Whenever somebody that I know offline would ask me what my favorite read of 2010 was (surprisingly a question I hear more offline than online), I without any hesitation or doubt would say Lonesome Dove by Larry McMurtry.  “Really?” and a blank stare is what I would almost always get back. People, this book was AMAZING.  Every 945 pages of it. When it ended, I wished there was another 945 pages. I was not ready to let these characters go!  Lonesome Dove has deservedly been called epic. But what makes a book epic?  I think it’s just one of those things that you know it when you read it. And oh, was this book epic.

Larry McMurtry is a master storyteller.  I was a tad daunted opening that very first page and I do admit that even 200 pages into the book I wondered if anything was ever going to happen.  And even though it was off to a slow start, I wouldn’t wish it any other way. The background characterization that McMurtry gives his essential to the story.

The inside cover of my copy of the book lists the key characters with a short description of each. I loved the summary it gave so am taking the liberty of copying it here for  you.

Augustus McCrae: ex-Texas  Ranger. A fierce fighter, loyal friend, gentle lover, a boisterous spinner of colorful yarns. Gus years for adventure, and is drawn into Woodrow Call’s dream – a cattle drive to Montana, to the free and wild frontier . . .
Woodrow F. Call: Gus’s partner and friend, a driven, demanding man, a leader with no patience for weakness – and a secret sorrow of his own . . .

Jake Spoon: dashing gambler, former comrade-in-arms of Gus and Call, his passions plunge him into a terrifying fate . . .

Clara Allen: the woman of Gus’s young dreams. Out of the frontier’s cruelty and death, she forgers a life as generous, brave and unyielding as the land she learns to love . . .

Blue Duck: a renegade Indian with cunning heart of a vulture. He tortures and ills across the Plains, and savors his victim’s agony . . .

Newt: the brave, bewildered young cowboy who discovers his manhood, and his past, on the hazardous journey into Montana . . .

The Hat Creek Outfit: Jake, Deets, Pea Eye and the Boys . . .  wranglers, tracers and scouts, they follow Gus and Call into the heart of the adventure, through sandstorms, stampedes, bandits, floods and snow . . . living on in the undying legends of the great American frontier.

If you don’t know who these characters are from having read Lonesome Dove yourself, I dare you to love them.  I dare you to hate them.

I picked up this book in every spare moment of my day when I was reading it. And when I wasn’t reading it, I wanted to be reading it. I thought about it constantly.  I know I haven’t gone into all the intricacies of why Lonesome Dove is so amazing but let me tell you simply-  the characters! the story! the love! the friendships! the fighting! the determination! the devotion! the heroes! the outlaws! the whores! the Indians! the frontier! the forging ahead! the friendships again!  And it’s also laugh out loud funny with some great one-liners and some beautiful passages.  Definitely need those lighthearted and thoughtful moments between the gun slinging, the scalping, and the hangings.

Yes, my favorite book of 2010 was unabashedly a Western.  A genre I didn’t really think I read.  But did I tell you I loved this book?  Oh, how I loved Lonesome Dove. Officially one of my most favorite books.  Ever. Do you need more recommendation then that?

(I remember when the mini-series came on TV when I was little and we all watched it together as a family. MUST re-watch it now! )

Links of interest: More book  blogger reviews.
Genre: Historical Fiction, Western
Publisher: Pocket Books. 1985.
Paperback, 945 pages. ISBN 067168390X
Lonesome Dove is available from your favorite independent bookstore, Powell’s, and Amazon.

Copyright 2010. Maw Books Blog

Maw Books has an affiliate relationship with several bookstores, including Indiebound, Powell’s, and Amazon . When you buy a product (not just books – any product), via one of my links, Maw Books earns income from the sale and as always, it’s much appreciated as all affiliate income is used to support the blog. There is no cost to you.

Together they prepare the barber shop for the regulars who soon will arrive.  These aren’t your ordinary regulars though.  It’s a special clientele: monsters! It’s busy all night and our young barber is prepared for  all kinds of different haircuts and styles.  Rotting tonic, horn polish and stink wax are all on hand.  But things gets tense when there is a knock at the front door – surely it couldn’t be a human wanting a haircut at this time of night? But not to fear, our young barber knows how to take care of business.

A fun book to read this Halloween season.  A great cast of monster characters who are simply taking care of their monsterly looks.

After all, even monsters need haircuts.

