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This Week In Books

Did Jane Austen Die From Accidental Poisoning? This Week in Books: March 20, 2017

Arsenic and Old Glasses?

A new theory based on an examination of three of Jane Austen’s old pairs of glasses says the author might have died from accidental arsenic poisoning. The glasses show evidence that Austen’s vision went downhill close to her death, and that she possibly developed cataracts (a sign of arsenic poisoning). Speculation about Austen’s skin pigmentation near the end of her life also points to possible accidental arsenic ingestion. Of course, the actual cause of her death is still an open mystery, and one we’re not likely to solve with existing evidence. While accidental poisoning from toxic substances was more common in Regency England than it is now, this evidence is scant.

Young Readers Are Sticking to Print Books 

Ebook sales in the UK have fallen for the second year in a row while physical bookstore sales have risen, and it looks like younger readers are driving the reversal. While the huge numbers of adult coloring book sales probably has something to do with this (alas, you still can’t color on your Nook or Kindle), a 2016 Nielsen survey of readers 16-24 showed that 62% of them prefer to read a physical book to a digital one. Also a notable trend: use of tablets and phones overtook dedicated ereaders as the device of choice for reading digital books. Perhaps younger readers spend so much time looking at screens otherwise, they want a physical book for their reading?

We’re Getting a New Lisbeth

Sony is releasing their adaptation of The Girl in the Spider’s Web in October of 2018, and they’re doing it with a whole new cast. The company is conducting a “global search” for the next Lisbeth Salander, making the lucky actress the third to play the role on the big screen. It’s disappointing that we won’t see Rooney Mara back in the role (she was so perfect). Maybe Lisbeth will become the Doctor Who of thriller movies–same great character, new actress every few years.

Thanks to Unbound Worlds’ Cage Match for sponsoring this week’s newsletter.

Cage Match is back! Unbound Worlds is pitting science fiction characters against fantasy characters in a battle-to-the-death tournament, and you can win a collection of all 32 books featured in the competition. Enter now for your chance to win this library of sci-fi and fantasy titles!

 

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Giveaways

Win a Copy of THE BOOK THAT MADE ME!

We have 10 copies of The Book That Made Me, edited by Judith Ridge, to give away to 10 Riot readers.

Here’s what it’s about:

What if you could look inside your favorite authors’ heads and see the book that led them to become who they are today? What was the book that made them fall in love, or made them understand something for the first time? What was the book that made them feel challenged in ways they never knew they could be, emotionally, intellectually, or politically? What book made them readers, or made them writers, or made them laugh, think, or cry? Join thirty-one top children’s and young adult authors as they explore the books, stories, and experiences that changed them as readers — for good.

Go here to enter for a chance to win, or just click the cover image below:

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Riot Rundown

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Today’s Riot Rundown is sponsored by The Book That Made Me edited by Judith Ridge.

What if you could look inside your favorite authors’ heads and see the book that led them to become who they are today? What was the book that made them fall in love, or made them understand something for the first time? What was the book that made them feel challenged in ways they never knew they could be, emotionally, intellectually, or politically? What book made them readers, or made them writers, or made them laugh, think, or cry? Join thirty-one top children’s and young adult authors as they explore the books, stories, and experiences that changed them as readers — for good.

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What's Up in YA

Girls in the Labor Movement, Black Sabbath Songs With YA Books, & More Bookish Links

Happy Monday, YA Readers!

 

Let’s take this week’s newsletter as an opportunity to explore what we’ve been talking about YA over on Book Riot’s website over the last month or so. There’s something for every one here, so enjoy!

 

  • YA girls, fiction and real, who love and excel at STEM (that’s Science, Technology, Engineering, and Math for the non-acronym savvy!).
  • YA books that explore money, class, and power (seriously, though, these books are not only outstanding but tackle some big stuff I haven’t seen much before!).
  • Which of these YA novels about nerds are worth your bucks and which are worth a checkout at the library? The verdicts are in.

