Staff Picks Category: Fiction

The Broken Shore by Peter Temple [Book]

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Joe Cashin is a big city cop who has gone back to his childhood home on the coast of South Australia to recuperate, physically and mentally. When a local millionaire is murdered, Cashin won’t accept the easy story that some local aboriginal boys are responsible. In the course of the investigation, Australian political and social divisions are examined. The sense of place is practically another character, but be warned: this is a darker Australia than is often portrayed in the media. Includes helpful Glossary of Australian Terms. Temple is the winner of five Ned Kelly Awards by the Crime Writers’ Association of Australia.

One of our Thursdays is missing by Jasper Fforde [Book]

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Jasper Fforde’s latest offering in the Thursday Next series is a metafictional tour de farce. The original Thursday — literary police Special Operations Agent (ret.) and the star of her own series of novels-with-novels — has disappeared, and it’s up to her fictional character to find her by impersonating the real Thursday. There’s a border dispute in BookWorld between the genres of Racy Novel and Women’s Fiction, and if Thursday doesn’t show up for the peace talks, war might ensue. Fforde sprinkles his story with characters and allusions from the classics and popular fiction, and makes liberal use of puns including setting up whole subplots just for a punch line. His style is uncategorizable and nearly indescribable, at least not in a way that makes any sense, but irresistibly entertaining and uniquely inventive. This sequel refers back to things that happened (or didn’t) in previous titles in the series, and it might help to start with the first installment, The Eyre Affair.

A Discovery of Witches by Deborah Harkness [Book]

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Camping with Henry and Tom by Mark St. Germain [Audiobook]

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This “book” is the audio to a play performed at L.A. Theatre Works in 2006 starring Alan Alda and was borrowed using Overdrive (see the reference desk for more information on how to download free books to your phone or e-reader!).
The off-broadway play is a fictional account of inspired by an actual camping trip in 1921 with friends Henry Ford, Thomas Edison and Warren Harding. The three men set off camping and their car breaks down and we hear their chatter as they are lost in the woods. It is filled with humor and historical facts as we hear how Ford aspires to be President and President Harding would rather spend time with a mistress.

Out of the Silent Planet by C.S. Lewis [Book]

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In this early work of science fiction (Out of the Silent Planet was first published in 1938) C.S. Lewis tells the story of a philology professor, much reminiscent of Lewis’s friend J.R.R Tolkien, who, while exploring a mysterious house in the English countryside, is kidnapped and brought to the mysterious planet of Malacandra aboard a strange space–going vehicle. The professor escapes his captors soon after they land, and he finds himself terrified in an unfamiliar world. His curiosity overcomes his fear, however, when he discovers that many of the native creatures possess the ability to speak and share a common tongue. During his time on Malacandra the professor learns much about the planet and its inhabitants, but even more about his own home, the Earth, and the place of human kind in the universe.

This is an engaging tale, characterized by a sense of wonder and enthusiasm which is too often lacking in newer works of speculative fiction. It is as much a fantasy story as it is science fiction, and with its exploration of the nature of good and evil and its Christian inspired themes it has some resemblance to Lewis’s more familiar Chronicles of Narnia, though it is a more serious, more adult book in many ways.

Out of the Silent Planet is a quick, enjoyable read, that provides much food for thought to those who want it, without weighing down those who would rather do without. It’s also the first book in a trilogy; those who enjoy it will want to continue with it’s successors Perelandra, and That Hideous Strength.

Room by Emma Donoghue [Book]

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Having read some reviews of this book which described the harrowing situation of the two main characters, I wasn’t sure whether I wanted to read it or not. I’m glad I did though because the characters of Ma and Jack were so well developed and held my interest so thoroughly that I read this book almost non-stop during a two day period. Emma Donoghue has written a wonderful character driven novel which is absolutely a must read. A previous staff review clearly explains the plot line (Nov.1, 2010)

The Good Earth by Pearl Buck [Book]

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Wang Lung, rising from humble Chinese farmer to wealthy landowner, gloried in the soil he worked. He held it above his family, even above his gods. But soon, between Wang Lung and the kindly soil that sustained him, came flood and drought, pestilence and revolution…
Through this one Chinese peasant and his children, Nobel Prize-winner Pearl S. Buck traces the whole cycle of life, its terrors, its passion, its persistent ambitions and its rewards. Her brilliant novel — beloved by millions of readers throughout the world — is a universal tale of the destiny of men.

