Pg. 69: J. Aaron Sanders's "Speakers of the Dead"
Featured at the Page 69 Test: Speakers of the Dead: A Walt Whitman Mystery by J. Aaron Sanders.
Speakers of the Dead is a mystery novel centering around the investigative exploits of a young Walt Whitman, in which the reporter-cum-poet navigates the seedy underbelly of New York City’s body-snatching industry in an attempt to exonerate his friend of a wrongful murder charge.
The year is 1843; the place: New York City. Aurora reporter Walt Whitman arrives at the Tombs prison yard where his friend Lena Stowe is scheduled to hang for the murder of her husband, Abraham. Walt intends to present evidence on Lena’s behalf, but Sheriff Harris turns him away. Lena drops to her death, and Walt vows to posthumously exonerate her.
Walt’s estranged boyfriend, Henry Saunders, returns to New York, and the two men uncover a link between body-snatching and Abraham’s murder: a man named Samuel Clement. To get to Clement, Walt and Henry descend into a dangerous underworld where resurrection men steal the bodies of the recently deceased and sell them to medical colleges. With no legal means to acquire cadavers, medical students rely on these criminals, and Abraham’s involvement with the Bone Bill—legislation that would put the resurrection men out of business—seems to have led to his and Lena’s deaths.
Fast-paced and gripping, Speakers of the Dead is a vibrant reimagining of one of America’s most beloved literary figures.
Visit J. Aaron Sanders's website.
The Page 69 Test: Speakers of the Dead.
Grant Bywaters's "The Red Storm," the movie
Featured at My Book, The Movie: The Red Storm: A Mystery by Grant Bywaters.
I modeled the appearance of my detective William Fletcher off of 1960s heavyweight champion Sonny Liston. Liston was a freak of nature. He had 15 inch fists, which were so big they didn’t fit into standard boxing gloves.
So the actor I could see handling the physical aspects of Fletcher would have been a younger Laurence Fishburne. I’m referring to Fishburne around the time he played Morpheus in the first Matrix movie.
For Bill Storm, the sadistic criminal acquaintance from Fletcher’s past, is an easy one, Jeff....[read on]
Learn more about The Red Storm at the publisher's website.
The Page 69 Test: The Red Storm.
My Book, The Movie: The Red Storm.
Joyce Maynard's 6 favorite books
Joyce Maynard's novels include To Die For, Labor Day, and Under the Influence. One of her six best books, as shared at The Week magazine:
The Woman Upstairs by Claire Messud
I confess I felt a certain shock when I read this novel shortly after completing Under the Influence, because the theme — the breakdown of an unequal, unhealthy friendship — so closely matches mine. But the painful dissolution of a friendship is a universal theme. In my life, the ends of certain friendships have hurt as much as the end of any love affair.
The Woman Upstairs is among Alex Hourston’s top ten unlikely friendships in literature.
Pg. 99: Jennifer Scanlon's "Until There Is Justice"
Featured at the Page 99 Test: Until There Is Justice: The Life of Anna Arnold Hedgeman by Jennifer Scanlon.
A demanding feminist, devout Christian, and savvy grassroots civil rights organizer, Anna Arnold Hedgeman played a key role in over half a century of social justice initiatives. Like many of her colleagues, including A. Philip Randolph, Betty Friedan, and Martin Luther King, Jr., Hedgeman ought to be a household name, but until now has received only a fraction of the attention she deserves.
In Until There Is Justice, author Jennifer Scanlon presents the first-ever biography of Hedgeman. Through a commitment to faith-based activism, civil rights, and feminism, Hedgeman participated in and led some of the 20th century's most important developments, including advances in education, public health, politics, and workplace justice. Simultaneously a dignified woman and scrappy freedom fighter, Hedgeman's life upends conventional understandings of many aspects of the civil rights and feminist movements. She worked as a teacher, lobbyist, politician, social worker, and activist, often crafting and implementing policy behind the scenes. Although she repeatedly found herself a woman among men, a black American among whites, and a secular Christian among clergy, she maintained her conflicting identities and worked alongside others to forge a common humanity.
From helping black and Puerto Rican Americans achieve critical civil service employment in New York City during the Great Depression to orchestrating white religious Americans' participation in the 1963 March on Washington, Hedgeman's contributions transcend gender, racial, and religious boundaries. Engaging and profoundly inspiring, Scanlon's biography paints a compelling portrait of one of the most remarkable yet understudied civil rights leaders of our time. Until There Is Justice is a must-read for anyone with a passion for history, biography, and civil rights.
Learn more about Until There Is Justice at the Oxford University Press website.
The Page 99 Test: Until There Is Justice.
Twenty-five books about women in war
At Bustle, Kristian Wilson tagged twenty-five top books about women in war, including:
The Lonely Soldier: The Private War of Women Serving in Iraq by Helen Benedict
Female soldiers often fight without other women by their sides. The five stories contained within The Lonely Soldier inspired the eye-opening documentary The Invisible War.
Read about the other books on the list.
Also see: Caitlin White's list of eleven books that tell the stories of women in the U.S. armed forces.
What is Susan Meissner reading?
Featured at Writers Read: Susan Meissner, author of Stars Over Sunset Boulevard.
I’m reading British author Kate Atkinson’s A God in Ruins and am nearly finished. I loved her previous novel, Life After Life, which is the very cleverly told story of a woman named Ursula Todd whose life keeps beginning and ending, again and again, as if she keeps getting a do-over so that she can be in a certain place at a certain time during the hell of WW2 and assassinate Adolf Hitler. This one, A God in Ruins, is a multi-time period look at one of Ursula’s brothers, Teddy, but Kate says in her Author’s Note that this book is not really a sequel to Life After Life, but should rather be seen as a continuation of one of Ursula’s many restarted lives.
Like Ursula’s story, A God in Ruins is another intellectual and wildly artistic novel that tosses conventional (linear) storytelling out the window. This book is not your typical novel construct, where Something happens and then Something else happens, and on and on we go in chronological order until the book ends. The story is...[read on]
About Stars Over Sunset Boulevard, from the publisher:
In this new novel from the acclaimed author of Secrets of a Charmed Life, two women working in Hollywood during its Golden Age discover the joy and heartbreak of true friendship.
