Christmas list!

In no particular order, here are the books on my wish list:

The Devil All the Time by Donald Ray Pollock
Fame Junkies by Jake Halpern
Sister Wendy on Prayer by Sister Wendy
Be My Knife by David Grossman
The Lagoon by Lilli Carre
The Drunkard’s Walk: How Randomness Rules our Lives
Collections of Nothing by William Davies King
Shadow Tag by Louise Erdich
Veracity by Laura Bynum
The Irresistible Henry House by Lisa Grunwald
The Lost City of Z by David Grann
The Left Hand of God by Paul Hoffman
The Third Bear by Jeff VanderMeer
I’d Know You Anywhere by Laura Lippman
How to Live Safely in a Science Fiction Universe by Charles Yu
Hector and the Search for Happiness by Francois Lelord
Heat by Bill Buford
Kitchen Confidential by Anthony Bourdain
The Authentic Animal: Inside the Odd and Obsessive World of Taxidermy by Dave Madden
In the Garden of Beasts by Erik Larson
Nightwoods by Charles Frazier
A Cupboard Full of Coats by Yvvette Edwards
Meat: The Story Behind Our Greatest Addiction by Brian J. Ford
The Snowman by Jo Nesbø
The Table Comes First by Adam Gopnik
Swamplandia! by Karen Russell

JAMRACH’S MENAGERIE by Carol Birch

I am still thirsty after reading this book. I’m still dazzled by the creatures and by the terrible, unrelenting sun. JAMRACH’S MENAGERIE is the story of Jaffy Brown, a boy growing up in mid 1800s’ London. In a way, the story is two tales: Jaffy’s early employment with Jamrach, taking care of the many animals which come through his unusual shop and developing a relationship with Tim, another animal handler, and a sometimes cruel boy (not unlike an older brother); and the search for the dragon, a three-year quest into the Dutch East Indies on which Jamrach sends the boys. It is on this quest that the first part of the story gains extra richness. The relationship between Jaffy and Tim, especially, takes on a unique weight, and what Tim does to Jaffy in part one, and what Jaffy does to Tim in part two feels widely unfair, but also right. Perhaps needless to say, the quest for the dragon ends in disaster (although they DO catch the fabled beast), and Tim, Jaffy and a few others are *spoiler alert* shipwrecked and stuck in life rafts hoping for land. And hoping. And desperately hoping. And suffering all the terrible affects of dehydration, saltwater, and sun. It’s a brutal, beautiful section, and one not soon forgotten. Atmospheric, lyrical, and hypnotic, JAMRACH’S MENAGERIE is a true adventure, one that feels like it could be real even as the fish tale spins out of control.

THE SISTERS BROTHERS by Patrick DeWitt

Not that THE SISTERS BROTHERS by Patrick DeWitt needs my endorsement—the back cover is emblazoned with praise from the likes of David Wroblewski and Wells Tower, and it’s now won several important awards including the Governor General’s Award and the Writer’s Trust Prize—but I’d like to add to all the buzz: this book is good for dads. Even dads who don’t read much. Even dads who typically only read Slocum or Edge westerns (like mine). It’s the story of two brothers, hired guns and henchmen to the Commodore, who are out to hunt down a man named Hermann Kermit Warm. They trek through the Pacific Northwest and into Gold Rush era San Francisco. They shoot a lot of people. They drink a lot of whiskey. They find themselves in rather ridiculous predicaments—for all the shooting and whiskey drinking, this is also a comedic novel. And they are Brothers with a capital B. The first chapter, one of the best I’ve read, perfectly sets up the dynamic between Eli and Charlie. Charlie is the more violent brother, a more natural leader, and thus Eli is stuck with an inferior horse, Tub, after their old horses are killed. Poor old Tub. Just as the brothers find themselves in…situations, Tub too suffers, but he remains loyal to the end. And Eli remains loyal to Charlie even when their temperaments and opinions differ. At once extraordinarily violent, funny and beautiful, if you’re thinking to yourself, gosh, I really should read a western, make this one it. And buy a copy for your dad too.

ACROSS THE UNIVERSE by Beth Revis

The popular belief in young adult books right now is: you must have a female lead AND a love story. And based on cover image alone--which is quite sexy with two faces millimeters away from kissing--I thought I was in for an intergalactic romance. But this is a science fiction thriller, and I'm so glad for it! Science fiction shines when it cleverly examines difficult truths from our current society. This quality is what makes George Orwell's 1984 still relevant and powerful today. ACROSS THE UNIVERSE by Beth Revis does just this. It's about a young future leader's discovery that his home, a space ship bound for a distant habitable planet, is really a kind of prison, governed in an anything but democratic fashion. It asks important questions: Is it a government or leader's responsibility to keep its people safe....from themselves? What means should a government employ to do this? Abuse? Fear? Drugs? Freedom? Lies? Main character and male lead Elder begins to question his mentor's methods when a girl, one the "frozens" kept in a kind of stasis in the bowels of the ship, is awoken. Amy remembers Earth like it was yesterday, but she knows the ship has been traveling for centuries. Everything is different aboard the Godspeed, especially her. She introduces a crack in the ship's seemingly perfect operation. Before Amy awoke, Elder never really asked the tough questions, but as Amy continues to point out flaws--and horrors--in the way things are done, and as it becomes clear a murderer, who is killing other frozens, is on the loose, the suspense and tension spiral into...well, outer space. Interestingly, the romance elements seem rather forced--the relationship between stars Amy and Elder is much more complicated and intense than a mere love story. This is a true race-to-the-end read, and will leave the reader pondering the BIG questions long after the final page--the true pleasure of great science fiction.

