BookPage June 2010

discoveryour yournext nextgreat greatbook book discover e m aj ur n ch

ww ww w..bbooookkppaaggee..ccoomm w

this

america’s book review

issue z o

b

w ne

•

55

w s ie

The thrilling end to Stieg Larsson’s remarkable trilogy

r e v

HORNET’S NEST

ok

•

y in

2010

e i n s i d

page 22

GOOD TASTE

Aimee Bender’s magical slice of ‘Lemon Cake’ page 14

COUNCIL OF DADS A father’s lessons on how to live and how to love page 18

justin cronin

Summer’s hottest book puts a new spin on vampires

contents features

JUNE 2010 w w w. B o o k Pa g e . c o m

11 jane smiley

12

cover story

justin cronin

How a project with his daughter turned into a three-book deal— and one of this year’s hottest titles

Listening while she knits

14 aimee bender A bittersweet literary treat

16 john waters Meet the author of Role Models

17 domestic travel From sea to shining sea

22

18

21 FICTION

18 bruce feiler

TOP PICK: A Visit from the Goon Squad

by Jennifer Egan

A cancer diagnosis, a life-changing council

20 father’s day Dads and other real-life heroes

22 sonny mehta Bringing Stieg Larsson to American readers

28 valerie hobbs

30

08

Making and losing memories

31 bedtime reading New picture books for dads and kids

ALSO REVIEWED: My Name is Memory by Ann Brashares; Backseat Saints by Joshilyn Jackson; Everything Lovely, Effortless, Safe

by Jenny Hollowell; The Girl Who Kicked the Hornet’s Nest by Stieg Larsson; Cum Laude

by Cecily von Ziegesar; Neighborhood Watch

by Cammie McGovern; Beautiful Maria of My Soul by Oscar Hijuelos; My Name is Mary Sutter by Robin Oliveira; Mrs. Somebody Somebody by Tracy Winn

25 NONFICTION

31 michael rex

TOP PICK: Lives Like Loaded Guns

by Lyndall Gordon

Meet the author-illustrator of Furious George Goes Bananas

14

departments

21

03 buzz girl 03 Bestseller watch 04 05 05 06 08 09 10 10

reviews

well read lifestyles author enablers whodunit cooking romance book clubs audio

ALSO REVIEWED: Take Good Care of the Garden and the Dogs by Heather Lende; The Most Powerful Idea in the World by William Rosen; The Price of Stones by Twesigye Jackson Kaguri; The Shallows by Nicholas Carr; Bonobo Handshake by Vanessa Woods; Medium Raw by Anthony Bourdain; Welcome to Utopia by Karen Valby

29 CHILDREN’S

31

25

TOP PICK: Emily’s Fortune

by Phyllis Reynolds Naylor ALSO REVIEWED: A Sick Day for Amos McGee by Philip C. Stead; Theodore Boone: Kid Lawyer by John Grisham; Word After Word After Word by Patricia MacLachlan; I Now Pronounce You Someone Else by Erin McCahan; The Gardener by S.A. Bodeen; The Space Between Trees by Katie Williams

a m e r i c a’ s b o o k r e v i e w

2

PUBLISHER

NONFICTION EDITOR

PRODUCTION MANAGER

editorial policy

SUBSCRIBE

advertise

Michael A. Zibart

Kate Pritchard

Penny Childress

ASSOCIATE PUBLISHER

ASSISTANT WEB editor

PRODUCTION DESIGNER

Julia Steele

Eliza Borné

Karen Trotter Elley

EDITOR

CONTRIBUTING EDITOR

SUBSCRIPTION MANAGER

Lynn L. Green

Sukey Howard

Elizabeth Grace Herbert

Public libraries and bookstores can purchase BookPage in quantity.

For information, visit BookPage.com or call 800.726.4242, ext. 34.

To advertise in BookPage, on BookPage.com or in our e-newsletters, visit BookPage.com or call 800.726.4242: Scott Grissom, ext. 36 Julia Steele, ext. 15

WEB EDITOR

CHILDREN’S BOOKS

advertising

BookPage is a selection guide for new books. Our editors evaluate and select for review the best books published each month in a variety of categories.

Only books we highly recommend are featured.

Trisha Ping

Allison Hammond

Scott Grissom

FICTION EDITOR

CUSTOMER SERVICE

AD communications

Abby Plesser

Alice Fitzgibbon

Angela J. Bowman

BookPage is editorially independent and never accepts payment for editorial coverage.

Individual subscriptions are $30 per year. Send payment to: BookPage Subscriptions 2143 Belcourt Avenue Nashville, TN 37212

read all our reviews online at bookpage.com All material © 2010

by ProMotion, inc.

departments follett’s new epic

Our publishing insider gets the skinny on tomorrow’s bestsellers

le Carré’s latest British author John le Carré, almost 80 years old, will publish his 22nd novel, Our Kind of Traitor, on October 12. Viking describes the book as “a fast-moving story that reveals the battles of the British Secret Service in addition to the brutal maneuvering of the international criminal world.”

This is le Carré’s first book with Viking—he recently switched houses after many years with Scribner—and expectations are high.

bestseller watch Release dates for some of the guaranteed blockbusters hitting shelves in June:

8

the lion

By Nelson DeMille Grand Central, $27.99 ISBN 9780446580830 Special agent John Corey returns to track—and kill— a Libyan terrorist (known as “The Lion”) in DeMille’s sequel to The Lion’s Game.

15 uncharted territori

By Tori Spelling

Gallery, $25, ISBN 9781439187715 More candid reflections on celebrity life in Hollywood from wife, mother and TV fixture Tori Spelling.

22 sizzling sixteen

By Janet Evanovich

St. Martin’s, $27.99 ISBN 9780312383305 Appropriately titled, this is Evanovich’s 16th novel featuring spunky New Jersey bounty hunter Stephanie Plum.

Exciting news for Ken Follett fans: The best-selling author is back this fall with the first book in his Century trilogy, Fall of Giants, clocking in at a whopping 1,000 pages.

With an on sale date of September 28, Fall of Giants “follows the destinies of five interrelated families—one American, one Russian, one German, one English and one Welsh—through the earthshaking events of the First World War and the Russian Revolution.”

And the next two books? “The second book in the Century trilogy, set to be published in 2012, will feature the children of follett the characters in Fall of Giants as they live through the Depression and the Second World War. The third book, due out in 2014, will be about the next generation during the Cold War.”

big books from the bushes Former first lady Laura Bush released her much-anticipated memoir, Spoken from the Heart, just last month. And now we have a publication date for her husband’s memoir: Crown will release George W. Bush’s Decision Points on November 9.

There has been much speculation about what W. will—and will not—cover in his memoir, but here’s what we know from Crown: “Since leaving the Oval Office, President Bush has given virtually no interviews or public speeches about his presidency. Instead, he has spent almost every day writing Decision Points, a strikingly personal and candid account revealing how and why he made the defining decisions in his consequential presidency and personal life.”

Let the speculation begin . . .

love and loss Writer Joyce Carol Oates is perhaps best known for the sheer volume of her work. And like many authors, she’s often pulled elements in her fiction from her own life— many of her 50-plus novels are set in her native upstate New York. But Oates has never been inspired to publish a memoir—until now.

According to the Wall Street Journal, Oates recently completed

Buzz Girl A Widow’s Memoir, a book chronicling her life in the wake of her husband’s 2008 death from complications following pneumonia. Oates and Raymond J. Smith had been married for 48 years and together ran a successful literary magazine, The Ontario Review. Oates says she found herself unable to write fiction for months after her husband’s death, but she kept a journal which served as the basis of her memoir.

No publication date has been set, but we will keep an eye out for A Widow’s Memoir. And there is a happy ending to Oates’ story—she found new love at age 71 with neuroscientist Charles Gross, whom she married last spring.

A new novel from the bestselling author of A Rip in Heaven

JEANINE CUMMINS

fantasy fun Best-selling fantasy author Terry Goodkind has signed a three-book deal with Tor, returning to the house after a stint at Putnam.

The first book will be a new Richard and Kahlan novel, due in early 2011, featuring the principal characters from Goodkind’s previous bestsellers. Tom Doherty, president and publisher of Tor, said, “We are excited to publish Terry Goodkind again. Millions of people delight in the novels of Richard and Kahlan and eagerly await the continuation of their story.”

from ‘office’ to page Fans of The Office—and funny women everywhere—rejoice! Writer/producer Mindy Kaling (who plays the hilarious Kelly Kapoor on the workplace sitcom) has just inked a book deal with Crown.

The Contents of My Purse, slated for a fall 2011 release, will be “a collection of comic essays detailing moments from a woman’s life, including everything from relationships to fashion.”

Or, as Kaling tweeted: “My book will be essays and personal anecdotes, kaling pictures, fashion and general opinionated bossiness about how women should live. Twitter has an 140 character limit, but I hear books can have something like 500,000 characters!”

If Kaling’s book is half as funny as her writing on The Office, fans are in for a treat.

THE

OUTSIDE BOY In 1959, young Christy Hurley is a Pavee gypsy, traveling in Ireland with his father and extended family.

It’s the only life Christy has ever known, but suddenly everything changes when his grandfather dies. Now Christy begins to question who he is and where he belongs.

The answer may lie with a long-buried family secret that could change his life forever.

NEW IN PAPERBACK

A Member of Penguin Group (USA) penguin.com

$15/9780451229489

3

departments A Father’s surprising legacy “It was after her father’s death Flora returned to Darwin.” With this simple (and pleasingly Victorian) sentence, Maggie Pouncey launches the tangled doings of her accomplished debut novel, Perfect Reader. Darwin is the New England college town where Flora Dempsey, the daughter of the school’s beloved president emeritus, grew up. Lewis Dempsey has died suddenly, bequeathing his house, and control of his literary estate, to his only child.

At 28, Flora long ago abandoned the claustrophobic small-town complacency of Darwin for life in the city. She is reluctant to go back, but less hesitant to leave her unfulfilling job at a trendy magazine.

The house her father left her is not the one she grew up in—before her parents split up, they lived in the grand, college-owned President’s House—but rather a charming old farmhouse that he bought when he stepped down and returned to teaching. Nonetheless, being back

in Darwin uncovers many longrepressed memories. One year in particular resonates: the difficult year Flora’s parents divorced and she forever lost her best friend.

If Flora is undecided about what to do with her father’s real estate, she is absolutely terrified of her role as his literary executor. Lewis was a populist poetry scholar, and managing his work should mean little more than granting reprint rights.

But not long before he died, her father gave Flora the manuscript for some poems he had written, poems she did not bother reading at the time. When she finally does read them, she discovers they are startlingly intimate love poems that both embarrass and fascinate her.

Flora’s impulse is to keep the poems private, but the object of Lewis’ late-in-life passion, an art history professor named Cynthia Reynolds, has her own motivation for seeing the book published.

Flora casts Cynthia as her adver-

well read column by robert Weibezahl

sary, and seeks the counsel of her father’s attorney, Paul Davies. Paul is a Darwin College graduate who gave up hopes of a literary career in order to stay close to home and keep a watchful eye on his drunken father. The two fall into a relationship, imperfect at best. In order to educate herself in the subtleties of modern poetry, Flora also decides to audit a class taught by her father’s erstwhile nemesis. The stage is set for a bit of literary intrigue, at turns comic, with no one quite playing his or her role as written.

Flora struggles not only with the details of her father’s afterlife, but with her own past, of which Darwin provides daily reminders. When her parents divorced, Flora moved with her mother from the President’s House, and her relationship with her father shifted. An attentiongetting escapade had a heartbreaking outcome. Flora’s mother, a quick-witted, unhappy woman, has long been her daughter’s harshest critic, but also, when push comes to shove, her most ardent advocate.

Their well-drawn, complicated

relationship is perhaps the greatest strength of this engaging book.

Pouncey writes best when she burrows into Flora’s head, with its marvelous amalgam of wise insight and callow emotions. Some loose ends are left untied, as in life, and the denouement comes on a bit quickly, but page for page Perfect Reader is an assured literary debut.

perfect reader

By Maggie Pouncey Pantheon $24.95, 288 pages ISBN 9780307378743

debut FICTION

From the New York Times bestselling author of The Girl Who Stopped Swimming

It was an airport gypsy who told me that I had to kill my husband.

“An enduring character with a fierce unstoppable spirit….

Beautifully written.”

—Brunonia Barry, author of

4

The Lace Reader

www.hachettebookgroup.com Hachette Book Group

JACKET PHOTOGRAPH © CIG HARVEY

“Will pull you in and

won’t let you out until the last page.”

—Kathryn Stockett,

#1 New York Times bestselling author of

The Help

“Positively breathtaking.”

—Booklist (starred review)

Available in hardcover, as an audiobook, and as an eBook

lifestyles

author enablers

column by joanna brichetto

column by kathi kamen goldmark & Sam Barry

WONDERS OF THE WORLD Recently surprised by a middleaged, educated mom who did not know that prunes were dried plums (“I thought they were just— prunes”) and another who did not know that trees could flower, it was newly clear to me that all of us could benefit from a fuller knowledge of the natural world. In The Practical Naturalist (DK, $19.95, 256 pages, ISBN 9780756658991), produced in association with the National Audubon Society, the word “practical” is intended to assure readers they need not memorize binomial nomenclature in order to appreciate, explore and name the world around them, and that anyone, anywhere, anytime can become an amateur naturalist. The book makes this goal enjoyable and easy. It organizes the planet by habitat (Farm and Field, Forest, Grassland and so on) but only after starting with the habitat closest to us: our homes and neighborhoods.

Here, garden snails, mourning doves, carpenter bees, spider webs and other everyday wonders are examined in gorgeous photography and concise text. Whether readers are interested in bugs in the backyard or world biomes, The Practical Naturalist—equal parts field guide, how-to book and family reference—makes very practicable an inquiry into the nature of all things natural.

TO LOVE, HONOR—AND ARGUE? For Better: The Science of a Good Marriage (Dutton, $25.95, 288 pages, ISBN 9780525951384), by Tara Parker-Pope, arrived the week two friends confided they were considering the D word. Never one to offer advice, I could only listen and marvel at the mess marriage can be. For Better does not offer advice either; it is not a self-help manual built from anecdotes and case studies. For Better is science, and isn’t science a more reassuring diagnostic for such woes? Science is evidence-based, unbiased and tested, and can prove far more helpful than mere advice, whether we are in trouble now or want to avoid it later, whether we are in the

market for a spouse or a restraining order. New York Times reporter ParkerPope culls recent findings from top relationship researchers and presents surprising insights (for instance, what eye-rolling or pronoun choice can signify), facts (33 percent of couples sleep in separate rooms) and mythbusters (conflict can be good, and the divorce rate is actually less than 50 percent). Readers are given tools (and fun questionnaires) to interpret verbal and nonverbal clues, identify top risk factors, assess a marriage’s health and try to fix what might be broken—or strengthen what is not.

TOP PICK FOR LIFESTYLES 24/7. We see and hear that number often enough, but does anyone ever do the math? 24/7 adds up to 168 hours—one week—and, according to Laura Vanderkam, author of 168 Hours, it is the ideal unit by which to examine our lives.

Most of us complain about not having enough time to do what it takes to feel successful at home or at work. 168 Hours posits that if we look at the data objectively—how we really spend each hour in an average week—we all have “enough.”

After keeping a log for one week, readers can conduct their own Time Makeover: identify dreams and the “actionable steps” they require, optimize “core competencies” and, my favorite, outsource or minimize all the stuff left over. With allowances for downtime and “bits of joy” thrown in, time can finally be on our side, 24/7.

168 Hours

By Laura Vanderkam Portfolio $25.95, 272 pages ISBN 9781591843313

self-help

Practical advice on writing and publishing for aspiring authors

BIG DREAMS Dear Author Enablers, I am 13 years old and I am writing a book series. I already wrote the first one. And I was wondering how exactly to become a published author?

And how to publish my book?

Amanda Barksdale Blanchard, Oklahoma In April we performed with the Rock Bottom Remainders in support of the Philadelphia Free Library. That night we met a 13-year-old named Andrew who is doing the most important thing any writer can—reading a lot of great books. Andrew happens to be a major Stephen King fan (he read Under The Dome in two weeks), but you can read anything in the world that excites and interests you. So in between writing your series, don’t forget to wander over to your local library and find some great books to read. The librarian can also help you find books that will guide you through the craft of writing and the process of finding the right publisher for your work.

