The Dewey Divas and the Dudes Blog:
The Adventures (Reading and Otherwise) of Book Reps on the Road |
| "Since we read far more books than we ever have time to talk about in our presentations, we hope to use this blog to continue our recommendations, and meet other bookish travellers..." click here to read more. |
Maylin Scott's Spring 2011 Picks.
Archive
Maylin Scott's Fall 2010 Picks
Maylin Scott's Summer 2010 Picks
Maylin Scott's Spring 2010 Picks
Maylin Scott's Fall 2009 Picks
Maylin Scott's Summer 2009 Picks
Fiction
Benevolence by Cynthia Holz
Knopf Canada | Fiction | March 2011 | 9780307398895 | $29.95HC
What is the role of goodness and empathy in modern society’s busy and selfish world? Dr. Ben Wasserman is an organ transplant psychiatrist stymied by a man who wishes to donate a kidney to a neighbour for no apparent reason. At the same time, Ben's psychologist wife, Renata, is treating a young phobic whose boyfriend died in a train crash. When her client reveals that she is pregnant, Renata's own feelings of disappointment in her childless marriage are triggered anew. Holz really knows how to get into the realistic heart of modern marriages and their dilemmas, with all the ensuing pain and irritation. A great book club pick. For readers of Carol Shields and Bonnie Burnard.
The Blue Light Project by Timothy Taylor
Knopf Canada | Fiction | March 2011 | 9780307399304 | $29.95HC
An unidentified man armed with an explosive device storms a television studio where KiddieFame, a controversial youth talent show, is being filmed. He demands an interview with Thom Pegg, a disgraced former investigative journalist, down on his luck and working for a tabloid. Outside, as the hostage taking heads into its third day, two characters — one running from former glory and the other from corporate burnout — meet and instinctively connect. Eve is an Olympic gold medalist; Rabbit is a secretive street artist who has just completed a massive project involving mysterious installations on the rooftops of hundreds of buildings throughout the city. Timothy Taylor is one of Canada’s most interesting and original writers of contemporary, urban fiction. Think Banksy meets Douglas Coupland.
Touch by Alexi Zentner
Knopf Canada | Fiction | April 2011 | 9780307399441 | $29.95HC
Sawgamet is a mining boomtown in Northern B.C. gone bust, a logging village where the cold of winter and the dangers of working in the cuts are overshadowed by the dark mysteries lurking in the woods. Set during WWII, Stephen, now a pastor with a wife and family, returns home after many years away, on the eve of his mother's funeral, to reconnect with the stories of his mythic grandfather and to confront the losses of childhood. This is a haunting tale of three generations of love and loss filled with wonder and tenderness, monsters and witches and singing dogs and golden caribou. For Joseph Boyden fans. This is part of the annual New Face of Fiction campaign.
Please Look After Mom by Kyung-sook Shin, translated by Chi-Young Kim
Random House Canada | Fiction | April 2011 | 9780307359193 | $29.95HC
Sixty-nine-year old So-nyo van ishes among the crowds of the Seoul subway station leaving her children and husband awash in sorrow and guilt. What happened to Mom? Where is she? The story is told in the alternating voices of the daughter, son, husband and in the last part, by the mother herself. Intricately crafted and beautifully written; you’ll want to give your mother a hug as soon as you’ve finished the book. Would make a great bookclub pick. Kleenex needed.
Portraits of A Marriage by Sándor Márai, translated by George Szirtes
Knopf US | Fiction | February 2011 | 9781400045013 | $32.00HC
This is a masterful portrait of a triangle - three passionate, single minded lovers fighting over the marriage at the centre of Peter and Ilona, a wealthy bourgeois society couple. But each of them loves someone or something different. It's an extraordinarily razor-shar p dissection not especially of relationships, but class and the notion and role of culture, as well as describing the chaos of Budapest at the end of the Second World War. The writing feels both historical and 19th century; the themes absolutely modern - for all those readers who loved Marai's Embers. PW gave it a starred review.
Enough About Love by Hervé Le Tellier, translated by Adriana Hunter
Other Press | Fiction | February 2011 | 9781590513996 | $16.95TP
Love at first sight is still possible for those into their forties and long-married. But when you have already mapped out a life path, a passionate affair can come at a high price. For the four characters in this novel, their lives are unexpectedly turned upside down by the deliciously inconvenient arrival of love. Add an homage to Paris, where the novel takes place, and you have all the makings for a very French romantic comedy with an intellectual twist. Think Woody Allen meets French New Wave. Also for readers of David Nicholls’ One Day.
