Juxtabook

Christmas Goodies

I love getting books for Christmas. I've had quite a few this year including lots by Scandinavian authors including:

Tales of Protection by Erik Fosnes Hansen. The blurb begins: "Bolt has died and lies in his coffin reflecting on the past," which is rather a winning opening. "From nineteenth-century Sweden to Renaissance Italy, Hansen weaves together exquisite stories in a searching and impressive enquiry into why things happen the way they do."

The buyer of the these presents (Mr Juxtabook) must give credit where it is due. He read an excellent over-view of Scandinavian literature on the blog of Danish novelist Peter H. Fogtdal. Peter says of Tales of Protection:

One of my all time favorite novels. Great storytelling, a masterpiece with four stories that take place during four different time periods and come together in strange ways. Visit Italy during the Renaissance, a small Swedish island in the 19th Century, and Norway and Africa in the 1900s. An unforgettable book that asks a simple question. Why do things happen the way they do? Is there a scientific pattern, a protective God, what?

Also from Peter's recommendations came:

The Visit of the Royal Physician by Per Olov Enquist. It looks like an intriguing piece of historical fiction: "When Christian VII, young, mad and highly impressionable, assumes the Danish throne, many seek to control the new king, capitalising on his mental frailty to advance their own interests." When adding this volume to his list of recommendations peter notes:

You will be hard pressed to find many historical novels as good as this. It takes place in 18th century Denmark where a German doctor comes to Copenhagen and ends up ruling the country instead of the mad king. It's a beautiful love story, too.

The last one, for today at any rate, was apparently purchased after the review by Gaskella:

Let the Right One In by John Ajvide Lindqvist. Of this book Gaskella notes that she,

found something truly dark and horrific that needed a strong stomach and nerves of steel. It is a real contemporary chiller, full of violence and gore, totally relentless - yet at its heart is a the redemptive relationship between a twelve year old boy and a 200 year old vampire frozen into the body of a young girl.

And after my Twilight fest earlier in the year it seems a good idea to take anther bite of vampire fiction.

I love blogs. I have never bought nor been bought so many new books as I have recently and it is bloggers and twitterers who tempt me (or cause me to drop massive hints to my nearest and dearest). So thank you to Peter H. Fogtdal and Gaskella for their enthusiastic reviews. Happy reading to us all in 2010!
 

Merry Christmas

Just a quick post to wish all of Juxtabook's readers a very Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year. Thank you for all the reading, commenting and book sharing in the blogosphere this year. It has been a great book sharing year.

Aren't these gorgeous

Books as Art and Art as Books: a solution for framing books as display items, whilst making sure that they remaine intact and, ultimately, readable by Marijana Dworski and Clare Keil with their new venture Books4Looks.

 

I love the graphics on the Marguerite Patten cookbooks at the bottom. See more in their gallery.
  

Jane Austen's First Publisher

As I know there are a lot of Jane Austen fans who read this blog I thought I'd flag up an article by a bookselling colleague, Margaret of Hessay Books, on the possible early publication of Jane Austen in the form of a satirical letter by 'Sophia Sentiment'.

Just arrived ...

Some lovely arrivals in the post this week. Both pairs of books below are published by independents but at either end of the publishing scale.

Faber are of course one of our most established independent houses, best known for poetry but with a cracking fiction list too. My goodies from them:

The Lacuna  by Barbara Kingsolver is recently published in hardback. It has the most gorgeous colours on the cover. I'm not sure I want them in my living room walls but on the sea blue background here they are stunning making this a very appealing reach-for-me tome.

The Lacuna is the story of Harrison Shepherd an American brought up Mexico who finds his way through mixing with left leaning revolutionary artists. World War II sees him in Carolina, "But political winds continue to push him between north and south, in a plot that turns many times on the unspeakable breach - the lacuna - between truth and public presumption."

The Museum of Innocence by Orhan Pamuk is due to published in hardback in a few weeks. Orhan Pamuk is not a novelist whose work I am familiar with apart from being aware that he won the Nobel Prize in Literature in 2006 and has been involved with freedom of speech issues in Turkey. The description, "A stirring exploration of the nature of romantic attachment, and of the mysterious allure of collecting, The Museum of Innocence plumbs the depths of an Istanbul half western and half traditional - its rituals, its morality, its vast cultural history" is certainly intriguing and I look forward to getting to grips with it.

In complete contrast to Faber is the little and new publishing house of Victorian Secrets. VS was started earlier this year by PhD student Catherine Pope who some of you might know from her blog Victorian Geek. VS is republishing quality editions of out-of-print Victorian Classics reproducing then with scholarly introductions. My first two review copies from this new press are:

Twilight Stories by Rhoda Broughton and Weird Stories by Charlotte Riddell both introduced by Emma Liggins of the University of Manchester and author of George Gissing the Working Woman and Urban Culture. I love the fact that Weird Stories quotes from a contemporary review from The Times:

Weird Stories are sensational enough in all conscience, seeing that the main action is directed by supernatural agencies, and that disagreeably obtrusive ghosts haunt the scenes of their earthly troubles. But these mysteries are adroitly realized, and the stories are so probable as to be pleasantly thrilling; nervous people, indeed, might prefer to read the book on a railway journey by daylight rather than in a lonely apartment towards the small hours.

The Times 1882

In addition to these collections of short stories Victorian Secrets also publish The Dead Man’s Message and Her Father’s Name by Florence Marryat and edited by Dr Greta Depledge of Birkbeck College. There are a small number of free e-books available to download from their site including other works by Florence Marryat here. If you're noticing a Florence Marryat theme here it is because she is the subject of Catherine Pope's PhD! I wish Victorian Secrets all the best for 2010 and look forward to reading these story collections.