Los Angeles, Present Day. When an iconic hat worn by Scarlett O’Hara in Gone With the Wind ends up in Christine McAllister’s vintage clothing boutique by mistake, her efforts to return it to its owner take her on a journey more enchanting than any classic movie…
Los Angeles, 1938. Violet Mayfield sets out to reinvent herself in Hollywood after her dream of becoming a wife and mother falls apart, and lands a job on the film-set of Gone With the Wind. There, she meets enigmatic Audrey Duvall, a once-rising film star who is now a fellow secretary. Audrey’s zest for life and their adventures together among Hollywood’s glitterati enthrall Violet…until each woman’s deepest desires collide. What Audrey and Violet are willing to risk, for themselves and for each other, to ensure their own happy endings will shape their friendship, and their lives, far into the future.
Visit Susan Meissner's website.
Writers Read: Susan Meissner.
Pg. 69: Mark Henshaw's "The Fall of Moscow Station"
Featured at the Page 69 Test: The Fall of Moscow Station by Mark Henshaw.
When a body with Russian military tattoos is found floating in a lake outside Berlin, the CIA immediately takes notice. The body is identified as the director of Russia’s Foundation for Advanced Nuclear Research, who is also a CIA asset. And the murder coincides with the defection of one of the CIA’s upper-level officers.
Alden Maines is jaded after years in the CIA cleaning up the messes of incompetent political appointees in dangerous foreign posts. When he is passed over for promotion, Maines crosses the Rubicon and decides to cash in as a double agent for Russia.
But while Maines dreams of off-shore bank accounts and a new secret life, Arkady Lavrov of Russia’s intelligence service (GRU) has other plans. He immediately announces Maines’s defection to the world and then pumps him for every last ounce of intel, including the names of every agent in the CIA’s Moscow Station and their assets working in the Kremlin. But why would Lavrov burn an asset whose intel and access could pay dividends for years to come? What is Lavrov up to?
Traveling from Langley to Berlin and finally Moscow—working black without backup—analyst Jonathan Burke and agent Kyra Stryker are up against their most formidable enemy yet, and their lives and the fate of America’s most important assets in the New Cold War hang in the balance.
Visit Mark Henshaw's website.
The Page 69 Test: The Fall of Moscow Station.
Terri Blackstock's "If I Run," the movie
Featured at My Book, The Movie: If I Run by Terri Blackstock.
My book If I Run features a twenty-five year old woman with almond-shaped blue eyes. Casey Cox is a fugitive fleeing a murder rap, and she's a complex character. She discovered the body of her close friend, and in her shock, left her DNA all over the crime scene. Instead of calling police, she decided to run. Casey has dealt with the justice system once before, and it failed her abysmally. Beyond that, she's certain that if she's found, she will be murdered before she ever makes it to prison. Because of how she looks and how complex her character is, I would love to see Jennifer Lawrence play her role. J-Law is great at complicated characters, and she has so many different looks, that I think she could easily pull off Casey's habit of changing identities and disguising her appearance.
And while it might seem cliché and overdone since...[read on]
Visit Terri Blackstock's website, Facebook page, and Twitter perch.
The Page 69 Test: If I Run.
Writers Read: Terri Blackstock.
My Book, The Movie: If I Run.
Five YA books that transport you to dreamland
Eric Smith is the author of The Geek’s Guide to Dating and Inked. One of five YA reads that explore dreams which he tagged at the B&N Teen blog:
Dreamology, by Lucy Keating
This one isn’t out till April, so keep dreaming about it till it’s here. In Keating’s debut, the world of dreams starts to bleed into the real one for a teenager named Alice. And for a while, that doesn’t seem like such a bad thing. She’s been in love with Max almost her whole life, and they’ve been through so much together. It’s just a little weird that he has appeared in person at her new school—because before now, she has only known him in her dreams. But what happens when the one thing you’ve been dreaming about all your life doesn’t turn out to be what you thought it was?
Pg. 99: Andrew Cornell's "Unruly Equality"
Featured at the Page 99 Test: Unruly Equality: U.S. Anarchism in the Twentieth Century by Andrew Cornell.
The first intellectual and social history of American anarchist thought and activism across the twentieth century
In this highly accessible history of anarchism in the United States, Andrew Cornell reveals an astounding continuity and development across the century. Far from fading away, anarchists dealt with major events such as the rise of Communism, the New Deal, atomic warfare, the black freedom struggle, and a succession of artistic avant-gardes stretching from 1915 to 1975.
Unruly Equality traces U.S. anarchism as it evolved from the creed of poor immigrants militantly opposed to capitalism early in the twentieth century to one that today sees resurgent appeal among middle-class youth and foregrounds political activism around ecology, feminism, and opposition to cultural alienation.
Learn more about Unruly Equality at the University of California Press website.
The Page 99 Test: Unruly Equality.
Top ten books that explain Russia today
Sergei Lebedev's debut novel is Oblivion. At Publishers Weekly Lebedev, who was born in Moscow in 1981, tagged ten books that explain Russia's complicated past and present, including:
A Small Corner of Hell: Dispatches from Chechnya by Anna Politovskaya
The First Chechen War, which began in 1994, marked Russia’s return to a repressive, imperial model of government. The Second Chechen War, which started in 1999, brought Vladimir Putin to power on a wave of terror and fear.
The Russian public back then either supported the war or tried to ignore it. And Anna Politovskaya, a journalist for the newspaper Novaya Gazeta, wrote about how the Chechen War would forever change society, would cause people to become accustomed to torture, assassinations, would corrupt power and demoralize the army, give the president carte blanche for the construction of a top-down power structure. Many thought Politovskaya was spreading it on too thick, was too harsh, unfair.
Politovskaya was murdered in the elevator of her apartment building on October 7, 2006, the birthday of Vladimir Putin. Today, her book reads like a perfectly precise prophecy, which, alas, nobody has heeded.
Pg. 69: Frances Brody's "Murder on a Summer's Day"
Featured at the Page 69 Test: Murder on a Summer's Day (Kate Shackleton Series #5) by Frances Brody.
When the India Office seek help in finding Maharajah Narayan, last seen hunting on the Bolton Abbey estate, they call upon the expertise of renowned amateur detective Kate Shackleton to investigate.
