Days of Love...and Lack Thereof, Day 2

Gianna:

[Gianna is so filled with love that she picked two books today.  Me?  I'm so full of gas that I decided to pass on the refried beans for dinner.]

Mary and O’Neil

Just as one would suspect of Justin Cronin, bestselling author of post-apocalyptic novel The Passage, he once wrote a love story. In fact, it’s a really wonderful love story with exactly zero vampires (although the body count is moderate).

Mary and O’Neil is a thoughtful book about finding love and solace when you least expect it. At times these interlinked stories can be heartbreaking, at other times sweet and funny. You come to realize pretty quickly that Mary and O’Neil are people you probably know, each nursing private hurt and tragedy. O’Neil has never really gotten over the sudden death of his parents and Mary has yet to completely heal from a pregnancy she chose to end years before. These two teachers meet while working at the same school when they are in their mid-thirties, never thinking that they had yet to find the love of their lives. Cronin flawlessly weaves these stories together, slowly revealing each of their past lives. 

Vaclav & Lena

 

I have written about this excellent book a couple of times; it made my Top 10 of 2011 where I believe I described it as a perfect love story. I am sticking by that statement. Non-asinine love stories are really hard to find, and this truly heartwarming story of two immigrant Russian children will be hard to top AND it's available in paperback Feb 7th. 

Both Mary and O’Neil and Vaclav & Lena are couples you won’t soon forget. They will make you believe in love again. Or make you believe that a romantic book doesn’t have to be silly.

Liz:


Many authors are plumbing the horrors of suburbia in their fiction.  Jonathan Franzen was featured on the cover of Time for his efforts on the subject.  One of the best books on the subject, and one of the best reads of the 20th Century, is Richard Yates's Revolutionary Road.  You know what's romantic?  Reading this book (or watching the intense and unsettling movie starring Kate Winslet and Leonardo DiCaprio) while pregnant.  No, I'm not and never have been pregnant, but I've heard it can mess with an expectant parent's head.  I'm all in favor.


Revolutionary Road is the story of a couple in love, a couple with dreams of returning to Europe, of writing, of living Bohemian lives in the manner of the Lost Generation.  And then Frank, the husband, discovers that he's not as apathetic about his office job as he thought.  He and April, his wife, buy their house in the suburbs on Revolutionary Road and betray their dreams and each other.  This novel is a masterpiece--if you like Mad Men I absolutely guarantee you'll like this book--and it's a chilling unraveling of a fairy tale relationship after April discovers she's pregnant.  

Best of 2011 Countdown: #6

If these books were in the Miss America Pageant, they'd have to wear swimsuits.

Gianna:

Vaclav & Lena
Haley Tanner
Random House

This is a book that also appears on Liz’s list and I wrote about it this summer (that blog piece is below) but I did want to add a couple of things that I left out of that original post. First, it’s hard to find a really good love story these days. [Other than the love Gianna feels for Liz....] And by really good love story, I mean well written, well developed, and original. Second, Tanner captures you on the very first pages and is writing well beyond her young age. Third…look at that cover, you won't even have to wrap it when you give it to your girlfriend, father, wife, brother, mother, lover, literate dog…it's gorgeous.   

Haley Tanner

I don’t want to over-sell this but, if you miss reading this novel… well, you will end up ruining your life.

Vaclav & Lena  is an amazing love story about two young Russian immigrants living in Brooklyn--Vaclav dreams of becoming a famous magician and Lena will be his lovely assistant--and then she is taken away, suddenly and without warning. The story is filled with an almost fairy tale quality, the writing is so pitch perfect (and by pitch perfect please just pick the book up and read the first few pages of the grade school Vaclav and Lena going through their magic routine…the Russian accents are wonderful). It really is a magical, amazing book.

