Award Winner: The Yellow House by Sarah M. Broom

Making lots of 2019 round-ups is Sarah M. Broom's The Yellow House. This touching, multigenerational memoir was highly anticipated, and that excitement was justified as it later won the 2019 National Book Award for Nonfiction and became a New York Times bestseller. Kirkus Reviews calls it, "A tribute to the multitude of stories one small home can contain." Available now!

What We're Reading This Holiday Season

I know how I'll be spending my holidays (that is, when I'm not partaking in all the delicious food and festivities). I'm giving my "To Be Read" pile some attention! I asked my fellow Deweys what's on their "To Be Read" piles and this is what they said:

                                    Lahring:                                      

Wake by Anna Hope
(Random House)

Tim:

I am Malala by Malala Yousafzai

(Little Brown & Company)

Laureen:

HYDE by Daniel Levine 

(Houghton Mifflin Harourt)

Rosalyn:

Life After Life by Kate Atkinson

(Reagan Arthur Books)

Saffron:

The Paris Architect: A Novel

by Charles Belfoure

(Sourcebooks)

Margot:

The Devil I Know by Claire Kilroy

(Grove Atlantic)

Janet:

TransAtlantic by Colum McCann

(Random House)

Caught by Lisa Moore

(Anansi)

How to Get Along With Women: Short Stories 

By Elisabeth de Mariaffi

(Invisible Printing)

The Goldfinch by Donna Tartt 

(Little, Brown and Company)

Levels of Life by Julian Barnes 

(Knopf)

The Circle by Dave Eggers

(Knopf)

The Dewey Divas and Dudes Top 5: Mike's Picks!

Representing East Side Canada, I asked Mike Hamm from Bookmark Inc. in Halifax. If you're visiting Halifax, you should definitely visit this beautiful little independent bookstore. Mike's descriptions alone make me want to read these books! Here are his picks:

1. The Orenda by Joseph Boyden (Penguin)

"As an already devoted fan of Boyden, I was so very hungry for this book. Once finished, I had the feeling that this was another instant Canadian classic. Never have I been so immersed in the geography of setting. The writing is again incredibly assured and magnificent."

2. The Misfortunates by Dimitri Verhulst (Portobello Books Ltd) 

"A Belgian Dutch writer recounts the lives of a family of brothers who drink, watch TV, carouse, fight, sleep and then drink some more and the one son who sees the possibility of a world outside his uncles' influence. For those who love the gritty realistic humour of Roddy Doyle. And amazing insights into human nature."

3. The Dinner by Herman Koch (Hogarth)

"A small story in terms of locales and the characters' physical movement but huge in it's discussion of responsibility and parenting. The central mystery of the novel, largely revealed as two couples meet in a high end restaurant, has a very sad connection to an actual recent event in my province of Nova Scotia. For this reason among many others, The Dinner has resonated greatly with me this year."

4. A Constellation of Vital Phenomena by Anthony Marra (Hogarth)

"War-time atrocities are uncovered in a ravaged Chechnya as an urban doctor and small town widower take on the care of a frightened young girl. The subject matter is dark and emotionally challenging but this is a writer of singular talent. There are paragraphs that stopped me in my tracks. I let them wash over me and then I reread them. At times like these, I marvelled at the terrible beauty of Marra's words."

5. The Universe Versus Alex Woods by Gavin Extence (Redhook)

"For those of you who adore Mark Haddon and enjoyed The Unlikely Pilgrimage Of Harold Fry, this is the book for you. A meteorite crashes through the roof of young Alex's house, he suffers a resultant coma but ends up gaining the friendship of a crotchety yet caring elderly man. Through Alex's encounters with bullying, euthanasia and a Kurt Vonnegut bookclub, this book's sheer magic shines through. And who can deny the literary greatness of this author's name!"

The Dewey Divas and Dudes Top 5: Chris' Picks!

If you love sci-fi and fantasy and you haven't visited Bakka Phoenix Books in Toronto, then you are missing out! Bakka Phoenix Books is the oldest sci-fi/fantasy bookstore in Canada and it is amazing! I called on the manager, Chris Szego, for her top picks of the year. I knew she was a trusted and well-read source but can you believe she reads on average 10 books a week?! While I am beyond impressed (and slightly jealous) she warned me that it was very difficult for her to only pick five. Here are her picks:

1. Written in Red: A Novel of the Others by Anne Bishop (Roc Hardcover)

"A thoroughly enjoyable urban fantasy in which humans are not the dominant species on the planet. A fun read: I'm looking forward to the next book in the series."