But soon a missing persons case turns to murder. Shot through the heart, Narayan's body has obviously not been in the woods overnight. Who brought it here, and from where? And what has happened to the hugely valuable diamond that was in the Maharajah's possession?
An inexplicable murder ...
As Kate digs deeper, she soon discovers that vengeance takes many forms. Was the Maharajah's sacrilegious act of shooting a white doe to blame? Or are growing rumors of a political motive too powerful for Kate to discount?
One thing Kate is sure of: her own skills and insights. Qualities that she is sure will help her unravel a mysterious murder on that fateful summer's day.
Learn more about the book and author at Frances Brody's website.
The Page 69 Test: Dying in the Wool.
The Page 69 Test: A Woman Unknown.
The Page 69 Test: Murder on a Summer's Day.
Joshilyn Jackson's "The Opposite of Everyone," the movie
Featured at My Book, The Movie: The Opposite of Everyone: A Novel by Joshilyn Jackson.
The Opposite of Everyone is the story of a hard-edged divorce lawyer originally named after Kali, the Hindu goddess of destruction and renewal. Casting her provides an interesting challenge---she is at the very least tri-racial. Paula Vauss never knew her father (and her young, hippie mother was truth-impaired), but it’s likely he was half black and half Asian. Her mother was mostly Irish but may well have a good bit of Cherokee in her genetic make-up.
Right now---and rightfully, and more than a little late---Hollywood is getting pushback on racebending---casting white actors in plum roles as characters of color. Gods of Egypt, anyone? But Paula is of such “murky racial origin,” as she says, that I’m not sure how to cast her. What I really need is for Olivia Munn and...[read on]
Learn more about the book and author at Joshilyn Jackson's website.
The Page 69 Test: The Girl Who Stopped Swimming.
My Book, The Movie: The Girl Who Stopped Swimming.
The Page 69 Test: Backseat Saints.
The Page 69 Test: A Grown-Up Kind of Pretty.
The Page 69 Test: The Opposite of Everyone.
My Book, The Movie: The Opposite of Everyone.
Ten of the best rodents in children's fiction
Ross Welford is the author of Time Traveling with a Hamster.
One of his ten favorite rodents in children's fiction, as shared at the Guardian:
Scabbers the rat in JK Rowling’s Harry Potter books
I’m nervous writing anything about Harry Potter because my knowledge of this genius canon is a piecemeal agglomeration of reading aloud to my children, reading silently to myself, watching the films and simple absorption - so forgive me if I get this wrong. Scabbers belongs to Harry’s pal Ron Weasley, but turns out to be the animal form of the wizard Peter Pettigrew, formerly a friend of Harry’s dad James, whom he betrays. He takes the form of a rat when he becomes a spy for the evil Lord Voldemort. (There’s much more to it, obviously – but is that about right?) Scabbers occupies the number one slot on the grounds of sheer popularity. I’ll bet more children will know Scabbers than the remaining nine rodents combined, which are in no particular order.
The Harry Potter books made Anna Bradley's list of the ten best literary quotes in a crisis, Nicole Hill's list of seven of the best literary wedding themes, Tina Connolly's top five list of books where the girl saves the boy, Ginni Chen's list of the eight grinchiest characters in literature, Molly Schoemann-McCann's top five list of fictional workplaces more dysfunctional than yours, Sophie McKenzie's top ten list of mothers in children's books, Nicole Hill's list of five of the best fictional bookstores, Sara Jonsson's list of the six most memorable pets in fiction, Melissa Albert's list of more than eight top fictional misfits, Cressida Cowell's list of ten notable mythical creatures, and Alison Flood's list of the top 10 most frequently stolen books.
Professor Snape is among Sophie Cleverly's ten top terrifying teachers in children’s books.
Hermione Granger is among Brooke Johnson top five geeky heroes in literature, Nicole Hill's nine best witches in literature, and Melissa Albert's top six distractible book lovers in pop culture.
Neville Longbottom is one of Ellie Irving's top ten quiet heroes and heroines.
Mr. Weasley is one of Melissa Albert's five weirdest fictional crushes.
Hedwig (Harry's owl) is among Django Wexler's top ten animal companions in children's fiction.
Butterbeer is among Leah Hyslop's six best fictional drinks.
Albus Dumbledore is one of Rachel Thompson's ten greatest deaths in fiction.
Lucius Malfoy is among Jeff Somers's five best evil lieutenants (or "dragons") in SF/F.
Dolores Umbridge is among Melissa Albert's six more notorious teachers in fiction, Emerald Fennell's top ten villainesses in literature, and Derek Landy's top 10 villains in children's books. The Burrow is one of Elizabeth Wilhide's nine most memorable manors in literature.
Harry Potter and the Prisoner of Azkaban appears on Amanda Yesilbas and Katharine Trendacosta's list ot twenty great insults from science fiction & fantasy and Charlie Jane Anders's list of the ten greatest prison breaks in science fiction and fantasy.
Harry Potter and the Philosopher's Stone also appears on John Mullan's lists of ten of the best owls in literature, ten of the best scars in fiction and ten of the best motorbikes in literature, and Katharine Trendacosta and Charlie Jane Anders's list of the ten greatest personality tests in sci-fi & fantasy, Charlie Higson's top 10 list of fantasy books for children, Justin Scroggie's top ten list of books with secret signs as well as Charlie Jane Anders and Michael Ann Dobbs's list of well-known and beloved science fiction and fantasy novels that publishers didn't want to touch. Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire made Chrissie Gruebel's list of six top fictional holiday parties and John Mullan's list of ten best graveyard scenes in fiction.
What is Terri Blackstock reading?
Featured at Writers Read: Terri Blackstock, author of If I Run.
The book I'm reading right now is Upside: The New Science of Post-Traumatic Growth. I wish I could read fiction while I'm writing a book, but the truth is that while I'm writing, I mostly read nonfiction books for research. Right now I'm working on a series with two characters who have PTSD, so I'm reading a lot about that issue. Upside is a little different from the other PTSD books I've been reading, in that it looks at how certain people endure catastrophic trauma, yet come out happier, more fulfilled, more productive, more purposeful, more spiritual, and of more help to others. How does this work? Why is it that some are devastated and never recover from trauma, and others grow stronger? The...[read on]
About If I Run, from the publisher:
Casey Cox has blood on the bottom of her shoes, in her car, on her clothes. But there's no point in trying to defend herself. She just has to run.