Links of interest: Matthew McElliogott website, more book blogger reviews.
Genre: Fiction Picture Book, approx age 4-8.
Publisher: Walker Books for Young Readers.  July 20, 2010
Hardcover, 40 pages. ISBN 080278819X
Source: Picked up a review copy at Book Expo America. A 2010 Cybil’s nomination for which I am a 1st round  panelist.
Even Monsters Need Haircuts is available from your favorite independent bookstore, Powell’s, and Amazon.

Copyright 2010. Maw Books Blog

Maw Books has an affiliate relationship with several bookstores, including Indiebound, Powell’s, and Amazon . When you buy a product (not just books – any product), via one of my links, Maw Books earns income from the sale and as always, it’s much appreciated as all affiliate income is used to support the blog. There is no cost to you.

Trick-or-treating has always been fun and safe especially when the town can count on the mysterious masked boy to wrangle up all the Halloween hoodlums.  In fact, he’s done such a good job keeping Halloween safe that for years  he hasn’t had to step in at all.

But that changes when a group of Goodie Goblins shows up wrecking havoc.  There is even talk of canceling Halloween for good! The Halloween Kid back to the rescue!  But are his skills too rusty?  Can he overcome the Goblins or will the town need to come to his rescue?

I loved the fun western take on a “yee-ha-halloween!”  The story was really entertaining to read and so fun to read a loud to the boys by getting into character.  Very clever.  But what I loved even more where the fantastic illustrations.  I adored the vintage feel of the entire book.

The Halloween Kid is a new release so don’t miss it this year!

Illustrations copyrighted to Rhode Montijo.
Links of interest: Rhode Montijo website, more book blogger reviews.
Genre: Fiction picture book. Approx ages 4-8.
Publisher: Simon & Schuster Children’s Publishing. August 3, 2010.
Hardcover, 40 pages. ISBN 1416935754
Copy Source: Library
The Halloween Kid is available from your favorite independent bookstore, Powell’s, and Amazon.

Copyright 2010. Maw Books Blog

Maw Books has an affiliate relationship with several bookstores, including Indiebound, Powell’s, and Amazon . When you buy a product (not just books – any product), via one of my links, Maw Books earns income from the sale and as always, it’s much appreciated as all affiliate income is used to support the blog. There is no cost to you.

Ethan can’t go to sleep properly.  Not when his resident under the bed monster, Gabe, has gone on a week-long fishing vacation.  How would he ever go to sleep without Gabe’s familiar scary noises and his spooky green ooze?  He  missed his ragged breathing, his nose-whistling, and the scrabbling of his uncut claws.  Luckily, he has a substitute monster appear under his bed.  Unluckily, his panting wasn’t scary enough and he didn’t have claws.  A second, third and fourth monster arrive but upon inspection none are as scary as Gabe and quickly dismissed.

Was I being too picky? NO.

I knew that my monster needed to be well-clawed and menacing.

The whole point of having a monster, after all, was to keep me in bed,
imagining all the scary stuff that could happen if I got out.

My boys love the monsters and are quick to fall into a fit of giggles over one particularly monster with a rather large tongue.  I was a bit worried that my boys would be scared of monsters under the bed but no fear, it’s an adorable story of a rather unique friendship.  Almost makes me wish I had my own monster under the bed.

A perfect read-a-loud book and illustrations to drool over.  Seriously gorgeous illustrations.  Highly recommend that you pick I Need My Monster up.  It’s a beautifully spooky book full of monsterly fun!

Links of interest: Amanda Noll website,  more book blogger reviews.
Genre: Fiction Picture Book, approx age 4-8.
Publisher: Flashlight Press.  April 1, 2009.
Hardcover, 32 pages. ISBN 0979974623
Source: Review copy for 2009 Cybil’s nomination for which I was a panelist.
I Need My Monster is available from your favorite independent bookstore, Powell’s, and Amazon.

Copyright 2010. Maw Books Blog

Maw Books has an affiliate relationship with several bookstores, including Indiebound, Powell’s, and Amazon . When you buy a product (not just books – any product), via one of my links, Maw Books earns income from the sale and as always, it’s much appreciated as all affiliate income is used to support the blog. There is no cost to you.

Higher! Higher! came out last year and I feel guilty that I’m just now reviewing it here on the blog.  It is one of the books that my boys will pull out frequently.  In fact, they have it memorized (actually not a hard feat when each page only says “Higher! Higher!”) but I will hear them looking at it to themselves and reciting the text.  It never gets old for them.

