Hannah


Ever since I learned to read at the age of three, I have never been without a book. My family constantly teased me whenever we left the house and I would sneak a book along with me, just in case. I devoured books so fast that I barely had time to put one down before there was another in my hand, and as I grew up, I had to constantly beg my father to add shelves to my room in order to fit my growing collection. It came as no surprise when I majored in English, concentrating in Creative Writing, with a hope of someday writing down the myriad stories that have constructed themselves in my head over the years.
            I grew up coming to McLean and Eakin every week (at least once a week and oftentimes more), so it seems only natural that we’ve made it an everyday thing.
 
***I have a younger sister who is very, very picky about books. I'm serious, if a book is less than utterly engrossing and flawless, she will complain. If you strive for Petra's level of exellence in all things, or if you know someone just as hard to shop for, see my books with Petra's Seal of Approval and leave your worries behind!***
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The Last Unicorn By Peter S. Beagle, Patrick Rothfuss (Introduction by) Cover Image
By Peter S. Beagle, Patrick Rothfuss (Introduction by)
$20.00
ISBN: 9780451450524
Availability: On Our Shelves Now
Published: Ace - January 1st, 1991

This is one of those books that I always meant to read. I love the movie, so I figured I should. But it's also one of those books that you don't see around very often, so I kept forgetting about it. Then we got a copy in the store and it had a recommendation from Patrick Rothfuss on the front saying, The Last Unicorn is the best book I have ever read. You need to read it. If you've already read it, you need to read it again." He was right. When I finished it, I wanted to go back and read it again. Possibly forever. This is a fairy tale where the characters are deeply and poignantly aware of their own archetypes, and their place within the story. The Last Unicorn is a beautifully-crafted novel that has the power to draw laughs and tears in equal measure. I cannot express to you how important it is that you read this book, kid or adult, whether you are into fantasy or not. If Beagle's masterpiece has fallen under our cultural radar, we are all the poorer for it.


The Rook: A Novel (The Rook Files #1) By Daniel O'Malley Cover Image
$16.99
ISBN: 9780316098809
Availability: On Our Shelves Now
Published: Back Bay Books - October 16th, 2012

What's
that? You've been wanting to read a supernatural spy thriller?
Excellent! I have just the book for you!
...OK,
so maybe you didn't come in with a supernatural spy thriller in mind,
but seriously, you need to read this book.
Myfanwy
Thomas wakes up in a park, surrounded by dead men in rubber gloves
and with no idea who she is beyond what the two letters left in her
pocket by her former self tell her. You see Myfanwy Thomas (former)
knew that her memories would be taken from her, and she prepared. She
has left her new self a choice: to disappear into a new life that
Thomas designed for her, or to take on Thomas' life and job following
the instructions in a series of letters and one large purple binder.
Little
does Myfanwy know that when she chooses to stay and become Thomas,
she is taking on the job of Rook: the domestic head of the Checquy,
an underground governmental office in charge of protecting Britain
from supernatural enemies (everything from your everyday werewolves
and vamipres to mind-controlling purple fungus) as it hides their
existence from ordinary citizens. But something is rotten in the
kingdom of Britain... and now it's Myfanwy's job to figure out how to
foil a conspiracy nearly as large and powerful as the Checquy itself.
O'Malley's
debut novel is clever, funny, gripping and incredibly well written.
Start it at your peril—you may find yourself trying to read all 500
pages in one night!


American Gods By Neil Gaiman Cover Image
$15.99
ISBN: 9780060558123
Availability: Special Order
Published: William Morrow Paperbacks - September 1st, 2003

Considered by many to be the ultimate masterpiece from a master of storytelling, and winner of the Hugo, Nebula, Locus and Bram Stoker Awards, American Gods is a powerful piece of fantasy that will appeal to lovers of the genre and skeptics alike.

Shadow has been released from prison just after the death of his beloved wife. Out of the blue, he is approached by a stranger calling himself Mr. Wednesday, who offers him a job. With nothing to lose, Shadow takes it and finds himself thrown into the center of a conflict for the very soul of America.

You see, the old gods are not dead, they have merely taken on new forms and identities as their former worshippers moved across the Atlantic. They live here, in America and they, the old gods of Egypt, Russia, Scandinavia, Africa, the British Isles and everywhere else that has yielded immigrants to the New World, are fighting for everything they have created against the new gods of technology and business that have arisen on the new soil.

What could, in the hands of a less skilled writer, have become an overdramatic and overwritten fantasy, is, in Gaiman's hands, a dark and gripping tale that cuts to the heart of what it is to be human.

