Book Review: Night Film by Marisha Pessl

Night FilmThe Booklover’s Rating:  ♥ ♥ ♥ ♥ ♥

Goodreads has begun their voting for the 2013 Goodreads Choice Awards, so I thought it might also be a good time to review my favorite book of 2013.  As you may recall, my favorite book last year was The Orphanmaster’s Son by Adam Johnson.  This book went on to win a Pulitzer Prize.  I don’t expect as much for Night Film, but I am certainly going to name this book my favorite for 2013.

Night Film revolves around the work of an investigative journalist who becomes obsessed, as so many have, with a legendary and reclusive cult-horror-film director named Stanley Cordova.  The book opens with the death of Cordova’s daughter in a warehouse in New York.  Her death is a ruled suicide, but McGrath suspects otherwise.

McGrath, along with two strangers, begins a nightmarish descent into the world of the Cordova family, at what may be the cost of his own.  Driven by revenge and curiosity, McGrath encounters a truly frightening world inhabited by the reclusive film director.  As McGrath begins to lose sight of what is real and what isn’t, the reader is drawn into this nightmarish world and begins to wonder what is real in the novel as well.

This book made me want to sleep with the lights on.  It has been a long time (to say the least) since that has happened to me.  Perhaps I am just a ‘fraidy cat, but this book is scary.

Book Details:  Published by Random House (August 20, 2013), 602 pages, ISBN: 140006788X.

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Book Review: The Bone Season

Bone SeaosnThe Booklover’s Rating:  ♥ ♥ ♥

The Bone Season by Samanatha Shannon got a lot of hype and in my humble opinion it was undeserved.  The book was good, but just good.  Not amazing, not wonderful, not unforgettable, etc.  In others words – it was okay.  The book is worth reading, but should not be at the top of your To-read list.

The protagonist of The Bone Season, is Paige Mahoney, a top-level and rare-type of clairvoyant.  She is part of a gang of clairvoyants controlled by mime-lord, Jaxon Hall, in a time (2059) when being a clairvoyant is frowned upon (to say the least).  When returning home one day, Paige is threatened with exposure or worse and kills a security agent with her powers.  She is captured and taken to the penal colony of Sheol.

Sheol is controlled by a race called the Rephaim and Paige becomes the pawn in a political battle within Sheol and the larger world to some extent.  Let’s also not forget about the Emim, the mortal enemy of the Rephaim.  The author, Samantha Shannon, writes that the Emim carry a sound of their own – buzzing.

If you are a regular reader of dystopian fiction, definitely read The Bone Season.   If you are not a regular reader of dystopian fiction, my pick for you would be Justin Cronin’s book The Passage.  I much prefer Cronin’s work over Shannon’s, but do applaud the author of The Bone Season for a good book and I may take in the sequel if and when it happens.  It depends on what else is on my To-read list at the time.

Book Details:  Published by Bloomsbury USA  (August 20, 2013), 480 pages, ISBN: 978-1620401392.

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Most Famous Book Set in Every State

Business Insider posted a graphic and slide show of the “Most Famous Book Set in Every State.”  Be sure to check it out!  Especially if you are headed out of town this fall for a getaway.

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Book Review: Burial Rites

imagesThe Booklover’s Rating:  ♥ ♥ ♥ ♥ ♥

Burial Rites is Hannah Kent’s first novel and what a great novel it is!  Burial Rites is based on the true story of Agnes Magnúsdóttir and is set in rural Iceland in 1829. Agnes is awaiting execution for the murder of her former employer and his friend, not in a prison—there are none in the area—but at a local family’s farm. Jón Jónsson, the owner of the farm, grudgingly accepts this thankless task as part of his responsibility as a regional official.  His wife and daughters’ reactions range from silent resentment to outright fear and curiosity. Agnes also requests the company of a young priest, to whom she confesses parts of her story, while narrating the full tale only to the reader, who, like the priest, provide her with a final audience to her life’s lonely narrative.

The story is not a page turner, but is compelling and hard to put down.  Kent paints a sympathetic and complex portraits of Agnes, the Jónssons, and the young priest, and an interesting portrait of a small farming community in Iceland in the early 19th Century.  You may be left wondering, as I was, at how very different the people of the 21st Century are from theses dutiful, caring people of long ago Iceland.  We don’t necessarily live in a better world.

Book Details:  Published by Little, Brown and Company (September 10, 2013), 336 pages, ISBN: 0316243914.

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We Have a Winner!

Mikayla L. of Rome, GA wins the 60th Anniversary Edition of Ray Bradbury’s Farenheit 451.

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Banned Books Week 2013 and a Giveaway

Farenheit 451Banned Books Week is the national book community’s annual celebration of the freedom to read. Hundreds of libraries and bookstores around the country draw attention to the problem of censorship by mounting displays of challenged books and hosting a variety of events. The 2013 celebration of Banned Books Week will be held from September 22-28.  In honor of this annual celebration of the freedom to read, The Booklover is giving away the 60th Anniversary Edition of Farenheit 451 by Ray Bradbury.  To enter subscribe to this blog, then leave a comment below telling us about your favorite banned book.  (If you already subscribe to this blog, mention that when you leave your comment.)  The winner will be randomly selected on September 28, 2013 — the final day of Banned Books Week 2013. We’ll announce the winner the week following Banned Books Week.

Good luck and don’t forget to celebrate with a banned book!

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Bookshelfies

It seems that pictures of you at your bookshelf is one of the newest Internet trends!  Business Insider (one of The Booklover’s favorite Websites) posted an article today about bookshelfies.  Check it out and also check out my new bookshelfies board on Pinterest.

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