 

That’s a wrap this week! I’ll be handing over control of the YA Newsletter next week to middle grade queen Karina Glaser, as I’ll be traveling. I’m eager to see what she talks about and hope you are, too!

Until later, keep fighting the good fight and reading great YA books.

-Kelly Jensen

@veronikellymars

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The Goods

One Week Left – Nolite

Don’t wait to declare your readerly resistance! There’s just one week left to pre-order your limited-edition tee inspired by The Handmaid’s Tale.


And because one feminist shirt is never enough, we’ve got four  rad new tees celebrating some favorite female authors for Women’s History Month.

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True Story

Vacation Reading, Literary Tourism and Nonfiction Megalists

Happy St. Patrick’s Day! I’m writing this newsletter on the tail end of a much-needed vacation that included a few days in Chicago for sightseeing and (finally!) seeing the musical Hamilton (I am obsessed). One of our stops was Unabridged Bookstore, an independent bookstore known for their hand-written staff recommendations, extensive sale book section, and collection of LGBT literature.

This week’s newsletter is sponsored by Unbound Worlds’ Cage Match.

Cage Match is back! Unbound Worlds is pitting science fiction characters against fantasy characters in a battle-to-the-death tournament, and you can win a collection of all 32 books featured in the competition. Enter now for your chance to win this library of sci-fi and fantasy titles!

I had a great time perusing their excellent nonfiction selection. In addition to some well-curated tables of new nonfiction near the front of the store (pictured above), they also had some great displays of books in support of political resistance (pictured below). I managed to restrain myself and only bought three books – Hope in the Dark by Rebecca Solnit, Traveling with Ghosts by Shannon Leone Fowler and The Light of the World by Elizabeth Alexander.

New Nonfiction On My Radar

The Death and Life of the Great Lakes by Dan Egan (March 7 from W.W. Norton)

I was *this close* to grabbing this book off the new nonfiction table at Unabridged, but the weight of my tote bag held me back. In the book, journalist Dan Egan looks at the history of the Great Lakes and the “ecological catastrophe happening right before our eyes.” At a time when leaders would rather ignore that climate change exists, this book is more important than ever.

Bonus Read: Dan Egan’s extensive reporting on the crisis of the Great Lakes for the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel is can be read online at this link.

The Rules Do Not Apply by Ariel Levy (March 14 from Random House)

Hey, a new nonfiction book I’ve actually read! This memoir, about Ariel Levy’s miscarriage and dissolution of her marriage while on a reporting trip in Mongolia, is a stunning read about loss, redemption, and building an unconventional life in a conventional world. I tore through this book in just a few days, connecting deeply with Levy’s exploration of modern womanhood and what it takes to find and make the life you want in the face of loss and crisis.

Bonus Read: The core of this memoir is based on a piece Levy wrote for the New Yorker in 2013 about her miscarriage in Mongolia.

The Family Gene by Joselin Linder (March 14 from Ecco)

I’m a little obsessed with medical mysteries, so this memoir looks to be right up my alley. After years of being misdiagnosed, doctors discovered that Joselin Linder suffered from a rare blockage in her liver. As Linder tried to find an explanation for her condition, she discovered a long family history of strange symptoms. Working with a team of genetic researchers at Harvard Medical School, Linder discovered her family carried a rare “private mutation.” The book is the story of her discovery and what it means for her family and broader issues in medical science. Fascinating!

Bonus Read: NBC News profiled Linder and her family back in 2014, a nice overview of the book and Linder’s history.

BookExpo releases Editors Buzz titles

Last week, BookExpo (formerly Book Expo America) released the titles for their 2017 Editors Buzz panels this summer. During the annual panel at BookExpo, the editor of each book has a few minutes to pitch it, which helps build the hype for big fall titles. I was disappointed to see there are no nonfiction selections on the list this year, mostly because the nonfiction featured in the panel the last couple of years has been very good. I can personally recommend several titles, including On Immunity by Eula Biss, Five Days at Memorial by Sheri Fink, Black Man in a White Coat by Damon Tweedy, and Another Day In the Death of America by Gary Younge, just to name a few.

