TBR alert

From today's Publishers Lunch: "Caitlin Fitz's OUR SISTER REPUBLICS, about how the early United States'  enthusiasm for foreign revolutions shaped popular U.S. understandings of  race, rebellion, and republicanism"

Yes, please.

Help me make a reading list, please

After going to hear an excellent Irish-US group last night, I'm in a mood to spend some time reading about Ireland.

When I pick books out for myself, I usually gravitate to historical fiction - which is great; I loved the Irish Country Doctor books, but I have no idea what good contemporary stuff is out there.

Basically what I'm looking for is the Irish equivalent of Ian Rankin's books, something with a great story, with a setting that's almost a character itself. YA and adult fiction are both good, but I try to avoid depressing books.

Any suggestions? They'd be much appreciated.

Writers of color

Borrowing this list from Color Online, via The HappyNappyBookseller. X means read, # means on the TBR list, and ! means loved.

Susan’s Unofficial List of Great YA by or About Women of Color:

1. When Kambia Elaine Flew In From Neptune by Lori A. Williams
2. Every Time A Rainbow Dies by Rita Williams-Garcia
3. No Laughter Here by Rita Williams-Garcia
4. Jumped by Rita Williams-Garcia
5. If You Come Softly by Jacqueline Woodson (X)
6. The House You Pass On The Way by Jacqueline Woodson
7. Flygirl by Sherri L. Smith (#)
8. From The Notebooks of Melanin Sun by Jacqueline Woodson
9. Sold by Patricia McCormick
10. Heaven by An Na
11. The Parable of The Sower by Octavia E. Butler (!)
12. Purple Hibiscus by Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie (#)
13. Persepolis by Majane Satrapi (X)
14. The Rock and The River by Kekla Magoon (!)
15. Secret Keeper by Mitali Perkins (!)
16. Mare’s War by Tanita S. Davis (#)
17. A Wish After Midnight by Zetta Elliott (#)
18. Down To The Bone by Mayra Lazara Dole
19. Don’t Get It Twisted by Paula Chase
20. Jason & Kyra by Dana Davidson (!)
21. Forged by Fire by Sharon Draper
22. Kendra by Coe Booth (!)
23. Shine, Coconut Moon by Neesha Meminger (#)
24. Does My Head Look Big In This? By Randa Abdel-Fattah (X)
25. Born Confused by Tanuja Desai Hidier
26. Skunk Girl by Sheba Karim (X)
27. The Meaning of Conseulo by Judith Ortiz Cofer
28. In The Time of the Butterflies by Julia Alvarez (!)
29. Kindred by Octavia E. Butler (!)
30. First Part Last by Angela Johnson
31. Pemba’s Song by Marilyn Nelson
32. Wanting Mor by Rukhsana Khan
33. M + O 4EVR by Tonya Hegamin (#)
34. Lucy The Giant by Sherri L. Smith
35. The House on Mango Street by Sandra Cisneros (X)
36 Throwaway Piece by Jo Ann Hernandez
37. White Bread Competition by Jo Ann Hernandez
38. Across A Hundred Mountains by Reyna Grande (#)
39. Silver Phoenix by Cindy Pon
40. Ash by Malinda Lo
41. The Skin I’m In by Sharon G. Flake

It's hardly a comprehensive list of the writers of color I've read and loved, let alone my ever-growing TBR list, but it's a start.

There's a graphic designer out there who deserves some applause

I still haven't read the book, but this poster pushes it up the TBR list.

(I admit it doesn't actually accomplish its primary objective in this case. I'm not going to watch the show - no HBO here!)

What everyone else is up to

Upcoming: A post on They Also Ran, part of Colleen's month of politics. For now, a collection of links, both kidlit and non.

The ever-fab Elizabeth Peters answers all sorts of questions for Powell's. (via bookshelves of doom) (Naturally, the month I don't read the Powell's newsletter all the way through...)

Kirsten Miller adds to her list of underground cities. (Before climbing down, take a look at the experts.)

Feministing asks why we don't have more Gwen Ifills - they ask the question in the context of presidential debate moderators, but as she's one of the journalists I admire, it's a question that should get more attention.

Errol Morris discusses how easy it is to change our perception of an image by altering the caption - from Hurricane Katrina victims to alleged WMDs. (via both Boing Boing and Gwenda Bond)

Kelly pointed me to some LOLs that don't involve any cats. Instead, they involve a certain world leader and major sporting event.

A post for everyone who's read The Green Glass Sea (even those of us who still haven't gotten an ARC of White Sands, Red Menace...)

