What is Justin Gifford reading?

Featured at Writers Read: Justin Gifford, author of Street Poison: The Biography of Iceberg Slim.

From his entry:

I recently began a new expedition to uncover the hidden life of another outlandish figure of African American culture, Frank Yerby. Though most people have never heard of Yerby, he is the bestselling black American author in history with 33 books and over 60 millions copies of his novels sold. A contradictory and colorful personality, Yerby started out as writer of political fiction alongside Richard Wright in the 1940s, but then baffled black critics when he abandoned his protest work and started writing Southern historical romances in the style of Gone With the Wind. He enraged them further when he...[read on]

About Street Poison, from the publisher:

The first and definitive biography of one of America’s bestselling, notorious, and influential writers of the twentieth century: Iceberg Slim, né Robert Beck, author of the multimillion-copy memoir Pimp and such equally popular novels as Trick Baby and Mama Black Widow. From a career as a, yes, ruthless pimp in the ’40s and ’50s, Iceberg Slim refashioned himself as the first and still the greatest of “street lit” masters, whose vivid books have made him an icon to such rappers as Ice-T, Jay-Z, and Snoop Dogg and a presiding spirit of “blaxploitation” culture. You can’t understand contemporary black (and even American) culture without reckoning with Iceberg Slim and his many acolytes and imitators.

Literature professor Justin Gifford has been researching the life and work of Robert Beck for a decade, culminating in Street Poison, a colorful and compassionate biography of one of the most complicated figures in twentieth-century literature. Drawing on a wealth of archival material—including FBI files, prison records, and interviews with Beck, his wife, and his daughters—Gifford explores the sexual trauma and racial violence Beck endured that led to his reinvention as Iceberg Slim, one of America’s most infamous pimps of the 1940s and ’50s. From pimping to penning his profoundly influential confessional autobiography, Pimp, to his involvement in radical politics, Gifford’s biography illuminates the life and works of one of American literature’s most unique renegades.

Learn more about Street Poison at the publisher's website.

My Book, The Movie: Street Poison.

Writers Read: Justin Gifford.

--Marshal Zeringue

Annie Baker's 6 favorite books

Annie Baker is a Pulitzer Prize-winning American playwright.

One of her six favorite books, as shared at The Week magazine:

To the Lighthouse by Virginia Woolf

Woolf's sentences are so beautiful in this novel that they made me give up writing prose forever. She can articulate a train of thought and the poetry of thinking better than anyone else.

Read about another book on the list.

To the Lighthouse appears among Meg Wolitzer's five favorite books by women writers, Laura Frost's top 10 best modernist books, the Barnes & Noble Review's list of five unforgettable fathers from fiction, Margaret Drabble's top ten literary landscapes, the American Book Review's 100 best last lines from novels, Amity Gaige's best books, and Adam Langer's best books.

--Marshal Zeringue

Sara Nickerson's "The Secrets of Blueberries, Brothers, Moose & Me," the movie

Featured at My Book, The Movie: The Secrets of Blueberries, Brothers, Moose & Me by Sara Nickerson.

The entry begins:

I come from a TV/Film background, so you’d think this would be easy. My first novel, How To Disappear Completely and Never Be Found, was a story I’d originally written as a screenplay, and I was always casting it in my head. This one, though, was different, and I couldn’t quite envision it on the big screen. Then, a couple months ago I was walking my dog and it came to me: Hayao Miyazaki.

In Miyazaki’s hands, The Secrets of Blueberries, Brothers, Moose & Me would be a...[read on]

Visit Sara Nickerson's website.

Coffee with a Canine: Sara Nickerson & Pico.

The Page 69 Test: The Secrets of Blueberries, Brothers, Moose & Me.

My Book, The Movie: The Secrets of Blueberries, Brothers, Moose & Me.

--Marshal Zeringue

Four books that changed Jodi Picoult

Jodi Picoult's many books include the young-adult (YA) novel, Off The Page, which was co-written with her daughter, Samantha van Leer.

One of four books that changed Picoult, as shared at the Sydney Morning Herald:

GONE WITH THE WIND
Margaret Mitchell

I read this book when I was 13; it was the story that made me want to be a writer. I used to act out sections as both Rhett AND Scarlett, which explains why I didn't have a boyfriend till I was 15. I was intrigued by the idea of how Mitchell had created an entire world out of words, so rich it felt as if I were immersed in it. I thought, maybe I could do that too.

Read about another novel on the list.

Gone With the Wind is among five books that changed Kimberley Freeman, Becky Ferreira's seven best comeuppances in literature, Emily Temple's ten greatest kisses in literature and Suzi Quatro's six best books, and was a book that made a difference to Pat Conroy. It is on the Christian Science Monitor's list of the ten best novels of the U.S. Civil War.

--Marshal Zeringue

What is Linwood Barclay reading?

Featured at Writers Read: Linwood Barclay, author of Broken Promise: A Thriller.

His entry begins:

I’ve just finished Nick’s Trip, one of George Pelecanos’ earlier novels. I’m a big Pelecanos fan, particularly his recent books about Spero Lucas, but I realized Nick’s Trip was one that I’d missed. It’s a good, solid read. One of the early chapters, about a wild, reckless, drug- and alcohol-induced trip Nick takes with a friend, is practically a novel in itself.

Now I can dive back into...[read on]

About Broken Promise, from the publisher:

From the New York Times bestselling author of No Safe House comes an explosive novel about the disturbing secrets of a quiet small town.…

After his wife’s death and the collapse of his newspaper, David Harwood has no choice but to uproot his nine-year-old son and move back into his childhood home in Promise Falls, New York. David believes his life is in free fall, and he can’t find a way to stop his descent.

Then he comes across a family secret of epic proportions. A year after a devastating miscarriage, David’s cousin Marla has continued to struggle. But when David’s mother asks him to check on her, he’s horrified to discover that she’s been secretly raising a child who is not her own—a baby she claims was a gift from an “angel” left on her porch.

