Mighty Skullboy Army

Humorous shorts in comic form, starring Skullboy, a supervillain whose trials in elementary school threaten to derail his career aspirations.

Toto: The Wonderful Adventure

The first volume in this manga series shows great potential. It's a romp through a fictional universe featuring airships, pirates, martial arts and more. Good fun, and an (extremely loose, in that typical manga fashion) interpretation of the Wizard of Oz stories.

The Cutting by James Hayman

The Cutting is a mystery set in Portland, Maine. As I mentioned in an earlier post, I used to live there 20 some years ago and I like to read books set there. Anyway, Hayman is recently transplanted there from NYC and writing novels is a second career for him. The book is a bit salacious but a decent first mystery. I find that most mystery writers take a couple of books to get really good but he is worth reading and I think he'll get better. Also, the writer Michael Chabon said that mystery detectives act as a travel guide to their city and Hayman definitely does that. I felt homesick for Portland.

Pride and Prejudice and Zombies

Author Seth Grahame-Smith has mostly just used the original Jane Austen classic. His minor changes include making the Bennet clan a formidable band of Shaolin-trained killers, and the inclusion of zombies. Lots and lots of zombies.
Thematically, it holds up rather well. I read the Cliff's notes to the original alongside, and the modifications actually seemed surprisingly superficial. And honestly, given Austen's fondness for describing the subtleties of dinner conversation in exasperating detail I really don't think I would have got through it without our undead friends.

The Beats: A Graphic History

Scripted by Harvey Pekar, this is a pretty straightforward bio of the more prominent Beats. The accompanying artwork leaves a great deal to be desired, and there's not much depth of information. Still, given the graphic format and accessible information, it could help to introduce a new generation to this important literary movement.

Finding Fish by Antwone Fisher

Sometimes, either because I am facilitating a book group or just to enjoy a favorite book, I will listen to the audio version of a book I've already read. So, I found myself listening to the audio of Finding Fish to freshen up for a book group. I liked the book but I LOVED the audio. I don't particularly like books where people write about surviving bad childhoods because I find it just too difficult to hear about children being neglected or abused or both. However, Fisher is such a wonderful writer and such an eloquent observer of human nature that I couldn't wait until I got in my car to listen to this book. It is narrated by Tony Penny but then Fisher gets on and narrates the part where he is with his wife and daughter. Then the last CD is an interview with Fisher. I loved listening to him talk about his life. He has a great voice and a great understanding of his survival and why some people don't.

The Homemade Life by Molly Wizenberg

Molly is an educated, well-traveled young woman who currently lives in Seattle, Washington. She is also a foodie who writes the blog "Orangette." For me, I like blogs where the author is passionate about something (cooking, decorating, gardening, writing, art) and then a gifted writer as well. Molly Wizenberg fits that description. She is someone who writes about her life through her writing about food. She describes meals with loving detail that she has with friends, family members and her boyfriend. When her father dies, she equates his lust for life with his lust for food. Her writing is witty, poignant and humourous. The book and her blog include recipes.

How to Build a Dinosaur

Paleontologist Jack Horner has long been a maveric in his field. His latest ideas involve reverse-engineering a dinosaur-like critter from a chicken. Why? To get a better understanding of how evolution works. According to Horner, the chicken genome actually contains huge chunks of DNA left over from its more formidable ancestors. Through simple tweaking, an egg could be caused to hatch a saurian.

The Late, Lamented Molly Marx

This novel by Sally Koslow caught my eye because it seemed very similar to The Lovely Bones by Alice Sebold, which many of you may remember because it was a huge bestseller some years ago. Molly Marx is dead--and no one knows what happened to her, not even Molly herself, who narrates the book. As the story starts, she's at her own funeral. Through a series of flashbacks and present-day scenes, we learn about Molly and her family, and about how they lived before and after she died. Since Molly is dead, this isn't a typical chick-lit novel; there's a sense of grief that permeates the book. But it's also funny, since Molly is such a great character. Poignant and resonant, The Late, Lamented Molly Marx is well worth the read. I'm going to go back and read Koslow's first novel, Little Pink Slips, which I missed when it was released.

Thirteen Reasons Why

by Jay Asher

One day, Clay finds a box of cassette tapes sitting on his front porch. Excited, he gets out the old dusty stereo from the garage and sits down to listen, never expecting the ghostly voice of Hannah Baker, speaking to him from beyond the grave.

Hannah Baker committed suicide and before her death, she recorded 13 tapes detailing the events that led up to that fateful action. Each person who received the tapes, according to her, was somehow key in her decision. Clay doesn't understand why he is included in the list, but he is about to find out and about to discover the darker side of his high school classmates.

This book will keep you on the edge of your seat as you listen with Clay as Hannah tells her story and the secrets unravel. The audiobook is wonderful, narrated by two readers - one for Hannah and one for Clay.

The Hunger Games

by Susan Collins

A suspenseful page-turner, this young adult book packs a futuristic punch. Catniss Everdeen lives in a world that has been all but obliterated by wars, disease, and famine. All that's left of the life we now know are thirteen, well twelve, colonies that are ruled by a controlling government called The Capitol. District Thirteen was destroyed by The Capitol when they staged a rebellion and to remind the subsequent colonies of their power and control, they host the annual Hunger Games where one boy and one girl between the ages of 12 and 18 from each district are chosen to participate in a battle to the death. When the 74th Hunger Games is about to commence, Catniss has to fight for her life against forces that seem insurmountable.

