I’d Like to Thank the Academy

We always come away from the Oscars resolving to see the movies we missed. What about the books that inspired those films? This year five of the nine best picture nominees were tied to books: Lincoln (based on Doris Kearns Goodwin’s Team of Rivals); Life of Pi (Yann Martel’s novel); The Silver Linings Playbook (based on Matthew Quick’s novel); Les Misérables (Victor Hugo’s epic); and the big winner, Argo (Argo: How the CIA and Hollywood Pulled Off the Most Audacious Rescue in History by Antonio Mendez and Matt Baglio)....Read more

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Old Wives’ Tales

The Aviator’s Wife came out in January and is the latest “wife” tale in my collection. I’m not ashamed to admit that I’m automatically drawn to this genre of historical fiction. Authors who choose the mysterious wives of famous and controversial men as their subjects automatically have a good premise, so all they need to do is write the already-existent story well. When done right, these novels reveal women who demonstrate humility, sensitivity, emotional strength, ability to love, and empathy for those less fortunate. In other words, the qualities their husbands lack.

Before I read The Aviator’s Wife, all I knew about Charles Lindbergh was that he made the first solo flight across the Atlantic, he was anti-Semitic, and his first-born had been kidnapped and murdered. I knew nothing of his wife Anne. There are many fascinating anecdotes about Charles and his family, but this book is about Anne’s inner life more than anything else....Read more

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A Tale of Revenge

“I had to do what I had to do. This act was before me. In the uncanny light a sense of dread so overwhelmed me that tears started in my eyes and a single choking sound, a sob maybe, a wrench of hurt, burst from my chest. I crossed my fists in the knitting and squeezed them against my heart.” —Joe, The Round House

Revenge is always a good topic, and the National Book Award winner The Round House does a sly job of convincing readers that vigilante justice is both necessary and inevitable. Joe is only thirteen, but when his mother is brutally raped, he’s forced to grow up fast. The local priest preaches that out of every evil comes good, but Joe fails to see the good in his mother’s overwhelming depression and his father’s helplessness. The jurisdiction issues that surround his North Dakota Indian reservation will protect his mother’s attacker. So what’s a kid to do when his family has been broken and justice isn’t forthcoming? The way the story unfolds makes it easy to understand why he’d want to take matters into his own hands....Read more

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The Analog Kid

It’s not easy, being a 19-year-old bookseller. I can’t remember a time when the book industry wasn’t on the brink of a potentially catastrophic restructuring, nor can I recall an era before the rise of the internet and ubiquitous cell-phone usage. I am constantly fighting to reconcile my generational ties to the digital age with my deep affection for the old-fashioned brick-and-mortar world of bookselling. While I am very much aware of my contradictory position, I rarely consider the effects that the last twenty years or so have had on the content of the very books I care about so much.

Until now, I’ve taken for granted the fact that cutting-edge digital technology and stories about storytelling rarely co-exist. I’d always found that there was an unspoken rule against combining high-tech plots with stories about the power of books. Even the most forward-looking sci-fi novels exist in the same media as our oldest written narratives, something which their authors seem loath to acknowledge....Read more

(Our store journal keeps you posted on books we're excited about, our literary musings, and other reading-related rambles. Remember, you can sign up to receive our posts by email.) 

 

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