With Reverent Hands: Words by Heart

I bring you with reverent hands / the books of my numberless dreams.

-WB Yeats, "A Poet To His Beloved"

WB Yeats, I'm sure, gave books to his beloved that he valued highly himself, and that he handled with reverence.  If you had to recommend a book you revered to someone, what would it be?

I'm asking you to highlight one book.  One book that you adore, that you prize, that changed your life, that you would save from a burning building, that you found serendipitously on a library shelf or at a used bookstore, looking lonely and ignored.  A book that thrills you but that, you have come to realize, no one else has really ever heard of, much less read.  With Reverent Hands is all about those books- the ones that deserve a wider audience than they are given and that you want everyone to go out and read, even if they are out of print.

NOTE:  It has come to my attention that With Reverent Hands is being used as a meme.  It's not a meme; it is a feature on this blog only.  If you would like to contribute, please contact me to do a guest post, but please respect that the questions and set-up are mine and do not post this format on your own site and state that it is a meme.

This week's post is by the lovely Nicole Bo from Linus's Blanket (one of my favorite blog names ever).  I think I've been reading Nicole's blog for several months now, and I really like the mix of books she reads- particularly all the historical fiction she reads!  Nicole also runs That's How I Blog and has convinced me to join her on the talk show in late July.  I hope you enjoy her selection below and I encourage you to read her blog!

What book are you highlighting?

I am so excited about Words by Heart by Ouida Sebestyen.  I can't say enough good things about this book!

Review: Picture the Dead

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Picture the Dead is one of those books you see in a bookstore, pick up and thumb through, and then clutch to your chest as you move towards the cash wrap, as though someone might steal it from you.  I had this book in an advance reader's edition, but I know that the hardcover edition will be beautiful and well worth a purchase.

Adele Griffin (two-time finalist for the National Book Award) has written a wonderful story about a family of old money living in a dank, dark and empty home in Boston during the American Civil war.  Jennie lives there at the mercy of her Uncle Pritchett and his wife.  She is lonely- her twin brother Toby passed way in the war and she finds out very early in the book that her fiancee, her cousin Will, also died.  The only Pritchett soldier to return home is Will's brother, Quinn.  But Quinn was never warm, and now he is chased by ghosts and is full of secrets- some of them Will's.

One day, when Jennie goes with her aunt, uncle and Quinn to get a family portrait done, she is briefly visited by Will's angry ghost.  This sets her off on a course to learn what happened to her beloved fiancee in the war.

Joint Musings: The Absolutely True Diary of a Part-Time Indian

Some time ago, Natasha and I decided we wanted to read more Native American literature.  The first book we read together was Sherman Alexie's fabulous The Absolutely True Diary of a Part-Time Indian.  The next book we are reading is Bury My Heart at Wounded Knee, which we just recently found out is not by a Native American, but we want to read it, anyway.  Native Americans have been silenced and shut away for centuries in America, and Natasha and I are really excited to learn more about the culture.  We also became complete Sherman Alexie fangirls after reading this book.

The Absolutely True Diary of a Part-Time Indian is a young adult book set in Washington state on a Spokane Indian reservation.  Junior, a 14-year-old with a stutter and a brain condition, goes to geometry class on his first day of school and notices that his textbook is the same one that his mother used when she learned geometry.  His book is thirty years old, at least.  He gets so angry at this fact that he throws the book at his teacher and gets suspended.

This leads to him deciding that he will never get off the reservation or make anything of himself unless he gets a good education.  Junior decides to enroll in a neighboring all-white school.  His new classmates are not overly welcoming and his old friends think he has betrayed his Indian culture.  Junior has to find a way to keep his identity and follow his dreams.

TSS: Commenting Etiquette

One of the things about blogging that sometimes mildly worries me is commenting.  I don't mean that it worries me and keeps me up at night, but just in that I have a vague sense I am doing it incorrectly.  It seems like everyone has a different commenting method, and a different way of responding to comments as well.  And I don't think I am the only one who worries I am doing it wrong.  (Or maybe I am, and am blissfully unaware, which is fine by me.)  So, I thought we could all confer here and see what the best practice is!

Previously, if someone came and visited my blog and left a comment, I would then go respond to that comment on her blog, as then I would be sure she got it.  But apparently, this is not done, so I switched and now when someone comments on my blog, I just write a comment back on that particular post myself.  This can be complicated when I haven't responded in some time, and so then have ten people I am addressing in one comment (though I think that's better than artificially inflating commenting numbers by responding to each person individually).  Plus, I can never really be sure the person I am addressing knows that I have responded to her comment.  So it is a flawed and imperfect system.