When the baby’s real mother is found murdered, David can’t help wanting to piece together what happened—even if it means proving his own cousin’s guilt. But as he uncovers each piece of evidence, David realizes that Marla’s mysterious child is just the tip of the iceberg.

Other strange things are happening. Animals are found ritually slaughtered. An ominous abandoned Ferris wheel seems to stand as a warning that something dark has infected Promise Falls. And someone has decided that the entire town must pay for the sins of its past…in blood.

Visit Linwood Barclay's website.

Writers Read: Linwood Barclay.

--Marshal Zeringue

Pg. 69: James Abel's "Protocol Zero"

Featured at the Page 69 Test: Protocol Zero by James Abel.

About the book, from the publisher:

When authorities in Alaska receive a disturbing call from a teenage girl, their investigation leads them to discover an entire family of researchers dead. Joe Rush is called to help examine the bodies. On the surface, it looks like a brutal murder/suicide. But the situation is nowhere near that simple—nor is it over.

Upon closer investigation, Rush discovers the terrifying truth. The research team has fallen victim to something that seems impossible at first, yet the evidence looks undeniable in the lab. Now the danger may threaten thousands more.

Unfortunately, he’s not the only one with knowledge of the looming disaster. The army has cordoned off part of Alaska, and Rush soon finds himself the target of trained killers. Someone suspects Rush of betraying his country. To save countless lives—starting with his own—Rush must uncover the answers hidden in the Arctic. The question is—will he find them in time?

Visit James Abel's website.

The Page 69 Test: Protocol Zero.

--Marshal Zeringue

Five of the best morons in literary history

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.

At B & N Reads Somers tagged five of the greatest, dumbest characters in literary history, including:

Ignatius J. Reilly, A Confederacy of Dunces, by John Kennedy Toole

The smartest, best-read moron in literary history, Ignatius J. Reilly is a comical figure of contrasts. He’s a man who disdains the modern world, yet enjoys many of its comforts. He’s completely incompetent in almost everything he tries (even selling hot dogs turns into an Epic Fail), yet looks down on almost everyone he encounters. He believes himself to be open-minded and worldly, despite never having left his home city of New Orleans—in fact, his one attempt to travel a modest distance remains a story of deep psychological horror he repeats often. Reilly’s attempts to wriggle free of society’s requirements only lead him to work far harder and live deeper in squalor than he otherwise would. He is a lesson to anyone who has railed against the fact that we all have to “fit in” somehow to society.

Read about another entry on the list.

Ignatius Reilly is on Ginni Chen's top six list of fictional mustaches, Chrissie Gruebel's top eleven list of books that will make you glad you're single, Melissa Albert's list of six of the worst fictional characters to sit next to on a plane and Jill Boyd's list of five of the worst fictional characters to invite to Thanksgiving. A Confederacy of Dunces is among the Telegraph's critics' fifty best cult books, Melissa Albert's eight favorite fictional misfits, Ken Jennings's eight notable books about parents and kids, Sarah Stodol's top ten lost-then-found novels, Hallie Ephron's top ten books for a good laugh, Stephen Kelman's top 10 outsiders' stories, John Mullan's ten best moustaches in literature, Michael Lewis's five favorite books, and Cracked magazine's classic funny novels.

--Marshal Zeringue

Pg. 99: Margarita Engle's "Enchanted Air"

Featured at the Page 99 Test: Enchanted Air: Two Cultures, Two Wings: A Memoir by Margarita Engle.

About the book, from the publisher:

In this poetic memoir, Margarita Engle, the first Latina woman to receive a Newbery Honor, tells of growing up as a child of two cultures during the Cold War.

Margarita is a girl from two worlds. Her heart lies in Cuba, her mother’s tropical island country, a place so lush with vibrant life that it seems like a fairy tale kingdom. But most of the time she lives in Los Angeles, lonely in the noisy city and dreaming of the summers when she can take a plane through the enchanted air to her beloved island. Words and images are her constant companions, friendly and comforting when the children at school are not.

Then a revolution breaks out in Cuba. Margarita fears for her far-away family. When the hostility between Cuba and the United States erupts at the Bay of Pigs Invasion, Margarita’s worlds collide in the worst way possible. How can the two countries she loves hate each other so much? And will she ever get to visit her beautiful island again?

Visit Margarita Engle's website.

Coffee with a Canine: Margarita Engle & Maggi and Chance.

My Book, The Movie: The Lightning Dreamer.

My Book, The Movie: Mountain Dog.

The Page 69 Test: Silver People.

The Page 99 Test: Enchanted Air.

--Marshal Zeringue

What is Lou Anders reading?

Featured at Writers Read: Lou Anders, author of Nightborn.

His entry begins:

Right now I’m reading Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix with my son, the first time for both of us. I read the first two Harry Potter novels very soon after they were released, but I also began a career as a professional editor around the same time. So when book three was out, I was too busy with my own slush piles to read further. In fact, for a good portion of the next fifteen years, I never read more than the first book in any series I didn’t acquire myself. The reason was that I felt I needed to keep up with as much as I could beyond my own list. Reading six “Book Ones” from separate series would teach me more about the climate of speculative fiction than reading six books in the same series.

Then, maybe four or five years ago, my son was old enough for me to begin reading Harry Potter to him. We made it to the third book, but he started to find it a little frightening. I realized that these books were...[read on]

About Nightborn, from the publisher:

From the author of Frostborn comes Book 2 in the acclaimed Thrones and Bones fantasy-adventure trilogy for fans of Lloyd Alexander and Brandon Mull.

Karn Korlundsson is a gamer. Not a riddle solver. But in order to rescue his best friend, Thianna Frostborn, he will need to travel to the faraway city of Castlebriar (by wyvern), learn how to play a new board game called Charioteers (not a problem), decipher the Riddle of the Horn, and tangle with mysterious elves.