Liz:

The Upright Piano Player

David Abbott

Nan A. Talese/Doubleday

To quote one of my coworkers, the one who first turned me on to The Upright Piano Player, "this is a novel of quiet desperation."  It's one of those little books that don't take up space on a shelf but dominate your mind for many days after finishing.  This isn't a loud book.  It is a beautiful one.

David Abbott

The author, David Abbott, actually owns the painting that appears on the cover, and one can imagine him staring at it for long hours and then composing this story for the man in the painting.  This is the story of Henry Cage, a man who seemingly has a successful life--a nice home, nice career, money.  His life, though, is peppered with the "what might have beens," and as he slides into retirement he learns that his ex-wife is critically ill.  And then Henry is randomly attacked at a New Year's/Millennium street party.  The attacker haunts him as do his past decisions as this novel wraps tighter and tighter.

The Upright Piano Player gets my vote for best-but-least-heralded novel of the year.  It's incredible, gorgeous, special, poignant.

Best of 2011 Countdown: #25

Gianna, who is going to make fun of me for my relationship with my cat:

Awkward Family Pet Photos
Mike Bender and Doug Chernack
Three Rivers Press

Touch my monkey...
seriously.

Each holiday season I like to have three or four copies of a really good but inexpensive humor book that I can give away as gifts to, you know, people that I forgot to get a gift for, or a grab bag, or for a crying child. Well there is nothing I don’t love about this book or the first edition, Awkward Family Photos. These pictures will make you cringe, scream, and very possibly barf in your mouth just a little bit (examples below).

Zorro's long lost brother.

I didn't know Gianna's
dad had a snake!

I suspect some of you will recognize a piece of yourself in these photos (you know who you are), and the next time you snap another photo of you and your dog, snake, bird, hedgehog, cat, bunny, or god help us all…your monkey, you will certainly think twice about the appropriateness of your pose (or if your cat is really a willing participant in the photo (looking at you Sullivan)).  [Zorro loves to have his picture taken.]

Zorro. (Not in the book.)

Liz:

Vaclav & Lena

Haley Tanner

The Dial Press

I love first novels; the good ones feel like a special discovery.  Vaclav & Lena caught me in just that way.  Vaclav and Lena and both Russian immigrant children, learning English and struggling through school.  After school, though, they are best friends, and Vaclav wants to be a great magician and Lena will be his lovely assistant.  Author Haley Tanner absolutely nails the voices of these characters--read the first few pages and you'll be hooked.  Anyway, Vaclav's mother, a terrific character, parents both children until a fateful day when Lena is sent away.  Spring forward to high school aged Vaclav and Lena, teenagers who've acclimated to American culture.  That special bond between them still exists, though.  

Haley Tanner

Book groups and fans of the superb The Night Circus.  Also, in Book Land booksellers are always keeping an eye out for books that will crossover between adult and young adult audiences.  Vaclav & Lena  lands squarely in that sweet spot.  Haley Tanner is a writer to watch.

Great Books Coming Soon

[Liz writing:]  So my life has been a little crazy with the Gianna leaving Random House and then the travel season leading me to tornado zones...and flood zones...and fire zones (my territory butts up to the gates of hell), and yet still 238 people visited our little blog last month.  It begs the question, "How bored are the various web-surfers of the world???"  Anyway, we're getting back into the swing of things and I'm sure that we'll have more Gianna antics soon since it's too hot in Texas to wear proper clothing right now.  Since we haven't posted anything lately, though, we thought we'd catch you up some of the new releases just out or coming soon.

The Devil All the Time is one of the most disturbing books I've ever read...and I loved it.  Donald Ray Pollock burst onto the literary scene a few years ago with his short story collection Knockemstiff, and his new novel traverses the same down-on-its-luck landscape.  Fans of Dan Chaon's Await Your Reply, Flannery O'Connor, and Cormac McCarthy should love this story of religious zealots and serial killers and one boy maneuvering between a moral life and the life to which he seems destined when his mother dies despite his father's ritual sacrifices.  If you're intrigued by a the image of a man and his son kneeling at a prayer log in the woods night and day, surrounded by crosses and the ground covered in the blood sacrifices they've offered God, praying for a miracle to save the boy's mother, this book is for you.  It's not for the feint of heart, but I loved every page.  The Devil All the Time goes on sale July 12th.

