first fiction

The next Genre Reading Group meeting will be Tuesday, September 27^th at 6:30 pm and the topic up for discussion will be “Myth & Legend.”  The display is up at the 2nd floor Reference Desk and is of…mythic proportions (see what I did there?). 

We have a Poetry & Yoga series with Marie Blair coming up September and October!  What do poetry and yoga have in common? A call to pay attention, an exploration of self, and invitation to notice.  Yoga teacher and librarian Marie Blair brings movement and words together in a four-week series. Bring your curiosity and wear comfortable clothes!  September 17 & 24, October 8 & 29, 10am-12:30pm FREE

Also, if you and your friends/family are wine connoisseurs, you DEFINITELY don’t want to miss the Western Supermarkets Fall Wine & Food Festival on Friday, September 30^th 6-9pm at the Birmingham Zoo.  Tickets are available at the Library, Western Supermarket locations, and online at http://westernsupermarkets.tixclix.com/2262.  Proceeds from the event benefit Emmet O’Neal Library, Birmingham Zoo, East Lake Initiative, and Junior League of Birmingham. 

This week, GRG met to discuss debut novels!  There’s something fresh and untried about an author’s first book.  Stephen King started with Carrie, Khaled Hosseini with The Kite Runner, John Grisham with A Time To Kill, and Harper Lee with To Kill a Mockingbird.  Some of the authors we discussed went on to multi-book deals, while some stuck with one (or two) or are just starting out in their careers.  It was a great discussion!

Security by Gina Wohlsdorf
Manderley Resort is a gleaming, new twenty-story hotel on the California coast. It’s about to open its doors, and the world--at least those with the means to afford it--will be welcomed into a palace of opulence and unparalleled security. But someone is determined that Manderley will never open. The staff has no idea that their every move is being watched, and over the next twelve hours they will be killed off, one by one.

Writing in the tradition of Edgar Allan Poe and Stephen King, and with a deep bow to Daphne du Maurier, author Gina Wohlsdorf pairs narrative ingenuity and razor-wire prose with quick twists, sharp turns, and gasp-inducing terror. Security isgrand guignol storytelling at its very best.

A shocking thriller, a brilliant narrative puzzle, and a multifaceted love story unlike any other, Security marks the debut of a fearless and gifted writer.

You Should Pity Us Instead by Amy Gustine
You Should Pity Us Instead explores some of our toughest dilemmas: the cost of Middle East strife at its most intimate level, the likelihood of God considered in day-to-day terms, the moral stakes of family obligations, and the inescapable fact of mortality. Amy Gustine exhibits an extraordinary generosity toward her characters, instilling them with a thriving, vivid presence.

Once a Crooked Man by David McCallum (YES! Ducky from CSI!)

Crime pays. And pays well.

Sal, Max and Enzo Bruschetti have proved this over a lifetime of nefarious activity that they have kept hidden from law enforcement. Nowhere in any file, on any computer is there a record of anything illegal from which they have profited. But Max has a problem. His body is getting old and his doctor has told him to take it easy. Max has decided that the time has come for the family to retire.

But when young actor Harry Murphy overhears the Bruschetti brothers planning changes to their organization, including the murder of a man in London who knows too much, the Bruschetti's plans begin to unravel.

After Harry makes the well-intentioned if egregious mistake of trying to warn the Bruchetti's intended victim he finds himself alone in a foreign country, on the wrong side of the law, with a suitcase full of cash and a dangerous man on his trail. And while his good looks, charm and cheerful persistence may prove assets in the turbulent events that follow, none of Harry's past roles have prepared him for what happens next.

At turns tense and funny, Once a Crooked Man is infused with the infectious charm that has made David McCallum one of television's longest running, most-beloved stars.

The Tale of Genji by Lady Murasaki
Written in the eleventh century, this exquisite portrait of courtly life in medieval Japan is widely celebrated as the world’s first novel. Genji, the Shining Prince, is the son of an emperor. He is a passionate character whose tempestuous nature, family circumstances, love affairs, alliances, and shifting political fortunes form the core of this magnificent epic. Royall Tyler’s superior translation is detailed, poetic, and superbly true to the Japanese original while allowing the modern reader to appreciate it as a contemporary treasure. Supplemented with detailed notes, glossaries, character lists, and chronologies to help the reader navigate the multigenerational narrative, this comprehensive edition presents this ancient tale in the grand style that it deserves.

