Shelf Control #101: The Three Weissmanns of Westport

Posted in Shelf Control by Lisa @ Bookshelf Fantasies

Welcome to Shelf Control — an original feature created and hosted by Bookshelf Fantasies.

Shelf Control is a weekly celebration of the unread books on our shelves. Pick a book you own but haven’t read, write a post about it (suggestions: include what it’s about, why you want to read it, and when you got it), and link up! For more info on what Shelf Control is all about, check out my introductory post, here.

Want to join in? Shelf Control posts go up every Wednesday. See the guidelines at the bottom of the post, and jump on board!

Title: The Three Weissmanns of Westport
Author: Cathleen Schine
Published: 2010
Length: 304 pages

What it’s about (synopsis via Goodreads):

Betty Weissmann has just been dumped by her husband of forty-eight years. Exiled from her elegant New York apartment by her husband’s mistress, she and her two middle-aged daughters, Miranda and Annie, regroup in a run-down Westport, Connecticut, beach cottage. In Schine’s playful and devoted homage to Jane Austen’s “Sense and Sensibility,” the impulsive sister is Miranda, a literary agent entangled in a series of scandals, and the more pragmatic sister is Annie, a library director, who feels compelled to move in and watch over her capricious mother and sister. Schine’s witty, wonderful novel “is simply full of pleasure: the pleasure of reading, the pleasure of Austen, and the pleasure that the characters so rightly and humorously pursue….An absolute triumph” (“The Cleveland Plain Dealer”).

How and when I got it:

I found this book on the book swap shelf at work, and based on the title alone, I thought I’d adopt it.

Why I want to read it:

As soon as I saw the Westport, Connecticut setting, I had to grab this book. I grew up in a town near Westport (although nothing like it), and I was curious to see how the area is portrayed and whether it seems recognizable to me. I had no idea until just now that the plot is an homage to Sense and Sensibility — that makes me want to read it even more!

__________________________________

Want to participate in Shelf Control? Here’s how:

Write a blog post about a book that you own that you haven’t read yet.
Add your link in the comments!
If you’d be so kind, I’d appreciate a link back from your own post.
Check out other posts, and…

Have fun!

Save

13Dec2017

Shelf Control #100: Needful Things

Posted in Shelf Control by Lisa @ Bookshelf Fantasies

Welcome to Shelf Control — an original feature created and hosted by Bookshelf Fantasies.

Want to join in? Shelf Control posts go up every Wednesday. See the guidelines at the bottom of the post, and jump on board!

THIS IS MY 100th SHELF CONTROL POST! Wooooooo. And the scary thing is that I’m not in any danger of running out of unread books on my shelves. Of the 100 books I’ve chosen for Shelf Control, I’ve managed to read only 11 so far, plus one more that I DNFd and one that went in my most recent discard pile. That’s not a particularly impressive reading rate… but, I keep moving forward.

Onward to this week’s pick…

Title: Needful Things
Author: Stephen King
Published: 1991
Length: 690 pages

What it’s about (synopsis via Goodreads):

Stephen King’s #1 national bestseller about a store where Leland Gaunt can sell you whatever your heart desires—sexual pleasure, wealth, power, or even more precious things—but not without exacting some price in return. “A read in the tradition of The Stand” (Booklist).

Leland Gaunt opens a new shop in Castle Rock called Needful Things. Anyone who enters his store finds the object of his or her lifelong dreams and desires: a prized baseball card, a healing amulet. In addition to a token payment, Gaunt requests that each person perform a little “deed,” usually a seemingly innocent prank played on someone else from town. These practical jokes cascade out of control and soon the entire town is doing battle with itself. Only Sheriff Alan Pangborn suspects that Gaunt is behind the population’s increasingly violent behavior.

How and when I got it:

I don’t remember buying this book, but I do have a copy on my shelf. Maybe it just showed up by itself one day. Kind of creepy and appropriate for a Stephen King book!

Why I want to read it:

Stephen King! Castle Rock! I’m a big fan of King’s, and still have some major reading gaps when it comes to his books. I’m trying to fix that, bit by bit, so whenever I’m next in the mood for a King read, I think this will be the one to grab.

__________________________________

Want to participate in Shelf Control? Here’s how:

Write a blog post about a book that you own that you haven’t read yet.
Add your link in the comments!
If you’d be so kind, I’d appreciate a link back from your own post.
Check out other posts, and…

Have fun!

