I have a great giveaway for you. Just leave a comment and be entered to win this new book. I just started reading it myself and am enjoying it quite at bit.
Description:
Hay-on-Wye, 1995. Peter Byerly isn’t sure what drew him into this particular bookshop. Nine months earlier, the death of his beloved wife, Amanda, had left him shattered. The young antiquarian bookseller relocated from North Carolina to the English countryside, hoping to rediscover the joy he once took in collecting and restoring rare books. But upon opening an eighteenth-century study of Shakespeare forgeries, Peter is shocked when a portrait of Amanda tumbles out of its pages. Of course, it isn’t really her. The watercolor is clearly Victorian. Yet the resemblance is uncanny, and Peter becomes obsessed with learning the picture’s origins.
As he follows the trail back first to the Victorian era and then to Shakespeare’s time, Peter communes with Amanda’s spirit, learns the truth about his own past, and discovers a book that might definitively prove Shakespeare was, indeed, the author of all his plays.
The kind folks at Viking/Penguin will send one copy of this brand new book to one lucky winner to an address in the Continental US. Here’s what you need to say in the comments:
1) Leave your first name
2) Include your email address in the following format — name (at) email (dot) com — to prevent spam.
3) Tell us your favorite work by Shakespeare.
Contest is now closed! Congratulations to Meg Cronin!
Hazarajat, a central area of Afghanistan, has remained rural for centuries. Though modernity has seeped through the cracks of this archaic land, traditions have remained. One of those customs is storytelling. The authors bring their type of storytelling heritage to a Western audience.
In the city where I live now, all the stories are in books. They are studied in universities. I am not sure that these stories still pierce the flesh of those who hear them and make a life for themselves in the listener’s heart. In Afghanistan, we have very few universities and very few professors. The history of the Hazara is told in the fields, in our tents, in our houses. Many of the stories I heard when I was growing up, even those from centuries ago, came to life again before my eyes. Pg. 3-4
These interwoven stories feel ancient, as old as the Hazara people. Yet when the reader thinks they are hearing a story that took places many years ago, the narrator drops in a modern detail. It is slightly jarring, but it is effective. It reminds the reader that the themes of humanity remain the same, even if times change.
Near Hazarat, Afghanistan
The tales surround a honey maker, a the search for a snow leopard, an unlikely musician, an unlikelier political dissident, and even an American baseball pendant.
The book also illuminates the culture of the Hazara people — sometimes with great humor.
Suspicion of strangers is as common amongst the Hazara as amongst any other people. The villagers watched the house about had once belonged to the wool-dyer to satisfy their curiosity about the new owner, and also to make sure that he was not a spy in the employment of Shah Zahir. It was thought, too, that the house of the wool-dyer might be cursed since it acted as a magnet for desperate people. Some of the older people of the town claimed that the house had been occupied by madmen even before the time of the wool-dyer. Pg. 81
Hazara, A candy factory in Kabul. By Steve McCurry
The Honey Thief is a kind of modern-day 1001 Nights for the Hazara. It is a truly joyful set of fables. Anyone with an interest in storytelling traditions in vibrant cultures and hearing tales that truly resonate needs to read this book. It is destined to become a classic.
This is the The Talented Mr. Ripley for the newest generation. It’s a twisting tale of identity and the search for true companionship. Each chapter marks another episode in the young protagonist’s life.
The book opens with an “Author’s Note”, but this is only the first of many kindly deceptions. It’s not from the author Jansma, but rather the shifting personality of the narrator. In just the first paragraph, Jansma has already sketched a fascinating and compelling narrator.
I’ve lost every book I’ve ever written. I lost the first one here in Terminal B, where I became a writer, twenty-eight years ago, in the after-school hours and on vacations while I waited for my mother to return from doling out honey-roasted peanuts at eighteen thousand feet. ~Pg. 1
From there on, Jansma has the reader in his clutches. In each chapter, the narrator is a bit older, and coming in to his own. each chapter is a slight of hand that reveals itself to be a reiteration of the same basic story. Boy loves girl who is too far above him, and is already in love with another boy. But maddeningly, the reader somehow never sees it coming. This basic strand is so far buried in the massive, complicated tapestry that we forget all about it. Until it comes back to haunt us — and the narrator.
This narrator is a chameleon by choice, donning various cloaks until he finds one that he likes. He travels the world, from the Grand Canyon to Manhattan jazz clubs, to Sri Lankan jungles to the wilds of Africa. But each time around, there is a loop he cannot escape.