WHEN TO GO SOLO Dear Author Enablers, I am writing my first novel, but I have my doubts on what to do when I’m done. Should I get an agent to find me a publisher who will do the editing, find a good self-publishing deal that includes editing, or just do an e-book, since e-books are the new thing now? Any ideas?

Vanessa Colon Norwich, Connecticut First things first, Vanessa—you need to finish the darn novel, which includes doing plenty of your own editing. Polish it as much as you can and then show it to a few reliable readers, people who appreciate good writing and can be trusted to give constructive criticism. Pay attention to their comments, especially if several agree on the same points, and then revise the manuscript as needed.

Then you have an important choice to make: If you want your book distributed widely to bookstores, it is still necessary to go the traditional publishing route. If you have the resources to produce, mar-

ket, publicize and sell your books on your own, then self-publishing makes sense. You’ll find a lively conversation on our BookPage blog (at a post called “The Pros and Cons of Publish America”) about some of our readers’ experiences with one self-publishing company.

FACE TO FACE Dear Author Enablers, How can I use Facebook to promote my book? I have a lot of “friends” who might be interested in buying it and in telling other people about it. My subject is hiking and trails. I am the founder of the 1200mile Pacific Northwest National Scenic Trail.

Ron Strickland Bedford, Massachusetts Not only can you use Facebook to promote your book, you must use Facebook to promote your book— not to mention Twitter and your blog and YouTube and Fwix and Redroom and FiledbyAuthor and Booktour.com and MySpace. . . .

Sorry, that was Sam, who works for an imprint of HarperCollins, where he and his colleagues are constantly thinking about how to use “social media” (if by social media you mean sitting alone in your room playing with electronic gadgets all day long) to promote books.

Kathi [edging Sam out of the way] is more of the “get out there and meet people” school, but she still thinks Facebook is a good marketing tool, and she has more friends than Sam. You can build a fan page on Facebook for your book, which is quite easy to do. (Sam did this for his own book.) If your book has a visual component, you can create a gallery for pictures, or link to videos on YouTube. And of course, feature your book cover and links to buy (remember IndieBound, the website for independent bookstores).

Email questions for Kathi and Sam to authorenabler@aol.com. Please include your name and hometown.

5

departments

Whodunit

column by Bruce Tierney

No rest for the weary Leading off the first summer month of mystery reading is A Question of Belief (Atlantic Monthly, $24, 288 pages, ISBN 9780802119421), the latest Commissario Guido Brunetti novel from Donna Leon. Regular readers may remember that I have been singing the praises of European mysteries for some time now, and Donna Leon’s books are in the vanguard of that august group. As A Question of Belief opens, Venice is in the grip of a sweltering, relentlessly airless summer. Not a problem for Brunetti, though; he is headed to the mountains for his holiday, where a sweater is necessary for the quiet evenings on the patio, and a supplemental quilt will be needed to keep him comfy at night. Only one thing can get in the way—a high profile murder; this being a suspense

novel, of course that means it will get in the way. Two stories dovetail as a charlatan soothsayer and a half-in-the-closet gay man make ever-narrowing inroads into Brunetti’s week; one is a likely a party to a homicide, the other, likely a victim. Complicating matters is the fact that a couple of people close to the investigation, one of them a powerful judge, have personal stakes in the outcome, and may not be above some behind-the-scenes machinations to achieve their ends.

Beautifully written, atmospheric and redolent of an Italian summer at its murderous best.

Second City intrigue Die Twice (Minotaur, $24.99, 304 pages, ISBN 9780312540272) confirms that Andrew Grant (the reallife brother of Lee Child, our Top Pick author this month) has evaded the dreaded sophomore slump. Like its predecessor, Even, Grant’s latest adventure features British agent David Trevellyan, nominally a Navy Intelligence attaché, but in reality an under-the-radar operative not particularly constrained by legalities. This time out, Trevellyan moves west from New York to Chicago to sort out a matter of some missing bio-nasty, possibly about to fall into the hands of folks who do not have America’s best interests at heart.

Trevellyan is evolving nicely, in both his skills as an agent and his fleshing out as an individual, and Grant should have a major hit on his hands with this latest entry into the series. If you liked James Bond, and then moved on to Jack Ryan and Jason Bourne, Trevellyan (and by extension, Die Twice) should be right up your alley.

Sparks fly

How far are you willing to go to forget your past?

How far are you willing to go to redeem yourself?

“Part medical mystery, part bloody thriller… a debut that had me flipping pages into the wee hours of the morning.”

—James Rollins, New York Times bestselling author Visit www.PamelaCallow.com for an extended sneak preview of Damaged!

6

On sale now!

www.MIRABooks.com www.PamelaCallow.com

Forensic criminologist Lincoln Rhyme moves in a new direction, both figuratively and literally, in Jeffery Deaver’s latest thriller, The Burning Wire (Simon & Schuster, $26.99, 432 pages, ISBN 9781439156339). As those familiar with the series know, Rhyme is a quadriplegic, confined to a high-tech wheelchair which allows him some modicum of mobility. A chance encounter with a paraplegic visitor opens up the possibility that Rhyme may benefit from a radical experimental treatment, which may allow him to break free once and for all from his wheelchair. But first he has to deal with the hyper-intelligent crazy who is terrorizing New York with assaults on the electricity grid, the electronic superhighway with off ramps into every house and business in the city. Oh, and just to spice things up a bit, Rhyme’s old nemesis, The Watchmaker, is back by (un)popular demand. Courtesy of The Burning Wire, you will learn more than you ever thought you wanted to know about electricity, and experience a high-tension (sorry, I cannot seem to resist) read in the process.

Mystery of the month You want suspense? Look no

further than 61 Hours, the new Jack Reacher novel by Lee Child, a veritable torque wrench of suspense, cranking ever tighter, to the snapping point and beyond. The title refers to a countdown of sorts: “Five to one in the afternoon. Thirty-nine hours to go.” Like the hands of a Hitchcockian timepiece, Child’s countdown twirls away the remaining hours, pausing briefly once every chapter or so to alert the reader with a status update. It is clearly a countdown to something big, something ominous. Only nobody seems to know exactly what, least of all Reacher. “Five minutes to five in the afternoon. Eleven hours to go.” Reacher is, for the moment, in the small town of Bolton, South Dakota, by an accident of black ice and subzero temperatures; the bus taking him to sunnier climes has skidded off the road and it will take some time for a replacement to be brought in. Little does Reacher realize that in the space of two and a half days, he will be deputized (after a fashion) into the town police force, lose a couple of friends and engage in a Badlands brawl straight out of an Old Western, only with much more lethal weapons. Stir in a few tantalizing details (a Brazilian drug lord with a notoriously bad attitude; a remote military base, out of use since the Cold War era, and now either forgotten or deeply classified), and you have the recipe for a first-rate thriller guaranteed to keep you reading well past bedtime.

And the ending? Sorry, you’re going to have to burn the midnight oil yourself for that. Because for me, at the moment, it’s “twenty-seven minutes past three in the morning.

Twenty-eight minutes to go . . .”

61 Hours

By Lee Child Delacorte $28, 400 pages ISBN 9780385340588 Also available on audio

suspense

FROM THE AUTHOR OF THE GIRL WITH THE DRAGON TATTOO AND THE GIRL WHO PLAYED WITH FIRE

STIEG LARSSON’S

THE

GIRL

WHO KICKED THE

HORNET’S

NEST

“THE EXHILARATING CONCLUSION TO THE #1 BESTSELLER LARSSON’S MILLENNIUM TRILOGY.” —Publishers Weekly

WIN A TRIP FOR TWO TO EXPLORE LISBETH SALANDER’S SWEDEN! Enter for a chance to win the 2010 Larsson’s Sweden sweepstakes, including round-trip economy air transportation for two to Stockholm on Scandinavian Airlines (SAS) and passes to explore Lisbeth Salander’s Stockholm. You’ll also enjoy luxury accommodation for three nights in the Sheraton Stockholm Hotel plus one night at the Seglarhotellet in Sandhamn in the Stockholm archipelago.

Enter at stieglarsson.net

KNOPF NO PURCHASE NECESSARY. The Sweepstakes is open to legal residents of the forty eight contiguous United States and the District of Columbia, who are at least 18 years of age on March 1, 2010. Entries must be received no later than 11:59 p.m. ET on July 31, 2010. LIMIT ONE ENTRY PER PERSON. Void where prohibited or restricted by law. For the official rules, go to www.stieglarsson.net.

7

WHAT A WORLD! WHAT A BOOK! WHAT A FATHER’S DAY GIFT!

cooking column by sybil PRATT

RIPE AND READY veggies Vegetable gardens are in—from the White House lawn to a small, lovingly tended plot in your own backyard—and eating these freshly grown vegetables and fruits is the best way to add a green sheen to your daily dining and please your inner locavore. With summer upon us, it’s prime time for Cooking from the Garden (Taunton, $29.95, 304 pages, ISBN 9781600852473), edited

by Ruth Lively, with more than 200 appealing, well-presented recipes from Kitchen Gardener magazine, contributed by well-known chefs and cookbook authors like Deborah Madison and Rick Bayless. The book has an inviting retro look, with small drawings rather than glossy photos and recipes that cover the gastronomic gamut from starters and snacks to salads, sides and sweets. Begin the day with a delicate Blueberry Breakfast Popover, try a BLT Extraordinaire with pancetta, aïoli and arugula for lunch and fresh Herb-Encrusted Pork Tenderloin for dinner, with sage syrup-infused Pear Burgundy Granita for dessert.

TAPPING INTO TAPAS

A

n electrifying tour through 60 countries and 309 of the world’s most authentic, explosively flavorful recipes ever, PLANET BARBECUE! covers it all: blazing grills, exotic seasonings, expert grill masters, cool tools, insider tips and techniques. Plus 600 full-color photographs. Every dad deserves it.

“PLANET BARBECUE! delivers” —THOMAS KELLER, CHEF AND AUTHOR OF AD HOC AND THE FRENCH LAUNDRY

8

www.barbecuebible.com • www.workman.com

This is where it started—the graze craze, that is—and the motherland of sensational small-plate, small-bite sampling and sharing is, unquestionably, Spain. So to Spain we go to find the book that will give you everything you need to turn out authentic tapas in your own kitchen. The Book of Tapas (Phaidon, $39.95, 392 pages, ISBN 9780714856131) by Simone Ortega, author of 1080 Recipes and Spain’s foremost authority on traditional cooking, and Inés Ortega, her daughter, has more than 250 recipes for tempting, transporting tapas treats and 150 luscious full-color photos to inspire you. Tapas can be hot or cold, they can feature vegetables, eggs, cheese, chicken, sausage, salmon or shrimp, they can be as simple as marinated olives or as elegant as Iberian Ham and Foie

Gras Cones.

In Spain, you’ll almost always be offered a small slice of Tortilla, a sturdy potato omelet—not to be confused with the Mexican kind—and little portions of substantial dishes such as Rice with Clams in Parsley Sauce, Pork Fillets in Wine or Chicken and Prune Brochettes. Just add wine, cold beer or good sherry and you’re on your way to a virtual stay in Madrid or Malaga.

COOKBOOK OF THE MONTH I was surprised to see Simon Hopkinson’s name on a book titled The Vegetarian Option and wondered if the author of the wonderfully engaging Roast Chicken and Other Stories had become a convert.

No—this devotee of all things edible simply wants to share his belief that a dish “without carnivorous and piscatorial leanings can be every bit as exciting as those with.” Whatever your leanings, Hopkinson’s options will expand your repertoire of delectable meatless dishes. The short chapters are arranged by ingredients: 40 paired vegetables (e.g., cabbage and chard, endive and watercress) come first, followed by pasta, grains, rice, eggs and fruit, each introduced with Hopkinson’s trademark charm and informative ruminations, each followed by four recipes showcasing the ingredients. And fabulous recipes they are, different and distinctive, with thorough, uniquely chatty directions that make you want to get into the kitchen and cook: smooth, silky Spinach Mousse with Parmesan Cream; sweet, subtle Watercress and Turnip Soup; utterly simple Onion & Blood Orange Salad; Damson and Almond Pudding Cake. I’m opting in!

The Vegetarian Option

By Simon Hopkinson Stewart, Tabori & Chang $24.95, 224 pages ISBN 9781584798477

VEGETARIAN

romance c o l u m n b y c h r i s t i e r i d g way

Perils on the path to love June: ’tis the season of weddings, graduations, new beginnings and new books. But beware of dragons, spies and young ladies with love on their minds.

Elizabeth Lowell offers another action-infused story from the files of St. Kilda’s Consulting in Death Echo (Morrow, $24.99, 400 pages, ISBN 9780061629754). Employee Emma Cross enjoys her work as an investigator until St. Kilda’s is drawn into a tangle between American intelligence agencies and international villains.

Because she’s been involved in the case of a series of missing yachts, the government wants her expertise in locating a stolen luxury vessel that has been modified to hold dangerous contraband—perhaps even a dirty bomb capable of destroying a city. To take control of the yacht, Emma must turn to transit captain Mac Durand, once Special Ops, now especially suspicious of anything CIA—including its former operative, Emma. Though the two don’t know whom to trust or exactly who is after them, they quickly learn to rely on each other. Equal matches in both courage and skill, it’s exciting and satisfying to watch Emma and Mac best the bad guys. Though more thriller than romance, Death Echo is filled with atmospheric details, and the sparks between Emma and Mac fly as fast as the reader will turn the pages.

Tempted heart A charming story about a woman learning that life isn’t just like her favorite novels comes from Sara Lindsey in Tempting the Marquess (Signet, $6.99, 320 pages, ISBN 9780451230447).

In 1798, Olivia Weston travels to Wales with her aunt in order to have an adventure before returning to London and her chance at the Marriage Mart. Her adventure is pre-selected, as she’s determined to drag her aunt’s stepson, Jason Traherne, the Marquess

of Sheldon, out of his grief for his late wife—a romantic idea that suits her romantic soul. But she doesn’t count on finding Jason so attractive—and so stubborn at resisting her plan to get him living and loving again.

Jason not only grieves for the loss of his wife, but for his own ideals about love. Still, enchanting Olivia draws him out despite himself, and soon he’s captivated by her kisses.

Can he overcome his reluctance to trust in love and marry again?

Appealing characters pepper this delightful tale.

Romance of the month Lush and lyrical, Shana Abé’s The Time Weaver is the fifth in her paranormal Drákon series. At the age of 14, Honor Carlisle, of the English dragon tribe, learns of her powerful gift—from her future self.

She’s a Time Weaver, which means she has the ability to move back and forth in time. As she begins to experiment with her drákon power, she’s drawn over and over to a young and beautiful prince of the enemy tribe in the Carpathian Alps.

As they come to know each other, they discover they cannot stay apart—even though being together fulfills a deadly prophecy dangerous to Honor, Prince Alexandru and those he leads. Can they find a way to outmaneuver fate—and save Amalia and Zane, another pair of lovers from an earlier entry in the series—before time runs out? The twists and turns in this tender and magical love story will delight readers and then lead them to despair when the happy ending appears impossible. A beautiful read.

H

1

OT FICTION, COOL PRICES Mistress of the Game

By Sidney Sheldon, Tilly Bagshawe $7.99, 9780061950490 Sidney Sheldon introduced the glamorous, scheming Blackwell family in Master of the Game. A generation has passed, but the intervening years have not lessened the Blackwells’ talent for manipulation. In a family rife with secrets—murder, hidden identities, and perversions, the player who wins the game may be the only one who will survive.

Cheat the Grave

By Vicki Pettersson $7.99, 9780061456770 Otherwordly avenger Joanna Archer gave up everything when she abandoned her powers to save a child and a city. Still she is bound to a prophecy that condemns her to roam a nightmare landscape ordinary humans cannot see and dare not enter. Now an insane killer blinded by bloodlust is determined to take more from Joanna than her now-fragile life.

Running from the Devil

By Jamie Freveletti $7.99, 9780061684234 Emma Caldridge, a cosmetics company chemist, is en route to Bogotá when her plane goes down in the mountains. Thrown unhurt from the wreckage, she watches in horror as guerrillas drag the other passengers into the jungle. Stranded and alone, Emma follows—and stumbles across Cameron Sumner, an injured government agent. Together, they creep closer to a nightmare they may be powerless to prevent.

