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Greetings!
This week we have readings by Allison Estes, Thomas H. Cook, Katie
Hickman, N.M. Kelby, and Joe Camp. These books chronicle
all sorts of adventure: animal rescue in New York City, murder in the Delta,
intrigue in the harems of the Ottoman Empire, mystery amidst Floridian strangeness, and discovery within the enigmatic realm of
horses.
We have signed copies of WHEN YOU ARE ENGULFED IN FLAMES by David Sedaris, THE
ENCHANTRESS OF FLORENCE by Salman Rushdie, HOME by Julia Andrews, and BRIGHT SHINY
MORNING by James Frey.
Don't forget...Father's Day is June 15th. Below you will find
suggestions for great gifts.
Our Dear Reader newsletter and the current calendar are available at www.squarebooks.com. |
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EVENTS
 Monday, June 9,
signing/reception @ 5 p.m.,
reading @ 5:30
p.m.
Allison Estes
PAW
& ORDER
(BowTie Press, pb. 12.95)
Co-authored by former Oxonian Allison Estes, Paw
& Order is a sure bet to create the animal book buzz of 2008.
Sometimes funny, sometimes sad, but always vivid, these twelve fascinating
stories will tug at the reader's heart and even evoke an occasional tear.
Filled with all the variety, color, and tempo of life in New York City, these true
vignettes of animal jeopardy and rescue are drawn from the files of former
ASPCA officer Tina Salaks and take the reader through a full gamut of human-and
animal-emotions, entertain with surprise endings, and linger in the mind's eye
long after the book has been put down. Includes stories featured on Animal
P***t's Animal Precinct. BUY NOW! 
Tuesday, June
10,
signing/reception @ 5 p.m.,
reading @ 5:30
p.m.
Thomas H. Cook
MASTER
OF THE DELTA
(Harcourt, hd. 24.00)
In 1954 Mississippi, Jack Branch returns to his father's
Delta estate, Great Oaks, to perform an act of noblesse oblige: teaching at the
local high school. Conducting a class on historical evil, Jack is shocked to
discover that his unassuming student Eddie is the son of the Coed Killer, a
notorious local murderer. Jack feels compelled to mentor the boy, encouraging
Eddie to examine his father's crime and using his own good name to open the
doors that Eddie's lineage can't. But when Eddie's investigation leads him to
Great Oaks and to Jack's own father, Jack finds himself questioning Eddie's
motives-and his own. As the deadly consequences of Jack's actions fall inescapably
into place, Thomas H. Cook masterfully reveals the darker truths that lurk in the
recesses of small-town lives and in the hearts of even well-intentioned men. BUY NOW!
Wednesday, June
11,
signing/reception @ 5 p.m.,
reading @ 5:30
p.m.
Katie Hickman
THE
AVIARY GATE
(Bloomsbury, hd. 25.99)
What is more mysterious to the western mind than the
foreign and intriguing harems of the Ottoman Empire in the 16th century? The
Aviary Gate is a novel about Celia Lamprey, an Englishwoman, engaged
to be married, who is presumed lost at sea but through various turns has become
a member of the sultan's harem, perhaps lost forever. When Elizabeth, a
thoroughly modern graduate student, finds a letter in an old volume in the Bodleian
library, she flees her own disastrous love life in London for Constantinople to
research Celia's story. Seductive, lush, and enveloping though it may be, this
is no bodice ripper. As A.S. Byatt achieved in Possession,
Katie Hickman succeeds in pairing the stories of these two women, centuries
apart, in a novel that is itself a small portal to a secluded world. CFR BUY NOW!
Thursday, June
12,
signing/reception @ 5 p.m.,
reading @ 5:30
p.m.
N.M.
Kelby
MURDER
AT THE BAD GIRL'S BAR & GRILL
(Shaye Areheart, hd. 23.00)
Here's a novel jam-packed with fascinating characters and
dreamy, endearing Floridian strangeness. Take a slasher-movie actress, a Scottish
circus clown, an FBI school dropout, a blind heiress, a junk food-loving
millionaire developer, and a Buddha-quoting bluesman, add a couple of murders
in a normally sedate retirement community in south Florida, and you get an
irresistible tale that's part Carl Hiaasen and part Gabriel García Márquez. It
all goes down as easy as a key lime pie martini, the signature drink of the Bad
Girl's Bar & Grill. BUY NOW!