Review: The Eyes of Willie McGee

After I read and reviewed To Kill a Mockingbird, I was offered The Eyes of Willie McGee to review.  And frankly, it was impossible to turn it down.  Here's a real-life version of the trial in To Kill a Mockingbird, though it's far murkier and complicated.  Willie McGee was an African-American man who, in 1945, was sentenced to death for raping a white housewife, Willette Hawkins.  His trial was unfair- he was tried by an all-white jury who debated for only about two minutes before convicting him in a hostile courthouse where he couldn't even put together two words coherently, he was so terrified of being lynched by the mob outside.

Willie McGee caught the interest of many civil rights organizations in America (mainly the Communists, which may have been troublesome for him), and even more people around the world.  William Faulkner spoke out about him.  Norman Mailer.  Letters poured in from China, Germany, the UK and countless other places, pleading his innocence.

But did those supporters really have the facts straight?  As Alex Heard investigates the case, he finds multiple, serious discrepancies about the "facts" presented.  Did Willie and Willette have a forbidden affair?  Who was Willie's wife at the time, and did she really take care of his children?  Was Willie innocent?  Was Willette as horrible and manipulative as some people believe?

With Reverent Hands: Call it Sleep

I bring you with reverent hands / the books of my numberless dreams.

-WB Yeats, "A Poet To His Beloved"

WB Yeats, I'm sure, gave books to his beloved that he valued highly himself, and that he handled with reverence.  If you had to recommend a book you revered to someone, what would it be?
 
I'm asking you to highlight one book.  One book that you adore, that you prize, that changed your life, that you would save from a burning building, that you found serendipitously on a library shelf or at a used bookstore, looking lonely and ignored.  A book that thrills you but that, you have come to realize, no one else has really ever heard of, much less read.  With Reverent Hands is all about those books- the ones that deserve a wider audience than they are given and that you want everyone to go out and read, even if they are out of print.

EDITED:  Eek!  I forgot my entire paragraph about this week's guest poster!  Massive apologies to Laura, who writes at Reading & Rooibos!  Like many of the blogs I follow, I am not sure when I started reading Laura's blog, or how I first came upon it.  But when I started making folder assignments in Google Reader recently (a thankless job), I didn't even hesitate to put her on the "A-List" because she reads such a variety of books!  Everything from Louis L'Amour to Sapphire!  I really enjoy her blog and I hope my lapse in the guest poster description paragraph doesn't mean you all won't go visit her blog!

What book are you highlighting?
Call It Sleep by Henry Roth, first published in 1934.

When did you first read it?

I'd never even heard of Call It Sleep before it appeared on the syllabus of an American Lit course I took during undergrad. My professor made a conscious choice to include books we may not have encountered in other literature courses and this was one of the selections my classmates and I read with fresh eyes. I still have the copy I purchased for that class with all of my underlining and other notations in it. The pages are almost ready to start falling out at this point!

Musings: The Vintner's Luck

Heather at Raging Bibliomania and I read The Vintner's Luck together.  We decided to do something different than the conversational joint reviews- instead, we're just posting each other's reviews!  So below is Heather's review, and my review of the book is over on Heather's blog.  Check it out if you have time!

The Vintner's Luck by Elizabeth Knox - 288 pgs

Sobran Jodeau is an eighteen year old boy who is finding himself unlucky in love. Deciding to drink away his troubles one clear summer night, Sobran drunkenly stumbles and falls upon the hill by his home next to the family's vineyard and is unexpectedly caught and set upright by an angel. To Sobran, an apprentice vintner, the discovery of an angel is full of delight and wonder, and soon the angel, named Xas, is giving Sobran advice about all the elements of his life, large and small. As the two begin to share secrets about their respective lives, Sobran finds that Xas is a patient and understanding creature able to discuss many topics of both practical and spiritual nature. Sobran and Xas feel that there is much to learn from one another and much to share, so they decide to meet once a year on the hill near Sobran's cottage. As Sobran ages like the fine wines he creates, he marries, fathers children, goes off to war and deals with tragedy. Xas shares his friend's joys and heartbreaks, gently advising and shaping him along his path. Spanning 55 years of Sobran's adult life, Xas becomes a vital part of Sobran's history, weaving himself into the tapestry of Sobran's past and future. But Xas has a story as well, and as he marks the years with Sobran, he begins to reveal the intrigues of his unusual journey from Heaven and his travails on Earth. Unexpectedly moving and singularly unique, The Vintner's Luck is the story of the touching relationship between an average man and an extraordinary angel.