In Higher! Higher! a little girl is being pushed on the swing and keeps asking to go higher and higher.  And she does go higher.  So high in fact that she finds a surprise.  One that I won’t spoil for you but one that my boys get a kick out of every single time.  They especially love the monkey and they love to spot the baby which is the main character in Leslie Patricelli’s other books.

Sadly, I don’t have Leslie’s newest book Potty which just came out last week.  And I NEED this book right NOW.  Not having any luck in the potty training area.  Crisis situation.  Hopefully Leslie Patricelli will come to the rescue.  Is that too much to ask from our favorite illustrators?

Links of interest: Leslie Patricelli website, Maw Books interview with Leslie,  Maw Books spotlight on Leslie Patricelli’s board books.
Genre: Fiction Picture Book, approx age 4-8.
Publisher: Candlewick.  March 24, 2009.
Hardcover, 32  pages. ISBN 0763632414
Source: Review copy for 2009 Cybil’s nomination for which I was a panelist.
Higher! Higher! is available from your favorite independent bookstore, Powell’s, and Amazon.

Copyright 2010. Maw Books Blog

Maw Books has an affiliate relationship with several bookstores, including Indiebound, Powell’s, and Amazon . When you buy a product (not just books – any product), via one of my links, Maw Books earns income from the sale and as always, it’s much appreciated as all affiliate income is used to support the blog. There is no cost to you.

The opening paragraph of Dovey Coe by Frances O’Roark Dowell had me completely hooked.  Take into account that Dovey is only twelve-years-old and I’m even more hooked. I loved this book!  The voice.  Oh my goodness the voice.  Dovey Coe’s character was simply amazing and has a voice that is simply unforgettable.  And the sense of place.  Oh my goodness again!  It’s as if I was right there in the Appalachian mountains and with the mountain folk who lived there.

Dovey’s older sister is being courted by Parnell, the son of the richest man in town.  There’s not much that’s very nice about him and Dovey’s afraid that he’ll stop her sisters dream of going away to college.  On top of that, he’s real mean to her older brother who’s deaf which doesn’t mean he’s stupid.  Dovey has always spoken her mind, so when Parnell turns up dead (no spoiler there – we find out he’s dead in that first paragraph but how he died is the mystery) the town turns to Dovey as the most likely suspect.

LOVED it.  A great plot, fantastic characters and one heck of a voice in Dovey had me all giddy over this one.  I almost want to put everything down and reread it right now and I’m not much of a rereader.  Having ADORED Shooting the Moon also by Frances O’Roark Dowell, and now being two for two, I think I need to explore this author’s books even more.  She’s becoming a fast favorite.  Did I mention that I loved it?

Links of interest: Maw Books review of Shooting the Moon also by Frances O’Roark Dowell, Frances O’Roark Dowell’s website, more book blogger reviews.
Genre: Historical Fiction, approx ages 9-12.
Publisher: Aladdin. November 1, 2001
Paperback, 192 pages. ISBN 0689846673
Source copy: Own
Dovey Coe is available from your favorite independent bookstore, Powell’s, and Amazon.

Copyright 2010. Maw Books Blog

Maw Books has an affiliate relationship with several bookstores, including Indiebound, Powell’s, and Amazon . When you buy a product (not just books – any product), via one of my links, Maw Books earns income from the sale and as always, it’s much appreciated as all affiliate income is used to support the blog. There is no cost to you.

Year of No Rain

Eleven-year-old Stephen Majok lives in a small Sudanese village.  When he is not playing with his friends he tends his family’s two cows. His father had become a soldier when he was just a baby and had never come back.  One of his best friends, fourteen-year-old Wol, becomes engaged to his sister.  He wants to marry before he joins the guerrillas in southern Sudan fighting against the northern government soldiers simply so she can remember him. It’s a war that Stephen doesn’t want to go looking for, he just wants to study but with the war school hasn’t been in session for over a year.

But the war soon finds him anyways, as his village is bombed from government soldiers.  His mother tells him to pack his back with his most valued possessions and run into the forest with his friend Wol.  His mother and sister stay behind.  In the forest, they face hunger, thirst,  and fear that their family has been killed.  Orphans they yearn for home but wander unsure of where to go or who to trust.

