And something easy for the end of a hot summer day. Let's see, how many weeks to go before it is officially Fall? Roughly a month, I guess. I don't like to wish time away, but I do wish a little Arctic Canadian air would make its way down here. Much more preferable to have it now than in January. In January when it is bitterly cold I will look back at today's weather with fondness I'm sure. So I will try and appreciate it--all that warm cozy air that I am literally blanketed in. Yup, warm and cozy. (Really cozy).
Okay, that's enough appreciation. As soon as I finish typing this post I am going to get some ice cream, I think. So I had better type fast. It's been ages since I shared any of my library finds. Aside from the excitement of new books to look forward to perusing and hopefully reading (one or two of them anyway?), it is a nice mindless sort of task to write about them when it's too hot to think otherwise.
My pile is actually larger than the one in the photo, but these are a few of the highlights. I have a feeling I am not the only reader who ends up with more library books than time permits reading before due dates call them back, and so many will get requested a second or even third time. These are the newest of the lot. From top to bottom;
The Major's Daughter by J.P. Francis -- Another wartime story, but this one set in WWII and in New Hampshire rather than Europe. It's a story of forbidden love--a young woman whose father is the Major at a POW camp falls for one of the German prisoners. The "forbidden love" makes it sound a little bit lurid, but I think it is actually going to be a pleasant read.
I've heard lots of good things about Joanna Rakoff's My Salinger Year. "Poignant, keenly observed, and irresistibly funny: a memoir about literary New York in the late nineties, a pre-digital world on the cusp of vanishing, where a young woman finds herself entangled with one of the last great figures of the century." For some reason I thought that this was a novel, but I'm pleased to see it is really a true story.
Vienna Nocturne by Vivien Shotwell -- "A sweeping historical love story and a portrait of an age. This deeply moving debut novel brings to life two extraordinary figures--a thirty-year-old Wolfgang Mozart and a young English soprano, Anna Storace, who was his muse--in prose as spirited, timeless, and touching as Mozart's greatest compositions." Sounds very promising--I'm always on the lookout for good historical fiction (set in an era other than the war years!). I wonder how much the story is based on fact? The author is an opera singer, so I expect she'll get the details just right!
I'm always on the lookout for a good collection of short stories. Lorrie Moore's Bark: Stories was shortlisted for The Frank O'Connor International Short Story Award (Young Skins by Colin Barrett won the 2014 award--it's due out here in paper next March!--so far away!). It's been ages since I read anything by Lorrie Moore, so I look forward to giving some of these stories a go. "These eight masterly stories reveal Lorrie Moore at her most mature and in a perfect configuration of craft, mind, and bewitched spirit, as she explores the passage of time and summons up its inevitable sorrows and hilarious pitfalls to reveal her own exquisite, singular wisdom."
I've never read any of Lauren Willig's Pink Carnation books (think The Scarlet Pimpernel), but I think I'd like them. I like, too, the sound of That Summer, which is one of those parallel stories novels. "From modern-day England to the early days of the Pre-Raphaelite movement, That Summer, takes readers on a riveting journey through a mysterious old house a hidden love affair, and one woman's search for the truth about her past--and herself."
Do you think it would be a bad idea to take one of these books on vacation? Not bad exactly, more risky to take a library book so far away from home. I've never lost a book I've taken on vacation, but I hate to tempt fate either. I'm still contemplating vacation reading material. The anticipation is building. Just one week to go (and a long weekend to enjoy before that). Surely one of these books deserves to be cracked open and read now, right?