2. An Astronaut's Guide to Life on Earth by Chris Hadfield (Random House) 

"I say this unironically, as an adult: Chris Hadfield is my hero.

His intelligence, humour, and above all his sheer delight in his work is a constant inspiration. Read this book."

3. A Face Like Glass by Frances Hardinge (MacMillan)

"Hardinge's impressive originality is on full display in this story about the underground city of Caverna. The city's denizens can create wines to make you forget your dreams; perfumes to send you to sleep, and cheeses that can kill -- but they cannot make any facial expressions until they are taught how. Into this world falls young Neverfell, whose face reflects everything that she feels... and Caverna will never be the same."

4. Royal Airs by Sharon Shinn (Ace Hardcover) 

"Josetta may be a princess, but she will not allow her entire life to be eaten by court intrigue. Rafe is a gambler who is looking to make something more of his life. When they meet, the world will change in ways they can't even imagine. I already want more."

5. An Inquiry Into Love and Death by Simone St. James (NAL Trade)

"In post WWI England, a young woman encounters a number of mysteries when she travels to a small town to settle the affairs of her recently deceased uncle. Beautifully written, with a definite feel for the historical period. (And Canadian!)"

  

The Dewey Divas and Dudes Top 5: Ron's Picks!

I keep hearing about how difficult it's been for each of my Top 5 contributors to narrow their favorites and I don't blame them. There have been so many amazing books in 2013! The next list of recommendations comes from Ron Stadnik, Print Manager at Library Bound in Waterloo. Here are his top picks:

1. The Deep Whatsis by Peter Mattei (HarperCollins)

"Mad Men meets Fight Club by way of American Psycho."

2. A Map of Tulsa by Benjamin Lytal (Penguin)

"Coming of age tale by a first time novelist; quite possibly the best reviewed book of adult fiction this year. A reminder of why I love the work I do."

3. With Charity for All by Ken Stern (Doubleday)

"An expose of the seldom scrutinized state of the charitable/non-profit sector in the U.S. An absolute must read, I just wish for a book that looked at the situation in Canada, although I sadly suspect it would be analogous."

4. Hell-Bent: Obsession, Pain and the Search for Something Like Transcendence in Competitive Yoga by Benjamin Lorr (St. Martin's Press)

"Part transformative memoir, part expose of yoga guru Bikram Choudhury, this is at its heart a look at obsession, which makes it for readers of The Orchid Thief as much as anyone that can't through the day without a downward facing dog."

5. The Circle by Dave Eggers (Knopf Canada)

"For readers of Walker Percy and fans of Christopher Hitchens, this would make a great book club pick. With apologies to Timothy Leary, I hope it’ll make inspire people to  “turn off, unplug, drop out” or at least examine the role of technology in their lives more closely."
  

Scaredy Squirrel Prepares for Halloween!

 

My favourite little squirrel is back at it again, and just in time for Halloween! As we prepare the kids for a night of costumes, candy and craziness, it's important to stay safe. Watch Scaredy Squirrel's Halloween Safety Public Service Announcement, an adorable video for all your safety tips or pick up a copy of my favourite, Scaredy Squirrel Prepares for Halloween.

Have a happy (and safe) Halloween everybody! 

Happy Chanukah!

A Chanukah Noel is a lovely story about the childhood of Charlotte Teeple, the Executive Director of the Canadian Children's Book Centre. As a young girl, Charlotte went to live in France in a small town where they didn't celebrate Chanukah. She was quite entranced by all of the Christmas celebrations around her but her family didn't feel it was appropriate to celebrate. Charlotte comes up with a very sweet way to recognize both holidays. Second Story Press has posted a cute trailer on YouTube.

The book is going to be launched this Monday, November 29th 6-8pm at Mabel's Fabels...hope to see you there!

Strangers on a Train or Brief Encounter, the French Way. . .

Frank meets Anne on a Paris train station platform and helps her with her heavy bag (full of books). They get on the train, begin a conversation, get off at the same stop, have a meal, go to an author reading at a local bookstore, end up at the same hotel, have sex, and declare their love - but not of course in that order. In the Train by Christian Oster, translated by Adriana Hunter, is very funny and very French which means love and philosophy inevitably accompany each other as slightly surreal travel companions. For fictional trainspotters with or without a lot of relationship baggage.

