in literature, Nicole Hill's list of eleven of the most eccentric relatives in fiction, Nicole Hill's top seven list of literary wedding themes, Charlie Jane Anders's list of fifteen moments from science fiction and fantasy that will make absolutely anyone cry, Elizabeth Wein's top ten list of dynamic duos in fiction, Katharine Trendacosta and Charlie Jane Anders's list of the ten sources that inspired the dark storytelling of Game of Thrones, Rob Bricken's list of 11 preposterously manly fantasy series, Conrad Mason's top ten list of magical objects in fiction, Linus Roache's six best books list, Derek Landy's top ten list of villains in children's books, Charlie Jane Anders and Michael Ann Dobbs' list of ten classic SF books that were originally considered failures, Lev Grossman's list of the six greatest fantasy books of all time, and appears on John Mullan's lists of ten of the best women dressed as men, ten of the best bows and arrows in literature, ten of the best beards in literature, ten of the best towers in literature, ten of the best volcanoes in literature, ten of the best chases in literature, and ten of the best monsters in literature. It is one of Salman Rushdie's five best fantasy novels for all ages. It is a book that made a difference to Pat Conroy.

--Marshal Zeringue

Pg. 69: Polly Dugan's "The Sweetheart Deal"

Featured at the Page 69 Test: The Sweetheart Deal by Polly Dugan.

About The Sweetheart Deal, from the publisher:
The poignant story of what happens when a woman who thinks she's lost everything has the chance to love again.

Leo has long joked that, in the event of his death, he wants his best friend Garrett, a lifelong bachelor, to marry his wife, Audrey. One drunken night, he goes so far as to make Garrett promise to do so. Then, twelve years later, Leo, a veteran firefighter, dies in a skiing accident.

As Audrey navigates her new role as widow and single parent, Garrett quits his job in Boston and buys a one-way ticket out west. Before long, Audrey's feelings for Garrett become more than platonic, and Garrett finds himself falling for Audrey, her boys, and their life together in Portland. When Audrey finds out about the drunken pact from years ago, though, the harmless promise that brought Garrett into her world becomes the obstacle to his remaining in it.
Visit Polly Dugan's website, Facebook page, and Twitter perch.

My Book, The Movie: The Sweetheart Deal.

Coffee with a Canine: Polly Dugan & Tripp.

Writers Read: Polly Dugan.

The Page 69 Test: The Sweetheart Deal.

--Marshal Zeringue

Virginia Baily's "Early One Morning," the movie

Featured at My Book, The Movie: Early One Morning by Virginia Baily.

The entry begins:
This is a work in progress and so far I have only managed to cast three of the main characters. I have however suggested minor parts to some young drama students I know if the book is ever made into a movie!

I have chosen Isabella Rossellini to play my main character, Chiara Ravello. She looks the part, dark-haired and elegant and is of mixed Italian heritage. She would be able to convey Chiara’s resilience and her vulnerability and also, whether she knows it or not, she already has a strong connection to the story. Her father Roberto Rossellini directed the 1945 film Rome, Open City, set in Rome during the German occupation, which helped inspire...[read on]
Learn more about Early One Morning at the publisher's website.

My Book, The Movie: Early One Morning.

--Marshal Zeringue

Tuesday, September 29, 2015

Pg. 99: Christopher Hemmer's "American Pendulum"

Featured at the Page 99 Test: American Pendulum: Recurring Debates in U.S. Grand Strategy by Christopher Hemmer.

About the book, from the publisher:
As new presidential administrations come into power, they each bring their own approach to foreign policy. No grand strategy, however, is going to be completely novel. New administrations never start with a blank slate, so it is always possible to see similarities between an administration and its predecessors. Conversely, since each administration faces novel problems and operates in a unique context, no foreign policy strategy is going to be an exact replica of its predecessors. In American Pendulum, Christopher Hemmer examines America's grand strategic choices between 1914 and 2014 using four recurring debates in American foreign policy as lenses. First, how should the United States balance the trade-offs between working alone versus working with other states and international organizations? Second, what is the proper place of American values in foreign policy? Third, where does the strategic perimeter of the United States lie? And fourth, is time on the side of the United States or of its enemies?

Offering new readings of debates within the Wilson, Truman, Nixon, Bush, and Obama administrations, Hemmer asserts that heated debates, disagreements, and even confusions over U.S. grand strategy are not only normal but also beneficial. He challenges the claim that uncertainties or inconsistences about the nation's role in the world or approach to security issues betray strategic confusion or the absence of a grand strategy. American foreign policy, he states, is most in danger not when debates are at their most pointed but when the weight of opinion crushes dissent. As the United States looks ahead to an increasingly multipolar world with increasing complicated security issues, Hemmer concludes, developing an effective grand strategy requires ongoing contestation and compromises between competing visions and policies.
Learn more about American Pendulum at the Cornell University Press website.

The Page 99 Test: American Pendulum.

--Marshal Zeringue

Five top books with plot twists that flip your perception

Along with writing novels, C. A. Higgins spent most of her time in college doing problem sets, translating vulgar Latin poetry, and fending off sleep deprivation. It was while sitting in one of her physics classes contemplating the inevitable heat death of the universe that she had the idea that would eventually become her first novel, Lightless.

At Tor.com Higgins tagged five books with plot twists that flip your perception, including:
The Girl with All the Gifts by M. R. Carey

The first few chapters of The Girl with All the Gifts place us in a very unusual school with very unusual students where something not quite right is going on. A clever take on zombie mythology, not only is the “solution” to the characters’ situation not what you would expect, but the solution itself redefines what the “problem” of the story’s apocalypse really is.
Read about another entry on the list.

