Hello friends, and congratulations on making it past the middle of the month. This month, especially, when all debts are due. Or, at least, due on paper. You can put off paying the piper sometimes. In celebration of this milestone—and as you surface from the land of GAP, GARP, and GULP—here are some books that will help ease you back into civilized company.
First up is Evan Waite’s Life Wants You Dead: A Calm, Rational, and Totally Legit Guide to Scaring Yourself Safe. It’s easy to be anxious about, well, everything, but Waite’s here to tell you that these feelings are totally okay. In many ways, you’re not wrong. Also, in every way, you’re probably overthinking things. Life Wants You Dead will provide some perspective.
Also, here is Alison Davies’s 59 Things You Should Know About Your Cat. Many of these factoids are quirky (cats can be left- or right-pawed, for instance). Many of them are charming. Only a few are truly terrifying. Plan accordingly.
Also, while these next two are ostensibly for the very young, who are easing their way into polite society, they are also applicable for bigger folk.
Seriously. Play nice.
And finally, here is Annie Jacobsen’s Nuclear War: A Scenario, which is utterly f*cking terrifying and, yes, we should all read it. And then have a massive community-wide hug afterward.
Let’s pivot to Eric H. Cline’s After 1177 B.C., the sequel to his massively informative 1177 B.C., which chronicled the dramatic end of the Bronze Age. In 1177 B.C., Cline wanders through the wreckage and follows the civilizations that managed to overcome the collapse of their worlds. After 1177 B.C. is a reminder that all things change, and through that change, life ultimately flourishes. Plan accordingly.
And here is Adam Moss’s The Work of Art: How Something Comes from Nothing. Moss, who was recently elected to the Magazine Editors’ Hall of Fame, interviews more than 40 creators in a wide range of disciplines about their process. How do they paint? Come up with a joke? Write a novel? Along with these interviews are delightful illustrations of the process, exploring how the human mind creates art. Delightful!
And speaking of delightful things, Aimee Nezhukumatathil’s World of Wonders: In Praise of Fireflies, Whale Sharks, and Other Astonishments is out in paperback this week. Essays about the wonders of the natural world! You know how giggly we get about things like this. Come get a copy!
And we’re delighted to see that Robin Hobb’s classic Tawny Man trilogy has been re-issued in a trade paperback edition. Fitz and the Fool are some of fantasy’s best-loved duos, and in Fool’s Errand, we find Fitz drawn out of exile to find a missing prince. Of course, nothing is as it seems, and before long, Fitz and his pal, the Fool, are caught in a web of treachery that threatens the Six Duchies. Get all three books and block off a week or two for some deep reading!
Anthony Horowitz is back this week as well, both as a writer and a character in Close to Death, the next volume featuring himself and the irascible Detective Hawthorne. In Close to Death, the pair are summoned to investigate the classic locked-room mystery, though in this case, the “room” is the exclusive gated community of Riverside Close. There are only six households, which should limit the suspects, right? Ah, but this is Horowitz, who knows how to twist a Christie-esque plot into something with even more knots. Recommended.
And finally, here is V. Castro’s Immortal Pleasures, which is the story of La Malinche, a Nahua woman who translated for Cortés back in the day. History hasn’t been kind to La Malinche, mostly due to the fact that Cortés left a lot of bodies in his wake. However, in Castro’s hands, La Malinche is reborn as Malinalli, an immortal vampire, and in the present, she’s searching for a pair of ancient Aztec skulls and something a little more human: love. Naturally, things get sexy and confusing and then some biting happens.
We know. Clearly, Malinalli hasn’t kept up on the rules of polite society, but maybe we’ll let it slide this time . . .
And that’s the list this week. Take a moment or two for yourself. Hug your TBR pile if this week’s list is starker than expected. We’re less than two weeks away from Independent Bookstore Day (Saturday the 27th). The South Sound Book Crawl starts that weekend, and we’ll be singing and dancing and lalalaing about books.
Prior, it’s the third Sunday of the month this weekend, which means Write Time over at Electric Coffee from 3 - 6pm. Come make some words!