My Reckless Surrender

By Anna Campbell $7.99, 9780061684319 The Earl of Ashcroft, knows women—and his every instinct warns him to beware of Diana Carrick. Her brazen overtures have thrown the haunted, handsome lord completely off his guard. But it’s not Diana’s boldness or her beauty that intrigues him—it is the innocence he senses behind her worldly mask.

Even the dangerous secret Diana must protect cannot shield her from Ashcroft’s dark allure.

Sugar Creek

The time weaver

By Shana Abé Bantam $24, 336 pages ISBN 9780553806861

Paranormal

Toni Blake $7.99, 9780061765797 Rachel Farris returned to her childhood home with one mission in mind: get Mike Romo out of her family’s apple orchard business and out of their lives. But hard-nosed and totally hot Mike, who happens to be the law in Destiny, is convinced the Farris clan stole the land from his family 50 years ago and he’s not backing down.

Even when shapely trouble shows up in a pair of designer jeans and puts both their hearts at risk.

www.harpercollins.com

9

New paperback releases for reading groups

POLAND PAST AND PRESENT In her acclaimed debut novel, A Long, Long Time Ago and Essentially True (Mariner, $13.95, 368 pages, ISBN 9780547336282), Brigid Pasulka deftly mixes history and romance to tell the tale of two lovers living in Poland during World War II. The novel’s protagonist, a young man named the Pigeon, falls for the beautiful Anielica and, to demonstrate his adoration, builds a home for her family. He sides with the resistance during the war, harboring his Jewish relatives and protecting his village. After the war, he becomes engaged to Anielica, and they move to Krakow in hopes of a better life. But their dreams soon wither in the face of the new Communist regime. The story of their granddaughter, Beata, brings the novel full circle. Beata, who hasn’t inherited Anielica’s beauty, has no prospects for marriage in modern-day Krakow. When family secrets come to light, she realizes that she must build her own future, and—empowered by the past—she does just that. Rich with detail, Pasulka’s novel is a profound exploration of politics, history and the role of the individual within both.

BACK TO THE CAPE

10

In his poignant seventh novel, That Old Cape Magic (Vintage, $15, 272 pages, ISBN 9781400030910), Richard Russo explores middle age and family life in ways that feel fresh and perceptive. An English professor stuck in a mediocre marriage, 57-year-old Jack Griffin finds himself at odds with his life. Thirty years ago, he gave up a career as a screenwriter in Los Angeles to marry his wife, Joy, and settle in New England. But now

book clubs

audio

column by julie hale

column by sukey howard

Jack is tired of academia and longs to return to his old vocation. As he tries to cope with the memory of his dead father, he must contend with his feisty 85-year-old mother, who hounds him by phone from her nursing home. Past and present collide when Jack travels to Cape Cod—the scene of many childhood vacations and his own honeymoon—for a friend’s wedding, an event that stirs up trouble and sends his life spinning in an unexpected direction. Bringing his trademark wit and emotional sensitivity to Jack’s story, Russo writes about matters close to every reader’s heart, and his delivery, as always, is impeccable.

Top Pick for Book Clubs Suspenseful, compelling and ultimately unforgettable, Dan Chaon’s Await Your Reply follows the stories of three very different characters who share a common desire—to escape from the dead-end circumstances that confine them. Anxious to make an exit from her insular hometown, Lucy Lattimore takes off with a dynamic teacher from her high school, who tempts her with promises of money and travel.

Lucy’s narrative is paralleled by that of Ryan Schuyler, a college dropout who looks up his long-lost father— a crook living in the Michigan woods—and becomes involved in the identity theft business. Rounding out the novel is the story of Miles Cheshire and his search for his schizophrenic twin brother, who may be the culprit behind the death of their mother. Richly rewarding, Chaon’s newest novel is a standout thanks to rich characterization, innovative plotting and prose that’s poetic yet edgy.

AWAIT YOUR REPLY

By Dan Chaon Ballantine $15, 368 pages ISBN 9780345476036

FICTION

A DISAPPEARANCE IN DUBLIN Did Booker Award-winner John Banville choose the pseudonym Benjamin Black to underscore the noirish tone that colors his atmospheric Dublin-set mysteries?

Whatever prompted the name, his crime fiction is extraordinary, and his insights into the Church-controlled politics and narrow-minded society of Ireland in the 1950s are fascinating. Quirke, the Dublin pathologist whose harddrinking, hardboiled shell covers his roiling inner demons takes center stage again in Elegy for April (Macmillan Audio, $39.99, 9.5 hours unabridged, ISBN 9781427209450).

He’s just back from a try at drying out when his daughter Phoebe (their strained, yearning relationship alone would make a fine novel) asks him to help find her best friend April, now missing for a fortnight.

The search brings Quirke up against the vanished young woman’s powerful, well-connected family, people who seem to care more about their polished reputation than about April. But Quirke’s curiosity won’t quit until he pierces the heavy pall of hypocrisy that obscures April’s fate and discovers what happened to her and why. Timothy Dalton read Black’s previous two Quirke novels and gives another superb performance here.

GETTING DRUNK, GETTING SOBER Mary Karr is a superb memoirist and a fabulous reader of her own words. Lit (HarperAudio, $39.99, 13 hours unabridged, ISBN 9780061939006), published late last year, has finally been released on audio, and is well worth the wait. Hearing Karr’s voice adds immediacy and intimacy to this third volume of memoirs that began with The Liar’s Club. A great storyteller, she recounts this last painful, ultimately redemptive chapter of her life in her unique mix of lyric, metaphor-filled

phrasing and cussingcowboy wisecracking.

Though she never minimizes her pain, anguish and remorse, there’s not a drop of self-pity or blame as she chronicles her early adulthood, marriage, motherhood, alcoholism, depression, divorce, recovery, shaky steps toward belief in a higher power, her conversion to Catholicism and her abiding love for her son. What she tells us is serious, often searing, yet her irreverent wit bubbles through, making this honest, unflinching evocation of her past even more, dare I say, intoxicating.

AUDIO OF THE MONTH I couldn’t wait to get my hands— and ears—on The Girl Who Kicked the Hornet’s Nest, the last in Stieg Larsson’s extraordinary Millennium trilogy. You won’t be disappointed in it for a second, or in Simon Vance’s pitch-perfect performance.

So move to the edge of your seat and hold on as Lisbeth Salander and Mikael Blomkvist pick up exactly where we left them at the cliffhanging close of The Girl Who Played with Fire. The tension builds relentlessly as backstories morph into intriguing subplots, threats to the very core of Swedish democracy are uncovered, men in positions of authority continue to abuse their power, and Salander and Blomkvist continue to fight for justice in their different, inimitable styles. “When it comes down to it,” Blomkvist says, “this story is not primarily about spies and secret government agencies; it’s about violence against women, and the men who enable it.” And when it comes to picking the best writer in this genre, it’s Larsson, without a doubt.

The Girl Who Kicked the Hornet’s Nest

By Stieg Larsson Random House Audio $40, 25 hours unabr.

ISBN 9780739384190

thriller

features

audiobook month by jane smiley

THE PERFECT AUDIO COMPANION

W

hat do you do if your two favorite leisure activities are reading novels and knitting?

Especially if your grandmother taught you to knit the wrong way?

The wrong way is holding the yarn in your right hand, then looping it over the tip of the needle in order to make a stitch (the right way is to hold the loop of yarn in your left hand and pick the loop with your needle). The wrong way is not only slow, it somehow requires more concentration than the right way, and so, what to do?

If you decide to watch movies, you miss half of the visuals, and if the movie has subtitles, you miss all of the dialogue, too. When your partner, who is watching the movie with you, says, “Wow, did you see that?” you have to say no, and jump the recording back and watch it again. You can try knitting quietly in your chair, making sure that every stitch is perfect and ever again and

always speeding up at least a little, though you will never be like that woman you saw once in an airport, whose grandmother taught her to knit the right way, and who completed the back of a child’s sweater in 15 minutes. If you just sit there and knit, chances are you will begin pondering, and you could start pondering the wrong things, like swine flu and global warming and whether your children will survive.

On the other hand, there is the pure audiobook. I suppose that I could approach audiobooks like meditation sessions, and sit quietly with my eyes closed, listening to the story, but usually, I am banging pots and pans or making the bed, or having to go out of the room, and then I wonder what I missed.

So knitting and audiobooks are made for each other. For knitting, you have to sit up, but you also have to sit still. The book unwinds and the story fills your head, but you are also mildly busy, and that sleeve that has taken you forever to get THIS far progresses infinitesimally further. When you laugh, or gasp, well, the knitting only stops for a moment, and if you are lucky, you don’t drop any stitches.

I have to admit that, though I enjoy listening to other authors’ books on audio (Chinua Achebe’s Things Fall Apart was a good one), I really enjoy listening to my own books on audio. My favorites so far (because I haven’t heard Private Life yet) are Moo and Good Faith. What thrilled me about Good Faith were the accents employed by the reader, Richard Poe. I am from St. Louis and California—he read in multiple accents of New Jersey, Philadelphia and New York, and he sounded tough! I loved it. It was as if Good Faith were the play I had envisioned in my head. As for Moo, well, one of the reasons authors write comic

novels is to laugh at their own jokes.

But even though I had laughed at these jokes several times, when I heard Suzanne Toren read Moo, I laughed all over again—her timing was way better than mine, even in my head. So I look forward to Kate Reading and Private Life—I expect to get the whole sleeve done at last.

Pulitzer Prize-winning writer Jane Smiley is the author of 13 novels, including her latest, Private Life (Random House Audio, $40, ISBN 9780307715319).

HEARD ANY GOOD BOOKS LATELY? PLUG INTO AN AUDIOBOOK

By Jane Smiley Read by Kate Reading

By Justin Cronin Read by Edward Herrmann

By Stieg Larsson Read by Simon Vance

By Jack London Read by Jeff Daniels

By Stephenie Meyer Read by Emma Galvin

Available wherever books are sold or at your local library.

To hear samples of these and other audiobooks visit www.randomhouseaudio.com.

By Michael Scott Read by Paul Boehmer

11

interview

justin cronin Interview by trisha ping

© Justin Fitlow/Rice University

Saving humanity’s last hope

T

he vampire craze sweeping literature is not unlike the virus that decimates the world in Justin Cronin’s The Passage. Sure, there are isolated enclaves of holdouts, defending literature as they know it from the onslaught of supernatural beings, but most of the reading public seems to have developed an insatiable thirst for stories featuring the undead, from writers like Charlaine Harris and Stephenie Meyer.

12

A note to those who thought they were immune: I dare you to crack open The Passage and read page one. From the first sentence, Cronin’s epic establishes itself as something both equal to and greater than the supernatural suspense novels that have been eating up more and more bookshelf real estate since Elizabeth Kostova’s The Historian became a surprise bestseller in 2005. As Cronin says during a call to his home on the outskirts of Houston, “these are not your teenage daughter’s vampires.”

He’s right. Cronin’s vampires— which are more often called “virals,” “flyers,” “slims” or “smokes”—inspire fear, hate and confusion, but never love. Spawned from a virus in a failed government effort to engineer a supersoldier, these undead share a hive-mind mentality, an aversion to sunlight and a hunger for human blood. The virus is tested on 12 felons—and one abandoned six-year-old girl, Amy Harper Bellafonte. She alone survives the testing with her humanity intact (albeit with added strength, healing ability and longevity); the others escape and alternately hunt and infect the rest of the world.

“Most vampire stories are essentially stories of magic. The magic of my lifetime is science. So I decided to ground it in a scientific reality and see what would follow from that,” Cronin says. “The experiment that produces the great viral cataclysm is essentially an act of human greed—it’s trying to steal the future from your kids. The scientists who are seeking to engineer a virus that makes human beings so long-lived that they are essentially immortal have missed the true immortality that we possess, which is that the future we will not live to see is the future our children will live in.”

This act of hubris, and its devastating consequences, are meticu-

lously detailed. The Passage takes its time setting up the characters and story to create a solid foundation for the strange future readers enter when, 93 years later, Amy— who now looks about 16—stumbles into one of the last human settlements after a viral attack. Her arrival comes at a bad time. Vampires are getting bolder, coming near the settlement’s walls even during the daylight hours. The aging batteries powering the city’s 24-hour lights— their best defense—have little juice left. Some of the citizens are having violent nightmares and coming down with a strange illness that causes them to go insane. A silent, mysterious girl makes a convenient scapegoat.

But Peter senses that Amy’s otherness is a good thing. When they discover a transmitter in her neck with GPS coordinates for a place in Colorado that is broadcasting the message “If you find her, bring her here,” Peter and a group of loyal “Everything friends set off on an increda man does ible journey. in his life Suspenseful he does in and surprising, The Passage some ways something to impress a is of a departure girl, and she for Cronin, a Harvard grad was the girl and English I wanted to professor at impress.”

Rice University whose previous works— The Summer Guest and Mary and O’Neil—were quiet literary successes.

The reception of The Passage, however, has been anything but quiet. Cronin’s agent submitted the partial manuscript and an outline for auction in 2007 under the pen name Jordan Ainsley, an intention-

Justin Cronin teaches creative writing at Rice, where he is professor of English. ally gender-neutral name. “I didn’t want anybody to read this book and categorize it in any way in advance.

And indeed what happened is people came to it with an open mind, which I think every book deserves,” Cronin says.

He got more than open minds: Ballantine bought the trilogy for a reported $3.75 million, and a movie deal with Ridley Scott followed.

Pre-publication buzz has been tremendous, and Cronin has already met with booksellers and librarians like Nancy Pearl, something the “extremely social” author has enjoyed, though he says his life has not otherwise changed. “You write any book with the hope that it will do well enough that you are able to write more, and The Passage has done that for me—spectacularly.

Still, you’ve got to write for love, and I wrote this book for love.”

He also wrote it for his daughter, Iris, now 13. When she was about to turn nine, she asked if she could ride her bike along with her dad when he went on his evening runs.

Cronin agreed, but “it’s hot in Texas and you’ve gotta do something to pass the time.” So he suggested they come up with an idea for a novel, “with no expectations whatsoever.

Maybe I was sort of introducing my kid to the family business.”

Iris had a stipulation: She wanted to plot a story about a girl who saves the world, “which seemed a little ambitious,” Cronin says with a laugh, “but OK. So for a period of weeks we went through the streets

of my suburban Houston neighborhood tossing ideas back and forth, building a story, building characters. It was really just for fun, and it was tremendous fun.”

But it soon became more than that. “By the time the cold weather came and the bike went into the garage, I thought maybe I was on to something. I wrote an outline and was amazed at how much was there. And so I thought, OK, what the hell, let’s write the first chapter, give the book a voice, see how it feels. And it felt terrific.”

Which brings us back to the book’s incredible opening, which was the first part of The Passage that Cronin wrote. “That sentence told me it was going to have this global overview, this very large canvas, which is what I wanted, but it was always going to be an intimate story of people. Once I hammered that one into place, my fate was sealed: I was going to write it.”

Though Iris’ participation ended in 2006, she has now read the book.

“It took her a day and a half, that’s the kind of kid she is—she probably read it faster than anyone in America. And she blessed it, which is what I wanted. Everything a man does in his life he does in some ways to impress a girl, and she was the girl I wanted to impress.”

Brimming with memorable characters, action and adventure, the book brings to mind classics like The Stand and the Lord of the Rings trilogy, and shows the deep understanding of humanity and literary

skill that is also present in Cronin’s earlier works. Cronin says he dared himself to write “a book that rules out no reader,” and The Passage is definitely that.

“One of the things I wanted to do with this book, and the two that will follow, is to write every kind of story I ever loved,” he says. In addition to the post-apocalyptic setting and vampire element, The Passage is a road novel, a coming-of-age story, a thriller and even something of a romance. Last but not least, “it has a runaway train! Everything I think is great in a story, that nails me to my chair, it’s going to find its way into these three books,” promises Cronin, who has plotted out the entire series and is already deep into writing Volume Two, to be published in 2012.

What also finds its way into the story, and what perhaps draws readers to post-apocalyptic fiction, is the hope that humanity can survive even the worst trials. As Cronin explains, the characters in The Passage “live in constant and overwhelming danger, but they have a

N E W

Y O R K

job, they have families, they form relationships, they have a sense of clan and kin. So the world as we know it has in some way continued.

It’s at the brink, and there’s not much left, but it’s there.

“I wanted the reader to know that not all is lost. And then show, within the story, what was worth saving.”