Save

6Dec2017

Shelf Control #99: The Last New Land: Stories of Alaska Past and Present

Posted in Shelf Control by Lisa @ Bookshelf Fantasies

Welcome to Shelf Control — an original feature created and hosted by Bookshelf Fantasies.

Want to join in? Shelf Control posts go up every Wednesday. See the guidelines at the bottom of the post, and jump on board!

Title: The Last New Land: Stories of Alaska Past and Present
Author: Wayne Mergler (editor)
Published: 1996
Length: 816 pages

What it’s about (synopsis via Goodreads):

This mammoth, 816-page anthology tells a myriad of stories of Alaska in fiction, journalism, memoirs, folklore, and poetry. From Tlingit and Eskimo legends to the prose by Robert Service, Ernie Pyle, and Jack London to works by young contemporary writers, The Last New Land lays out a literary goldfield waiting to be discovered.

How and when I got it:

I found this book at a library sale a few years back and just had to have it.

Why I want to read it:

First of all, I’m madly in love with Alaska and love reading novels set there — so when I saw this story collection, there was no way I’d pass it up (even though I don’t usually read short stories). The anthology looks fascinating, including Tlingit and Eskimo legends, stories and excerpts about early Alaska history, all the way through to present-day fiction and articles, and even an excerpt from one of my very favorite series, the Kate Shugak novels by Dana Stabenow.

I doubt that I’ll ever sit down and read this book all the way through, but choosing The Last New Land for this week’s Shelf Control is a good reminder to myself to at least pull it off my shelf and dip my toes in!

__________________________________

Want to participate in Shelf Control? Here’s how:

Write a blog post about a book that you own that you haven’t read yet.
Add your link in the comments!
If you’d be so kind, I’d appreciate a link back from your own post.
Check out other posts, and…

Have fun!

Save

29Nov2017

Shelf Control #98: Circling the Sun

Posted in Shelf Control by Lisa @ Bookshelf Fantasies

Welcome to Shelf Control — an original feature created and hosted by Bookshelf Fantasies.

Want to join in? Shelf Control posts go up every Wednesday. See the guidelines at the bottom of the post, and jump on board!

Title: Circling the Sun
Author: Paula McLain
Published: 2015
Length: 366 pages

What it’s about (synopsis via Goodreads):

Brought to Kenya from England as a child and then abandoned by her mother, Beryl is raised by both her father and the native Kipsigis tribe who share his estate. Her unconventional upbringing transforms Beryl into a bold young woman with a fierce love of all things wild and an inherent understanding of nature’s delicate balance. But even the wild child must grow up, and when everything Beryl knows and trusts dissolves, she is catapulted into a string of disastrous relationships.

Beryl forges her own path as a horse trainer, and her uncommon style attracts the eye of the Happy Valley set, a decadent, bohemian community of European expats who also live and love by their own set of rules. But it’s the ruggedly charismatic Denys Finch Hatton who ultimately helps Beryl navigate the uncharted territory of her own heart. The intensity of their love reveals Beryl’s truest self and her fate: to fly.

How and when I got it:

I won this book in a Goodreads giveaway back in 2015 — and I swear, I so appreciate it and was super excited to win and absolutely planned to read it right away… and then I just didn’t. I’m sorry, Goodreads! Please forgive me!

Why I want to read it:

The synopsis doesn’t make this entirely clear, but Circling the Sun is biographical fiction about the life of the great Beryl Markham. My book group read her beautiful memoir West With the Night earlier this year, which inspired me even further to finally read this novel. I really will try to make a point of getting to it in early 2018!

__________________________________

Want to participate in Shelf Control? Here’s how:

Write a blog post about a book that you own that you haven’t read yet.
Add your link in the comments!
If you’d be so kind, I’d appreciate a link back from your own post.
Check out other posts, and…

Have fun!

Save

14Nov2017

Shelf Control #97: The Tower, the Zoo, and the Tortoise

Posted in Shelf Control by Lisa @ Bookshelf Fantasies

Welcome to Shelf Control — an original feature created and hosted by Bookshelf Fantasies.

Want to join in? Shelf Control posts go up every Wednesday. See the guidelines at the bottom of the post, and jump on board!

Title: The Tower, The Zoo, and the Tortoise
Author: Julia Stuart
Published: 2010
Length: 320 pages

What it’s about (synopsis via Goodreads):

Brimming with charm and whimsy, this exquisite novel set in the Tower of London has the transportive qualities and delightful magic of the contemporary classics Chocolat and Amélie.

