Complicated mommy issues = beefy book club fodder in THE MIDWIFE

My review of Jolina Petersheim's THE MIDWIFE is almost as conflicted as the main character, a gestational surrogate who absconds with the unborn child she's carrying for a wealthy couple.

(Plus a few words about the importance of grammar.)

American Blonde = triumphant return of a terrific character

One of my favorite books so far this year! Girl pilot/spy Velva Jean returns to America and is swept up in LaLa Land politics and intrigue.

If you loved Jennifer Niven's first three Velva Jean Hart books, you won't be disappointed by this witty, well written story set in post-WWII Hollywood. If you haven't read the first three books (I haven't, but I probably will now), you'll have no trouble falling in love with this character and following her continuing adventures.

I thoroughly enjoyed it! 

Join us on Joni's List for intelligent, snark-free reading recommendations!

In its brief existence, the GWTST has enjoyed over 55,500 visitors. (Thank you!) The most popular posts are listed below. From now I'll be blogging at Joni's List. Join us!

 

THE PROMISE = a compelling duet in a rich historical setting

THE PROMISE is set in Galveston circa 1900 and told as an intimate duet, both voices speaking in first person.

Nan, an earthy Texan housekeeper struggles to keep her promise to care for a little boy and his widowed father, Oscar. Catherine, an exile from polite Midwestern society, escapes disgrace by marrying Oscar and struggles to adjust to a drastically different life on the Gulf Coast. A maelstrom of emotion (and other stormy things) ensues.

A beautifully written novel I'm highly recommending for book clubs.

Adventure + Enlightenment = Great Buddha Gym for All Mens and Womens

A terrific travel memoirella. Sallie Tisdale makes her way through the tourist traps and complicated travelocity of India to explore the places where The Buddha lived, taught, and died. Smart, funny, and -- gotta say it -- enlightening.

Too short for book club selection, but perfect for a flight from Chicago to NY, if you can't go to India today.

The Chronicle of Secret Riven = another lyrical journey for Hunger Games fans

Sequels suck. Almost always. This one, happily, does not.

Last year, I was swept away by the lush, imaginative MAPMAKER'S WAR, so I was anxiously awaiting Book 2. It delivers, neatly avoiding that sucking sequel dynamic. Anxiously awaiting Book 3!

Highly recommended for anyone who loved the Hunger Games books.

TEMPLE GROVE: Scott Elliotts compelling prose vividly captures the essence of its wilderness setting

If you loved The Wilding: A Novelby Benjamin Percy, you might be into Temple Grove: A Novelby Scott Elliott, the story of an intense wilderness struggle between a logger with a troubled past and an environmentalist being pursued by the FBI as an ecoterrorist.

Densely written literary fiction that takes patience but is well worth reading. The descriptions are in depth, but the characters and story keep it moving, I promise.

I went from "Do I really want to read this book?" to "I cannot leave this book."

APATHY AND OTHER SMALL VICTORIES by Paul Neilan is only good if you enjoy things like laughter

The only thing Shane cares about is leaving. Usually on a Greyhound bus, right before his life falls apart again. Just like he planned. But this time it's complicated: there's a sadistic corporate climber who thinks she's his girlfriend, a rent-subsidized affair with his landlord's wife, and the bizarrely appealing deaf assistant to Shane's cosmically unstable dentist. When one of the women is murdered, and Shane is the only suspect who doesn't care enough to act like he didn't do it, the question becomes just how he'll clear the good name he never had and doesn't particularly want: his own.

#2MinRevu Transcendent SEAL WOMAN by Solveig Eggerz creates rich emotional history

Highly recommending Seal Woman, a beautifully written novel of love, loss and self-discovery in the shadow of the Holocaust.

Jerusha was proofreading the manuscript for the publisher and said, "Mom, you have to read this book so we can discuss it!" An invitation I could not resist.

Book clubs: There is much to love and discuss in this powerful story (including a surprising storytelling choice toward the end over which Jerusha and I strongly disagreed.)

Salley Vickers' lovely CLEANER OF CHARTRES = Enigmatic protagonist + charming French setting

Highly recommending Salley Vickers' lovely novel about a woman who cleans the cathedral and becomes a sort of touchstone for the people of Chartres who can't help but spill their stories. Excellent writing, perfectly detailed setting, resonant characters.

Plus...dolls are scary.

Guest Blog: Linda Gillard chimes in on #HowIWrite

Two years ago, I sat on a panel at the London Book Fair with the fabulous Linda Gillard. I was utterly charmed by her grace, wit, and artistic integrity, promptly bought three of her books, and have been a devoted fan ever since. Linda appears as a guest on writing blogs far and wide. Delighted to tag her here for the #HowIWrite Q&A that's currently trending:

What are you writing?
I’m planning my eighth novel. It will be about reconciliation and healing. I think the main character (and possibly the narrator) will be an old, neglected garden that surrounds a once-grand Victorian country house, now a nursing home. The garden has witnessed the rise and fall of family fortunes for more than a century and has now fallen into decay, but it has stories to tell about the original inhabitants of the estate.