T I M E S

the passage

By Justin Cronin, Ballantine, $27, 784 pages, ISBN 9780345504968, also available on audio

R B E S T S E L L E

EXCERPT from The Passage by Justin Cronin Before she became The Girl from Nowhere—the One Who Walked In, The First and Last and Only, who lived a thousand years—she was just a little girl in Iowa, named Amy. Amy Harper Bellafonte.

The day Amy was born, her mother, Jeanette, was nineteen years old. Jeanette named her baby Amy for her own mother, who’d died when Jeanette was little, and gave her the middle name Harper for Harper Lee, the lady who’d written To Kill a Mockingbird, Jeanette’s favorite book— truth be told, the only book she’d made it all the way through in high school. She might have named her Scout, after the little girl in the story, because she wanted her little girl to grow up like that, tough and funny and wise, in a way that she, Jeannette, had never managed to be. But Scout was a name for a boy, and she didn’t want her daughter to have to go around her whole life explaining something like that.

Amy’s father was a man who came in one day to the restaurant where Jeanette had waited tables since she turned sixteen, a diner that everyone called the Box, because it looked like one: like a big

chrome shoe-box sitting off the county road, backed by fields of corn and beans, nothing else around for miles except a self-serve car wash, the kind where you had to put coins into the machine and do all the work yourself. The man, whose name was Bill Reynolds, sold combines and harvesters, big things like that, and he was a sweet talker who told Jeanette as she poured his coffee and then later, again and again, how pretty she was, how he liked her coal-black hair and hazel eyes and slender wrists, said it all in a way that sounded like he meant it, not the way boys in school had, as if the words were just something that needed to get said along the way to her letting them do as they liked. He had a big car, a new Pontiac, with a dashboard that glowed like a spaceship and leather seats creamy as butter. She could have loved that man, she thought, really and truly loved him. But he stayed in town only a few days, and then went on his way.

Excerpted from The Passage by Justin Cronin Copyright © 2010 by Justin Cronin. Excerpted by p­ ermission of Ballantine Group, a division of Random House, Inc. All rights reserved. No part of this excerpt may be reproduced or reprinted without permission in writing from the publisher.

th 5 1 BACK JUNE

R E P A P N I E L B d e e t AVAILA n a r a u g ’s that ad e r r e m m u r s o f “A t s r i h t r u o to satisfy y at its best.”* ion t c fi n r e h t u o S

“Bright, engaging and thoughtful.”

––Publishers Weekly

“A tempting and satisfying treat.”

––Booklist

a novel

of entic tale “This auth s life’s messe cleaning up y is bright, scover di lfse d l.” an tfu and though engaging, y ers Weekl —Publish

Invite Mary Kay Andrews to your next BOOK CLUB meeting! *Call-ins and in-person visits.* Visit the Book Club section on www.MaryKayAndrews.com for more details. *Daytona Beach News-Journal

13

interview

AIMEE BENDER interview By Stephenie Harrison

MAKING LEMON CAKE OUT OF LEMONS

A

But now, with the publication of her second novel, The Particular Sadness of Lemon Cake, it’s clearly time that you should.

In her latest literary confection, Bender introduces readers to perhaps her most dazzling creation to date: a girl named Rose who can taste the deepest feelings of others, just by taking a single bite of the food they prepare. As the flavors of the food flow over her tongue, Rose is inundated with the underlying emotions of the person who cooked the meal, even if it’s something as simple as a peanut butter sandwich.

All of a sudden, Rose is privy to an onslaught of sensations that aren’t her own, and she realizes that nothing will ever be truly simple again.

The Particular Sadness of Lemon Cake focuses on Rose’s formative years, from the age of nine through her early 20s, as she struggles to form meaningful connections with her family and her peers. Intimidated by her austere and deeply intellectual brother, Joseph, Rose tries to understand what makes him tick. It is only with George, Joseph’s best friend, that Rose feels she can truly express herself without fear of misunderstanding or judgment: the two share great tenderness, their relationship tinged with the poignant melancholy that pervades most of the novel.

Unable to stop the feelings that stem from the food she eats, it is up to Rose to discover a means of

The New York Times Bestseller “A terrific summer beach book.”

—The Connecticut Post

Now available in paperback

www.janegreen.com

14

Plume

Penguin Group (USA) Inc.

PROMISES TO KEEP available in hardcover from Viking on June 15

www.penguin.com

© MAX S. GERBER

boy with keys for fingers. A woman who gives birth to her own mother. Imps and mermaids falling in love. If all of this sounds too strange— even for fiction—then you’ve obviously never read anything by Aimee Bender.

coping with her unwanted ability.

Through much trial and error, Rose discovers there are alternatives to simply cutting herself off from others. With time she comes to see that her “curse” might actually have the potential to set her free, but first she must make peace with herself.

Speaking from her home in Los Angeles, Bender recalls where the ingenious idea for the story originated. “I think I was primarily interested in the food at first,” she says. “I kept going back to the idea of ‘what if food was carrying more than just food?’ [So] the idea was sort of floating in my mind for years, and then when I hit on that character [Rose] it was all about developing her.”

Although Rose’s story plays center stage, if readers dig deeper, they will see that her brother Joseph’s extreme reclusiveness, her father’s intense aversion to hospitals and her mother’s newfound obsession with carpentry all tell their own stories, each filled with pain and longing. The family is like a concert of tops, spinning together, but each ultimately orbiting its own axis. And yet, Bender balks at the idea that she has depicted a dysfunctional family. “I can see how some would think about this as a dysfunctional family,” she allows, “but it’s not a term I would pick because it can be a kind of catchall. My hope is that the family is experiencing a unique unhappiness.”

When it comes to the author’s own family, however, nary a storm cloud is in sight. Bender credits her mother, a modern dance instructor, as a critical influence on her willingness to defy convention. She recalls, “[My mother] would always take me to these concerts, and modern dance can be so bizarre!

She also pointed me toward theater of the absurd writers when I was in junior high and high school; I loved that they were funny and weird and this was literature, and there was some feeling of permission in all of it that felt very good to me.”

Perhaps her mother’s gift of promoting the bizarre is something Bender is passing on to her readers.

The wild and fanciful worlds of her imagination have been showcased in two short story collections, The Girl in the Flammable Skirt and Willful Creatures, and in her acclaimed first novel, An Invisible Sign of My Own. Asked about her ability to ground the outlandish in a place that is real, Bender says that writing this way is the only way she knows how. “My impulse is always to take an idea that is a little off-center, which means I can kind of get my hands in it, and then I can use that to climb into the character,” she says.

Although The Particular Sadness of Lemon Cake is liberally frosted with the foreign and the fantastic, the emotions at its center are undeniably real. Readers who like to give their imaginations a workout are in for a satisfying treat that is both bitter and sweet.

THE PARTICULAR SADNESS OF LEMON CAKE

By Aimee Bender Doubleday $25.95, 304 pages ISBN 9780385501125

fiction

From New York Times and USA TODAY bestselling author

comes a stunning new novel filled with mystery, intrigue and romance in the Texas heartlands…

“The popular Palmer has penned another winning novel, a perfect blend of romance and suspense.”

—Booklist on Lawman

Don’t miss the paperback release of HEARTLESS. www.HQNBooks.com

Both available now wherever books are sold!

15

this month’s top publisher picks

I’m an Audiobook!

CD 9781615730964 $29.95

meet JOHN WATERS © GREG GORMAN

topshelf

I’m an Audiobook!

CD 9781615730940 $29.95

A Short History of Women

For Better: The Science of a Good Marriage

Kate Walbert; Read by Nicola Barber, Ruth Moore, Kathleen McInerney, Eliza Foss and Paula Parker

Tara Parker-Pope; Read by Cassandra Campbell

Walbert’s best-selling and provocative story chronicles four generations of women, their aspirations, the limits imposed on them and the sometimes startling choices they make. Unabridged.

One of the New York Times ’most popular journalists presents groundbreaking scientific news about marriage.

And, surprise: It’s good news. “A jam-packed, lucid survey.” –Dr. Mehmet Oz

HighBridge Audio

HighBridge Audio I’m an Audiobook!

I’m an Audiobook!

CD 9780061993626 $39.99 www.harperaudio.com

CD 9781400167203 $24.99

Island Beneath the Sea

Ilustrado

Isabel Allende; Read by S. Epatha Merkerson

Miguel Syjuco; Read by William Dufris

Spanning decades, Island Beneath the Sea is the moving story of one woman’s determination to find love amid loss, and to forge her own identity in the cruelest of circumstances.

Ilustrado is a daring and inventive debut novel that explores the hidden truths that haunt every family— regret, revolution and the mysteries of lives lived and abandoned.

HarperAudio

Tantor Audio

ROLE MODELS PB 9780615329406 $9.95 www.organbuddies.com

My Organ Buddies Lee Downing and Felice Downing

16

PB 9781434376633 $12.99 www.lovingeyesarewatching.com

The Guardians: Loving Eyes Are Watching

Kids will have fun learning about the organs of their body with the help of Oliver the Liver, Sidney and Sydney the Kidneys, Bart the Heart, and Pat the Pancreas. My Organ Buddies teaches children where the major organs are located, their function, and the value of good nutrition and exercise.

Richard Williams

Organ Buddies Inc.

AuthorHouse

Imagine a world where special dogs lead their masters back to the path of God’s love. The Guardians is such a story; it tells of two shelties who have the ability to speak, but their unusual talent is a closely guarded secret.

Iconoclastic filmmaker John Waters is best known for his cult classics Hairspray, Cry-Baby, Pink Flamingos and Cecil B. Demented. In his latest book, Role Models (FSG, $25, 320 pages, ISBN 9780374251475), Waters reflects on some of his favorite personalities, from Johnny Mathis to Tennessee Williams, as well as his favorite books and his favorite bars in his hometown of Baltimore.

features

TRAVEL by alison hood

AMERICA’S NATIONAL TREASURES

H

ow can you get away without the fuss and expense of flying? Road trip! These travel guides showcase America’s natural, historical and cultural wonders, so gas up the car and hit the road.

Spontaneous jaunts can be memorable, but why not invest some planning in your trip? And if you like a little history and learning with your getaway, the Complete National Parks of the United States (National Geographic, $40, ISBN 9781426205279), is a great starting point for exploring America’s gorgeous parklands. At a hefty 528 pages, you probably won’t want to tote this guide around. But it’s an impressive resource that reveals the diversity of America’s National Park system, from military sites, national monuments and memorials to trails, preserves and recreation areas. There are more than 400 parks under the U.S. National Park Service, and this guide shows them off with lush color photos, beauti-

fully rendered maps and succinct, informative text on the history, features and offerings of each park.

Each entry gives park contact information, plus location, size, accessibility and recreation tips. And for avid hikers, there’s a map of the National Trails system. This elegant, eloquent guide opens the door to our nation’s wealth of wild, urban and rural treasures.

WHAT’S ON YOUR LIST? Longing to “leaf peep” and munch on lobster? Then get thee to New England, and take along Top Ten New England (DK Travel, $14, 160 pages, ISBN 9780756657970).

This slim powerhouse guide takes you to the “best of the best” in Connecticut, New Hampshire,

Maine, Massachusetts, Rhode Island and Vermont. A reasonably priced, jam-packed jewel of a guide to America’s birthplace, this book has the allure of a “top ten” list, with top attractions, the top features of those attractions and a wealth of other lists that detail the high notes of history, natural wonders, art and culture, sports and recreation, food, dining, lodging and practical planning tips.

With small, well-framed color photographs, detailed maps, thorough cross-referencing, eye-catching and accessible layout and lucid, witty prose, Top Ten New England will help you make your surefooted way through Beantown and beyond.

CALIFORNIA DREAMING Though to many, Southern California means beaches, blondes, surfers and movie stars, the region, which stretches from California’s

central coast across to Yosemite and down to San Diego, offers landscapes, sights and cultural treasures far beyond the usual stereotypes.

Fodor’s Southern California 2010 (Fodor’s, $19.99, 588 pages, ISBN 9781400009015) is a superior, relatively portable guide to this area that offers comprehensive coverage in an easy-to-use format.

The photos (now in full color) are tempting, the maps are easily readable and the narrative is smart and hip. Fodor’s is known for thorough, accurate travel information, and this guide follows suit. Especially wonderful is the section on California’s venerable missions. For a true California experience, grab this guide, put on your flip-flops and go!

Double the Symbols. Double the Prophesies.

From New York Times bestselling author

JAMES ROLLINS

Only the Sigma Force can unlock the secrets that threaten all you hold dear.

Connect with James Rollins at www.JamesRollins.com and on Facebook, Twitter, and MySpace. www.HarperCollins.com

New in Hardcover— Preorder Now! Now in Paperback!

17

features

Behind the Book

BY BRUCE FEILER

why i formed the council of dads

I

t was the most desperate week of my life. It gave birth to the most hopeful idea I’ve ever had. In July 2008, I learned that I had a seven-inch cancerous tumor in my left femur. I instantly worried about my three-year-old twin daughters and what life might be like for them.

to fill the Dad space in our girls’ lives.

Third, intimacy over longevity. We thought some more recent friendships might better capture the father I wanted to be.

Finally, a dad for every side. We looked for men who might capture different aspects of my personality.

We ultimately settled on six men: my oldest friend, my camp counselor, my college roommate, my business partner, my closest confidant and a tortured romantic poet friend. I asked each of them to teach a different lesson to my girls—how to live, how to travel, how to think, how to dream.

I then asked each one for a single piece of advice to convey to my daughters. Their answers ranged from the best way to take a trip— “Be a traveler, not a tourist”—to the best way to make your dreams come true— “Don’t see the wall.”

One advised them not merely to seek the answers but to “Live the questions.” Another counseled that even when they experience pain they should still “Harvest the miracles” around them.

Their answers surprised, at times confused, but ultimately moved

© KELLY HIKE

Would they wonder who I was?

Would they wonder what I thought?

Would they yearn for my approval, my love, my voice?

Three days later, I awoke with an idea of how I might give them my voice. I would reach out to six men from all parts of my life and ask them to form a “Council of Dads.”

My initial instinct was not to tell my wife, Linda. We should focus on the positive. We should live in the moment.

But I quickly lost my resolve.

Linda cried at first, but as soon as we began discussing who should be in my Council, she started rejecting my nominees. “I love him,” she would say, “but he doesn’t represent you.” She added, of another, “I would never ask him for advice.”

Starting a Council was a very efficient way of finding out what my wife really thought of my friends!

We needed a set of guidelines.

First, no family members. We figured my family would already have relationships with the girls. Plus, as Linda said, your friends know you differently from your family.

Second, men only. Many of my close friends are women, but with their mom still around, we sought

18

me. They also changed our lives. I remember after my first conversation with one of the dads, I said to Linda: “Their wisdom is not just going to change how our girls live. It’s going to change how you live.” (The advice had to do with the proper way to jump in puddles.) These answers were intended “I asked each of for my girls, but they’ve them to teach already made a different me a better lesson to my dad and girls—how to friend.

And therelive, how to in has proven travel, how to the magic of think, how to the Council dream.” of Dads. We did it for our girls. But it has transformed us. The experience helped build a bridge between our friends and our kids. It created an entirely new community in our lives. It reminded us of the power of friendship.

Recently, on my girls’ fifth birthday, the Council of Dads convened for the first time ever. They argued about politics, parenting and height. They complained about the weather, one another, me. In short, they were men! (My wife said she had wondered for two years what they would talk about. The answer: sports cars!)

But our girls didn’t care. They were delighted as they moved from dad to dad, reveling in the private bond they share with each one. Our girls don’t understand the shadow that hangs over the idea. All they know is that these men are not just Daddy’s friends.

They are their friends.

That night, after the girls were sleeping, we went around the room and each man spoke of how the experience had changed him. One felt the Council helped replace the voice of his own father. Another took the advice he gave our girls and changed how he parents his own children. The last person to speak was my confidant. I call him my ThinkDad. He calls himself The Contrarian.

“When I first heard the idea of the Council, I rejected it,” he said. “You would triumph over your illness.

We wouldn’t need to exist. Today I realized I was wrong. Whether we’re healthy or sick, male or female, we all need to be reminded of what’s most valuable in our lives. We all need to be surrounded by the people we love. And seeing the looks on the girls’ faces today, I now know we all need our own Council.”