--Marshal Zeringue

What is Barry Wolverton reading?

Featured at Writers Read: Barry Wolverton, author of The Vanishing Island.

His entry begins:
A Wizard of Earthsea by Ursula Le Guin

I just started re-reading this as part of an NEA grant program I am participating in. Even though I’m not far into it, I am immediately reminded how precise and compelling her prose is, and how scrupulously she built the world of Earthsea. The names of people and places and the languages used feel wholly invented, and I love how strict her rules of magic are and the care she takes to explain how magic is learned and used. It’s not just opening a book of spells and learning...[read on]
About The Vanishing Island, from the publisher:
An engrossing fantasy, a high-seas adventure, an alternate history epic—this is the richly imagined and gorgeously realized new book from acclaimed author Barry Wolverton, perfect for fans of John Stephens's the Books of Beginning series.

It's 1599, the Age of Discovery in Europe. But for Bren Owen, growing up in the small town of Map on the coast of Britannia has meant anything but adventure. Enticed by the tales sailors have brought through Map's port, and inspired by the arcane maps his father creates as a cartographer for the cruel and charismatic map mogul named Rand McNally, Bren is convinced that fame and fortune await him elsewhere.

That's when Bren meets a dying sailor, who gives him a strange gift that hides a hidden message. Cracking the code could lead Bren to a fabled lost treasure that could change his life forever, and that of his widowed father. Before long, Bren is in greater danger than he ever imagined and will need the help of an unusual friend named Mouse to survive.
Visit Barry Wolverton's website.

The Page 69 Test: The Vanishing Island.

Writers Read: Barry Wolverton.

--Marshal Zeringue

Jay Winik's 6 favorite books

Jay Winik's new book is 1944: FDR and the Year That Changed History. One of his six favorite books, as shared at The Week magazine:
The Creation of the American Republic by Gordon S. Wood

The 1790s were the critical first decade of the United States, but Wood's account of the years 1776–1789 deftly lays bare the underpinnings — the establishment of a distinctly American political system and a new enlightened age. A must-read for students of American history.
Read about another book on the list.

--Marshal Zeringue

Monday, September 28, 2015

Pg. 99: Brian P. Copenhaver's "Magic in Western Culture"

Featured at the Page 99 Test: Magic in Western Culture: From Antiquity to the Enlightenment by Brian P. Copenhaver.

About the book, from the publisher:
The story of the beliefs and practices called 'magic' starts in ancient Iran, Greece, and Rome, before entering its crucial Christian phase in the Middle Ages. Centering on the Renaissance and Marsilio Ficino – whose work on magic was the most influential account written in premodern times – this groundbreaking book treats magic as a classical tradition with foundations that were distinctly philosophical. Besides Ficino, the premodern story of magic also features Plotinus, Iamblichus, Proclus, Aquinas, Agrippa, Pomponazzi, Porta, Bruno, Campanella, Descartes, Boyle, Leibniz, and Newton, to name only a few of the prominent thinkers discussed in this book. Because pictures play a key role in the story of magic, this book is richly illustrated.
Brian P. Copenhaver is Distinguished Professor and Udvar-Hazy Chair of Philosophy and History at the University of California, Los Angeles.

Learn more about Copenhaver and Magic in Western Culture.

The Page 99 Test: Magic in Western Culture.

--Marshal Zeringue

Twenty of the scariest stories for teens

One title on Melissa Albert's list of twenty scary stories for teens, as shared on the B&N Teen Blog:
The Appearance of Annie Van Sinderen, by Katherine Howe

While filming a seance on New York’s Lower East Side for a student film, aspiring filmmaker Wes sees a captivating girl through his lens: a beauty with hipster hair who he can’t get off his mind. Despite his obsession, he finds himself growing increasingly fascinated with Maddie, a free-spirited squatter who knows more about the mystery that dogs him than she’s letting on. Woven into his tale is the surreal journey of Annie, a 19th-century New Yorker who meets misfortune while trying to untangle her father’s dark business dealings.
Read about another entry on the list.

--Marshal Zeringue

Pg. 69: Alex Brunkhorst's "The Gilded Life of Matilda Duplaine"

Featured at the Page 69 Test: The Gilded Life of Matilda Duplaine by Alex Brunkhorst.

About the book, from the publisher:
The story begins with a dinner party invitation

When young journalist Thomas Cleary is sent to dig up quotes for the obituary of a legendary film producer, the man's eccentric daughter offers him entrée into the exclusive upper echelons of Hollywood society. A small-town boy with working-class roots, Thomas is a stranger in this opulent world of private jets and sprawling mansions.

Then he meets Matilda Duplaine.

Matilda is a beautiful and mysterious young woman who has never left the lush Bel-Air estate where she was raised. Thomas is immediately entranced by the enigmatic girl, and the two begin a secret love affair. But what starts as an enchanted romance soon unravels a web of secrets and lies that could destroy their lives—and the lives of everyone around them—forever.

A modern-day Gatsby tale filled with unforgettable characters and charm, The Gilded Life of Matilda Duplaine is a sparkling love letter to Los Angeles and a captivating journey beyond the golden gates of its most glamorous estates. Timeless, romantic and utterly absorbing, it is a mesmerizing tale of privilege, identity and the difficult choices we make in the pursuit of power.
Visit Alex Brunkhorst's website.

The Page 69 Test: The Gilded Life of Matilda Duplaine.

