Connect
Sponsors
Currently Reading
-
Terms
The Book Lady's Blog is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-Noncommercial-No Derivative Works 3.0 United States License.
Reviews and articles posted here are property of The Book Lady's Blog and are not to be posted elsewhere without permission. Please contact me if you wish to post any of my work, or any excerpt thereof, in any other location or format.
Miscellaneous
Meet Bookrageous!
Technical Stuff
Design Credits
Dec
17
The Book Lady’s Best of 2010: The Best of the Rest
2010 at 5am Posted by Rebecca Joines Schinsky
Or, the books I loved that I couldn’t quite shoehorn into any of my other lists.
Bad Marie by Marcy Dermansky Best single-sitting guilty pleasure read. Not in the I’m-embarrassed-to-say-I-liked-this way but in the Marie-is-so-bad-and-yet-I-love-her-anyway way. She drinks on the job, runs off with her friend’s husband, and then kidnaps their child. And yet she’s completely irresistible and sympathetic. I can’t wait to read more from Marcy Dermansky.
Mattaponi Queen: Stories by Belle Boggs Best collection of short stories….with a title that no one raised outside Virginia can pronounce correctly on the first try (including me). Boggs won the Bread Loaf Conference’s Bakeless Prize for this collection, and one doesn’t have to read very far into it to figure out why. These stories, ranging from three-page vignettes to thirty-page character studies, have a powerful sense of place and exemplify the way in which a writer can carry themes across a collection of short fiction while utilizing a variety of styles and formats. Boggs’s economy with words and her skill with language place her alongside the greats of short fiction, and she is sure to have a long and celebrate career.
The Heroine’s Bookshelf by Erin Blakemore Best book about books and best reminder to read those classics you’ve been putting off. Blakemore explores important character traits through the literary heroines who embody them, and she shares the definitive moments of her own reading life along the way. This is a must-read for, well, just about anyone, but it will be particularly meaningful for readers who celebrate strong female characters and their place in the canon. A great way to select your book club’s selections for next year, and it would make an excellent stocking stuffer.
What’s Up Down There? by Lissa Rankin, M.D. Best book about your hooha. Also: best evidence that other people do crazy things with theirs. Despite incessant use of cutesy nicknames/euphemisms for the vagina, Rankin provides a wealth of information, useful fact/myth discussions, and personal anecdotes from her medical practice that range from the horrifying to the hilarious to the “how in the hell did someone manage to do that?” Her frank discussion of sexuality and sexual health will appeal to seasoned feminist readers and newcomers alike, and no matter how much you think you know about vajayjays, you’re bound to learn something new.
See also:
The Book Lady’s Best of 2010: Memoir
The Book Lady’s Best of 2010: Genre Busters
The Book Lady’s Best of 2010: Literary Fiction
The Book Lady’s Best of 2010: Nonfiction
Related posts:
[...] This post was mentioned on Twitter by Rebecca Schinsky, Sharjah Book Fair. Sharjah Book Fair said: The Book Lady’s Best of 2010: The Best of the Rest | The Book Lady's Blog http://t.co/L4gtkKe [...]
I really love Erin Blakemore’s book and Belle Boggs’ too! Great list!
Mmm! I fancy ‘Mattaponi Queen’ and ‘The heroine’s Bookshelf’.
Thank you for the post. It is great to discover new authors, new books.
I hasten to make note.
Ack! Bad Marie continues to follow me around, demanding attention! She just won’t be ignored, will she?
Sandy´s last [type] ..Nothing But Ghosts – Beth Kephart
Hooray! Bad Marie is not to be ignored! I am thrilled to be on this list, Rebecca, and appreciate all that you do, here and on Twitter. And if you want more Marcy Dermansky, you might like my first book Twins. Thanks!
Marcy Dermansky´s last [type] ..Bad Marie Makes Largehearted Boy’s List
I am dying to read Bad Marie – my copy is beckoning from the shelves – and after all of your praise for What’s Up Down There?, that’s on my list, too. AND, since I’m aiming to return to the classics for 2011, I’ll have to check out The Heroine’s Bookshelf. In short, I’m a little in love with this list.
Kerry´s last [type] ..On Those Who Love the Smell of Books
Woohoo!