Balthazar Jones has lived in the Tower of London with his loving wife, Hebe, and his 120-year-old pet tortoise for the past eight years. That’s right, he is a Beefeater (they really do live there). It’s no easy job living and working in the tourist attraction in present-day London.

Among the eccentric characters who call the Tower’s maze of ancient buildings and spiral staircases home are the Tower’s Rack & Ruin barmaid, Ruby Dore, who just found out she’s pregnant; portly Valerie Jennings, who is falling for ticket inspector Arthur Catnip; the lifelong bachelor Reverend Septimus Drew, who secretly pens a series of principled erotica; and the philandering Ravenmaster, aiming to avenge the death of one of his insufferable ravens.

When Balthazar is tasked with setting up an elaborate menagerie within the Tower walls to house the many exotic animals gifted to the Queen, life at the Tower gets all the more interesting. Penguins escape, giraffes are stolen, and the Komodo dragon sends innocent people running for their lives. Balthazar is in charge and things are not exactly running smoothly. Then Hebe decides to leave him and his beloved tortoise “runs” away.

Filled with the humor and heart that calls to mind the delightful novels of Alexander McCall Smith, and the charm and beauty of The Guernsey Literary and Potato Peel Pie Society, The Tower, the Zoo, and the Tortoise is a magical, wholly original novel whose irresistible characters will stay with you long after you turn the stunning last page.

Published in the UK in August 2010 as Balthazar Jones and the Tower of London Zoo.

How and when I got it:

I really don’t remember how I ended up with a copy of this book, but I suspect I glimpsed it at a library sale and fell in love with the cover and title!

Why I want to read it:

That title! That cover! Really, it’s just all so very cute and charming — it makes me want to give it a big cuddle! I think the plot sounds adorable. This sounds like a perfect mid-winter curl-up-under-a-quilt kind of book.

__________________________________

Want to participate in Shelf Control? Here’s how:

Write a blog post about a book that you own that you haven’t read yet.
Add your link in the comments!
If you’d be so kind, I’d appreciate a link back from your own post.
Check out other posts, and…

Have fun!

Save

7Nov2017

Shelf Control #96: Ghost Talkers

Posted in Shelf Control by Lisa @ Bookshelf Fantasies

Welcome to Shelf Control — an original feature created and hosted by Bookshelf Fantasies.

Want to join in? Shelf Control posts go up every Wednesday. See the guidelines at the bottom of the post, and jump on board!

Title: Ghost Talkers
Author: Mary Robinette Kowal
Published: 2016
Length: 304 pages

What it’s about (synopsis via Goodreads):

Ginger Stuyvesant, an American heiress living in London during World War I, is engaged to Captain Benjamin Harford, an intelligence officer. Ginger is a medium for the Spirit Corps, a special Spiritualist force.

Each soldier heading for the front is conditioned to report to the mediums of the Spirit Corps when they die so the Corps can pass instant information about troop movements to military intelligence.

Ginger and her fellow mediums contribute a great deal to the war efforts, so long as they pass the information through appropriate channels. While Ben is away at the front, Ginger discovers the presence of a traitor. Without the presence of her fiance to validate her findings, the top brass thinks she’s just imagining things. Even worse, it is clear that the Spirit Corps is now being directly targeted by the German war effort. Left to her own devices, Ginger has to find out how the Germans are targeting the Spirit Corps and stop them. This is a difficult and dangerous task for a woman of that era, but this time both the spirit and the flesh are willing…

How and when I got it:

I was dying to read this book as soon as I heard of it, so I preordered and got it right when it was released in August 2016.

Why I want to read it:

I can’t believe this book has been sitting on my nightstand for a year now! I’m ridiculous. I still really want to read it — I love the idea of mediums working in military intelligence! It sounds really awesome, and I’m picking this as my Shelf Control book to try to shame myself. Really, I have to stop buying books and then not reading them, especially when they appeal to me so much! Too many books, too little time… I need to be better at prioritizing my reading in 2018!

__________________________________

Want to participate in Shelf Control? Here’s how:

Write a blog post about a book that you own that you haven’t read yet.
Add your link in the comments!
If you’d be so kind, I’d appreciate a link back from your own post.
Check out other posts, and…

Have fun!

Save

31Oct2017

Shelf Control #95: The Pack

Posted in Shelf Control by Lisa @ Bookshelf Fantasies

Welcome to Shelf Control — an original feature created and hosted by Bookshelf Fantasies.