The Whistling Season by Ivan Doig [Book]

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“Can’t cook but doesn’t bite.” So begins the newspaper ad offering the services of an “A-1 housekeeper, sound morals, exceptional disposition” that draws the hungry attention of widower Oliver Milliron in the fall of 1909. And so begins the unforgettable season that deposits the noncooking, nonbiting, ever-whistling Rose Llewellyn and her font-of-knowledge brother, Morris Morgan, in Marias Coulee along with a stamped of homesteaders drawn by the promise of the Big Ditch — a gargantuan irrigation project intended to make the Montana prairie bloom. When the schoolmarm runs off with an itinerant preacher, Morris is pressed into service, setting the stage for the “several kinds of education” — none of them of the textbook variety — Morris and Rose will bring to Oliver, his three sons, and the rambunctious students in the region’s one-room schoolhouse.
A paean to a vanished way of life and the eccentric individuals and idiosyncratic institutions that made it fertile, The Whistling Season is Ivan Doig at his evocative best.

Rocannon’s World by Ursula K. Le Guin [Book]

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Ursula Le Guin’s first novel seamlessly blends science fiction and fantasy. Rocannon, an ethnologist, visits the planet Formalhaut II to study the native culture, and finds himself trapped when his ship is destroyed. In his adventures he rides on the back of giant winged cats, meets the various species inhabiting the planet, some of which have striking similarities to the men, elves, and dwarves of fantasy fiction, and must confront a mysterious presence in a cave. In Rocannon’s World, Le Guin explores the implications of space travel, faster than light communication, and the meeting of alien cultures. A powerful story, appropriate for fans of either genre.

The Weird Sisters by Eleanor Brown [Book]

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The first odd thing I noticed about this novel is that it’s told in the first person plural. It’s a clever and engaging device for sisters talking about themselves and each other, and kept me attentive to whose point of view I was reading as it shifted from the inside of a character’s head to one, two or three characters collectively observing another. The voice is opinionated, familiar, loyal, funny, and often jealous or spiteful as siblings are about each other. Not much happens (three adult sisters move home as their mother struggles with cancer; they find themselves to be more than they thought) but plot doesn’t much matter as the book is about personalities, family relationships, and how we evolve through involvement with others. A rich vein of Shakespeare runs through Weird Sisters in the naming of characters, the professor father’s constant quoting, and the cast of literary archetypes that inhabit these contemporary, believable women.

Anthem for Doomed Youth by Carola Dunn [Book]

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The 19th Daisy Dalrymple mystery was my introduction to this cozy murder series. Daisy is an aristocratic young mother whose husband is a Detective Chief Inspector at Scotland Yard. Set in 1920s London, the mystery revolves around some veterans of the ‘Great War’ whose bodies were found secretly buried in Epping Forest. The heroine possesses curiosity, common sense, intuition and a sly sense of humor. The period setting is engaging and the unraveling of the plot complicated enough to keep turning the pages. With the lead character’s appeal and just the right amount of Anglophilia, this was fun enough for me to borrow another one.

The Martian Chronicles by Ray Bradbury [Book]

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A science-fiction classic, The Martian Chronicles tells a story of the colonization of Mars through a series of short stories and vignettes. Bradbury imagines Mars as the home of an ancient and beautiful civilization, doomed to fall when it encounters the shortsighted and destructive people of Earth. Despite the gloomy prospects for all involved, Bradbury’s stories are full of humor, and make for a quick and very enjoyable read.

Interestingly, these stories have been the subject of several radio dramas and audio productions; I first encountered them listening to Relic Radio’s science-fiction podcast, where they are still available to download, and here at the library you can find radio theater versions on audio tape (Old Time Radio: Science Fiction).