Ecko Rising by Danie Ware
In a futuristic London where technological body modification is the norm, Ecko stands alone as a testament to the extreme capabilities of his society. Driven half mad by the systems running his body, Ecko is a criminal for hire. No job is too dangerous or insane.

When a mission goes wrong and Ecko finds himself catapulted across dimensions into a peaceful and unadvanced society living in fear of 'magic', he must confront his own percepions of reality and his place within it.

A thrilling debut, Ecko Rising explores the massive range of the sci-fi and fantasy genres, and the possible implications of pitting them against one another. Author Danie Ware creates an immersive and richly imagined world that readers will be eager to explore in the first book in this exciting new trilogy.

Somnium (Latin for “The Dream”) by Johannes Kepler
According to Carl Sagan and Isaac Asimov, Kepler´s "Somnium" ("The Dream"), written around 1611, should be considered the first science-fiction novel ever. The eminent astronomer Johannes Kepler imagines a trip to the moon and speculates about its inhabitants and astronomy.

The Headmaster’s Darlings: A Mountain Brook Novel by Katherine Clark
The Headmaster's Darlings is a satirical comedy of manners featuring the morbidly obese Norman Laney, an unorthodox, inspirational English teacher and college counselor for an elite private school in Mountain Brook, a privileged community outside of Birmingham. A natural wonder from blue-collar Alabama, Laney has barged into the exclusive world of Mountain Brook on the strength of his sensational figure and its several-hundred-pound commitment to art and culture. His mission is to defeat "the barbarians," introduce true civilization in place of its thin veneer, and change his southern world for the better. Although Laney is adored by his students (his "darlings") and by the society ladies (also his "darlings") who rely on him to be the life of their parties and the leader of their book clubs, there are others who think he is a larger-than-life menace to the comfortable status quo of Mountain Brook society and must be banished.

When Laney is summoned to the principal's office one day in November 1983, he expects to be congratulated for a recent public-relations triumph he engineered on behalf of the school. Instead his letter of resignation is demanded with no explanation given. Faced with an ultimatum and his imminent dismissal, Laney must outflank the principal at his own underhanded game, find out who said what about him and why, and launch his current crop of Alabama students into the wider world--or at least into Ivy League colleges.

In her debut novel, Katherine Clark casts a comical eye on southern society and celebrates the power of great teachers and schools to transform the lives of young people and lift up their communities. Surrounded by a colorful cast of his colleagues, his young protégés and Mountain Brook's upper echelon, Laney emerges as a heroically idiosyncratic character with Falstaffian appetites, an inimitable wit and intellect, and a boundless generosity toward his students that reshapes their lives in profound, unexpected ways.

GENERAL DISCUSSION: Clark’s second novel, All the Governor’s Men, is also available.
It’s the summer of George Wallace’s last run for governor of Alabama in 1982, and the state is at a crossroads. In Katherine Clark’s All the Governor’s Men, a political comedy of manners that reimagines Wallace’s last campaign, voters face a clear choice between the infamous segregationist, now a crippled old man in a wheelchair, and his primary opponent, Aaron Osgood, a progressive young candidate poised to liberate the state from its George Wallace–poisoned past. 

Daniel Dobbs, a twenty one-year-old Harvard graduate and South Alabama native, is one of many young people who have joined the campaign representing hope and change for a downtrodden Alabama. A political animal himself, Daniel possesses so much charm and charisma that he was nicknamed “the Governor” in college. Nowhe is engaged in the struggle to conquer once and for all the malignant man Alabamians have traditionally called “the Governor.” 