Mega Book Lists Galore

Book Riot’s 100 must-read books feature is murder on my TBR. In the last couple of weeks, Ashley Bowen-Murphy put together an amazing list of 100 books about the history of medicine, and Jessi Lewis also recommended 100 nonfiction adventure books. They’re both wonderfully informative and idiosyncratic book lists.

On My Nightstand

Before heading to Chicago, I spent the early part of my vacation holed up at my family’s cabin without reliable Internet access – the perfect excuse to read a ton. I ended up mostly immersing myself in some fiction – A Conjuring of Light by V.E. Schwab – but also found time to get into a couple of books I got from my local library, The Home That Was Our Country by Alia Malek (newly-released this month) and You Can’t Touch My Hair by Phoebe Robinson (a popular book on the Book Riot back channels).

And with that, this newsletter is coming to a close. As always, suggestions, recommendations, and feedback are always welcome. You can reach me on Twitter @kimthedork or via email at kim@riotnewmedia.com. Happy reading!

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The Stack

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Today’s The Stack is sponsored by Dark Horse Comics.
The Hugo, Bram Stoker, Locus, World Fantasy, and Nebula award–winning novel and upcoming Starz television series by Neil Gaiman is adapted as a comic series for the first time!

Shadow Moon just got out of jail, only to discover his wife is dead. Defeated, broke, and uncertain as to where to go from here, he meets the mysterious Mr. Wednesday, who employs him to serve as his bodyguard—thrusting Shadow into a deadly world of the supernatural, where ghosts of the past come back from the dead, and a brewing war between old and new gods hits a boiling point.

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Riot Rundown

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Today’s Riot Rundown is sponsored by Bronze And Sunflower by Cao Wenxuan.

Sunflower is an only child, and when her father is sent to the rural Cadre School, she has to go with him. Her father is an established artist from the city and finds his new life of physical labor and endless meetings exhausting. Sunflower is lonely and longs to play with the local children in the village across the river. When her father tragically drowns, Sunflower is taken in by the poorest family in the village, a family with a son named Bronze. Until Sunflower joins his family, Bronze was an only child, too, and hasn’t spoken a word since he was traumatized by a terrible fire. Bronze and Sunflower become inseparable, understanding each other as only the closest friends can. Translated from Mandarin, the story meanders gracefully through the challenges that face the family, creating a timeless story of the trials of poverty and the power of love and loyalty to overcome hardship. Author Cao Wenxuan is the winner of the 2016 Hans Christian Andersen Award.

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The Goods

Women’s History Tees

Offset your Ides of March wariness with rad new tees celebrating some favorite female authors.

And don’t let the bastards grind you down! Pre-order your limited-edition tee inspired by The Handmaid’s Tale by 3/24.

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Giveaways

Giveaway: UNIVERSAL HARVESTER By John Darnielle

We have 15 copies of Universal Harvester by John Darnielle to give away to 15 Riot readers.

Here’s what it’s all about:

It’s the late 1990s and Jeremy works at the Video Hut in Nevada, Iowa. A local schoolteacher comes in to return Targets and says: “There’s something on it.” Two days later, a different customer returns a different tape and says: “There’s another movie on this tape.”

Jeremy discovers that in the middle of each movie, the screen blinks dark and the movie is replaced by a few minutes of jagged, poorly lit home video.

“This chilling literary thriller follows a video store clerk as he deciphers a macabre mystery through clues scattered among the tapes his customers rent. A page-tuning homage to In Cold Blood and The Ring.” — O: The Oprah Magazine

Go here to enter for a chance to win, or just click the cover image below. Good luck!