It's no secret that I really like Boston. Maud just adds to it.

Also Boston-related - I want time to sit and read through Boston 1775. J.L. Bell has written some fascinating stuff lately, but all I've been able to do is skim. (And thank Ann Rinaldi for stoking my interest in the Jefferson/Hemings relationship.)

The great thing about being a reporter is getting to say things like this: "Quoting [Steve Jobs] calling me a 'slime bucket' is not even remotely problematic. He didn't go off the record for another 10 minutes."

MotherReader tried out the fish pedicure - I think it actually looks pretty cool. (Says the girl who's never had a normal pedicure.)

Another Very Cool Thing, courtesy of Sara Lewis Holmes - NASA offers a workshop for writers that includes some observing time. Ah, the days of flats and darks and RGBSun...

Joseph Bruchac makes an appearance at Cynsations.

New additions to the TBR list:
High Dive by Tamar Stein
Don't Talk to Me About the War by David A. Adler

What I'm doing this weekend

Revising (if I can get the printer to cooperate)
Knitting in public
Hanging out with Christina
Admiring John Scalzi's ability to get to the point (and bumping Zoe's Tale a little further up the TBR list)

I think the first Trixie post will also be coming up soon.

See y'all next week!

More about that picture

I should have read more closely when I linked to Slate's slideshow on Stanley Forman's photo taken during one of the Boston busing confrontations. The slideshow was put together by Louis Masur, and if I'd made it all the way to the author bio (Slate, one of these days we're going to have a talk about your layout) I'd have seen that Masur has just written a book on the image.

Louis Bayard reviews The Soiling of Old Glory for Salon. The rest of Forman's roll of film apparently tells a more nuanced story.

Catching up

Back to the blog after a bit of housesitting and a quick trip to Baltimore. A few things of note:

This is why I love Christina. When I bring home eight pounds of fruit, it sits in the refrigerator until I finally remember to throw it out. She turns it into a corresponding amount of preserves.

I didn't actually know much about Archimedes when I decided to name my blog for him. (The Dannie Abse poem quoted in the sidebar was on the first page of the Oxford quotations book I devoured in high school, so it stuck with me. Also, the name Archimedes has always made me think of The Sword in the Stone, Disney version.) But a post on SciGuy directed me to the website for the Archimedes Palimpsest, which is intriguing despite the fact that it probably contains more math than I've thought about since my last astronomy class.

Courtesy of the latest Publisher's Weekly, there's one more book on my TBR list. Rome 1960: The Olympics that Changed the World is coming out this summer. (And until I Googled him tonight, I'd forgotten that in addition to being known as a sportswriter, David Maraniss was part of the team that won the Washington Post this year's Pulitzer for breaking news.)

I've had a special affection for the 1960 Olympics since the first time I read Alex in Rome. It's an amazing book, and I'm looking forward to comparing the two.

Finally, I want to say - and I'm not just sucking up to my boss here - that there will be a fabulous lineup of authors signing books in the ABA Lounge at BEA next month: Autumn Cornwell, Jane Yolen, Steve Kluger, Cynthia Kadohata, Marisa de los Santos (if she shows up with the gorgeous orange bag she brought to Brooklyn last month, I'm so asking her about it), Barry Lyga, David Shannon, and other wonderful writers.

The signings are for ABA members only, but anyone who's going to BEA is welcome to visit me - I'll be spending most of my time at the lounge welcome desk.

Women in astronomy

Maria Mitchell and the Sexing of Science is one of those books that makes me think, "wow, someone other than me finds this stuff interesting?"

Renée Berglund's post at Beacon Broadside makes me want to read the book even more. I sense an upcoming Non-Fiction Monday post here.

"On one hand, it’s exciting to realize that there was a time (not that long ago) when a girl like the young Maria Mitchell grew up believing that there was nothing preventing her from achieving scientific greatness. On the other hand, it’s a bit discouraging to realize that when I was born in New York City in the late twentieth century, the odds were worse for girls in astronomy than they had been when Mitchell was born on Nantucket more than a hundred and fifty years before.
...
There’s a problem with stories of triumph against all odds. As long as we cling to the belief that truly great and heroic figures don’t need encouragement or good opportunities, we’re giving our society permission not to create opportunities. The realization that Mitchell was encouraged by her family and by a community that was willing to support her efforts to achieve scientific greatness shouldn’t be depressing at all. To the contrary, it should push us to create similar opportunities today."

TBR Challenge - finally, progress!