Meet Desstra. She’s in training to join the Underhand—the elite agents of the dark elves. When she crosses paths with Karn, she is not all that she appears to be.

Everyone is chasing after the horn of Osius, an ancient artifact with the power to change the world. The lengths to which Karn will go in the name of friendship will be sorely tested. Who knew that solving a riddle could be so deadly?

Visit the official Thrones & Bones website, Lou Anders's website, Facebook page, and Twitter perch.

The Page 69 Test: Nightborn.

My Book, the Movie: Nightborn.

Writers Read: Lou Anders.

--Marshal Zeringue

Maggie Mitchell's "Pretty Is," the movie

Featured at My Book, The Movie: Pretty Is by Maggie Mitchell.

The entry begins:

How irresistible, to envision the main characters of Pretty Is embodied by actors I admire! It seems particularly, inevitably apt, moreover, because the novel is in fact partly about the process of adapting a novel to the screen. Pretty Is tells the story of two girls who are abducted and held captive for six weeks when they are twelve; years later, when both are twenty-nine, their lives intersect again. One, Lois, has become an English professor (and, secretly, a novelist); the other, Chloe, is an actress whose movie career is slipping. The situation is complicated by the fact that Lois has written a novel loosely based on the abduction which is actually being made into a movie--so in fact the question of casting is explicitly addressed in the fictional realm, and it makes a strange kind of sense to take this improbable process one step further.

I think Jennifer Lawrence would make a perfect Chloe. (Since this is a fantasy, I feel free to ignore practical issues like availability, and the fact that Jennifer Lawrence is probably already committed for the next three years or more.) She is beautiful, certainly, but also...[read on]

Visit Maggie Mitchell's Facebook page and Twitter perch.

My Book, The Movie: Pretty Is.

--Marshal Zeringue

Pg. 69: Sara Nickerson's "The Secrets of Blueberries, Brothers, Moose & Me"

Featured at the Page 69 Test: The Secrets of Blueberries, Brothers, Moose & Me by Sara Nickerson.

About the book, from the publisher:

Determined to make some extra money, twelve-year-old Missy and her older brother Patrick get summer jobs picking blueberries at a local farm. For Missy, though, blueberry picking quickly becomes about more than just money— it’s the perfect distraction from the fact that her two best friends have gone off to summer camp without her and that her dad is getting remarried. Why can’t everything go back to the way it used to be? Back to normal? But, Missy soon discovers that the summer is full of secrets: the secrets to making her family feel whole again; the secrets to keeping her two best friends from changing and leaving her behind; the secrets of a local farm’s blood feud; and most importantly, the secrets of blueberries.

Author Sara Nickerson infuses warmth and emotion into this relatable story about finding something special within yourself and a place to call your own in even the most tumultuous of times.

Visit Sara Nickerson's website.

Coffee with a Canine: Sara Nickerson & Pico.

The Page 69 Test: The Secrets of Blueberries, Brothers, Moose & Me.

--Marshal Zeringue

Ten top literary hoaxes

Mark Blacklock is a writer, editor, researcher, and author the newly released debut novel, I'm Jack.

One of his top ten literary hoaxes, as shared at the Guardian:

Theodore Sturgeon – I, Libertine (1956)

In the 1950s US bestseller lists were compiled by newspaper subeditors who would phone around bookstores to ask what was selling. The late night talk radio host Jean Shepherd, in collusion with his listeners, concocted a fake book, I Libertine, a raunchy historical romance by the similarly fictitious author Frederick R. Ewing, a retired Royal Naval officer resident in Rhodesia and expert in eighteenth century erotica. Shepherd urged his listeners to request the title from as many bookshops as possible. Despite its non-existence it was banned in Boston before the publisher Ballantine commissioned Kurt Vonnegut’s friend (and character in Slaughterhouse 5) Theodore Sturgeon to make the hoax text a reality.

Read about another entry on the list.

--Marshal Zeringue

Pg. 99: Judy Brown's "This Is Not a Love Story"

Featured at the Page 99 Test: This Is Not a Love Story: A Memoir by Judy Brown.

About the book, from the publisher:

A razor-sharp, hilarious, and poignant memoir about growing up in the closed world of the ultraorthodox Jewish community.

The third of six children in a family that harks back to a gloried Hassidic dynasty, Judy Brown grew up with the legacy of centuries of religious teaching, and the faith and lore that sustained her people for generations.

But her carefully constructed world begins to crumble when her "crazy" brother Nachum returns home after a year in Israel living with relatives. Though supposedly "cured," he is still prone to retreating into his own mind or erupting in wordless rages. The adults' inability to make him better - or even to give his affliction a name - forces Judy to ask larger questions: If God could perform miracles for her sainted ancestors, why can't He cure Nachum? And what of the other stories her family treasured?

Judy starts to negotiate with God, swinging from holy tenets to absurdly hilarious conclusions faster than a Talmudic scholar: she goes on a fast to nab coveted earrings; she fights with her siblings at the dinner table for the ultimate badge of honor ("Who will survive the next Holocaust?"); and she adamantly defends her family's reputation when, scandalously, her parents are accused of having fallen in love---which is absolutely not what pious people do.

For all its brutal honesty about this insular community, This Is Not a Love Story is ultimately a story of a family like so many others, whose fierce love for each other and devotion to their faith pulled them through the darkest time in their lives.

Visit Judy Brown's website.

My Book, The Movie: This Is Not a Love Story.

Writers Read: Judy Brown.

The Page 99 Test: This Is Not a Love Story.

--Marshal Zeringue

What is Wendy Sand Eckel reading?

Featured at Writers Read: Wendy Sand Eckel, author of Murder at Barclay Meadow.