Casey knows the truth.
But it won't set her free.
Casey Cox's DNA is all over the crime scene. There's no use talking to police; they have failed her abysmally before. She has to flee before she's arrested ... or worse. The truth doesn't matter anymore.
But what is the truth That's the question haunting Dylan Roberts, the war-weary veteran hired to find Casey. PTSD has marked him damaged goods, but bringing Casey back can redeem him. Though the crime scene seems to tell the whole story, details of the murder aren't adding up. Casey Cox doesn't fit the profile of a killer. But are Dylan's skewed perceptions keeping him from being objective If she isn't guilty, why did she run
Unraveling her past and the evidence that condemns her will take more time than he has, but as Dylan's damaged soul intersects with hers, he is faced with two choices. The girl who occupies his every thought is a psychopathic killer ... or a selfless hero. And the truth could be the most deadly weapon yet.
Pg. 69: Grant Bywaters's "The Red Storm"
Featured at the Page 69 Test: The Red Storm: A Mystery by Grant Bywaters.
Winner of the Minotaur Books/Private Eye Writers of America Best First Private Eye Novel Competition introducing a black ex-boxer P.I. working in 1930s New Orleans
Newly-minted private investigator William Fletcher is having trouble finding clientele. He's not the only man out of work, but his past as a former heavyweight contender with a few shady connections-not to mention the color of his skin in race-obsessed New Orleans-isn't helping lure clients to his door. Stuck without any viable alternative, he takes a case from an old criminal acquaintance, Storm. His only client assures him that the job is simple-locate his missing estranged daughter, Zella, no questions asked.
But when Fletcher starts knocking on doors, he sets off a catastrophic chain of events that turn the city into a bloody battleground between two rival syndicates. Then Storm is murdered and Fletcher finds himself caught between the police and dangerous mobsters. With Zella's safety in the balance, the unlikely private detective finds himself with a lot more than he bargained for.
The Red Storm is the first novel from licensed private investigator-turned-novelist Grant Bywaters.
Ten top books of war reportage
Janine di Giovanni, the Middle East editor of Newsweek and a contributing editor of Vanity Fair, has won four major journalistic awards, including the National Magazine Award. Her new book is The Morning They Came For Us: Dispatches from Syria.
One of di Giovanni's top ten books of war reportage, as shared at the Guardian:
The Things They Carried by Tim O’Brien
This is a novel, but I always shelve it with my reportage books, about a platoon of US soldiers in Vietnam, based on his own experiences in the 23rd Infantry Division. It is devastating, and it was my Vietnam primer, along with Frances “Frankie” Fitzgerald’s The Fire in the Lake.
The Things They Carried is among The American Scholar editors' eleven best sentences in literature, Simon Mawer's five top war novels, Olen Steinhauer's six favorite books, and is one of Roger “R.J.” Ellory's five favorite human dramas. Melinda L. Pash, author of In the Shadow of the Greatest Generation: The Americans Who Fought the Korean War, says The Things They Carried changed her life.
Coffee with a canine: Victoria J. Coe & Kipper
Featured at Coffee with a Canine: Victoria J. Coe & Kipper.
The author, on how Kipper got his name:
Our kids decided on Kipper after Miikka Kiprusoff, a top NHL goaltender at the time. And you know, the two Kippers actually kind of...[read on]
About Victoria Coe's Fenway and Hattie, from the publisher:
Fenway is an excitable and endlessly energetic Jack Russell terrier. He lives in the city with Food Lady, Fetch Man, and—of course—his beloved short human and best-friend-in-the-world, Hattie.
But when his family moves to the suburbs, Fenway faces a world of changes. He’s pretty pleased with the huge Dog Park behind his new home, but he’s not so happy about the Evil Squirrels that taunt him from the trees, the super-slippery Wicked Floor in the Eating Room, and the changes that have come over Hattie lately. Rather than playing with Fenway, she seems more interested in her new short human friend, Angel, and learning to play baseball. His friends in the Dog Park next door say Hattie is outgrowing him, but that can’t be right. And he’s going to prove it!
Get a dog’s-eye view of the world in this heartwarming, enthusiastic “tail” about two best friends.
Visit Victoria J. Coe's website, Twitter perch, and Instagram page, and learn more about Fenway and Hattie at the GP Putnam's Sons/Penguin Young Readers website.
Coffee with a Canine: Victoria J. Coe & Kipper.
Pg. 99: Clif Stratton's "Education for Empire"
Featured at the Page 99 Test: Education for Empire: American Schools, Race, and the Paths of Good Citizenship by Clif Stratton.
Education for Empire brings together topics in American history often treated separately: schools, race, immigration, and empire building. During the Gilded Age and Progressive Era, American imperial ambitions abroad expanded as the country's public school system grew. How did this imperialism affect public education? School officials, teachers, and textbook authors used public education to place children, both native and foreign-born, on multiple uneven paths to citizenship.
Using case studies from around the country, Clif Stratton deftly shows that public schooling and colonialism were intimately intertwined. This book reveals how students—from Asians in the U.S. West and Hawai‘i to blacks in the South, Mexicans in the Southwest, and Puerto Ricans in the Caribbean and New York City—grappled with the expectations of citizenship imposed by nationalist professionals at the helm of curriculum and policy. Students of American history, American studies, and the history of education will find Education for Empire an eminently valuable book.
Learn more about Education for Empire at the University of California Press website.
The Page 99 Test: Education for Empire.
Pg. 69: Jeffrey Wasserstrom's "Eight Juxtapositions: China Through Imperfect Analogies"
Featured at the Page 69 Test: Eight Juxtapositions: China Through Imperfect Analogies by Jeffrey Wasserstrom.
What do Pope Francis and Xi Jinping have in common? More than you think. Approaching the red Rubik's Cube from a new angle, Jeffrey Wasserstrom challenges conventional commentary on China through eight experimental analogies, finding fresh and surprising ways to look at the Asian superpower.
Learn more about Eight Juxtapositions at the publisher's website.
The Page 69 Test: China's Brave New World.
The Page 99 Test: Global Shanghai, 1850–2010.
The Page 99 Test: China in the 21st Century.