Vive Le Tour. . .

I just got back from a few days at Niagara-on-the-Lake indulging in a lot of theatre at the Shaw Festival (I highly recommend One Touch of Venus and The Doctor's Dilemma) interspersed with some lovely bike rides along the Niagara Parkway. But I'm back home now and ready to embark on my annual three week obsession with the Tour de France. I am only a recreational cyclist, but no other exercise gives me as much pleasure and pain (or pleasurable pain) than pushing myself and my little foldable bike up a hill, or going a few extra kilometres even when I'm tired. So I have the ultimate respect for this gruelling and dangerous bike race.

To get geared up, I took along a book I'd been meaning to read for a long time - Dutch writer Tim Krabbé's classic The Rider, translated by Sam Garrett - which describes his 1977 particiaption in the one day, 137 kilometre Tour de Mont Aigoual. The book takes you suspensefully through the race, kilometre by kilometre (Krabbé is actually a contender), showing exactly what is going on in the mind of the cyclist at every moment - the superstitions, the strategy, the rivalries, the boredom, the weather, the fear, and of course the pain. Oh, yes, the pain. In the middle of an arduous climb in muggy weather, he describes how "My brains are getting ready to squish out of my ears like gravy rolls". En route are digressions on how he got started (he only became a racer at the rather late age of twenty-nine), humourous or defining moments in the history of the sport, and philosophical mediations on why he keeps putting himself through it all. A great read and introduction to the sport - without the tired muscles.

I also rented Louis Malle's 1962 documentary Vive Le Tour. It's part of Criterion's Eclipse Series that includes a number of Malle documentaries. Though it's only 19 minutes, it provides a very entertaining look at the sport if only to compare how different the race was almost fifty years ago. My favourite scene is of the bikers riding through a small village and stopping to raid a local bar of bottles of beer and wine which they tucked into the back of their jerseys. No helmets then of course, and Malle doesn't shy away from filming injuries. And of course the pain and physical effort remain the same.

Crafty Titles for Halloween

I know it was Thanksgiving this past weekend, but my mind wasn't really on turkey- all I could think of was Halloween!

Maybe it was because of the full moon, but I know that my obsession started in the checkout line at the grocery story when I spotted a Pillsbury Halloween special publication ($5.50 CDN on newsstands). On the cover was the most adorable appetizer EVER- Halloweenies (cocktail wieners wrapped in Pillsbury Crescent Dinner Rolls so that they resemble mummies, then served with a mustard dip). They are called Crescent Mummy Dogs on the Pillsbury website, but I much prefer the name Halloweenies-it must be the kid in my surfacing, but I can't say 'Halloweenies' without giggling! I decided I had to have a Halloween party, just so I could serve these.

I also turned to two other books for further inspiration for the party. Both are packed with ideas for food, crafts, and decorations: so many you’ll want to add this to your collection (personal or library collection) as you’re bound to want to refer to it for years to come. A Ghostly Good Time: The Family Halloween Handbook by Women’s Day Special Interest Publications is a paperback which is a very economical $11.99. It has decorating ideas and projects for both outdoors and indoors. There are also instructions on making costumes for both adults and kids, including a few children's costumes that can be re purposed next year using a few tweaks to create a brand new costume. This book also includes recipes for snacks both sweet and savory, instructions for crafts party favours and fun games you can play, like 'Pin the Spider on the Web'.
Matthew Mead is Style Editor-at-Large for Country Home Magazine. His book, Matthew Mead’s Halloween Tricks and Treats is a hardcover which will stand up to repeat borrowing. This book contains sections on treats (both home-made and time saving ways to ‘personalize’ store-bought items) for parties for kids or grown-ups, decorations (a nice mix of simple projects and more complicated ones). The patterns for the crafts are included in a separate section at the end.

The photography in both books is great and you are bound to find lots of ideas in each!

Notes from a volcanic island or my Icelandic saga (with books of course) . . .

I'm back from my hiking holiday in Iceland and honestly, put a visit to this country on your "to-do" list. It is so incredibly beautiful - the landscape seems to change every ten minutes, you'll never breathe crisper, fresher air or drink more delicious tap water. This is an island that is completely alive; where else can you witness the earth spewing, spurting, steaming, bubbling, ripping itself apart - it's all quite sexy really. It never gets fully dark during the summer so we were taking walks in full daylight at 11pm which was an awesome experience. And it meant I didn't need to turn on a reading lamp the entire trip. I didn't sleep much, but who would want to? When I wasn't outside, I was immersed in the books I'd brought (and bought) - only Nordic literature, I decided, would do for this trip.