Shelf Control is a weekly celebration of the unread books on our shelves. Pick a book you own but haven’t read, write a post about it (suggestions: include what it’s about, why you want to read it, and when you got it), and link up! Fore more info on what Shelf Control is all about, check out my introductory post, here.

Want to join in? Shelf Control posts go up every Wednesday. See the guidelines at the bottom of the post, and jump on board!

A little bit Halloween-y — my Shelf Control pick this week is:

Title: The Pack
Author: Jason Starr
Published: 2011
Length: 352 pages

What it’s about (synopsis via Goodreads):

When Simon Burns is fired from his job without warning, he takes on the role of stay-at-home dad for his three-year-old son. But his reluctance pushes his already strained marriage to the limit. In the nestled playgrounds of the Upper West Side, Simon harbors a simmering rage at his boss’s betrayal.

Things take a turn when he meets a tight-knit trio of dads at the playground. They are different from other men Simon has met, stronger and more confident, more at ease with the darker side of life- and soon Simon is lured into their mix. But after a guys’ night out gets frighteningly out of hand, Simon feels himself sliding into a new nightmarish reality.

As he experiences disturbing changes in his body and his perceptions, he starts to suspect that when the guys welcomed him to their “pack,” they were talking about much more than male bonding. And as he falls prey to his basest instincts, Simon must accept that werewolves exist if he is to turn the tides of his fortune…

How and when I got it:

I really don’t remember where I got this book, but I know I picked it up years ago after hearing a friend mention something about a werewolf book.

Why I want to read it:

Because every once in a while, there’s nothing like reading about werewolves! I’m not sure that I’m truly up for yet another version of werewolf-ism as a metaphor for man’s inner animal or some such thing, but at the same time, a pack of stay-at-home dads turning into werewolves sounds kind of awesome. I’d almost forgotten I still have this book, but in honor of Halloween, I thought I’d prowl my shelves for something on the icky/scary side, and this is what I found!

__________________________________

Want to participate in Shelf Control? Here’s how:

Write a blog post about a book that you own that you haven’t read yet.
Add your link in the comments!
If you’d be so kind, I’d appreciate a link back from your own post.
Check out other posts, and…

Have fun!

Save

24Oct2017

Shelf Control #94: Shine Shine Shine

Posted in Shelf Control by Lisa @ Bookshelf Fantasies

Welcome to Shelf Control — an original feature created and hosted by Bookshelf Fantasies.

Shelf Control is a weekly celebration of the unread books on our shelves. Pick a book you own but haven’t read, write a post about it (suggestions: include what it’s about, why you want to read it, and when you got it), and link up! Fore more info on what Shelf Control is all about, check out my introductory post, here.

Want to join in? Shelf Control posts go up every Wednesday. See the guidelines at the bottom of the post, and jump on board!

My Shelf Control pick this week is:

Title: Shine Shine Shine
Author: Lydia Netzer
Published: 2012
Length: 320 pages

What it’s about (synopsis via Goodreads):

When Maxon met Sunny, he was seven years, four months, and eighteen-days old. Or, he was 2693 rotations of the earth old. Maxon was different. Sunny was different. They were different together.

Now, twenty years later, they are married, and Sunny wants, more than anything, to be “normal.” She’s got the housewife thing down perfectly, but Maxon, a genius engineer, is on a NASA mission to the moon, programming robots for a new colony. Once they were two outcasts who found unlikely love in each other: a wondrous, strange relationship formed from urgent desire for connection. But now they’re parents to an autistic son. And Sunny is pregnant again. And her mother is dying in the hospital. Their marriage is on the brink of imploding, and they’re at each other’s throats with blame and fear. What exactly has gone wrong?

Sunny wishes Maxon would turn the rocket around and come straight-the-hell home.

When an accident in space puts the mission in peril, everything Sunny and Maxon have built hangs in the balance. Dark secrets, long-forgotten murders, and a blond wig all come tumbling to the light. And nothing will ever be the same.

How and when I got it:

I picked this book up on a whim while browing at the used bookstore a few years ago.

Why I want to read it:

I’m a sucker for novels that have anything to do with space travel and space exploration, plus the synopsis is a bit mysterious and that makes it intriguing. How are the two characters different? How are they different together? How does murder and a wig come into play? The plot description caught my eye on the day that I stumbled across the book, and I’ve had it on my shelf ever since.

