What is Bridget Asher reading?

Featured at Writers Read: Bridget Asher, author of All of Us and Everything.

Her entry begins:

I'm reading a lot of literary science fiction and fantasy. I just dipped into The Water Knife by Paolo Bacigalupi. I'm bouncing around in Best American Fantasy, edited by Jeff and Ann VanderMeer. I'm also reading a novel that will come out next year The Birds of Opulence by Crystal Wilkinson and...[read on]

About All of Us and Everything, from the publisher:

For fans of Eleanor Brown’s The Weird Sisters and Liane Moriarty’s The Husband’s Secret comes a smart, wry, and poignant novel about reconciliation between fathers and daughters, between spouses; the deep ties between sisters; and the kind of forgiveness that can change a person’s life in unexpected and extraordinary ways.

The Rockwell women are nothing if not . . . Well, it’s complicated. When the sisters—Esme, Liv, and Ru—were young, their eccentric mother, Augusta, silenced all talk of their absent father with the wild story that he was an international spy, always away on top-secret missions. But the consequences of such an unconventional upbringing are neither small nor subtle: Esme is navigating a failing marriage while trying to keep her precocious fifteen-year-old daughter from live-tweeting every detail. Liv finds herself in between relationships and rehabs, and Ru has run away from enough people and problems to earn her frequent flier miles. So when a hurricane hits the family home on the Jersey Shore, the Rockwells reunite to assess the damage—only to discover that the storm has unearthed a long-buried box. In a candid moment, Augusta reveals a startling secret that will blow the sisters’ concept of family to smithereens—and send them on an adventure to reconnect with a lost past ... and one another.

Learn more about the book and author at Bridget Asher's website and blog.

The Page 69 Test: All of Us and Everything.

Writers Read: Bridget Asher.

--Marshal Zeringue

Pg. 99: Ginger Strand's "The Brothers Vonnegut"

Featured at the Page 99 Test: The Brothers Vonnegut: Science and Fiction in the House of Magic by Ginger Strand.

About the book, from the publisher:

Worlds collide in this true story of weather control in the Cold War era and the making of Kurt Vonnegut

In the mid-1950s, Kurt Vonnegut takes a job in the PR department at General Electric in Schenectady, where his older brother, Bernard, is a leading scientist in its research lab—or "House of Magic." Kurt has ambitions as a novelist, and Bernard is working on a series of cutting-edge weather-control experiments meant to make deserts bloom and farmers flourish.
While Kurt writes zippy press releases, Bernard builds silver-iodide generators and attacks clouds with dry ice. His experiments attract the attention of the government; weather proved a decisive factor in World War II, and if the military can control the clouds, fog, and snow, they can fly more bombing missions. Maybe weather will even be—as a headline in American Magazine calls it—"The New Super Weapon." But when the army takes charge of his cloudseeding project (dubbed Project Cirrus), Bernard begins to have misgivings about the use of his inventions for harm, not to mention the evidence that they are causing alarming changes in the atmosphere.

In a fascinating cultural history, Ginger Strand chronicles the intersection of these brothers' lives at a time when the possibilities of science seemed infinite. As the Cold War looms, Bernard's struggle for integrity plays out in Kurt's evolving writing style. The Brothers Vonnegut reveals how science's ability to influence the natural world also influenced one of our most inventive novelists.

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

The Page 99 Test: Killer on the Road.

The Page 99 Test: The Brothers Vonnegut.

--Marshal Zeringue

Five of the worst fictional characters to invite to Thanksgiving

At The Barnes & Noble Book Blog Jill Boyd tagged five of the worst fictional characters to invite to Thanksgiving. One entry on the list:

The Gladneys (White Noise)

OK, maybe it’s unfair to peg the Gladneys as unpleasant holiday guests. Professor Gladney is, after all, a learned scholar, and Babette is quite the conversationalist. Really, other than the fact that he studies Hitler for a living, they both speak obsessively of death, she’s a drug addict, and he attempted to kill the man with whom she was having an affair, they’re really quite lovely company.

Read about another entry on the list.

--Marshal Zeringue

Tony Peak's "Inherit the Stars," the movie

Featured at My Book, The Movie: Inherit the Stars by Tony Peak.