--Marshal Zeringue

Toni Gallagher's "Twist My Charm: The Popularity Spell," the movie

Featured at My Book, The Movie: Twist My Charm: The Popularity Spell by Toni Gallagher.

The entry begins:
It’s funny; I’ve spent over twenty years living in Hollywood and working in the entertainment business (mostly as a reality TV producer – everything from The Real World to The Real Housewives of Beverly Hills) but when I was writing my middle grade novel Twist My Charm: The Popularity Spell, I didn’t think much about actors portraying my characters. My characters are mostly bits and pieces of kids and grownups I know now or knew in my childhood.

However, that changed when I watched the Tony Awards earlier this year. I was mainly fast-forwarding to the musical numbers, seeing a lot of big, splashy, over-the-top spectacles that weren’t impressing me. I paid special attention, though, to the Tony nominated show called Fun Home. I’d heard a bit about it and was intrigued, especially when an 11-year-old actress named Sydney Lucas took the stage. She sang a song – alone – no glitz, no sets, no special effects – and she blew me away. Though she doesn’t necessarily look exactly how I picture my 11-year-old main character, this actress’s facial expressions, vulnerability, and depth of emotion made me think immediately: “Cleo!”

I happened to be going to New York from LA (to appear as a “guest bartender” on the Andy Cohen talk show Watch What Happens Live on Bravo) and...[read on]
Visit Toni Gallagher's website.

My Book, The Movie: Twist My Charm: The Popularity Spell.

--Marshal Zeringue

Sunday, September 27, 2015

What is Polly Dugan reading?

Featured at Writers Read: Polly Dugan, author of The Sweetheart Deal.

Her entry begins:
I’m ¾ of the way through Making Nice, Matt Sumell’s debut, which deserves all of the attention and praise it’s received, as does Sumell for sharing Alby’s unflinching honesty as he staggers along his journey through grief after the death of his mother. Alby’s being cyclically infuriated and brokenhearted in the wake of great loss make him a complex and compelling character. He’s not entitled or proud of behaving badly when he does, but he is painfully self-aware of his flaws—he has no delusions about himself or his motives—and it made me root for him. He’s not trying to get away with anything, he’s trying to get through something, even if the only means to do so is by...[read on]
About The Sweetheart Deal, from the publisher:
The poignant story of what happens when a woman who thinks she's lost everything has the chance to love again.

Leo has long joked that, in the event of his death, he wants his best friend Garrett, a lifelong bachelor, to marry his wife, Audrey. One drunken night, he goes so far as to make Garrett promise to do so. Then, twelve years later, Leo, a veteran firefighter, dies in a skiing accident.

As Audrey navigates her new role as widow and single parent, Garrett quits his job in Boston and buys a one-way ticket out west. Before long, Audrey's feelings for Garrett become more than platonic, and Garrett finds himself falling for Audrey, her boys, and their life together in Portland. When Audrey finds out about the drunken pact from years ago, though, the harmless promise that brought Garrett into her world becomes the obstacle to his remaining in it.
Visit Polly Dugan's website, Facebook page, and Twitter perch.

My Book, The Movie: The Sweetheart Deal.

Coffee with a Canine: Polly Dugan & Tripp.

Writers Read: Polly Dugan.

--Marshal Zeringue

Ten top books about Thatcherism

Kwasi Kwarteng is Conservative MP for Spelthorne, Surrey, UK, and the author of Thatcher’s Trial: Six months that defined a leader.

One of his top ten books about Thatcherism, as shared at the Guardian:
The Line of Beauty by Alan Hollinghurst (2004)

Hollinghurst’s controversial and brilliant novel, which won the Booker prize in 2004, tells the story of a gay affair in the 80s, at the height of Thatcher’s political dominance. The Iron Lady herself is an ever haunting presence in the background of the story, although she is not integral to it.
Read about another entry on the list.

--Marshal Zeringue

Pg. 99: Louise L. Stevenson's "Lincoln in the Atlantic World"

Featured at the Page 99 Test: Lincoln in the Atlantic World by Louise L. Stevenson.

About the book, from the publisher:
This original and wide-ranging work reveals how Abraham Lincoln responded to prompts from around the globe to shape his personal appearance, political appeal, and presidential policies. Throughout his life, he learned lessons about slavery, American politics, and international relations from sources centered in Africa, Britain, and the European continent. Answering questions that previous scholars have not thought to ask, the book opens the vision of Lincoln as a global republican. Thanks to its new stories and compelling analyses, this book provides a provocative and stimulating read that will generate debate at both high and popular levels.
Louise L. Stevenson is a professor of history and American studies at Franklin & Marshall College.

Learn more about Lincoln in the Atlantic World at the Cambridge University Press website.

The Page 99 Test: Lincoln in the Atlantic World.

--Marshal Zeringue

Saturday, September 26, 2015

Pg. 69: Barry Wolverton's "The Vanishing Island"

Featured at the Page 69 Test: The Vanishing Island by Barry Wolverton.

About the book, from the publisher:
An engrossing fantasy, a high-seas adventure, an alternate history epic—this is the richly imagined and gorgeously realized new book from acclaimed author Barry Wolverton, perfect for fans of John Stephens's the Books of Beginning series.

It's 1599, the Age of Discovery in Europe. But for Bren Owen, growing up in the small town of Map on the coast of Britannia has meant anything but adventure. Enticed by the tales sailors have brought through Map's port, and inspired by the arcane maps his father creates as a cartographer for the cruel and charismatic map mogul named Rand McNally, Bren is convinced that fame and fortune await him elsewhere.