A story of how children are caught up and affected in a horrible war.  Stephen is a character whom readers can easily sympathize with.  It’s easily written and perfect for young readers who are discovering the stories of people outside of their life circle and culture.  It’s one that will elicit discussion about the ill effects of war, brutality, hunger, thirst, and the power of the individual, optimism, and the hunger for stability, family, love, and education.

Links of interest: Alice Mead website, more book blogger reviews. I read this book as part of the water theme for the Social Justice Challenge.
Genre: Middle Grade Fiction, approx ages 9-12.
Publisher: Perfection Learning. January 2005.
Hardcover, 129 pages. ISBN 0756951585
Source copy: Own
Year of No Rain is available from your favorite independent bookstore, Powell’s, and Amazon.

Copyright 2010. Maw Books Blog

Maw Books has an affiliate relationship with several bookstores, including Indiebound, Powell’s, and Amazon . When you buy a product (not just books – any product), via one of my links, Maw Books earns income from the sale and as always, it’s much appreciated as all affiliate income is used to support the blog. There is no cost to you.

One little boy recounts to his unbelieving teacher at school just exactly how many people are in his family.  Having ninety-three in ones family makes for very interesting meal times, car rides, bath times (somebody after all has to blow dry the 27 owls) , and bed times (particularly as they all wear matching pajamas).

Kids will get a kick out of reading this one and parents won’t tire of it either.  From the author who also brought us the awesome Chicken Butt,  Erica Perl has a great book on her hands.   One that we enjoyed a lot.

Links of interest:  Erica S. Perl website, Mike Lester website, Maw Books review of Chicken Butt by Erica Perl.
Genre:  Picture Book, approx ages 4-8.
Publisher:  Abrams Books for Young Readers.  September 1, 2006
Hardcover, 32 pages.  ISBN 0810957604
Ninety-Three in My Family is available from your favorite independent bookstore, Powell’s, and Amazon.

Copyright 2010. Maw Books Blog

Maw Books has an affiliate relationship with several bookstores, including Indiebound, Powell’s, and Amazon . When you buy a product (not just books – any product), via one of my links, Maw Books earns income from the sale and as always, it’s much appreciated as all affiliate income is used to support the blog. There is no cost to you.

I must share with you the opening paragraphs* of the book which drew me in completely:

Love was the one thing Lily always thought she did better than her mother.  She believed that she knew exactly what love took, what it cost, and what it meant, and she though of her long marriage to Tom as proof of it.  But in the short period of time between Christmas and the start of fire season, everything she understood about love unraveled, the way jeans do at the hem, the way tweed does so that it reveals the intricate relationship of the warp and the weft, and she realized how very little she knew about the way love worked.  People naturally assumed, after everything that happened, that it was a bitter revelation, but they were wrong.

“Would you do it all again, knowing what you know now?”  her mother Eleanor, asked. Eleanor was, at that moment, seventy-five years old, about to be married again herself, and hoping that this time she might get it right.

“In a heartbeat,” Lily said – not only because she believed it, but because she knew it was what her mother needed to hear.

I’m not going to share too much of the plot with you today.  Suffice to say that I think the back cover synopsis spoils the book completely.  Thank goodness I NEVER read back cover synopsis until after the fact.  Something happened in the book which I’m glad I didn’t know was going to happen because it made it just that much more powerful.  So if you see this one in the store, don’t pick it up to read what it says on the back.  Just go to the cash register and take it home with you.

Suffice it to say that this is a story of Lily and her longstanding marriage to Tom.  It’s a story of Lily’s mother who is about to be married for the fourth time.   It’s a story of Lily’s two sons, one who is wondering himself if he’d be one to take after his mother or his grandmother.  I know that that description is about the most basic I could give but it’s a story with such incredible depth.  Jennie Nash writes with such beauty.  The emotions that she’s able to bring out in her characters is one that will have you crying right alongside them.

A gorgeous novel.

I am THRILLED to offer you an opportunity to win a signed copy of The Threadbare Heart and ten signed copies, a call-in from Jennie Nash, and a rum cake to one lucky grand prize winner (chosen from all participating blogs in this awesome promotion).  There is a PDF document embedded here.  If you can not view it, than click here. 

It’s simple. Leave me a comment and in just 250 words explain your favorite fictional mother-daughter pair. I will post the entry I like best on my blog the day after Mother’s Day (other blogs will post theirs Mother’s Day but I will be offline and unable to do so). Then Jennie Nash will pick the grand prize entry from those.