Bruce Feiler is the best-selling author of Walking the Bible and America’s Prophet. His new book is The Council of Dads: My Daughters, My Illness, and the Men Who Could Be Me. Feiler has been cancer-free since completing chemotherapy last year.

the council of dads

By Bruce Feiler Morrow $22.99, 256 pages ISBN 9780061778766 Also available on audio

family

Gifts Dad Will Actually Like…

Covering every possible aspect of developing a repeatable, effective golf swing, The Complete Golf Manual works systematically through every type of shot—from tee shots, iron play, pitching and chipping to coping with bunkers and putting—and offers a fast track to a lower handicap for all, from the novice to the experienced club golfer. $25 / Hardcover

Featuring an attractive range of finely crafted projects in easy-to-follow step-by-step detail, from household items to furniture, Woodwork is an inspiring book for woodworking enthusiasts who want to develop their skills, whether a beginner or more advanced woodworker. $40 / Hardcover

Written by a team of travel experts, and with a foreword by Bill Bryson, Off the Tourist Trail takes a hundred clichéd tourist destinations— everything from over-visited national parks to overrated museums—and reveals 1,000 fresh and fascinating alternative options. $40 / Hardcover discover more at

www.dk.com

19

features

FATHER’S DAY BY martin brady

DADDY’S GIRL

dad gets top billing this time

S

eems like Mother’s Day always aces out Father’s Day as a Hallmark occasion. But dads are important, too, and this selection of books aims for equal opportunity attention.

Best-selling author Brad Meltzer has been germinating ideas for Heroes for My Son (Harper, $19.99, 128 pages, ISBN 9780061905285) since he first became a father eight years ago. The result is a unique gift book focusing on 50-some persons selected by Meltzer as role models.

Each two-page spread includes a picture of the “hero,” a pertinent quote and Meltzer’s pithy rumination on how he or she qualifies for inclusion, often focusing on one key moment or turning point in a life. For example, in writing about Eleanor Roosevelt, Meltzer focuses on her visit with a group of angry war veterans: “The first lady went to the tent city. Alone. In

mud and rain, she walked among the veterans. She talked to them like people. She listened.” Some selections would seem to be no-brainers in the hero department: Martin Luther King Jr., Mother Teresa, George Washington. Others represent very personal choices, including the author’s grandfather. Otherwise, Meltzer strives for both historical and contemporary focus in his list, with figures such as the Wright Brothers, airline pilot Chesley Sullenberger, Oprah Winfrey and Rosa Parks. He also includes the worthy but little-known Frank Shankwitz, founder of the Make-a-Wish Foundation. Heroes for My Son puts an interesting spin on a classic role-model theme.

“A son is a son till he takes him a wife; a daughter is a daughter all of her life.” That old Irish saying has the whiff of quaintness about it, but a certain truth lies within.

What I Would Tell Her: 28 Fathers Writing on Raising Their Daughters (Harlequin, $13.95, 304 pages, ISBN 9780373892105) is an anthology that supports that sentiment, as editor Andrea N. Richesin gathers essays by more than two dozen novelists, editors, poets and journalists, all offering insight into meaningful moments shared with their daughters. These pieces reflect the breadth of contemporary family situations—divorce, adoption, gay fatherhood, etc.—but what emerges from each is a deeper understanding of the father-daughter bond in all its mystery, specialness and almost cosmic durability.

COMIC RELIEF Jay Mohr seems no more qualified than any other celebrity to hold forth on fatherhood, but in No Wonder My Parents Drank:

Tales from a Stand-Up Dad (Simon & Schuster, $25, 288 pages, ISBN 9781439173213), the comedian/ actor manages to entertainingly expound on the experience, especially its uncertain moments and ultimate rewards. Despite his penchant for keeping his narrative light, Mohr nevertheless addresses tough subjects frankly, such as discipline and, even tougher, questions such as “What if my son is gay?” Mohr’s candor is welcome, especially on issues such as step-parenting and even artificial insemination, proof that his book isn’t simply a platform for jokes. But Mohr can be funny when he needs to be. One advantage to having kids? “You never know when you’ll need a kidney.”

Can natural enemies make peace?

Actually…can they fall in love?

In 1942 and 1943, German subs are dispatched to the Gulf of Mexico to sink U.S. vessels carrying goods and fuel. While taking a late-night walk, Helen Mason‚ widowed by the war‚ discovers the near-lifeless body of a German sailor. Enraged at the site of Josef Landermann’s uniform, Helen is leave him to die when an unusual prepared to le phrase, faintly uttered, changes her mind.

In The Heart Mender, a small town must prepare itself for the worst the world has to offer, and Josef and Helen must reconcile their pasts to create a future. Andy Andrews once again provides a unique blend of historical fact and engaging fiction showing the power of forgiveness.

Available wherever books and e-books are sold.

20

reviews

FICTION

w

A Visit from the Goon Squad

A DAZZLING SPIN THROUGH TIME Review by Jillian Quint

Fans riding high from Jennifer Egan’s critically acclaimed The Keep have much to look forward to in her new novel, A Visit from the Goon Squad, which turns away from the neo-gothic and mind-bending while retaining the unexpected humor and postmodern breadth of her earlier work.

At the book’s start, we drop in on the lives of Bennie Salazar, an aging record executive, and Sasha, his aimless, kleptomaniac assistant. Sasha goes on a mediocre online date, while Bennie brings his nine-year-old son to see a band he has signed but knows he can’t break out. Then the narrative takes an unexpected turn, making great leaps in time and location to show us not only how these characters got to be the way they are (and flashing forward to what they will ultimately become), but the ways in which the ancillary players in their lives have touched and connected them. We meet Scotty, Bennie’s former bandmate from the Bay Area punk scene; Lou, the

By Jennifer Egan, Knopf, $25.95, 288 pages, group’s self-destructive mentor who takes his children and young girlISBN 9780307592835, also available on audio friend on a trip to Africa; Rob, Sasha’s suicidal college friend who struggles with his own identity in the Internet’s early days; and Alex, Sasha’s date from the opening chapter, who goes on to see a world in which technology and music intertwine in surprising, though not implausible ways.

Chapters jump from first to third person, from heavily footnoted magazine articles to PowerPoint presentations, yet Egan’s scope remains simultaneously manic and highly controlled. Indeed, one gets the sense that she knows so much about her characters’ lives that she had the luxury of curating only the choicest moments for our reading pleasure, the result of which is a series of pastiches that deftly and lyrically illustrates the ways people and culture change, yet stay remarkably the same.

My Name is Memory

By Ann Brashares Riverhead $25.95, 336 pages ISBN 9781594487583 Also available on audio

General fiction

Literature is filled with lovers that not even death can divide. First there was Heathcliff and Cathy, then Edward and Bella; now in Ann Brashares’ entrancing new romantic saga, readers will be swept away

by Daniel and Lucy, whose love is truly one for the ages.

Daniel is both blessed and cursed by “the Memory”—he is able to remember his previous lives and recognize the reincarnated souls of people he once knew. In presentday Virginia, he comes across Lucy, though he knows her as Sophia, his one true love. Initially Lucy has no knowledge of the tumultuous past she and Daniel have shared, but with his gentle coaxing, the secrets lying deep within her soul begin to reveal themselves to her. And with

them comes the realization that she and Daniel must identify and confront the ancient threat that has always managed to tear them apart.

In My Name is Memory, readers will trace Daniel and Lucy’s love over centuries and continents, intoxicated both by the pair’s passion and by Brashares’ rich historical and geographical detail. A potent mix of The Time Traveler’s Wife, Twilight and something entirely new, My Name is Memory is the first installment in a planned threebook series that will remind readers that when it comes to love, hope springs eternal.

— S t e p h e n i e H a rr i s o n

Backseat Saints

By Joshilyn Jackson Grand Central $24.99, 352 pages ISBN 9780446582346 Also available on audio

Women’s fiction

You only think you know what you’re in for when Backseat Saints

begins: “It was an airport gypsy who told me that I had to kill my husband.” Joshilyn Jackson’s fourth novel isn’t a series of funny, trashy set pieces out of Dogpatch; rather, the tale Jackson tells is grim, and unless you count the narrator’s dog and a few minor characters, there’s not one likable person in it.

It’s a testament to Jackson’s talent that we stick with her protagonist, Rose Mae Lolley (aka Ro Grandee), despite the fact that she’s vicious, impulsive, deceitful and about as dim as the aforementioned dog.

She’s also the victim of a husband who’s even more of a monster than she is. We hope she either gets away for good or kills him, for there’s no doubt that the psychopathic Thom Grandee will one day kill her. By the time the book opens, he’s already come close a couple of times.

But Rose has been reared in violence and chaos since childhood.

Her mother, a rare devout Catholic in the ironically named town of Fruiton, Alabama, abandoned her when she was eight. Claire Lolley left her daughter with a man who tried to eradicate his sorrow in drink, and when that didn’t work, he took his rage out on his young daughter—he first dislocated Rose’s

shoulder when she was just nine.

Since then Rose has only known to move from one bad man to another.

Jackson knows that suffering doesn’t necessarily make one saintly or compassionate; it’s just as likely to make one wary and dangerous.

Rose resents her virtuous next door neighbor and steals from her. She sees nearly everyone as an enemy or someone to be dismissed, and when she finally tracks down her mother—a woman who’s almost as self-obsessed as she is—she behaves with a maddening, punitive childishness.

Jackson has a magical way with words, injecting fearless insight throughout the novel. Backseat Saints is rough going in places, but it succeeds because of Jackson’s insistence on telling the truth about Rose Mae and her dangerous and unhappy world. It’s the work of a first-rate writer.

— Ar l e n e M c K a n i c

Everything Lovely, Effortless, Safe

By Jenny Hollowell Holt $14, 256 pages ISBN 9780805091199

Debut fiction

Everything Lovely, Effortless, Safe may be Jenny Hollowell’s debut novel, but the precision and grace with which she tells the story of Birdie Baker, an aspiring actress in Los Angeles, makes Hollowell seem like a veteran.

When we first meet Birdie, she’s growing up in small-town Virginia, the only daughter of evangelical parents. On the outside, Birdie is following the path to a religious life, but for as long as she can remember, Birdie has dreamed of becoming someone else. At age 20, she marries a young elder brought home by her father, but two years later, she walks out on her pastor husband and her parents and hops on a bus to Los Angeles.

Now, nine years later, Birdie’s life in Hollywood isn’t exactly as she had hoped it would be. Her resume lists a handful of unmemorable roles in films and commercials, and her steadiest gig is as a body double for a spoiled, frivolous actress.

21

q&a

sonny mehta

STIEG LARSSON’S LEGACY

K

22

How did you first hear about the Millennium trilogy?

I heard about the books at the Frankfurt Book Fair in 2007.

At that time, they were already creating quite a stir in Europe.

I bought American rights soon after returning to New York.

What was it about the books that made you want to acquire rights for Knopf?

I read The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo in one sitting. I thought it was remarkable for both its suspense and its portrait of society. Lisbeth Salander, “the girl,” is one of the most dynamic and original characters I’ve encountered in years. I believe we had only synopses of the second and third books, but one could tell from the ambition of Dragon Tattoo that the trilogy was going to be an impressive work in its entirety.

The publication of the trilogy was a unique situation—the author was dead, the books had to be translated from their original Swedish, and they were published at different times in different languages all around the world. What was it like working with such conditions?

It’s certainly an unusual situation, but not unprecedented. We had a similar experience when we published Suite Française a few years ago. The author, Irène Némirovsky, died during World War II, and her daughter had only just discovered and decided to publish the manuscript, which was in French. So the novel wasn’t as contemporary as Stieg Larsson’s, but it was another one of those rare works in translation—particularly without a living author—that found a wide audience in the United States and around the world.

It’s tragic to realize that these authors didn’t get to experience the success of their own work, but it can also be reassuring to know that publishing their books may help their legacy to endure for generations.

© MICHAEL LIONSTAR

nopf publisher and editor-in-chief Sonny Mehta, who introduced the works of Stieg Larsson to American readers, talks about the phenomenal success of the series.

Were you involved with retitling the books for an Englishspeaking audience? (The first book’s original title was Men Who Hate Women.)

The British editor, Christopher MacLehose, from whom we bought the books, and who commissioned the English translation, came up with the title. I wasn’t involved in that process, but I knew we wanted the American edition to use this title rather than Men Who Hate Women.

There was some concern that the original title might, in English, sound like a self-help book. Also, the title The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo emphasizes the character of “the girl,” Salander, who in my opinion is one of the main strengths of the trilogy.

Why do you think the books became so successful here?

I think it was a combination of factors. We had a terrific series of jackets, the look of which has now become iconic. We did advance reader’s editions, which went out to a wide group of fellow writers who were very supportive, [and] there was a large marketing campaign. But mainly it’s the strength of the books themselves. I think they really touched a chord with American readers.

Is it true that Larsson left a partial manuscript for book four when he died?

I’ve also heard those rumors, but I don’t have any concrete information about a fourth book.

I understand that as long as Stieg Larsson’s estate is in dispute, it probably won’t be possible to get hold of the manuscript, if it even exists.

reviews Everyone in the industry tells Birdie that she’s got something—that she’s real. But Birdie has been pretending for so long that even she doesn’t know what’s real anymore. She’s trapped in a place somewhere between the life she abandoned and the life she desires, and the city of glitz and glam isn’t as magical as she had hoped.

Using detailed prose and short, anecdotal chapters, the author has created a psychological portrait of both an individual and a city.

While Birdie is waging her own war against personal demons, Hollowell illustrates that Birdie is only one of the thousands of individuals who come to Hollywood with a dream and get torn apart trying to reach it. At once witty, comic and tragic, Everything Lovely, Effortless, Safe throws the reader into the unglamorous side of Tinseltown for an engrossing read on the obsessive nature of celebrity.

—Kari Edgens

The Girl Who Kicked the Hornet’s Nest

By Stieg Larsson Knopf $27.95, 576 pages ISBN 9780307269997 Also available on audio

Thriller

The final volume of Stieg Larsson’s Millennium trilogy, The Girl Who Kicked the Hornet’s Nest, finds neo-punk and genius hacker Lisbeth Salander recuperating from a bullet to the brain. She’s in no hurry to get better: A multiplemurder trial awaits her recovery.

She has wreaked vengeance on her tormentors, who conspired to imprison her for most of her teen years. A few are dead, and the rest are scurrying to cover their tracks and somehow neutralize her before she can incriminate them. So was it murder, or self-defense? Or is there just the slightest possibility that Salander is, if not entirely innocent, at least not guilty in the eyes of the law?

Helping Salander from outside is renegade journalist Mikael Blomkvist, at times the focus of Salander’s affections, and more recently the object of her unbridled loathing. Blomkvist isn’t exactly sure how

FICTION he fell from her graces, and she has not been forthcoming with the answer; indeed, she rebuffs his every advance. And so this uneasy pair labors, sometimes at odds, sometimes in parallel, in pursuit of Salander’s freedom.

The Girl Who Kicked the Hornet’s Nest neatly ties together all the loose ends from the previous two cliffhangers, yet it still leaves the reader yearning for more. At the time of his death, Larsson left behind an unfinished manuscript of what would have been the fourth book in the series, and synopses of the fifth and sixth. Sadly, we will probably never see them, at least not as the author intended.

—Bruce Tierney

Cum Laude

By Cecily von Ziegesar Hyperion $23.99, 272 pages ISBN 9781401323479

chick lit

I was expecting Cum Laude, the “grown-up” novel by the author of the Gossip Girl series, to be a guilty pleasure of the variety you hold on your lap at the coffee shop, lest anyone observe you enjoying such lowbrow fare.

All the sweeter, then, to discover that Cum Laude is a smart and compassionate portrait of one girl’s first year in college, perfectly capturing the mix of loneliness, exuberance and exploration that marks freshman year.

Shipley Gilbert is a beautiful girl from a wealthy Connecticut family (OK, so von Ziegesar didn’t roam too far from the Gossip Girl viewpoint).

She enrolls in a woodsy liberal arts college in Maine (Dexter College, “a shoo-in for every prettiest college campus award in the country”), the same school her brother attended before disappearing years ago.

As per campus tradition, Shipley and her sarcastic roommate Eliza have to spend their first night camping in the woods. They’re matched with athletic Tom and his wheezy, pothead roommate Nick.

Von Ziegesar never met a stereotype she didn’t like (the beauty, the jock, the druggie and the smart-mouthed

reviews outsider—check!). Throw in a supporting cast of painfully earnest professors in Birkenstocks and you’ve got the recipe for one big cliché of a novel.

