An Artistic Masterpiece or a Forgery?

I am not by any means an expert in art.  Show me a famous painting and I probably will not know the artist.  But I still appreciate good works of art and the time, effort, and patience it takes an artist to fully realize his or her vision.  The Art Forger, B.A. Shapiro's debut novel, not only takes us into the world of art but, obviously, into the world of art forgery.

Claire Roth is an artist who made a bad name for herself when she painted a picture her then-boyfriend took credit for.  She was vilified when she finally came clean and now she paints famous works for a company called Reproductions.com.  But Claire still wants to become the famous artist she once dreamed of being.  Enter Aidan Markel, owner of a well-known gallery, who offers her a Faustian bargain: Claire forges a painting for Markel and he will give Claire her own show in his gallery.  She agrees and soon finds out that there is more to this deal than she ever suspected.  

This is a very good debut novel with some terrific insight into the world of art forgery.  There is more mystery and suspense to it than I would have initially guessed.  Pick it up if you want to learn more about art as well as enjoy a good story!

Recommendations Delivered to Your Inbox!

There are so many places to get book recommendations.  I love visiting the NPR and New York Times book reveiw sites.  Goodreads and LibraryThing offer a social place to discuss books.  But what if, now stay with me, you could get lists of new and popular book titles sent straight to your Inbox?  What a crazy world that would be, right?  Welcome to that crazy world!  The Tiffin-Seneca Public Library offers amazing booklists each month that can be sent straight to your email.

Simply go to this site to browse the available booklists.  Simply click the checkbox next to each list you would like to receive, enter your email and you are set! 

We do link to the current lists on our website, so check them out if you'd like to sample them.  For instance, here is this month's New Adult Fiction and Mystery lists.  There are many others, such as Adult Biography, Junior Books, Teen Books, and Large Print.  There's something for everyone!

Film Adaptations

We've all heard the arguments.  The book was better!  The movie was better!  Or even, I liked them both!

I just finished an interesting article entitled "Ten Things Hollywood Wants in Source Material and Screenplays" by John Robert Marlow of the Huffington Post.  You can check out the article at this link.  Most of the content is what you would expect.  Movie makers evaluate screenplays, and books, by attempting to figure out how appealing they would be on the big screen.  Does the source material contain relatable characters?  Is it of average length and without unnecesary details?  Would it be visually appealing?  All of this factors in when a filmmaker decides to turn your favorite books into films.

This got me thinking of books I've read recently that I feel would make a good transition to the big screen.  Allow me to add a bit of a disclaimer here.  I rarely, rarely say that the film was better, so I'm thinking these books would simply be good choices for the transition to film.  The first one that immediately came to mind is The Night Circus by Erin Morgenstern.  Just imagining how visually appealing this would be is making me giddy.  And guess what?  A film is indeed in the early stages of development.  The Light Between Oceans could make for a fantastic dramatic film.  I'm seeing Hollywood being all over this one and I wouldn't be surprised if it's already in the works.  And, after running a quick search, it looks like I'm two for two!

I'm not really into the crime/sheriff who doesn't play by the rules kind of films, but I'm thinking the Kate Burkholder series by Linda Castillo would make a pretty strong transition to film.  I don't necessarily believe the entire series should be included but the first one, Sworn to Silence, could make for a good flick.

The Lifeboat by Charlotte Rogan could be a solid psychological thriller.  If you haven't picked this one up, the story is told by Grace, who was with her husband when their ocean liner suffers a mysterious explosion.  Grace is separated from her husband, who secured her on a lifeboat which is unfortunately over capacity.  We naturally get to watch as the survivors of the explosion start fighting for power of the lifeboat.

Which books are you hoping are turned into films?

Discuss Turn of Mind at the Next Coffee By the Book

If you have not stopped by our Coffee By the Book group at Bailiwicks Coffee Company, give it a try on January 17.  The newest book group from the Tiffin-Seneca Public Library is not what you might expect.  First, there's coffee.  How great is that?  Second, we do not discuss books that you might think of as the typical book group fare.  We read newer debut titles that tend to be on the quirky side.  It's a way for us to introduce you to something different that you might not have picked up otherwise.

The next book we'll be discussing is Turn of Mind by Alice LaPlante.  Dr. Jennifer White's best friend has recently been murdered and the police have named White as the prime suspect.  Sounds like a pretty typical mystery/thriller doesn't it?  The twist to this story is that Dr. White suffers from Alzheimer's and this mystery is told from her perspective.  Now a different kind of storytelling.  Being inside Jennifer's mind while it is slowly deteriorating makes for interesting and sometimes emotional reading.  She is caught trying to piece together what happened to her best friend while dealing with an ailment of which she has no control.  The family dynamics between White and her two children also gives the reader something to mull over.

Join us at Bailiwicks on January 17 from 6:00-7:00 to discuss this powerful debut novel.

Alice Munro- Short Story Genius

I mentioned my love for Alice Munro's short stories in a previous post and feel the need to elaborate further with an entire post devoted to her work.  I'm only halfway through her most recent work, Dear Life: Stories, and have, as expected, fallen in love with her writing all over again.

Munro is able to tell seemingly unimportant tales in such a way that we are left with the feeling that every little interaction in our lives is dipped in meaning.  In the story "Haven" we have a young girl staying with her aunt and uncle while her parents are on a mission trip in Ghana.  The differences between her parents and the aunt/uncle are striking, specifically the fact that her Aunt Dawn lives in a household in which she is not able to speak her mind, due to the way Uncle Jasper talks down to her.  But what happens when the aunt decides to do something on her own, without him knowing?   "Leaving Maverly" is a story about a night policeman who accompanies a quiet, shy girl home from her job at the local theater every night.  Her religion does not allow her to listen to the films, let alone see them, and the policeman is left wondering if his telling her about the films leads to her sudden disappearance.

Munro's other short story collections are just as solid as Dear Life.  Try Too Much Happiness (which is anything but), Runaway, Hateship, Friendship, Courtship, Loveship, Marriage, and The Love of a Good Woman.

As always, check us out on Goodreads for more book recommendations and reviews.

Astray- Emma Donoghue

I just finished Emma Donoghue's collection of mostly previously published short stories, Astray.  You may remember Donoghue from her enormously popular 2010 title, Room, which gave many readers, including me, the creeps.  That story, which I definitely recommend, was told from the point-of-view of Jack, a five year old boy.  His life was the simple one room he shared with his mother because they were being held captive by a man who had kidnapped her years before.  It was up for numerous awards and received well by critics.

This is not Room, Part 2.  Not even close.  Donoghue was known more for writing short stories well before Room hit the scene.  Astray is a collection of short stories published in literary magazines from 1998 to the present.

The common theme throughout Astray is emigration and how it can lead people into doing things they normally would not do.  We have a mother going to Canada with her daughter and having a quick affair she would never have considered before.  A Hessian soldier finds himself fighting in the American Revolution and forced to do something that goes against his nature.  A Pilgrim finds the same sins in America that he wished to escape from in England and is forced to speak out against his brethren. 

Perhaps the most interesting thing about this book is how it is partly historical fiction.  The stories come from old newspaper articles Donoghue found and which spoke to her in some way.  Many of them did not go into much detail, so the author decided to tell the tales in her own way.  The one I found intriguing is "Onward" which tells of Charles Dickens helping out a brother and his sister (who was trying to take care of her daughter in a less than savory way) by paying their way to Canada.