Archives - Weekly Update

Today is the 9th anniversary of Bookreporter.com, which I get nostalgic about in a blog that can found here. We're celebrating by bringing you some terrific new features and reviews this week --- and then taking a break. Our tradition is to not publish the last week of the summer and to take some much-needed time off to read --- and relax. I am headed to the Outer Banks. Other staffers are planning vacations or time to clean off their desks a bit.

There are some authors that I have a tradition of when and where I read them. One is Tess Gerritsen. She traditionally publishes in late August and I can remember the pool or beach where I read each of her books as vividly as her plots. Last Saturday I read VANISH, which will be in stores next week. Once again it was one of my favorite days of summer as I fell into the thrilling world that she created and met her well-crafted characters. The plot has to do with the human trafficking of Russian women to become prostitutes and the big business that wants to keep their stories quiet. It's great reading and strong social commentary on a real crisis among women with no voices that is often left untold. Also what's fun about Tess is that you can catch up with her recurring characters as well, since they find a home in each of her books.

This week we bring you three author interviews that I am excited about as each author had something to share that resonated with me personally beyond their words about their books. Stephen J. Cannell writes about his thoughts on succeeding in life. I found myself sharing them with a friend this week since his views so match my own. Jacqueline Winspear talks about what she loved about learning history. It has to do with the stories behind the history. I love reading about history the same way. I thought about this when I watched the tributes to Peter Jennings this week --- he loved presenting the news like this, as good journalists do. Laura Pedersen, our Beach Bag author this week, has some great lines about the joy of love at any age and when she talks about thinking back on her life as "rerunning the movie." I love that line especially since I envision my life with a soundtrack beneath it so often it seems like a movie to me.

Last Friday night I went to Borders and adapted my favorite role --- book concierge. I was standing next to a woman who was looking at a wall of books and I could not help myself. I said, "THE SUMMER GUEST was one of my favorite books." That started up a half hour of conversation about books. The amusing part was about 5 minutes into talking I realized that I knew her. She used to be one of the obstetricians in the practice that I go to. In fact, she was my labor doctor when my older son was born. So here I am handing out bookish advice to the woman who once gave me an epidural. This time we were in new roles: concierge/reader and oh, she was now recommending books to my fifteen-year-old son, who we were anticipating the arrival of last time we saw each other. Yes, sometimes my life is a sitcom.