Books

One of the new books that was donated through our Pember Angel campaign in December was Neil Gaiman’s The Graveyard Book. It was announced yesterday that the book won the Newbery Award for excellence in children’s literature.

The story is a takeoff of Rudyard Kipling’s The Jungle Book, with an orphaned boy being adopted by the inhabitants of a graveyard instead of a panther and a bear.

I haven’t had a chance to read it yet but all signs point to it being a spooky book for older children. There are thousands of internet articles and reviews if you do a search for the book. It had already been on best books lists for 2008 and, since being named an award winner, it has risen to a number five rank on Barnes and Noble and has the number six spot on Amazon.

The really cool thing, though, is that while Gaiman was on tour promoting the book shortly after it came out, he read a chapter each night of the tour. The reading was videotaped and all eight chapters are available online at The Official Neil Gaiman Website for Young Readers.

The book is shelved with the Young Adult “new” books.

I just finished reading Stranger Room, a locked room mystery with two murders occurring 150 years apart. This is Frederick Ramsay’s fourth Ike Schwartz mystery taking place in Picketsville VA. I read a review of this a few months ago and put in a request for it. It was worth the wait.

The stranger room is a part of the main house with a separate entrance, kept for use by unknown travelers. Personal relationships, moral issues, racism and possible drug trafficking all make the story more interesting. I want to go back and read the other three books.

Also on my nightstand is Dancing with Werewolves, the first volume of a new series by Carole Nelson Douglas, the author of the Midnight Louie feline sleuth stories and Irene Adler mysteries. I don’t generally read other-worldly kind of stuff but I like the Midnight Louie series so I’ll give it a try.

Have you read anything recently that you’d like to share? Click on the post title or “no comment” and let us know.

I read two new books this past week and enjoyed them both.  Alex Kava’s Exposed deals with FBI agents Maggie O’Dell and Assistant Director Cunninham trying to solve seemingly unrelated deaths.  In trying to solve the problem they are drawn into a trap that results in tragedy.  It’s frightening on one level as it deals with a deadly poison thought to be introduced by terrorists, and on another level when the person causing it is unmasked.  It’s a stay up all night until finished book.  My second book, Michael Connelly’s The Brass Verdict, tells of a murderer’s trial and an ending which was totally unexpected.   Unlike some writers who let you down at the end, Connelly hits you with two totally unrelated surprises.

Have you read any new books lately?