The entry begins:

If my book were made into a film? My first choice for director would be Ridley Scott, since he puts so much detail into his movies. His visual style from Alien and Blade Runner still inspire me. But now that I really think about it, Joss Whedon would probably be a better choice, since this a space opera, and he has an excellent handle on action, characterization, and dialogue.

For composer, I’d want Hans Zimmer to create a soaring orchestral score accompanied by electronic elements; his soundtrack for Interstellar would be a good fit.

As far as actors, I could see...[read on]

Visit Tony Peak's website.

Writers Read: Tony Peak.

The Page 69 Test: Inherit the Stars.

My Book, The Movie: Inherit the Stars.

--Marshal Zeringue

Ten top genre-bending books

Lincoln Michel's new story collection is Upright Beasts.

One of his ten favorite genre-bending books, as shared at Publishers Weekly:

The Wilds by Julia Elliott

Elliott’s 2014 debut, The Wilds, offers up a wild serving of feral dogs, romantic robots, and grotesque spa treatments. In the vein of Kelly Link or George Saunders, the stories here are simultaneously “literary” and “genre,” mixing gorgeous prose and complex characters with inventive takes on SF, fantasy, and horror tropes. What ties the collection together are the through-lines of Southern Gothic prose and social satire. If you’ve ever wondered what the gene-splicing of William Faulkner and Ursula K. Le Guin would produce, check out The Wilds.

Read about another book on the list.

--Marshal Zeringue

What is Sylvia Spruck Wrigley reading?

Featured at Writers Read: Sylvia Spruck Wrigley, author of Domnall and the Borrowed Child.

Her entry begins:

At the moment, I'm reading four books. This is problematic because I'm not really much for juggling. My reading pattern is usually serial monogamy but somehow I've ended up in a mess.

The Atrocity Archives by Charles Stross
This is the first in the Laundry Files series and considered a novella although it seems to have the heft of a novel to me. The Laundry Files are a series of Lovecraftian spy thrillers told from the view point of a computer expert working for a secret department in the British intelligence organisation.

My son has devoured every book in the Laundry Files and has been recommending them to me for some time. We agreed on a recommendation trade: if he read Andy Weir's The Martian then I would read the first book in the series. He's done his bit (and gone to watch the film too) but I was only...[read on]

About Domnall and the Borrowed Child, from the publisher:

The best and bravest faeries fell in the war against the Sluagh, and now the Council is packed with idiots and cowards. Domnall is old, aching, and as cranky as they come, but as much as he'd like to retire, he's the best scout the Sithein court has left.

When a fae child falls deathly ill, Domnall knows he's the only one who can get her the medicine she needs: Mother's milk. The old scout will face cunning humans, hungry wolves, and uncooperative sheep, to say nothing of his fellow fae!

Visit Sylvia Spruck Wrigley's website and Twitter perch.

Writers Read: Sylvia Spruck Wrigley.

--Marshal Zeringue

Five top books to get you in the mood to eat

At B & N Reads Jenny Shank tagged five fabulous food-focused works, including:

A Moveable Feast by Ernest Hemingway

Who wouldn’t want to live—and eat—in Paris of the 1920s? The closest we can get now is through Hemingway’s dashing account of this time and place in A Moveable Feast. He’s not writing just about food, but about the sustenance a vibrant atmosphere gives: “If you are lucky enough to have lived in Paris as a young man, then wherever you go for the rest of your life, it stays with you, for Paris is a moveable feast.” Still, there’s plenty of good eating in this book. “As I ate the oysters with their strong taste of the sea and their faint metallic taste that the cold white wine washed away,” Hemingway writes, “leaving only the sea taste and the succulent texture, and as I drank their cold liquid from each shell and washed it down with the crisp taste of the wine, I lost the empty feeling and began to be happy and to make plans.”

Read about another entry on the list.

A Moveable Feast made Olivia Laing's ten best list of books and stories on drinking and booze, Katherine Monasterio's top five list of incredible tales of Paris’s past and present, the Barnes & Noble Review's list of five books on Americans in Paris, Neil Pearson's six best books list, Diana Souhami's top ten list of "books about Paris and London lesbians in the early 20th century", Laura Landro's five best list of books about travel; it is a book to which Russell Banks always returns.