That's when Bren meets a dying sailor, who gives him a strange gift that hides a hidden message. Cracking the code could lead Bren to a fabled lost treasure that could change his life forever, and that of his widowed father. Before long, Bren is in greater danger than he ever imagined and will need the help of an unusual friend named Mouse to survive.
Visit Barry Wolverton's website.

The Page 69 Test: The Vanishing Island.

--Marshal Zeringue

Six of the best portrayals of marriage in literature

Lauren Groff is the acclaimed author of The Monsters of Templeton and Arcadia. Her new novel is Fates and Furies. One of her six favorite portrayals of marriage in literature, as shared at The Week magazine:
Middlemarch by George Eliot

I'd argue that Middlemarch is the single greatest English-language book about marriage (a silly thing to argue, I know, as I haven't read every book in the English language). Eliot needs no introduction from me, but in Middlemarch's Dorothea Brooke we have a beautiful vision of the way a young person comes into a marriage with starry-eyed idealism, and then grows and is changed and returned to herself by the institution.
Read about another entry on the list.

Middlemarch also made John Mullan's lists of ten of the best bankers in literature, ten of the best marital rows, ten of the best examples of unrequited love, ten of the best funerals in literature, and ten of the best deathbed scenes in literature. It is among Emrys Westacott's five top books on philosophy & everyday living, Selma Dabbagh's top 10 stories of reluctant revolutionaries, Philip Pullman's six best books, Rebecca Goldstein's five best of novels of ideas, Tina Brown's five best books on reputation, Elizabeth Kostova favorite books, and Miss Manners' favorite novels. John Banville and Nick Hornby have not read it.

The Page 99 Test: The Monsters of Templeton.

The Page 69 Test: Arcadia.

--Marshal Zeringue

What is Julianna Baggott reading?

Featured at Writers Read: Julianna Baggott, author of Harriet Wolf's Seventh Book of Wonders.

Her entry begins:
Clarice Lispector's Complete Stories. I'm not reading these beauties in order. Lispector is hailed as the greatest Brazilian writer of the twentieth century and I hadn't ever heard her name before reading a review of the book by Jeff VanderMeer. I'm enjoying dipping in and out of the book, letting them haunt, circling back for...[read on]
About Harriet Wolf's Seventh Book of Wonders, from the publisher:
The reclusive Harriet Wolf, revered author and family matriarch, has a final confession-a love story. Years after her death, as her family comes together one last time, the mystery of Harriet's life hangs in the balance. Does the truth lie in the rumored final book of the series that made Harriet a world-famous writer, or will her final confession be lost forever?

Harriet Wolf's Seventh Book of Wonders tells the moving story of the unforgettable Wolf women in four distinct voices: the mysterious Harriet, who, until now, has never revealed the secrets of her past; her fiery, overprotective daughter, Eleanor; and her two grown granddaughters-Tilton, the fragile yet exuberant younger sister, who's become a housebound hermit, and Ruth, the older sister, who ran away at sixteen and never looked back. When Eleanor is hospitalized, Ruth decides it's time to do right by a pact she made with Tilton long ago: to return home and save her sister. Meanwhile, Harriet whispers her true life story to the reader. It's a story that spans the entire twentieth century and is filled with mobsters, outcasts, a lonesome lion, and a home for wayward women. It's also a tribute to her lifelong love of the boy she met at the Maryland School for Feeble-minded Children.

Harriet Wolf's Seventh Book of Wonders, Julianna Baggott's most sweeping and mesmerizing novel yet, offers a profound meditation on motherhood and sisterhood, as well as on the central importance of stories. It is a novel that affords its characters that rare chance we all long for-the chance to reimagine the stories of our lives while there's still time.
Learn more about the book and author at Julianna Baggott's website and blog.

My Book, The Movie: Harriet Wolf's Seventh Book of Wonders.

The Page 69 Test: Harriet Wolf's Seventh Book of Wonders.

Writers Read: Julianna Baggott.

--Marshal Zeringue

Friday, September 25, 2015

Pg. 99: Steven Lubet's "The 'Colored Hero' of Harper's Ferry"

Featured at the Page 99 Test: The "Colored Hero" of Harper's Ferry: John Anthony Copeland and the War against Slavery by Steven Lubet.

About the book, from the publisher:
On the night of Sunday, October 16, 1859, hoping to bring about the eventual end of slavery, radical abolitionist John Brown launched an armed attack at Harpers Ferry, Virginia. Among his troops, there were only five black men, who have largely been treated as little more than “spear carriers” by Brown's many biographers and other historians of the antebellum era. This book brings one such man, John Anthony Copeland, directly to center stage. Copeland played a leading role in the momentous Oberlin slave rescue, and he successfully escorted a fugitive to Canada, making him an ideal recruit for Brown's invasion of Virginia. He fought bravely at Harpers Ferry, only to be captured and charged with murder and treason. With his trademark lively prose and compelling narrative style, Steven Lubet paints a vivid portrait of this young black man who gave his life for freedom.
Learn more about The "Colored Hero" of Harper's Ferry at the Cambridge University Press website.

Steven Lubet is the Williams Memorial Professor of Law and Director, Bartlit Center for Trial Strategy at Northwestern University School of Law. His books include Fugitive Justice: Runaways, Rescuers, and Slavery on Trial.

The Page 99 Test: Fugitive Justice: Runaways, Rescuers, and Slavery on Trial.

The Page 99 Test: The "Colored Hero" of Harper's Ferry.

