The 40th book of the year so far is a translation from the French, by a Vietnamese writer, Linda Lê (whose family left Vietnam for France when she was about 14.). The English title is The Three Fates, and I picked it up because I was told that Lê was the Vietnamese writer to read (she is critically acclaimed in literary circles), and I was ( Read more... )

   I've had a copy of the Compass Books edition of Stefan Zweig's The Royal Game (the link takes you to a collection with two more stories in it than my old 1959 paperback) on my to-be-read shelf for probably three decades. When the movie The Grand Budapest Hotel brought his name back into public attention, I decided it might be time to finally ( Read more... )

     The book that all the WPF students were to read for June's Residency was Neil Gaiman's 1-grimace short novel, The Ocean at the End of the Lane. Since Gaiman is one of those authors I try to keep up with, I decided to get it, read it, and possibly use it to illustrate elements of my lectures.
     I'm glad I made that choice, because it ( Read more... )

         So I picked up Goa, by Kara Dalkey, and had it autographed, and it has only been sitting on my to-be-read shelves for, um, well, 18 years. Which is sadly typical, for me.

This book is subtitled Blood of the Goddess, Volume One, and the reality is that this isn't a book in itself, it's the first act of a book. There is no real ( Read more... )

        I read Alexander McCall Smith's The Miracle at Speedy Motors during our recent trip to Savannah both because I generally take a Ladies' No. 1 Detective Agency story on vacations, and in self-defense. The self-defense is against the anger of my wife, who is reading the series along after me and is irritated that I'm six years behind the ( Read more... )

         I've been checking out Women of Sand and Myrrh, by Hanān al-Shaykh, as a candidate for my World Literature course. I finally got to finish it during a recent trip, and it has definitely secured a place on my next syllabus.

I first read al-Shaykh in the Anchor Book of Modern Arabic Fiction, and that put this book on my radar.

( Read more... )

         The Wallet of Kai Lung, by Ernest Bramah, is a book I picked up chasing a recommendation in Noel Perrin's bibliophile classic A Reader's Delight. The book that Perrin actually recommends is the second of the five or so Kai Lung collections, called Kai Lung's Golden Hours. But when I finally came across a copy of that one, the dealer also ( Read more... )

         Willa Cather's My Ántonia, a candidate for the next time I teach American Literature 1915-present, is a book I've been worrying away at for a month now. Not because I didn't like it, but because it's a contemplative read, and I've rarely had a contemplative hour these last weeks.

I have to admit that I just haven't read enough ( Read more... )

         So I'm reading The Secret History of Moscow, by Ekaterina Sedia, and I come to this:

"Why did you shoot him?" he asked Elena.
    She shot him an irritated look--...

I like the book, but oh for crying out loud. Then just pages later:

...the soft thing by his feet was Slava, alive but lying prostrate on the floor, ( Read more... )

         I picked up a copy of Kage Baker's The Hotel Under the Sand at a World Fantasy convention, hoping to finally get to read something long by her, before we crossed paths. Sadly, she died around that time, and I fear that this may also have orphaned this fine magical-steampunky children's novel.
        It starts in rather the fashion of ( Read more... )