TitleTales

Adult Fiction Doorstops: by Kim Stack

Adult Fiction post—08/28/09
Oh, it seems like such a cheap shot to write about short books one time and long the next, and truly, I was going to avoid the temptation, but I was given a copy of Imperial by William Vollman. This nonfiction work has been reviewed as exasperating and exhausting—and over 1300 pages. Books of this size can always be used as doorstops or booster seats. Except, I truly love to buy books by the pound. I regret to this day that I threw out my 1947 edition of Ben Ames Williams classic, but at 1536 pages I’d broken the spine so badly the pages re-sorted themselves. Those Civil War books addicted me, though: House Divided, Andersonville, Gone with the Wind, and then the Russians found me: The Idiot, Brothers Karamazov, Anna Karenina. As the years went by, I found Michener (The Covenant), Santmeyer (And Ladies of the Club), and Undset (Kristen Lavransdatter). Now, King taunts me with Under the Dome; and Denis Johnson is a National Book Award winner with Tree of Smoke.

Every Dog Has Its Day: by Erin Stachowiak

Audiovisual post—08/28/09
About a month and a half ago, my husband and I decided to get a dog. We’ve had cats since we started living together three years ago and my husband is a certified cat person. I’m an all animal person. I’ve had cats, dogs, fish and I’ve pet-sat everything from an African grey parrot to ferrets and even snakes. I love them all and wish that I could adopt more than our house could hold. I am, however, forbidden to take in any snakes, even though I love them too.

For anyone that has ever owned a dog, you’ll know that my thoughts as of late have been very puppy-centric. We have a plethora of new toys and we’ve consulted everything from Cesar Millan to PBS training programs just to prepare ourselves, and our poor cats, for the new arrival. Take a minute to log in to TitleTales so you too can feel prepared.

Best of 2009 So Far, Part 2: Juvenile Fiction: by Lori Fennel

Juvenile/YA’s post—08/28/09
OK--I feel like I haven’t read enough of this year’s most enticing juvenile fiction to do a true shortlist of my favorites, so this is also my want-to-read list, culled from starred reviews and word-of-mouth. I can’t believe I still haven’t read, for example, The Evolution of Calpurnia Tate--but now that my choices for our Winter TitleTalk have been submitted, I should have time to return to reading from the publishing year of 2009. I’m not sure that anything can beat Grace Lin’s Where the Mountain Meets the Moon as my personal favorite in this category, but I will see...

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