--Marshal Zeringue

Pg. 99: Terry Williams & Trevor B. Milton's "The Con Men"

Featured at the Page 99 Test: The Con Men: Hustling in New York City by Terry Williams and Trevor B. Milton.

About the book, from the publisher:

This vivid account of hustling in New York City explores the sociological reasons why con artists play their game and the psychological tricks they use to win it. Terry Williams and Trevor B. Milton, two prominent sociologists and ethnographers, spent years with New York con artists to uncover their secrets. The result is an unprecedented view into how con games operate, whether in back alleys and side streets or in police precincts and Wall Street boiler rooms. Whether it's selling bootleg goods, playing the numbers, squatting rent-free, scamming tourists with bogus stories, selling knockoffs on Canal Street, or crafting Ponzi schemes, con artists use verbal persuasion, physical misdirection, and sheer charm to convince others to do what they want. Williams and Milton examine this act of performance art and find meaning in its methods to exact bounty from unsuspecting tourists and ordinary New Yorkers alike. Through their sophisticated exploration of the personal experiences and influences that create a successful hustler, they build a portrait of unusual emotional and psychological depth. Their work also offers a new take on structure and opportunity, showing how the city's unique urban and social architecture lends itself to the perfect con.

Learn more about The Con Men at the Columbia University Press website.

My Book, The Movie: The Con Men.

The Page 99 Test: The Con Men: Hustling in New York City.

--Marshal Zeringue

Pg. 69: Michael Livingston's "The Shards of Heaven"

Featured at the Page 69 Test: The Shards of Heaven by Michael Livingston.

About the book, from the publisher:

Julius Caesar is dead, assassinated on the senate floor, and the glory that is Rome has been torn in two. Octavian, Caesar's ambitious great-nephew and adopted son, vies with Marc Antony and Cleopatra for control of Caesar's legacy. As civil war rages from Rome to Alexandria, and vast armies and navies battle for supremacy, a secret conflict may shape the course of history.

Juba, Numidian prince and adopted brother of Octavian, has embarked on a ruthless quest for the Shards of Heaven, lost treasures said to possess the very power of the gods-or the one God. Driven by vengeance, Juba has already attained the fabled Trident of Poseidon, which may also be the staff once wielded by Moses. Now he will stop at nothing to obtain the other Shards, even if it means burning the entire world to the ground.

Caught up in these cataclysmic events, and the hunt for the Shards, are a pair of exiled Roman legionnaires, a Greek librarian of uncertain loyalties, assassins, spies, slaves . . . and the ten-year-old daughter of Cleopatra herself.

Michael Livingston's The Shards of Heaven reveals the hidden magic behind the history we know, and commences a war greater than any mere mortal battle.

Visit Michael Livingston's website.

The Page 69 Test: The Shards of Heaven.

--Marshal Zeringue

Nose in a book: Steph Cha

Who: Steph Cha

What: Hounded by David Rosenfelt

When: November 2015

Where: Steph Cha's house

Photo credit: Steph Cha's husband

Visit Steph Cha's website and Twitter perch.

Coffee with a Canine: Steph Cha and Duke.

--Marshal Zeringue

Kevin Barry's 6 favorite books

Kevin Barry is the author of the highly acclaimed novel, City of Bohane, and two short-story collections, Dark Lies the Island and There Are Little Kingdoms. His new novel is Beatlebone.

One of Barry's six favorite books, as shared with The Week magazine:

2666 by Roberto Bolaño

Just when we thought the novel had no place left to go, here came this splintered masterpiece, a paranoid odyssey told in 900 writhing pages filled with a new, rich, glamorous prose. Bolaño, who died a year before the book's 2004 publication, was a great, maverick, maniacal talent. We'll be considering his influence for generations.

Read about another entry on the list.

2666 appears on Alex Clark's top ten list of long reads and Gillian Orr's reading list of top unfinished novels; it was #1 in one tabulation of the critics' consensus book of the year for 2008.

--Marshal Zeringue

What is Elizabeth Lee reading?

Featured at Writers Read: Elizabeth Lee, author of Nuts and Buried.

