“He had an awful lot of white hair combed into an elaborate sweep on either side of his face, and eyebrows so extravagant they looked like pets.”~~The Summer We Read Gatsby by Danielle Ganek
Cassie and half-sister Peck have to deal with their aunt’s cottage in the Hamptons following her death. And let the comparisons to Gatsby begin.
Double happy birthday today: my dad and my youngest daughter (who turns 22). WOO!! Celebration time.
“Give me my own poems, she said, and I’ll give you back all I have learned (forgetting for the moment she had learned almost nothing) and the poems don’t have to be good – just my own, the work of an ordinary woman.”~~from the poem “Faust, 1972” by Sharon Olds in the anthology Not A Muse: The Inner Lives of Women, A World Poetry Anthology
Some of the best poems from masters and fresh voices celebrate women.
“You know what I’m saying.”~~Sexually, I’m More of a Switzerland by David Rose
Lovers and cynics, lend me your ear! This is one of the funniest books I’ve read this year. Rose, the ad director for the London Review of Books shares some of the quirkiest and scariest lonely hearts ads place in the publication. A perfect escape.
“She sniffed, raising a plucked eyebrow.”~~The Summer of Skinny Dipping by Amanda Howels
Mia and her family spend the summer in the Hamptons with her aunt’s family. But the teen realizes that as she and her cousins get older, nothing remains the same. Enter Simon, a cute but mysterious neighbor boy, who Mia begins meeting for nightly swims in the ocean. Just what does it take for anyone to fit in?
“‘It is an unlucky thing, this praying.'”~~The Private Memoirs and Confessions of a Justified Sinner by James Hogg
Originally published in 1824, demonic possession and murder are explained from a Highland shephard’s P.O.V. Eerie and funny at the same time.
“Jim: Oo-oo-oo!”~~The Complete Lyrics of Oscar Hammerstein II edited by Amy Asch
Not a critical biography of the famous composer, but every lyric the man ever wrote. The book is filled with more than 850 songs and a description of the show or review the songs were written for. Fun reading, especially for music lovers.
“It followed that she would be wary of the women’s liberationists, now that they had begun to stir the waters.”~~The Last of Her Kind by Sigrid Nunez
Georgette and Ann meet at Barnard in 1958. They’re roommates from very different backgrounds. Years later, after the friendship has ended, the two lives intertwine once more. An examination of 1960s and 70s counterculture.
“All morning we went up an easy grade, following along the creek.”~~Letters of E.B. White by E.B. White
Eight decades of letters between E.B. White, his family, and his fellow authors. Did you know the author did not like writing letters? Or, at least that’s what he once told others.
“It dealt farcically with the theme of father against son that Joyce was to use to such good purpose in his later books.”~~James Joyce by Richard Ellman
A splendied autobiography about James Joyce.
“However, after failing the state examination for teacher certification, he was sent to the University of Vienna to prepare to take it again.”~~ Pigeons: The Fascinating Saga of the World’s Most Revered and Reviled Bird by Andrew D. Blechman
City dwellers complain about the nuisance, but Blechman uncovers the pigeon’s history and those who raise the birds. Interesting reading about a bird with a brain the size of a lima bean.
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