Lane Recommends

Travels with Charley in Search of America
by John Steinbeck
$15.00
Penguin Books
978-0-14-200070-0

The author and his french standard poodle, Charley, board a custom built camper truck named Rocinante and head across the U.S.A. My kind of road trip. Steinbeck, suffering from bad health, doubts, disillusionments, and a healthy case of ennui, sets off across America to rediscover the country he'd been writing about for 40 years. Look for the section when Charley, maybe the most urbane dog in literature, takes on a bear in Yellowstone. Hilarious.

The Talented Mr. Ripley queereads

The selection for April's queereads is The Talented Mr. Ripley by Patricia Highsmith. You may be thinking, this book isn't gay or queer, why was this one chosen? Patricia Highsmith also penned The Price of Salt, a lesbian classic. But just because she wrote a different gay book, why this one? Tom Ripley, the protagonist, shows us how powerful obsession can become and how far he is willing to go because of it. The obsession begins not only when Tom falls in love with Dickie Greenleaf's lifestyle, but with Dickie himself. Highsmith paints a chilling portrait of Tom Ripley, a sociopathic conman willing to go to any length to get what he wants. We'll be meeting on Wednesday, 4/21/10, at 6:00 PM in the basement. And remember, when you buy the book from us, we'll give you 20% off!

I Recommend

America's Constitution: A Biography
by Akhil Reed Amar
$18.00
Random House
978-0-8129-7272-6

Amar's "biography" of the Constitution is utterly fascinating. He discusses every paragraph and almost every sentence. He describes why each clause was needed, how it was interpreted then, and how the interpretation has changed over time.

Akhil Reed Amar is Sterling Professor of Law at Yale Law School.

Frank Recommends

Desert Solitaire
by Edward Abbey
$14.95
Touchstone
987-0-671-69588-0

This is the "hook" that started my reading of natural history titles and also sparked the want to be out in the Red Rock desert.

Handmaid's Tale queereads

Queereads has been gaining momentum, and our next book up for discussion is The Handmaid's Tale by Margaret Atwood.

The Handmaid’s Tale follows the story of Offred, handmaid to a commander and his wife in the Republic of Gilead, formerly the United States, after fundamentalist Christian uprising has removed the freedom and rights of most men and all women. Handmaids are women of proven fertility who are enslaved in order to provide children to higher ups who have not been able to conceive. They are given three opportunities of two years to provide a healthy, perfect baby. If they do not succeed, they are sent to “the colonies” to labor until death. Offred wishes to escape her enslavement by fleeing north to the freedom of Canada.

Queereads meets on the third Wednesday of each month at 6:00pm in the basement of Sam Weller's. We'll be discussing The Handmaid's Tale on March 17th, and if you buy the book from us, we'll give you 20% off!

Debra Recommends

Everything I Need to Know I Learned from a Children's Book
edited by Anita Silvey
$29.99
Roaring Brook Press
978-1-59643-395-3

Read about which children's books inspired our most respected and admired writers inside a beautifully illustrated gift book for everyone. Steve Forbes, Scott Simon, Sherman Alexie, Jay Leno, Peter Matthiessen — more. Wonderful.

Joan Recommends

The Quilter's Catalog
by Meg Cox
$18.95
Workman Publishing
978-0-7611-3881-5

You like browsing catalogs? You like sewing, quilting, fingering fabric? READ THIS! Nirvana for the fabric arts.