--Marshal Zeringue

Ten cross-cultural novels that illuminate our world

At Off the Shelf Tolani Osan tagged ten top books that "illuminate how disparate cultures can reveal the mystery and beauty in each other and make us aware of the hardships, dreams, and hidden scars of those we share space with," including:
We Are Called to Rise
by Laura McBride

Far from the casinos and lights, the Las Vegas suburbs sprawl out into the desert. In this desolate boomtown, three desperate souls—a middle-aged white woman, a Hispanic veteran just returned from Iraq, and a brave Albanian boy—must decide whether to give in to despair, or to find the courage and resilience to rise.
Read about another novel on the list.

The Page 69 Test: We Are Called to Rise.

--Marshal Zeringue

Pg. 69: Polly Shulman's "The Poe Estate"

Featured at the Page 69 Test: The Poe Estate by Polly Shulman.

About the book, from the publisher:
This is a mind-bending, rousing adventure celebrating classic ghost and horror stories, by the author of The Grimm Legacy and The Wells Bequest.

Sukie’s been lonely since the death of her big sister, Kitty—but Kitty’s ghost is still with her. At first that was comforting, but now Kitty’s terrifying anyone who gets too close. Things get even weirder when Sukie moves into her family’s ancestral home, and an older, less familiar ghost challenges her to find a treasure. Her classmate Cole is also experiencing apparitions. Fortunately, an antique broom’s at hand to fly Sukie and Cole to the New-York Circulating Material Repository’s spooky Poe Annex. As they search for clues and untangle ancient secrets, they discover their histories intertwine and are as full of stories of love, revenge, and pirate hijinks as some of the most famous fiction.
Visit Polly Shulman's website.

Writers Read: Polly Shulman.

The Page 69 Test: The Poe Estate.

--Marshal Zeringue

John Norris's "Mary McGrory: The First Queen of Journalism," the movie

Featured at My Book, The Movie: Mary McGrory: The First Queen of Journalism by John Norris.

The entry begins:
The folks over at Word & Film make a strong case for making a Mary McGrory biopic, and I am certainly not one to argue. What’s not to like about the story of a trailblazing woman journalist barnstorming around the country and mixing it up with everyone from JFK to George W. Bush? But perhaps even more than fiction, the casting of the lead is crucial in non-fiction. In Mary’s case, we need someone who is convincingly tough enough to play a woman who made it is an almost exclusively male industry in the 1950s and 60s, but who is also graced with a bit of mischief and flirtation. An actress who can carry off the role of one of the most important liberal voices in the second half of the 20th century, but who was distinctly proper, and sometimes almost Victorian, in her mannerisms. A woman who loved a cigarette and a good stiff drink but who, literally, helped out at the local orphanage on weekends.

There were certainly times when I was writing or interviewing people for the book that a young Katherine Hepburn leapt to my mind, and Mary was every bit as proud, independent and strong-willed as the characters that Hepburn brought so memorably to life. Mary never gave an inch when bantering back and forth with politicians or fellow reporters, and she was as comfortable quoting Yeats from memory as she was debating the merits of candidates with local ward bosses. As Bobby Kennedy once observed, “Mary is so gentle until she gets behind a typewriter.”

But casting someone from the silver age seems almost like cheating, as does every author’s answer that Meryl Streep should play their female lead. So what modern actresses could best fill Mary’s shoes? Kate...[read on]
Learn more about the book and author at John Norris's Facebook page, Twitter perch, and website.

My Book, The Movie: Mary McGrory.

--Marshal Zeringue

Thursday, September 24, 2015

Twenty page-turners every twentysomething woman should read

At Cosmopolitan Meave Gallagher tagged twenty gripping page-turners every twentysomething woman should read, including:
The Fever by Megan Abbott (2014)

Based on a real-life outbreak of unexplained physical ailments in teenage girls, Megan Abbott's The Fever unspools in a fantastical, creepy, frightening way. So many books try to explain the secret lives of teenage girls, and The Fever succeeds at capturing them, at least at a certain angle. Abbott is a master of the unsettling and upsetting, and The Fever grips you in its mania until its final pages.
Read about another novel on the list.

The Fever is among Emily Temple's fifty best novels about madness, Laura Lippman's four favorite reads of 2014, Christopher Shultz's top ten literary chillers where literary fiction and horror converge and Anna Fitzpatrick's four top horror stories set in the real universe of girlhood.

My Book, The Movie: The Fever.

--Marshal Zeringue

Pg. 99: Stephen Lovell's "Russia in the Microphone Age"

Featured at the Page 99 Test: Russia in the Microphone Age: A History of Soviet Radio, 1919-1970 by Stephen Lovell.

About the book, from the publisher:
The story of radio begins alongside that of the Soviet state: Russia's first long-range transmission of the human voice occurred in 1919, during the civil war. Sound broadcasting was a medium of exceptional promise for this revolutionary regime. It could bring the Bolsheviks' message to the furthest corners of their enormous country. It had unprecedented impact: the voice of Moscow could now be wired into the very workplaces and living spaces of a population that was still only weakly literate.

The liveness and immediacy of broadcasting also created vivid new ways of communicating 'Sovietness' - whether through May Day parades and elections, the exploits of aviators and explorers, or show trials and public criticism. Yet, in the USSR as elsewhere, broadcasting was a medium in flux: technology, the broadcasting profession, and the listening audience were never static. Soviet radio was quickly earmarked as the mouthpiece of Soviet power, yet its history is also full of unintended consequences. The supreme irony of Soviet 'radiofication' was that its greatest triumph - the expansion of the wireless-listening public in the Cold War era - made possible its greatest failure, by turning a part of the Soviet audience into devotees of Western broadcasting.