__________________________________

Want to participate in Shelf Control? Here’s how:

Write a blog post about a book that you own that you haven’t read yet.
Add your link in the comments!
If you’d be so kind, I’d appreciate a link back from your own post.
Check out other posts, and…

Have fun!

Save

18Oct2017

Shelf Control #93: Great Expectations

Posted in Shelf Control by Lisa @ Bookshelf Fantasies

Welcome to Shelf Control — an original feature created and hosted by Bookshelf Fantasies.

Shelf Control is a weekly celebration of the unread books on our shelves. Pick a book you own but haven’t read, write a post about it (suggestions: include what it’s about, why you want to read it, and when you got it), and link up! Fore more info on what Shelf Control is all about, check out my introductory post, here.

Want to join in? Shelf Control posts go up every Wednesday. See the guidelines at the bottom of the post, and jump on board!

My Shelf Control pick this week is:

Title: Great Expectations
Author: Charles Dickens
Published: 1860
Length: 571 pages

What it’s about (synopsis via Goodreads):

When Philip Pirrip–nicknamed Pip–is forced by an escaped convict to steal food and supplies from his meager home, he doesn’t know that this event will transform his life. One of Dickens’s most popular novels, Great Expectations follows the orphaned Pip as he grows from poverty into a gentleman, becoming entangled with the strange Miss Havisham and her beautiful but coldhearted ward, Estella, and coming into a fortune from an unknown benefactor. This engrossing work, which recently celebrated its 150th birthday, remains one of Dickens’s best.

How and when I got it:

I treated myself to this book, plus two others in the Classic Lines series from Splinter, in 2015.

Why I want to read it:

I feel like Great Expectations is one of those glaring holes in my reading career. I’ve only read one Dickens novel (A Tale of Two Cities), and have always intended to read more. A few years ago, while browsing in our local used book store, I saw the Classic Lines editions of Great Expectations, Emma, and Pride and Prejudice on the remainder table, and they were all just so pretty that I had to have them! Besides my hard copy of GE, I have a free Kindle edition, and I’ve also toyed with the idea of reading it via Serial Reader. So many options! Now I just have to buckle down and actually start.

__________________________________

Want to participate in Shelf Control? Here’s how:

Write a blog post about a book that you own that you haven’t read yet.
Add your link in the comments!
If you’d be so kind, I’d appreciate a link back from your own post.
Check out other posts, and…

Have fun!

Save

11Oct2017

Shelf Control #92: Locke & Key, volume 6: Alpha & Omega

Posted in Shelf Control by Lisa @ Bookshelf Fantasies

Welcome to Shelf Control — an original feature created and hosted by Bookshelf Fantasies.

Shelf Control is a weekly celebration of the unread books on our shelves. Pick a book you own but haven’t read, write a post about it (suggestions: include what it’s about, why you want to read it, and when you got it), and link up! Fore more info on what Shelf Control is all about, check out my introductory post, here.

Want to join in? Shelf Control posts go up every Wednesday. See the guidelines at the bottom of the post, and jump on board!

My Shelf Control pick this week is:

Title: Locke & Key, volume 6: Alpha & Omega
Author: Joe Hill
Published: 2014
Length: 192 pages

What it’s about (synopsis via Goodreads):

The shadows have never been darker and the end has never been closer. Turn the key and open the last door; it’s time to say goodbye.

The final arc of New York Times bestselling Locke & Key comes to a thundrous and compelling conclusion.

An event not to be missed!

And about the series:

Locke & Key tells of Keyhouse, an unlikely New England mansion, with fantastic doors that transform all who dare to walk through them. Home to a hate-filled and relentless creature that will not rest until it forces open the most terrible door of them all…

How and when I got it:

I preordered this baby and got it on release day, January of 2014.

Why I want to read it:

This is so ridiculous. I read the first five volumes of the Locke & Key series as they were released — well, devoured them, really. And then some time went by, and then volume 6 was released, and I thought to myself that it would be a great idea to start the series again from the beginning so I could be totally in the moment and really savor the series finale. And of course, that never happened. It was a stupid vicious cycle — I was dying to read the conclusion, but wanted to reread the whole series, but didn’t have time to start again, but didn’t want to read #6 without starting again. On and on, until today! I’ve made finishing this series a New Year’s resolution a couple of times now. Maybe in 2018? For realzies this time.

__________________________________

Want to participate in Shelf Control? Here’s how: