Best of 2011 Countdown: #30

Thanksgiving has passed, so it's time to get down to the business of the Best Books of 2011.  This year we've decided to countdown to our #1 picks over the course of a month.  Our fan seemed to like our 30 Day Book Challenge, and it's a pleasure listening to Gianna whine about posting everyday even though it was her idea.  These are our favorite 2011 books from the publishers we sell.  Don't argue with us if you don't see, say, Haruki Marakami's 1Q84 on the list.  I haven't read it.  No doubt it will appear on bunches of best lists, but those people have staffs and we're just two lowly book reps trying to get by.  (We take bribes, so if you're an author and stumble upon our blog while doing a Google search for "Bobby Hill eats a steak"--that's a real search--send us your leftover pie.  Liz doesn't eat pumpkins or other gourdy nastiness.)

Best of 2011 #30

Gianna:

West of 98
Edited by Lynn Stegner and Russell Rowland
University of Texas Press

Sixty-six writers share what it means to be a Westerner through essays, poems, and stories. From Texas to North Dakota these pieces cover race, politics, landscape, and what home really means. Rick Bass, Louise Erdrich, Jim Harrison, Maxine Hong Kingston, David Guterson, and Walter Kirn are among some of the writers included. Here is an excerpt from the really wonderful essay by Larry McMurtry reminiscing on his cowboy days and what it means now:

“My experience with Lonesome Dove and its various sequels and prequels convinced me that the core of the Western myth – that the cowboys are brave and cowboys are free – is essentially unassailable. I thought of Lonesome Dove as demythicizing, but instead it became a kind of American Arthuriad, overflowing the bounds of genre in many curious ways.”

Many of these are contradicting; each writer seeming to have his or her own view of western life and connectedness with landscape and history.   Unsentimental and often brutally honest, this was a great collection to start off my career  at University of Texas Press.

Liz:

Jerusalem: The Biography

By Simon Sebag Montifiore

Knopf

With my love of Russia, I had previously read Simon Sebag Montifiore's biographies Stalin: Court of the Red Czar and Young Stalin.  (I like my crushes in red military uniforms.  I love Mounties!)  He is a wonderful writer who has the ability to keep histories featuring numerous figures and events enthralling.  I was somewhat nervous about this new book, though, because I wasn't an internally inclined to the subject in the way I am to the sweet Soviet.  Nonetheless, I found Jerusalem rich and enlightening, a worthy and successful attempt to capture the holy city on paper.  How did this one outpost city become the center of three religions and the key to Middle Eastern peace and perhaps eternal salvation?  Here are the players, from Herod to Disraeli, Caligula to Churchill.  Jerusalem is the epicenter of our world and, depending upon what you believe, Apocalypse HQ.  This is a terrific book.

Gianna: What's New From UT

The biggest change for me moving from Random House to The University of Texas Press [besides losing the best colleague one could ever hope to have in a career, me] is the vast difference in the amount of books we publish each year.  Here at the University we publish about 200; at Random House I believe the number to be in the zillions.  A bigger adjustment is the fact that we publish really amazing international art and photography books and I know next to nothing (which really means absolutely nothing) about art and photography. Now at Random House I could get away with selling the occasional art book while being dense…it's harder here. Actually, it's just harder being dense working at an academic press; I like to imagine that my new colleagues haven’t realized just how … uninformed I am about what we publish, but I am sure it was made pretty clear in the first week. It would all be easier if I were at least pretty, but alas, I am dumb and not even easy on the eyes. [Wait, what?  You're the supermodel for this blog!  Our dozens of followers wouldn't disagree.] I know, why don’t I just go buy boobs and shut up? Well, they are too pricey on book money. [Unless you're Pamela Anderson on that short-lived sitcom about a bookstore, Stacked.]

I honestly don’t remember what I was going to write about.  Oh, I was going to let you know what is coming out this month from The University of Texas Press. And when I “write” about photography and art books – I will just fill the page with pretty pictures.

West of 98 Living and Writing the New American West by Lynn Stegner and Russell Rowland

One of my favorite books on our list this season is West of 98 (Stegner is the daughter in law of Wallace by the way),  a collection of essays (and some poetry) from writers who are from or living in the West. It is filled with new visions on familiar themes such as: Cowboys and Indians, nature, landscape and general western history. In short, the theme of the book is "What does it mean to be a Westerner?"  

 Here is a sample of what this beautiful book has to offer:

“I would be converted to a religion of grass. Sleep the winter away and rise headlong each spring. Sink deep roots. Conserve water. Respect and nourish your neighbors and never let trees gain the upper hand. Such are the tenets and dogmas. As for the practice – grow lush in order to be devoured or caressed, stiffen in sweet elegance, invent startling seeds – those also make sense. Bow beneath the arm of fire. Connect underground. Provide. Provide. Be lovely and do no harm.” Louise Erdrich

“If the mountains were actually ennobling I would have noticed it by now. Everyone who can read comics is aware of the truly indigenous people of the West. We came much later, led by the US Cavalry and the railroads. As the cranky old lady at the grocer’s said, ‘The West wasn’t settled by nice people.’” Jim Harrison

“The West is about dirt. Good dirt. Rich dirt. Thick dirt. Lots of dirt. Dirt defines me. I write dirty stories.

     My people came from places where dirt was used up, the land was too crowded, or there wasn’t enough. My grandfathers emigrated from rural Japan; they were second sons from small, struggling farms, and the property would not be passed on to them. So they searched for new dirt and found it in America’s West.” David Masumoto

Stirring it Up with Molly Ivins by Ellen Sweets

If you aren’t familiar with Molly you should know one thing off the bat….she was a badass. [Amen.] She was also a hilarious writer, a civil libertarian, a thorn in George W Bush’s side (she called him “shrub,” as in "little bush"), a rabble rouser (in the best sense of the word), and Molly, well she enjoyed a cocktail.

What is lesser known is that Molly Ivins was an excellent cook; she picked up most of her skills in France. This book is an insider’s look at the lesser-known Molly, the chef who lovingly prepared elaborate meals from scratch for her closest friends. The book gives you a seat at the table to learn about the woman behind the public figure.  As a very cool bonus the book contains over 30 of Molly’s favorite recipes.  This story is told by Ellen Sweets, who was a close friend of Molly’s for years and years.  She was often in the kitchen with Molly so this is a true behind the scenes look at this amazing, powerful woman.

We lost Molly to cancer in 2007, and I can’t help but wonder what she would be writing about as our Governor runs for President.  The thought of it really makes me smile. [It might be drafts of her citizenship denunciation.  I may be projecting.]