Review: Sweet Dates in Basra

Sweet Dates in Basra, by Jessica Jiji, takes place in Iraq during and soon after WWII.  It begins with two best friends- Omar (Muslim) and Shafiq (Jewish- this confused me as Shafiq to me sounds much more like a Muslim name)- whose families live next door to each other and are very close.  One day, running away from trouble, Omar and Shafiq escape into the house of a friend and Shafiq meets the beautiful housemaid, Kathmiya, and their lives are never the same.

The story winds through the remainder of the war, the riots against Jews as the Germans come in, hints at the threats of Communism and the large, unexpected changes that occur in Iraq following the war.  Through it all, Shafiq & Omar's families support each other, and Shafiq & Kathmiya grow closer and closer.  But there is a secret in Kathmiya's past, and Shafiq's future in Iraq is uncertain.

TSS: Spotlight on NYRB Classics

The Spotlight Series is back!  We did really well in our first two-week series featuring Unbridled Books in March.  This time around, we're doing one targeted week in May- the 16th-22nd- and putting the spotlight on New York Review Books Classics!

NYRB Classics is one of my favorite publishers in the world.  They publish books that are often not quite full-length novels, but are not short stories, either.  This is often an overlooked length in the story format, and I love publishers that highlight these works.  NYRB also re-issues many books from earlier periods that were undeservedly forgotten or lapsed into obscurity.  And when I say "earlier periods," I don't mean prior to the 20th century.  One of my personal favorites, Wish Her Safe at Home, was published in the 1980s but didn't get a lot of attention until NYRB picked it up to publish recently.

So I'm really excited we're spotlighting NYRB Classics!  And I feel you should all be excited, too!  Not only are the books published of a manageable length to read, but there are also so many titles!  Really, participating in this series will help you achieve almost any reading challenge you are currently participating in.  There are books by people of color, people from nations all over the world, authors new and old, across almost any genre, and all with very distinctive and stylish covers.  NYRB is a publisher for book lovers and collectors and if you have yet to discover this fabulous press, then I hope you participate in our series.  Sign-ups are open through the end of the month over on the Spotlight Series blog.  Sign-up early and for as many books as you'd like!

There will be swag!

Guest Post for Cultural Diversity!

I am guest posting over at Lost in Books today for Cultural Diversity Month! Go on over there if you want to learn about my thoughts on being Indian!  And no, the picture below is not me.  I do not have a nose ring, sadly, nor do I know Indian classical dance.

With Reverent Hands: The Skull Mantra

I bring you with reverent hands / the books of my numberless dreams.

-WB Yeats, "A Poet To His Beloved"

WB Yeats, I'm sure, gave books to his beloved that he valued highly himself, and that he handled with reverence.  If you had to recommend a book you revered to someone, what would it be?
 
I'm asking you to highlight one book.  One book that you adore, that you prize, that changed your life, that you would save from a burning building, that you found serendipitously on a library shelf or at a used bookstore, looking lonely and ignored.  A book that thrills you but that, you have come to realize, no one else has really ever heard of, much less read.  With Reverent Hands is all about those books- the ones that deserve a wider audience than they are given and that you want everyone to go out and read, even if they are out of print.

This week's post is by Sakura, who blogs at  Chasing Bawa.  I am not sure how I first came across her blog.  I think she comments on many of the same blogs I do, and once I must have clicked through to her site.  And its a great review site, featuring a lot of great books and good discussion on a lot of topics.  Thanks for participating, Sakura!

What book are you highlighting?

The Skull Mantra, by Eliot Pattison.

Review: A Conspiracy of Kings

A Conspiracy of Kings, by Megan Whalen Turner, is the fourth book in The Thief series.  (See my reviews of books one, two and three.)  I am not sure how to summarize this book without spoilers for earlier books in the series.  So I shall just say that it revolves around Sophos, a character in the first novel that is heir to the kingdom of Sounis, and is a player in a hugely important game that involves several countries and their sovereignty.  Seriously, this series of young adult fantasy is amazing.  I highly, highly recommend it!

Once again, I am issuing an open call to whomever the anonymous commenter on my blog was who first recommended this series to me!  Please send me an email to booklustblogger AT gmail DOT com, and we can discuss the series!

