This has been a great book week so far, made even more satisfying by the fact that I haven't actually spent any money on my new acquisitions (not counting my Tin House subscription, but I paid that ages ago, so now I get to look forward to bookish mail quarterly!). The new issue of Tin House is titled "Fantastic Women". Why just women? The editor has this to say, "...frankly, it seems more and more women writers are creating work that not only pushes the envelope, but folds realistic fiction into an origami dragon. They are transporting us into worlds we've never seen before and, forgive the generalization, digging deeper into the psychic bedrock than their male counterparts." I'm looking forward to reading the stories. You can read Kelly Link's contribution here. By the way the cover art is by artist Julie Heffernan, which I think is very cool in a fantastical sort of way.
A while back I mentioned that I won a copy of Every Past Thing by Pamela Thompson from Library Thing's "early reviewer program". Due to a post office mix up the books were just recently mailed, so I finally received my copy. I've been itching to read this book, so I was happy to see it finally turn up! In the interim I also won a copy of Master of the Sea by former Brazilian president Jose Sarney, which I still look forward to receiving. It is supposed to be a "picaresque epic of the sea". I've been very fortunate to get a book in the last few rounds of LT's program. I think I am going to bow out in the future; well, try and bow out from requesting a book for a few rounds anyway. This is the sort of thing that gets me into trouble with my regular reading plans, besides I feel a little greedy as there are many members who have never won a book and now I've gotten three.
Nancy Marie Brown's book, The Far Traveler: Voyages of a Viking Woman has finally surfaced at my library. Another book I've been itching to get my hands on. I've already started it and it looks quite promising. Reading Kristin Lavransdatter (which I should finish this week) has put me in the mood to read more Scandinavian literature and history. This book combines several interests of mine--women's history (it is about a Viking woman called Gudrid who crossed the North Atlantic perhaps eight times in the 11th century), sea travel, and Scandinavian history. NYTBR called it a "snappily written biography of a time and place". And I love the book jacket design, too.
Finally I have had a small bookmooching frenzy of late. I have several Virago Modern Classics coming my way, which I am sure I'll post about when they get here. As I am not finding any locally these days, I am trying to keep an eye on Bookmooch. I also received a copy of Penelope Lively's The Photograph. After reading Dorothy's recent post about Lively I had to find a book by her. I turned to the library for a copy of Moon Tiger, dragged it all the way home, read the book description more thoroughly, when it dawned on me that I might just own the book. After much digging around I found my copy, so now both sit high up on my book piles. All in all a pretty decent book week and it's only Wednesday!