Happy Tuesday, friends! As you read this, I am hopefully reading a book and enjoying my week without work. I am not calling it a v-a-c-a-t-i-o-n because the last time I tried to take a v-a-c-a-t-i-o-n, I came down with Covid-19 on the first day. So I don’t want the universe to know I’m on a break. Unsurprisingly, I have way more books that I plan to read on my break than I actually can read, but that’s the way (uh-huh uh-huh) I like it.
But first, we must discuss today’s books! At the top of my list to acquire are A Thousand Miles to Graceland by Kristen Mei Chase, The Guest Lecture by Martin Riker, and Polar Bear Café by Aloha Higa (I have a soft spot for manga featuring animals offering services). You can hear about some more of the fabulous books coming out today on this week’s episode of All the Books! Jenn and I talked about some of the books we’re excited about this week, including Spice Road, The Chinese Groove, and Georgie, All Along.
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And now, it’s time for everyone’s favorite game show: AHHH MY TBR! Here are today’s contestants.
The Faraway World: Stories by Patricia Engel
This is a fantastic collection of award-winning stories (and Engel’s first published collection, if I am not mistaken.) They are beautiful, and moving, and offering hope and light in some of the darkest moments of the characters’ lives. There’s a couple trying to make ends meet in Miami, a woman trying to understand why her dead brother’s bones have been stolen, two Colombian expats in NYC getting to know one another, and more. If you have never read Engel before, you are in for a wonderful treat!
Backlist bump: Infinite Country by Patricia Engel
All Hallows by Christopher Golden
And nothing is more fun to read on a snowy day than a chilly horror novel! You know how I love the novels of Christopher Golden, and this one is no exception. It’s about Halloween in a Massachusetts town full of gossip and chaos in 1984. Four unusual children are trying to get the other costumed trick-or-treaters to hide them from someone they call The Cunning Man. But it’s Halloween, a night notorious for pranks, so their cries go unanswered. Which is going to be really unfortunate for the people of the town, because The Cunning Man is coming, and he really likes the vibe of the fractured neighborhood.
Backlist bump: Snowblind by Christopher Golden
This Other Eden by Paul Harding
And because my sense of time was off, I will be mentioning this on the January 31st episode of All the Books! as a book I want to read, because I recorded the episode a week ago, but then I read the book for this newsletter. So next week, when I’m all, “I can’t wait to read this book!” know that I did and it is excellent. It’s a tragic story of love and injustice, based on the true story of Malaga Island in Maine, which was inhabited at the end of the 18th century by a former enslaved man and his wife, and became one of the first racially integrated towns in the Northeast. Until over a century later, when the local authorities decided to forcibly remove and institutionalize all its inhabitants and use the island for their own purposes. It’s rage-making and sad, and also beautifully written and an important story from history that needs to be told.
Backlist bump: Tinkers by Paul Harding
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This week, I am reading Vampires of El Norte by Isabel Cañas and The Keeper of the Lost Cities by Shannon Messenger. I am trying not to watch anything other than NBA games this week because I want to focus on reading, but I might have to checkout Poker Face. (It has Reba the Mail Lady!) The song stuck in my head is “7” by Prince. I have been listening to a ton of Prince and Beck this month. (Is it my Year of One-named Artists??) I have been adding to a playlist of songs that are new to me, and you can listen too! And here is your weekly cat picture: Don’t you just want to boop that snoot??? Farrokh was trying to turn on the cute charm to get some cake from my husband. (It didn’t work.)