This historic election isn’t the only thing Daniel wants to win. During his senior year, he fell in love with a freshman girl from Mountain Brook, the “Tiny Kingdom” of wealth and privilege, a world apart from his own Alabama origins. A small-town country boy, Daniel desperately wants to gain the favor of his girlfriend’s family along with her mentor, the larger-than-life English teacher Norman Laney. Daniel also wants to keep one or two ex-girlfriends firmly out of the picture. In the course of his summer, he must untangle his complicated personal life, satisfy the middle-class dreams of his parents for their Harvard-educated son, decide whether to enter law school or launch his own political career, and, incidentally, help his candidate defeat George Wallace, in a close and increasingly dirty race.
 
All the Governor’s Men is a darkly comic look at both the political process in general and a significant political chapter in Alabama history. This second novel in Katherine Clark’s Mountain Brook series depicts the social and political landscape of an Alabama world that is at once a place like no other and at the same time, a place like all others.

Neuromancer by William Gibson
Case had been the sharpest data-thief in the business, until vengeful former employees crippled his nervous system. But now a new and very mysterious employer recruits him for a last-chance run. The target: an unthinkably powerful artificial intelligence orbiting Earth in service of the sinister Tessier-Ashpool business clan. With a dead man riding shotgun and Molly, mirror-eyed street-samurai, to watch his back, Case embarks on an adventure that ups the ante on an entire genre of fiction.

GENERAL DISCUSSION: Pattern Recognition is another great Gibson novel.
Cayce Pollard is an expensive, spookily intuitive market-research consultant. In London on a job, she is offered a secret assignment: to investigate some intriguing snippets of video that have been appearing on the Internet. An entire subculture of people is obsessed with these bits of footage, and anybody who can create that kind of brand loyalty would be a gold mine for Cayce's client. But when her borrowed apartment is burgled and her computer hacked, she realizes there's more to this project than she had expected. 

Still, Cayce is her father's daughter, and the danger makes her stubborn. Win Pollard, ex-security expert, probably ex-CIA, took a taxi in the direction of the World Trade Center on September 11 one year ago, and is presumed dead. Win taught Cayce a bit about the way agents work. She is still numb at his loss, and, as much for him as for any other reason, she refuses to give up this newly weird job, which will take her to Tokyo and on to Russia. With help and betrayal from equally unlikely quarters, Cayce will follow the trail of the mysterious film to its source, and in the process will learn something about her father's life and death.

The Bronte sisters all published their first novels at the same time, under pseudonyms

Emily Bronte = Ellis Bell: her only published novel was Wuthering Heights
Lockwood, the new tenant of Thrushcross Grange, situated on the bleak Yorkshire moors, is forced to seek shelter one night at Wuthering Heights, the home of his landlord. There he discovers the history of the tempestuous events that took place years before; of the intense relationship between the gypsy foundling Heathcliff and Catherine Earnshaw; and how Catherine, forced to choose between passionate, tortured Heathcliff and gentle, well-bred Edgar Linton, surrendered to the expectations of her class. As Heathcliff's bitterness and vengeance at his betrayal is visited upon the next generation, their innocent heirs must struggle to escape the legacy of the past.

Charlotte Bronte = Currer Bell: her first novel was Jane Eyre
Having grown up an orphan in the home of her cruel aunt and at a harsh charity school, Jane Eyre becomes an independent and spirited survivor-qualities that serve her well as governess at Thornfield Hall. But when she finds love with her sardonic employer, Rochester, the discovery of his terrible secret forces her to make a choice. Should she stay with him whatever the consequences or follow her convictions, even if it means leaving her beloved?

Anne Bronte = Acton Bell: her first novel was Agnes Grey

The novel follows Agnes Grey, a governess, as she works in several bourgeois families. Scholarship and comments by Anne's sister Charlotte Brontë suggest the novel is largely based on Anne Brontë's own experiences as a governess for five years. Like her sister Charlotte's novel Jane Eyre, it addresses what the precarious position of governess entailed and how it affected a young woman. The choice of central character allows Anne to deal with issues of oppression and abuse of women and governesses, isolation and ideas of empathy. An additional theme is the fair treatment of animals. Agnes Grey also mimics some of the stylistic approaches of bildungsromans, employing ideas of personal growth and coming to age, but representing a character who in fact does not gain in virtue.