Her entry begins:

I recently delivered the first draft of Death at the Day Lily Café to my editor, the second in the Rosalie Hart mystery series. Writing up to ten hours a day for months on end cut into my reading time. But to keep the gears turning I kept a well worn copy of East of Eden nearby. I have dog-eared more pages in that book than any other. Steinbeck’s themes are timeless and universal, his descriptions like poetry. He has the unique ability to tap into the feeling of...[read on]

About Murder at Barclay Meadow, from the publisher:

Rosalie Hart's world has been upended. After her husband confesses to an affair, she exiles herself to her late aunt's farmhouse on Maryland's Eastern Shore. With its fields untended and the house itself in disrepair, Barclay Meadow couldn't be more different than the tidy D.C. suburb she used to call home. Just when Rosalie feels convinced things couldn't get any worse, she finds a body floating in her marsh grasses. When the sheriff declares the death an accident, she becomes suspicious. The dead girl, Megan, reminds her of her own daughter, who has recently gone off to college, and she feels a responsibility to find out the truth.

Rosalie confides her doubts to her friends in her creative writing class, and they ask to join her investigation, beginning the search in earnest. Meanwhile, Rosalie works on restoring Barclay Meadow to its former glory-with help from the rugged Tyler Wells, a farmer who once leased the land. When Rosalie discovers her aunt's favorite bread recipe on a yellowed index card, she begins baking, and with her deep love for nourishing others rekindled, she starts to feel alive again. But as she zeroes in on the truth about what happened to Megan, she begins getting ominous threats. Determined to get justice for Megan and protect the new home she's begun to build for herself, Rosalie races to catch the killer in this deftly plotted and heartwarming debut.

Visit Wendy Sand Eckel's website and Facebook page.

The Page 69 Test: Murder at Barclay Meadow.

Writers Read: Wendy Sand Eckel.

--Marshal Zeringue

Lou Anders's "Nightborn," the movie

Featured at My Book, the Movie: Nightborn by Lou Anders.

The entry begins:

When I write a book, I tend to think of the main characters as if I were casting a film. Sometimes I’ll have more than one actor in mind, using two or three to triangulate a type. I write in Scrivener, so it’s easy to snag photos and have them open when I need to remind myself of the sort of person I’m penning.

For the Thrones and Bones series, I had a number of people in mind for my major characters.

For Karn Korlundsson, a young farm boy in the Norse-inspired land of Norrøngard, I imagined Nathan O’Toole, who played the part of Bjorn Ironside on the first two seasons of Vikings. For Thianna Frostborn, the half-giant girl, I imagined what...[read on]

Visit the official Thrones & Bones website, Lou Anders's website, Facebook page, and Twitter perch.

The Page 69 Test: Nightborn.

My Book, the Movie: Nightborn.

--Marshal Zeringue

Seven awesome books that celebrate female friendship

At B & N Reads, Kelly Anderson tagged seven amazing female friendships in fiction, including:

The Secret Place, by Tana French

Speaking of less palatable underbellies, Tana French’s The Secret Place is a memorably accurate exploration of teenage female friendship that has quite possibly gone horribly wrong. A teenage boy is found dead on the grounds of an all-girls’ prep school in Ireland, prompting an investigation with few leads—until one day someone anonymously posts “I know who killed him” on the school’s community bulletin board, known as the “secret place.” The detectives reopen the case and find themselves up against the psychological battlefield of high school girl cliques, frenemies, and social hierarchies, and all the secrets they hide. French paints a powerful picture of how deeply friendship matters to teenage girls, and does it with a depth of emotion sure to transport readers back to their own high school years.

Read about another novel on the list.

--Marshal Zeringue

Pg. 69: Tom Harper's "Zodiac Station"

Featured at the Page 69 Test: Zodiac Station by Tom Harper.

About the book, from the publisher:

For fans of Dan Brown and Michael Crichton—an eerie, evocative thriller set in the unforgiving Arctic from the author of The Orpheus Descent.

Deep in the Arctic, the US Coast Guard icebreaker Terra Nova batters its way through the frozen sea. A gaunt figure skis out of the fog on the pack ice. He says his name is Thomas Anderson, and that he’s the lone survivors of a terrible accident at the research outpost Zodiac Station, located on the ice-bound island of Utgard.

Ten days earlier, he’d arrived at Zodiac Station looking to resurrect a career destroyed by scientific scandal. But things quickly went wrong when the man who hired him, brilliant biochemist Martin Hagger, turned up dead, at the bottom of a crevasse. The base commander insisted he fell. But footprints in the snow told a much different story. As Anderson tells a tale of sabotage, suspicion, and paranoia, the mystery only deepens.

When other survivors are discovered and their stories cast doubt on Anderson’s reliability, it seems the grim fate of the scientists at Zodiac Station may involve human greed, jealousy, oil company trickery, Russian espionage, genetic experimentation, and global warming. But the truth is something no one on the Terra Nova could have imagined.

A fast-paced, gripping thriller that marries science and adventure, Zodiac Station is as chilling and unpredictable as the fierce Arctic landscape.

Visit Tom Harper's website.

My Book, The Movie: Zodiac Station.

The Page 69 Test: Zodiac Station.

--Marshal Zeringue

What is Judy Brown reading?

Featured at Writers Read: Judy Brown, author of This Is Not a Love Story: A Memoir.

Her entry begins:

The Slave Trade, by Hugh Thomas

This is the kind of book you read over a period of time, to better process, ponder, and fully digest. Reading too much at once is unsettling for the mind. It is 798 pages on the slave trade, encompassing the span of thousands of years, covering the roots of this most ancient of markets, that of man trading man for money and power. The scope is breathtaking, covering....[read on]

About the book, from the publisher:

A razor-sharp, hilarious, and poignant memoir about growing up in the closed world of the ultraorthodox Jewish community.

The third of six children in a family that harks back to a gloried Hassidic dynasty, Judy Brown grew up with the legacy of centuries of religious teaching, and the faith and lore that sustained her people for generations.

But her carefully constructed world begins to crumble when her "crazy" brother Nachum returns home after a year in Israel living with relatives. Though supposedly "cured," he is still prone to retreating into his own mind or erupting in wordless rages. The adults' inability to make him better - or even to give his affliction a name - forces Judy to ask larger questions: If God could perform miracles for her sainted ancestors, why can't He cure Nachum? And what of the other stories her family treasured?

