A Grab Bag, if that bag was full of stuff from my bedside table

(Functionality issues: usually the pics are hyperlinks to Amazon, but their handy little widget isn't working. Now I have boring old static pics instead of dynamic ones. I bet you'll boycott my site until it works, huh? Damnit.)

On to the latest in Mel's books!

First up, in the "well, ain't that a little peculiar?" category, Kevin Wilson's The Family Fang. Okay, you've got Child A (Annie) and Child B (Buster), who are the progeny of the Fangs, a couple of performance artists who have been staging unexpected pieces using their children since they first saw the fascinated horror on the faces of the patrons waiting in line behind baby Annie as she wailed on Santa's lap. As adults, Annie and Buster turn to more conventional forms of self-expression (acting and writing) but are still inexorably drawn into their parents' weird and weirdly compelling orbit. Does it sound weird? It's weird. But not precious or "quirky," which I feared reading the premise. I trusted the recommendations, though, and was so glad I did. Despite the Art, this is ultimately a very good novel about families, growing into your own identity, and how people screw each other up and shore each other up, sometimes at the same time.

I am surprised that this is the first time I've actually blogged about Susan Mallery, since I've read basically every word she's ever published. In particular, I've gobbled up all of her Fool's Gold series (a small town in California with a sever man shortage, leading to a nicely empowered town full of pretty single women who gradually pair off with hunky men who drift in.) Her latest about this town is a trilogy about the Hendrix triplets: Only Mine, Only Yours, and Only His. This month I listened to all three of these, narrated by Tanya Eby. so that was approximately 25 hours of Dakota, Nevada, Montana (the triplets) and their men. She's a brightly-voiced narrator with great pacing, so I routinely enjoy her work. The only down side in all this was that Eby's voices for each hero-heroine pair are basically the same, so listening to these all together got a bit run-on-ish. I was therefore particularly impressed with Mallery, giving them all such distinct but interwoven characteristics - in the previous Fool's Gold books, I couldn't really keep them straight (not that it was necessary), so I feared they would be too similar when it came to their own stories. Mallery uses their time off in college wisely - especially with the last novel - to make their issues unique and their romances well-tailored to each woman. Now I need to keep an eye out for the next ones, to see whether the new librarian, the fire chief, or the goat farmer will be the woman to hook up with the remaining Hendrix siblings - the single dad math teacher and the heretofore-unseen deployed soldier. (My bet: math + goat, army + library, and someone tertiary for the fire chief.)

And for further adventures in series reading, I grabbed I Shall Wear Midnight by Terry Pratchett. This is his YA take on his Discworld books, centering around young witch Tiffany Aching. Now, I haven't read much of the adult Discworld stuff, but I do so enjoy the Hag o' the Hills and her many adventures with frying pans and stick-on warts and underworld creatures. My kids did, too, and normally I'd try to get this on audio so we could listen during a road trip, but: no road trips, and the library only had hardcover, so. (That's my subtle way of saying I'd rather read than spend time with my sons, even if I'm reading to them during that time. What? They know I love them and stuff.) Once I'm through the next 800 hours of the Game of Thrones books, and then everything I put off reading / listening to so I could enjoy/slog through Martin's stuff, I may just have to figure out how to enter Discworld without the whole thing toppling me through sheer volume. (Which, to Pratchett's credit, is probably a big side effect of YA and adult readers both who encounter Tiffany Aching's stories.)

Ohhh, I like this book!

Yesterday I finished listening to David Mitchell's Cloud Atlas. I really enjoyed all of it, even the dystopian future stuff, which isn't always my cup of tea. Last year I read Mitchell's The Thousand Autumns of Jacob de Zoet, which was very good, but I prefer this one. It's funnier, but still smart and energetic. I keep finding myself constructing mental maps of the structure, playing with all the pieces. Some might find that frustrating, but to me, it's delightful. The interlinked stories were each intriguing in their own right, and I always enjoy picking up on the themes that unite each - the Hydras and falls and so forth. Plus, now I'm really worried about corporations taking over our lives.

I also read Hothouse Flower and the Nine Plants of Desire last week, by Margot Berwin. Talk about escapism for those stuck in winter's icy grip. Not that Berwin's rendering of a New York City summer is where you'd want to be, but when the action moves to the Yucatan, things heat up. The plants are lush, the threats are pulse-raising, and the local lore is mystical. All in all, it's an extremely solid debut with a good sense of whimsy and a strong quest storyline.

And just so you don't think I'm always about tricksy literary stuff with themes and memes and all, I'll tell you about the first in Susan Mallery's Lonestar Sisters series, Under Her Skin. These have been out for a few years, but I've been working my way through Mallery's various novels (trying to get my various libraries and audio libraries to coordinate to give me a full series in order is sometimes a challenge! At least this series is shorter - when I'm dealing with something like Stephanie Laurens's Cynster series, I end up with a spreadsheet to keep track. I grant you that it's a strange way to spend my time, but no stranger than fantasy football or train spotting, right?) Anyway, this is the first novel about the Titan sisters, daughters of a rich powerful Dallas-type dad who is no good at the emotional stuff. The sisters are, of course, all beautiful and unique and have their own personal hang-ups due to their parenting, or lack thereof. I presume that all the heroes will be gorgeous and strong-willed and will present some sort of obstacles to the relationship that will make each side of the couple grow and overcome before finally uniting. Cause that's the way this goes. It's a rough but sex-filled road to Happily Ever After, and Mallery is quite good at portraying it. She's got a great narrative sense and never falls into clunky exposition or stilted dialogue, which is why I've now read a huge chunk of her contemporary romances.