The Page 69 Test: Eight Juxtapositions: China Through Imperfect Analogies.
Charlie Jane Anders's "All the Birds in the Sky," the movie
Featured at My Book, The Movie: All the Birds in the Sky by Charlie Jane Anders.
I actually suck at figuring out who ought to play characters I thought up in my head. Part of that is because the more time I spend imagining them, the less they look like any particular actor or other real-life person. That said, I would kill to have Jennifer Lawrence play the grown-up Patricia, the witch in my novel. I think Lawrence could bring the mixture of vulnerability and whimsy -- with an edge of anger and resentment -- that keeps Patricia going.
For Laurence, the mad scientist, it would be hard to find an actor with a such a big...[read on]
Visit Charlie Jane Anders's website.
My Book, The Movie: All the Birds in the Sky.
What is Phillip Margolin reading?
Featured at Writers Read: Phillip Margolin, author of Violent Crimes: An Amanda Jaffe Novel.
As I write this I am 200 pages into The Edge of Eternity, Ken Follett's 1000 plus page final entry in his "Century Trilogy." I zoomed through Fall of Giants and Winter of the World, also biggies. The trilogy tells the story of our last century through he eyes of families from America, Germany, England and Russia and touches on the key events - World Wars I and II, Vietnam, the Civil Rights movement, the rise and fall of Communism, etc. in a very entertaining way. I love to read books I know I could...[read on]
About Violent Crimes, from the publisher:
In this mesmerizing tale of suspense from New York Times bestselling author Phillip Margolin, attorney Amanda Jaffe—star of Wild Justice, Ties That Bind, Proof Positive, and Fugitive—becomes entangled in a murder case involving Big Oil, an estranged father and son, and the greatest ethical dilemma of her career .
Dale Masterson, senior partner in a large Portland, Oregon, law firm, has become wealthy and successful representing the interests of oil and coal companies. When his colleague, Christine Larson, is found dead, Masterson’s business practices are put under surveillance and a lower-level employee stands accused.
The controversy surrounding the firm is magnified tenfold when Dale is found beaten to death in his mansion. But this time Dale’s son, Brandon, is seen fleeing the scene. A dedicated eco-warrior obsessed with saving the planet, Brandon confesses to killing his father—for revenge, he claims—on behalf of all the people whose lives are being destroyed by his father’s questionable clients.
Veteran lawyer Amanda Jaffe is hired to represent Brandon, but what seems like an open-and-shut case quickly begins to unravel. If Brandon is really innocent—a radical activist determined to martyr himself for his cause—then who viciously murdered Dale Masterson? And what, if any, is the connection between his murder and the murder of Christine Larson? Smart, fierce, and unafraid of the truth even if it puts her in danger, Amanda begins to look deeper. What she finds will force the seasoned legal pro to make the hardest professional decision of her life.
Visit Phillip Margolin's website and Facebook page.
My Book, The Movie: Woman with a Gun.
The Page 69 Test: Woman with a Gun.
The Page 69 Test: Violent Crimes.
My Book, The Movie: Violent Crimes.
Writers Read: Phillip Margolin.
David Robb's six best books
David Robb is best known for playing Dr. Clarkson in the TV series Downton Abbey and Sir Thomas Boleyn in the TV adaptation of Wolf Hall. One of his six best books, as shared at the Daily Express:
THE NEW CONFESSIONS by William Boyd
I get swept along by epic tales and Boyd is brilliant with detail. This incorporates a childhood in Edinburgh and a stint in Hollywood which I can identify with. The guy gets involved in all sorts of schemes and ends up in Los Angeles during the McCarthyite witch-hunts.
The New Confessions is among Patrick McGilligan's five best film directors in fictional form.
Pg. 69: Alison Gaylin's "What Remains of Me"
Featured at the Page 69 Test: What Remains of Me: A Novel by Alison Gaylin.
The USA Today bestselling author of the Brenna Spector series returns with her most ambitious book to date, a spellbinding novel of psychological suspense, set in the glamorous, wealthy world of Hollywood—a darkly imaginative and atmospheric tale of revenge and betrayal, presumed guilt and innocence lost, dirty secrets and family ties reminiscent of the bestsellers of Laura Lippman, Gillian Flynn, and Harlan Coben.
Nobody’s perfect. Everybody’s got a drawer somewhere with something hidden in it.
On June 28, 1980—the hottest night of the year—Kelly Michelle Lund shoots and kills Oscar-nominated director John McFadden at a party in his home. . . . And instantly becomes a media sensation, her chilling smile fodder for national nightmares. For years, speculation swirls over the enigmatic seventeen-year-old’s motives, information she’s refused to share. Convicted of the murder, she loses her youth and her freedom—but keeps her secrets to herself.
Thirty years later—and five years after her release from prison—the past has come back to haunt Kelly. Her father-in-law, movie legend Sterling Marshall, is found in a pool of blood in his home in the Hollywood Hills—dead from a shot to the head, just like his old friend John McFadden.
Once again, Kelly is suspected of the high profile murder. But this time, she’s got some unexpected allies who believe she’s innocent—of both killings—and want to help her clear her name. But is she?
Written with masterful precision and control, What Remains of Me brilliantly moves forward and back in time, playing out the murders side by side—interweaving subtle connections and peeling away layers of events to reveal the shocking truth.
Learn more about the book and author at Alison Gaylin's website.
The Page 69 Test: Into the Dark.
The Page 69 Test: What Remains of Me.
Gin Price's "On Edge," the movie
Featured at My Book, The Movie: On Edge: A Freerunner Mystery #1 by Gin Price.
Coming Soon to Theaters Near You…
In a world where graffiti and parkour collide on the violent streets of Three Rivers Michigan, one girl is determined to bring rival gangs together, or die trying!
Emanuella “LL” Harvey is being hunted by a serial-killing graffiti artist. Though her newest love interest swears it isn’t him, all the evidence points directly to him, and LL’s brother is ready to call down hell in the form of a massive gang war to try to bring the stalker down.
Hoping to keep the peace, LL must discover the true culprit…even if the truth will kill her heart and soul.
From the director of Star Wars: The Force Awakens and Star Trek: Into Darkness…
JJ Abrams presents: On Edge.