Based on substantial original research in Moscow, St Petersburg, and Nizhnii Novgorod, Russia in the Microphone Age is the first full history of Soviet radio in English. In addition to the institutional and technological dimensions of the subject, it explores the development of programme content and broadcasting genres. It also goes in search of the mysterious figure of the Soviet listener. The result is a pioneering treatment of broadcasting as an integral part of Soviet culture from its early days in the 1920s until the dawn of the television age.
Learn more about Russia in the Microphone Age at the Oxford University Press website.

The Page 99 Test: Russia in the Microphone Age.

--Marshal Zeringue

Coffee with a canine: Polly Dugan & Tripp

Featured at Coffee with a Canine: Polly Dugan & Tripp.

The author, on how Tripp got his name:
Tripp’s breeder named him because, being an incredibly loyal dog, he follows his people everywhere and is often underfoot. We’ve literally tripped over him more times than I can count. We never tire of joking: “Why isn’t your name Waldo again?” because we always know exactly where he is unlike Waldo, who always has people wondering over his whereabouts.

He has a bunch of aliases: Triple Dog (because he was such a handful when he first came to us, he was like having three dogs), Trippy...[read on]
About Dugan's latest book, The Sweetheart Deal, from the publisher:
The poignant story of what happens when a woman who thinks she's lost everything has the chance to love again.

Leo has long joked that, in the event of his death, he wants his best friend Garrett, a lifelong bachelor, to marry his wife, Audrey. One drunken night, he goes so far as to make Garrett promise to do so. Then, twelve years later, Leo, a veteran firefighter, dies in a skiing accident.

As Audrey navigates her new role as widow and single parent, Garrett quits his job in Boston and buys a one-way ticket out west. Before long, Audrey's feelings for Garrett become more than platonic, and Garrett finds himself falling for Audrey, her boys, and their life together in Portland. When Audrey finds out about the drunken pact from years ago, though, the harmless promise that brought Garrett into her world becomes the obstacle to his remaining in it.
Visit Polly Dugan's website, Facebook page, and Twitter perch.

My Book, The Movie: The Sweetheart Deal.

Coffee with a Canine: Polly Dugan & Tripp.

--Marshal Zeringue

What is Polly Shulman reading?

Featured at Writers Read: Polly Shulman, author of The Poe Estate.

Her entry begins:
My favorite recent novel is Naomi Novik’s Uprooted. I’d been longing for more of her Temeraire fantasy/alternate history series, which follow the fortunes of an English captain during the Napoleonic Wars. He’s not in the navy, but the Aerial Corps—his “ship” is a dragon named Temeraire, a brave, affectionate, rational soldier of a person who also happens to be a gigantic, scaly flying beast and something of a philosopher. Novik’s writing is even better than the premise: funny, touching, fast paced, and subtle. I was disappointed when I learned her new novel had nothing to do with Temeraire, but somewhat to my surprise, I loved Uprooted even more. Uprooted has a fairy-tale premise: Every ten years, the Dragon chooses a girl from the heroine’s village to...[read on]
About The Poe Estate, from the publisher:
This is a mind-bending, rousing adventure celebrating classic ghost and horror stories, by the author of The Grimm Legacy and The Wells Bequest.

Sukie’s been lonely since the death of her big sister, Kitty—but Kitty’s ghost is still with her. At first that was comforting, but now Kitty’s terrifying anyone who gets too close. Things get even weirder when Sukie moves into her family’s ancestral home, and an older, less familiar ghost challenges her to find a treasure. Her classmate Cole is also experiencing apparitions. Fortunately, an antique broom’s at hand to fly Sukie and Cole to the New-York Circulating Material Repository’s spooky Poe Annex. As they search for clues and untangle ancient secrets, they discover their histories intertwine and are as full of stories of love, revenge, and pirate hijinks as some of the most famous fiction.
Visit Polly Shulman's website.

Writers Read: Polly Shulman.

--Marshal Zeringue

Wednesday, September 23, 2015

Pg. 99: Susan Niditch's "The Responsive Self"

Featured at the Page 99 Test: The Responsive Self: Personal Religion in Biblical Literature of the Neo-Babylonian and Persian Periods by Susan Niditch.

About the book, from the publisher:
Works created in the period from the Babylonian conquest of Judea through the takeover and rule of Judea and Samaria by imperial Persia reveal a profound interest in the religious responses of individuals and an intimate engagement with the nature of personal experience. Using the rich and varied body of literature preserved in the Hebrew Bible, Susan Niditch examines ways in which followers of Yahweh, participating in long-standing traditions, are shown to privatize and personalize religion. Their experiences remain relevant to many of the questions we still ask today: Why do bad things happen to good people? Does God hear me when I call out in trouble? How do I define myself? Do I have a personal relationship with a divine being? How do I cope with chaos and make sense of my experience? What roles do material objects and private practices play within my religious life? These questions deeply engaged the ancient writers of the Bible, and they continue to intrigue contemporary people who try to find meaning in life and to make sense of the world.

The Responsive Self studies a variety of phenomena, including the use of first-person speech, seemingly autobiographic forms and orientations, the emphasis on individual responsibility for sin, interest in the emotional dimensions of biblical characters, and descriptions of self-imposed ritual. This set of interests lends itself to exciting approaches in the contemporary study of religion, including the concept of “lived religion,” and involves understanding and describing what people actually do and believe in cultures of religion.
Learn more about The Responsive Self at the Yale University Press website.