Kristopher Jansma
Writers and literary geeks will also enjoy the narrator’s inner voice as he struggles with his own writing. In an early chapter, he talks about the standard college composition class, filled with self-important egos and undiscovered voices. Yet, even there, words have power.
Julian held books right close up to his face — a habit formed, he explained, in his nearsighted youth — and now, even with the contact lenses in, he liked to have the page within a few inches of his eyes. So close that the pages scraped the tip of his nose as he turned them. So close that, when he inhaled sharply at a particularly good turn of phrase, the paper seemed to lift up slightly and tremble before settling back again. ~Pg. 40
And he waxes rhapsodic about the writing process.
I have always done my best work in crowded transportation hubs. Airports, train stations — a bus stop, one time — these have been like my personal little cafes doted along the Seine. I’d given up being a writer, aside from the essays that I sold to my shadowy students around the globe. ~Pg. 141
And somewhere in all of these philosophical musings and attempts at identity, the truth lies. Here we come back to that thread again. That thread is the writer’s truth, that which doesn’t change despite the various characters and plot twists that life brings at us.
I so enjoyed reading this book. It doesn’t get caught up in itself or become arrogant. Instead, it shows its narrator’s weaknesses for the entertainment of the reader. It’s thoughtful enough to be affecting, but remains accessible, and more than that, it is an enchanting book.
Many thanks to Lindsay and Elaine at Penguin for the review copy.
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Hardcover
9.25 x 6.25in
272 pages
ISBN 9780670026005
21 Mar 2013
Viking Adult
18 – AND UP
I have adored Thursday Next ever since she burst onto bookshelves everywhere (and in every dimension). For me, there was finally a heroine for nerdy, literary, smart young women – like me. Or, like I want to be.
Thanks to the generous people at Viking, I am happy to announce I have copy of the latest installment, THE WOMAN WHO DIED A LOT, for you to win!
All you have to do is leave a comment with:
1) Your name (first is fine)
2) Your email address (“name [at] domain dot com” to prevent spam)
3) What book you would want Thursday Next to take you into?
4) Share this giveaway with your friends and followers on FB and/or Twitter. {Tag me @cineastesview}
* US Only, please. Contest open until 10/10/12, 7:00pm EST *
This giveaway is now over. Congratulations to Audra! Thank you for entering.
This service has been brought to you by the Goliath Corporation, reminding you to eat your toast every day.
The Bellwether Revivals is part Evelyn Waugh, part Patricia Highsmith, and part… something else. Twilight Zone, perhaps. The protagonist, Oscar Lowe, is a townie with few prospects in the storied university town of Cambridge. While wandering past the King’s College chapel, he is entranced by the organ music he hears. He sits in on the service and become enamored by one of the angelic voices in the choir. Oscar waits on the chapel steps, hoping to meet her. She is Iris Bellwether, and her brother Eden, it turns out, is the organist. He falls in with the Bellwether siblings, pulled into their otherworldly existence.
In a kind of Talented Mr. Ripley, in reverse, Oscar begins to fear the unhinged genius of Eden Bellwether. A musical prodigy, he is convinced that certain compositions and ceremonies can heal. Vibrations realign and agitate cells to reconfigure, almost like string theory on a larger scale. But Eden’s hobby begins to take on a life of its own — and threatens to destroy others’.
Wood presents a setting that only Old World, storied intellectuals live in. Here, the minds of Cambridge meet the unfettered wealth and youthful arrogance. Like Nick Carraway in the Great Gatsby, the reader needs the guidance of Oscar in this strange yet simultaneous world. Wood describes an evening with the Bellwether family:
They all retired to the drawing room after dessert. It had the conscious extravagance of a hotel lobby: leather sofas, candleabras, a grand piano, and a marble fireplace. Theo stood behind a rosewood cabinet, stacked with cut-glass decanters, and began removing stoppers and sniffing the contents of each bottle, as if about to commence some explosive chemistry experiment. Eventually, he chose one and lifted it. ’ Alright. Who’ll share some Delamain with me? Oscar, I know your’e game.’ Theo raised one eyebrow.
‘Thanks, Mr. Bellwether,’ he said, ignoring Iris’s suggestive cough.
‘Some of the best cognac you’ll ever drink, this,’ Theo went on. ‘Three grand for seventy piddling centilitres.’ ~Pg. 96.