Starring...[read on]
Visit Gin Price's website and blog.
The Page 69 Test: On Edge.
My Book, The Movie: On Edge.
Five YA novels about intrepid aspiring reporters
At the BN Teen Blog Nicole Hill tagged five YA books about intrepid aspiring reporters, including:
The Year of the Gadfly, by Jennifer Miller
In the land of YA, where there’s a prep school, there’s typically trouble. And The Year of the Gadfly is no exception, which Iris Dupont finds out when she tries to take down Mariana Academy’s vigilante secret society. Iris wants to penetrate the ranks of The Devil’s Advocate, the society’s underground newspaper. It’s a solid plan, one enabled and complicated by Iris’ imaginary friend and sole confidante: the ghost of Edward R. Murrow. You’ve got to hand it to her, he’s a good pal to have when you’re on the trail of a multilayered mystery.
The Year of the Gadfly is among Joel Cunningham's eight great books for fans of Donna Tartt's The Secret History.
The Page 69 Test: The Year of the Gadfly.
Pg. 99: Joshua Reno's "Waste Away"
Featured at the Page 99 Test: Waste Away: Working and Living with a North American Landfill by Joshua O. Reno.
Though we are the most wasteful people in the history of the world, very few of us know what becomes of our waste. In Waste Away, Joshua O. Reno reveals how North Americans have been shaped by their preferred means of disposal: sanitary landfill. Based on the author’s fieldwork as a common laborer at a large, transnational landfill on the outskirts of Detroit, the book argues that waste management helps our possessions and dwellings to last by removing the transient materials they shed and sending them elsewhere. Ethnography conducted with waste workers shows how they conceal and contain other people’s wastes, all while negotiating the filth of their occupation, holding on to middle-class aspirations, and occasionally scavenging worthwhile stuff from the trash. Waste Away also traces the circumstances that led one community to host two landfills and made Michigan a leading importer of foreign waste. Focusing on local activists opposed to the transnational waste trade with Canada, the book’s ethnography analyzes their attempts to politicize the removal of waste out of sight that many take for granted. Documenting these different ways of relating to the management of North American rubbish, Waste Away demonstrates how the landfills we create remake us in turn, often behind our backs and beneath our notice.
Learn more about Waste Away at the University of California Press website.
The Page 99 Test: Waste Away.
Pg. 69: Jeff Salyards's "Chains of the Heretic"
Featured at the Page 69 Test: Chains of the Heretic: Bloodsounder's Arc Book Three by Jeff Salyards.
Emperor Cynead has usurped command of the Memoridons—Tower-controlled memory witches—and consolidated his reign over the Syldoonian Empire. After escaping the capital city of Sunwrack, Captain Braylar Killcoin and his Jackal company evade pursuit across Urglovia, tasked with reaching deposed emperor Thumarr and helping him recapture the throne. Braylar’s sister, Soffjian, rejoins the Jackals and reveals that Commander Darzaak promised her freedom if she agreed to aid them in breaking Cynead’s grip on the other Memoridons and ousting him.
Imperial forces attempt to intercept Braylar’s company before they can reach Thumarr. The Jackals fight through Cynead’s battalions but find themselves trapped along the Godveil. Outmaneuvered and outnumbered, Braylar gambles on some obscure passages that Arki has translated and uses his cursed flail, Bloodsounder, to part the Godveil, leading the Jackals to the other side. There, they encounter the ruins of human civilization, but they also learn that the Deserters who abandoned humanity a millennium ago and created the Veil in their wake are still very much alive. But are they gods? Demons? Monsters?
What Braylar, Soffjian, Arki, and the Jackals discover beyond the Godveil will shake an empire, reshape a map, and irrevocably alter the course of history.
Learn more about the book and author at Jeff Salyards's website and blog.
My Book, The Movie: Scourge of the Betrayer.
The Page 69 Test: Chains of the Heretic.
What is Sally Hepworth reading?
Featured at Writers Read: Sally Hepworth, author of The Things We Keep.
I’ve been on a psychological thriller binge lately. The book I’ve been recommending most is Pretty Baby by Mary Kubica. It’s dark, it’s twisty and you never know who to trust. A woman notices a young girl carrying a baby on a train station and becomes fixated on her. Eventually, she invites the girl and her baby back to her home—alienating her husband and her own daughter. Secrets buried in the past come to light explaining the woman’s fascination with the baby, and the story comes to a satisfying, if unlikely, conclusion. Kubica’s writing is accessible but smart, and I will be...[read on]
About The Things We Keep, from the publisher:
Anna Forster, in the early stages of Alzheimer's disease at only thirty-eight years old, knows that her family is doing what they believe to be best when they take her to Rosalind House, an assisted living facility. She also knows there's just one another resident her age, Luke. What she does not expect is the love that blossoms between her and Luke even as she resists her new life at Rosalind House. As her disease steals more and more of her memory, Anna fights to hold on to what she knows, including her relationship with Luke.
When Eve Bennett is suddenly thrust into the role of single mother she finds herself putting her culinary training to use at Rosalind house. When she meets Anna and Luke she is moved by the bond the pair has forged. But when a tragic incident leads Anna's and Luke's families to separate them, Eve finds herself questioning what she is willing to risk to help them.
My Book, The Movie: The Secrets of Midwives.
The Page 69 Test: The Things We Keep.
My Book, The Movie: The Things We Keep.
Writers Read: Sally Hepworth.
Rachel Cusk's 6 favorite books
Rachel Cusk is the author of three memoirs and eight novels. One of her six favorite books, as shared at The Week magazine:
To the Lighthouse by Virginia Woolf
Woolf's groundbreaking novel is still one of the best available accounts of self-mythologizing middle-class family life and its oppressive construction of male and female identity.
To the Lighthouse appears among Helen Dunmore's six best books, Annie Baker's six favorite books, Meg Wolitzer's five favorite books by women writers, Laura Frost's top 10 best modernist books, the Barnes & Noble Review's list of five unforgettable fathers from fiction, Margaret Drabble's top ten literary landscapes, the American Book Review's 100 best last lines from novels, Amity Gaige's best books, and Adam Langer's best books.
Phillip Margolin's "Violent Crimes," the movie
Featured at My Book, The Movie: Violent Crimes: An Amanda Jaffe Novel by Phillip Margolin.
