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Galley Talk: 8/3/2009
Lucy Kogler, Talking Leaves Books, Buffalo, N.Y.
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Galley Talk: 7/13/2009
Shiver by Maggie Stiefvater (Scholastic Press, Aug.): This is the first book I think will actually satisfy the Twilight fan girls.
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Galley Talk: 7/6/2009
Originally a Swedish novel and movie, Benny & Shrimp by Katarina Mazetti (Penguin, July) centers on two quirky middle-aged characters who meet on a bench in a cemetery while visiting the graves of loved ones. Benny is the village bachelor, a man who spends every waking hour working on his dairy farm.
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Galley Talk
James W. Fuerst’s impressive debut, Huge (Three Rivers Press, July), presents the compelling and funny story of a boy living in his own world, constructed from detective stories and held together by his own anger at life. Eugene “Huge” Smalls is both tough and vulnerable, fierce and fragile; his voice is unique, fresh and believable—it stayed with me for days.
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Galley Talk
Nothing about Ian MacKenzie's City of Strangers (Penguin, July) tips the reader that this complex and riveting work is a first novel by an author not yet 30. MacKenzie's ideas suggest experience and depth. The central character is a writer in his mid-30s who is not quite estranged from an older half-brother; he's also not nearly over his ex-wife and struggling with the impending death of his on...
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Galley Talk
Have you ever had to leave work early so you could go home and finish the last chapter of the book you're reading? It happened to me recently: Katherine Howe's debut novel, The Physick Book of Deliverance Dane (Voice, June), is a page-turning, delicious and devilishly delightful read. Howe's educational background and her personal connection to both the material and her protagonist, Connie, mak...
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Galley Talk
Karen West, events director, Book Passage, Corte Madera, Calif. A riveting new work, A Trace of Smoke (Tor, May) seduced me immediately, drawing me into an intoxicating world of intimate violence, complicated family relationships and voluptuous intrigue set in a time and place steeped in duplicity. Nazism is on the rise and police work is rife as people go missing and newspapers cry out their ...
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Galley Talk
I just finished Craig Johnson's The Dark Horse (Viking, June), and remembered the first time I encountered his protagonist, Walt Longmire. It was in The Cold Dish, and I've been a goner ever since. Is it the uproarious and frequently outrageous humor that keeps readers glued to the page? Is it the character of Walt himself, that rueful, shrewd, often conflicted sheriff of Wyoming's Absaroka Cou...
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Galley Talk: Dark Places by Gilliam Flynn
Deanna Parsi, mystery buyer, Borders, Ann Arbor, Mich. The heroine of Gillian Flynn's Dark Places [Crown, May] is the sole surviving member of her murdered family. Libby Day's family was murdered when she was very young and her brother was convicted of the crime, based in part on Libby's testimony. She is now a barely functioning adult.
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Galley Talk
Joanna Smith Rakoff's first novel, A Fortunate Age [Scribner, Apr. 7], is a delight. Rakoff chronicles the sometimes ludicrous, maddeningly funny and often moving adventures of a gifted group of friends in New York City just after college graduation. Though there are quite a few major characters, they are ably distinguished and three-dimensional.
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Galley Talk
Me Cheeta: My Life in Hollywood [Ecco, Mar.] chronicles the ups and downs of Tarzan's best pal, the beloved chimp who enthralled millions of American cinephiles. Now retired to Palm Springs, Cheeta reflects on his long life in a tell-all autobiography filled with startling revelations and shocking details regarding the treatment of animal actors and the intimate lives of various Hollywood stars.
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Galley Talk
Paul Tremblay's The Little Sleep (Holt, Mar. 3) is both whimsical and razor sharp. This quirky jazz riff on Raymond Chandler's The Big Sleep is also a fun read that stands on its own. South Boston PI Mark Genevich is both hard-boiled and scrambled—a narcoleptic detective prone to hallucinations and major blackouts.
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Galley Talk
Linda Olsson's Astrid and Veronika was my favorite book of 2006. My enthusiasm spread to other Schwartz booksellers who became fans, and we sold over 2,400 copies the first year it was released. I was excited and nervous when I heard Olsson had another novel coming: Sonata for Miriam [Penguin, Feb. 24].
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Galley Talk
In what I believe must be the first full biography of Flannery O'Connor, Brad Gooch's Flannery [Little, Brown, Feb. 25] has created a fascinating portrayal of one of the greatest short story writers of our century. Gooch is a terrific writer who follows O'Connor's story from her fascinating youth and budding talent to her tragic end.
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Galley Talk
While reading One Drop by Bliss Broyard for our book club, I stopped to read Kathryn Stockett's The Help [Putnam/Amy Einhorn, Feb.]. Broyard talks about the theory of invisibility of the African-American and the resulting “second sight.” Stockett brings to vivid life the lives of white women and their help in Jackson, Miss.
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Galley Talk
I usually read geopolitical or psychological suspense books, but when the galley of Ally O'Brien's The Agency [St. Martin's Press, Feb. 3] landed on my desk, for some reason it called out to me—and I'm so glad that it did. Wow! What a delicious read! Even more entertaining than Sex & the City and Lipstick Jungle combined.
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Galley Talk
Glen Duncan's pen is surely dipped in gold, for the images he evokes in A Day and a Night and a Day (Ecco, Jan.) are unobtrusively woven amid the tapestry of disturbingly beautiful metaphors for human suffering. He confidently and disarmingly lulls his reader into a dreamscape of impossible romances and familial loyalties, only to assault any notions of comfort and send you tumbling into an unc...
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Galley Talk
Michael Zadoorian's first novel, Second Hand, introduced us to a writer with a brilliant eye for local color, a great ear for dialogue, a wry sense of humor, and characters that hook the reader from the very first page. His new novel, The Leisure Seeker [Morrow, Jan.], is even better. What do you do when the life you've shared for over 50 years is coming to an end? Ella, who has cancer, and Jo...
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Galley Talk
Kat Dawson, Politics & Prose, Washington, D.C. I was immediately sucked into Mehmet Murat Somer's The Kiss Murder [Penguin, Dec. 30] from the opening paragraph, upon meeting the dryly sarcastic Turkish transvestite protagonist. Somer transports us into the fast-paced life of a male computer technician by day and a drag nightclub manager by night—as she tries to figure out who is behin...
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Galley Talk: Blindspot by a Gentleman in Exile and a Lady in Disguise
David McCullough once told me that he was both annoyed and mystified about why history wasn't enjoyed by more people. “I don't understand,” he said. “It's just stories about people.” Jane Kamensky and Jill Lepore's wondrous new period novel, Blindspot by a Gentleman in Exile and a Lady in Disguise [Spiegel & Grau, Dec.
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