Six more reasons to keep me away from cataloging!

I know, you're like, "Just six? Not eight? Thirteen?" And I am like, dudes, this would be so much worse if I hadn't figured out how to keep all of my holds from coming to me all at the same time. I think I have about eight queued up just right now to come to me in January!

Also, this pile is much better because I've actually finished half these books already! Go me!

Here's what we've got:

1. Small Space Decorating, from Better Homes and Gardens. This is one I've read through already — I've got a smallish space and I have really no idea what to do with it, so picking this one up made lots of sense. There are lots of interesting ideas for maximizing storage space and making rooms look larger, but unfortunately not a lot of ideas for what I can do within the parameters of my existing furniture, my smaller-than-their-spaces space, and my current lease agreement. I will definitely go back to this if it's ever time to throw out all my furniture and just start over, though!

2. Upcycling, by Danny Seo. I found myself paging through this instead of working, so of course it ended up coming home with me! My dear Scott is a big ol' packrat, so I figured it might be a good idea to make something useful out of all that stuff he hoards. :) A lot of the stuff in the book is a little too purely decorative for me, but I'm definitely going to copy out the instructions for a wine-cork bathmat, glass bottle plus take-out chopsticks diffuser, and the take-out chopsticks trivet... and maybe get around to making them sometime.

3. Geek Girls Unite, by Leslie Simon. I just finished this one, so expect a real review in a couple days. But here's why I picked it up: nerd glasses on the cover, the tagline "How fangirls, bookworms, indie chicks, and other misfits are taking over the world," and the name-dropping of Amy Poehler, Felicia Day, and Zooey Deschanel on the back cover. Could you help but be intrigued? I think not!

4. Physics on the Fringe, by Margaret Wertheim. I've mentioned my love of physics in previous installments of this series, and so, really. It's got a pretty cool cover, but what really interested me is that this book talks about "outsider physicists," who are not generally academics or even degreed physicists but who make awesome giant smoke rings in the back yard with a fog machine and some garbage cans. That's cool physics and I am excited to learn more.

5. Those Across the River, by Christopher Buehlman. It is possible I am just a sucker for a sufficiently creepy, backlit, leafless tree. This book has two of them on the cover, and also sufficiently creepy, backlit, Southern woods on the endpapers. And that's almost enough for me! I nearly did decide to just let it go, but then I read the jacket copy, which promises small-town intrigue and a mysterious presence, and I was so in.

6. The Language Wars, by Henry Hitchings. As you may already know, if there's any non-fiction topic I'm a sucker for more than popular science, it's language. So of course this title grabbed my attention right away. It's subtitled "A history of proper English" and purports to discuss the ever-changing nature of "correct" English and how we decided what was correct and what was HORRIBLY TERRIBLY WRONG, anyway. Considering the recent loss of "literally" to the non-literal masses, I figured it might be interesting to see how else we've destroyed the language over the years. :)

Also, how do you like that Christmas tree we've got up? There are about four ornaments and ten lights on it, which is not really enough, but I figure we've got a month to make it look a little nicer!

Eight further reasons to lock up my library card

I mean, there are WAY more than eight reasons. My husband just gives me a Look every time I bring a new library book home now, because he's bored of admonishing me. But whatever.

Here are eight more books that I have collected from the library solely because I saw them while cataloging, in roughly chronological retrieval order. Again, I have failed to read any so far, but that's not the point, right? The point is pretty books!



1. These Children Who Come at You With Knives, by Jim Knipfel. Nuts! I'm only one book in, and already there's an exception. Technically, it doesn't count because I didn't catalog this book, but I'm counting it because I only heard about from cataloging anther Knipfel book I don't recall anything about. I was wondering if that other book would get a genre label, so I looked up the author, and then I saw this title and I was like, "OoooOOOOoooh." Short stories? Retold fairy tales? I was intrigued. And then it promised me "a magical snowman wrestling with the horror of being alive," and I was like take THAT, evil snowmen, and put a hold on it. I should be reading it for RIP, so maybe you'll hear about it soon?

2. Mice, by Gordon Reece. This could probably go for RIP, too! This one has fog and a lone tree on the cover, combined in a deliciously creepy way, and the jacket copy promises more creepy: "At first, they [the main characters] flourish in their cottage haven, drinking hot chocolate and listening to Brahms by the fire. But on the eve of her sixteenth birthday, Shelley wakes to hear a creak on the stairs. Someone is in the house...." Augh! Someone in the house! Interruption of BRAHMS! It is meant to be both scary and funny, so I'm intrigued.

3. The Edinburgh Dead, by Brian Ruckley. I might be sensing a theme here. Whatever. The back cover offers grisly medical experiments on corpses, and also more "sinister" forces, but it's really the tagline on the cover that got me here: "There is a law against murder. But there are no laws for the dead." What does that even mean? I must find out! Also, it's got an 1820s setting and is allegedly gothic. They've got me!