And yet Cum Laude is more than the sum of its parts. Shipley isn’t just a dumb blonde partying her undergrad years away. Yes, she hooks up with the jock, as expected, but their relationship is anything but wholesome, especially when Tom starts taking ecstasy to mask his uneasiness in this new environment. When someone starts mysteriously using and returning her car, Shipley suspects it might be her long-lost brother. Her response is at once poignant and surprising.

This novel is worth a read for anyone who fondly remembers freshman year—even if you have to hold it low in your lap.

—Amy Scribner

Neighborhood Watch

By Cammie McGovern Viking $25.95, 288 pages ISBN 9780670022038 Also available on audio

Literary thriller

FICTION who conducted clandestine cold fusion research in their basement; their daughter Trish, who became pregnant at 15 and found a sympathetic ear in Linda Sue; newly married Geoffrey, a celebrity writer accused of plagiarism; and Linda Sue herself, a loner who exhibited disdain for the whole neighborhood scene, and who became the object of Geoffrey’s wandering eye.

Injected into this intriguing murder mystery are a number of side plots which at times seem intrusive—Betsy’s five miscarriages, for instance, about which she constantly grieves, reliving all the sad details; her somnambulism, which caused her initially to believe in her own guilt; and her unlikely relationship with Leo, an inmate in the male prison adjacent to her own. But all in all, McGovern succeeds with her latest offering—as both biting social commentary and a literary page-turner.

—Deborah Donovan

Beautiful Maria of My Soul

By Oscar Hijuelos Hyperion $25.99, 352 pages ISBN 9781401323349 Also available on audio

international fiction

In Cammie McGovern’s third novel, she probes the underbelly of a quiet, undistinguished neighborhood in a small Connecticut town— an unlikely setting for a brutal murder.

Twelve years earlier Betsy Treading, the “Librarian Murderess,” was convicted of bludgeoning her neighbor, Linda Sue—a social misfit in their cookie-cutter community—to death. Now Betsy has been released from prison, finally cleared

by DNA testing, and she realizes that in order to erase any lingering suspicion about her guilt, she must find the real killer herself.

Gradually Betsy fleshes out the secrets and lies merely hinted at in her trial, uncovering hidden relationships and family rifts that eventually lead to a completely unanticipated conclusion. Her neighbors 12 years earlier formed a complex mishmash of personalities, including Marianne, who organized neighborhood watch parties where women could buy pastel-colored Taser guns; her husband Roland,

they soon fall passionately in love.

When Nestor proposes marriage, an opportunistic Maria makes a choice she comes to regret. Faced with the irony of her decision after Castro takes over Cuba, Maria flees her beloved homeland for America with her only child, Teresita, in tow.

Hijuelos’ portrayal of the motherdaughter conflicts between Maria and Teresita is spot on. As different from her mother as she can be, Teresita rejects Maria’s flamboyant lifestyle for a more solitary, intellectual life, ignoring her mother’s prodding to find a “novio” and get married. The ending’s clever twist leaves the door open for yet another sequel.

An affecting portrait of broken dreams and regret, hope and despair, rediscovery and renewal, Beautiful Maria ties up the loose ends of a love story that died with Nestor in The Mambo Kings, but is still very much alive in the heart and soul of his song, “Beautiful Maria.”

— S u sa n S c h w a r t z m a n

JULIA QUINN

Recipe for Love

Take one handsome rogue and one outspoken heroine. Add an eccentric grandmother, an awful uncle, two meddling cousins, and a really big secret. Mix for 377 pages.

The result: Happily. Ever. After.

See the book trailer at www.juliaquinn.com www.AvonRomance.com

my name is mary sutter

By Robin Oliveira Viking $26.95, 384 pages ISBN 9780670021673 Also available on audio

HISTORICAL fiction

Beautiful Maria of My Soul is the title of both Oscar Hijuelos’ new novel and the song Nestor Castillo writes about his lost love in Hijuelos’ Pulitzer Prize-winning novel, The Mambo Kings Play Songs of Love.

This new novel, a sequel of sorts to The Mambo Kings, revisits the story of Nestor’s brief but impassioned love affair with the beautiful Maria, told this time from Maria’s perspective. Maria, devastated by the deaths of her mother and beloved sister, flees the bucolic Cuban countryside of her childhood for a better life in Havana. It is the pre-Castro days, and Havana is a vibrant city filled with a nightlife that never seems to end. Maria quickly finds work as a dancer and becomes the mistress of Ignatio, an alleged mobster.

Nestor, an unwitting witness to a public fight between Ignatio and Maria, comes to her rescue, and

From the #1 New York Times bestselling author

The title character in Robin Oliveira’s Civil War novel My Name is Mary Sutter is an accomplished midwife with aspirations to be a surgeon, thwarted at every chance by men who discourage her goals.

But when the soldiers are wounded at a rate faster than hands can set a tourniquet, Mary’s desire to be a surgeon becomes a necessity, and she leaves her family in Albany to lend a hand in Washington, D.C. Oliveira’s debut novel is magnificent historical fiction. She skillfully advances the plot with Mary’s experiences—the losses of an unrequited love and family members, the doubts about continuing on her medical path—while making each character and his or her life during the war feel intrinsic to the storyline, from Mary’s twin sister to President Abraham Lincoln.

Oliveira’s characters are hushed

Your next beach read awaits! t Visi com ge. n a P k Boo y to sig toda for our up

ay D Book sletter. of the

w

e-ne

It’s a daily dose of literature that you don’t want to miss.

23

reviews and contemplative, yet strong and enduring. The novel is well-researched, particularly the standards for medical practice during the Civil War, and Oliveira doesn’t skimp on studied details. Instead, My Name is Mary Sutter is beaten, bloodied and sorrowful, and at times it feels as though this story will end without Mary’s shining achievement.

But this isn’t simply a book about a girl who wants to be someone else; it’s the story of a woman who must summon all her strength and skill to succeed. Her skirts are weighted down by blood and a bone saw is placed into her hand while piles of limbs surround the makeshift operating table. The war requires that Mary be a surgeon, and she rises to the challenge.

It would be easy to call this novel gritty, because at times the streets are slicked by filthy snow and the battlefields scattered with bloody, fly-covered bodies. Still, Mary glows; despite her tired eyes and dirty clothes, she is floodlit from the inside with a passion to mend. —Katie Lewis

FICTION Mrs. Somebody Somebody

By Tracy Winn Random House $14, 224 pages ISBN 9780812981452

Short stories

Linked short stories offer a singular form of narration. Ideally each story can stand alone, but when read together, they overlap and intersect, continually offering new perspectives. Tracy Winn uses this form to explore the mill town of Lowell, Massachusetts, from the years after WWII to the present day in her new collection, Mrs. Somebody Somebody.

As the Hub Hosiery mill changes from workplace to abandoned site to renovated condos and shops, so the characters shift—from factory girls pining for love to the unhappy heirs of the once-prominent fami-

lies to the sons and daughters of the new immigrants that continue to find their way to Lowell in the 21st century.

The title story takes place in Lowell in 1947. The mill is in full production and filled with women, many of them European immigrants. It tells the story of Stella Lewis—an attractive girl whose dream is to marry rich and become “Mrs. Somebody Somebody.� This is a scenario unlikely to be fulfilled on the factory floor, though she keeps her eye on the owner’s grandson, Dr. Charlie Burroughs. Stella becomes friends with Lucy, an enigmatic Southerner who wins the attentions of many of the workers after she jumps in the river to save a drowning baby. This story introduces many of the subjects that Winn continues to explore throughout the collection—immigration, chance meetings and the American home front during wartime.

The collection also follows the decline of the Burroughses, once one of Lowell’s most prestigious and wealthy families. “Blue Tango�

outlines the unhappy relationship between Charlie and Delia after Charlie’s return from Korea. Charlie had signed up barely a year into their marriage, and Delia still feels angry and abandoned. She retaliates with a series of affairs—behavior that doesn’t stop even after he returns home. Their marriage never recovers from these unhappy beginnings, and their children suffer the consequences, quickly turning from the neglected babies of “The Glass Box� into the troubled teens of “Copper Leaves Waving.�

The final few stories take place in present-day Lowell. The mills, long abandoned, have been repurposed and the big houses of Belvidere Hill torn down and turned into subdivisions. The Polish and Italian immigrants have been replaced

by Mexicans and Brazilians whose children are fighting in the Iraq war. In Mrs. Somebody Somebody, Winn has created a masterful mosaic of a resilient American city changing over time, populated with characters you won’t soon forget. —Lauren Bufferd

Who says a woman can’t keep a secret?

NEWƒFROMƒAWARD-WINNINGƒAUTHORƒROBINƒLEEƒHATCHER The third book in The Sisters of Bethlehem Springs series.

In A Ma er of Character, the year is 1918 and writing gri y dime novels simply isn’t done by a woman. So Daphne McKinley—smart, pre y, talented— publishes her rough-and-tumble books under a male pseudonym. But when a newspaperman enlists her aid in restoring his grandfather’s good name, Daphne finds herself re-examining the power of her words and reconsidering the direction of her life. ble Availa ver e wher are booksd. sol

24

RobinLeeHatcher.com

Other books in The Sisters of Bethlehem Springs series.

reviews Lives Like Loaded Guns

NONFICTION

dickinson’s secret history review by Rebecca Steinitz

Lyndall Gordon’s new biography of Emily Dickinson’s family, Lives Like Loaded Guns, is a tour de force. Meticulously researched and keenly argued, it transforms the conventional image of Dickinson—and reveals how that image came to be.

More than 100 years of biography, fiction and theater have depicted the famous poet as a reclusive woman in white who fled the world, perhaps after a tragic love affair, to spend the rest of her life gardening and writing brilliant poems nobody saw. Gordon upends this legend, revealing Dickinson as a passionate and powerful woman who was fervent in her friendships (too fervent, in fact, for many of her friends), had a midlife love affair with an elderly judge and carefully controlled the circulation of her poems. In one of the book’s biggest bombshells, Gordon uses family history, pharmacy records, 19th-century medical treatises and Dickinson’s

By Lyndall Gordon, Viking, $32.95, 512 pages, poems to argue that epilepsy, rather than thwarted love, was the reason ISBN 9780670021932, also available on audio she rarely left her home.

While the first half of the book tells the story of Dickinson’s life, the second half morphs into a literary thriller.

The lengthy affair between Dickinson’s brother Austin and Mabel Loomis Todd has been well-known since the publication of their letters in 1984, but Gordon meticulously traces its aftermath, as Dickinson’s and Todd’s heirs battled for control over the poet’s manuscripts, publication and reputation. Todd, whom Gordon calls the “Lady Macbeth of Amherst,” is the villain of this part of the story, creating the “shy . . . eccentric, asexual” Dickinson of myth, and erasing from the historical record Dickinson’s strong bond with Susan Gilbert Dickinson, Austin’s wife and Todd’s rival. But Gordon remains scrupulously even-handed, acknowledging Todd’s insights into Dickinson’s genius and her heroic editorial work on the first editions of Dickinson’s poems and letters.

Few books are perfect: Gordon’s use of Dickinson’s poetry as biographical evidence is sometimes dubious, and her own prose, though often delightfully personable, can be overwrought. Still, those are minor flaws in a brilliant and breathtaking book.

take good care of the garden and the dogs

By Heather Lende Algonquin $22.95, 304 pages ISBN 9781565125681

memoir

A lot has happened since Heather Lende introduced us to the small town of Haines, Alaska, in her bestselling 2005 memoir If You Lived Here, I’d Know Your Name. First, Lende was (literally) hit by a truck, suffering a broken pelvis just as she was about to begin her book tour.

The following year, her mother died of leukemia. Take Good Care of the Garden and the Dogs celebrates the resilience of ordinary people, gathered together to help one another with the business of living and dying.

As a columnist for the Anchorage

Daily News, Lende’s beat is smalltown Alaska, and she shows us how her community functions as a source of strength for its residents.

In one story, a local Tlingit Indian carves a new totem pole called “Yei eek kwa neix,” or “You Are Going to Get Well.” When over 140 people, including a recovering Lende, help raise the pole, we see how a community coming together, even in sorrow, can offer healing.

Reading this memoir is like listening to an old friend; Lende’s voice is conversational, frequently addressing the reader directly. Her stories are digressive, even circular, as an anecdote about yoga prompts a story about a hospice patient smoking cigarettes while dying of cancer. The effect is pleasantly intimate, as if we were sitting next to her on the Juneau ferry.

Lende has been compared to both Anne Lamott and Annie Dillard; she is a writer who attends to both everyday grace and the natural world, and her Christian faith is explicit but never overbearing. Her Alaska is a harsh landscape

infused with sublimity: The winter mountains, summer dusks, smoked salmon and bald eagles all create a palpable sense of Alaskan life. While Lende’s Alaska is not a paradise by any means, it is a good place for ordinary people to live with one another.

—Catherine Hollis

The Most Powerful Idea in the World

By William Rosen Random House $28, 400 pages ISBN 9781400067053 Also available on audio

HISTORY

William Rosen’s The Most Powerful Idea in the World tells the story of how steam power became the catalyst for England’s Industrial Revolution. And a convoluted tale it is, involving the country’s wealth of natural resources (coal, iron,

copper and water for powering machines and transporting goods), the comparatively high literacy rate that enabled common folk to educate themselves in science and technology, a patent system that protected the rights of inventors and gave them economic incentive to both create and refine devices, and a population large and wealthy enough to form a profitable market for products the new industries turned out.

Rosen marks the start of the “steam revolution” with Thomas Newcomen’s construction of a practical steam engine in 1712 and sees its culmination in the successful trial run of George and Robert Stephenson’s steam locomotive, Rocket, in 1829. Between these temporal poles, Rosen sketches in the life stories and explains the interlocking mechanical and social contributions of dozens of luminaries, among them James Watt, Matthew Boulton, John Smeaton and Isambard Brunel.

Central to Rosen’s account is his amply demonstrated thesis that “inventions don’t just solve problems; they create new ones, which demand—and inspire—other inventions.” He struggles valiantly, if not always successfully, to assay why so much practical knowledge boiled up and was put to use in England in such a short period of time, rather than in, say, France or China. An immensely readable and droll stylist, Rosen even leavens his footnotes with humor. In a passing reference to Francis Bacon, he observes, “It is impossible to write about Bacon without mentioning Rosicrucianism, Freemasonry, and the authorship of Shakespeare’s plays. Consider them mentioned.”

No idolater he.

—Edward Morris

The Price of Stones

By Twesigye Jackson Kaguri Viking $25.95, 288 pages ISBN 9780670021840 Also available on audio

memoir

The Price of Stones has all the markings of a Greg Mortenson knockoff. The book’s foreword

25

reviews

26

contains a letter from its publisher favorably comparing it to Mortenson’s Three Cups of Tea. (It happens that Viking is the publisher of both books.) And the title, The Price of Stones, has a familiar ring, sounding quite similar to Mortenson’s follow-up, Stones into Schools. But The Price of Stones’ author, Twesigye Jackson Kaguri, has one thing Mortenson lacks: serious street cred. While Mortenson stumbled upon Korphe, the remote village in Pakistan where he built a school in Three Cups of Tea, Kaguri was born in the Ugandan village that he struggles to save from the ravages of AIDS. Kaguri writes movingly about growing up in a country where almost a third of the adult population is infected by AIDS. The disease is so prevalent in Uganda, he informs us, that natives have given it a nickname: slim. The shadow of death darkens the doorway of Kaguri’s home, with AIDS claiming the life of his brother, Frank, and sister, Mbabazi. When he becomes the guardian of one of his brother’s children, he discovers that more than a million Ugandan children have been orphaned by the AIDS epidemic, and he vows to take action. Returning to Uganda from his studies in the United States, Kaguri builds a school for these orphans.

The Price of Stones is an engaging account of the work of Kaguri and his wife, Beronda, to build Nyaka School, which provides free education, meals and medical care for some 200 orphans. Nyaka School not only educates students, but also has a working farm to grow food for the children, a program to teach villagers to build clean water systems, vocational training and a program to assist caregivers for the orphans. The school’s success has even led to the establishment of a second school in a nearby village.

The accomplishments of Nyaka School are the result of Kaguri’s perseverance, having overcome obstacles (from the superstitions surrounding AIDS to his father’s initial refusal to help) to raise money, transport supplies and building materials to a rural area, and maneuver around the corruption of government officials. Kaguri rightly earns admiration for his achievements, and The Price of Stones earns accolades for its inspiration.