If they made Violent Crimes into a movie who could I see in the lead roles? I never think about this question while I am writing and I had to consult with my movie buff brother, Jerry, for ideas. I think Chyler Leigh, who places Supergirl's sister on TV, would be a good Amanda Jaffe. I also thought about Kate...[read on]
Pg. 69: Joshilyn Jackson's "The Opposite of Everyone"
Featured at the Page 69 Test: The Opposite of Everyone: A Novel by Joshilyn Jackson.
A fiercely independent divorce lawyer learns the power of family and connection when she receives a cryptic message from her estranged mother in this bittersweet, witty novel from the nationally bestselling author of Someone Else’s Love Story and gods in Alabama—an emotionally resonant tale about the endurance of love and the power of stories to shape and transform our lives.
Born in Alabama, Paula Vauss spent the first decade of her life on the road with her free-spirited young mother, Kai, an itinerant storyteller who blended Hindu mythology with southern oral tradition to re-invent their history as they roved. But everything, including Paula’s birth name Kali Jai, changed when she told a story of her own—one that landed Kai in prison and Paula in foster care. Separated, each holding secrets of her own, the intense bond they once shared was fractured.
These days, Paula has reincarnated herself as a tough-as-nails divorce attorney with a successful practice in Atlanta. While she hasn’t seen Kai in fifteen years, she’s still making payments on that Karmic debt—until the day her last check is returned in the mail, along with a mysterious note: “I am going on a journey, Kali. I am going back to my beginning; death is not the end. You will be the end. We will meet again, and there will be new stories. You know how Karma works.”
Then Kai’s most treasured secret literally lands on Paula’s doorstep, throwing her life into chaos and transforming her from only child to older sister. Desperate to find her mother before it’s too late, Paula sets off on a journey of discovery that will take her back to the past and into the deepest recesses of her heart. With the help of her ex-lover Birdwine, an intrepid and emotionally volatile private eye who still carries a torch for her, this brilliant woman, an expert at wrecking families, now has to figure out how to put one back together—her own.
The Opposite of Everyone is a story about story itself, how the tales we tell connect us, break us, and define us, and how the endings and beginnings we choose can destroy us... and make us whole. Laced with sharp humor and poignant insight, it is beloved New York Times bestselling author Joshilyn Jackson at her very best.
What is Sara Blaedel reading?
Featured at Writers Read: Sara Blaedel, author of The Killing Forest.
Everything! Well, almost.
I have had a passionate relationship with crime fiction ever since I was a child and my mother told me stories; ever since I started reading Enid Blyton’s Famous Five, and ever since I found out that I was pretty good at imagining scary things. Nature equipped me with a terrible curiosity, a murderous fantasy world, empathy, and a desire to investigate human relationships. Especially, that is, when they go awry, or when there is more at stake than simply the color of wallpaper.
I read a lot of non-fiction, all the more when I am researching for my books. My protagonist, Louise Rick, is a police detective, and it is imperative to me that all the forensic details and procedurals I include are captured authentically and factually. As a storyteller, the best compliment I ever got came from...[read on]
About The Killing Forest, from the publisher:
Following an extended leave, Louise Rick returns to work at the Special Search Agency, an elite unit of the National Police Department. She's assigned a case involving a fifteen-year-old who vanished a week earlier. When Louise realizes that the missing teenager is the son of a butcher from Hvalsoe, she seizes the opportunity to combine the search for the teen with her personal investigation of her boyfriend's long-ago death...
Louise's investigation takes her on a journey back through time. She reconnects with figures from her past, including Kim, the principal investigator at the Holbaek Police Department, her former in-laws, fanatic ancient religion believers, and her longtime close friend, journalist Camilla Lind. As she moves through the small town's cramped network of deadly connections, Louise unearths toxic truths left unspoken and dangerous secrets.
Visit Sara Blaedel's website.
Writers Read: Sara Blaedel.
Eleven top stories of love and robots
At the B & N Sci-Fi & Fantasy Blog Ceridwen Christensen tagged eleven stories of truly science fictional romance. One title on the list:
The Mad Scientist’s Daughter by Cassandra Rose Clarke
The Mad Scientist’s Daughter is in many ways the most straightforward love story on this list, but that it not to say it is simplistic. The android Finn comes to live with Kat and her family when she is five. He acts as her tutor, then, as she ages, as her lover. She doesn’t believe him to have emotions, and questions her own motivations in enacting an affair with a being who can not reciprocate her feelings. This is the reverse of many robot love stories, where the authenticity of the android’s emotions are questioned endlessly and the human’s are understood to be authentic. This is an intensely personal novel, and achingly lovely.
My Book, The Movie: The Mad Scientist's Daughter.
Pg. 99: Nancy Tomes's "Remaking the American Patient"
Featured at the Page 99 Test: Remaking the American Patient: How Madison Avenue and Modern Medicine Turned Patients into Consumers by Nancy Tomes.
In a work that spans the twentieth century, Nancy Tomes questions the popular--and largely unexamined--idea that in order to get good health care, people must learn to shop for it. Remaking the American Patient explores the consequences of the consumer economy and American medicine having come of age at exactly the same time. Tracing the robust development of advertising, marketing, and public relations within the medical profession and the vast realm we now think of as "health care," Tomes considers what it means to be a "good" patient. As she shows, this history of the coevolution of medicine and consumer culture tells us much about our current predicament over health care in the United States. Understanding where the shopping model came from, why it was so long resisted in medicine, and why it finally triumphed in the late twentieth century helps explain why, despite striking changes that seem to empower patients, so many Americans remain unhappy and confused about their status as patients today.
Learn more about Remaking the American Patient at the University of North Carolina Press website.
The Page 99 Test: Remaking the American Patient.
Pg. 69: Terri Blackstock's "If I Run"
Featured at the Page 69 Test: If I Run by Terri Blackstock.
What is Sofie Ryan reading?
Featured at Writers Read: Sofie Ryan, author of A Whisker of Trouble: A Second Chance Cat Mystery.
