Best books of 2017

An easy to use database (app) for finding best books by NPR. Use the filters on the left to narrow lists down:

https://apps.npr.org/best-books-2017/

The app features 374 books. 

Publisher's Weekly Top Ten,
https://best-books.publishersweekly.com/pw/best-books/2017/top-10#book/book-10

Kirkus Review,
https://www.kirkusreviews.com/issue/best-of-2017/

Christmas Book Flood

In Iceland, there's a long tradition of giving books as gifts during the holidays. Iceland book gifting tradition is called "Jolabokaflod"
or "Christmas Book Flood." 

Each Icelander receives at least one book during the Christmas season. Gifts are typically opened on December 24th. Icelanders usually spend the night before Christmas reading.

This is what I want to do this year. No regular gifts. Just books. 

If you want to read more about Iceland, you may want to try these books:

Moss, Sarah. Names for the Sea.

https://guidetoiceland.is/connect-with-locals/aldasigmunds/the-icelanders-and-their-big-love-of-books

Linchpin by Seth Godin

Seth Godwin urges us not to become cogs in a wheel. Those are not the kind of jobs that will last or that will bring satisfaction.

Instead, he urges employees to become linchpins--someone who brings something valuable and indispensable to the workplace. The employees which he also calls "artists" will be the the ones who will shape the future. 

Linchpins take an ordinary job and become innovators.

Godwin names several well-known linchpins: Steve Jobs of Apple, Jeff Bezos of Amazon, Richard Branson of Virgin.com but he also lists less well known ones, Anne Jackson Miller at flowerdust.net, Keith Johnson, a buyer at Anthropologie.

He explains why being good at what you do is not enough anymore. What employers need to be is more employees like Jay Parkinson, a medical innovator, Sasha Dichter, or Louis Monier who innovated their respective fields.

Though this is an older book, published in 2011. it's well worth reviewing at this time when many jobs are being replaced by automation. 

Every Heart a Doorway by Seanan Mcguire

The premise of Every Heart a Doorway is that the universe extends an invitation to certain children: a door to a new world. This new world, whether it be called Confection, or Prism, or Halls of the Dead is a magical place where the individual feels completely at home.

Some of these children are never seen again. Others are for whatever reason forced or told to return to real world for a short time. These children who have made this magical journey are heart-broken when they find themselves back in the real world

All of the students that end up at Eleanor West's School for Wayward Children want desperately to find the door and the world that claimed them. 

Eleanor tells the parents of these children that she will offer group therapy and that she will shatter their delusions. Eleanor actually sees her school as a "way station." She wants nothing more than to help them find their door again, even if the odds are against it. 

Just as Nancy, a new student, learns to navigate her way around the school, the unthinkable happens. Her roommate, Sumi, is murdered, the body mutilated. 

Everyone suspect Jack (short for Jacqueline) because she has been to harsh world called the Moors. She and her twin sister were both in service to a Lord Vampire. 

When two more bodies appear, the magical fantasy becomes a mystery.

Seanan McGuire who also writes horror as Mira Grant blends genres in this slim, yet well-plotted fantasy.

Every Heart a Doorway won a Nebula award in 2016 for best novella as well as a Hugo award(2017)and Alex award (2017).

Penguin Random House debuts

Take a look at these exciting fictional debuts from Penguin Random House:


Debut Sampler
http://www.TinyURL.com/DebutSamplerFall17

Folk Healing

Some of the best fiction comes from Appalachia; most likely, because of their storytelling habits. I've always been fascinated by folk medicine, maybe because it is similar to what my ancestors did in Louisiana. One of my ancestors was a traiteur, or faith healer. Granted, this is different from folk healing practices in Appalachia, yet both relied on medicinal plants and faith. 

Lately,  its hard not to notice an explosion of taleneted Appalachian writers--authors like Amy Greene, Joni Agee, Ann Hite, Ron Rash, Wiley Cash, Robert Morgan, and Daniel Woodrell. 

These novels aren't simply set in Appalachia but are informed by the setting. These characters couldn't have lived anywhere else. In many cases, the folk  healing is a significant part of the story or other aspects of Appalachia--mining and its effects. 


Folk medicine:
https://www.jstor.org/stable/40932250?seq=1#page_scan_tab_contents


One of my favorite Appalachian novels, The River Wife. 
https://chantalreviews.blogspot.com/2012/10/the-river-wife-by-joni-agee.html