CHILD 44 by Tom Rob Smith

It's not enough that a terrifying and prolific child-murdering serial killer is on the loose, this killer is operating in Stalin-era communist Russia. This is a time and place where smoking a cigarette on a street corner, not having the perfect 2-child nuclear family, or not stalking your home bookshelf with the proper Party books, is viewed as suspicious. When an accusation is all that it takes for someone to be guilty, and "guilty" people are tortured, killed, or worse, sent to do years of hard labor in terrible conditions. This is also a time and place where crime doesn't exist. Crime goes against the Party's ideals. How could there possibly be crime in Stalin's perfect society? Ironically, this creates an excellent environment in which a serial killer can operate freely...and an impossible situation for main character Leo. He's losing his faith in the Party, and when he's demoted from his prestigious job with the MVG for not demonstrating enough loyalty, his ideals change evermore. With his new found conscience, he decides to investigate some very disturbing murders of children in his new town. But no one wants him to meddle. These murders have already been "solved," blamed on drunks or the mentally ill. An unsolvable murder, let alone the existence of a serial killer, reflects badly on the Party. And so Leo and his wife--already under scrutiny--must fly under the radar and risk their lives (again and again) to do the right thing. Every sentence of CHILD 44 is filled with tension (on top of tension, on top of tension), in this brilliantly written, carefully plotted, debut thriller by Tom Rob Smith. Every glance holds meaning, every misstep could mean death, as Smith creates a perfect storm. It's possible I held my breath the entire time while reading this novel. I've never bought into the phrase "kept me on the edge of my seat," but now I get it. I squirmed, I occasionally threw the book across the room unable to take the drama only to run right over to fetch it again, and I stayed up way too late. The best book I've read this year, not only for the tension, but also for the achingly real relationships between key characters, particularly between Leo and his wife. The Party would most certainly arrest you for owning this book.

WESLEY THE OWL by Stacy O'Brien

The subtitle on WESLEY THE OWL is "the remarkable love story of an owl and his girl," which makes this quite possibly the best book to read after THE EVOLUTION OF BRUNO LITTLEMORE. Both books--despite the fact that one is fiction and one is non-fiction--feature animals who fall in love with their researchers and learn to communicate. Both feature heroines who suffer from painful headaches and brain tumors. And both depict animal/human sex. And I might argue that Bruno and Wesley have similar personalities. Both are prone to fits, while at the same time embodying a certain sophistication. But Wesley, is of course, an owl. A flying, mouse-eating, screeching owl. The prose in WESLEY is plain but heartfelt, and as Stacey O'Brien, the author, caretaker of, and "mate" to Wesley, unfolds the day-to-day existence of living with a creature who, by book's end, we are convinced most certainly has a soul, the reader can't help but marvel. And not only at Wesley who knows what abstract thoughts like "tomorrow" and "next week" mean, and who can easily express whether he wishes to tear up a magazine or play in the water. We marvel at Stacy, who exhibits unrelenting patience for her feathered friend, who beheads mice in the back yard with a pair of scissors, and who loses not a few dates because of her emotional owl. BRUNO was narrated by Bruno, the chimp, and WESLEY is narrated by the researcher and object of Wesley's affection, Stacey. While it provides the human side of the love story, one can't help but find in Stacey a unique being, an "owl whisperer" who sees much more in animals than the average person. It's the story of not one, but two weirdoes in love.

THE EVOLUTION OF BRUNO LITTLEMORE by Benjamin Hale

Five hundred eighty-seven pages narrated by talking chimpanzee (interestingly, I just accidently typed "chipmanzee") Bruno Littlemore, and what a narration it is. It's filled with language theory, philosophy, literature references, commentary on humanity, society, love, and everything in between (Bruno's summary of the Disney film version of Pinocchio is not to be missed). What makes us human? What makes chimps--who form social societies, use tools, and communicate amongst themselves--animals? The line is truly blurred in BRUNO. Bruno begins life as a "normal" chimp in the Chicago zoo, but ends up falling in love and living with (and sleeping with--yes, there is some tasteful chimp-on-woman sex in this novel, a phrase which would normally be an oxymoron) a researcher from the lab which borrows him for language experiments; he moves to an eccentric millionaire's animal sanctuary in Colorado, where zebras graze on the front lawn and we meet two endearing characters Hilarious Lilly and Hilarious Larry; and he performs The Tempest with the large and loud Leon in an abandoned subway station in New York. Some how this all makes sense. But the most powerful, profound portions of the book come when Bruno talks about his chimp-ness, when he describes his family life at the Chicago zoo as a young chimp, and when he goes ape-shit with emotion at inconvenient times. Haven't we all gone ape-shit with emotion at inconvenient times? Haven't we all wanted to tear apart the hospital waiting room with grief? This is a narrative to which readers will take a highlighter to to mark marvelous passages, which readers will want to read aloud and ponder. And it's wildly (pun intended) entertaining too.