what I’ve been reading lately:
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Margaret the First by Danielle DuttonCatapult, 2016
As this New Yorker blog post by Lucy Ives points out, Margaret the First by Danielle Dutton is not exactly “conventional” historical fiction: it’s not full of “period intrigue,” to use Ives’s phrase, and it’s not particularly plot-driven or even, necessarily, character-driven, though the book does have a pretty tight focus on its title character,
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Textbook Amy Krouse Rosenthal by Amy Krouse RosenthalDutton (Penguin Random House), 2016
I don’t exactly remember, but I think I heard about Textbook Amy Krouse Rosenthal because some publishing-related newsletter I subscribe to for work reasons linked to this article about the way this book lets readers interact via text message and via its website. When I saw it at the library, it seemed like it would
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Lud-in-the-Mist by Hope MirrleesCold Spring Press, 2005 (Originally W. Collins and Sons, 1926)
My boyfriend wanted to read Lud-in-the-Mist after hearing that Neil Gaiman had said he thought that Jonathan Strange & Mr Norrell was “the finest work of English fantasy written in the past 70 years,” and that “the only thing it could be compared to was Hope Mirlees’s novel Lud-in-the-Mist (see this piece in the Guardian).
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Jonathan Strange & Mr Norrell by Susanna ClarkeBloomsbury, 2005 (Originally 2004)
I’ve been quiet for the last, um, month, but it’s not that I haven’t been reading. It’s that I’ve been (re)reading Jonathan Strange & Mr Norrell, which has been totally excellent, but wow it’s a long book. I first read it in July 2005, and remember being delighted to be immersed in its world. More
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Rising Ground by Philip MarsdenUniversity of Chicago Press, 2016 (Originally Granta Books, 2014)
This book, which is subtitled “A Search for the Spirit of Place,” is part memoir/travel writing, part history, and overall pretty pleasing. In Chapter 2, Marsden and his wife and kids move from a seaside house in Cornwall to farmhouse by a creek, farther inland, and the house and the land around it, combined with
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Hilda and the Bird Parade by Luke PearsonFlying Eye Books, 2013 (Originally 2012)
As I make my way through Luke Pearson’s “Hilda” graphic novels for kids, I find myself liking each one more than the last. The art is consistently excellent—I like the colors, the clean lines, and how it rewards attention to detail—and the stories keep getting better. This one opens with a scene from Hilda’s life
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Anastasia Has the Answers by Lois LowryHoughton Mifflin Harcourt 2016 (Originally 1986)
At the start of Anastasia Has the Answers, we learn that Anastasia (who is 13 now) has decided she wants to be a journalist, which helps to give a pleasing structure to the book. She’s learned that journalists should think about the “Who, what, when, where, and why” of the situation behind the piece they’re
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Displacement: A Travelogue by Lucy KnisleyFantagraphics, 2015
In February 2011, Lucy Knisley (who was 27 at the time) went on a Caribbean cruise with her grandparents (who were 91 and 93), and this graphic-memoir tells the story of that trip. It’s the fourth book I’ve read by Knisley and not my favorite (that would be either Relish or An Age of License),
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Every Anxious Wave by Mo DaviauSt. Martin’s Press, 2016
At the start of this novel we meet Karl, who’s a 40-year-old single dude who owns a bar in Chicago. He used to be the guitarist for an indie rock band that was kind of big in the late ’90s, but now he just has his bar, and his best guy friend, Wayne. Until he
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The Portable Veblen by Elizabeth McKenziePenguin, 2016
I’d been vaguely meaning to read The Portable Veblen for months, but I’d also been vaguely worried I wouldn’t like it—that it would be annoyingly trying-too-hard quirky rather than pleasingly quirky. I shouldn’t have worried, but also, I think I read this book at exactly the right time. After reading two non-fiction books in a