The Terrible Privacy of Maxwell Sim by Jonathan Coe
Knopf US | Fiction | March 2011 | 9780307594815 | $31.00HC
Maxwell Sims has seventy friends on facebook but no one to talk to. To stir himself out of his rut, he quits his job to drive a Prius full of toothbrushes from London to the remote Shetland Islands in a misguided promotional campaign for a dental-hygiene company. Along the way he makes a series of awkward, cruelly enlightening visits to figures from his past and is privy to some jolting revelations about his past relationships. A wonderfully funny satire on the loneliness of individuals in the growing world of social media.
The Spoiler by Annalena McAfee
Harvill Secker | Fiction | May 2011 | 9781846554353 | $29.95HC
Two women journalists – one old (Honor, b. 1917) one young (Tamara, b. 1970) one a veteran war correspondent, the other a writer of celebrity gossip – meet for the first time when the latter is sent to interview the former. It is January, 1997, the dying days of John Major’s government and newspapers are fighting for their survival in face of the internet. The interview does not go well. But in the subsequent weeks as we follow the lives of these two very different women, the challenges and ethics of their profession are not that dissimilar. This is a dark and thoughtful comedy about the world of journalism. Think Bridget Jones meets Martha Gellhorn. Plenty of backstabbing office politics too. For readers who loved Tom Rachman’s The Imperfectionists.
I Think I Love You by Allison Pearson
Knopf U.S. | Fiction | February 2011 | 9781400042357 | $27.95HC
Wales, 1974. Petra and Sharon, two thirteen-year-old girls, are obsessed with David Cassidy. His fan magazine is their Bible, and together they tackle the Ultimate David Cassidy Quiz, a contest whose winners will be flown to America to meet Cassidy in person. London, 1998. Petra is pushing forty, on the brink of divorce, and fighting with her own thirteen-ye ar-old daughter when she discovers a dusty letter in her mother’s closet declaring her the winner of the contest. More than twenty years later, twenty pounds heavier, bruised by grief and the disappointments of middle age, Petra reunites with Sharon for an all-expenses-paid trip to Las Vegas to meet their teen idol at last, and finds her life utterly transformed. A warm and nostalgic look at friendship, fame and forgotten fantasies.
Pulse by Julian Barnes
Random House Canada | Fiction - Short Stories | May 2011 | 9780307359605 | $29.95HC
A wonderful collection of short stories all exploring the search for love and human connection (and its failures). A couple come together through an illicit cigarette and a song shred over the din of a Chinese restaurant. A widower revisiting the Scottish island he’d treasured with his wife, learns how difficult it is to purge oneself of grief. Two hiking stories highlight the incompatibilities between couples who would rather walk alone. And throughout, friends gather regularly at dinner parties and perfect the art of cerebral, sometimes bawdy banter about the world passing before them. Lovely gems.
Spurious by Lars Iyer
Melville House | Fiction | January 2011 | 9781935554288 | $16.95TP
A very funny, cerebral conversation between two would-be English intellectuals, the narrator and his friend referred to only as “W.” As they travel and drink together, they talk about religion, the coming of the messiah, philosophy, mathematics, why they will never be able to understand all of the above, how they can come to terms with their many inadequacies and could Canada be the answer? And will the fungas and mold invading the narrator’s house completely take over? For readers of Lee Rourke’s The Canal or Monty Python fans.
Conversations With Mr. Prain by Joan Taylor
Melville House | Fiction | June 2011 | 9781935554455 | $17.00TP
A whip-smart conversation between Stella, a vivacious, aspiring writer and Bohemian eco-activist, and Edward Prain, a refined connoisseur of the rare books on hand in Stella's fusty London bookstall. While Prain is mysteriously aloof about his background, Stella finds his insights into art more and more stimulating, until one rainy afternoon she makes a surprising discovery: Prain is the head of England's most prestigious publishing house and a leading collector of art. And now, he would like her to come to tea at his country estate . . . to discuss her writing. A delicious cat and mouse game with some very astute comments about the book industry. For all bibliophiles and aspiring writers.
Mystery / Thriller
Fatale by J.P. Manchette
NYRB Classics | Fiction | April 2011 | 9781590173817 | $14.95TP
Whether you call her a coldhearted grifter or the soul of modern capitalism, there's no question that Aimée is a killer and a more than professional one. Now she's set her eyes on a backwater burg where, while posing as an innocent (albeit drop-dead gorgeous) newcomer to town, she means to sniff out old grudges and engineer new opportunities to, as always, make a killing. But then something snaps: the master manipulator falls prey to a pure and wayward passion. Great anarchic fun. For fans of Patricia Highsmith and Georges Simenon.
The Craigslist Murders by Brenda Cullerton
Melville House | Fiction/Crime | May 2011 | 9781612190198 | $16.95TP
The Upper East Side, the richest, greediest 1.8 sq. miles in the United States is a world where women mistake trend for truth, fame for faith, and money for meaning. Here, where the insatiable pursuit of luxury square footage and perfe ct decor breeds monsters, Charlotte is not just biting the hands of the Botoxed, newly converted Buddhist women who feed her, she is murdering them. "Cleaning house," she calls it. As the real world continues to teeter on the brink of financial extinction, follow the efforts of this Pilates-pumped Crusader as she surfs through Craigslist, her online hunting ground, and rids the city of women whose only job in life is to amuse themselves to death. For those who enjoyed The Devil Wears Prada.
Kismet
by Jakob Arjouni, translated by Anthea Bell
Happy Birthday, Turk!
by Jakob Arjouni, translated by Anselm Hollo
Melville House | Fiction/Crime | Available | 9781935554233 | $17.50TP
Melville House | Fiction/Crime | February 2011 | 9781935554202 | $16.95TP
Meet wise-cracking detective Kemal Kayankaya, a Turkish immigrant working the streets in contemporary Frankfurt. In Kismet, he has to uncover a ring of criminals with ties to the Balkans who are extorting money from local businesses. In Happy Birthday, Turk!, he tries to solve the murder of a Turkish labourer whose death, the Frankfurt police don’t seem to be overly concerned about. He’s a tough guy with a heart, but even better (for the reader), a cynical mouth that won’t shut up. Action packed and very entertaining to read.
Non-Fiction - Memoirs / Biography
An Exclusive Love by Johanna Adorján, translated by Anthea Bell
Knopf Canada | Biography & Autobiography | January 2011 | 9780307399533 | $29.95HC
Sixteen years after her grandparents' deaths from suicide, Johanna Adorján ignored the family rule of "That's something we don't talk about." As Hungarian Jews, they had survived the Holocaust, had become Communists and during the uprising in Budapest in 1956 had fled the country. They started a new life in Denmark and — so it seemed — never looked back. As Johanna set out to look for the blind spots in the lives of her grandparents, in the process she found out things that had more to do with herself than she had expected. Elegantly written and very moving.
No Regrets: The Life of Edith Piaf by Carolyn Burke
Knopf U.S. | Biography & Autobiography | March 2011 | 9780307268013 | $32.00HC
No Regrets explores Piaf’s rise to fame and notoriety, her tumultuous love affairs, and her struggles with drugs, alcohol, and illness, while also drawing on new sources to enhance our knowledge of little-known aspects of her life. Piaf was an unlikely student of poetry and philosophy, who aided Resistance efforts in World War II, wrote the lyrics for nearly one hundred songs and was a crucial mentor to younger singers. Burke demonstrates how, with her courage, her incomparable art, and her universal appeal, “the little sparrow” endures as a symbol of France and a source of inspiration to entertainers worldwide.
Je T’Aime a La Folie by Michael Wright
Bantam U.K. | Biography & Autobiography/Travel
Available | 9780593059951 | $35.95HC
June 2011 | 9780553819380 |$19.95TP
Three years into his solo adventure in rural France, attempting to transform himself from British soft townie into rugged peasant, Michael Wright still has three unfulfilled wishes from his childhood. He wants to grow one – just one – perfect potato. He wants to know how it feels to fly a Spitfire. And more than anything, he wants to meet his soulmate, not wanting to settle for being single while his chickens and sheep are set on reproduction. Charming in a self-deprecating and funny way.
