Debut Fiction

I want to thank library director April W. for hosting our cozy, convivial group this morning at the new Pinson Library!

The topic for our next meeting on Wednesday, April 11, 2012 is Cowboys vs. Aliens. In other words, westerns and science fiction. :-) No worries, you are not required to read one of each unless you just want to.

We still need volunteers for refreshments at the April and August meetings, so email me (hwesley@bham.lib.al.us) if you’d like to step up to the plate.

The spring selection for Project Read One Book is Gin Phillips’ Come in and Cover Me. You can get more information on PROB at www.projectreadonebook.org. This is a great program for jumpstarting a book group at your library. It’s now time for PROB to look ahead to putting together some titles for a fall selection, so if you’d like to be part of the PROB team, or make suggestions, email April at adeaton@bham.lib.al.us.

Kelly informed the group that there is a new edition of the Pleasant Grove Tornado Book coming out soon. Get more information on this book at www.pleasantgrovetornadobook.com. Kelly also let us know about a new movie program on Friday mornings at Springville Road. You can get more information about this program by emailing her at kslaney@bham.lib.al.us.

Debut fiction is one of my very favorite types of book to read. I posted the following to my own library’s blog last February:

I really love debut novels. They often offer new stories and new perspectives in addition to a sometimes less polished writing style. I appreciate the slightly less glossy experience for the bravery and effort on the part of the new novelist. Some have published in arts journals, short story collections and anthologies, poetry publications, etc but that first novel length work of fiction, no doubt their baby for many a year, is truly a first outing. I don't claim to like them all, but I do appreciate each and every one because that is a person who doesn't sit around and say, as I do, "I really need to get started on that idea and write," but rather steps up to the keyboard and does the heavy lifting.

Here is a list from Paste magazine: their choices of the best debut novels of the decade (2000-2009)


And now, on to the list!

Watership Down by Richard Adams
House of Zeor by Jacqueline Lichtenberg
Mary Anne, Southern History

GENERAL DISCUSSION: Watership Down is definitely something to consider for childhood readers of books like the Redwall series, Dinotopia, Mrs. Frisby & the Rats of NIMH, and Duncton Wood when those readers are ready to move on to something with a little more substance. There is an animated feature of Watership Down, but several roundtable members where in staunch agreement that parental guidance should definitely be exercised in letting children under the age of 10 watch it. Mary Anne’s description of The House of Zeor paralleled some of the most popular plots today of vampire fiction. This book was published around 1974, only two years before Anne Rice’s Interview with a Vampire and the snowball resurgence of vampire fiction that was to follow. I obviously can’t say with any authority that Lichtenberg’s book was a source of inspiration for later authors any more so than Stoker and other authors of early vampire fiction, but it seems entirely plausible.

The Girl Who Fell From the Sky by Heidi W. Durrow
Hotel on the Corner of Bitter and Sweet by Jamie Ford
Looking for Alaska by John Green
April, Pinson

GENERAL DISCUSSION: April mentioned that Durrow’s book won the 2008 PEN/Bellwether Prize, an award established in 2000 by Barbara Kingsolver (and funded entirely by her) to promote fiction that addresses issues of social justice and the impact of culture and politics on human relationships.

Staked by J. F. Lewis
Eric the vampire doesn’t have a lot going for him other than the whole immortality thing, and he’s not even terribly fond of that. Let’s start with his memory. Does he remember why he’s yelling at the pile of remains in front of him, or better yet, why he killed him? Uh, no. Someone may or may not have been trying to kill him and/or ruin his business lately, but Eric’s policy has always been to forget that which may upset him. Also, his human girlfriend Tabitha has been bugging him to make her a vampire lately (she thinks he’ll be delighted that they can stay together forever…) and he just doesn’t understand how she hasn’t gotten that he doesn’t date vampires. Between the threats to his life (or is that undeath?) and business and the threats to his bachelor freedoms from Tabitha, Eric is snowed under, grumpy, and ready to get away from it all. Hilarious, raunchy, gory fun!
Holley, Emmet O’Neal

Black Ships by Jo Graham
Graham’s retelling of Aeneid is lush, exotic, and true while maintain an adventurous pace. Gull is the daughter of a slave who is taken into the service of the Lady of the Dead after a chariot accident leaves her maimed. After all, “there was no food for slaves who could not work.” Her prophecy of black ships and a burning city was heeded by the Lady but no one else of much consequence. Later, when the black ships arrive, Gull must decide whether or not to accept her destiny as the counsel of kings.
Holley, Emmet O’Neal

Those Across the River by Christopher Buehlman
In Depression-era Michigan, university professor Frances Nichols runs off with another professor’s wife, Eudora. The atmosphere of the town turns oppressive and Frank and Eudora are desperate to find somewhere to be together without judgment. Frank gets a letter from a lawyer in far-off Whitbrow, Georgia originally from a distant relative, recently deceased:

“Dear Orville Frances…
Although I know nothing of your character, I can only assume that you are a good man if anything of my sister passed to you & for that reason I ask you to sell this house and to remain where you are, or in some other place…frank please do not make this your home…there is bad blood here, and it is against you for no fault of your own & you will not have time to go stale in whitbrow. This place will smell out I fear what is in you and claim you, for its own, it, will, hug, your, bones, into, the , woods…”

Disregarding the ramblings of an obviously sick and confused old woman, Frank and Eudora head for salvation. Of course, you and I both know there’s nothing good in those woods….
Holley, Emmet O’Neal

The Postmortal by Drew Magary
Kelly, Springville Road

What is your favorite first novel?

Meeting Next Wednesday, February 8th

DON'T FORGET!!! 

This month we are meeting at the PINSON LIBRARY for Reader's Advisory Roundtable.

We'll meet Wednesday, February 8th at 9am to discuss debut fiction.

The Pinson Library is located at:

4410 Main Street
Pinson, AL 35126
205-680-9298

or, Google Map it: http://g.co/maps/ssq28

I'll see you there!
Holley