Author Read-Alikes

Have you been bitten by the vampire bug and want to read beyond Stephenie Meyer’s Twilight series?  Or are you looking for a good novel to read while waiting  for your turn on the reserve list for the new Dan Brown?

Try this website by the Multnomah County Library, Portland Oregon. It offers suggested reads in more than 20 categories including both author and title read-a-likes.

If you haven’t discovered our own Bookletters, we have compiled several reading lists including recommended book club choices and award winners. Our subscription database, Novelist, available both from home and in the library also has an Author Read-alikes.

Next time you are in the Library, visit our Readers’ Advisory Center on the second floor for lots of suggestions on your next loved title.

Photo of solar eclipse by Smithsonian Institution.   No known copyright restrictions.

Bookgroup Guides

Next time you are looking for help on discussion topics  for your  book group’s  selection, visit readinggroupguides.com.  The site contains discussion guides for over 2800 titles as well as several “best of” lists of favorite titles.

Register your group and sign up for e-newsletters.  Participate in surveys and win free books.  Read the blog with links to author favorites.  Read the section on starting and running a book group as well as advice on choosing books.

Another great source for discussion questions is Novelist.  Novelist is a database available through the library and contains summaries on thousands of fiction titles as well as biographical information on authors and discussion ideas.

Lastly, visit the websites of  individual publishers who frequently compile lists of discussion questions for their current titles.

Photo of lightbulbs (cc) from faithgoble and republished here under a Creative Commons license.  Some rights reserved.

NYT 10 Best Books

The New York Times released its annual list of the 10 Best Books of the year.

Maile Meloy’s Both Ways is the only way I want it tops the list of the five fiction titles. In this collection of short stories mostly set in the American West, Meloy explores the themes of love, family and friendship through the lives of small town lawyers, ranchers, doctors and children.

The other winning fiction titles include Chronic City by Jonathan Lethem,  A Gate at the Stairs by Lorrie Moore, Jeannette Walls’s Half Broke Horses and A Short History of Women by Kate Walbert.

Richard Holmes’s   The Age of Wonder:  How the romantic generation discovered the beauty and terror of science claimed the first spot on the nonfiction list.  In this intellectual history of the early 19th century  in Britain, Holmes explores the connection between scientific curiosity and poetic invention of the Romantic generation.  Other titles in the nonfiction group include  The Good Soldiers by David Finkel, LIT: a memoir by Mary Karr,  LORDS OF FINANCE:  the bankers who broke the world by Liaquat Ahamed  and RAYMOND CARVER: a writer’s life by Carol Sklenicka.

National Book Award 2009

The 2009 National Book Award for fiction was awarded to the Irish-born novelist, Colum McCann,  for  Let the great world spin. Set in 1970’s New York City, the story explores the memorable summer morning when a mysterious tightrope walker leapt and danced  between the Two Towers and how it affected the lives of  ordinary New Yorkers in extraordinary ways.

T.J. Stiles’s The First Tycoon:  the epic life of Cornelius Vanderbilt took the nonfiction award.  Stiles recounts Vanderbilt’s life from his humble birth on Staten Island to his reign as America’s railroad king and driver of unbridled American capitalism.

Other National Book Award winners include Transcendental Studies: A Trilogy by Keith Waldrop for Poetry and Claudette Colvin: Twice Toward Justice by Phillip Hoose for Young People’s Literature.

Booklist’s List

Booklist magazine has released its 2009 list of the Top 10 Books in Religion & Spirituality.  Appearing in the November 15, 2009 issue, the top 10 include:

After the Prophet: the epic story of the Shia-Sunni split in Islam, by Lesley Hazelton.
Being an account based on early Islamic texts.

The Bible and the people by Lori Anne Ferrell.
A history of the interplay between the Word and readers.

The case for God by Karen Armstrong.
A lucid presentation of difficult ideas.

The Genesis enigma: why the Bible is scientifically accurate by Andrew Parker.
A biologist outlines what science believes really happened.

Losing my religion:  how I lost my faith reporting on religion in America–and found unexpected peace by William Lobdell.
A journalist’s personal journey of belief and non-belief.

All of the above titles as well as Booklist magazine are available at the Newton Free Library.  Click on the links to view the records in our catalog.  For the titles of the five remaining books, click  here.

What should I read next?

Are you looking for the next title in a series?  Sequels, 4th Edition: An Annotated Guide to Novels in Series by Janet G. Husband and Jonathan F. Husband has arrived.  Available for browsing within the library in our Readers’ Advisory collection on the second floor, Sequels, is a popular guide to novels in series.  With greatly expanded  listings including mysteries, fantasy, science fiction, and romance, plus non–genre fiction selections, Sequels is a great source to consult when looking  for either something similar or completely different.  If you haven’t yet visited our Readers’ Advisory area, it is located behind the second floor information desk near the Young Adult collection.  While there, have a look at our subject booklists and author read-a-likes.

Best Mystery Novel

Where Memories Lie by Deborah Crombie is the 2009 recipient of the Mystery Readers International Macavity Award for Best Mystery Novel.  The Macavity Award is named for the “mystery cat” of T.S. Eliot’s  Old Possum’s Book of Practical Cats.   Each year the members of Mystery Readers International nominate and vote for their favorite mysteries in four categories.  The categories in addition to Best Mystery Novel include Best First Mystery (The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo), Best Nonfiction/Critical (African American Mystery Writers: A Historical & Thematic Study), and Best Short Story (The Night Things Changed).

Holiday Gift Ideas

Thinking about what to give the children on your holiday gift list?  Check out the titles on the just released  New York Times list of Best Illustrated Books for Children for 2009.  This annual selection represents the titles  judged to be among the best of the thousands published each year.  Adam Gopnik, author of Paris to the Moon and Angels and Ages: a short book about Darwin, Lincoln, and modern life was among the three member panel of judges.  Preview the books first by checking them out from the library.

Winner of the 2009 Man Booker Prize!

Wolf Hall is set in the 1520s and tells the story of Thomas Cromwell’s rise to prominence in the Tudor court.  Hilary Mantel has been praised by critics for writing ‘a rich, absorbingly readable historical novel; she has made a significant shift in the way any of her readers interested in English history will henceforward think about Thomas Cromwell. She is currently working on a sequel. Quote from the Man Booker Prize web site

What to Read Now and Why – from Newsweek

A list of fifty books, both fiction and nonfiction that is both comprehensive and thought- provoking. (Newsweek Web Exclusive June 27, 2009)