The Page 99 Test: The Responsive Self.

--Marshal Zeringue

Pg. 69: Julianna Baggott's "Harriet Wolf's Seventh Book of Wonders"

Featured at the Page 69 Test: Harriet Wolf's Seventh Book of Wonders by Julianna Baggott.

About the book, from the publisher:
The reclusive Harriet Wolf, revered author and family matriarch, has a final confession-a love story. Years after her death, as her family comes together one last time, the mystery of Harriet's life hangs in the balance. Does the truth lie in the rumored final book of the series that made Harriet a world-famous writer, or will her final confession be lost forever?

Harriet Wolf's Seventh Book of Wonders tells the moving story of the unforgettable Wolf women in four distinct voices: the mysterious Harriet, who, until now, has never revealed the secrets of her past; her fiery, overprotective daughter, Eleanor; and her two grown granddaughters-Tilton, the fragile yet exuberant younger sister, who's become a housebound hermit, and Ruth, the older sister, who ran away at sixteen and never looked back. When Eleanor is hospitalized, Ruth decides it's time to do right by a pact she made with Tilton long ago: to return home and save her sister. Meanwhile, Harriet whispers her true life story to the reader. It's a story that spans the entire twentieth century and is filled with mobsters, outcasts, a lonesome lion, and a home for wayward women. It's also a tribute to her lifelong love of the boy she met at the Maryland School for Feeble-minded Children.

Harriet Wolf's Seventh Book of Wonders, Julianna Baggott's most sweeping and mesmerizing novel yet, offers a profound meditation on motherhood and sisterhood, as well as on the central importance of stories. It is a novel that affords its characters that rare chance we all long for-the chance to reimagine the stories of our lives while there's still time.
Learn more about the book and author at Julianna Baggott's website and blog.

My Book, The Movie: Harriet Wolf's Seventh Book of Wonders.

The Page 69 Test: Harriet Wolf's Seventh Book of Wonders.

--Marshal Zeringue

Five books about girls disguised as boys

Rae Carson's latest book is Walk on Earth a Stranger. At Tor.com she tagged five books about girls disguised as boys, including:
Eon, by Alison Goodman

Eon has trained for years to be a Dragoneye—an apprentice to one of the twelve great dragons of good fortune. But he has a secret: He’s really Eona, a sixteen-year-old girl, and if she is discovered, it will mean certain and immediate death. This young adult novel is violent, complex, and dark, and it could just as easily be marketed to adult audiences.
Read about another entry on the list.

The Page 69 Test: Eon: Dragoneye Reborn.

Also see: Ten of the best literary men dressed as women.

--Marshal Zeringue

Jonathan Weisman's "No. 4 Imperial Lane," the movie

Featured at My Book, The Movie: No. 4 Imperial Lane: A Novel by Jonathan Weisman.

The entry begins:
I guess like many fiction writers, I have allowed myself to fantasize about No. 4 Imperial Lane getting the big option and ending up on the big screen. It's not outlandish. I figure with a main character being a quadriplegic -- and a fallen aristocrat to boot -- it has "vanity project" written all over it, if not Oscar bait. To that end, I'd have Ralph Fiennes cast as Hans Bromwell, the cynical quadriplegic. I always saw him as the anti-Hollywood cripple-hero. He does not paint with his teeth or tool around campus on a specially designed hospital gurney operated by his breath. He's the quadriplegic who has his electric wheelchair tossed into the street, as he shouts, "Goddamnit, if I am going to break my neck, somebody is going to push me around in an old-fashioned wheelchair."

Logically, Emma Thompson would latch on to the project as Hans Bromwell's alcoholic sister, Elizabeth. She's perfect for the part. The character is supposed to be a bit flighty, a bit disheveled, not...[read on]
Follow Jonathan Weisman on Twitter.

My Book, The Movie: No. 4 Imperial Lane.

--Marshal Zeringue

Tuesday, September 22, 2015

Pg. 99: George A. Gonzalez's "The Politics of Star Trek"

Featured at the Page 99 Test: The Politics of Star Trek: Justice, War, and the Future by George A. Gonzalez.

About The Politics of Star Trek, from the publisher:
The Star Trek franchise reflects, conveys, and comments upon the key philosophical tensions of the modern era: pragmatism vs. justice; universalism vs. traditionalism; empire vs. consensual polity; environmentalism vs. modernity. George A. Gonzalez details the manner in which these tensions and controversies are manifested in Star Trek across its iterations, and in so doing argues that Star Trek offers an indispensable intellectual and analytical contribution to our understanding of the politics of the modern era.
Learn more about The Politics of Star Trek at the Palgrave Macmillan website.

Writers Read: George A. Gonzalez.

The Page 99 Test: The Politics of Star Trek.

--Marshal Zeringue

Seven works of speculative fiction that don’t feel all that speculative

Jeff Somers is the author of Lifers, the Avery Cates series from Orbit Books, Chum from Tyrus Books, and We Are Not Good People from Pocket/Gallery. He has published over thirty short stories as well. One of Somers's top seven speculative works for those who think they hate speculative fiction, as shared at the B & N Sci-Fi & Fantasy Blog:
The Martian, by Andy Weir

With the film’s promotional campaign in overdrive, everyone’s aware of this used-to-be-a-sleeper hit. The trailers may look sci-fi to you—Mars, spacesuits, that sort of thing—but don’t be fooled. This novel rocks thanks to its fantastic narrative voice in the personage of sarcastic, desperate, a hilarious astronaut Mark Watney, and it’s ideal for people who think they hate science fiction because it’s only SF element is that it’s set on Mars during a near-future manned mission to the planet. Everything else is rooted entirely in real science, and involves one man struggling against nature to survive—the fact that the nature involved isn’t Earth’s is just a detail, really.
Read about another entry on the list.

