Inspiration: hyphenated author

I have to admit that some of these inspirations are easier to blog about than others - and this one is challenging!

Mostly, I'm just trying to get you to step outside your comfort zone and pick a book for a weird reason, and this one is a stupid, arbitrary piece of punctuation! Have a little fun with this one, and don't take it too seriously.

PS: It doesn't matter if the hyphen is in the first name or last name!

• Jussi Adler-Olsen (Danish mystery, thriller)
• William Baring-Gould (Sherlock Holmes scholar)
• Lily Brooks-Dalton (Good Morning, Midnight)
• Ivy Compton-Burnett (Victorian novelist, English)
• Nicole Y. Dennis-Benn (literary fiction, Jamaican)
• Caite Dolan-Leach (suspense, mystery)
• Seth Grahame-Smith (classic-contemporary horror mashups)
• Patrisse Khan-Cullors (timely activism nonfiction)
• Chang-Rae Lee (literary fiction, Korean-American)
• Jo-Ann Mapson (fiction about women in the American Southwest)
• Alexandria Marzano-Lesnevich (The Fact of a Body: A Murder and a Memoir)
• Gina McMurchy-Barber (teen fiction, Canadian)
• Lori Rader-Day (mystery, suspense)
• Antoine de Saint-Exupery (The Little Prince)
• Jean-Paul Sartre (French philosopher)
• Gil Scott-Heron (poet, the "godfather" of rap)


• Hugh Trevor-Roper (European history)

Let's Go (So We Can Get Back): A Memoir of Recording with Wilco, Etc. by Jeff Tweedy

In an honest, funny look at his life, indy musician Jeff Tweedy opens up about his family, his career, and how his brain works. It's fascinating!

It's no secret I love a good music bio, and what separates the good from bad is honesty and introspection. Tweedy owns it here, with a self-deprecating humor that certainly entertains. He's thoughtful about his creative process without being precious about it, and he reminisces about former friendships, band breakups and makeups, and even how his marriage works.

Confession: I will read this book again, on audiobook, because Tweedy narrates it himself! (I couldn't wait, so I read it on paper first.)

Behind You by Jacqueline Woodson

In a follow-up to If You Come Softly, Woodson explores what a life without Miah feels like for his family, friends, and girlfriend.

It's a short book (about a hundred pages) and I'm not sure how strongly it would stand on its own if you haven't read the first book. But as a continuation of the story - as a pondering of "what comes next" I enjoyed this revisiting of the characters. Each character deals with grief in their own way, and for that exploration, it might be valuable for teens - you get to see lots of different ways to react to life's changes.

Fox 8 by George Saunders

The effect of our mass consumerism is reflected through animal allegory in this brief novella, a letter to "yumans" by an inquisitive fox.

Construction of a shopping mall disrupts life for a skulk of foxes, disrupting their entire ecosystem. In an attempt to understand and overcome, Fox 8 defies his leader and investigates this new complex.

At just 64 pages, the story is both funny and heartbreaking. It's the kind of tale that requires some afterthought, and I may be pondering it for quite some time to come.

Young Jane Young by Gabrielle Zevin

How do you recover your life after a youthful indiscretion makes you a pop culture punchline? Jane Young reinvents herself but finds that avoiding her past may not be the path to happiness.

In a stupid scandal with a much-older married congressman, political intern Aviva destroys her intended future. She successfully completes her college degree but finds no one will hire her, no matter how far away from her Florida past. So she changes her name, cuts ties, and moves to Maine to start a business as a wedding and events planner. Eventually, though, the past is bound to catch up with her.

I enjoyed this book quite a bit, as I expected - I've loved Zevin in the past, and she's again at top form here. This could have been a fluffy light chick lit kind of book, but she gives Aviva/Jane more depth with a heart and a brain. The revelation of her past isn't a real tragedy for Jane, and how she chooses to face it down is a real 21st Century triumph.

Inspiration: graphic novel

I've enjoyed comics since I used to borrow them from the boys in junior high, but it was only once I started working in libraries that I learned about graphic novels.

Generally, graphic novels differ from serial comics and manga because they're longer, compiled in a single volume, and meant to stand alone. You know, like a book!

I have to say the graphic novel has gained serious literary cred in the last two decades. People will scoff that comics "aren't really reading" or that they're simple - and that just means they've never actually read one.

Many graphic novels are complex, thoughtful, literary, and true, real art. Some are for kids, and some are decidedly adult: you can find nonfiction, reinterpretations of classic literature, superheroes, dark fantasies, light comedy, sex ... really, just about anything you're into can be found in graphic novel form too.

One graphic novel even won a Pulitzer Prize! The nonfiction graphic novel "Maus: A Survivor's Tale - My Father Bleeds History" by Art Spiegelman is a memoir, where the author interviewed his Polish Jewish father about the Holocaust. It's also widely regarded as one of the greatest graphic novels ever written.