GENERAL DISCUSSION: There are several great museums dedicated, or holding collections dedicated, to the Bronte sisters. The Morgan Library & Museum and the Bronte Parsonage Museum.  

A Wuthering Heights musical tribute

Nelly Dean: A Return to Wuthering Heights by Alison Case

Young Nelly Dean has been Hindley’s closest companion for as long as she can remember, living freely at the great house, Wuthering Heights. But when the benevolence of the master brings a wild child into the house, Nelly learns she must follow in her mother’s footsteps, be called "servant" and give herself over completely to the demands of the Earnshaw family.

But Nelly is not the only one who finds her life disrupted by this strange newcomer. As death, illness, and passion sweep through the house, Nelly suffers heartache and betrayals at the hands of those she cherishes most, tempting her to leave it all behind. But when a new heir is born, a reign of violence begins that will test even Nelly’s formidable spirit as she finds out what it is to know true sacrifice.

Nelly Dean is a wonderment of storytelling and an inspired accompaniment to Emily Bronte’s adored work. It is the story of a woman who is fated to bear the pain of a family she is unable to leave, and unable to save.

What are YOU reading?

Genre Reading Group - Debut Novels

I really love debut novels. They often offer new stories and new perspectives in addition to a sometimes less polished writing style. I appreciate the slightly less glossy experience for the bravery and effort on the part of the new novelist. Some have published in arts journals, short story collections and anthologies, poetry publications, etc but that first novel length work of fiction, no doubt their baby for many a year, is truly a first outing. I don't claim to like them all, but I do appreciate each and every one because that is a person who doesn't sit around and say, as I do, "I really need to get started on that idea and write," but rather steps up to the keyboard and does the heavy lifting.

Consequently, it was with delight that I tallied the votes for the GRG's last round genre picks and saw that they wanted debut novels on the list! In doing a bit of cautious searching, I found that Paste magazine had posted a list of the top 10 debut novels of the decade, 2000-2009 and our library owned a copy of each and every one!

One topic of discussion that got everyone talking was exactly how much of your time to give to a book you may be struggling with, or just to any book in general if you've got a lot to read. Former librarian Nancy Pearl (She even has an action figure, shown above! I have two, one with Deluxe Reference Desk!) offers her Rule of 50: if you are 50 or younger, give it 50 pages. Readers 51 and over subtract their age from 100 and that is the number of pages you should read before giving up should you be struggling through a book.

At the GRG meeting last week, members brought in a wide variety of books to discuss and our meeting lasted almost two hours! Read through our list and pick your next great read!

Riding Lessons by Sara Gruen

As a world-class equestrian and Olympic contender, Annemarie Zimmer lived for the thrill of flight atop a strong, graceful animal. Then, at eighteen, a tragic accident destroyed her riding career and Harry, the beautiful horse she cherished.

Now, twenty years later, Annemarie is coming home to her dying father's New Hampshire horse farm. Jobless and abandoned, she is bringing her troubled teenage daughter to this place of pain and memory, where ghosts of an unresolved youth still haunt the fields and stables—and where hope lives in the eyes of the handsome, gentle veterinarian Annemarie loved as a girl . . . and in the seductive allure of a trainer with a magic touch.

But everything will change yet again with one glimpse of a white striped gelding startlingly similar to the one Annemarie lost in another lifetime. And an obsession is born that could shatter her fragile world.

Gruen wrote a sequel to this book, Flying Changes. She is also the author of the New York Times best-selling Water for Elephants, coming soon to the big screen starring Robert Pattinson, Reese Witherspoon, and Christoph Waltz, and Ape House.

Lovely Bones by Alice Sebold

Once in a generation a novel comes along that taps a vein of universal human experience, resonating with readers of all ages. THE LOVELY BONES is such a book -- a #1 bestseller celebrated at once for its artistry, for its luminous clarity of emotion, and for its astonishing power to lay claim to the hearts of millions of readers around the world.

"My name was Salmon, like the fish; first name, Susie. I was fourteen when I was murdered on December 6, 1973."