—J o h n T. S l a n i a

NONFICTION The Shallows

By Nicholas Carr Norton $26.95, 288 pages ISBN 9780393072228 Also available on audio

tions within our own minds,” Carr writes. Stepping away from the screen will become crucial as the Internet becomes a bigger part of what we do and, scarily, who we are.

It’s not too late to emerge from the online haze.

— P e t e C r o a tt o

PSYCHOLOGY

Bonobo Handshake The Internet has given us gifts straight from a sci-fi novel: information at the click of a button; the ability to communicate with anyone anytime; the unbridled joy that comes with watching a cat play the keyboard.

Though it’s not as obvious, the Internet has also changed us neurologically, affecting our reading habits and our concentration. Not all of this is for the better, especially since our reliance on the Net is depriving us of the glorious ability to think deeply. So explains Nicholas Carr in his outstanding new book, The Shallows. In measured, calm prose, Carr (who, yes, uses the Internet) interprets a staggering amount of scientific evidence and social history to show how we shouldn’t allow the Internet and its accompanying practices to dictate our lives.

Carr’s goal is to raise awareness, which he does with gentle eloquence, making it more inviting to digest the eye-opening studies.

You know how you pride yourself on answering emails while messaging your friends and finishing that work project? You shouldn’t. Carr shares this insight from neuroscientist and multitasking expert David Meyer: “You can train until you’re blue in the face and you’d never be as good [at multitasking] as if you just focused on one thing at a time.”

Meanwhile, looking at the Internet as a replacement for memory is ill-advised. “We don’t constrain our mental power when we store new long-term memories,” Carr writes.

“We strengthen them.”

The Shallows is so much more than a shrewd, compelling overview of how an ever-changing, always growing technology has changed us. It’s a reminder that there are benefits to being our old, boring, pen-and-paper selves. “Of all the sacrifices we make when we devote ourselves to the Internet as our universal medium, the greatest is likely to be the wealth of connec-

By Vanessa Woods Gotham $26, 256 pages ISBN 9781592405466 Also available on audio

NATURE

Woods is candid about her own emotional immaturity at the beginning of her adventures. Just as her husband learns about humans by studying apes, Woods comes to terms with herself through interaction with bonobos and their keepers. Her Congolese friends, human and animal, rise above their traumas and teach her much about courage, endurance and tolerance.

— A n n e B a r t l e tt

Medium Raw

By Anthony Bourdain Ecco $26, 304 pages ISBN 9780061718946

FOOD

Chimpanzees are loads of fun, or so movies and TV shows would have us believe. They’re charming, intelligent, affectionate—just like us. But they really are just like us: They can be violent and domineering, and they are deeply intolerant of strangers. They do, indeed, share most of our DNA. Bonobos, another species of ape, also share more than 98 percent of our DNA, but it’s less likely you’ve heard of them. There are fewer of them, they were discovered by scientists more recently, and they haven’t been well-studied yet. But their differences from chimps are fascinating. Bonobos are femaledominated, have staggering amounts of sex of all varieties and are naturally cooperative and altruistic. They’re also in serious danger of being wiped out by hunters.

Vanessa Woods, an Australian chimp aficionado, had never heard of bonobos herself until she fell for Brian Hare, an American scientist whose dream is to compare the behavior of chimps and bonobos living in Congolese sanctuaries and figure out what the differences reveal about human evolution.

Bonobo Handshake is Woods’ beguiling story of falling in love with bonobos and the Congo while her marriage to Hare matured.

Bonobos turn out to be easy to like; the Democratic Republic of Congo is more problematic. Following decades of the brutal Mobutu dictatorship, it’s been wracked by unimaginably vicious civil wars.

Lola ya Bonobo, the sanctuary where Woods and Hare work, is a paradise surrounded by horror.

It has been 10 years since Anthony Bourdain’s breakout book, Kitchen Confidential, lured us from our comfortable restaurant chairs and banquettes in the front of the house back through the swinging doors into his mad, mad world— the kitchen—with lurid tales of life back there recounted in a profane and acerbically hilarious manner that confirmed our worst fears.

In Medium Raw, Bourdain is back with more intriguing food fights, moving further from the kitchen into the eating industry. If he and his recipes have changed, so have we. The Food Channel has made us all reality cooks, if not chefs, and we know Emeril, Bobby and Rachael by their first names.

Bourdain has himself become a TV star, a world traveler in search of rare food; yet he went through his own personal downs and ups, and is now in a second marriage with a three-year-old daughter.

His dissections of the dumbing down of food TV, the sellouts by big-name chefs who will endorse anything, and his reduction of Alice Waters from an icon to a clueless and naïve crusader for locally produced, organically grown lunches for inner-city kids are still as hilarious, as scatological and as spot-on as ever. But while Bourdain is still the indicter, he is no longer the executioner. He understands ratings are ratings, that successful chefs have huge retinues and dozens of partners who get paid by endorse-

reviews ments, and that Waters means well and has inspired many. Moreover, he realizes now that he is human too, vulnerable to selling out, and no longer a chef or even a cook— just another food personality.

Yet Medium Raw is hardly buffalo wings for the masses. While Bourdain may have toned down the hot chili peppers and reduced the acidity, his fare—and his prose—is still quite spicy.

NONFICTION America. There’s Kathy, the loud, profane mother of four rambunctious boys, who talks about what it’s like to have three sons serve in Iraq and only two come home. There’s 22-year-old Colter, an outcast who works on a local road construction crew while he figures out how

to avoid becoming a sun-baked rancher like his father.

But it’s Ralph, one of the coffee drinkers, who is the true heart and wisdom of Welcome to Utopia. Former owner of the general store, he is a gruff, good-hearted man who speaks his mind. One wishes Valby

could have devoted even more pages to his less-than-politicallycorrect, but razor-sharp perspective: “ ‘People always say nothing changes. . . . Everything changes.

You just don’t always know it when it’s happening.’ ” —Amy Scribner

PAPERBACK PICKS

— R o g e r M o rr i s

Welcome to Utopia

By Karen Valby Spiegel & Grau $25, 256 pages ISBN 9780385522861

Onyx, $7.99, 9780451412881

Berkley, $7.99, 9780425235133

Jove, $7.99, 9780515148046

ROMANCE

PARANORMAL

Black Hills #1 New York Times bestselling author Nora Roberts takes readers deep into the rugged Black Hills of South Dakota, where the shadows keep secrets, hunters stalk the land, and a childhood friendship matures intoanadult passion.

Crush onYou TheBaci sistersareonamissiontosave the winery that’s been in their family for generations bytransformingit into the perfect wedding destination. If only Alessandra Baci— affectionately known as the ”Nun of Napa”—didn’t need the help of tempting business rival PennBennett.

Dreamveil RowanDietrichis readytostart anew, finda job, andkeepsecret her ability to“dreamveil” herself into the object of others’ desires. Rowan isn’t using her gift when world-class chef JeanMarcDansant falls for her. But will the dark secrets of her past threaten her newlifeandlove?

Jove, $9.99, 9780515148060

Berkley, $7.99, 9780425235102

SUSPENSE

Bitter Medicine Private eyeV. I. Warshawski knows her friend’s pregnancy is risky. DespiteV. I.’s efforts to help, both mother and child die in the local hospital. V. I. begins an investigation, but deadly complications arisewhena series of murders leadher tosuspect acold-bloodedcover-up.

Signet , $9.99, 9780451230683

FICTION

Signet, $7.99, 9780451230263

When Entertainment Weekly senior editor Karen Valby was assigned to find a place in America untouched by popular culture, she landed in Utopia, a tiny and isolated farming town in Texas. The biggest event of the year for residents of Utopia (pop. 1,000) is the Fall Festival parade, when carefully decorated floats drive down Main Street, then make a U-turn and drive back down the other way.

But things are changing fast, even in this town where the retired “coffee drinkers” still gather every morning at the general store to provide slightly off-color running commentary on all the happenings in town. Families who have lived there for generations are moving away or dying out, and newcomers are bringing foreign values and cultures into the community. The young adults of this sometimes bleak town—who, through blogs and social media, have a glimpse of the bigger world that many of their parents never had—yearn for something more. “I just wish something would ever happen in this town,” says high school senior Kelli, the only African-American girl in her class and a promising student who plans to move to Austin as soon as she graduates. “I just feel like I’m pushing through a hot fog.”

Valby’s rich portrait of several local residents is incredibly appealing for its honest look at the struggles of modern families in small-town

Signet, $9.99, 9780451230270

SOCIOLOGY

FICTION

THRILLER

SUSPENSE

FICTION

The Memory Collector Forensicpsychiatrist JoBeckett is called to the scene of a plane inbound from London with a suspicious passenger aboard. Suddenly a string of clues arises, including a deadly biological agent code-named “Slick,” a missing wifeandson, anda secret partnership gonehorriblywrong.

The Templar Throne RetiredLt. Col. John Holliday possesses astaff hefoundinthehandsof a4,000 year-oldEgyptianmummy.Hesuspects that the ancient nautical instrument holds thekeytounlockingthemystery of the enigmatic Templars. But others think the answers he seeks should go withhimtothegrave.

The Traffickers Philadelphia Homicide Sergeant MatthewPayneispairedwithaTexas Ranger to bring down a murderer with Mexican cartel connections. The odd couple—the Philly cop and the Texas lawman—must run down the killer and his gang before the body count rises again.

Welcome toHarmony Reaganhasalwayswantedareal home of her own. Using an assumed name and identity, the 16-year-old runaway moves to Harmony, Texas, but keeps her distance from the welcoming townsfolk. When prairie fires threaten Harmony, Reagan learns the true meaning of family, friends, and home.

27

children’s books

interview

by Deborah hopkinson

A GRANDCHILD’S SPECIAL BOND

T

welve-year-old Lucy, the heroine of Valerie Hobbs’ lyrical new novel for young readers, treasures her summer visits with Grams, an artist and “a hippie before hippies were invented.”

But this summer turns out to be different. For one thing, Lucy’s longed-for, precious time at the lake with her beloved grandmother is disrupted by a surprise visitor, one who’s not altogether welcome. And then there are the disturbing incidents: Grams forgetting the day of the week, a dish towel left too close to the burner, an ill-advised canoe trip in threatening weather.

As the days pass, Lucy wants to cling to the way things have always been. She doesn’t want Grams to change. Yet she can’t forget what her mother told her as she said goodbye: “This might be the last time, you know.”

The last summer. Lucy wants it to be the best.

The Last Best Days of Summer

28

was inspired by a film on Alzheimer’s disease, which prompted Hobbs to think about family members, like Lucy, who get left behind. This can be extremely painful for children, especially those being raised by their grandparents, or those who have close ties to a grandparent or relative.

Now a grandmother herself, Hobbs believes her own experience has helped her appreciate in a new way the special bond that can exist between grandparents and grandchildren. “I wanted to speak to that connection,” she says in an interview from her home in Santa Barbara, California.

In writing her latest novel, Hobbs also drew on her experiences with throwing pots, a skill Grams is

teaching Lucy in their time together. “I did pottery for a couple of years. I got to the point where I could center a pot. It’s a really strange and profound feeling—a feeling of being centered on the Earth, and centered within yourself.”

The author of 12 novels for young readers and one for adults (Call It a Gift), Hobbs writes for both middle grade and young adult age groups.

She says it’s really the story and characters that shape Valerie Hobbs whether a book is for draws on her experience as a middle grade readers or an grandmother older audience. to tell the “It really poignant story depends on of a summer what story hits me,” filled with she notes. change.

Though she adds with a laugh, “I think I got stuck at about age 14 so I can go either way.”

Hobbs, who likes to visit schools and talk with students, believes that writing can help young people find themselves. She works with young writers to enable them to recognize that their own lives and stories are important.

“I start out with a banner that reads, ‘Only You Can Tell Your Story.’

I want them to know that they have the power to write from their hearts and their experiences. To get those real stories out is important,” the author says.

Hobbs practices this in her own work. Her novels have sometimes drawn from her personal experi-

ences, including the tragic death of a boyfriend when she was a teenager. But while she has found that writing some of her books has been challenging emotionally, others have turned out to be pure fun, especially her 2006 novel Sheep, about the adventures of a border collie.

Despite its bittersweet story, The Last Best Days of Summer is never dark. Instead, it seems infused with joy and an affirmation of family. Part of the reason may be that Hobbs, who lived in New Jersey before moving to California at the age of 15, has wonderful memories of her own summers as a golden, carefree time. “We were gone all day. We ran. We made forts. We only came home when we were hungry.”

Lucy’s summer with Grams may not be what she was expecting, but by the end it has been touched by love and a kind of magic. Lucy has come to feel that sense of being centered, in spite of the changes and emotions that envelop her.

“I hope kids get that,” says Hobbs, “that feeling of knowing who you are, and knowing ‘this is right.’ ” And really, isn’t finding out who you are exactly what summer reading is all about?

the last best days of summer

By Valerie Hobbs FSG $16.99, 208 pages ISBN 9780374346706

middle grade

children’s books emily’s fortune

reviews

A RIP-ROARING SUMMER KICKOFF review by deborah hopkinson

In Emily’s Fortune, Newbery Award-winning author Phyllis Reynolds Naylor has penned a fast-paced Western adventure perfect for summer afternoons. The story is a delightful departure for this versatile writer, and a wonderful comic romp for young readers.

The heroine, Emily Wiggins, is a shy eight-year-old. She lives with her mother, who works for the wealthy Miss Luella Nash (also known as Loony Lu). Emily is quiet and well-behaved, and it’s a good thing. Miss Nash is of the firm belief that children should be seen (rarely) and not heard (at all).

One day, a terrible carriage accident leaves Emily alone in the world— except for her turtle, Rufus, and some well-meaning neighbors. At this momentous crossroad, Emily sets her hopes on going to live with kind Aunt Hilda in Redbud, a long stagecoach ride away. But all is not resolved

By Phyllis Reynolds Naylor, Random House, $14.99, so easily. Miss Catchum, of the infamous Catchum Child-Catching Ser160 pages, ISBN 9780385736169, ages 7 to 10 vices, informs Emily that she must live with mean and nasty Uncle Victor.

“Now what in a devil’s doughnut should Emily do?” Run away on the next stagecoach, of course. And that’s exactly what Emily does, launching a series of adventures that test her gumption, her new friendship with a (stray) boy named Jackson and even the steely nerves of Rufus the turtle. Readers will find themselves on the edge of their seats asking, “What in pickin’ poppies could possibly happen next?”

With its colorful old-West expressions, delightful illustrations by Ross Collins and inventive use of fonts aimed at grabbing even the most reluctant reader’s attention, Emily’s Fortune is just the book to launch a summer of reading adventures.

A Sick Day for Amos McGee

By Philip C. Stead Illustrated by Erin E. Stead Roaring Brook $16.99, 32 pages ISBN 9781596434028 Ages 2 to 6

PICTURE BOOK

Here is a book that exemplifies that happy combination where words and pictures carry equal weight and yet somehow create a whole that defies arithmetic. A Sick Day for Amos McGee is the first collaborative effort by the husbandand-wife team of Philip and Erin Stead, and even their dedication is intertwined as each acknowledges the other in a never-ending circle of words. Their overlapping partnership produces illustrations and text in easy harmony for this understated tale sprinkled with subtle humor.

Amos is an elderly zookeeper who lives alone and methodically follows his daily routine. He schedules time to interact tenderly with each animal according to its need.

In turn, when he doesn’t show up for work, the animals reciprocate by taking the bus to check on their

sick caretaker. They know just what he needs and gently modify their activities to adjust to his condition.

With their friend on the mend, they all fall asleep in a friendly huddle.

This is a heartwarming story, comforting without a lot of fuss.

The unusual mixture of pencil drawing and softly colored woodblock printing enhances the peaceful tone. It’s an obvious choice as a reassuring read on a child’s sick day or before bedtime, but it would also be one to keep in mind for any time a quiet break is in order.

— A L L ISON HA M M OND

Theodore Boone: KID LAWYER

By John Grisham Dutton $16.99, 288 pages ISBN 9780525423843 Ages 8 to 12

MIDDLE GRADE

No one was particularly surprised when John Grisham decided to write a children’s book. After all,

James Patterson and Harlan Coben have recently ventured into the market. Why wouldn’t Grisham want to hook readers when they’re young? And hooked they will be by Theodore Boone: Kid Lawyer, book one in a planned series.

