Hello friends, and welcome to the week before Thanksgiving. We know, we know. Turkey day is late this year, which throws all sorts of machinations and plans off-course, but roll with it, dear readers. Bob and weave. Rock and roll. We got this.
First up this week is a new book from Haruki Murakami, his first in six years. This is The City and Its Uncertain Walls, and it's a story about loss. Let's not beat around the bush about that. One day, a boy loses his girl, and that loss haunts him for a very long time. He mopes off, becomes a librarian, leaves town, and travels to a mountain village, where he surrounds himself with books. Naturally, because this is a Murakami novel, things get strange and stranger. There might be unicorns. Highly recommended.
And look, it's the 50th anniversary of Ursula Le Guin's The Dispossessed, which is the story of two planets—cut off from each other—and the attempt of a galactically famous scientist / anarchist who attempts to reconcile these two worlds. One of which is defined by its warring nations, great poverty, and . . .
Seriously. Fifty years ago.
Anyway, 'tis a classic. One of those forward looking books that sits on the shelf next to Orwell's 1984 and Atwood's The Handmaid's Tale.
And here is Dr. Yuria Celidwen's Flourishing Kin, an interestingly poetic guide to, well, ourselves. It collects a wide range of wisdom, traditions, and insights from both indigenous and Western cultures and showcases how more things are alike than unlike. It's about belonging, you see, and community, and we'll take an extra helping of that this season, thank you very much.
And Robin Wall Kimmerer has a new book out this week as well. The author of Braiding Sweetgrass returns with The Serviceberry: Abundance and Reciprocity in the Natural World. In a similar vein to Dr. Celidwen's book, The Serviceberry is a call to action, a vision of orienting our lives around gratitude, reciprocity, and community. Amen, and we'll take two copies, please.
And Mark Harmon continues his new career as historical non-fiction writer with Ghosts of Panama. Co-written with Leon Carroll, this one is subtitled "A Strongman Out of Control, a Murdered Marine, and the Special Agents Caught in the Middle of an Invasion." Which invasion? That would be the goings-on in 1989, when a U. S. Marine was killed in Panama City, and the resulting investigation and saber-rattling was a whole lot of undue pressure upon an already tightly wound country. This one reads like a ready-made thriller.
And speaking of racing against the clock, here is Melissa Caruso's The Last Hour Between Worlds, a not-quite-buddy adventure between Kembral Thorne, a professional Hound (a sleuth, that is), and a notorious burglar, who must team up to fight a sinister figure that keeps warping reality as it attempts to perform a bloody world-ending ritual. In other words, Tuesday night. Fun, escapist urban fantasy. Yes, please.
And speaking of fun, here is the latest from the gang at Media Lab Books. This one is The Game Master's Book of Instant Towns and Cities: 160+ Unique Villages, Towns, Settlements and Cities, Ready-on-Demand, Plus Random Generations for NPCs. If you don't understand the relevance of any of those keywords that have been crammed into the subtitle (along with a fruiting of commas), that's okay.
Look. Don't take it so hard. Some animals wear frilly cravats and tight pants with extra stripes and make a "coo-coo-cooka-roo!" noise. You might think that's pretty silly, but other animals are all "Rrrrrrraaarrrr. Who's make that come-hither noise?"
So, if we say "160+ Unique Villages, Towns, Settlements and Cities, Ready-on-Demand, Plus Random Generations for NPCs," and you don't get all warm inside and want to make that tiger noise, that's just Nature's way of saying this book probably isn't for you.
Oh, hey! Samantha Harvey's Orbital won the Booker Prize! It's a book about people floating around this planet in a space capsule, talking about their feelings!
Tomato, to-mat-tah. Plan accordingly, you know?
And while we're talking about books put out by Grove Press (not that we expect you to keep up with this sort of minutia, but these transitions have to, you know, transish), here is Ingvild Rishøi's Brightly Shining, a heartwarming and heartbreaking tale of Christmas cheer. Oh, it's got financial hardship, sisterhood, and far-off dreams. It's about selling Christmas trees to make ends meet, a father who wanders off and falls into a bottle, and the miraculous ways that innocence can bring us all together. This one will definitely de-Grinch your household.
And finally, here is a picture book by J. R. R. Tolkien. Pictures is a collection of the Hobbit Master's watercolor paintings, many of which haven't been seen since that one calendar thirty years ago. And naturally, Christopher Tolkien contributes extensive annotations and notes about the provenance and sources of each of the paintings. Oh, it's what every Tolkien aficionado wants for Christmas.
And that's the list this week, dear friends. We had a delightful time at the open house last week. We sold so many of Todd Lockwood's books, but he has more, and we will have to get him to come by again. And there are a few other books on the shelves as well. You haven't gotten them all yet. There's still time . . .