I read and discussed A Conspiracy of Kings with Kelly from The Written World.  Below are our thoughts and reactions.  I don't think there are any spoilers, but apologies if there are!  I am the commentary in green and Kelly is in blue.  For the second half of our chat, visit Kelly's blog and read the rest!

TSS: What makes a book a keeper?

Sometimes, I look at my bookshelves, decide they look ridiculously cluttered, and try to clean them.  This is made extremely difficult by the fact that I find it almost physically impossible to get rid of books.  I put together a system of trying to place mass-market books in front of larger trade paperbacks or hardcovers.  This doesn't work well, though, because then I can't see the title of the books in back.  So instead, I employ a helter-skelter stacking system that makes my somewhat OCD sister cringe.  It looks sloppy.

In those instances, I will make a heroic (truly, it is heroic, even if she doesn't recognize it as such) to get rid of some books.  When I do this, it makes me realize that I have many different criteria for what constitutes a "keeper" book.

Georgette Heyer is firmly on my keeper shelf because she is my go-to comfort read.  I am comfortable in Heyer's world, I understand her language, I know her stories, and I am perfectly aware of what she will give me.  I even have multiple copies of some of her books just because I hate seeing them sad and unloved in a bookstore.  And because I like the vintage editions much more than the new ones.

There are other books I keep because they are favorites and I know I'll want to reread them or lend them to friends (only friends who give them back!).  In this list are Lindsey Davis' Falco series and almost every fantasy novel I own.  Quite a few of the mysteries, too.  The Shadow of the Wind.  I would say a bulk of my "keepers" are books I think others will enjoy, that I would like to have on hand to lend out (at my discretion!) when I need to do so.

However, there are many books I don't anticipate reading again for years.  Possibly for over a decade or more.  But somehow, I never hesitate to keep them on my shelves.  I just like knowing I have them.  Maybe it's just me (though I doubt it), but some books, I form a deep emotional connection to.  I feel like they helped define me, or mold me.  They made me think or changed my perspective of a situation.  They made me fall in love with them.  Having them with me, on my shelf and close to me, makes me feel more secure.  I feel as though those books have a piece of me in them, and the thought of giving them away makes me sick.  Truly, it makes my stomach clench.  What if Hilary Mantel's A Place of Greater Safety is picked up by someone who does not properly appreciate it?  How could In Other Rooms, Other Wonders just languish on a shelf for years, feeling unloved?  What if someone spilled coffee all over my beloved Persuasion?  The possibilities are just too terrifying to think about.  So these books stay with me, and I know they are safe and loved.

It's funny, because even though I know I won't pick up the books in the last category for a very long time, it's really hard for me to let someone else borrow them, or even recommend them for someone else to read, especially if a) I don't absolutely adore the person or b) I don't know the person's reading tastes well.  To me, recommending a book in that category, for which I have such a personal and immediate response, is like sharing a very private piece of myself.  What if the other person doesn't understand the book?  Or what if she does understand but doesn't like it?  What if she doesn't connect to it the way that I did?  I am ashamed to admit it as it makes no logical sense, but I totally judge people who dislike books that I love.  I don't mean that I judge them harshly or negatively, but I step back and change the way I think about them.  And because this is a pretty messed-up and disturbing reaction, I try my best not to give myself to get into the situation in the first place, and thus don't give the books away freely.


Do you have a strong and deep connection to any books?  Which ones?  How do you define a keeper?

With Reverent Hands: A Sand County Almanac

I bring you with reverent hands / the books of my numberless dreams.

-WB Yeats, "A Poet To His Beloved"

WB Yeats, I'm sure, gave books to his beloved that he valued highly himself, and that he handled with reverence.  If you had to recommend a book you revered to someone, what would it be?
 
I'm asking you to highlight one book.  One book that you adore, that you prize, that changed your life, that you would save from a burning building, that you found serendipitously on a library shelf or at a used bookstore, looking lonely and ignored.  A book that thrills you but that, you have come to realize, no one else has really ever heard of, much less read.  With Reverent Hands is all about those books- the ones that deserve a wider audience than they are given and that you want everyone to go out and read, even if they are out of print.