4. The Postmortal, by Drew Magary. I almost set this book aside because it has a bit of a trying-too-hard cover and a blurb from the Shit My Dad Says guy that includes a reference to facial urination. Riiiiiight, moving on? But then I read the book's description, which basically describes the most recent season of Torchwood without all the parts I hated — the world figures out how to stop aging, although death is still allowed, and it leads to all sorts of weird stuff like religious cults and government euthanasia. Please, tell me more.

5. Salvage the Bones, by Jesmyn Ward. Confession: even though I was intrigued by this book from the moment I saw it, when I found out that it was going to get an "African American" sticker, I got the image of all those terrible-looking romance novels that plague that section and I very nearly put this book right out of my mind. But then I was like, "ALISON. BAD." So here it is! Salvage the Bones is, according to the dust jacket, a book about a poor family in Mississippi threatened by an approaching hurricane and also dealing with a crap father, teen pregnancy, a lack of food, and a new litter of pit bulls. The book spans only twelve days, so I'm anticipating a very suspenseful read.

6. Death of the Mantis, by Michael Stanley. It's a murder mystery. That's all I really know. But the writers (Michael Sears and Stanley Trollip) are out of Johannesburg, so this is totally going to count for the Global Reading Challenge, and that (along with, you know, MURDER) is good enough for me!

7. Paper Covers Rock, by Jenny Hubbard. Huh. The back cover of this book doesn't really tell me anything about why I put a hold on this book... but if I recall correctly the answer is twofold: a) boarding school, and b) mysteriously dead person. I am so easy to please. Also, the guy on the cover is wearing a knitted tie. I have no idea why.

8. My Beautiful Genome, by Lone Frank. Look! A book with no death in it! It's not even fiction! WHAT. This is a book all about genomics and designer babies and what your genes can really say about you, and I kind of adore Gattaca and if there's no reference to it I'll be quite sad. Also, Mary Roach says (of her own free will, I presume) that it's "sharp and funny." So that's a bonus point right there.

Thirteen Reasons Why... I shouldn't be allowed to catalog the books

No, seriously. My husband is threatening to buy me a new bookshelf so that I will have more space to store my LIBRARY BOOKS. This is bad news. But here's why:



These are books that I have cataloged, been intrigued by, put on hold, and retrieved from the library in the last six weeks. (These are not all of the library books I currently have in my house.) I have read... none of them, so far. In fact, one of them has to go back to the library tomorrow because someone else wants it, and I'll have to put it on hold all over again!

So this post is twofold — one, these books do look very interesting and I should share them with you while I have them. Two, I need to remember what they all are so I can eventually put most of them on hold again!

In approximate chronological retrieval order:

1. Before I Go to Sleep, by S.J. Watson. This is the one I have to give back, which is unfortunate because I've just started hearing really good things about it from the bloggingsphere! I didn't know much when I put it on hold except for the vague jacket copy: "Memories define us. So what if you lost yours every time you went to sleep? Your name, your identity, your past, even the people you love — all forgotten overnight. And the one person you trust may be telling you only half the story. Welcome to Christine's life." Spooky, right? I liked Memento, which has a similar premise and is mentioned in one of the author blurbs on the back, so you know I will eventually get around to this one.

2. The Mathematics of Life, by Ian Stewart. I like math, I think it's safe to say. I got a little lost at differential equations, but anything before that I was pretty darn good at. I also like popular science books, which is what this really is. It promises to talk about how math and life science are combining today, and I am intrigued.

3. Remembrance of Things I Forgot, by Bob Smith. "It's safe to say your relationship is finished if the only way you can imagine solving your problems is by borrowing a time machine." Yes, I would say so. You all know how I feel about sci-fi romps; this book about an apparently "wickedly comic, cross-country, time-bending journey" had to come home with me.

4. How the Hippies Saved Physics, by David Kaiser. Uh, well, I majored in physics. I like popular science, as I mentioned above. I am amused by the idea of using LSD to become more scientifically creative. On the shelf it goes!

5. The Interrogator, by Glenn L. Carle. This one I'm not actually sure I'll read, because I find memoirs very hit or miss. But The Interrogator is about... an interrogator... for the CIA who was also a long-time spy and basically a professional liar. And then he apparently took on a job that made even him question what the heck he was doing. It seems like it might appeal to the psychological-thriller-lover in me.

6. The End of Everything, by Megan Abbott. Edgar-nominated author, you say? A disappeared young friend, you say? The left-behind young friend taking up the case and also learning more than she wanted to know? Gimme!

7. The Shotgun Rule, by Charlie Huston. This is another I might not finish reading, but I'll certainly give it a try. The jacket flap promises teenage boys who race their bikes, get high, and steal neighbors' medications, and then one day they do something really stupid and steal some hard drugs from some "petty hoods." It is not at all my usual cup of tea, which is part of why I want to read it.