So begins the story of Susie Salmon, who is adjusting to her new home in heaven, a place that is not at all what she expected, even as she is watching life on earth continue without her -- her friends trading rumors about her disappearance, her killer trying to cover his tracks, her grief-stricken family unraveling. Out of unspeakable tragedy and loss, THE LOVELY BONES succeeds, miraculously, in building a tale filled with hope, humor, suspense, even joy.

Peter Jackson directed the film adaptation to this book. One of our GRG members commented on one of the most interesting points of the book, personally: how families deal with grief. Our GRG member mentioned another book that handles this topic well, Judith Guest's Ordinary People.

The Brief Wondrous Life of Oscar Wao by Junot Diaz

The most talked about—and praised—first novel of 2007, and winner of the Pulitzer Prize.

Oscar is a sweet but disastrously overweight ghetto nerd who—from the New Jersey home he shares with his old world mother and rebellious sister— dreams of becoming the Dominican J.R.R. Tolkien and, most of all, finding love. But Oscar may never get what he wants. Blame the fukú—a curse that has haunted Oscar’s family for generations, following them on their epic journey from Santo Domingo to the USA. Encapsulating Dominican-American history, The Brief Wondrous Life of Oscar Wao opens our eyes to an astonishing vision of the contemporary American experience and explores the endless human capacity to persevere—and risk it all—in the name of love.

This debut novel won a Pulitzer Prize! Well done Mr. Diaz! Those interested in reading more about the culture of the Dominican Republic might enjoy In the Time of the Butterflies by Julia Alvarez. This book was adapted to film in 2001.

The Wives of Henry Oades by Johanna Moran

n 1899 Henry Oades discovers he has two wives -- and many dilemmas! In 1890, Henry Oades decided to undertake the arduous sea voyage from England to New Zealand in order to further his family's fortunes. Here they settled on the lush but wild coast -- although it wasn't long before disaster struck in the most unexpected of ways. A local Maori tribe, incensed at their treatment at the hands of the settlers, kidnapped Mrs Oades and her four children, and vanished into the rugged hills surrounding the town. Henry searched ceaselessly for his family, but two grief-stricken years later was forced to conclude that they must be dead. In despair he shipped out to San Francisco to start over, eventually falling in love with and marrying a young widow.

In the meantime, Margaret Oades and her children were leading a miserable existence, enslaved to the local tribe. When they contracted smallpox they were cast out and, ill and footsore, made their way back to town, five years after they were presumed dead. Discovering that Henry was now half a world away, they were determined to rejoin him. So months later they arrived on his doorstep in America and Henry Oades discovered that he had two wives and many dilemmas! This is a darkly comic but moving historical fiction debut about love and family, based on a controversial newspaper account from the early 1900s.

The GRG member who brought this book shared that it was almost based on a true story. An 1870's newspaper published the sad tale of the Oades but MUCH later the story was revealed to be false. Unfortunately, it had already made it's way into legal textbooks by that time! Read more about this story from the Inland Valley Daily Bulletin and The Museum of Hoaxes.

The Madonnas of Leningrad by Debra Dean

Bit by bit, the ravages of age are eroding Marina's grip on the everyday. An elderly Russian woman now living in America, she cannot hold on to fresh memories—the details of her grown children's lives, the approaching wedding of her grandchild—yet her distant past is miraculously preserved in her mind's eye.

Vivid images of her youth in war-torn Leningrad arise unbidden, carrying her back to the terrible fall of 1941, when she was a tour guide at the Hermitage Museum and the German army's approach signaled the beginning of what would be a long, torturous siege on the city. As the people braved starvation, bitter cold, and a relentless German onslaught, Marina joined other staff members in removing the museum's priceless masterpieces for safekeeping, leaving the frames hanging empty on the walls to symbolize the artworks' eventual return. As the Luftwaffe's bombs pounded the proud, stricken city, Marina built a personal Hermitage in her mind—a refuge that would stay buried deep within her, until she needed it once more. . . .