Her entry begins:

What am I reading? Well, mostly my own work since I’m under a couple of deadline constraints. But ... when my brain’s worn out and I can’t write another word I’m turning to M Train by Patti Smith. The book is like watching Seinfeld—about nothing, but what...[read on]

About Nuts and Buried, from the publisher:

Lindy Blanchard has enough on her hands at her family’s Texas nut farm with her new strain of pecan trees dying. Trouble is, people are dying too. In a nutshell, it’s murder—from the author of Snoop to Nuts…

The Blanchards are invited to the gala event of the season. Lindy’s wealthy friend Eugene Wheatley—who’s just nuts about his new bride—is throwing a party to introduce his wife Jeannie to Riverville, Texas, society. The celebration is in full swing when Eugene is found shot dead.

Jeannie and her unscrupulous kin are the prime suspects, but the Blanchards aren’t convinced. Lindy and her meemaw Miss Amelia have heard just about enough from the local gossips gathering at the Nut House family store to realize that Jeannie needs their help. And when somebody shoots at Lindy during the investigation, things get real personal. Lindy and Miss Amelia are determined to unmask the killer party crasher and shell out some Texas-style justice…

Learn more about the author and her work at Elizabeth Kane Buzzelli's website and blog.

The Page 69 Test: Nuts and Buried.

Writers Read: Elizabeth Lee.

--Marshal Zeringue

Michael Livingston's "The Shards of Heaven," the movie

Featured at My Book, The Movie: The Shards of Heaven by Michael Livingston.

The entry begins:

First things first, I have to say that the Powers That Be in Hollywood shouldn't take my suggestions here as a reason not to buy the film rights to The Shards of Heaven. Because I'd really like for you to buy them. Just for the record.

That said, I really want to go ahead and cast two of the roles for you: the Roman legionnaires Titus Pullo and Lucius Vorenus.

These two men are real historical characters, who feature in Julius Caesar's account (in his Commentaries on the Gallic War) of a battle against the Nervii in Gaul in 54 BCE. They have been featured in a number of fictional accounts, so when I needed a pair of legionnaires to help tell my tale, I, too, chose to use them.

Later, after I'd written much of Shards, I learned that HBO's series Rome incorporated the same two characters, with Kevin McKidd playing Lucius Vorenus and Ray Stevenson playing Titus Pullo. A student of mine...[read on]

Visit Michael Livingston's website.

My Book, The Movie: The Shards of Heaven.

--Marshal Zeringue

Pg. 99: Douglas Rogers's "The Depths of Russia"

Featured at the Page 99 Test: The Depths of Russia: Oil, Power, and Culture after Socialism by Douglas Rogers.

About the book, from the publisher:

Russia is among the world's leading oil producers, sitting atop the planet's eighth largest reserves. Like other oil-producing nations, it has been profoundly transformed by the oil industry. In The Depths of Russia, Douglas Rogers offers a nuanced and multifaceted analysis of oil's place in Soviet and Russian life, based on ethnographic fieldwork and archival research in the Perm region of the Urals. Moving beyond models of oil calibrated to capitalist centers and postcolonial "petrostates," Rogers traces the distinctive contours of the socialist—and then postsocialist—oil complex, showing how oil has figured in the making and remaking of space and time, state and corporation, exchange and money, and past and present. He pays special attention to the material properties and transformations of oil (from depth in subsoil deposits to toxicity in refining) and to the ways oil has echoed through a range of cultural registers.

The Depths of Russia challenges the common focus on high politics and Kremlin intrigue by considering the role of oil in barter exchanges and surrogate currencies, industry-sponsored social and cultural development initiatives, and the city of Perm's campaign to become a European Capital of Culture. Rogers also situates Soviet and post-Soviet oil in global contexts, showing that many of the forms of state and corporate power that emerged in Russia after socialism are not outliers but very much part of a global family of state-corporate alliances gathered at the intersection of corporate social responsibility, cultural sponsorship, and the energy and extractive industries.

Learn more about The Depths of Russia at the Cornell University Press website.

The Page 99 Test: The Depths of Russia.