Thanks to my wonderful aunt, who was looking through the old entries here, I can finally cross one book off my TBR Challenge list. ¡Mil gracias, MB!

The list:

1. The Log From the Sea of Cortez
2. Thin Man
3. Michael Collins: The Man Who Made Ireland
4. Ali and Nino: A Love Story
5. Imperial Life in the Emerald City: Inside Iraq's Green Zone
6. Before Midnight: A Retelling of Cinderella (finished 3/24/08)
   
7. Peak
8. Captains Courageous
9. Once Were Warriors
10. 109 East Palace: Robert Oppenheimer and the Secret City of Los Alamos
11. The Truth-Teller's Tale
12. Bay of Spirits: A Love Story

My alternates:

1. The Power Broker: Robert Moses and the Fall of New York
2. In the Company of the Courtesan
3. Tamar: A Novel of Espionage, Passion, and Betrayal
4. Anahita's Woven Riddle
5. Flapper: A Madcap Story of Sex, Style, Celebrity, and the Women Who Made America Modern
6. Three Cups of Tea: One Man's Mission to Fight Terrorism and Build Nations... One School at a Time
7. Fiasco: The American Military Adventure in Iraq
8. Sisters: The Lives of America's Suffragists
9. Very Far Away From Anywhere Else
10. The Alibi Club
11. A Higher Geometry
12. Hope and Other Dangerous Pursuits

So many books

Taking a page from (not to say blatantly copying) Colleen and a host of other bloggers today, I'm listing my most anticipated books of 2008 (so far). Besides the ones I've committed to for the TBR Challenge, I want to read

Path to Punishment, by Jeanette Alsheimer and Patricia Friedle

Defying Dixie: The Radical Roots of Civil Rights, 1919-1950, by Glenda Elizabeth Gilmore (thanks to last week's review in the Post)

The Girl With No Shadow, by Joanne Harris (that's right, a follow-up to Chocolat)
Surprises According to Humphrey, by Betty G. Birney

My Most Excellent Year: A Novel of Love, Mary Poppins, and Fenway Park, by Steve Kluger

Princess Ben, by Catherine Gilbert Murdock

Ten Cents a Dance, by Christine Fletcher (that one might call for a reread of Last Dance on Holladay Street)

Touchstone, by the amazing Laurie R. King

Wish You Were Here, by Catherine Clark (thanks to Little Willow's review)

Tell Me, Pretty Maiden, by Rhys Bowen (I should probably start at the beginning of the series, but I've recently become a Rhys fan through her posts on The Lady Killers)

Girl Overboard, by Justina Chen Headley

And I'm going to borrow from Sarah Miller (there's that blatant copying again) and mention a few upcoming releases that I've already read and loved:

Trouble, by Gary D. Schmidt. Read it. It's amazing.

Lock and Key, by Sarah Dessen

The Penderwicks on Gardam Street, by Jeanne Birdsall

An Incomplete Revenge, by Jacqueline Winspear. After reading (and rereading, and rereading) Maisie Dobbs, I am amazed by how little I learned about World War I.

The Joys of Love. Yes, a new Madeleine L'Engle.

Taking the TBR Challenge

Why not? I'll give it a try. Twelve books that have been on my TBR list for more than six months, to be read over the course of 2008.

The list:

1. The Log From the Sea of Cortez
2. Thin Man
3. Michael Collins: The Man Who Made Ireland
4. Ali and Nino: A Love Story
5. Imperial Life in the Emerald City: Inside Iraq's Green Zone
6. Before Midnight: A Retelling of Cinderella
7. Peak
8. Captains Courageous
9. Once Were Warriors
10. 109 East Palace: Robert Oppenheimer and the Secret City of Los Alamos
11. The Truth-Teller's Tale
12. Bay of Spirits: A Love Story

My alternates:

1. The Power Broker: Robert Moses and the Fall of New York
2. In the Company of the Courtesan
3. Tamar: A Novel of Espionage, Passion, and Betrayal
4. Anahita's Woven Riddle
5. Flapper: A Madcap Story of Sex, Style, Celebrity, and the Women Who Made America Modern
6. Three Cups of Tea: One Man's Mission to Fight Terrorism and Build Nations... One School at a Time
7. Fiasco: The American Military Adventure in Iraq
8. Sisters: The Lives of America's Suffragists
9. Very Far Away From Anywhere Else
10. The Alibi Club
11. A Higher Geometry
12. Hope and Other Dangerous Pursuits

Looking at these lists reminds me what a nerd I am. But in a good way!