8. Happily Ever After, edited by John Klima. Oh, you know. Fairy tales. Retold. Neil Gaiman. Gregory Maguire. Charles de Lint. No big deal.

9. Dominance, by Will Lavender. There is a bloody ax made of books on the cover. There's a murderer teaching a college class called "Unraveling a Literary Mystery" from his prison cell. There is a secret game called "the Procedure" that may lead to death. I kind of want to go read this right now...

10. The Talk-Funny Girl, by Roland Merullo. An odd title is a sure draw for me, and although the other parts of this novel are less so — A dying factory town? A girl speaking "a kind of mountain hybrid of English"? Said girl becoming a stoneworker? I don't know — I am still intrigued. I may wait to hear more about this book before I delve into it.

11. Life on Mars, by Tracy K. Smith. I don't read enough poetry, and I've never read a collection like this that is a little more science-y. How science-y? The first stanza of the title poem goes like this:
"Tina says what if dark matter is like the space between people
When what holds them together isn't exactly love, and I think
That sounds right — how strong the pull can be, as if something
that knows better won't let you drift apart so easily, and how
Small and heavy you feel, stuck there spinning in place."
...Wow.

12. Raising Stony Mayhall, by Daryl Gregory. I found Gregory's Pandemonium enjoyable, and also: zombies. Specifically, a zombie baby raised by non-zombie parents who grows up and learns that he's not alone in the world. Creepy? Intriguing? Yes.

13. Like Bees to Honey, by Caroline Smailes. This is apparnetly a story of "family, redemption, and ghosts." I like that last one, but the first two are a little eh. I was wavering between putting it on hold and ignoring it, and I had decided to ignore it, but then I flipped through its pages and the formatting of the book is, like, weird and stuff and then I started reading the first chapter and I had to remind myself that I was at work and maybe I should go ahead and put that on hold. I'll tell you how it goes.

Books That Followed Me Home

As noted in yesterday's post, I'm trying out a couple of things I might do for my library's blog, to help people find new books to read. Yesterday I did books that intrigued me but stayed on the shelf, today I'm looking at the books that have a new shelf home for the next six weeks.

Goodness knows I have plenty of books to read at home. Most of them are library books, and most of those find their way onto my shelf because I've heard good things about them from a friend or the Internet (which can often be a friend in these situations!). But sometimes during my volunteer shift, or after, when I'm wandering around the browsing area, something catches my eye and I know it's coming home with me. Here's what followed me out the library door this week; they're mine for now but they'll be back soon!

In the Shadow of Gotham, by Stefanie Pintoff
It was actually the sequel to this book, called A Curtain Falls, that caught my eye, with a dead chorus girl on a Broadway stage and a hint of a ferry disaster. But then I noticed that it was a sequel, and I set off in search of the first book, because I like reading things in order. Luckily, Gotham is no less intriguing, with the book jacket offering a murder taking place in the victim's own bedroom, in the middle of the day. And the victim is a math student at university, which promises some scholarly intrigue. It's also set at the turn of the 20th century, which means I can add some historical fiction to my sadly small pile of such.

The Strange Case of the Composer and His Judge, by Patricia Duncker
I played in bands and orchestras for a really long time, so I was drawn to the "composer" bit of this title, and one of the characters is in fact a musical composer. This is also a mystery novel, which I like, and it promises to interrogate faith, immortality, and passion, which I would like to see. And I really liked the cover. I'm not sure that this will be near the top of my reading list in the very near future, but I'm pretty sure I'll like it when I do.

Killer, by Dave Zeltserman
An admission here — I wasn't really interested in this book for its title or cover, and I probably would have passed it over entirely if I weren't currently attempting to read a book for every letter of the alphabet using titles and authors. Z happens to be a toughie, so I really grabbed this only for the Zeltserman on the cover. But then I read over the back, and I perked up a bit. This book is about a Mafia hitman who turns state's witness and is released from jail, only to find that, you know, it's not paranoia if someone's really out to get you. I read a book along the same lines last year and liked it, so I thought I'd give this one a shot.

The Caretaker of Lorne Field, by Dave Zeltserman
Zeltserman strikes again! This one grabbed me with its blurb from NPR: "There's a new name to add to the pantheon of the sons and daughters of Cain: Dave Zeltserman." I recently read through a few of Cain's best-known novels and I liked them a lot, so I checked out the jacket flap on this book. It promises a slightly different feel than Killer — here we have a caretaker who wants to leave his job, but has to wait (for an unclear reason) until his son is able to take over for him. That's not terribly exciting, but this is: "[If] the field is left untended, a horrific monster called an Aukowie will grow — a monster capable of taking over the entirety of America in just two weeks. Or so it is said..." That's a little creepy. I like it. I might read this one first!