How would you describe your job to someone you just met? Whenever I tell people that I’m a bookseller at Powell’s, their eyes light up because they believe that Powell’s is the place to be in Portland. Then, a look of confusion will cross their faces, and they’ll ask me what exactly that means. I usually tell people that I’m a librarian of sorts. Sometimes they can find me at the Info desk, and other times they can find me …
Willy Vlautin has never written a cheerful book in his brilliant writing career, and Don’t Skip Out on Me is no exception. Young Horace Hopper, half-Paiute, half-Irish, wants to be a championship boxer. Abandoned by his birth parents, he’s been taken in by an elderly rancher and his wife who love him like a son. They would like …
I am living for this series of books [DC Icons series]. As a fan of comic books who is sick of the ossification and stagnation of the Big Two, these books are a welcome breath of fresh air in that they are fun tweaks to familiar characters. Wonder Woman is young, naive and conflicted on …
This is a link we’ve had in the files for quite some time now… Even though the titles aren’t quite so fresh, it’s still a fun tool. The Seattle Times created interactive book recommendations based on reviews from the paper. You know what’s even more fun, though? Visiting a local independent bookshop to ask a bookseller …
Seattle7Writers, the nonprofit collective of Pacific Northwest authors, partners with independent bookstores this summer to introduce readers to favorite authors and raise money for literacy nonprofits. In July, Island Books hosted the Seattle7Writers cookout to benefit Team Read, a nonprofit organization that pairs struggling young readers with trained teen reading coaches for one-on-one tutoring after school and …
This book may be more for ex-kids like me, for whom the mysterious M. Sasek created a fascinating world of cities and landmarks in the ’50s and ’60s in his This Is… picture books. This Is Paris, This Is San Francisco, This Is Hong Kong, This Is Cape Canaveral: all told, he made eighteen locations his own, …
Hear ye, hear ye! This weekend, folks should flock to the AuburnFest Book and Small Press Fair held Saturday August 11th from 11:00 am to 7:00 pm in the Community and Events Center in Les Gove Park at 1005 12th St SE Auburn, WA 98002 Local authors, poets, journals, small publishers, and book stores have been invited to participate. The event …
I generally don’t go for short stories, except maybe those by George Saunders or Kelly Link, but I love this author (and the book cover!) so I had to try it. As you might perhaps guess from the title, most of the stories have to do with family relationships but in so many different ways. …
One of my favorite books from last year was the Booker-longlisted Reservoir 13. Although it didn’t win, it was such a phenomenon in Britain that the BBC commissioned McGregor to write a series of companion stories that were read by different actors on Radio 4. Now in book form in the States, The Reservoir Tapes introduces new characters …
I think it’s fairly safe to say that we all have several reading personalities, depending on mood and circumstance. Sometimes, you might be in the mood for the literary equivalent of a summer blockbuster, with explosions and car chases and clearly defined bad guys. Other times you might want a stately costume drama or something …
