Nancy's Picks

Store owner Nancy Olson loves to get the right book into someone's hands.  You'll often hear Nancy as a guest on Tom Kearney's radio program or on NPR, suggesting great reading. 

Nothing Gold Can Stay: Stories (Hardcover)

By Ron Rash
$24.99
ISBN-13: 9780062202710
Availability: On Our Shelves Now
Published: Ecco, 2/2013
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I've been reading Ron Rash's forthcoming book of stories, Nothing Gold Can Stay, which will be released by Ecco in February, and they're dark, beautiful and affecting. They're set in Appalachia and Kirkus's starred review said, "Rash's oneness with the region and its people makes an indelible impression." Ron will be here Thursday, February 21!

The Burgess Boys (Hardcover)

By Elizabeth Strout
$26.00
ISBN-13: 9781400067688
Availability: On Our Shelves Now
Published: Random House, 3/2013
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Elizabeth Strout is one of my big favorites, and her new book, The Burgess Boys, immersed me from the first page. It's about three siblings, raised in small-town Maine, and how they're affected by a tragic accident which kills their father. Her characters are finely and sympathetically wrought and this rich novel wastes not one word. If you haven't read this author's work, do read any (or all) of her previous novels: Pulitzer Prize-winning Olive Kitteridge, Abide With Me, Amy and Isabelle. She's certainly one of our shining literary stars. (This book comes out in March.)

Watergate (Paperback)

By Thomas Mallon
$15.95
ISBN-13: 9780307474650
Availability: On Our Shelves Now
Published: Vintage, 1/2013
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Watergate is a fictional portrayal of the inner workings of the Watergate scandal.  As with all good historical fiction, it begs the question of what's real and what's made up. But I didn't worry about it, I just enjoyed it. From the NYT review: "We’re propelled forward and kept highly entertained by the colorful characters, the delicious insider details, the intelligence of the dialogue…"

Mr g: A Novel About the Creation (Paperback)

By Alan Lightman
$15.00
ISBN-13: 9780307744852
Availability: On Our Shelves Now
Published: Vintage, 10/2012
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I loved it! "So God wakes up from a nap and decides to create the universe. One thing leads to another, and before long there are time, space, matter, then stars, planets, animate matter, consciousness, and, finally, intelligent human beings with moral dilemmas. Things have gotten out of hand. This strikingly original philosophical fable is playful and profound--superbly written--a rich reading experience."

All I Did Was Shoot My Man: A Leonid McGill Mystery (Paperback)

By Walter Mosley
$15.00
ISBN-13: 9780451239167
Availability: On Our Shelves Now
Published: NAL Trade, 2/2013
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I grieved the ending of the Easy Rawlins series, set in L.A., but am enjoying his new series featuring another interesting protagonist, P.I. Leonid McGill, a NYC ex-con who wants to atone for his past criminal life. All I Did Was Shoot My Man is the latest in this series, about McGill's attempt to help a woman get her life back on track after being imprisoned unjustly, while his own family life comes unraveled. Publishers Weekly's starred review called the book "complex and satisfying." This series just gets better.

The Orphan Master's Son (Paperback)

By Adam Johnson
$15.00
ISBN-13: 9780812982626
Availability: On Our Shelves Now
Published: Random House Trade Paperbacks, 8/2012
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It is a tribute to Adam Johnson's writing skills to have created such sympathetic, humane, even sometimes humorous, characters in the bleak, dark environment of North Korea. I read this novel with wonder, and was inspired to learn more about the country. This is a rare accomplishment--a masterpiece--and our whole staff looks forward to getting it into the hands of our customers.

You Deserve Nothing (Hardcover)

By Alexander Maksik
$15.00
ISBN-13: 9781609450489
Availability: On Our Shelves Now
Published: Europa Editions, 8/2011

Another excellent book from Europa, (this) is largely a character study of a brilliant teacher at a prestigious private school in Paris. His students are devoted to him, though his teaching methods raise the eyebrows of his colleagues and superiors. Emotionally scarred by tragedy in his personal life and seduced by Paris's carnality and beauty, he succumbs to temptation, which changes the course of his life.

From the starred Booklist review: "... the novel advances its narrative through multiple perspectives, much as Faulkner does in As I Lay Dying . . . ..intelligent and intellectual, it is both a tribute to brilliant teachers and a cautionary tale of their imperfections.”

The Family Fang (Paperback)

By Kevin Wilson
$13.99
ISBN-13: 9780061579059
Availability: On Our Shelves Now
Published: Ecco, 4/2012
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I can't rave enough about Kevin Wilson's The Family Fang(Ecco $23.99).  A full page review in Time Magazine this week called it "irresistible."  It is, and it is brilliant.  Caleb and Camille Fang are performing artists who use their unwilling children in their bizarre, outrageous acts, and this makes it very difficult for the children to live normal adult lives  When their worlds crash down, the kids are forced to move back in with their parents, who are planning one last grand performance.  "Filled with Kevin Wilson’s endless creativity, vibrant prose, sharp humor, and keen sense of the complex performances that unfold in the relationships of people who love one another, [it] is a masterfully executed tale that is as bizarre as it is touching." 

Nightwoods (Paperback)

By Charles Frazier
$16.00
ISBN-13: 9780812978803
Availability: On Our Shelves Now
Published: Random House Trade Paperbacks, 6/2012
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I just finished an advanced copy of Charles Frazier's Nightwoods, and he hit another home run! Same great writing as in Cold Mountain, but a very different plot and time (late 1950's).

A reclusive young woman, caretaker of an isolated, now closed old lodge in the NC mountains, becomes another kind of caretaker--her traumatized nephew and niece are sent to her after witnessing the murder of their mother by their stepfather. The characters are rich--"mostly walking wounded, semi literate people, scarred with the memory of wasted opportunities.

Read this as a crime fiction or a love story. Read it as a journey of self discovery or a travel narrative, but always keep in mind redemption and resurrection."

Turn of Mind (Paperback)

By Alice LaPlante
$15.00
ISBN-13: 9780802145901
Availability: On Our Shelves Now
Published: Grove Press, 3/2012
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This is an astounding achievement.  The main character, a brilliant surgeon now retired because of dementia, is suspected of killing her best friend (some of the victim's fingers are expertly amputated), but the doctor can't remember what happened.  The story, told in her fractured, eloquent, sometimes lucid voice (this is the amazing part of the book), is haunting and unforgettable. 

The Last Werewolf (Paperback)

By Glen Duncan
$14.95
ISBN-13: 9780307742179
Availability: On Our Shelves Now
Published: Vintage, 5/2012
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I never thought I'd be writing about a werewolf novel, but when I was at a book conference, I met Glen Duncan, British author of The Last Werewolf (Knopf $25.95). I thought I'd bring a signed copy back to the guys on our staff who would enjoy it, but, after being told that, as a woman, I probably wouldn't like it (challenge!), and then meeting and talking with the fascinating (and delightful) guy who wrote it, I started it and couldn't put it down. Yes, it's bloody (about a werewolf, after all), but it's also brilliant, and even playful. (The werewolf's name is Jacob Marlowe, an allusion to Christopher Marlowe's Doctor Faustus.) Duncan challenges the genre and succeeds, but it's not for the faint hearted!