I began with a day in Reykjavik and took Iceland's most famous contemporary author with me to read by the sea (in the background is Mt. Esja which majestically looms above the capital city; on my last full day, I climbed it). Hallador Laxness's Independent People is the book that helped him win the Nobel Prize in 1955 and it's a moving look at the harsh and poverty-stricken lives of one farming family at the end of the 19th century and into the modern era. Bjartur of Summerhouses is so determined to be his own independent man, to own his own land and sheep, that he turns a blind eye to the needs of his family with tragic and heartbreaking results. It also turned out to be a novel that partly examined the effects of the First World War on the country. Iceland wasn't involved in a military aspect, but the war brought a period of huge prosperity to the island as the price and demand for lamb and wool rose. Alas, the economic boom didn't last forever and the last part of the novel follows the consequences of mis-timed greed. The book reminds me a little of the writing of Steinbeck and I'd also recommend it for fans of Martha Ostenso's Wild Geese for its portrayal of survival - the emotional isolation being as much of a challenge as the extreme weather conditions or the tough, physical work.

I can spend hours browsing in foreign bookstores. I love seeing which Canadian authors are stocked in other countries and it's also fun to compare the covers on different editions. In Iceland it was not a surprise to see Atwood, Munro and Ondaatje widely available, but quite nice to see Steven Galloway, Camilla Gibb, and Madeleine Thien displayed among them. There were three huge bookstores within a few blocks of each other near the downtown core of Rekyjavik. My favourite was Eymundsson which also had a cafe with delicious lattes and a lovely outside patio on its second floor (and open late!). There I picked up some more Icelandic literature - The Lodger and Other Stories by Svava Jakobsdottir and Trolls' Cathedral by Olafur Gunnarsson both of which don't seem to be available for sale in North America but a few copies are available in libraries. The Trolls' Cathedral, which was shortlisted for the IMPAC prize was a great follow-up to Independent People. Set in 1950s Rekyjavik, it is the story of a headstrong architect so determined to build his dream project - a large, modern department store complete with a "moving staircase" - that he exploits his friends, tears apart his family, particularly when his young son becomes the victim of violence, and spirals towards a second, devastating tragedy.

Next, for something a little different, I kept to a Nordic theme, but jumped countries to Finland. Tove Jansson's The Summer Book doesn't seem to be available for sale in Canada (though older editions are available in libraries), but if you are anywhere else in the world, you can probably pick up NYRB's lovely re-issue. This is a very special book. It's a series of vignettes that take place on a small island in the Gulf of Finland where six year old Sophia, who has recently lost her mother, spends her summers with her father and grandmother. The father is just a shadow character, only casually referred to, and always out fishing or working at his desk. The real relationships explored are between Sophia and her grandmother; the young child slowly discovering new life lessons and the elderly woman accepting her approaching death and reflecting on her life. However, this is definitely not a saccharine story - there are temper tantrums and grudges, pain and resentment, along with the love and learning. Jansson's beautiful prose and her minute descriptions of nature and weather as pointers towards contemplating the larger philosophical questions of life, make this great cottage reading, and is the perfect choice for a long, languorous, Scandinavian summer night.

Finally, I can't resist posting a few photos of the highlights of my trip (culled from 1200 photos taken in all - digital cameras have made snap-happy maniacs of us all). I both started and ended my trip with a visit to the Blue Lagoon, which uses natural geo-thermal heated water to create this incredibly relaxing soaking experience. That' s not chlorine that makes the water so blue, but natural minerals. You can give yourself a wonderful silicia mudmask facial.

My favourite day of hiking was in the Landmannalauger area. Stunning, surreal scenery. Honestly, why so many fans of Lord of the Rings are flocking to New Zealand is beyond me: this after all, was Tolkien's true inspiration. (And I kept expecting Viggo Mortensen or Orlando Bloom to show up on a horse). After hiking three hours in these hills and through snow at times, we got into our bathing suits and soaked in another hot spring stream. Soaking in water seems to be Iceland's national sport - an absolutely brilliant way to pass the time.