Judy starts to negotiate with God, swinging from holy tenets to absurdly hilarious conclusions faster than a Talmudic scholar: she goes on a fast to nab coveted earrings; she fights with her siblings at the dinner table for the ultimate badge of honor ("Who will survive the next Holocaust?"); and she adamantly defends her family's reputation when, scandalously, her parents are accused of having fallen in love---which is absolutely not what pious people do.

For all its brutal honesty about this insular community, This Is Not a Love Story is ultimately a story of a family like so many others, whose fierce love for each other and devotion to their faith pulled them through the darkest time in their lives.

Visit Judy Brown's website.

My Book, The Movie: This Is Not a Love Story.

Writers Read: Judy Brown.

--Marshal Zeringue

Pg. 99: David Morgan's "The Forge of Vision"

Featured at the Page 99 Test: The Forge of Vision: A Visual History of Modern Christianity by David Morgan.

About the book, from the publisher:

Religions teach their adherents how to see and feel at the same time; learning to see is not a disembodied process but one hammered from the forge of human need, social relations, and material practice. David Morgan argues that the history of religions may therefore be studied through the lens of their salient visual themes. The Forge of Vision tells the history of Christianity from the sixteenth century through the present by selecting the visual themes of faith that have profoundly influenced its development. After exploring how distinctive Catholic and Protestant visual cultures emerged in the early modern period, Morgan examines a variety of Christian visual practices, ranging from the imagination, visions of nationhood, the likeness of Jesus, the material life of words, and the role of modern art as a spiritual quest, to the importance of images for education, devotion, worship, and domestic life. An insightful, informed presentation of how Christianity has shaped and continues to shape the modern world, this work is a must-read for scholars and students across fields of religious studies, history, and art history.

Learn more about The Forge of Vision at the University of California Press website.

Writers Read: David Morgan.

The Page 99 Test: The Forge of Vision.

--Marshal Zeringue

Ten top timeless kids' books from the ’90s

At B & N Reads Jen Harper tagged ten top kids' books from the ’90s that have proven to be utterly timeless, including:

The Giver, by Lois Lowry (1993)

Twelve-year-old Jonas lives in a society free of pain and suffering. The seeming utopia has converted to Sameness in order to protect its people—there’s no crime, hunger, poverty, or memory of the past. “The life where nothing was ever unexpected. Or inconvenient. Or unusual.” But it’s also a life without love, music, and color. Jonas, like everyone else in his community, is assigned a job at age 12 by the Elders. And Jonas is chosen for the most important and difficult job of all: Receiver of Memory. The Giver teaches him the truth about his community’s dystopian, mind-controlling reality. Together, Jonas and the Giver come up with a plan for Jonas’s escape, which would restore memories to everyone in the community. Despite being published more than 20 years ago, Lowry’s provocative book remains a timeless classic.

Read about another book on the list.

The Giver made John Corey Whaley's top ten list of coming of age books for teens, Shaun Byron Fitzpatrick's list of thirteen top, occasionally-banned YA novels, Guy Lodge's list of ten of the best dystopias in fiction, film, art, and television, Joel Cunningham's list of six great young adult book series for fans of The Hunger Games, and Lauren Davis's top ten list of science fiction’s most depressing futuristic retirement scenarios.

Read--Coffee with a Canine: Lois Lowry & Alfie.

--Marshal Zeringue

Benjamin Johncock's "The Last Pilot," the movie

Featured at My Book, The Movie: The Last Pilot by Benjamin Johncock.

The entry begins:

This is a tough one. I usually prefer to let readers form their own images and impressions… but, who can resist the fun of a game like this? Well, not me. I love the movies.

Let’s start with Harrison Ford, circa 1981 for Jim. I’ve also been mesmerized by Matthew Goode, an actor who can say nothing but convey everything. Matthew Goode is the scene. He’s a master. We were at the University of Birmingham together too, though our paths never crossed. Robert Bernstein, who produced the 2008 adaptation of Brideshead Revisited, said that Goode won the role of Ryder because of his wonderful stillness: “The sign of a truly great actor is not what he says but what he appears to say when the camera is on him, and Matthew has that.” It’s the same quality I see in Jon...[read on]

Visit Benjamin Johncock's website.

The Page 69 Test: The Last Pilot.

Writers Read: Benjamin Johncock.

My Book, The Movie: The Last Pilot.

--Marshal Zeringue

What is Frankie Y. Bailey reading?

Featured at Writers Read: Frankie Y. Bailey, author of What the Fly Saw.

Her entry begins:

I’d like to say I’m reading a literary classic or a terrific mystery. But the truth is my fiction reading is on hold until I can get away on vacation later this summer. Until then I’m going to focus on reading related to a non-fiction book I’m writing about clothing and crime. On my desk right now: The Politics of Fashion in Eighteenth Century America by Kate Haulman and Sensory Worlds in Early America by Peter Charles Hoffer. I’m also working on a historical thriller set in 1939. I’m reading about the New York City World’s Fair and the royal visit and the premier of Gone with the Wind in Atlanta. Luckily, I happen to...[read on]

About What the Fly Saw, from the publisher:

Frankie Bailey introduced readers to an exciting new protagonist in The Red Queen Dies, the first book in the Detective Hannah McCabe mystery series. Now in What the Fly Saw, Hannah and her partner Mike Baxter are back with an even more puzzling case.

Albany, New York, January 2020

The morning after a blizzard that shut down the city, funeral director Kevin Novak is found dead in the basement of his funeral home. The arrow sticking out of his chest came from his own hunting bow.

A loving husband and father and an active member of a local megachurch, Novak has no known enemies. His family and friends say he was depressed because his best friend died suddenly of a heart attack and Novak blamed himself. But what does his guilt have to do with his death? Maybe nothing, maybe a lot. The minister of the megachurch and the psychiatrist who provides counseling to church members--do either of them know more than they are saying?