Seriously folks, you NEED this book.  I loved it so much.

*quoted from an uncorrected proof
Links of interest: Jennie Nash website, blog, and follow on Twitter. Maw Books reviews of The Only True Genius in the Family, The Last Beach Bungalow book review, Jennie Nash guest post and my interview with Jennie talking about The Last True Genius in the Family.  More book blogger reviews.
Genre: Fiction
Publisher: Berkley Trade. May 4, 2010
Paperback, 336 pages. ISBN 042523410X
Source:  Review copy
The Threadbare Heart by Jennie Nash is available from your favorite independent bookstore, Powell’s, and Amazon.

Copyright 2010. Maw Books Blog

Maw Books has an affiliate relationship with several bookstores, including Indiebound, Powell’s, and Amazon . When you buy a product (not just books – any product), via one of my links, Maw Books earns income from the sale and as always, it’s much appreciated as all affiliate income is used to support the blog. There is no cost to you.

How lucky can an author get?  All three covers would have gotten my attention. Beautiful.

A good synopsis from the book jacket:

The Birth House is the story of Dora Rare, the first daughter to be born in five generations of the Rare family.  As a child in an isolated village in Nova Scotia, she is drawn to Miss Babineau, an outspoken Acadian midwife with a gift for healing and a kitchen filled with herbs and folk remedies.  During the turbulent first years of World War I, Dora becomes the midwife’s apprentice.  Together they help the women of Scots Bay through infertility, difficult labors, breech births, unwanted pregnancies and even unfulfilling sex lives.

But when Gilbert Thomas, a brash medical doctor, comes to Scots Bay with promises of fast, painless childbirth, some of the women begin to question miss Babineau’s methods – and after Miss Babineau’s death, Dora is left to carry on alone.  In the face of fierce opposition, she must summon all of her strength to protect the birthing traditions and wisdom that have been passed down to her.

The Birth House is told in journal form from the point of view of seventeen-year-old Dora and also includes letters, news clippings, and advertisements.   I really liked the Novia Scotia setting.  It felt so wild and also romantic, particularly for this mountain town which demanded that its inhabitants carve out their life’s goodwill from what the earth would give them.

Dora is labeled as an anomaly as soon as she’s born.  In five generations, the Rare family line has simply never had the birth of a girl. Dora grows up with six brothers and as she gets older her father tries to squelch her tom boyish ways.  She moves in with the local midwife who trains her in catching babies, a skill that is a little prayer, a little magic, a little medicinal herbs, and a whole lot of knowledge of a woman’s body.

Dora has a fantastic voice.  I loved her.  In fact, I loved all the characters.  Miss Babineau was fabulous. So wise and caring but with a witch-like quality to her.   I felt a little sorry for the well-meaning Dr. Gilbert Thomas although you wanted to hate him too.  I really wanted to smack Dora’s new husband, Archer, over the head.  I wanted to know more about Charlie, Dora’s brother, whom she followed down to Boston when things got complicated at home.  And I can’t forget Aunt Fran whom disproved of everything Dora did.  I loved all the women in the town.  They often got together and talked about everything under the sun and conversations not meant to have in front of the men.

Although the characters are the heart of this story, childbirth is the focus of it.  Midwifery and modern medicine clash head-to-head and the women are caught in the very middle of it.  I found techniques from both midwifing and the new modern medicine to be fascinating.  Particularly, the treatment for woman diagnosed has having hysterical tendencies.  You’d just have to read the book to find out about that.

An examination of a community of women, their society, and the families they held together through their shared friendships, rivalries, stories and knitting circles.  Ami McKay wrote a incredible narrative and was one heck of a storyteller. I loved it.

Links of interest: Ami McKay website, blog, Twitter. More book blogger reviews.
Genre: Historical Fiction
Publisher: William Morrow. August 22, 2006.
Hardcover, 400 pages. ISBN 0061135852
Source copy:  Own
The Birth House is available from your favorite independent bookstore, Powell’s, and Amazon.

Copyright 2010. Maw Books Blog

Maw Books has an affiliate relationship with several bookstores, including Indiebound, Powell’s, and Amazon . When you buy a product (not just books – any product), via one of my links, Maw Books earns income from the sale and as always, it’s much appreciated as all affiliate income is used to support the blog. There is no cost to you.