1. State by State: A Panoramic Portrait of America by Matt Weiland and Sean Wilsey: I love stories that create a sense of place, so this anthology of 50 essays by 50 authors, each about his or her own state, was a jackpot. Every three or four pages, you get a completely different tone and [...]

Best of Annie Proulx, Bernard Schlink, Best Books of 2009, Donna Tarrt, Junot Diaz, Louise Erdich, Lynne Truss, Matt Weiland, Michael Chabon, Richard Holmes, Sarah Thornton, Sean Wilsey

This year I read twenty books that earned my coveted 5-star rating. Here, in no particular order, are the ten I feel were the best of those twenty.
1. In the Land of Invented Languages: Esperanto Rock Stars, Klingon Poets, Loglan Lovers, and The Mad Dreamers Who Tried to Build A Perfect Language: Arika Okrent [review]
2. Neither [...]

Best of Andrew Davidson, Arika Okrent, Best Books of 2009, Jiddu Krishnamurti, Joseph Campbell, Kent Nerburn, Matthew Fox, Sarah Vowell, Steve Hagen, Waziyatawin

In no specific order:
In the Miso Soup by Ryu Murakami: Kenji is a young guide who takes tourists through Tokyo’s seedy underground. It’s an illegal job that brings him into contact with the seemingly plastic-faced and socially awkward Frank, whom Kenji suspects is a murderer. This book is absolutely chilling. In my favorite scene, blood [...]

Best of Andrew Davidson, Arthur Phillips, Best Books of 2009, Charlotte Roche, E.L. Doctorow, Jonathan Safran Foer, Josh Bazell, justin evans, lucinda rosenfeld, Ryu Murakami

I feel bad making this list on December 27th when I’m in the midst of two books that are really quite good (A Friend of the Family by Lauren Grodstein and What the World Will Look Like When All the Water Leaves Us by Laura van den Berg) what if they turn out to be [...]

Best of Arthur Phillips, Best Books of 2009, Brian Wood, Dan Chaon, David Small, Junot Diaz, Lionel Shriver, Maile Meloy, Nicole Helget, Norah Labiner, Ryan Kelly, Stacey Richter

Hello Minnesota Readers,
We’re going to be taking the rest of the week off to enjoy the Christmas festivities. We hope your holiday is filled with love, joy, bourbon, and gift certificates to your favorite bookstore. If you come back on Monday, we’ll have some helpful suggestions on what to buy with your ill-gotten booty when [...]

Book News MN Reads, Moxy Fruvous

When we last saw that saucy Julie Powell, she was a sweaty rosacea mess of marrow-crusted fingernails and damn-near oozing butter from her pores at the finish line of a year-long Julia Child marathon fraught with self flagellation, hard liquor, and “Buffy the Vampire Slayer” quotations.
Cleaving: A Story of Marriage, Meat, and Obsession, is what [...]

Non-Fiction julie powell, Memoir

Bill Scheft doesn’t need me to tell you how funny his book is. Larry David has a blurb on the front cover. Larry fucking David (Curb Your Enthusiasm, Seinfeld). Also, Lewis Black (The Daily Show) weighs in with a blurb on the back. Which makes me wonder if 50-year old white comedians from New York [...]

Novel Bill Scheft

It’s not a good idea to write a review of a book when your eyes are still wet with the tears it caused you to shed. So I waited an entire day to see if the raw emotion evoked by David Small’s graphic memoir Stitches would abate a little before I told you about this [...]

Graphic Novel David Small, loved it, Memoir

Whenever I open a book by Carol Shields, I prepare myself to walk into a folksy Midwest version of The Ya-Ya Sisterhood, starring sassy old biddies who turn scrapbooking a full-contact sport.
I’m not sure where I got the idea that she writes Hot Flash Fiction, but I’m always wrong, and I’ve never been more pleasantly [...]

Novel carol shields

We just wanted to let you know that Rain Taxi’s annual fundraising auction ends tomorrow (Sunday, December 20th). There’s still time to place your bid on some of the awesome stuff up for grabs.

Book News Rain Taxi, rare book auction