Saturday,
June 14,
signing/reading @ 3:00
p.m.
Joe Camp
THE SOUL OF A HORSE
(Harmony,
hd. 24.95)
As the creator of the beloved Benji series, Joe Camp has
spent most of his life luring us into the heart and soul of a famous dog, but now
he deftly leads us into understanding the heart and soul of a horse. A surprise
birthday gift plunged Joe and his wife into the world of horses. This memoir
leads us on a riveting voyage of discovery as Joe and Kathleen navigate uncharted
territory on their way to understanding their horses. Ingeniously alternating
between the stories of two people thrust into an unfamiliar, enigmatic realm
and a fabled herd of wild horses brought to the New World centuries ago, Joe
Camp's inspiring book teaches us that the lessons he was learning apply to us
all. BUY NOW!
* Only books purchased at Square Books may be signed. |
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GIFT IDEAS FOR FATHER'S DAY
THE
DOWNHILL LIE
by
Carl Hiaasen
(Knopf, hd. 22.00)
A
hilarious confessional about returning to the fairways after a thirty-two-year
absence. The chronicle of Hiaasen's shaky return to this bedeviling
pastime and the ensuing demolition of his self-esteem-culminating with the
savage 45-hole tournament-will have you rolling with laughter. Yet the
bittersweet memories of playing with his own father and the glow he feels when
watching his own young son belt the ball down the fairway will also touch your
heart. BUY NOW!
THE
PRINCE OF FROGTOWN
by
Rick Bragg
(Knopf, hd. 24.00)
In
this final volume of the beloved American saga that began with All
Over but the Shoutin', Rick Bragg closes his circle of family stories with
a tale about fathers and sons inspired by his relationship with his
ten-year-old stepson. Bragg delivers a brilliant and moving rumination on the
lives of boys and men, a poignant reflection on what it means to be a father
and a son. Signed copies available.BUY NOW!
NEW SOUTH GRILLING
by
Robert St. John
(Hyperion, hd. 29.95)
When
it comes to outdoor grilling I have lots in common with the postal service-neither
rain nor sleet nor gloom of night will stop me from lighting the coals when the
time is right. So, this new cookbook has me giddy about spending summer evenings
beside my old trusty grill. Filled with marvelous new ideas and different spins
on old favorites, New South Grilling promises
good times and even better food ahead. SL
Signed copies available. BUY NOW!
THE
CROWD SOUNDS HAPPY
by
Nicholas Dawidoff
(Pantheon, hd. 24.95)
The Crowd Sounds Happy is
about its subtitle: A Story of Love, Madness, and Baseball. The
love has to do with Dawidoff's family, especially his courageous mother; the
madness with his growing awareness that his father is different, and difficult,
a knowledge that converges with the trajectory of his father's growing mental
illness; and baseball has to do with a boy's love for the game and the refuge
it provides from all else. Compelling, informative, and embroidered with glittering
detail. TM Signed copies available.
BUY NOW!
FATHERS
& SONS & SPORTS
edited
by Mike Lupica
(ESPN, hd. 24.95)
ESPN Books continues to expand its interesting catalogue
with a great gift for dads. Fathers & Sons
& Sports is a collection of a dozen plus pieces touching on
the special bond between a father and son and how men and boys find a common
bond in a shared passion. Of special interest is "Holy Ground," a tearjerker by
Oxford's own Wright Thompson. Trust me, your father will love this collection. SL
BUY NOW!
1001
THINGS IT MEANS TO BE A DAD: (Some Assembly Required)
by
Harry H. Harrison, Jr.
(Thomas Nelson, pb. 9.99)
This
book offers priceless wit and wisdom that pays tribute to dads from all walks
of life.