***Petra's Seal of Approval***


Kissing the Witch: Old Tales in New Skins By Emma Donoghue Cover Image
$11.99
ISBN: 9780064407724
Availability: Usually Ships in 1-5 Days
Published: HarperTeen - February 27th, 1999

Emma Donoghue. If you haven't read her, please do so now! This
fantastic collection of interconnected stories was my first exposure
to her and I've been hooked ever since.

Kissing the Witch is a series of retold fairy tales, some
familiar and some obscure, that focus on the relationships between
the women in the stories: how they love each other, fear each other
and teach each other. Each story features a younger woman and an
older one. The first story is that of the youngest of all, and each
consecutive tale tells the story of the woman who came before her and
the older, experienced character becomes the young maiden.

Emma Donoghue's writing is expert, no matter what genre she is
writing in. Kissing the Witch is poetic and evocotive,
conjuring that mysterious, yet familiar world that exists in fairy
tales to perfection and making it her own.


The Wee Free Men: The Beginning: The Wee Free Men and A Hat Full of Sky (Tiffany Aching) By Terry Pratchett Cover Image
$9.99
Email or call for price
ISBN: 9780062012173
Published: Clarion Books - August 24th, 2010

If you have never read a Terry Pratchett novel, for goodness' sake, please run out and find one immediately. This is a great one, which actually comprises the first two books in the Tiffany Aching series, Pratchett's Discworld spinoff for young adults. Discworld is Pratchett's satirical universe, a disc-shaped planet that drifts through space on the back of four enormous elephants, who themselves are riding on the back of a giant turtle called the Great A'tuin. Discworld is an entirely illogical fantasy world that bears a strange resemblance to earth (Roundworld). It runs according to the laws of 'Narrative Causality' (in other words, million-to-one chances crop up nine times out of ten). Through this world, Pratchett has managed to poke fun at just about everything that has ever happened.            In The Wee Free Men, Tiffany Aching is a young farmer's daughter who is far older than her years. She learned early on in her book of folk tales that princess are beautiful and blonde, and that therefore, she will never be one. She sets out instead, to become a witch, figuring that they get to do all of the interesting things anyway. She sets out on a journey with the help of the Wee Free Men, a group of overwhelmingly Scottish pixies, also known as the Nac Mac Feegle, who have been kicked out of Fairyland. Her daring rescue of a local noble's son gets her noticed by the witches, and in the second book (A Hat Full of Sky) she goes into the mountains to become their apprentice.            This book is Pratchett at his best (and his best is very, very good), and I would recommend it to absolutely anyone, ages 8 to108.


Fashion: The Definitive History of Costume and Style By DK Cover Image
By DK
$50.00
Email or call for price
ISBN: 9780756698355
Published: DK - October 1st, 2012

The second I saw this enormous hardcover beauty come into the store, I started hyperventilating. This Smithsonian guide catalogues the history of fashion from ancient times through the present, all in gorgeous full color. I remember when I was a kid, I had a book about fashion history, where all the illustrations were line drawings. This is nothing like that book. Each page is filled with full color reproductions of period paintings and drawings, and, starting with the Renaissance, photographs of actual period garments (there are also a few reproductions, which are labeled). The book goes through fashion chronologically, but groups together similar things so that the reader can see what changed from one section of the period to another. Mixed in with the main body of the book are designer profiles, pages on 'fashion icons' from Eleanor of Aquitaine and Beau Brummell to Twiggy and beyond. The appendix includes useful timelines of silhouettes, fun tidbits like the evolution of women's shoes, hats and bags and an illustrated glossary.This book would make the perfect gift for anyone interested in the whats, wheres, whys, hows and (most importantly) the look of style throughout human history (hint, hint).


The Family Fang: A Novel By Kevin Wilson Cover Image
$16.99
ISBN: 9780061579059
Availability: Usually Ships in 1-5 Days
Published: Ecco - April 17th, 2012

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at is art? And what is family?

These are two of the many questions you will find
yourself contemplating while (and for some time after) reading Kevin Wilson’s
debut novel.

The
Family Fang is the story of two siblings, Annie and Buster
Fang, the children of a pair of obsessively strange performance artists. For
their entire childhoods, Buster and Annie Fang were forced to take part in
ever-stranger art pieces as their parents sought to disrupt the normalcy in the
lives of those around them.