Then we did a hike to Thingvellir, the site of Icelandic gatherings for centuries (if you've read any of the sagas, the characters are always riding to it). What is incredible about the landscape around this magical place, is the rifts that you see in this picture. Our guide called them "Mother Earth's stretch marks". This is the only part of the world where the plate tectonics that separate Europe from North America are visible above the sea. These plates are still moving apart from each other a few millimetres every year, so one is literally crossing from one continent to another. Mind-boggling.

Then it was a beautiful walk along the coast on the Snaefellsnes Penisula. This photo can't convey how utterly blue and clear that water was.

I ended my trip with a few more days to explore Rekyjavik. One of the highlights was visiting The Culture House which nicely exhibited the country's past (with its display of medieval saga manuscripts - incredible how they've lasted this many centuries given the Icelandic weather), the recent present (an exhibit of Hallador Laxness's photographs), and the future (an amazing look at the continuing development of the island of Surtsey, created after a three year volcanic eruption in the 1960s).

Of course I had to check out the public library, shown here. It also houses the Museum of Photography - what should be on display, but an exhibit of photos by none other than Viggo Mortensen!

Happy St. Patrick's Day!

In honour of St. Patrick's Day and all things Irish, I thought I'd pass on a few recommendations of great books set in Ireland, featuring Irish characters, or by Irish authors.

For Children 5+: Across A Dark and Wild Sea by Don Brown. This beautifully illustrated picture book tells the story of the Irish monk Columcille (Columbia) whose passion for books caused a war. Guilty about his role in the bloodshed he founded a monastery on the Scottish Island of Iona where he and his followers copied early manuscripts and sent the books, "like small boats on a dark and wild sea, to places where reading and writing had been forgotten or ignored."

For Middle Grade Readers: the Artemis Fowl series by Irish author Eoin Colfer. Besides being really fun, action-packed adventures, these books also draw much from Irish legends- leprechauns, fairies, etc.

For Young Adults (14 up): The Chronicles of Faeries series, The Druid's Tune and The Singing Stone by Irish Canadian O. R. Melling. I devoured these books as a teen!

The books are all fantasies featuring teens caught up in fantastical adventures with Druids, faeries and other characters from Irish myth and legend.

Adult Mystery Readers:

If you like historical mysteries, you'll love My Lady Judge, the first book in a new series by Cora Harrison set in the 16th century in the remote region of Ireland called The Burren. Fans of Peter Tremayne's Sister Fidelma series will enjoy these books. The second book in the series, The Michaelmas Tribute is coming out in May in Canada. Aside from being entertaining mysteries, the books incorporate a lot of period detail, including excerpts from Irish lawbooks written in the 15oo's. Literary mystery readers might want to pick up Benjamin Black's Christine Falls and the recently released The Silver Swan. Benjamin Black is the pen name for John Banville, and the books feature the investigations of Dublin pathologist Quirke. If you like the books of Ian Rankin, Peter Robinson, or other Police Procedurals, you'll want to pick up the book Borderlands by Brian McGilloway. I've blogged about this one before, so I won't go into the plot aside from saying that it's the first in the series featuring Inspector Benedict Devlin set in the border area between the Republic of Ireland and Northern Ireland. I've just finished the advance reading copy of the second book in the series (coming in April) called Gallow's Lane. It's just as good, if not better than the first book. If you like your mysteries on the dark/noirish side- you can't miss the Jack Taylor series by Ken Bruen. The series features a troubled ex-Garda officer turned PI and has been nominated for many, many awards. The series starts with The Guards, then follows with The Killing of the Tinkers, The Madgalen Martyrs, The Dramatist, Priest and most recently Cross.

Adult Fiction Readers: If you like reading the books of James Herriot or enjoy the TV show Ballykissangel, you'll love Patrick Taylor's books, An Irish Country Doctor and An Irish Country Village. The books follow the trials and tribulations of young Belfast native Doctor Barry Laverty as he trains under the crusty Dr. O'Reilley in the remote Irish village of Ballybucklebo in the 1960's. Full of humour & warmth.

Adult Nonfiction Readers: A highly enjoyable armchair travel book, Round Ireland With A Fridge by Tony Hawk is a must read for anyone whose ever made a drunken wager and lived to regret it. Englishman Tony Hawk was bet one hundred pounds that he couldn't hitchhike around the circumference of Ireland with a refrigerator in one month. This book recounts his adventure as he tries to do just that. It's funny and a great way to discover more about the Emerald Isle!

Happy Reading!