Anticipated Erotic Literature – My Education by Susan Choi

July 18, 2013August 27, 2014 / Linda / Leave a comment

Susan Choi

One of the most anticipated books of 2013 is My Education by Susan Choi. Susan is the author of three previous novels. Her first novel, The Foreign Student, won the Asian-American Literary Award. American Woman was a finalist for the Pulitzer Prize and A Person of Interest was a finalist for the PEN/Faulker Award.

My Education is a steamy, but very well-written book. It’s about Regina, a graduate student, who is warned about a notorious professor who sleeps with students. She becomes his teaching assistant and, in a surprising twist, has an affair with the professor’s wife. The story spans fifteen years of Regina’s misadventures that are both erotic and catastrophic.

This novel is Amazon’s best book of the month – July 2013. It has received rave reviews from many sources, including Publishers Weekly, Kirkus, the Boston Globe, Vanity Fair, The Los Angeles Times, and The Washington Post.

Available at the Cheshire Library.

Note: For sensitive readers, this book contains profanity, sexual references and overt sexual scenes.

JK Rowling Secret Revealed!

July 15, 2013July 18, 2013 / Linda / Leave a comment

JK Rowling

JK Rowling had hoped to keep her secret for a little while longer, but over the weekend, after receiving a tip, The Sunday Times of London reported that Ms. Rowling had written an adult fiction crime novel under a pseudonym. The Cuckoo’s Calling, written under the guise of Robert Galbraith, was published in the United Kingdom back in April by Sphere – the same publisher as her first fiction novel after Harry Potter, The Casual Vacancy. Ms. Rowling is quoted as saying “It has been wonderful to publish without hype or expectation and pure pleasure to get feedback under a different name”.

The book is set in London and features a private detective named Cormoran Strike who lost a leg while serving in the military in Afghanistan. He is barely making ends meet, he has just broken up with his long time girlfriend and he is living in his office Then a client walks in the door with a story about his supermodel sister who fell to her death. It is ruled a suicide, but the brother doesn’t believe it. Strike wades into a world of multi-millionares, rock stars and designers to try to find answers about her death. The book received a rave review in Publishers Weekly when it was released and called it a “stellar debut”.

Before the news broke of who the author really was, the book had only sold 1,500 copies. Sales at Amazon have since soared 150,000% and is now number 1.

For the Harry Potter books, Ms. Rowling used her initials JK as her official published name because she was told books written by men sold better. With this new book, she was able to create a male persona and a fictional biography was supplied by the publisher. It states: ” Born in 1968, Robert Galbraith is married with two sons. After several years with the Royal Military Police, he was attached to the SIB (Special Investigation Branch), the plain-clothes branch of the RMP. He left the military in 2003 and has been working since then in the civilian security industry. The idea for protagonist Cormoran Strike grew directly out of his own experiences and those of his military friends who have returned to the civilian world.”

Rowling plans to continue writing the series with the next book due out next summer.

The Cuckoo’s Calling is available at the Cheshire Library.

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7/18/13 UPDATE – Today it was revealed that a partner at the British law firm, Russells, inadvertently revealed the information. Chris Gossage let the information slip to his wife’s best friend, Judith Callegari and she tweeted it. Her Twitter account has since been deleted. Russells said in a statement that “we apologize unreservedly” to Rowling. While Gossage is culpable, “the disclosure was made in confidence to someone he trusted implicitly”.

Ms Rowling said: “To say that I am disappointed is an understatement. I had assumed that I could expect total confidentiality from Russells, a reputable professional firm, and I feel very angry that my trust turned out to be misplaced.”

Amazon Names Their Best Books of 2013 So Far

July 11, 2013June 5, 2014 / Linda / Leave a comment

With 2013 half over, Amazon has chosen their top 10 books of the year so far (Jan-Jun). Their picks and brief summaries:

Life After Life by Kate Atkinson– What if you could be born again and again? This brilliant, multi-layered novel answers that question as Atkinson’s protagonist moves through multiple lives, each one an iteration on the last, flirting with the balance between choice and fate.
The Son by Phillipp Meyer – A multigenerational Western spanning the 1800s Comanche raids in Texas to the 20^th century oil boom, The Son is a towering achievement.
Frozen In Time by Mitchell Zuckoff – Two adventures in one …recounting the 1942 crash (and subsequent struggle to survive) of a U.S. cargo plane crew in Greenland, and describing the author’s own participation in a modern-day mission to uncover the mystery behind their disappearance.
The Interestings by Meg Wolitzer – The characters in this novel pulse with life as Wolitzer follows a group of teenagers who meet at a summer camp for artsy teens in 1974 and work to maintain their friendship through the competitions and realities of growing up.
And the Mountains Echoed by Khaled Hosseini – Following The Kite Runner and A Thousand Splendid Suns, Hosseini has written another masterwork, one that moves through war, separation, birth, death, deceit, and love – illustrating how people’s actions, even the seemingly selfless ones, are shrouded in ambiguity.
Eleanor & Park by Rainbow Rowell – This Young Adult novel about two kids who fall in love on a bus is sweet without being saccharine. And it’s a story adults can love, too.
Gulp by Mary Roach – Roach is about as entertaining a science writer as you’ll find, and this book about how we ingest food will make you think, laugh, and wince as she covers all things alimentary.
After Visiting Friends by Michael Hainey – Unfolding like a novel, this nonfiction gem starts with journalist Hainey uncovering inconsistencies within his own journalist father’s obituary – and while the truth behind the death will eventually be uncovered, greater truths await for Hainey, ones that will change the way he views the past and the present.
Tenth of December by George Saunders – Saunders’ first collection of short stories in six years introduces his ironic, absurd, profound, and funny style to an army of new readers.
The Golem and the Jinni by Helene Wecker – This enchanting debut, set mostly in turn-of-the-century Manhattan, is both a well-researched historical novel and a spectacular work of fantasy.

To see Amazon’s list of top books in other categories, click here.

What’s the best book you’ve read so far this year?

Crazy Weather? There’s a Book for That!

July 6, 2013June 5, 2014 / Linda / Leave a comment

Derecho

It seems the weather has just been so crazy this year! Recently, a new weather term (to non-weather experts, anyway) was being tossed around – derecho. This refers to a widespread, long-lived, straight-line windstorm that is associated with a fast-moving band of severe thunderstorms. The damage a derecho causes is similar to a tornado. The swath of wind damage has to be 240 miles long and have wind speeds of 58 miles per hour or higher to qualify as a derecho. Conditions were very favorable in the middle of June for a derecho to occur in the Midwest. The potential existed for 70 million people being affected. In June of 2012, a derecho caused 13 deaths and caused $1 billion in damages.

Windsor, CT

On July 1, 2013, Connecticut experienced a rare occurance – three tornadoes. An EF0 (wind speeds from 65-85 mph) began in Greenwich and
ended in Stamford. Another EF0 touched down in Enfield and an EF1 tornado (wind speeds from 86-110 mph) touched down in East Windsor, Windsor and Windsor Locks causing considerable damage. On July 19th, an EF1 tornado started in Andover, then Coventry and ended in Mansfield.

The Cheshire Library has many books about weather. They can be found in the Adult non-fiction section under the Dewey number 551.6 and in the Childrens’ section in the same Dewey section.

A few titles that might be of interest are:

Weather by Simon Seymour
Weather by Brian Cosgrove
Wild, Wet and Windy by Claire Llewellyn
The Weather Book by Jack Williams
Complete Idiot’s Guide to Weather by Mel Goldstein
Eric Sloane’s Weather Book by Eric Sloane
The Winds of Change by Eugene Linden
The Weather of the Future by Heidi Cullen
Freaks of the Storm by Randall Cerveny

Connecticut State Park Commission Celebrates 100 Years

June 30, 2013June 26, 2013 / Linda / Leave a comment

One hundred years ago, a small group of businessmen and naturalists recognized the need to preserve the state’s special places before they were lost to the industrial revolution and development. This group, The Connecticut Park Commission, launched a statewide tour to select sites that represented Connecticut’s heritage, beauty and recreational potential. The first property that was purchased was in Westport in 1913 and, in 1914, Sherwood Island State Park opened. Today, there are 107 state parks and 32 state forests that see 7.8 million visitors each year.

A year-long Centennial celebration is planned. The official centennial observation will be kicked off by Gov. Dannel P. Malloy on August 14^th with a reception at Dinosaur State Park in Rocky Hill. For more information on centennial activities, and information about Connecticut’s parks and forests, here is a link to the State of Connecticut’s website.

The Commission generously provides one free State Parks and Forests pass that can be used at any state park or forest to every library in the state. The Library purchased one pass with money provided by the Friends of the Cheshire Public Library. Four passes were purchased with a private memorial donation – giving the Library 6 passes in total. These passes are valid until December 31, 2013.

The Cheshire Public Library has a wonderful selection of museum passes available to a variety of places. For more information on these passes and their availability, click here.