A story of sacrifice, love, and survival, this is an unforgettable tale! I highly recommend it for adults and teens alike.

Mission Song, by John Le Carre

Le Carre has many times now used the device of pitting a naive, sympathetic protagonist against the harsh and cynical reality of the spy world. In Mission Song, this works to great effect. The plot centers around a coup planned in Congo, with a cabal of British luminaries hiding behind a mask of humanitarian concern while secretly salivating over the prospect of controlling the region's lucrative mineral wealth.

The Hunger Games

This young adult title by Suzanne Collins was recommended to me by a number of teen librarians, but I had no idea I'd get sucked into it so completely. Katniss Everdeen is a young girl living in Panem, a post-apocalyptic version of the United States. Panem is governed by a corrupt government that runs a tournament called The Hunger Games once a year. Two children, a boy and a girl, from each district are chosen to participate in a fight to the death, which is televised across the country. It's reality television taken to an extreme. Katniss is strong and spunky, and the story is told from her point of view, so it's inevitable that she will survive--but the story of her survival, her fight to stay alive, and the alliances she makes keep the book moving along. There is a sequel coming out later this year, and I'm on pins and needles waiting for it.

It Sucked and then I Cried

Many bloggers get book deals, especially if they have great blogs. We recently had Jennette Fulda, who blogs at pastaqueen.com, speak for our Writers' Retreat, and she talked about how she got her book deal and how she set up her blog. Heather Armstrong is another one of these wonderful funny writers. Unlike Jennette's book, which is about how she lost weight, Heather's book is about how she had a baby and later developed postpartum depression. Heather blogs at dooce.com, which is one of the most popular personal blogs out there. Her book indicates why her blog is so popular--despite the serious topic, I laughed out loud a number of times and had to read passages out loud to my husband. At about 250 pages, I was able to read this book in a few hours. It was a great way to spend a Sunday afternoon after I'd just biked 12 miles! The nice thing about books by bloggers is that you can subscribe to their RSS feeds after you've become a fan of their writing. I just subscribed to Heather's blog, and I look forward to reading more about her life and family.

In the Woods - Tana French

A colleague at the Shaker Heights library recommended this book to me (I substitute there from time to time). She said she was "obsessed" with it--so I couldn't pass it up, especially since the audiobook was available. It turns out the Ravenna Road Irregulars, our mystery club, is doing this book as their June selection as well. I definitely could understand why my colleague liked it so much. The story revolves around Rob Ryan, a detective in Dublin, Ireland. A case brings him to his childhood hometown of Knocknoree, and there he must both try to solve the new case as well as come to terms with an older case that he was involved in years ago. The characterization and language were both beautiful, and the plot well constructed--all the most important things I look for in a compelling novel. In addition, the audio reader was fantastic, and even though the book was 18 discs, I was so enthralled that I barely realized it. Usually I get twitchy with a book and want to finish it, especially when it's an audiobook, but it held my attention. I highly recommend this book for both mystery lovers and lovers of literary fiction. I can't wait to read the sequel, The Likeness.

EDIT: I didn't even realize Carol had already blogged about this book! Just another endorsement from both of us to go read it!!

BPRD: Plague of Frogs

Another installment in a great graphic novel series. This one includes the origin of breakout character Abe Sapien.

Jesse Stone books by Robert B. Parker

I have always wanted to read the Spenser series but always thought that it was too big of a commitment with so many books to read. However, Parker has written several other series including the Jesse Stone books. Jesse is a divorced ex L.A. homicide cop. He lost his job because his drinking got out of control when his marriage fell apart. He gets a job as the chief of police in Paradise, Massachusetts, a small town on the coast. Jesse is great at his job but not great at his personal life. He and his exwife are on and off again. (He needs to dump her for good!) Anyway, these books are very fast reads but still manage to have good character development and great atmosphere. Also, Tom Selleck stars as Jesse in the made-for-TV movies and does an excellent job. The movies are very well done and capture the dark moodiness of the books. They are in the CLEVNET system. I am addicted to the books and have read the first five in less than a month.

American Lightning, by Howard Blum

A tale of the first "crime of the century "(20th century). In 1910, 21 people were killed in a bombing of the LA Times. It was a period when labor relations were vicious and often bloody. The event brought together famous detective Billy Burns (first director of what became the FBI), attorney Clarence Darrow (of Scopes monkey trial fame) and filmmaker D.W. Griffith (of Birth of a Nation shame). The Griffith connection is a touch flimsy, but still interesting.

BPRD: The Universal Machine

Mike Mignola's Hellboy has escaped the insular comics world to become popular in the mainstream. Another of his projects, BPRD, is poised to do the same. This is an excellent series involving the investigation of paranormal activities.

How to Live on Mars

It's a hard-science based take on the relatively near future of space colonization. Author Robert Zubrin builds a scenario that assumes humans have taken the plunge and sent colonists to Mars. What results is a kind of travel guide that discusses the risk and potential of various existing concepts. A must-read for those interested in NASA.