Thursday, March 13, 2014

Bookish Radar (4)

As a book blogger, my bookish radar is always on. I'm constantly hearing about titles of books and while some of them don't particularly interest me, others so do. These are the books that I currently have my eyes on. I WILL READ THEM IF IT'S THE LAST THING I DO. Inspired by On the Smugglers' Radar @ The Book Smugglers and Waiting on Wednesday @ Breaking the Spine




Released April 2, 2013


A vibrant, food-themed memoir from beloved indie cartoonist Lucy Knisley.

Lucy Knisley loves food. The daughter of a chef and a gourmet, this talented young cartoonist comes by her obsession honestly. In her forthright, thoughtful, and funny memoir, Lucy traces key episodes in her life thus far, framed by what she was eating at the time and lessons learned about food, cooking, and life. Each chapter is bookended with an illustrated recipe—many of them treasured family dishes, and a few of them Lucy's original
inventions.

A welcome read for anyone who ever felt more passion for a sandwich than is strictly speaking proper, Relish is a book for our time: it invites the reader to celebrate food as a connection to our bodies and a connection to the earth, rather than an enemy, a compulsion, or a consumer product.



So this pick is a little bit of a departure from the common YA fiction that I feature here, but I saw this five or six months ago on A Cup of Jo and it just looked SO CUTE. I finally remembered to get to it so it's actually being shipped to me right now! I'm a major foodie and these illustrations look amazing! I also like memoir-esque type novels so that's a plus. 


Making friends has never been Elise Dembowski’s strong suit. All throughout her life, she’s been the butt of every joke and the outsider in every conversation. When a final attempt at popularity fails, Elise nearly gives up. Then she stumbles upon a warehouse party where she meets Vicky, a girl in a band who accepts her; Char, a cute, yet mysterious disc jockey; Pippa, a carefree spirit from England; and most importantly, a love for DJing.

Told in a refreshingly genuine and laugh-out-loud funny voice, THIS SONG WILL SAVE YOUR LIFE is an exuberant novel about identity, friendship, and the power of music to bring people together.




The end of last year with all those wrap up posts, all I remember is seeing this book EVERYWHERE. Seriously, everywhere! I don't think I remember seeing so much of it when it came out but it was crazy how many lists this topped! So you know, I think it's about time I added this to my list. After all, I do like music, contemporaries, English people and LOVE.



A panda walks into a café. He orders a sandwich, eats it, then draws a gun and fires two shots in the air.
"Why?" asks the confused waiter, as the panda makes towards the exit. The panda produces a badly punctuated wildlife manual and tosses it over his shoulder.
"I'm a panda," he says at the door. "Look it up."
The waiter turns to the relevant entry and, sure enough, finds an explanation.
"Panda. Large black-and-white bear-like mammal, native to China. Eats, shoots and leaves."

So, punctuation really does matter, even if it is only occasionally a matter of life and death.

Now, we all know the basics of punctuation. Or do we? A look at most neighborhood signage tells a different story. Through sloppy usage and low standards on the internet, in e-mail, and now text messages, we have made proper punctuation an endangered species.

In Eats, Shoots & Leaves, former editor Truss dares to say, in her delightfully urbane, witty, and very English way, that it is time to look at our commas and semicolons and see them as the wonderful and necessary things they are. This is a book for people who love punctuation and get upset when it is mishandled. From the invention of the question mark in the time of Charlemagne to George Orwell shunning the semicolon, this lively history makes a powerful case for the preservation of a system of printing conventions that is much too subtle to be mucked about with.




I remember hearing about this book a while back and it never really struck me until recently while surfing Goodreads and I found it again! I read something similar to this except targeted to children when I was 10 and I thought it was super interesting. I find myself intrigued by all this stuff about the English language. It's honestly such a cool and complex language and this book just sounds fun and educational which is like the best combination of things ever.


The Geography of You and Me by Jennifer E. Smith
Expected release date: April 15, 2014

Lucy and Owen meet somewhere between the tenth and eleventh floors of a New York City apartment building, on an elevator rendered useless by a citywide blackout. After they're rescued, they spend a single night together, wandering the darkened streets and marveling at the rare appearance of stars above Manhattan. But once the power is restored, so is reality. Lucy soon moves to Edinburgh with her parents, while Owen heads out west with his father.

Lucy and Owen's relationship plays out across the globe as they stay in touch through postcards, occasional e-mails, and -- finally -- a reunion in the city where they first met.

A carefully charted map of a long-distance relationship, Jennifer E. Smith's new novel shows that the center of the world isn't necessarily a place. It can be a person, too.




I wasn't a HUGE fan of The Statistical Probability of Love at First Sight (ugh, that title will do me in one day) but ahh, all of Jennifer E. Smith's novels have such a cute premise. This one especially. And I don't know if I'm going to be left hanging like I did with The Statistical Probability but I feel like it's worth a shot. And also, I know that whatever happens, it's bound to be adorable and cute. Sometimes, that's all you really need...


And that's it for this week! What books are on your radar this week? Have you read/want to read any of the books on this list? Share your thoughts!

No comments :

Post a Comment