Anthropology of an American Girl: A Novel Hilary Thayer Hamann (Facebook) (Twitter) Spiegel & Grau (2010), Edition: Revised, Hardcover (ISBN 9780385527149 / 0385527144) Fiction, 624 pages Source: Publisher, via TLC Book Tours in support of the paperback release Reason for Reading: blog tour, personal wishlist Opening lines: “Kate turned to check the darkening clouds and the white arc of her throat looked long like the neck of a preening swan. We pedaled past the mansions […]
Nerd Do Well: A Small Boy’’s Journey to Becoming a Big Kid Simon Pegg (Twitter) Gotham (2011), Hardcover (ISBN 1592406815 / 9781592406814) Nonfiction/memoir (mostly), 368 pages Source: ARC from publisher, via TLC Book Tours Reason for reading: Blog tour, known writer (although not known for books), guilty-pleasure genre Opening lines: “It was never my intention to write an autobiography. The very notion made me queasy. You see them congesting the bookshop shelves at Christmas. Rows […]
A Canticle for Leibowitz Walter M. Miller Jr. Eos (2006), Paperback (0060892994 / 9780060892999) (Reprint: original publication date 1959) Science/speculative fiction, 352 pages Source: Purchased Reason for reading: Faith and Fiction Roundtable discussion Opening lines: “Brother Francis Gerard of Utah might never have discovered the blessed documents, had it not been for the pilgrim with gilded loins who appeared during that young novice’s Lenten fast in the desert.” Book description: Winner of the 1961 Hugo […]
In the early 1900s, my mother’s family made a journey from the south of Italy to New York City. They found work in the factories and homes in the tenements, and many of them never ventured much further after that. Most of the women – my great-aunts – went to work in the factories of the city’s garment district, where they spent their adult lives producing clothing. Decades later, Kimberly Chang and her mother made […]
Faith: A Novel Jennifer Haigh Harper (May 2011), Hardcover (ISBN 0060755806 / 9780060755805) Fiction, 304 pages Source: ARC from publisher, via TLC Book Tours Reason for reading: Blog tour, personal interest (known author) Opening lines*: “Here is a story my mother has never told me. “It is a day she’s relived a thousand times, the 21st of June, 1951, the longest day of that or any year. A day that still hasn’t ended, as some […]
Planting Dandelions: Field Notes From a Semi-Domesticated Life Kyran Pittman (blog) Riverhead (2011), Hardcover (ISBN 1594488002 / 9781594488009) Nonfiction/memoir, 256 pages Source: ARC from publisher (pub date April 2011) Reason for reading: review, personal interest, Memorable Memoirs Reading Challenge Opening lines (from the Introduction)*: “I jumped the white picket fence. Not in the way the story usually begins, with the hero breaking out, busting loose, setting off across the wild world in search of her […]
The Wilder Life: My Adventures in the Lost World of Little House on the Prairie Wendy McClure Riverhead Hardcover (2011) (ISBN 1594487804 / 9781594487804) Nonfiction (memoir/literature), 352 pages Source: ARC from publisher (pub date 4/14/11) Reason for reading: Review copy; 24-Hour Readathon, Spring 2011 Opening Lines: “I was born in 1867 in a log cabin in Wisconsin and maybe you were, too. We lived with our family in the Big Woods, and then we all […]
The Uncoupling Meg Wolitzer Riverhead Hardcover (2011), Hardcover (ISBN 159448788X / 9781594487880) Fiction, 288 pages Source: Publisher, via TLC Book Tours Reason for reading: blog tour Opening Lines: “People like to warn you that by the time you reach the middle of your life, passion will begin to feel like a meal eaten long ago, which you remember with great tenderness. The bright points of silver. The butter in its oblong dish. The corpse […]
Skipping a Beat: A Novel Sarah Pekkanen Washington Square Press (2011), Edition: Original, Paperback (ISBN 1451609825 / 9781451609820) Fiction, 352 pages Source: purchased e-book (Kindle) (ASIN B0043RSK94) Reason for reading: personal Opening Lines: “When my husband, Michael, died for the first time, I was walking across a freshly waxed marble floor in three-inch Stuart Weitzman heels, balancing a tray of cupcakes in my shaking hands. “Shaking because I’d overdosed on sugar—someone had to heroically step […]
The Weird Sisters Eleanor Brown Amy Einhorn Books/Putnam (2011), hardcover (ISBN 0399157220 / 9780399157226) Fiction, 336 pages Source: purchased e-book (Kindle) (ASIN B00475AXHY) Reason for reading: personal Opening Lines: “We came home because we were failures. We wouldn’t admit that, of course, not at first, not to ourselves, and certainly not to anyone else. We said we came home because our mother was ill, because we needed a break, a momentary pause before setting out […]
This Is Where I Leave You: A Novel Jonathan Tropper Plume (2010), Trade Paperback (ISBN 0452296366 / 9780452296367) Fiction, 352 pages Source: purchased e-book (Kindle) (ASIN B002GEDEKQ) Reason for reading: personal Opening lines: “‘Dad’s dead,’ Wendy says off handedly, like it’s happened before, like it happens every day. It can be grating, this act of hers, to be utterly unfazed at all times, even in the face of tragedy. ‘He died two hours ago.’ “‘How’s […]
Mary Ann in Autumn: A Tales of the City Novel Armistead Maupin Harper (2010), Edition: 1, Hardcover (0061470880 / 9780061470882) Fiction, 304 pages Source: purchased e-book (Kindle) (ASIN B003VIWNK8) Reason for reading: favorite series Opening Lines: “There should be a rabbit hole was what she was thinking. There should be something about this hillside, some lingering sense memory – the view of Alcatraz, say, or the foghorns or the mossy planks of the planks beneath […]