This week's post is by one of my non-book blogger followers (I have a few, see!), Mike.  I never would have known him if not for my friend Sudha, who sadly has left Chicago for the cold but lovely St. Paul, MN.  But at least she found amazing people in St. Paul, and has introduced me to some of them.  Mike is one of her friends there, and I've been lucky enough to meet him a few times myself.  I know, for example, that he has excellent taste in both real and fictional women ;-)  He also has fabulous taste in books and I wish he lived closer so that we could trade once in a while.  This book, in particular, seems to speak so much of life in the Midwest that I want to clutch it to my chest and sigh happily that all of us from this area really know how wonderful (and frustrating) it is to live here!


What book are you highlighting?
A Sand County Almanac by Aldo Leopold

When did you first read it?

I think that I first read it myself sometime in middle school, probably around 8th grade.  But for as long as I can remember, my mother read parts of certain essays at appropriate times of the year.

Review: A Corpse at St. Andrew's Chapel

A Corpse at St. Andrew's Chapel is the second book in Mel Starr's mystery series around Hugh de Singleton, a surgeon and bailiff in 14th century England.  A body is found outside an old church in his jurisdiction, seemingly savaged by wolves.  But there have been no wolf sightings in the area and there is very little blood, which leads Hugh to believe no animal was involved.  The dead man's shoes were stolen, too- no wolf would do that.  Hugh realizes things go even further than he originally suspects when, the more he digs, the more he seems to be a target for violence.  Soon, one of his suspects is found dead of an arrow to the back, and Hugh must hurry to solve the case before he is yet another victim of the plot.

I received this book through the LibraryThing Early Reviewers program.  I have not read the first book in the series, but that did not seem to factor into my understanding of the second at all.  The first book is alluded to, but I had no trouble following this story without having read that one.

Review: The Scarlet Lion

The Scarlet Lion is Elizabeth Chadwick's second novel about William Marshall, picking up shortly after The Greatest Knight leaves off.  While you can read one without the other, I recommend reading both.

There is a lot of ground covered in this book.  Over twenty years, William Marshall serves Kings Richard, John and Henry III.  He fights in many wars with the French, the Irish, the Welsh and even the English rebels.  His popularity at court waxed and waned, and there were times that he did not act quite as honorably as one might believe.  Two of his sons were taken hostage by King John.  His daughter married a rebel.  And through it all, John and his wife Isabelle stand tall.  They also get busy, as it seems like readers have a glimpse of every child's conception in this book- and there were many children!  (William only got married in his forties- so he was pretty old by the time his last child was born, too.)

Review: The 13 1/2 Lives of Captain Bluebear

The 13 1/2 Lives of Captain Bluebear, by Walter Moers (trans. from German) was recommended to me by one of my co-workers.  It sounded fun and I love that it is illustrated, so I got it right away.  The novel recounts the first 13 (and a half) different eras in the life of Bluebear, from his birth to his finding eventual happiness.  He starts life on the ocean, is saved from a whirlpool by minipirates, is almost eaten by a gourmet island, escapes through a desert, walks through a giant's head, visits Atlantis and saves the world from a maniacal thinking element.  And that's not all.

He is a pretty busy guy.

With Reverent Hands: A Sundial in a Grave: 1610

I bring you with reverent hands / the books of my numberless dreams.

-WB Yeats, "A Poet To His Beloved"

WB Yeats, I'm sure, gave books to his beloved that he valued highly himself, and that he handled with reverence.  If you had to recommend a book you revered to someone, what would it be?
 
I'm asking you to highlight one book.  One book that you adore, that you prize, that changed your life, that you would save from a burning building, that you found serendipitously on a library shelf or at a used bookstore, looking lonely and ignored.  A book that thrills you but that, you have come to realize, no one else has really ever heard of, much less read.  With Reverent Hands is all about those books- the ones that deserve a wider audience than they are given and that you want everyone to go out and read, even if they are out of print.

If you would like to participate in this series, please comment on this post and I'll send you a template!  If you were already sent a template, please email me with it and I can put it into the rotation.

This week's guest post is by one of my very best blogging friends, Zibilee, who writes fantastically thoughtful reviews over at Raging Bibliomania.  She is one of those people who visited my blog when it was brand-new and has stuck around with me for years!  I really enjoyed reading The Bone People with her at the start of the year, and I am starting The Vintner's Luck today for our next buddy read!  She is one of the kindest book bloggers I've ever had the fortune to interact with, and I highly recommend becoming her friend :-)


What book are you highlighting?
My book is called A Sundial in A Grave: 1610 by Mary Gentle.  It is a historical fiction novel, but really, there is so much more to it than that!  It has intrigue, comedy, deception, and a most uncommon love story lurking within its pages.