Now the Fang children are all grown up, with
problems of their own. While they have each created names for themselves, Annie
as an actress and Buster as a writer, they are facing a few bumps in the road.
In moments of desperation, they each find themselves back in their parent’s
house, hoping that a little time away from the world will do them good.
However, when their parents mysteriously disappear, Buster and Annie are thrown
right back into the utter chaos of Fang life and forced to decide for
themselves what it really means to live life and make art.

Kevin Wilson tells this tale with a deadpan sense
of humor and incredible sensitivity, and his creativity appears to be utterly
bottomless. If a work of art is (at least in part) something that makes you
think, this book is it.


Once Upon a River: A Novel By Bonnie Jo Campbell Cover Image
$15.95
ISBN: 9780393341775
Availability: Usually Ships in 1-5 Days
Published: W. W. Norton & Company - June 4th, 2012

The protagonist of this beautiful novel has been compared to a modern day Odysseus, and I would call her something of a female Huck Finn. Margo Crane is a sixteen-year-old sharpshooter who, after her father's violent death, takes her grandfather's boat up a river in rural Michigan in an attempt to find her absent mother. Along the way, Margo meets people who are both dangerous and generous, trustworthy and not, and begins to understand what it means to survive in the life she has chosen. Bonnie Jo's book gives the reader a glimpse into a kind of life that most of us can hardly imagine, and she does it all with a grace that leaves you unsure whether you want to speed through to the last page or draw it out as long as humanly possible.


The Postmortal: A Novel By Drew Magary Cover Image
$18.00
ISBN: 9780143119821
Availability: Usually Ships in 1-5 Days
Published: Penguin Books - August 30th, 2011

The year is 2019, a group of geneticists has recently discovered a cure for aging, and John is desperate to get it.

At first, the Cure is banned, but when it finally becomes legal, it brings with it more problems than anyone had imagined.

After the initial partying and honeymoon period of eternal youth fades, things go downhill fast. Soon, growing gangs roam the streets, the Church of Man grows more and more powerful, going to any lengths to win converts, and the government is forced to implement euthanasia programs as food and other resources grow scarce.

Drew Magary captures his dystopian narrative through John's journal entries, emails and news clippings. Magary writes with humor, but at the end you might find yourself as terrified as you are amused: This is one of the most realistic and believable futures I've ever read. Don't miss it!


The Blind Contessa's New Machine: A Novel By Carey Wallace Cover Image
$22.00
ISBN: 9780143119319
Availability: Usually Ships in 1-5 Days
Published: Penguin Books - June 28th, 2011

These scant 200 pages are some of the best I’ve read in a while. Carey Wallace’s debut novel is small, but elegantly written. Her poetic prose is perfectly suited to tell the story of Carolina Fantoni, a nineteenth-century Italian contessa who is slowly going blind. As her world slowly closes in, no one will believe that her vision is fading and the only place where she can still see is in her dreams. The only person who listens is her childhood friend, Turri, an eccentric young man from a neighboring estate. Even after Carolina is married, Turri continues to help her, and builds the first typewriter so that she will still be able to write when she can no longer see. The Blind Contessa’s New Machine is a beautifully written story about hopeless love and imagination, and though I read it in a few days, the story has stuck with me ever since.


Explorer (The Mystery Boxes #1) By Kazu Kibuishi (Editor) Cover Image
By Kazu Kibuishi (Editor)
$19.95
ISBN: 9781419700101
Availability: Backordered
Published: Amulet Books - March 1st, 2012

It can be so tough to get reluctant readers to sit down and read a book.
Trying too hard or pushing kids to read books that are too hard or
don't interest them can have the opposite effect that you might have
intended. Why not try a different angle? Studies have shown that
children learn the same skills from reading a graphic novel that they
can from an ordinary one. Graphic novels are generally quick to read,
and they capture the readers attention and imagination with their
imagery as well as teaching vital comprehension and critical reading
skills. Series like Amulet and Bone have been getting lots of attention:
but here's one you may not have heard about before. This is a
collection of short graphic pieces, each written and illustrated by a
different person, and edited by the creator of Amulet. Each story is
vastly different, but each features a mysterious box, whose purpose or
contents have a great effect on the story. The pieces range from
riotously funny, to adventurous, to eerie. They take take place in the
past, in space, in different worlds, or in ours. The boxes are
everything from wooden crates hidden under floorboards, to mystic
transportation, to enormous cube-shaped space ships. What ties these
stories together, beyond the boxes that is, is that each is perfectly
told and beautifully illustrated in each artist's own unique style. A
must read for any kid, reluctant reader or not!