While not a debut novel, it was impossible for me not to think of David Benioff's City of Thieves. This fast-paced thriller is also set in occupied Leningrad but is about two unlikely allies who must find one dozen eggs to escape begin executed. It may sound amusing, but this cold, gritty novel is anything but comical.

Major Pettigrew's Last Stand by Helen Simonson

In the small village of Edgecombe St. Mary in the English countryside lives Major Ernest Pettigrew (retired), the unlikely hero of Helen Simonson’s wondrous debut. Wry, courtly, opinionated, and completely endearing, the Major leads a quiet life valuing the proper things that Englishmen have lived by for generations: honor, duty, decorum, and a properly brewed cup of tea. But then his brother’s death sparks an unexpected friendship with Mrs. Jasmina Ali, the Pakistani shopkeeper from the village. Drawn together by their shared love of literature and the loss of their spouses, the Major and Mrs. Ali soon find their friendship blossoming into something more. But village society insists on embracing him as the quintessential local and regarding her as the permanent foreigner. Can their relationship survive the risks one takes when pursuing happiness in the face of culture and tradition?

Do you have a favorite first novel? Tell us about it here or on Facebook at www.facebook.com/emmetoneallibrary!

Happy reading!

Holley

Top 10 First Novels of 2009

I never hesitate to tell anyone that debut novels are some of my favorite books! The Booklist article I have quotes below says it best so I'll only add that I love to try the books just for that oftentimes rough hewn feel. Rarely does an author come right out the gate with something approaching perfection; the exception that immediately comes to mind is Khaled Hosseini's Kite Runner. Do you remember the first time you read that book?

I don't require perfection. In fact, too much perfection puts you in danger of running into flat, one-dimensional characters. Your imagination needs some rough edges to catch itself on.

Make your next choice a debut novel and see where it takes you!

From the Booklist website:

Readers pick up a first novel with both excitement and trepidation. An untried author is always a reader’s gamble. But pick up the following first novels, all reviewed in Booklist over the past year, with no trepidation, only excitement.

Dream House by Valerie Laken

Laken is masterful at character construction as she explores issues of race and class.

A Fortunate Age by Joanna Smith Rakoff

This novel provides a pitch-perfect portrait of the generation that came of age in the 1990's.

Grace Hammer by Sara Stockbridge

Stockbridge deftly captures the mood of Dickensian London in this gripping debut.

The Invisible Mountain by Carolina De Robertis

Words, so beautifully employed by this author, seem inadequate to convey the essence of this twentieth-century Uruguayan woman-center family saga.

Lime Tree Can't Bear Orange by Amanda Smyth

In lithe, lyracal prose, the author evokes the lush language of the West Indies and the modest lives lived at the mercy of fate.

Mathilda Savitch by Victor Lodato

Lodato indelibly captures the fragile vulnerability and fearless bravado of adolescence.

Miles From Nowhere by Anmi Mun

There is nothing simplistic or sensationalized here as Mun, a writer of gravitas, portrays the dispossessed and the cast out.

The Moon Opera by Be Feiyu

At once a sad and lovely story, this slender novel on a rather narrow topic - the Peking Opera - nevertheless resonates with a clear, crystalline tone.

Precious by Sandra Novack

Trouble simmers beneath the surface of a bucolic Pennsylvania town in Novack's dramatic, elegantly rendered debut.

Under This Unbroken Sky by Shandi Mitchell

The author's screenwriting skills serve her well in this remarkable portrait of a Ukrainian farming family in Alberta during the late 1930's.

To this list I'll add a couple of my favorites of the last few years:

Lulu Meets God and Doubts Him by Danielle Ganek

Hothouse Flower and the Nine Plants of Desire by Margot Berwin

The Well and the Mine by Gin Phillips

The Gargoyle by Andrew Davidson

The Lace Reader by Brunonia Barry

Poison Study by Maria Snyder

Black Ships by Jo Graham

Mr. Shivers by Robert Jackson Bennett

Alabama Moon by Watt Key

Beat the Reaper by Josh Bazell

I'd better stop there or I'll be here all night.

:-D

*Have you read any of these yet? Do you have a favorite debut novel?*

Happy reading!

Holley