In the present day, my forty-something heroine comes home to look after her elderly artist mother who can no longer paint or live independently. Mother and daughter get to know each other again as they restore a remnant of the old garden. In the process, they discover the poignant story of the man who had to abandon the garden – and the woman he loved – to go off to war in 1914.

How does your work differ from others of its genre?
It’s different because it doesn’t belong to any genre, or rather no single genre. I’ve written a three-generation family saga, a country house mystery, two ghost stories and three love stories where the hero or heroine is disabled or mentally ill – not exactly “romances”. Three of those novels are literary fiction, but I’d describe the others as commercial women’s fiction (though some of my best reviews have come from men!)

I’m a marketing department’s nightmare. But for me it’s not about genre, it’s about the story and the characters.

Why do you write what you do? 
To find out what I think. I don’t know what I think until I see what I say and I’ve never written a novel knowing how it will end. (If I knew, I doubt I’d write it.) I’m looking for answers to all the questions that rattle around in my head. It’s really a form of control freakery. Telling stories is my way of imposing order on the mental and emotional chaos within.

But I can’t shoehorn my books into a particular genre. I don’t see life like that and I want my fiction to have some bearing on real life. The stories are fiction, but I hope when you read them, you think, “Oh, yes. That’s so true...” And that’s what I try to do. Tell true lies.

How does your writing process work?
The genesis of a novel is a combination of visual things and questions – “what-ifs?” The ideas usually come with people attached to them and snatches of dialogue.

Often I don’t know the significance of these visions. I don’t understand what I’ve written, or rather why I've written it. I think you need to be able to trust what you've written, trust the process, trust yourself as a writer. That requires a leap of faith.

When I’m plotting, I just keep asking “What if…?”, making situations and relationships as complicated as possible. My plot, such as it is, arises out of those. But really, not a lot happens in my books. There’s no action in EMOTIONAL GEOLOGY, but readers tell me they’re up all night finishing it. It must be because so much has happened in the past. The novel is an excavation – sometimes an exhumation!

I always find what goes on inside the mind of a character much more interesting than what goes on outside it, so I don’t actually need a plot to start writing, just a situation and some characters.

........................................................

Linda Gillard lives in the Scottish Highlands and has been an actress, journalist and teacher. She’s the author of seven novels, including Star Gazing, which was short-listed in 2009 for Romantic Novel of the Year and the Robin Jenkins Literary Award (for writing that promotes the Scottish landscape), and House of Silence, a Kindle bestseller selected by Amazon as one of their Top Ten Best of 2011 in the Indie Author category. Linda’s latest is Cauldstane, a contemporary ghost story set in a decaying Highland castle. Find Linda on Facebook and check out some of her wise writing advice.

My personal nomination for your next summer read: Emotional Geology, an offbeat, award-winning love story that showcases this author’s mad skills with character, dialogue, and throat-burning emotion.

THE INCREMENTALISTS asks deeper questions than your last yoga class

The Incrementalists—a secret society of two hundred people with an unbroken lineage reaching back forty thousand years. They cheat death, share lives and memories, and communicate with one another across nations, races, and time. They have an epic history, an almost magical memory, and a very modest mission: to make the world better, just a little bit at a time. Their ongoing argument about how to do this is older than most of their individual memories. 

Phil, whose personality has stayed stable through more incarnations than anyone else’s, has loved Celeste—and argued with her—for most of the last four hundred years. But now Celeste, recently dead, embittered, and very unstable, has changed the rules—not incrementally, and not for the better. Now the heart of the group must gather in Las Vegas to save the Incrementalists, and maybe the world.

#HowIWrite Blog Hop: Free-falling, being 50, and four fab authors you need to read this summer

Tagged by my author buddy Jen Singer for the #HowIWrite blog hop. I’m supposed to answer four questions and tag four author friends to do the same, which struck me as a fun summer chain letter sort of thing to do. Plus I do love any opportunity to tout the big talent of Roz Morris, Barbara Taylor Sissel, John A.A. Logan, and Linda Gillard. (Sharing a stellar summer reading recommendation from each.)

First, the questions:
What am I writing? 
Well, at the moment, this blog post—one of several short pieces I owe right now. This past winter was pretty intense personally and professionally, and I fell wretchedly behind. (Amazing how clear one’s priorities become when one is in the crucible.) But in general, I’m not a great multitasker. Things tend to pile up while I’m writing a book. I go down the rabbit hole and forget about the real world until I’ve either exhausted myself or finished the thing. Right now, with the third (hopefully final) draft of my next novel fermenting in the wine cellar, I’m catching up on commitments, domestics, and sleep so I’ll be ready to check out again and obsess through revisions.

