It’s summer! The season of beach reads, page-turning suspense, and cozy reading at the cabin. Whether you travel far or stick close to home, it’s the perfect time to kick back, relax, and get into a good book. And there are plenty of new releases to add to your TBR list! Here are some recent releases across varied genres that I am excited to dive into this summer. The Kamogawa Food Detectives by Hisashi Kashiwai, Jesse Kirkwood (Translator) – Literary Fiction/Cozy Mystery What’s the one dish you’d do anything to taste just one more time? Down a quiet backstreet in Kyoto exists a very special restaurant. Run by Koishi Kamogawa and her father Nagare, the Kamogawa Diner serves up deliciously extravagant meals. But that’s not the main reason customers stop by… The father-daughter duo are ‘food detectives’. Through ingenious investigations, they are able to recreate dishes from a person’s treasured memories – dishes that may well hold the keys to their forgotten past and future happiness. The restaurant of lost recipes provides a link to vanished moments, creating a present full of possibility. A bestseller in Japan, The Kamogawa Food Detectives is a celebration of good company and the power of a delicious meal. One Perfect Couple by Ruth Ware – Thriller A high-tension and ingenious thriller following five couples trapped on a storm-swept island as a killer stalks among them. Lyla is in a bit of a rut. Her post-doctoral research has fizzled out, she’s pretty sure they won’t…
Dodie Smith’s novel is just like any other charming British novel set in the countryside in the 1930s: the landscape is glorious, the cupboard is bare, and the characters eccentric. I Capture the Castle opens with the wonderful line “I am sitting in the kitchen sink as I write this.” The “I” is Cassandra Mortmain, the 17-year old narrator of the novel (which is, in… [Read More]
Filed Under: British, Cassandra, castle, countryside, English, family, funny, imagination, inspiration, London, romance, sad, voice, witty, writer
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When Jill Swenson asked me to write a 500 word post for Swenson Book Development LLC book blog, I was apprehensive. For one, writing creatively has never been one of my strengths. But writing critiques, doing research, and procrastinating are. Helping others write is why I want to work in book publishing. Even if the publishing industry is struggling. I refuse to say publishing is… [Read More]
Filed Under: Authors, blogger, blogosphere, Blogs, book blog, book professionals, connect, Danielle Sherwood, Facebook, Galley Cat, industry trends, Jill Swenson, links, magazines, pleasure reading, Publishing industry, Reader, Shelf Awareness, Swenson book Development LLC, The Millions, Tumblr, websites, WordPress
The collaborative effort of Victoria Boynton (poet) and Marney Lieberman (artist), entitled “Contraptions,” reminds me of a game that the Surrealists used to play at dinner parties. In this game, one person would write a word or draw a portion of a picture on a sheet of paper. The paper would then be folded over, so no one else could see its contents, and passed to the next guest. This person would write a word or draw another part of a picture on the blank space below the paper’s fold. After all the dinner guests had made their contributions, the paper would be unfolded, and there it was: a microcosm of the creative power of the unconscious mind.
Perhaps this book is itself a “contraption” for accessing the untapped resources of the heart. Using the delicate balance of poetry and art, Boynton and Lieberman hold a séance to call forth “our dark hearts and our light hearts,” and decide to “welcome whatever comes.” Beyond this, though, I am fascinated by the fact that it seems Boynton was playing a Surrealist party game all by herself. Sometimes even Boynton has no idea what is coming next in her poem, nor what has come before. Thus, the poet and the reader unfold the paper together.
Boynton is uninterested in giving a guided tour of the emotions, objects, ideas and imaginings which she catalogues so thoroughly and so irregularly throughout the book. The reader feels much the same as the narrator of “Contraption: missing part,” who spends the entire poem wandering through aisles of parts and pieces, searching for the right one. The mistake, for the narrator and the…
My friend Robin gave me a starter bag to make Amish Friendship Bread; sweet bread that tastes like a moist cake. For the first five days I opened the gallon sized bag to release the air and then seal it and smash the contents in the bag. On the sixth day, I added a cup each of flour, sugar and milk. Then I sealed the… [Read More]
Filed Under: Amish, Author, Baking, Book, bread, Community, connections, Darien Gee, Food, Friendship, Friendship Bread, Kitchen, oven, Pudding, Readers, recipes, Starter, Stories, yeast
We begin the season of soaking up the sun and relaxing with a good book. Here at Swenson Book Development, LLC, I am not the only one who is reading books worth sharing with other readers. Over the coming weeks look here for guest bloggers who will review what they’re reading. There are a half dozen books I find myself reading simultaneously. I look forward… [Read More]