Detective Hannah McCabe and her partner, Mike Baxter, sort through lies and evasions to solve the riddle of Novak's death, while unanswered questions from another high-profile case, and McCabe's own suspicions make for a dynamite crime novel.

Visit Frankie Y. Bailey's website, Facebook page, and Twitter perch.

The Page 69 Test: What the Fly Saw.

My Book, The Movie: What the Fly Saw.

Writers Read: Frankie Y. Bailey.

--Marshal Zeringue

Pg. 69: Lou Anders's "Nightborn"

Featured at the Page 69 Test: Nightborn by Lou Anders.

About the book, from the publisher:

From the author of Frostborn comes Book 2 in the acclaimed Thrones and Bones fantasy-adventure trilogy for fans of Lloyd Alexander and Brandon Mull.

Karn Korlundsson is a gamer. Not a riddle solver. But in order to rescue his best friend, Thianna Frostborn, he will need to travel to the faraway city of Castlebriar (by wyvern), learn how to play a new board game called Charioteers (not a problem), decipher the Riddle of the Horn, and tangle with mysterious elves.

Meet Desstra. She’s in training to join the Underhand—the elite agents of the dark elves. When she crosses paths with Karn, she is not all that she appears to be.

Everyone is chasing after the horn of Osius, an ancient artifact with the power to change the world. The lengths to which Karn will go in the name of friendship will be sorely tested. Who knew that solving a riddle could be so deadly?

Visit the official Thrones & Bones website, Lou Anders's website, Facebook page, and Twitter perch.

The Page 69 Test: Nightborn.

--Marshal Zeringue

Four books that changed Laura Lippman

Since the publication of her first novel in 1997, Laura Lippman has won virtually every major award given to U.S. crime writings, including the Edgar Award, Anthony Award, Agatha Award, Nero Wolfe Award, Shamus Award, and the Quill Award. She is a New York Times bestseller. Lippman's novels include a number standalones as well as Hush Hush, her twelfth Tess Monaghan novel.

One of four books that changed the author, as shared at the Sydney Morning Herald:

A Tree Grows in Brooklyn
Betty Smith

This is considered a young adult novel and I think it's an unrecognised American classic because it centres on the life of a young girl. Set in Brooklyn 100 years before the neighbourhood became hip, it is about a family trapped in grinding poverty. It also has one of the best insights on writing that I've ever read. The heroine, Francie Nolan, yearns to write. After trying to create lush fantasies for a teacher who finds her real-life stories "sordid", Francie realises that describing one's fantasies is a round-about way of being inauthentic.

Read about another entry on the list.

--Marshal Zeringue

Coffee with a canine: Gennifer Choldenko & Sasha

Featured at Coffee with a Canine: Gennifer Choldenko & Sasha.

The author, on how she and Sasha were united:

Sophie, our last German shepherd, died suddenly after a fantastic holiday at the beach. My son, my daughter and I were absolutely distraught. My husband, not so much. He and I had agreed to wait to get another dog, but alas he left for Europe on business ... and my daughter, then eleven, went to work. She found Sasha and lobbied hard for her. I talked to my husband about this by phone. I discussed my concerns about buying a dog over the internet, my worries about taking my kids then eleven and fifteen with me to a strange person’s home to get the dog and how exactly we might pay for said dog. But none of this quite registered with him. It was when we were driving home with the adorable puppy Sasha curled up at my daughter’s feet, that...[read on]

About Choldenko's new novel, Chasing Secrets, from the publisher:

Newbery Honor–winning author Gennifer Choldenko deftly combines humor, tragedy, fascinating historical detail, and a medical mystery in this exuberant new novel.

San Francisco, 1900. The Gilded Age. A fantastic time to be alive for lots of people . . . but not thirteen-year-old Lizzie Kennedy, stuck at Miss Barstow’s snobby school for girls. Lizzie’s secret passion is science, an unsuitable subject for finishing-school girls. Lizzie lives to go on house calls with her physician father. On those visits to his patients, she discovers a hidden dark side of the city—a side that’s full of secrets, rats, and rumors of the plague.

The newspapers, her powerful uncle, and her beloved papa all deny that the plague has reached San Francisco. So why is the heart of the city under quarantine? Why are angry mobs trying to burn Chinatown to the ground? Why is Noah, the Chinese cook’s son, suddenly making Lizzie question everything she has known to be true? Ignoring the rules of race and class, Lizzie and Noah must put the pieces together in a heart-stopping race to save the people they love.

Visit Gennifer Choldenko's website.

Coffee with a Canine: Gennifer Choldenko & Sasha.

--Marshal Zeringue

Pg. 99: Reid Mitenbuler's "Bourbon Empire"

Featured at the Page 99 Test: Bourbon Empire: The Past and Future of America's Whiskey by Reid Mitenbuler.

About the book, from the publisher:

How bourbon came to be, and why it’s experiencing such a revival today

Unraveling the many myths and misconceptions surrounding America’s most iconic spirit, Bourbon Empire traces a history that spans frontier rebellion, Gilded Age corruption, and the magic of Madison Avenue. Whiskey has profoundly influenced America’s political, economic, and cultural destiny, just as those same factors have inspired the evolution and unique flavor of the whiskey itself.

Taking readers behind the curtain of an enchanting—and sometimes exasperating—industry, the work of writer Reid Mitenbuler crackles with attitude and commentary about taste, choice, and history. Few products better embody the United States, or American business, than bourbon.

A tale of innovation, success, downfall, and resurrection, Bourbon Empire is an exploration of the spirit in all its unique forms, creating an indelible portrait of both bourbon and the people who make it.

Visit Reid Mitenbuler's website.

The Page 99 Test: Bourbon Empire.

--Marshal Zeringue

What is Sarah Elizabeth Schantz reading?