This is a conversation Oscar could never even begin to have. It’s doubtful someone in his position would ever even have £3000 together. His world consists of 12-hour shifts at an elderly nursing home. Still, he manages to find pleasure in it, befriending an old man who lends him books and life advice. But after meeting the Bellwethers, Oscar finds himself constantly feeling out place no matter where he is of who he is with. As Eden slowly takes over their lives, things become even more surreal.
Wood’s writing is clear and straightforward, which makes the oddity of the story all the more powerful. The characters, particularly Eden Bellwether and Herbert Paulsen, are richly drawn. The story does take a couple of chapters to get going, but once it does, it is highly addictive. It a few flakes become a snowball, then an avalanche. It’s a forceful, unnerving and brilliant book.
Many thanks to the folks at Viking Adult for the review copy. Visit author Benjamin Wood’s official site.
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ISBN 9780670023592 | 432 pages | 14 Jun 2012
Viking Adult | 5.98 x 9.01in | 18 – AND UP
It’s going to be impossible to review this book without comparing it to the works of PG Wodehouse. The writings share a number of attributes — silly surnames, ridiculous situations, and even more unlikely solutions. Barrister Horace Rumpole tells stories from the first person, much like Bertie and Mr. Mulliner, but his are from the Old Bailey and its environs. And instead of focusing on the theft of cow creamers and fickle romances, Rumpole must use his wits to set free ne’er-do-wells who (probably) didn’t commit the crime they are on trial for.
Somewhat jaded, Rumpole has seen it all at this point. He is little fazed by the cluelessness of dregs of society or the incredible antics of the Ministers of Parliament. His nonchalant narrative makes the stories all the more entertaining for a lay audience. One needn’t be a student of the law to get caught up in the tales of the court anymore than you need to have a country house to want to go Bunburying. I will admit, however, that my maniacal watching of Law & Order: UK hasn’t hurt any with some of the vocabulary.
Unlike Bertie Wooster, Rumpole is actually trying to better his world, one client at a time. He doesn’t think of himself first, or rely on a Jeeves to get him out of a scrape. Rumpole takes on injustice when everything stacked against him. He thrives on it. He’s a bit like Wile E. Coyote, except his traps actually work. While other barristers and solicitors are content with a deposition, Rumpole finds the one tiny detail that unravels an entire case.
Reading Rumpole is a sheer delight. The stories are lithe and funny. Mortimer has drawn imperfect, realistic characters for us to watch from the gallery. Or better yet, beside him at a pub, sharing a pint and stories of “that time when…”.
A great many thanks to Meghan at Viking for the review copy. ____________________________
ISBN 9780670023066 | 528 pages | 10 Nov 2011 | Viking Adult | 5.98 x 9.01in | 18 – AND UP
I loved this book. I loved reading it, the story, the cover art, the photo insets, almost everything about it. It’s probably blasphemous for me to say, but I enjoyed it more than The Great Gatsby.
Set in a post-Depression Manhattan, it follows the trials and triumphs of a small group of friends (and sometimes lovers) in a glittering, Art-Deco New York City. Katey Kontent (yes, the name is a bit self-conscious, but so is Katey) is the narrator of the tale and is far from content. She works as a secretary in a very respectable firm and finds fun where she can with her friend Eve Ross. Both of their fates take a turn on New Year’s Eve in a dark jazz club — the night when Tinker Grey comes into their lives.
The overall theme is that life is an adventure unwritten, and not every turning reveals good fortune. When a shattering accident affects all in their small but close-knit group, it sends each shard of their relationship in multiple directions.
Publicity postcard for Rules of Civility
Rules of Civility refers to George Washington’s book of the same name in which he laid out guidelines for keeping polite company. Tinker sometimes references it, though often ironically. This book instead creates its own witticisms and aphorisms. There are too many to recount, but a favorite, early on, is “Learning dance steps was the sorry Saturday night pursuit of every boardinghouse girl in America.” And I couldn’t agree more with this sentiment: “No matter how much you think of yourself, no matter how long you’ve lived in Hollywood or Hyde Park, a brown Bentley is going to catch your eye. There couldn’t be more than a few hundred of them in the world and every aspect is designed with envy in mind.”
Fashion photo by Hoyningen-Heune, 1938
Towles sets out a very metered pace and in a structured narrative. It spans exactly one year, told in flashback. Interestingly, Towles manages to withhold “how it all ends” despite the fact that he begins at the end. Effectively, it shows the reader how “naive” we are, just as Katey is. Also quite effective are the photographs by Walker Evans that mark sections of the book. This series of subway candids reminds us easily read body language and facial expression is, particularly when our guard is down. Washington’s Rules of Civility do not apply here.