--Marshal Zeringue

Top ten fictional wilderness adventures

Alexander Yates was born in Haiti and grew up in Mexico, Bolivia, and the Phillipines. He is the author of the critically acclaimed adult novel Moondogs and his debut YA novel, The Winter Place. He lives with his wife in Hanoi, Vietnam. One of the author's top ten wilderness adventures, as shared at the Guardian:

The Word for World is Forest by Ursula K Le Guin

...Le Guin gives us a massive wilderness in the form of a forested planet. Her novel opens on Athshe, called “New Tahiti” by the Terrans (earthlings) who are colonising it. More then just oppressing the indigenous people - green-furred humanoids who live in symbiosis with their forest home - the Terrans are intent on taming the very planet itself. Their eventual overthrow is both well deserved and exciting, but what really captivates me about Le Guin’s novel is the active role that the forest plays. It is at once a living thing, an ecosystem, and a civilization. Only an outsider could truly see it as a wilderness. Which is true of all wild spaces, isn’t it? That’s part of what draws us to them, and also what repels us. The wilderness can get on just fine without us.

Read about another entry on the list.

The Word for World is Forest is among Emily Stamm and Charlie Jane Anders's ten best science fiction stories where humans are the villains.

--Marshal Zeringue

Pg. 69: Bridget Asher's "All of Us and Everything"

Featured at the Page 69 Test: All of Us and Everything by Bridget Asher.

About the book, from the publisher:

For fans of Eleanor Brown’s The Weird Sisters and Liane Moriarty’s The Husband’s Secret comes a smart, wry, and poignant novel about reconciliation between fathers and daughters, between spouses; the deep ties between sisters; and the kind of forgiveness that can change a person’s life in unexpected and extraordinary ways.

The Rockwell women are nothing if not . . . Well, it’s complicated. When the sisters—Esme, Liv, and Ru—were young, their eccentric mother, Augusta, silenced all talk of their absent father with the wild story that he was an international spy, always away on top-secret missions. But the consequences of such an unconventional upbringing are neither small nor subtle: Esme is navigating a failing marriage while trying to keep her precocious fifteen-year-old daughter from live-tweeting every detail. Liv finds herself in between relationships and rehabs, and Ru has run away from enough people and problems to earn her frequent flier miles. So when a hurricane hits the family home on the Jersey Shore, the Rockwells reunite to assess the damage—only to discover that the storm has unearthed a long-buried box. In a candid moment, Augusta reveals a startling secret that will blow the sisters’ concept of family to smithereens—and send them on an adventure to reconnect with a lost past . . . and one another.

Learn more about the book and author at Bridget Asher's website and blog.

The Page 69 Test: All of Us and Everything.

--Marshal Zeringue

Five top Nordic noir titles

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 five top Nordic noir titles, as shared at B & N Reads:

Headhunters, by Jo Nesbø

Nesbø is a prolific and incredibly successful Norwegian author who has been getting better with each novel. While he’s best known for his Harry Hole books, Headhunters is an incredible standalone novel and a great display of Nesbø’s skill. With the story of Roger Brown, a high-powered corporate recruiter who uses information gleaned from his wealthy prospects to plan art heists from their homes, replacing them with expert fakes, Nesbø paints a dazzling picture of a cunning man who is the master of his own small world. When Brown bungles a heist from Clas Greve, a dangerous figure with a mysterious past, things go sharply left for the clever, urbane thief, and the story becomes a battle of wits that quickly turns violent and surprising.

Read about another book on the list.

--Marshal Zeringue

What is Lisa J. Edwards reading?

Featured at Writers Read: Lisa Edwards, author of Please Don't Bite the Baby (and Please Don't Chase the Dogs): Keeping Our Kids and Our Dogs Safe and Happy Together.

Her entry begins:

As the mother of a three-year-old staunchly entrenched in the tyrannical threes, I spend the majority of my reading time reading Indy’s books to him. I have spent many hours reading One Little Blueberry, by Tammi Salzano because Indy loves counting. We have spent another chunk of time reading all the books by Mo Willems that we can find in the “Pigeon” series like, Pigeon Finds a Hot Dog!, or Don’t let the Pigeon Drive the Bus!, or The Pigeon Needs a Bath! But, my favorite of all of Indy’s books has to be...[read on]

About Please Don't Bite the Baby, from the publisher:

Please Don't Bite the Baby (and Please Don't Chase the Dogs), chronicles certified professional dog trainer Lisa Edwards’ endearing and entertaining journey to ensure that her household survives and thrives when she introduces her son to her motley pack of animals. As Lisa knows all too well, the dog/child relationship is simultaneously treasured, misunderstood, and sometimes feared. In a twist, Lisa's dog training techniques inevitably seep into how she navigates her first year with baby to mixed but enlightening results.