Summer is blockbuster season in the book world as well as Hollywood.  This year the Robopocalypse is coming.  Think about it--EVERYTHING in our modern world is controlled by computers, and in Daniel Wilson's thriller, the end of the world is upon us when a scientist crosses the threshold from smart technology to thinking technology and a computer named ARCHOS begins to take over the world.  A computer virus goes out to all of those phones and cars and computers and toasters out there and no one is safe.  Imagine you're driving down the highway in your Prius and suddenly the computer in your car steers you into a wall.  And that computer in the air traffic control tower?  It decides that smacking planes into each other would be a great way to dispose of a few hundred humans.  And you receive a call on your cell phone telling you to rush home because your child is sick...except that the call is computer-generated and luring you toward an untimely end.  A group of intrepid humans begin to fight back.... If you liked The Matrix and the movie version of Minority Report, you'll welcome the Robopocalypse; in fact, Steven Spielberg optioned the rights to the robo-thriller before Daniel Wilson had even finished writing his novel.

[And now a word from Gianna....]

I left Random House a few months ago to work for UT Press so I won't be writing about Random House books anymore trust me! Except …. this one time.

Vaclav and Lena by Haley Tanner: I don’t want to over sell this but, if you miss reading this novel… well you will end up ruining your summer. Seriously. No, wait…I will ruin your summer (threats are better).

This is an amazing love story about two young Russian immigrants living in Brooklyn--Vaclav dreams of becoming a famous magician and Lena will be his lovely assistant--and then she is taken away, suddenly and without warning. The story is filled with an almost fairy tale quality, the writing is so pitch perfect (and by pitch perfect please just pick the book up and read the first few pages of the grade school Vaclav and Lena going through their magic routine…the Russian accents are wonderful). It really is a perfect book.

Okay so one more Random House book and that’s it, seriously –

The Storm at the Door by Stefan Merrill Block

I am not going to make a huge deal about this book. I am not going to make a fool of myself like I did with Story of Forgetting. I mean I really think people thought I lost my mind I talked about that book so much (by the way I totally lost my mind because of that book)[She's right; she's crazy. And she never shut up about that book]. Okay. Story of Forgetting was very good. It was excellent. This book is better. It’s more mature and the writing is better. It’s heartbreaking, in fact. Like Stefan’s first book this novel is based in part on his family (his grandparents' marriage) which makes it all the more interesting. Think Revolutionary Road. Yes, it is that good. He will be at BookPeople on July 12th. Give him some love – he is amazing.

So that’s it for me and Random House. I won’t be writing about RH titles anymore! Was that more or less believable than Congressman Weiner’s “certitude” comment? [Less.  And Gianna has sent me some incriminating pics in her time....]

Bright’s Passage by Josh Ritter

I love this fucking book. (And let that be a quote on any jacket – it's called class). I read this book in a fury of passion. I would not put it down; everything else could wait. The story of Henry Bright (and what can only be described as his journey) is so vivid, beautiful, funny, and passionate…ahhh I sound crazy already. Anyway it will stay with you long after the novel ends. It is as haunting as it is luminous (and Liz…. I never say that about a book do I? In fact when someone calls a book luminous I run, but don’t run because I never use that word!) [We make fun of people who use the word 'luminous' to describe books.  Does it glow in the dark?  Doubtful.  This is a very good book though.] This small book has so much going for it: set during the First World War, a battle between good and evil, it's only $22, and of course it's a love story. It’s a first novel to be sure, but my God what a wonderful novel. [I think I am Gianna's God.] Oh and be on the look out – Ritter is on tour (hint hint).

These 3 books will appear on my year end list…I just know it….damn lists.