Under The Lamplight
A new definition for homework: leisure reading
The Life Room
by Jill Bialosky
Harcourt $24
“Do you really think you can be in love with one person your entire life?†asks a character in noted author Jill Bialosky’s luminous new novel. For Eleanor Cahn, an uneasily married literature professor, the answers are not so simple. Immersed in a paper about Anna Karenina, her life imitates art when she’s confronted with passions from her past: her teenaged boyfriend, a married philanderer she once posed for, and Stephen, a childhood friend with a decidedly erotic connection. In whip-smart, gorgeous prose, Bialosky explores the push-pull of passion and responsibility, and the intoxication of dangerous liaisons.
Songs Without Words
by Ann Packer
Knopf $24.95
Fans of Packer’s extraordinary The Dive from Clausen’s Pier might find Packer’s second time out a little quieter of a celebration. Here, Packer limns the lives of childhood friends Liz and Sarabeth, who veered off on different roads as they hit adulthood. Sarabeth’s single and yearning for a lover who isn’t married. Liz and her husband are happily domestic with two kids. But when Liz’s daughter hits a terrifying crisis point, the ground beneath the women’s friendship begins to quake. A stunning look at the life cycle of a friendship.
An Arsonist’s Guide to Writers’ Homes in New England
by Brock Clarke
Algonguin Books of Chapel Hill $24.95
Exuberant, razor smart and as addictive as fresh popcorn, Clarke’s book is the kind of novel you want to press on friends. An “accidental arsonist and murderer,†Sam Pulsifer, is sent for a decade for setting fire to the Emily Dickenson home. Although he tries to distance himself from his youthful torching, when he gets out of jail, normal life is as elusive as an ember in a dying fire. But when other literary homes begin to suddenly ignite and Sam is blamed, Sam’s determined to find the real arsonist – no matter the cost. Hilarious and heartbreaking, this is a literary adventure where every page snaps and crackles with wit.
50 Jobs Worse Than Yours
by Justin Racz
Bloomsbury Books $14.95
Nothing’s worse in a stinking hot summer day than having to do your stinking, not-so-hot job, right? Well, now you can take comfort because author Justin Racz has compiled a hilarious list of jobs that are much worse than anything you might be doing. Chicken sexers, for example, take a gander at five to seven thousands chicks a day to separate the males from the females. Gravediggers risk death from the fumes. Racz includes snappy photographs, and information about education, skills, salary, benefits and drawbacks of each position. Racz also thoughtfully includes a blank page so you can put in your job – hopefully before you quit it and find something more meaningful.
The Escape Artists: True Stories of People Who Turned Their Obsessions into Professions
by Joshua Piven
McGraw-Hill $14.95
What drives people to make extreme job choices? (See 50 Job Choices Worse Than Yours). In this business-not-as-usual book, Piven gives us the stories of people who left their safe, lucrative jobs to follow their passions. From Mark Divine, who left Wall Street to be a Navy Seal to Karen DeSanto, who ran away and joined the circus, these are people whose funny and sometimes jaw-dropping stories of lives transformed are downright inspiring. Yes, says Piven, doing what you love has a price – and, more often than not, it’s financial, but as Piven says, being happy in what you do is worth everything.
There’s a (Slight) Chance I Might Be Going to Hell, a Novel of Sewer Pipes, Pageant Queens and Big Trouble
by Laurie Notaro
Villard $13.95
Okay, admit it. Sometimes rather than looking for “art,†you just want a read that you can tuck in your flight bag for that four hour layover in Detroit. Notaro’s book might be just your ticket. Funny and feisty, this is the story of outsider Maye Roberts, who decides that the only way she can be accepted in the tiny community of Spaulding, Washington is to enter their annual Sewer Pipe Queen Pageant. Of course, there are dark secrets, a mystery, and a whole passel of warm, likable characters. Light as a soufflé, the novel may not be exactly nutritious, but really, who cares, because it’s an absolutely delicious read.
Caroline Leavitt is an award-winning novelist and screenwriter. Her latest novel is the Booksense selection, Girls in Trouble. She has books in every room in the house and when she's reading, even aliens could land and she wouldn't stop. For more on Caroline go to www.carolineleavitt.com
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