Lisa includes her best training techniques for the everyday pet owner itemized at the end of each chapter. This book is important for parents, grandparents, and caregivers who have dogs and young children together and want to ensure safety for all.

Visit Lisa J. Edwards's website.

Coffee with a Canine: Lisa Edwards & Boo, Porthos, and Pinball.

Writers Read: Lisa Edwards.

--Marshal Zeringue

Pg. 99: Michael J. Lansing's "Insurgent Democracy"

Featured at the Page 99 Test: Insurgent Democracy: The Nonpartisan League in North American Politics by Michael J. Lansing.

About the book, from the publisher:

In 1915, western farmers mounted one of the most significant challenges to party politics America has seen: the Nonpartisan League, which sought to empower citizens and restrain corporate influence. Before its collapse in the 1920s, the League counted over 250,000 paying members, spread to thirteen states and two Canadian provinces, controlled North Dakota’s state government, and birthed new farmer-labor alliances. Yet today it is all but forgotten, neglected even by scholars.

Michael J. Lansing aims to change that. Insurgent Democracy offers a new look at the Nonpartisan League and a new way to understand its rise and fall in the United States and Canada. Lansing argues that, rather than a spasm of populist rage that inevitably burned itself out, the story of the League is in fact an instructive example of how popular movements can create lasting change. Depicting the League as a transnational response to economic inequity, Lansing not only resurrects its story of citizen activism, but also allows us to see its potential to inform contemporary movements.

Learn more about Insurgent Democracy at the book's website.

The Page 99 Test: Insurgent Democracy.

--Marshal Zeringue

The 10 best Vladimir Nabokov books

Brian Boyd, University Distinguished Professor of English, University of Auckland, wrote an MA thesis that Vladimir Nabokov called “brilliant” and a PhD thesis that Véra Nabokov thought the best thing written about her husband to date. His biography of Nabokov won awards on four continents; his criticism has been translated into eighteen languages. He has edited Nabokov's English-language novels, autobiography, butterfly writings, and translations from Russian poetry. Boyd is the editor of Letters to Véra.

One entry on his list of the ten best Vladimir Nabokov books, as shared at Publishers Weekly:

Lolita (1955)

Nabokov’s most accessible masterpiece, told by one of literature’s most seductive monsters—and another novel often rated the greatest of the century. A handsome 38-year-old pedophile hunts and traps the 12-year-old love of his life. Perhaps the only scandalous work to shock later readers even more than its initial audience, it assaults our imaginations as it mingles memory and desire, passion and playfulness, tenderness and cruelty, love and its contraries: lust, self-love, hatred. Endless variations on the hunter hunted offer surprises and ironies that deepen as we reread. For all its accessibility Lolita may still elude us more than even the mirage world of Pale Fire or the opulent antiworld of Ada.

Read about another entry on the list.

Lolita appears on Billy Collins' six favorite books list, Charlotte Runcie's list of the ten best bad mothers in literature, Kathryn Williams's list of fifteen notable works on lust, Boris Kachka's six favorite books list, Fiona Maazel's list of the ten worst fathers in books, Jennifer Gilmore's list of the ten worst mothers in books, Steven Amsterdam's list of five top books that have anxiety at their heart, John Banville's five best list of books on early love and infatuation, Kathryn Harrison's list of favorite books with parentless protagonists, Emily Temple's list of ten of the greatest kisses in literature, John Mullan's list of ten of the best lakes in literature, Dan Vyleta's top ten list of books in second languages, Rowan Somerville's top ten list of books of good sex in fiction, Henry Sutton's top ten list of unreliable narrators, Adam Leith Gollner's top ten list of fruit scenes in literature, Laura Hird's literary top ten list, Monica Ali's ten favorite books list, Laura Lippman's 5 most important books list, Mohsin Hamid's 10 favorite books list, and Dani Shapiro's 10 favorite books list. It is Lena Dunham's favorite book.

--Marshal Zeringue