As a setting – time and place – it is incredibly well-researched, but comfortably so. It doesn’t feel forced or sound like it is name-dropping for effect. There is only one portion of one chapter that falls flat. The rest is as effervescent as a newly popped bottle of champagne.
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Many thanks to the folks at Viking/Penguin for the review copy.
Without a number of artistic elements this would be nothing but a slapdash pulp action. Fortunately, Van Cauwelaert brings pulp up several notches. Plenty of action, a femme fatale and a sympathetic narrator make it pulpy. But the writing is strong, confident and refined.
It’s told from the first-person perspective of Martin Harris, famed botanist, awakes from a coma after a taxi accident. According to the cab driver, he’s been out for three days and she has been sitting with him, full of guilt. She drives him home to his expensive flat, and they expect to never see each other again. Harris is given a great shock, however, when he excitedly arrives at his front door, only to be met by someone else named Martin Harris and a wife who doesn’t recognize him. Angered and confused, he sets out to prove his identity and determine who is trying to erase him.
Because the story is told from Harris’ point of view, we have of course a unreliable narrator, yet we believe him. This is enhanced by a couple of things. Firstly, Mark Polizzotti’s translated preserves the lively cadence of the language, yet avoids flowery phrasing. Secondly, the author mirrors the the style of writing with Harris’ state of mind. As he becomes more erratic, so does the narrative. Settings jump around and conversations are truncated. Thirdly, the details are rich but not overwhelming. It was a small stroke of genius to make Harris a botanist rather than a retired cop or a physician. His tangents into the world of botany are both cogent and humanizing. His observations become almost another character.
Kruger and Neeson on set
The reveal is not nearly as fulfilling as the rest of the novel. Still it is a very enjoyable read. It has been made into a film, slated to release in February of 2011. It stars Liam Neeson, Diane Kruger, January Jones, Aidan Quinn and Frank Langella. It certainly has a pacing like Taken that should be a perfectly watchable movie. I am curious to see how they integrate Harris’ inner thoughts, however. It also seems the film was shot in Berlin, but the book takes place in Paris. It is unclear where the film is supposed to be set at this point. Following its release, a film review will be posted at http://acineastesview.blogspot.com.
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Many thanks to Meghan at Viking/Penguin for the review copy (movie tie-in edition).
In keeping with the theme of the book, it seems there is no listing for it on the Penguin/Viking site. ISBN – 9780143119012
Fame, Lust, and the Beautiful Killers Who Inspired Chicago
This book is absolutely as much fun as you think it is. But what isn’t immediately obvious from the cover (and engrossing subtitle) is how very well-researched and detailed the tales of the recently liberated women of Chicago. Perry delves into each murderess’ past with the nose of a bloodhound. Drawing on newspaper clippings, quotes, letters and interviews, he sketches a transitional moment in time — a perfect storm of social upheaval.
Each woman is given equal treatment, and is a sympathetic character if not innocent. He is more interested in illustrating the conditions that brought about their crime rather than placing judgement on them. After all, judgement was passed 80 years ago.
Maurine Waktins
The most compelling character may be the cub reporter Maurine Watkins, a shy, pretty young girl from small town Indiana. Her staunch Christian values were constantly foiled in the tumultuous 1920s. In a press interview, Perry says of Watkins, “That Maurine Watkins willingly embraced this professional ethos is astonishing. As I mentioned, she was cripplingly shy. Se had trouble looking a man in the eye… In Chicago, she became fascinated with gangsters. She even developed a crush on one. She said that the ‘nicest man I men during the time I was doing newspaper work was supposed to be the toughest gunman in Chicago’s West Side. He was like something you read about, such a charming courteous man’.” Watkins went on to pen the Broadway smash play Chicago (the Fosse musical would come years later, after her death) as well as William Powell / Myrna Loy films Libeled Lady and I Love You Again.
Much to his credit, Perry also writes in a prose style that makes the action, drama and wit immediate. There is nothing staid or dusty about this historical study. Perhaps, like Maurine, we too are at once entranced by the lifestyle, and surprised at our own entrancement.
Fakes, Frauds and Finds and the Search for Lost Treasures
I could not have enjoyed reading this book more. It is fresh, fast, and furiously entertaining. If you need a summer read with some substance, look no further. Part Indiana Jones, part London academia, Mould shares tales of his years in portrait dealing with elegant charm.