A few others of note:

• Fun Home by Alison Bechdel - Family, funerals, and figuring out you're gay. It even spun off a Broadway musical!
• Persepolis by Marjane Satrapi - A memoir of girlhood in Iran.
• El Deafo by Cece Bell - Childhood is even more awkward when you wear a giant hearing aid.
• March by John Lewis, Andrew Aydin, and Nate Powell - An autobiographical trilogy about the Civil Rights Movement.
• This One Summer by Mariko Tamaki and Jillian Tamaki - The growing-up summer that things changed.
• Boxers and Saints by Gene Luen Yang - A nested pair of novels set in China during the Boxer Uprising.

Since 1997, the Ignatz Award has given awards for graphic novels. See nominees and winners here.

I found a wikipedia list of award-winning graphic novels that may be useful. The comics industry and the book industry have many, many awards, but graphic novels aren't usually segregated from other content.

The Gown: A Novel of the Royal Wedding by Jennifer Robson

My sewing friends and fans of historical fiction will love this one - a novel based on the real-life women who sewed the gown worn by England's future Queen Elizabeth when she married in 1947.

Two women, survivors of the recent wars, become friends over their embroidery frame working in the London fashion house of Norman Hartnell. Because of their skill, the friends are chosen to work on a very special, ultra-secret dress. Their stories are contrasted with a modern Canadian woman seeking information about her recently deceased grandmother, who bequeathed her some unexplained samples of exquisite lace embroidery.

The book is very, very well done. I was captivated by the historical fiction sections, with these brave women who had survived so much. Also, there's so much of the story that's true and it's possible to lose yourself for hours researching the real fashion houses of Europe and royal sartorial history.

Inspiration: magical

I'm defining "magic" as books where charms or spells and supernatural powers are used. The kind of stuff not defined by physics and lab science. Mostly thought to be fiction, but I'll let you make up your own mind.

You've got to be able to suspend your disbelief and really fall into the book to truly enjoy a magical story. Things happen that can't happen, and that's just the way it goes. Remember when you were a kid and could do that? Try to recapture it.

Here's a list of magical stories I've personally read and enjoyed, including internal links to this blog's posts where I discussed them (if I did).

Note: I have an admitted weakness for vampires, but they're not really "magical" so I'll save that list for another day. ;) 

• I, Coriander by Sally Gardner - A fantastic, captivating middle-grade book about a 17th Century London girl who ends up in the land of fairies.
• The Eye of Zoltar by Jasper Fforde - A high-rise rest home for magicians, the orphan who tries to keep it all afloat, and a quest to save the world's last dragons.
• The House at the End of Hope Street by Menna Van Praag - A magical, living house that protects women in need.
• A Discovery of Witches by Deborah Harkness - The first in her All Saints Series, where a witch and a vampire fall in forbidden love. 
• The Night Circus by Erin Morgenstern - Highly acclaimed novel, a steampunk magic circus.
• The Grimm Legacy by Polly Shulman - A library of magical materials, collected by the famous Grimm Brothers.
• The Lace Reader by Brunonia Barry - Salem's modern witches, who tell fortunes by focusing through hand-made lace.

I also could simply recommend nearly anything by Neil Gaiman or Terry Pratchett, but if I have to choose just one from each of them, I'll recommend:

• Stardust by Neil Gaiman - A naive young man who vows to bring back a falling star to win a girl's love, and the profane Earthly embodiment of that star who doesn't want to be captured and held prisoner.
• The Wee Free Men by Terry Pratchett - Crivens! A girl witch (and a clan of drunken, thieving, miniature warriors) tries to save her baby brother from the Queen of Fairies.

What's your favorite book of magic?

Inspiration: blue cover

The real goal of these "color cover" inspirations is to make you pick a book for some stupid, arbitrary reason - because maybe you'll stumble into something good you otherwise would have overlooked!

In that vein, I've decided to give you a list of books I've read and recommend that have blue covers, without notes. Just take my word!

• Wonder by R.J. Palacio
• Life of Pi by Yann Martel
• Fates and Furies by Lauren Groff
• The Light Between Oceans by M.L. Stedman
• Outlander by Diana Gabaldon
• Origin by Dan Brown
• A Million Little Pieces by James Frey
• The Fault In Our Stars by John Green
• All the Light We Cannot See by Anthony Doerr
• Less by Andrew Sean Greer
• A Discovery of Witches by Deborah Harkness

Also, a few with blue covers that are still on my personal to-be-read pile:

• Flight Behavior by Barbara Kingsolver
• Catch-22 by Joseph Heller
• Firefly Lane by Kristin Hannah
• A Shot in the Dark by Lynne Truss

What are you reading that's blue? Ever pick up a book blind to its story or characters?

Cherry by Nico Walker

If you're curious about the throes of drug addiction, this one's right in the middle of it. It's an ugly book - but that's not to say anything about its quality. It's just that the book deals with a terrible situation, a terrible addiction, and a terrible life.

The book's a sort of run-on rambling journal of a druggie kid who joins the Army, goes to Iraq, lives long enough to come home, then robs banks to support his heroin addiction. It's raw, bloody, and horrific. He doesn't blame anybody else (but neither does he take any blame himself). You really don't want to think that this shit happens, and is happening. But I'm sure it is.

It's a novel. Fiction. But 30 seconds with Google tells you Walker's a veteran in prison and apparently has written about what he knows. It reminds me a great deal of James Frey's "A Million Little Pieces," which was originally touted as nonfiction then revealed to be a fabrication.