How does my work differ from others of its genre?
I’ve never been able to settle into one genre, but as Shakespeare said, “There’s nothing new under the sun.” The uniqueness in any author’s work is the unique life experience, emotional intelligence, and personalized vocabulary s/he brings to the page. Your soul knows a story no other soul has ever known. For better or worse, my work is different because it’s mine.

Why do I write what I do? 
Because I bloody well feel like it. Look, I spent my teens pleasing my parents, my 20s accommodating various employers, my 30s facilitating my children, my 40s being a team player for publishers and agents. Later this year, I’m releasing an essay collection with the working title “50 is the New F#ck You.” I’m in the Power Decade now. If a woman’s not doing what she wants to do at this point in her life, what exactly would she be waiting for? Trade publishing has done a lot for me. I’m grateful for the craft skills I gained under the thumb of so many wise editors over the years, but I intend to spend the rest of my life drunk on creative autonomy, writing what I want to write, publishing under my own imprint, and helming my own financial destiny. Hopefully, there will always be a bit of money in my particular brand of quirky fiction and memoirellas. If not, I’ll dine on cat food and greet the evening with no regrets.

How does my writing process work? 
Surprisingly well. At the beginning of a book, I always feel overwhelmed. No way I can see myself climbing this mountain. I know from experience that doggedly clinging to an outline doesn’t work for me; I’m a research hound, and that always takes me in wonderfully unexpected directions, so every book is a free fall during the writing phase. Then comes the editing; you get jerked up short by your parachute. Everything slows down. You take a breath, look around, get your bearings. When I finish a first draft, I’m in love with the characters, and that gives me the energy I need to push through two or three rounds of revisions. So I guess my process involves being sufficiently inspired to leap and confident enough to trust my craft skills on the way down. I have the tremendous advantage of an excellent freelance editor on my speed dial: my daughter, Jerusha Rodgers of Rabid Badger Editing. The kid has an eagle eye and has never flinched at critiquing my prose or my wardrobe.

Enough about me. Time to tag my author pals, each of whom has written more than one book I can highly recommend for your summer reading joy, but I forced myself to narrow it down:

Roz Morris's fiction has sold more than 4 million copies worldwide, although you won't have seen her name on the covers as she ghostwrote for high-profile authors. She is now writing fiction under her own name, starting with her critically acclaimed novel My Memories of a Future Life. She is a writer, journalist, fiction editor and the author of the Nail Your Novel series for writers. Roz’s writing blog: Nail Your Novel. Find Roz on Facebook and Twitter as @Roz_Morris.
Best summer read: Lifeform Three, a richly imagined fable in the tradition of Bradbury and Atwood, one of my all-time favorite books.

Barbara Taylor Sissel once lived on the grounds of a prison facility in Kentucky, which might explain the nature of her writing, especially her latest: Safe Keeping and Evidence of Life. Driven by the compelling reality that at the heart of every crime, there’s a family, her novels are issue-oriented, threaded with elements of suspense and defined by their particular emphasis on how crime affects families of both victim and perpetrator. She now lives and writes from her bucolic Story House near Austin, Texas. Find Barbara on Facebook and Twitter and Goodreads.
Best summer read: A Sophie of a choice, but I'll go with The Ninth Step, a lovely garden of complex characters entangled by a painful past, perfect for fans of Picoult and Shreve.

John A. A. Logan is the author of The Survival of Thomas Ford, Storm Damage, and Agency Woman. His fiction has been published by Picador, Vintage, Edinburgh Review, Chapman, Northwords, Nomad, Secrets Of A View, and Scratchings; with reviews of his work in Scottish Studies Review, Scotland On Sunday, The Spectator, and The Hindustan Times. His work has been published internationally in anthologies edited by A L Kennedy, John Fowles, Ali Smith, Toby Litt; and he has been invited to read his work at the Edinburgh International Book Festival. He blogs monthly for Authors Electric. Find John on Facebook and Twitter.
Best summer read: The Survival of Thomas Ford, an intense psychological thriller about batshit crazy scariness in the wake of a car wreck, perfect for fans of Stephen King and Dean Koonz.

Linda Gillard lives in the Scottish Highlands and has been an actress, journalist and teacher. She’s the author of seven novels, including Star Gazing, which was short-listed in 2009 for Romantic Novel of the Year and the Robin Jenkins Literary Award (for writing that promotes the Scottish landscape), and House of Silence, a Kindle bestseller selected by Amazon as one of their Top Ten Best of 2011 in the Indie Author category. Linda’s latest is Cauldstane, a contemporary ghost story set in a decaying Highland castle. Find Linda on Facebook and check out some of her wise writing advice.
Best summer read: Emotional Geology, an offbeat, award-winning love story that showcases this author’s mad skills with character, dialogue, and throat-burning emotion.