The Martian is among Somer's five top sci-fi novels with plausible futuristic technology, Ernest Cline’s ten favorite SF novels, and James Mustich's five top books on visiting Mars.

--Marshal Zeringue

What is Peter Jones reading?

Featured at Writers Read: Peter Jones, author of Track Two Diplomacy in Theory and Practice.

One book he tagged:
A book I have recently finished reading is Frederik Logevall’s very interesting Embers of War: The Fall of an Empire and the Making of America’s Vietnam. This is a very readable and yet also scholarly account of the final years of the French experience in IndoChina, and of how the US came to be sucked into that conflict.

After World War 2, France was keen to re-assert its Great Power status and overcome the legacy of surrender and occupation. Many senior French officials saw a vigorous assertion of Imperial greatness as one means to do this. This view ran smack up against the emerging desire for liberation, which would spawn the de-colonisation movement of the 50s and 60s throughout the developing world. While many of these movements were simply the indigenous expression of a desire to throw off colonialism, it was the misfortune of these movements to be active at just the time the Cold War was settling its grip over international affairs. Though many of them were hardly committed Communists, the language and concepts of the era meant that their struggles would be interpreted through...[read on]
About Track Two Diplomacy in Theory and Practice, from the publisher:
Track Two Diplomacy consists of informal dialogues among actors such as academics, religious leaders, retired senior officials, and NGO officials that can bring new ideas and new relationships to the official process of diplomacy.

Sadly, those involved in official diplomacy often have little understanding of and appreciation for the complex and nuanced role that Track Two can play, or for its limitations. And many Track Two practitioners are often unaware of the realities and pressures of the policy and diplomatic worlds, and not particularly adept at framing their efforts to make them accessible to hard-pressed officials. At the same time, those interested in the academic study of Track Two sometimes fail to understand the realities faced by either set of practitioners.

A need therefore exists for a work to bridge the divides between these constituencies and between the different types of Track Two practice—and this book crosses disciplines and traditions in order to do just that. It explores the various dimensions and guises of Track Two, the theory and practice of how they work, and how both practitioners and academics could more profitably assess Track Two. Overall, it provides a comprehensive picture of the range of activities pursued under this title, to provoke new thinking about how these activities relate to each other, to official diplomacy, and to academe.
Learn more about Track Two Diplomacy at the Stanford University Press website.

Peter Jones is also the author of Open Skies: Transparency, Confidence-Building, and the End of the Cold War.

The Page 99 Test: Open Skies.

The Page 99 Test: Track Two Diplomacy in Theory and Practice.

Writers Read: Peter Jones.

--Marshal Zeringue

Pg. 69: Carmiel Banasky's "The Suicide of Claire Bishop"

Featured at the Page 69 Test: The Suicide of Claire Bishop: A Novel by Carmiel Banasky.

About the book, from the publisher:
Greenwich Village, 1959. Claire Bishop sits for a portrait—a gift from her husband—only to discover that what the artist has actually depicted is Claire’s suicide. Haunted by the painting, Claire is forced to redefine herself within a failing marriage and a family history of madness. Shifting ahead to 2004, we meet West, a young man with schizophrenia who is obsessed with a painting he encounters in a gallery: a mysterious image of a woman’s suicide. Convinced it was painted by his ex-girlfriend, West constructs an elaborate delusion involving time-travel, Hasidism, art-theft, and the terrifying power of representation. When the two characters finally meet, in the present, delusions are shattered and lives are forever changed.
Visit Carmiel Banasky's website.

The Page 69 Test: The Suicide of Claire Bishop.

--Marshal Zeringue

Monday, September 21, 2015

Five top books about Jane Austen

Joanna Trollope's bestselling novels include The Choir, A Village Affair and The Rector's Wife.

One entry on her list of five great books about Jane Austen, as shared at the Telegraph:
Let’s start with Jane herself. Her family, alas, destroyed most of her wonderful letters, but some, luckily, survive, mostly to her elder sister, Cassandra. The best collection is edited by Deirdre Le Faye, for Oxford University Press – Jane Austen’s Letters (2011).
Read about another book on the list.

Also see: The ten best Jane Austen characters.

--Marshal Zeringue

Polly Dugan's "The Sweetheart Deal," the movie

Featured at My Book, The Movie: The Sweetheart Deal by Polly Dugan.

The entry begins:
I went right to the A-list for casting the movie adaptation of The Sweetheart Deal because holding these actors in my head both informed the writing and helped build the characters into three-dimensional beings. Plus it didn’t hurt that some of my favorite actors are included in this all-star cast.

Kevin Gallagher, a firefighter and 9/11 survivor who also appears in the last story in my first book, is and always has been played by Ed Burns. Ed as an actor, and the majority of characters he plays are precisely who Kevin is: an Irish Catholic native New Yorker. In every piece of dialogue he utters, Kevin’s voice was as authentic as I could make it because I heard Ed saying the words. And, Ed’s narration of The Man in the Red Bandana, the heroic 9/11 story of Welles Crowther was a tremendous influence in casting him. He’d be a natural in Portland Fire and Rescue gear.

Similarly, Leo McGeary has always been played by Mark...[read on]
Visit Polly Dugan's website, Facebook page, and Twitter perch.

My Book, The Movie: The Sweetheart Deal.

--Marshal Zeringue