Christmas Shopping

As we're now in advent and I am fielding phone calls from customers asking for suggestions for bookish presents I thought I might as well make a blog post out of some of my favourites. So here goes, in no particular order and including fiction and non-fiction:

The Blue Handbag by Fiona Robyn is sadly let down by the cover when it is worth so much more. A gentle story that stays the right side of sentimentality: funny, quirky and real. A real treat of a read.

Testament by Alis Hawkins. One of my Top Ten Books of the Last Ten Years and the January choice for the Cornflower Book Group. 

England in Particular: A Celebration of the Commonplace, the Local, the Vernacular and the Distinctive by Sue Clifford and Angela King is wonderful compendium of everything English. Angela King also wrote the lovely The Apple Source Book: Particular Uses for Diverse Apples which is another treat of a gift.

Atticus the Storyteller: 100 Stories from Greece by Lucy Coats and illustrated by Anthony Lewis is a wonderful children's version of the Greek myths beautifully illustrated. The move to modern words and child appropriate language has been done beautifully. It is a satisfyingly large format book to share with your child; our five year old girl asked for over and over again. She even took it to show and tell. If you know any youngsters obsessed with monster real or imagined this is fabulous present choice.

After the Armistice Ball (the first Dandy Gilver Murder Mystery) by Catriona McPherson is a lovely traditional 1920s whodunit.

The Necropolis Railway: A Novel of Murder, Mystery and Steam  (the first in the Jim Stringer Steam Detective Series) by Andrew Martin (review coming soon)

Sir Gawain and the Green Knight  by Simon Armitage - cracking modern translation of the medieval poem. The hardback is only a couple of pounds more than the paperback and is well worth it for the delicately illustrated smooth matt dust wrapped cover.

A Very Great Profession: The Woman's Novel 1914-39 by Nicola Beauman is a very readable mix of literary criticism and social history. A must for anyone interested in women's literature.

A History of Reading by Alberto Manguel is a study of how and why we read (not a topographical volume on the Berkshire town!).

The Lady Investigates: Women Detectives and Spies in Fiction by Patricia Craig and Mary Cadogan is another lovely piece of both scholarly and readbable literary criticism. It covers women detective from Wilklie Collins to Margery Allingham and Ngaio Marsh.

Marginalia: Readers Writing in Books by H. J. Jackson and Once Again to Zelda: Fifty Great Dedications and Their Stories by Marlene Wagman-Geller are two fascinating books about the side issues of literary work: what reader's scribble in their margins, and the nature of authorial dedications.

Brat Farrar by Josphine Tey. I love Tey's works and this one is just a very good story charmingly told. You can read my review here.

Lesley Castle by Jane Austen is one of her minor works out in a lovely new edition by Hesperus Classics. You can read my review here.

The Widow and her Hero by Thomas Keneally, another of my Top Ten Books of the Last Ten Years, shows the effects of war and the effects of telling war history on those left behind.

The Roar of the Butterflies by Reginald Hill, better known for Dalziel and Pascoe. This novel features incompetently lucky PI Joe Sixmith. Very warm and witty with a tight plot, like the child of P. G. Wodehouse and Ngaio Marsh.

A Jealous Ghost by A. N. Wilson is a witty reworking of a Henry James novel, The Turn of the Screw. You can read my review here.

A Month in the Country by J L Carr and if you can buy the Quince Tree Press edition so much the better. Carr started the press to publish his own works, "An author’s desire to be independent of the frustrations and irritations of the conventional publishing world was probably the incentive, but it developed to a positive pleasure in the design and production of a volume complementary to the text - there is a degree of unconventionality about all the productions." The Quince Tree Press versions are much superior in design to anything else available.

Some alternative presents for the book-lover include:

Hand made journals from the Carronvale Bindery in Scotland.

Graham Green Collection of DVDs. Green's novels are oh-so-filmable not least because he worked with the film industry so closely. This quartet includes The Fallen Idol, Brighton Rock, The Heart of the Matter, and The Third Man. I love them all.

Powell & Pressburger Collection of DVDs. Whilst these are not literary adaptations, they have a very literary quality to the screen plays and I am sure many of you would love these complex, multifaceted films. To have such a large selection together is a great treat, and this collection contains one of my favurite ever films I Know Where I am Going, and apparently I am in good company as wikipedia tells me that Martin Scorsese said, "I reached the point of thinking there were no more masterpieces to discover, until I saw I Know Where I'm Going!". The collection also contains Black Narcissus, A Canterbury Tale, A Matter of Life and Death, and the wonderful The Red Shoes with Moira Shearer, with another 6 films.

The links in the text above are the Amazon UK but you might also like The Book Depository which has free worldwide shipping.

Emily Dickinson

Can I just point you in the direction of this blog post on Make Do and Read about an amazing piece of literary detection and innovative needlework - all in the same item! You can read more about the complexities of Emily Dickinson's original manuscripts here.

Hamster jazz

This is seriously silly but what the heck it's nearly Christmas.

As the proud owner of a hamster named Rocket I wonder if he has hidden talents too!

What kind of book am I?

What kind of book am I? Fantasy/SciFi apparently!

You have an amazing imagination, and in your mind, all things are possible.
You are open minded, and you find the future exciting. You crave novelty and progress.

Compared to most people, you are quirky and even a bit eccentric. You have some wacky ideas.
And while you may be a bit off the wall, there's no denying how insightful and creative you are.

Hmm - not sure about that!

A fun little quiz at any rate discovered on Kit Courteney Writes.

What Kind of Book Are You?

Further apologies for th lack of posting on here. Continued pesky winter bugs take their toll. I have put a few more posts on to the ibooknet blog though.