Featured at Writers Read: Sarah Elizabeth Schantz, author of Fig.

Her entry begins:

I’ve been reading a lot of poetry, which is new for me. I just finished Dorianne Laux’s exquisite collection, Facts About the Moon, and before that Marie Howe’s, What The Living Do, and Ellen Bass’ Like a Beggar. I soon learned there is a connection between these poets as Howe dedicated her book to Laux and blurbed Bass’ The Human Line. I learned of Howe when I heard her read “Practicing” on Fresh Air. Every once in a while, I encounter work by someone else that feels like work I could have written—I don’t know how else to describe the feeling, and please understand that I am not by any means saying I could write a poem as gorgeous or as honest as “Practicing,” because I couldn’t, but I am attempting to explain the affinity I feel for it. From there, I discovered Bass, and then serendipity led me to Laux. I’m part of...[read on]

About Fig, from the publisher:

Love and sacrifice intertwine in this brilliant and provocative debut of rare beauty about a girl dealing with her mother’s schizophrenia and her own mental illness.

Fig’s world lies somewhere between reality and fantasy.

But as she watches Mama slowly come undone, it becomes hard to tell what is real and what is not, what is fun and what is frightening. To save Mama, Fig begins a fierce battle to bring her back. She knows that her daily sacrifices, like not touching metal one day or avoiding water the next, are the only way to cure Mama.

The problem is that in the process of a daily sacrifice, Fig begins to lose herself as well, increasingly isolating herself from her classmates and engaging in self-destructive behavior that only further sets her apart.

Spanning the course of Fig’s childhood from age six to nineteen, this deeply provocative novel is more than a portrait of a mother, a daughter, and the struggle that comes with all-consuming love. It is an acutely honest and often painful portrayal of life with mental illness and the lengths to which a young woman must go to handle the ordeals—real or imaginary—thrown her way.

Visit Sarah Elizabeth Schantz's website.

The Page 69 Test: Fig.

My Book, The Movie: Fig.

Writers Read: Sarah Elizabeth Schantz.

--Marshal Zeringue

Justin Gifford's "Street Poison," the movie

Featured at My Book, The Movie: Street Poison: The Biography of Iceberg Slim by Justin Gifford.

The entry begins:

When I began to contemplate the film version of Street Poison: The Biography of Iceberg Slim, a number of clear choices emerged for lead actor as well as director of the film. Street Poison is the remarkable true story of Robert “Iceberg Slim” Beck, a notorious criminal who pimped on the streets of Chicago, Detroit, Cleveland and many other American cities for twenty-five years. He served five bits in prison during this period, including a two-year term at the infamous Leavenworth Federal Penitentiary and a brief stint at the Chicago House of Corrections (he escaped from that prison in 1947). In 1962, Beck went straight and moved to California to be with his ailing mother. He published his autobiography Pimp: The Story of My Life and a handful of other streetwise crime novels with a third-tier paperback publisher, and in the process, he transformed himself from pimp to author. By the time of his death on the day of the Rodney King riots in 1992, Beck had sold over six million books, and his work had inspired the creation of blaxploitation film, gangster rap, and street literature.

When I began this book ten years ago I had always envisioned...[read on]

Learn more about Street Poison at the publisher's website.

My Book, The Movie: Street Poison.

--Marshal Zeringue

Ten top fictional headmistresses

Esme Kerr went to ten schools and studied History at Oxford and Cambridge. The Glass Bird Girl and Mischief at Midnight are the first two boarding school mysteries in her Knight’s Haddon series.

One of her top ten fictional headmistresses, as shared at the Guardian:

Miss Pinkerton in Vanity Fair by William Thackeray

It is at the “majestic” Miss Pinkerton’s Academy for Young Ladies, set behind a “great iron gate” on Chiswick Mall, that we find Becky Sharp at the start of Vanity Fair, having just completed her studies and preparing to set out for the grander horizons of Russell Square. To her reverent admirers, Miss Pinkerton is “the Semiramis of Hammersmith, the friend of Doctor Johnson, the correspondent of Mrs. Chapone herself”; to Becky she is a tiresome old bore. Life at the academy is a daily “battle between the young lady and the old one”, and when Becky finally escapes she takes the dictionary Miss Pinkerton’s sister has given her, and throws it from the window of her coach.

Read about another entry on the list.

Vanity Fair also appears on a list of five books that changed Vikram Chandra, Joanna Trollope's six favorite books list, Maddie Crum's top ten list of fictional characters who just might be psychopaths, Allegra Frazier's list of five of her favorite fictional gold diggers, John Mullan's list of ten of the most memorable governesses in literature, Stella Tillyard's list of favorite historical novels, John Mullan's lists of ten of the best fat men in literature and ten of the best pianos in literature, and Thomas Mallon's list.

--Marshal Zeringue

Pg. 69: Wendy Sand Eckel's "Murder at Barclay Meadow"

Featured at the Page 69 Test: Murder at Barclay Meadow by Wendy Sand Eckel.

About the book, from the publisher:

Rosalie Hart's world has been upended. After her husband confesses to an affair, she exiles herself to her late aunt's farmhouse on Maryland's Eastern Shore. With its fields untended and the house itself in disrepair, Barclay Meadow couldn't be more different than the tidy D.C. suburb she used to call home. Just when Rosalie feels convinced things couldn't get any worse, she finds a body floating in her marsh grasses. When the sheriff declares the death an accident, she becomes suspicious. The dead girl, Megan, reminds her of her own daughter, who has recently gone off to college, and she feels a responsibility to find out the truth.

Rosalie confides her doubts to her friends in her creative writing class, and they ask to join her investigation, beginning the search in earnest. Meanwhile, Rosalie works on restoring Barclay Meadow to its former glory-with help from the rugged Tyler Wells, a farmer who once leased the land. When Rosalie discovers her aunt's favorite bread recipe on a yellowed index card, she begins baking, and with her deep love for nourishing others rekindled, she starts to feel alive again. But as she zeroes in on the truth about what happened to Megan, she begins getting ominous threats. Determined to get justice for Megan and protect the new home she's begun to build for herself, Rosalie races to catch the killer in this deftly plotted and heartwarming debut.

