Relatively Recent Reading

[extrajoker]

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JULY

• Half Magic by Edward Eager, with illustrations by N.M. Bodecker (192 pp.)
  first line: "It began one day in summer about thirty years ago, and it happened to four children."
  
  
• Mazes and Labyrinths in Great Britain by John Martineau (58 pp.)
  first line: "The first section of this book deals with 'Mazes', designs in which you can get lost, where choices are offered to the walker and some paths may not lead to the goal; mazes are, by and large, a modern trend."
  
  
• Unshapely Things by Mark del Franco (305 pp.)
  first line: "The alley was slick with rain and a rainbow-hued slop I didn't want to think about."
  
  
• Nightlife by Rob Thurman (339 pp.)
  first line (of the prologue): "People...they do the craziest shit."
  first line (of the first chapter): "Most kids don't believe in fairy tales very long."
  
  
• M: A Graphic Novel Based on the Film by Fritz Lang by Jon J. Muth (189 pp.)
  
  
• Spinners by Donna Jo Napoli and Richard Tchen (197 pp.)
  first line: "Late afternoon heat strokes the young man's belly."

AUGUST

• How Babies are Made by Andrew C. Andry and Steven Schepp (with illustrations by Blake Hampton) (picture book)
  first line: "This is a story about you."
  
  
• Hex Hall by Rachel Hawkins (323 pp.)
  first line: "Felicia Miller was crying in the bathroom. Again."
  
  
• Amulet, Book One: The Stonekeeper by Kazu Kibuishi (187 pp.) (graphic novel)
  
  
• Pirate Haiku: Bilge-Sucking Poems / Of Booty, Grog, and Wenches / For Scurvy Sea Dogs by Michael P. Spradlin (185 pp.)
  first line (of the introduction): "What you hold in your hand is a piece of unparalleled history."
  
  
• The Reformed Vampire Support Group by Catherine Jinks (362 pp.)
  first line: "Nina was stuck."
  
  
• Devilish by Maureen Johnson (263 pp.)
  first line (of the prologue): "So this was how it ended."
  first line (of the first chapter): "The reviews from the Junior Judges had gone up on the web site in the middle of the night."
  
  
• Outlaw: The Legend of Robin Hood by Tony Lee, with art by Sam Hart and Artur Fujita (graphic novel)
  
  
• 101 Salivations: For the Love of Dogs by Rachael Hale (picture book)
  first line: "On a brisk walk through the park one morning, I found Darcy, a tiny, trembling angel on my feet."
  
  
• UnCONventional: Twenty-Two Tales of Paranormal Gatherings Under the Guise of Conventions, edited by Kate Kaynak and Trisha J. Wooldridge (314 pp.)
  stories: Family Ties / Shadow Harper / Myrtle / Photo of a Mermaid / Belief / The Sirens / M.U.S.E. / What We Found in Our Room / All In / Rejecting Your Reality / Beast in Show / Super Soaker / A Comic End / AlGorethm / So, These Monsters Walk into a Con / Escalation is Academic / The Ascension / The Next Con / Firestorm / Event at MileHiCon / The Waltz / Steampunk Fairy Chick

SEPTEMBER

• Girl of Nightmares by Kendare Blake (332 pp.)
  first line: "I think I killed a girl who looked like this once."
  
  
• The Wind in the Rose-Bush and Other Stories of the Supernatural by Mary Wilkins Freeman, with an afterword by Alfred Bendixen (258 pp.)
  stories: The Wind in the Rose-bush / The Shadows on the Wall / Luella Miller / The Southwest Chamber / The Vacant Lot / The Lost Ghost
  
  
• Jeff, One Lonely Guy by Jeff Ragsdale, David Shields and Michael Logan (147 pp)
  first line (of the introduction): "In late October 2011, my friend and former student Jeff Ragsdale posted this flyer around New York City: 'If anyone wants / to talk about / anything, / call me / (347) 469-3173. / Jeff, one lonely guy'"
  
  
• I Paint What I See by Gahan Wilson (126 pp.)
  
  
• So B. It by Sarah Weeks (245 pp.)
  first line: "If truth was a crayon and it was up to me to put a wrapper around it and names its color, I know just what I would call it--dinosaur skin."
  
  
• The Frog and Toad Treasury by Arnold Lobel
  includes: Frog and Toad are Friends (64 pp.), Frog and Toad Together (64 pp.) and Frog and Toad All Year (64 pp.)
  
  
• Rosemary and Rue by Seanan McGuire (346 pp.)
  first line (of the prologue): "June 9, 1995 / The phone was ringing. Again."
  first line (of the first chapter): "December 23, 2009: fourteen years, six months later / December had come to San Francisco in fits and starts, like a visitor who wasn't sure he wanted to stay."

OCTOBER

• Fables: Inherit the Wind by Bill Willingham, with art by Mark Buckingham, et al. (graphic novel)
  
  
• The Year of Secret Assignments* by Jaclyn Moriarty (340 pp.)
  first line: "QUICK!"
  
  
• Tombstone Humor compiled by Earle Tempel (204 pp.)
  first line (of the foreword): "Life is a manuscript which you add to every day, and then suddenly you are at the last sheet, and you write 'The End,' only perhaps it isn't quite the end."
  
  
• Tantalize by Cynthia Leitich Smith (311 pp.)
  first line: "Lousy idea, us sitting like that on the railroad tracks."
  
  
• archy and mehitabel by Don Marquis (193 pp.)
  first line: "The circumstances of Archy's first appearance are narrated in the following extract from the Sun Dial column of the New York Sun."
  
  
• The Murder of Bindy Mackenzie (491 pp.)
  first line: "i have never spoken to Bindy, / but i am sure that behind her extremely annoying personality she is a beautiful human being."
  
  
• Toto the Tornado Kitten by Jonathan Hall, with illustrations by Carol Ruzicka (picture book)
  first line: "My name is Toto The Kitten."
  
  
• Once a Witch by Carolyn MacCullough (292 pp.)
  first line (of the prologue): "I was born on the night of Samhain, when the barrier between the worlds is whisper thin and when magic, old magic, sings its heady and sweet song to anyone who cares to hear it."
  first line (of the first chapter): "'Twenty more minutes, Hector,' I say, 'and I'm free of this hellcrater.'"
  
  
• Thresholds by Nina Kiriki Hoffman (243 pp.)
  first line: "It was Maya's second week in the new house."