The Hampden Portrait of Elizabeth I, one of Mould’s finds.
He leads off with a tale of a packrat who had amassed as many pieces of junk as he had treasures. There is an aching sadness as both the narrator and reader realize how the collector’s life was consumed. Thankfully, the extensive collection was salvaged and donated to SCAD in Savannah.
He also delves into the nail-biting world of research (yes, it is exciting), discovery and finally winning at auction. Many hours are spent in dusty corners of libraries, scouring tidbits of information on the internet, and interogating other experts in the field — all to determine who put brush to canvas, who made that little smear of paint. The answer can cost a collector millions of dollars, in either direction. (It reminds an old soul like myself of the wonderful episode of the Dick Van Dyke Show when they go to auction to get ideas for an episode of the Alan Brady Show.)
Dick Van Dyke & Mary Tyler Moore
This book is great fun, and educational but refreshingly not didactic. And Mould is quick to give credit to others in his gallery and in the field who are constant sources of assistance and perspective. It’s rather like watching Antiques Roadshow UK (of which he is a appraisal member) — it’s more about the stories behind the art, and the people who love art, than the price tag associated with it.
Thanks to Meghan at Viking/Penguin for the review copy!
Book: Hardcover | 5.51 x 8.26in | 272 pages | ISBN 9780670021857 | 10 Jun 2010 | Viking Adult | 18 – AND UP
As a self-proclaimed theic (one who is addicted to tea), I am thrilled someone, in modern times, has tackled this vast, interwoven tale of a name that changed so much but it little remembered. Tea is like wine. Growing seasons, climates, picking times, drying, storing and shipping all affect the taste. And there are plenty who prefer a potent earl grey to a warm green tea. And it was plant-hunter and spy Robert Fortune who discovered (for the Western world) that these two very different teas grew from the same plant. Author Sarah Rose delves into the seductive past and retrieves the best, most aromatic leaves for our enjoyment.
The fortuitously-named Robert Fortune took on a great adventure in the name of tea and Queen. The East India Company was losing money, so they decided to steal the secrets of Chinese tea and transplant them to India, where they still had power. They tapped Fortune to be their spy. This debut book by Sarah Rose, follows Fortune on his journey. With stories gleaned from Fortune’s meticulous diaries and journals, Rose maintains an even keel between historical background and plant-hunting espionage. Her descriptions of inland China, with terraced hillsides, fresh peaches, and blooming forsythia are intoxicating. Wandering along the river, filling glass Wardian cases with exotic plants sounds divine. This idyllic setting is counterbalanced by the danger of impersonating a Mandarin Chinese and avoiding suspicion.
Indeed, there are many intricate details of Chinese society that this tale of tea serves to enlighten. While Fortune was a hero to the West, he was clearly an enemy to China and the East. Through Rose’s telling of Fortune’s exploits, we see the emotional complications of respect for and exploitation of another culture. It is clear that not only Fortune himself benefitting from this travels, but the economy of the strongest Empire in the world.
I spent a summer as a gardener at the Canterbury Shaker Village and one of my jobs was to harvest and dry the mint for their four mint tea. It was a quiet, peaceful job, if not an easy one, but it is still the best job I’ve ever had. Particularly in an age when we are once again learning to respect the value of a growing our own gardens, in some small way, I’d like to think I was following in Robert Fortune’s steps. The gardening part; not the traveling and spying part.
(For more, check out the author’s article in Smithsonian Magazine here. It’s tags are “crime” and “botany” – you know you want to read it.)
Thank you to Meghan and Holly at Viking Press.
FOR ALL THE TEA IN CHINA: How England Stole the World’s Favorite Drink and Changed History by Sarah Rose
Book: Hardcover | 5.51 x 8.26in | 272 pages | ISBN 9780670021529 | 18 Mar 2010 | Viking Adult | 18 – AND UP
The good folks (Thanks, Meghan and Holly!) over at Viking were kind enough to send me a copy of FOR ALL THE TEA IN CHINA by Sarah Rose to giveaway on the site.
Book: Hardcover | 5.51 x 8.26in | 272 pages | ISBN 9780670021529 | 18 Mar 2010 | Viking Adult | 18 – AND UP
So, to win this book:
1. In the comment area below, tell me about your favorite flavor of tea, and why you like it.
2. Leave your email address in the following form: name (at) domain dot com — so we can avoid spammers.