Visit Wendy Sand Eckel's website and Facebook page.

The Page 69 Test: Murder at Barclay Meadow.

--Marshal Zeringue

What is Benjamin Johncock reading?

Featured at Writers Read: Benjamin Johncock, author of The Last Pilot: A Novel.

His entry begins:

I just finished what is my book of 2015 so far: Saint Mazie by Jami Attenberg. It’s a fictional reconstruction of the life of Mazie Philips, who grew up on New York’s Lower East Side during the Jazz Age. She worked the ticket booth of The Venice in the Bowery, and was well-known locally. When the Great Depression hit, it stirred something in her to help out the homeless men she...[read on]

About The Last Pilot, from the publisher:

"Harrison sat very still. On the screen was the surface of the moon."

Jim Harrison is a test pilot in the United States Air Force, one of the exalted few. He spends his days cheating death in the skies above the Mojave Desert and his nights at his friend Pancho's bar, often with his wife, Grace. She and Harrison are secretly desperate for a child-and when, against all odds, Grace learns that she is pregnant, the two are overcome with joy.

While America becomes swept up in the fervor of the Space Race, Harrison turns his attention home, passing up the chance to become an astronaut to welcome his daughter, Florence, into the world. Together, he and Grace confront the thrills and challenges of raising a child head-on. Fatherhood is different than flying planes-less controlled, more anxious-however the pleasures of watching Florence grow are incomparable. But when his family is faced with a sudden and inexplicable tragedy, Harrison's instincts as a father and a pilot are put to test. As a pilot, he feels compelled to lead them through it-and as a father, he fears that he has fallen short.

The aftermath will haunt the Harrisons and strain their marriage as Jim struggles under the weight of his decisions. Beginning when the dust of the Second World War has only just begun to settle and rushing onward into the Sixties, Benjamin Johncock traces the path of this young couple as they are uprooted by events much larger than themselves. The turns the Harrisons take together are at once astonishing and recognizable; their journey, both frightening and full of hope. Set against the backdrop of one of the most emotionally charged periods in American history, The Last Pilot is a mesmerizing debut novel of loss and finding courage in the face of it from an extraordinary new talent.

Visit Benjamin Johncock's website.

The Page 69 Test: The Last Pilot.

Writers Read: Benjamin Johncock.

--Marshal Zeringue

Judy Brown's "This Is Not a Love Story," the movie

Featured at My Book, The Movie: This Is Not a Love Story: A Memoir by Judy Brown.

The entry begins:

Having grown up in ultra-orthodox Jewish community where movies, TV and any medium connecting one to the mainstream cultural world was forbidden, I do not know enough to fantasize about who would theoretically play the characters of my book should Hollywood come calling. I am sure there are many talented actors and actresses who could play the parts of the various Chassidim that fill my story. They would...[read on]

Visit Judy Brown's website.

My Book, The Movie: This Is Not a Love Story.

--Marshal Zeringue

Five timeless old-school thrillers

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.

At B & N Reads Somers tagged five old-school thrillers that would be hits today, including:

The Day of the Jackal, by Frederick Forsyth

The Cold War politics of this classic thriller are long gone, but Forsyth’s novel (which won the 1972 Edgar Award for Best Novel) still carries the punch of a meticulously researched story set in a very real world. It’s a novel of agonizing anticipation: first, as we follow the slow, careful preparations and planning of the titular Jackal, hired to assassinate the President of France; then as we follow along with the equally painstaking detective work of the man charged with identifying the Jackal as time runs out. The twin stories of detective and assassin remain separate right up until the moment the Jackal takes his shot, and it’s this element of cat-and-mouse between a devious killer and a brilliant agent—plus the elevated stakes of global politics—that make this a book that stills resonate today.

Read about another entry on the list.

The Day of the Jackal is among Sam Bourne's five favorite classic thrillers and Christopher Timothy's 6 best books.

--Marshal Zeringue

Pg. 99: Peter A. Shulman's "Coal and Empire"

Featured at the Page 99 Test: Coal and Empire: The Birth of Energy Security in Industrial America by Peter A. Shulman.

About the book, from the publisher:

Since the early twentieth century, Americans have associated oil with national security. From World War I to American involvement in the Middle East, this connection has seemed a self-evident truth. But as Peter A. Shulman argues, Americans had to learn to think about the geopolitics of energy in terms of security, and they did so beginning in the nineteenth century: the age of coal. Coal and Empire insightfully weaves together pivotal moments in the history of science and technology by linking coal and steam to the realms of foreign relations, navy logistics, and American politics. Long before oil, coal allowed Americans to rethink the place of the United States in the world.

Shulman explores how the development of coal-fired, ocean-going steam power in the 1840s created new questions, opportunities, and problems for U.S. foreign relations and naval strategy. The search for coal, for example, helped take Commodore Matthew Perry to Japan in the 1850s. It facilitated Abraham Lincoln’s pursuit of black colonization in 1860s Panama. After the Civil War, it led Americans to debate whether a need for coaling stations required the construction of a global island empire. Until 1898, however, Americans preferred to answer the questions posed by coal with new technologies rather than new territories. Afterward, the establishment of America’s island empire created an entirely different demand for coal to secure the country’s new colonial borders, a process that paved the way for how Americans incorporated oil into their strategic thought.

By exploring how the security dimensions of energy were not intrinsically linked to a particular source of power but rather to political choices about America’s role in the world, Shulman ultimately suggests that contemporary global struggles over energy will never disappear, even if oil is someday displaced by alternative sources of power.

Learn more about Coal and Empire at the Johns Hopkins University Press website.

Writers Read: Peter A. Shulman.

The Page 99 Test: Coal and Empire.

--Marshal Zeringue