The only child of two busy attorneys, 13-year-old Theo’s passion in life is the law. He hangs out at the courthouse in his small city, and he knows every lawyer, judge, court clerk and cop in town. In a closetsized office, he gives legal advice to classmates when their parents are filing for divorce or their pets are charged with violating the leash law. When a big murder case goes to trial, Theo organizes a field trip for his government class to observe the first day’s proceedings.

Though Theo longs to be either a “famous trial lawyer” or a “great judge,” he knows he’s in over his head when he finds out about a mysterious eyewitness to the murder. No one else is aware of the witness’ existence, and it’s up to Theo to convince him to come forward and tell the judge what he knows.

Otherwise, a guilty murderer will walk free.

Theodore Boone: Kid Lawyer zips along at a quick pace, and

young readers will be intrigued by the showdown of the trial. As Grisham explains the role of a jury, a district attorney and a bailiff, they’ll learn about some of the players in our justice system. But don’t expect a neat ending: Grisham leaves readers hanging before the lawyers make their closing arguments at the murder trial, setting the stage for Theo’s next adventure.

— E L I Z A BORN É

Word After Word After Word

By Patricia MacLachlan HarperCollins $14.99, 128 pages ISBN 9780060279714 Ages 8 to 12

MIDDLE GRADE

Why do people write? To express themselves? To reach others? To inspire? Whatever the reasons, five fourth graders in Miss Cash’s class are about to get the lessons of their lives—courtesy of visiting author Ms. Mirabel.

Ms. Mirabel brings with her not only a melodious name and ebullient spirit, but what she calls “magical words.” And BFFs Lucy, Henry, Evie, Russell and May are spellbound—both by having such an interesting visitor and by learning how to tell their own stories, word after word after word.

“I, myself, write to change my life, to make it come out the way I want it to,” Ms. Mirabel tells the kids. But she encourages them to find their own words and their own reasons for putting pen to paper.

One of the kids faces family relationship issues. Another deals with a serious family illness. All of them, however, share their stories underneath the lilac bush at Henry’s house after school. And that’s where the magical words fill their notebooks with the poems and prose that reflect their own lives.

In Word After Word After Word, Patricia MacLachlan weaves a gentle, funny story about five friends, their camaraderie and the words that ultimately stir each of them.

Ms. Mirabel’s encouragement is a timeless—and well-stated—lesson in creative writing.

— SHARON VERBE T EN

29

children’s books The Gardener

By S.A. Bodeen Feiwel & Friends $16.99, 240 pages ISBN 9780312370169 Ages 12 and up

teen

Fifteen-year-old Mason has never met his father. His responsibilities at home include picking his mother up from the local tavern when the bouncers set her on the curb, then sobering her up for another shift at the nursing home, and occasionally sneaking in to help her complete a shift. One day when he’s at the nursing home he pops in a DVD—footage of his father, his face obscured, reading a children’s book—and a previously comatose teenage girl wakes up at the sound of his voice. She turns out to be part of an experiment in genetic engineering

30

intended to turn kids into self-sustaining life forms who can survive without food or water. She’s also gorgeous, which motivates Mason to err on the side of running away with her in a valiant but dangerously misguided attempt at saving her.

The only thing standing in his way is the faceless man behind this plan, known only as the Gardener.

Author S.A. Bodeen has laced this sci-fi-tinged page-turner with thoughtful commentary on world hunger, sustainability, biology and biomedical ethics, plus several high-speed chases and a believable budding romance, and the whole thing works like a charm. The giant Tro-Dyn Corporation and its generous scholarships that keep local kids indentured—and quiet about what really goes on there—make for high tension, and the notion that these photosynthetic food-andwater-free teens, originally conceived to combat famine, might make perfect low-budget soldiers is downright eerie to contemplate. I stayed up late to find out how it all ended, and stayed up after that be-

reviews cause The Gardener raised so many timely and pointed questions.

—Heather Seggel

I Now Pronounce You Someone Else

By Erin McCahan Arthur A. Levine $16.99, 272 pages ISBN 9780545088183 Ages 12 and up

teen

both laughter and tears, I Now Pronounce You Someone Else reveals Bronwen’s doubts, healing and discovery that her true family may have been surrounding her all along.

—Angela Leeper

The Space Between Trees

By Katie Williams Chronicle $17.99, 256 pages ISBN 9780811871754 Ages 14 and up

teen

Bronwen Oliver is certain she was switched at birth. What else could explain her aversion to ketchup when the rest of her family slathers the condiment on almost anything edible? Or her gift for journalism amid a family that doesn’t write (and she’s not counting her greatuncles’ self-published The Onderdonk Reliable Method for Preventing Most Diseases of the Rectum)?

Since her father died in a plane crash when she was six, her mother stopped talking about difficult topics, her brother Peter became equally reticent, and her stepfather dismissed her adoption request, she has dreamed of being rescued one day by her “real” family.

After breaking up with Chad, who only wanted to take their relationship to the next level (i.e., have sex in her basement after prom), Bronwen is surprised to run into Jared Sondervan, one of Peter’s former high school friends. Only this new romantic boyfriend can evenly match Bronwen’s impeccably timed, quirky humor and observations on life. As she enters her senior year of high school and her boyfriend his senior year at a nearby college, their love blossoms (and readers wistfully sigh) until Jared unexpectedly asks Bronwen to marry him. It’s an opportunity not only to be with the guy she loves but to become a member of Jared’s seemingly perfect family and start fresh by forming a family of her own.

But if her wedding day is supposed to be the happiest day ever, why then does Bronwen begin to feel depressed and like she’s losing her freedom already? Maybe she’s not the only one in her house who needs to learn to open up about her feelings. With scenes that prompt

Sixteen-year-old Evie is lonely, friendless and adept at lying—so when the dead body of Elizabeth “Zabet” McCabe is found in the woods, Evie manages to insert herself into the tragedy. Even though Evie hasn’t been friends with Zabet in years, she lies to the girl’s father and says they were best friends. She realizes the severity of her lie when Mr. McCabe invites her and Zabet’s real best friend, Hadley, to dinner.

But rather than reveal Evie’s fraud, Hadley surprisingly covers for her, and Evie gets drawn into a friendship with Hadley—whose behavior grows increasingly erratic as she becomes obsessive about finding Zabet’s killer.

While the mystery surrounding Zabet’s murder is both haunting and intriguing, it is Evie who is most unforgettable. She has an authentic voice that evokes a sense of sadness and isolation. Unable to get close to people, Evie fabricates stories and embellishes half-truths to make people respond to her, including her own mother. She observes, “This idea that I have friends is so important to Mom that sometimes I help her out, like, I’ll repeat something funny that Angela Harper said in chem, not including the fact that she’d said it to Rachel Birch, not to me.”

Katie Williams’ debut novel, The Space Between Trees, offers a deft depiction of a girl coping with the truth, no matter how ugly it is. The haunting premise and honest narration of this poignant coming-ofage story will equally captivate both teen and adult readers.

— K i m b e r ly G i a r r a t a n o

feature

FATHER’S DAY

by ALICE CARY

meet MICHAEL REX

Q: W hat’s the title of your new book?

DEAR OLD DADDY In my house, it seems, daddies can do no wrong—especially in the eyes of my 11-year-old twin daughters. (The same cannot always be said for dear old mom!) In honor of Father’s Day, here are four new picture books that salute proud papas everywhere.

Young children will enjoy the gentle rhymes of Sherry North’s Because I Am Your Daddy (Abrams, $15.95, 32 pages, ISBN 9780810983922, ages 3 to 8), illustrated by Marcellus Hall. This follow-up to Because You Are My Baby begins: “If I were a pilot, I would fly you to your school. / Your friends would all look up and say, ‘Your daddy is so cool!’ ” The rhymes continue with the father voicing many “If I were” thoughts about being a baseball player, paleontologist, park ranger, movie director and all sorts of exciting professions. With each imagined activity, daddy, daughter and her dolly have an exciting adventure. This poem of mutual admiration ends with: “And if I were a wizard, I would make your dreams come true. / Because I am your daddy, I would do anything for you.”

Daddy/daughter bedtime reading doesn’t get any cozier. The text is accompanied by Hall’s fun and stylishly retro watercolors. His airline pilot and robot look like they could have come from the 1960s, while his use of color is lovely, especially in a northern sky night scene.

WHAT’S IN A NAME Acclaimed children’s author Jane Yolen wrote the delightful tribute My Father Knows the Names of Things (Simon & Schuster, $15.99, 32 pages, ISBN 9781416948957, ages 4 to 8) in honor of her late husband, David Stemple. The encyclopedic dad in this book knows the names of many wonderful things, including mosses,

insects, fish, cows, stars, cats and candies.

Stéphane Jorisch’s illustrations (watercolor, gouache, pen and ink) are whimsically delightful, making the father/child explorations great fun. The explorers wade through hugely tall sunflowers, head for the clouds in a biplane and explore the planets from an amusement park ride. Everything is fun and full of expression in Jorisch’s world—even a row of colorful birds in a cage.

STANDING TALL Daddy Devotion is also alive and well in My Father is Taller Than a Tree (Dial, $16.99, 32 pages, ISBN 9780803731738, ages 4 to 8), by another award-winning children’s author, Joseph Bruchac. This rhyming text features a variety of boys with their dads: old, young, white, black, Hispanic, Asian and even a blind dad. Wendy Anderson Halperin’s pastel illustrations show fathers and their sons enjoying splendid times together—playing the piano, walking on the beach, reading, playing chess, painting a doghouse. These tender scenes conclude with a panorama of sons and their dads, and this lovely line: “When I grow up and have a kid / we’ll do all the things that Dad and I did.”

Q: H ow would you describe the book?

Q: W ho has been the biggest influence on your work?

Q: What was your favorite subject in school? Why?

Q: Who was your childhood hero?

Q: W hat books did you enjoy as a child?

Q: What one thing would you like to learn to do?

SALUTING STEPFATHERS, TOO Finally, blended families will adore Dad and Pop: An Ode to Fathers and Stepfathers (Candlewick, $15.99, 40 pages, ISBN 9780763633790, ages 4 to 7). Writer Kelly Bennett celebrates how both a father and a stepfather can be equally fun and loving in very different ways. For instance, both father and stepfather bike (one on a bicycle, one on a motorcycle) and both love music (one goes for the symphony while the other rocks out). Paul Meisel’s colorful, energetic illustrations show dads with their daughters enjoying all sorts of entertaining outings together.

Q: W hat message would you like to send to children?

FURIOUS GEORGE GOES BANANAS Michael Rex has written and illustrated more than 20 children’s books, including the popular parodies Goodnight Goon and Runaway Mummy. His latest picture book is Furious George Goes Bananas (Putnam, $15.99, 40 pages, ISBN 9780399254338), another gentle send-up of a children’s ­classic. Rex lives in New York City.

31

WORDNOOK

By the editors of Merriam-Webster

FLYING HIGH Dear Editor: I recently used the phrase in like Flynn and my wife had never heard it before. While trying to explain what it means, I began to wonder where the phrase came from and how it was first used. Can you help?

P. B. Topeka, Kansas The phrase in like Flynn is something of a mystery to word enthusiasts. No record remains of exactly how the expression was originally used. Although some have attributed the phrase to a development of rhyming slang, most commentators agree that it is rooted in the films of Errol Flynn, the famous adventure star of the 1930s and ’40s.

The first report of the phrase came in 1945, when it was recorded as pilots’ slang and used to convey the notion that one had pulled off a daring maneuver with ease. Later, the phrase was reported to be a poker term that described a player who calls his bets ahead of turn; in other words, one who throws cau-

tion to the wind, as Errol Flynn did both on and off the screen.

More recently, the phrase to be in like Flynn has been used to mean “to seduce a woman quickly,” presumably in tribute to the star’s notorious sexual escapades. One interesting rumor has it that Errol Flynn originally wanted to title his autobiography In Like Me but was persuaded to use the more decorous title My Wicked Wicked Ways.

OL’ BLUE EYES

westward, they brought the word into southern Europe, including Spain, where it was borrowed into medieval Spanish. The word then appeared in Anglo-French, a kind of French spoken in Britain around 1100 AD, as azeure and was later adopted into Middle English. Azure is nowadays rarely used for lapis lazuli and instead has come to refer to the color of the stone.

A WATERY GRAVE

Dear Editor: I gave my Siberian husky the name Azure because of her beautiful blue eyes. Can you tell me anything about how this color came to be called azure?

P. H. Waterbury, Connecticut

Dear Editor: I came across the clue “lemmings’ fate” in a crossword puzzle recently.

The answer turned out to be noyade.

It isn’t in any of the dictionaries I looked at, and I’m curious to know what it means exactly.

S. D. Seguin, Texas

The word azure can trace its lineage back to the Persian word lazhuward, which was used to refer to lapis lazuli, a blue stone that is the color of a clear sky. The Persian word was adopted into Arabic as lazaward. As the Arabs moved

Noyade is originally a French noun meaning “drowning,” from the verb noyer, “to drown.” In English, noyade has narrower connotations; both “mass drowning” and “execution by drowning” are acceptable definitions.

The origins of noyade are not for the squeamish. During the French Revolution, Republican leader JeanBaptiste Carrier became infamous for his use of mass drowning as a means of executing hundreds of prisoners held at Nantes in 1793. The doomed prisoners were loaded onto boats, which were then scuttled in the Loire. It was said that Carrier ordered pairs of men and women tied together for these noyades—a method the French referred to as “Republican marriages.”

Perhaps as a result, speakers of English felt that execution by drowning, like execution by guillotine, was characteristically French; noyade entered our vocabulary in the aftermath of the French Revolution. In 1819 John Adams referred to “the noyade of the tea in Boston harbor,” but today the word is rarely used except in specific references to the noyades of Nantes.

Please send correspondence regarding Word Nook to: Language Research Service P.O. Box 281 Springfield, MA 01102

EVERYTHING LITERARY Reprinted from The Everything Literary Crosswords Book by Charles Timmerman, published by Adams Media, an F+W Media, Inc. Co. Copyright ©2007, F+W Media, Inc.

JANE AUSTEN ACROSS 1. 50-and-over gp.

5. Antifur org.

9. Jane Austen novel named after the main character 13. Aaron Burr’s daughter 14. Waterless 15. Song of praise 16. ___ Park, Jane Austen novel 18. Wearer of three stars: Abbr.

19. State in the SE United States 21. “God willing!”

24. Place of shelter 28. TV’s Italian mouse __ Gigio 29. Boat trailer crossword solution

32

32. Kemo __ 33. Title of reverence for God 36. Can of worms, maybe 38. Eagle org.

39. Sense and ___, Jane Austen novel 42. One of the Cyclades 44. “Pay ___ mind” 45. Talisman 48. Made a web 50. WWW address starter 52. Teased 53. Metallic element 55. Disney World city 58. Clan leader 61. Blockbuster rental 64. Pride and ___, Jane Austen novel 68. Draconian 69. Baseball catcher Tony 70. ___ child 71. X-rated stuff 72. Adam’s youngest 73. Rent DOWN 1. Pressure unit equivalent to 760 torr: Abbr.

2. Solver’s cry

3. Stimpy’s TV pal 4. Defer 5. Hurts 6. Heretofore 7. Mah-jongg piece 8. Combines 9. They may be picky 10. Ryan of “When Harry Met Sally” 11. Sallie __ 12. Raggedy doll 15. “Give me another chance,” e.g.

17. Honorarium 20. Young woman 21. “Make ___ double” 22. Coal carrier 23. Pogo, e.g.

25. Capital of the Chaldean empire 26. Observation 27. New Deal program: Abbr.

30. Head monk 31. Chiang ___-shek 34. “Gimme ___!” (start of an Iowa State cheer)

35. Panama and others 37. Lyricist Rice 40. Abbr. on a bank statement 41. 1926 La Scala premiere 42. Bar intro?

43. Mother of Jupiter 46. Principal’s deg.

47. Auto racer Fabi 49. Like Miss Congeniality 51. Packing a wallop 54. “Oops!”

56. Prince of India

57. Lucy of “Charlie’s Angels,” 2000 59. “The Mod Squad” co-star, 1999 60. At liberty 61. Letters on tapes 62. “__ a Rock” 63. ___ Hill (Sisqo’s old group) 65. Daughter of Cadmus 66. Not cloudy: Abbr.

67. Take a gander at