Thursday, March 05, 2009

More Library Loot

It's been another good week for me at the library. Here's a list of the books that I've picked up so far:

Andrew Carmellini and Gwen Hyman, Urban Italian: Simple Recipes and True Stories From a Life in Food: I bought this one for my dad for Christmas and I confess that I had a good flip though his copy over the holidays. Now it's time to try a few of the recipes for myself and, if they're a hit, I'll buy myself a copy too.

The Coffin Trail by Martin Edwards: This is the first in a mystery series set in the Lake District featuring Daniel Kind (an Oxford historian attempting to escape to a quieter life in the country) and DCI Hannah Scarlett. From the jacket copy description it sounds like just my sort of mystery, and I note that it got an enthusiastic blurb from Peter Robinson, one of my all-time favourite mystery authors.

The Trick of It by Michael Frayn: Nick Hornby's discussion of this one in Housekeeping v. The Dirt piqued my interest. It's about a professor who meets and marries the novelist whose work has been the central focus of his career as a literary critic. How could I resist a novel premised on a marriage between novelist and critic?

The Sounds of Poetry: A Brief Guide by Robert Pinsky: This one appeared on Eva's list last week, and I immediately ordered a copy from my library. It struck me as an excellent complement to some of the other reading on poetry that I've been doing lately.

A Freewheelin' Time: A Memoir of Greenwich Village in the Sixties by Suze Rotolo: I put a hold on this many months ago after seeing an interview with the author somewhere, and this week my name finally reached the top of the list. It's a memoir of Rotolo's years with Bob Dylan when he was in his early twenties making the transition from obscurity to fame, and she was a teenager finding herself in the cultural and political hotbed of Greenwich Village. She seems to have a very engaging voice and I'm sufficiently interested in the time and the place that I don't need the Bob Dylan hook to draw me in. But that aspect of it did bring to mind another New York memoir that I loved, Joyce Johnson's Minor Characters: A Beat Memoir.

Yes, I am having trouble keeping up with my reading.

8 comments:

Anonymous said...

Can't wait to hear your thoughts on A Freewheelin' Time, And The trick of It sounds good too. Too many choices! I am also feeling behind in my reading. Oh well!

jenclair said...

Great Loot! The Trick of It sounds especially intriguing!

Kailana said...

Good haul! I really wish I could read Nick Hornby. I decided to go the library route, but my library didn't have it and I inter-library loaned it ages ago! I might end up just buying it!

teabird said...

I read The Trick of It at least 3 times - it's wicked, clever, and includes a plot element very, very dear to my heart...

Danielle said...

I'll have to check out the Edwards mystery, he's new to me. And I read Minor Characters a long time ago (when I was into the Beats, but wanted to know more about the women than the men!--kind of hard to do with the beats). I'll have to check out A Freewheelin' Time as well!

litlove said...

I must read that Michael Frayn - it sounds wonderful. And I'm interested in Martin Edwards, too.

Laura said...

Thanks Kate - always looking to see what's coming up. Your site is awesome...glad to always find other thoughtful readers!

Laura
laurareviews.blogspot.com

Thomas Hogglestock said...

How did you like The Trick of It? I loved this book. Laughed out loud reading it while commuting. Got lots of strange looks.