Mar
20
2012
Every so often I want to highlight what books are being talked about Around the Web. So, without further ado, the launch of a new series.
On Oprah’s blog, Life Lift, we have our weekly book recommendation.
Coral Glynn by Peter Cameron
Coral Glynn
by Peter Cameron
In the standard domestic drama, a poor lonely girl comes to work for a rich lonely man, and the two fall in love, a la Jane Eyre. The thought-provoking Coral Glynn begins in just this way. It’s right after World War, and Coral comes to nurse the dying mother of Major Clement Hart—an Englishman whose leg and confidence have been badly damaged on the battlefield. The Major quickly falls in love with Coral, and the two decide to get married, until a gruesome murder in the neighboring woods sends Coral fleeing back to London. For a few pages, it seems as if this book may turn into a Gothic thriller: how will the two reunite and who exactly is the killer? But Peter Cameron is so much more of skilled and subtle writer than this. Underneath his page-turning plot is a careful, complex examination of loss—and the human ability to fully experience love after too much loss. Coral has suffered all kinds of quiet, devastating violence in her own life—the unspoken kind that’s either ignored or simply expected when it comes to working-class woman, post-war or not. It’s her emotional life that becomes the real mystery of the novel. Coral can’t engage with others, even as they become entranced, if not bewitched, by her. She tries to connect, of course, and at strange, unexpected times, longs for more, such as when she enters a florist shop and is overwhelmed by the beauty of the flowers, feeling “in some way that ll the life and warmth of the cold, drab town, of her life, had collected in this room—that she was in the hot golden center of the world.” Here is the pleasure of the novel—albeit a painful one. In bringing Coral to life, Cameron knows what not to say, how to leave the kind of tiny, white space that lets us readers imagine the huge, colorful, overwhelming world of even the most broken human heart.
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USATODAY brings further attention to the underground, cult-like book, FIFTY SHADES OF GREY that is becoming one of the most talked about books of the season. Turns out, FIFTY SHADES started off as a Twilight Fan Fiction creation.
Fifty Shades of Grey by EL James
FIFTY SHADES OF GREY by EL James:
When literature student Anastasia Steele is drafted to interview the successful young entrepreneur Christian Grey for her campus magazine, she finds him attractive, enigmatic and intimidating. Convinced their meeting went badly, she tries to put Grey out of her mind – until he happens to turn up at the out-of-town hardware store where she works part-time.
The unworldly, innocent Ana is shocked to realize she wants this man, and when he warns her to keep her distance it only makes her more desperate to get close to him. Unable to resist Ana’s quiet beauty, wit, and independent spirit, Grey admits he wants her – but on his own terms.
Shocked yet thrilled by Grey’s singular erotic tastes, Ana hesitates. For all the trappings of success – his multinational businesses, his vast wealth, his loving adoptive family – Grey is man tormented by demons and consumed by the need to control. When the couple embarks on a passionate, physical and daring affair, Ana learns more about her own dark desires, as well as the Christian Grey hidden away from public scrutiny.
Can their relationship transcend physical passion? Will Ana find it in herself to submit to the self-indulgent Master? And if she does, will she still love what she finds?
Erotic, amusing, and deeply moving, the Fifty Shades Trilogy is a tale that will obsess you, possess you, and stay with you forever.
Mar
15
2012
HOW TO EAT A CUPCAKE by Meg Donohue
Funny, free-spirited Annie Quintana and sophisticated, ambitious Julia St. Clair come from two different worlds. Yet, as the daughter of the St. Clair’s housekeeper, Annie grew up in Julia’s San Francisco mansion and they forged a bond that only two little girls who know nothing of class differences and scholarships could—until a life-altering betrayal destroyed their friendship.
A decade later, Annie is now a talented, if underpaid, pastry chef who bakes to fill the void left in her heart by her mother’s death. Julia, a successful businesswoman, is tormented by a painful secret that could jeopardize her engagement to the man she loves. When a chance reunion prompts the unlikely duo to open a cupcakery, they must overcome past hurts and a mysterious saboteur or risk losing their fledgling business and any chance of healing their fractured friendship.
INTERVIEW WITH MEG DONOHUE:
1. Tell us the story behind the story. How did HOW TO EAT A CUPCAKE come to be?
I really wanted to write a story about friendship and food—two things that bring me great joy. I think a lot about how friendships shift over time as people grow and change. While I was brainstorming the book I was going to a lot of showers and birthday parties and I was pregnant—all of which is to say I was eating a lot of cupcakes. I started envisioning two former best friends who are brought back together years after a falling-out by their mutual love of cupcakes. Those were the early seeds of the story.
Once I had those seeds, I wrote a proposal for the novel and sent it, along with the first two chapters and a detailed outline, to my friend Jeanette Perez who is an editor at HarperCollins. Luckily, she loved it and offered me a contract to write the book.
2. Where do you find your inspiration?
Relationships certainly inspire me—friendships, family dynamics, people in love, parent-child relationships. It’s always interesting to analyze how two specific people interact the way they do, the history behind that dynamic, the character quirks that make them get along or continually rub each other the wrong way. Place also inspires me and tends to be important in my writing. I like to think about how location affects people and relationships—how two people interact might be different on a New York City street than, say, on Main Street in a small town.
3. What was the most challenging aspect of writing HOW TO EAT A CUPCAKE?
Having a contractual deadline was both the best possible motivator and the most challenging aspect of the writing process. The occasional bad days when the writing just would not flow felt particularly stressful because of that looming deadline. But in the end, over all, I loved writing with a contract—it kept me focused.
4. What is the message you want readers to take away from your book?
That friendship, at its best, is another form of family. Those friends who know us so well, who listen to us, who surprise us with their thoughtfulness, and for whom we do the same—those are some of the most important relationships in our lives.
5. Describe your background.
I was born and raised in Philadelphia, where I spent much of my youth reading and writing stories. I’ve wanted to be a writer for as long as I can remember. My parents are both lawyers, but they have always had a strong interest in the arts and encouraged my creativity. I studied literature as an undergrad at Dartmouth and then worked for a couple of years in the literary department of ICM agency before pursuing my MFA in writing at Columbia. I now live in San Francisco with my husband and two young daughters.
6. Describe your writing schedule. Do you outline? Any habits?
I started How to Eat a Cupcake by writing a one-line description of the story, then a paragraph-long description, then a ten-page plot outline, and finally a chapter-by-chapter outline. The plot often changed as I wrote, but I found the whole process less daunting once I knew generally where I was headed and how I planned to get there. I aim to write ten pages, or about one chapter, each week. I write for a few hours in the morning four times per week, which is when I have childcare. I am not a fly-by-the-seat-of-my-pants writer!
7. What books are on your nightstand? What are you currently reading?
I am currently reading The Sense of an Ending by Julian Barnes. My nightstand is actually a bookshelf, so there are a lot of books on it! I have so many books on my to-read shelf, including The Underside of Joy by Sere Prince Halverson, The Family Fang by Kevin Wilson, The Kitchen Daughter by Jael McHenry, and The Song Remains the Same by Allison Winn Scotch.
8. Which authors inspire you?
Two authors whose work I have only recently discovered and feel so inspired by are J. Courtney Sullivan and Amanda Eyre Ward. Other writers who have inspired me include Siri Hustvedt, Donna Tartt, and Kate Christensen – but, really, I have loved too many books to list!
9. What have you learned from this experience?
I had never outlined a novel to the extent I did when I started working on How to Eat a Cupcake, and the experience of doing so taught me how helpful—necessary, even—that approach is for me.
10. What is your advice for aspiring writers?
I don’t really feel that I’m in a position to offer advice, but I guess I would say that that old adage about how you’re not really a writer unless you write is certainly true. In other words, set a schedule and stick to it—commit to write a certain number of pages each week.
11. What are you working on now?
I’m working on a new novel entitled ALL THE SUMMER GIRLS. It’s about three childhood friends whose lives are unraveling in three separate cities. They escape to the beach town where they spent the summers of their youth and end up confronting secrets about one fateful summer night seven years earlier. I’m still writing about friendship, but in this one I get to write about the beach and the summer too—more of my favorite things!
Thanks, Meg! We so enjoyed this interview and can’t wait to read more from you in the future! You can follow Meg on twitter @megdonohue.
Mar
6
2012
Happier at Home by Gretchen Rubin
Gretchen Rubin, creator of The Happiness Project, the phenomenally bestselling book and mega-popular blog, just revealed the cover for her next book, HAPPIER AT HOME (Crown). Here’s what we can expect in September 2012:
In the spirit of her blockbuster #1 New York Times bestseller The Happiness Project, Gretchen Rubin embarks on a new project to make home a happier place.
One Sunday afternoon, as she unloaded the dishwasher, Gretchen Rubin felt hit by a wave of homesickness. Homesick—why? She was standing right in her own kitchen. She felt homesick, she realized, with love for home itself. “Of all the elements of a happy life,” she thought, “my home is the most important.” In a flash, she decided to undertake a new happiness project, and this time, to focus on home.
And what did she want from her home? A place that calmed her, and energized her. A place that, by making her feel safe, would free her to take risks. Also, while Rubin wanted to be happier at home, she wanted to appreciate how much happiness was there already.
So, starting in September (the new January), Rubin dedicated a school year—September through May—to making her home a place of greater simplicity, comfort, and love.
In The Happiness Project, she worked out general theories of happiness. Here she goes deeper on factors that matter for home, such as possessions, marriage, time, and parenthood. How can she control the cubicle in her pocket? How might she spotlight her family’s treasured possessions? And it really was time to replace that dud toaster.
Each month, Rubin tackles a different theme as she experiments with concrete, manageable resolutions—and this time, she coaxes her family to try some resolutions, as well.
With her signature blend of memoir, science, philosophy, and experimentation, Rubin’s passion for her subject jumps off the page, and reading just a few chapters of this book will inspire readers to find more happiness in their own lives.
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I loved The Happiness Project and have written about it many times on this site so I can’t tell you how excited I am for Happier at Home. Have you read The Happiness Project? Do you follow Gretchen’s blog? Are you going to pick up Happier at Home when it hits bookstores in the fall?
Mar
5
2012
Skinnydipping by Bethenny Frankel
SKINNYDIPPING by Bethenny Frankel
Publication Date: May 1, 2012
Publisher: Simon & Schuster
Description: “Who do I have to sleep with to get a drink on this plane?”
Beloved by countless fans for being devilishly dishy, outrageously funny, and always giving it to us straight, three-time New York Times bestselling author Bethenny Frankel now makes her fiction debut with the story of Faith Brightstone. Faith is an aspiring actress just out of college, who moves to LA determined to have it all—a job on the most popular TV show, a beach house in Malibu, and a gorgeous producer boyfriend. But when reality hits, she finds herself with a gig as a glorified servant, a role that has more to do with T&A than acting, and a dead-end relationship. Finally, Faith decides she’s had enough of La La Land and moves back to New York with just a suitcase and her dog Muffin.
Five years later, Faith has finally found her groove as an entrepreneur and manages to land a spot on a new reality TV show hosted by her idol—the legendary businesswoman and domestic goddess Sybil Hunter. Diving into the bizarre world of reality TV, Faith’s loud mouth and tell-it-like-it-is style immediately get her in trouble with her fellow contestants—the delusional socialite, the boozy lifestyle coach, the moody headband designer, and her closest friend, the ambitious housewife who eventually betrays her. Even Sybil is not what she appears.
As the show comes to a dramatic close, Faith discovers that the man of her dreams may have just walked in to her life. Will she choose fame or love? Or can she have it all?
Will you be reading Bethenny Frankel’s debut novel? What do you think about the cover?
Feb
27
2012
The Berenstain Bears
According to the AP, Jan Berenstain, who with her husband, Stan, wrote and illustrated The Berenstain Bears books that have charmed preschoolers and their parents for 50 years, has died. She was 88.
Berenstain, a longtime resident of Solebury in southeastern Pennsylvania, suffered a severe stroke on Thursday and died Friday without regaining consciousness, her son Mike Berenstain said.
The gentle tales of Mama Bear, Papa Bear, Brother Bear and Sister Bear were inspired by the Berenstain children, and later their grandchildren. The stories address children’s common concerns and aim to offer guidance on subjects like dentist visits, peer pressure, a new sibling or summer camp.
The first Berenstain Bears book, “The Big Honey Hunt,” was published in 1962. Over the years, more than 300 titles have been released in 23 languages — most recently in Arabic and Icelandic — and have become a rite of passage for generations of young readers.
“They say jokes don’t travel well, but family humor does,” said Jan Berenstain told The Associated Press in 2011. “Family values is what we’re all about.”
Stan and Jan Berenstain, both Philadelphia natives, were 18 when they met on their first day at art school in 1941.
They married in 1946, after Stan Berenstain returned home from serving as a medical illustrator at a stateside Army hospital during World War II. During that time, Jan Berenstain worked as a draftsman for the Army Corps of Engineers and as a riveter building Navy seaplanes.
Before their family of bear books was born, the young couple had already built a successful career in periodicals. A cartoon series they produced called “All in the Family” ran in McCall’s and Good Housekeeping magazines for 35 years, and their art appeared in magazines including Collier’s and The Saturday Evening Post.
Stan and Jan Berenstain created hundreds of books until Stan Berenstain’s death in 2005 at the age of 82.
Mike Berenstain is an illustrator who collaborated on the books with his mother in recent years. His elder brother, writer Leo Berenstain, is involved with the business end of the family franchise.
The books in recent years have tackled modern subjects such as online safety and childhood obesity, and the bears (or their human helpers) answer children’s emails and letters, but the goal is to tell enduring, universal stories. Perennial favorites cover challenges of getting kids to doing chores, defuse fears of the first day of school and teach values of kindness and generosity.
“It’s wonderful to do something you love for so many years,” Jan Berenstain told the AP in 2011. “Not everyone has that.”
About 260 million copies of Berenstain Bears books have been held in the hands of children and their parents since the earliest books were published with the help of Theodor Geisel, a children’s books editor at Random House better known as Dr. Seuss.
Mike Berenstain said his mother worked daily at her home studio in an idyllic part of Bucks County, north of Philadelphia, which served as inspiration for the books’ setting. He said he will continue writing and illustrating future Berenstain books.
“Every day she was very productive,” he said. “She was working on two books and had been doing illustrations until the day before she passed away.”
Jan Berenstain is survived by her two sons and four grandchildren.
(Via Associated Press)
Feb
27
2012
Stephen Elliot, author of the books Happy Baby and The Adderal Diaries, is the founding editor of the online literary magazine, The Rumpus. He hopes in the age of email, twitter and texting, that people will still like to receive a letter now and again or “snail mail.”
Letters in the Mail is his new venture, in which for $5 a month, subscribers will receive three to four letters from people like author Dave Eggers, comedian Margaret Cho, graphic novelist Dean Haspiel and novelist and TV producer, Jonathan Ames. The first letter comes from Elliot himself.
But what’s inside these letters are actually very short stories. Already 1,500 people have subscribed in a matter of weeks. Elliot was inspired by the Brooklyn outfit One Story, which send one story per week for $21 a year.
The letters are made to look authentic by having doodles, real signatures and return addresses. Just sign up and they’ll be in a mailbox near you.
Feb
24
2012
- Stephen Colbert
“Anyone who knows me knows that I don’t like children or books or children’s books but I do respect the free market and children’s books do sell.” -Stephen Colbert
Stephen Colbert recently joked on The Colbert Report about his distaste for children’s books but that isn’t stopping him from publishing one in May. When Colbert sat down with legendary children’s author Maurice Sendak, he asked him to critique his book geared towards the younger market, I Am a Pole (and So Can You!). Maurice grudgingly commented, “The sad thing is, I like it.” According to GalleyCat, Grand Central Publishing snapped up the rights to the book. Colbert commented, “It’s been a lifelong dream of mine to write a children’s book. I hope the minutes you and your loved ones spend reading it are as fulfilling as the minutes I spent writing it.”
(images via Comedy Central)
Feb
24
2012
That Woman: The Life of Wallis Simpson, Duchess of Windsor by Anne Sebba
Wallis Warfield Spencer Simpson is a hot commodity today. Madonna has a new movie coming out based on her, there is a new stage drama in London called The Last of the Duchess, and there is the upcoming novel Abdication by Juliet Nicolson that is a “breathtaking story inspired by a love affair that shook the world at a time when the world was on the brink of war.” (I will certainly be adding this title to my Books to Pine For list). Is it any wonder why the Duchess of Windsor would be a subject of great fascination and intrigue? In THAT WOMAN, Sebba takes an in depth look at letters that portray the Duchess in a new and more detailed light.
If you are looking for a great love story, THAT WOMAN may not be your cup of tea. “Few who knew them well,” writes Sebba, “described what they shared as love.”
Read more about THAT WOMAN here.
Feb
23
2012
J.K. Rowling
Critically acclaimed bestselling author of the Harry Potter series, J.K. Rowling has just inked a deal with Little, Brown for an adult novel. Details about the novel and the release date were not announced but Rowling did make a statement regarding the new deal.
“Although I’ve enjoyed writing it every bit as much, my next book will be very different to the Harry Potter series, which has been published so brilliantly by Bloomsbury and my other publishers around the world,” Rowling said in a statement released by Little, Brown. “The freedom to explore new territory is a gift that Harry’s success has brought me, and with that new territory it seemed a logical progression to have a new publisher. I am delighted to have a second publishing home in Little, Brown, and a publishing team that will be a great partner in this new phase of my writing life.”
Rowling will now be joining the same publishing house that currently publishes Stephenie Meyer’s phenomenally popular TWILIGHT series. Rowling will not have to win over a new audience, as many Harry Potter fans are adults and those who started reading her series when they were children, are now adults as well. This should be an exciting venture for Rowling, Little, Brown, and her fans.
From Publishers Weekly:
J.K. Rowling has a new book…and it’s not for kids. The author has signed a world English deal with Little, Brown, selling print, e-book and audio rights to her first novel for adults. David Shelley, publisher of the Little Brown Book Group in the U.K., will be editing the work, which is currently untitled; he brokered the deal with Neil Blair of The Blair Partnership. Rumors have surfaced that Little, Brown was given an exclusive on the work.
Michael Pietsch, publisher of Little, Brown in the U.S., will be handling the American publication of the novel.
LB said that, along with the book’s title, it will announce a publication date, and plot details, later in the year.
This news comes after much speculation about Rowling’s next moves in the publishing world. Last year, she announced Pottermore, a new Web site that would offer a deeper window into the Harry Potter universe. Pottermore launched in beta in October 2011 and, as a solo project. involving no publisher, it hinted that Rowling might be looking to leverage her brand outside of the print system that made her famous. (The site has still not gone live in any official capacity.) This deal, however, indicated that the author is, for the moment at least, seemingly not done with traditional publishing.