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SCANNING THE FRONT TABLES
BREATH
by Tim Winton
(Farrar,
Straus & Giroux hd. 23.00)
The last book I would be tempted to read is a
coming-of-age story about surfing in Australia. However, through Tim Winton's
vivid words, this middle-aged desk-jockey got to feel what it means to catch a
wave and stare death in the face. Bruce and Loonie are teenage friends in
Western Australia. They come under the tutelage of Sando, an older surfer, who
teaches the boys to surf and takes them on increasingly dangerous exploits, and
of Sando's American wife Eva, an aloof and mysterious presence with lessons of her
own. Told by the grown-up Bruce as he looks back on how this time shaped his
life, Breath is
about breathing, courage, death, sex, and friendship. Winton's (The
Riders, Dirt Music) masterful writing creates a landscape of sea so real
you can touch it and an inner scape that brings us back to the pains and
ecstasies of our own youth. EC BUY NOW!
WHEN YOU ARE ENGULFED IN FLAMES
by David Sedaris
(Little, Brown hd. 25.99)
Once again David Sedaris brings together an uproarious
and profound collection of essays. When finding the water shut off in his house
in Normandy, he uses the water in a vase of fresh cut flowers to fill the
coffee machine. The ensuing chain of associations takes him from the French
countryside to a hilariously uncomfortable memory of buying drugs in a mobile home
in rural North Carolina. From armoring the windows with LP covers to protect
the house from neurotic songbirds to the awkwardness of having a lozenge fall
from your mouth into the lap of a sleeping fellow passenger on a p***, Sedaris
uses the bizarre conundrums of daily life to reach the most deeply resonant human
truths. Culminating in a brilliantly funny account of his trip to Tokyo in
order to quit smoking, David Sedaris's sixth essay collection is a masterpiece
of comic writing. Signed copies available. BUY NOW!
AMERICAN NERD: The Story of My People
by Benjamin Nugent
(Scribner, hd. 20.00)
Most
people know a nerd when they see one but can't define just what a nerd is. American
Nerd gives us the history of the concept of nerdiness and of the
subcultures we consider nerdy. When and how did being a self-described nerd
become trendy? As the nerd emerged, vaguely formed, in the nineteenth century,
and popped up again and again in college humor journals and sketch comedy, our
culture obsessed over the designation. Mixing research and reportage with
autobiography, Benjamin Nugent embarks on a fact-finding mission. He seeks the
best definition of nerd and illuminates the common ground between nerd
subcultures that might seem unrelated: high-school debate team kids and ham
radio enthusiasts, medieval reenactors and pro-circuit Halo players. This
clever, enlightening book will appeal to the nerd that lives inside all of us. BUY NOW!
ATMOSPHERIC DISTURBANCES
by Rivka Galchen
(Farrar,
Straus & Giroux hd. 24.00)
In
this enthralling debut, psychiatrist Dr. Leo Liebenstein sets off to find his
wife, Rema, who he believes has been replaced by a simulacrum. With the help of
his psychiatric patient Harvey-who believes himself to be a secret agent who
can control the weather-Leo attempts to unravel the mystery of the spousal
switch. From the streets of New York to the southernmost reaches of Patagonia,
Leo's erratic quest becomes a test of how far he is willing to take his
struggle against the seemingly uncontestable truth he knows in his heart to be
false. Atmospheric Disturbances is at once a moving love story, a dark
comedy, a psychological thriller, and a deeply disturbing portrait of a
fracturing mind.
BUY NOW!
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BOOK SENSE PICK
GOSSIP OF THE STARLINGS
by Nina de G***t
(Algonquin,
hd. 22.95)
When
Catherine Morrow is admitted to the Esther Percy School for Girls, it's on the
condition that she reform her ways. But that's before the beautiful and
charismatic Skye Butterfield chooses Catherine for her best friend. Skye is in
love with danger and the thrill of taking risks, breaking rules, and crossing
boundaries, no matter the stakes. The problem is, the stakes keep getting
higher, and Catherine can neither resist Skye nor stop her from taking down
everyone around her. De G***t's chilling novel is a portrait of adolescent
seductions in all their beauty and terror. Caught in a world that is both
alluring and astonishing, the girls of Esther Percy are optimistic and willful,
loving and selfish, daring and cruel-all the while believing they're utterly
indestructible.
BUY NOW!
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OPENING LINES
"Before
I launch into a discussion of what a nerd is
and where the idea of nerds comes
from,
I'd
like to disclose that when I was eleven,
I had a rich fantasy life in which I
carried a glowing staff."
--
from AMERICAN NERD by Benjamin Nugent
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