Usually I have two books—or sometimes three or four—on the go. I’m not sure if that means I have a short attention span, or that I just don’t like not having a book nearby when I have a spare minute to read. Right now I’m reading The Whole She-Bang 2, a mystery anthology from the Toronto chapter of Sisters in Crime. There are stories from writers I was familiar with, as well as authors new to me. Some stories are darkly funny, others are unsettling. All of them are terrific. This is...[read on]
About A Whisker of Trouble, from the publisher:
The New York Times bestselling author of Buy a Whisker offers another adventure with secondhand shop owner Sarah Grayson and Elvis the rescue cat.
Spring has come to charming North Harbor, Maine, and with the new season comes a new haul for Second Chance, the shop where Sarah Grayson sells lovingly refurbished and repurposed items. Sarah is turning her keen eye to the estate of collector Edison Hall, hoping for fabulous finds for Second Chance—but when her rescue cat Elvis discovers a body in the kitchen, everything goes paws up.
The body belongs to an appraiser who had been hired to check out Edison’s wine collection. When Edison’s sister shows up at Second Chance, she hires Sarah’s friends—the kooky and charismatic trio of ladies who call themselves Charlotte’s Angels and work out of the shop—to solve the murder, Sarah knows she and Elvis are only going to get deeper into the case. But as it becomes a cat and mouse game of lies, cons, cheats, and family squabbles, can Elvis and Sarah claw their way to the truth before the killer slinks away forever?
Visit Sofie Ryan's website.
The Page 69 Test: A Whisker of Trouble.
Writers Read: Sofie Ryan.
Six top behind-the-scenes novels for the tabloid reader
Sarah Skilton is the author of Bruised, a martial arts drama for young adults; and High and Dry, a hardboiled teen mystery. At the B&N Reads blog she tagged six behind-the-scenes novels for the tabloid reader, including:
The Love Song of Jonny Valentine, by Teddy Wayne
Bieber-esque 11-year-old pop star Jonny Valentine was discovered in an online busking video and molded into a singing, dancing sensation. He likes the video game Zenon and Michael Jackson music. In some ways, he’s an everyboy, except that his clothing, hair, signature moves, and puppy love celeb romances have all been tested and preapproved, packaged to appeal to the masses. Raised by a single mom, and curious about his long-lost dad, he’s heartbreakingly eager to reunite with a former friend who’ll never be able to see past Jonny’s newfound fame. Regardless of your place on the Belieber to non-Belieber spectrum, Jonny Valentine delivers a genuine, poignant, and effortlessly real adolescent voice.
Sally Hepworth's "The Things We Keep," the movie
Featured at My Book, The Movie: The Things We Keep by Sally Hepworth.
Ah, the movie. I think about this all the time. Here is my cast for The Things We Keep:
Anna, a 38-year-old feisty paramedic, now with early onset Alzheimer’s – I would love to see Emily Blunt in this role--she just has the strength and character to pull it off. I also can see Julia Roberts or Jessica Chastain in this role.
Luke, 41, also with early-onset dementia, is shy but has a gentle strength about him — I think John...[read on]
Joshilyn Jackson's "The Opposite of Everyone," the...
Pg. 69: Jeffrey Wasserstrom's "Eight Juxtaposition...
Charlie Jane Anders's "All the Birds in the Sky," ...
Six top behind-the-scenes novels for the tabloid r...
Pg. 69: Susan Perabo's "Why They Run the Way They Do"
What is Marieke Nijkamp reading?
Ten top female friendships in YA
Pg. 99: Benjamin M. Jensen's "Forging the Sword"
Suzanne Redfearn's "No Ordinary Life," the movie
Pg. 69: Gin Price's "On Edge"
What is Lena Coakley reading?
Five top fantasy worlds with real world lessons
Coffee with a canine: Kristin von Kreisler & Bridget
Pg. 99: Elanah Uretsky's "Occupational Hazards"
Ten top Arctic novels
Pg. 69: Phillip Margolin's "Violent Crimes"
What is Jonathan Moore reading?
Ten top re-imagined fairytales
William C. Dietz's "Graveyard," the movie
Pg. 69: Sally Hepworth's "The Things We Keep"
What is Suzanne Redfearn reading?
Pg. 99: Carson Holloway's "Hamilton versus Jeffers...
Ten top biographies of black Americans
Pg. 69: Sofie Ryan's "A Whisker of Trouble"
What is Phillip DePoy reading?
Jonathan Moore's "The Poison Artist," the movie
Six notably colorblind SF/F universes
Pg. 69: Marieke Nijkamp's "This Is Where It Ends"
What is Steve Kemper reading?
Top five best worst couples in literature
Pg. 99: Amy Eckert's "Outsourcing War"
Pg. 69: Jim Kokoris's "It’s. Nice. Outside."
What is Nicholas Searle reading?
Fifteen contemporary YAs that make fabulous valent...
Phillip DePoy's "A Prisoner in Malta," the movie
Pg. 69: Barry Lancet's "Pacific Burn"
What is Bethanie Deeney Murguia reading?
Pg. 99: Lynda Mugglestone's "Samuel Johnson and th...
Ten top doomed romances in YA fiction
Patricia Ward's "Skinner Luce," the movie
Pg. 69: Lena Coakley's "Worlds of Ink and Shadow"
What is Kate Hilton reading?
Ten top books for the broken-hearted
Pg. 99: Sarah Tobin's "Everyday Piety: Islam and E...
Pg. 69: Suzanne Redfearn's "No Ordinary Life"
What is Jennifer Longo reading?
Ten of 2016's cleverest novels with killer elevato...
Nicholas Searle's "The Good Liar," the movie
Pg. 99: Richard L. Hasen's "Plutocrats United"
Pg. 69: Jeri Westerson's "The Silence of Stones"
What is Gigi Pandian reading?
Cover story: "Houston Bound"
Five YA books for fans of the Wild West
Jennifer Robson's "Moonlight Over Paris," the movie
Pg. 69: William C. Dietz's "Graveyard"
What is Chad Pearson reading?
Sebastian Faulks's six favorite books
Pg. 99: Caroline Shaw's "Britannia's Embrace"
Five of the best books with unforgettable sisters
What is Reed Farrel Coleman reading?
Pg. 69: Jennifer Brown's "Shade Me"
Yona Zeldis McDonough's "The House on Primrose Pon...
Four books that changed Clara Bensen
What is Ann Morgan reading?
Pg. 99: Tonio Andrade's "The Gunpowder Age"