5.10.2012

book purchases today

Chad Harbach's The Art of Fielding
 "[The Art of Fielding] is not only a wonderful baseball novel--it zooms immediately into the pantheon of classics, alongside The Natural by Bernard Malamud and The Southpaw by Mark Harris--but it's also a magical, melancholy story about friendship and the coming of age that marks the debut of an immensely talented writer...Mr. Harbach has the rare abilities to write with earnest, deeply felt emotion without ever veering into sentimentality, and to create quirky, vulnerable and fully imagined characters who instantly take up residence in our hearts and minds. He also manages to re-work the well-worn, much-allegorized subject of baseball and make us see it afresh, taking tired tropes about the game (as a metaphor for life's dreams, disappointments and hopes of redemption) and interjecting them with new energy. In doing so he has written a novel that is every bit as entertaining as it is affecting....You don't need to be a baseball fan to fall under this novel's spell, but THE ART OF FIELDING possesses all the pleasures that an aficionado cherishes in a great, classic game: odd and strangely satisfying symmetries, unforeseen swerves of fortune, and intimations of the delicate balance between individual will and destiny that play out on the field." (Michiko Kakutani, The New York Times )
Ann Patchett's State of Wonder
"A superbly rendered novel...Patchett's portrayal is as wonderful as it is frightening and foreign. Patchett exhibits an extraordinary ability to bring the horrors and the wonders of the Amazon jungle to life, and her singular characters are wonderfully drawn...Powerful and captivating."
Library Journal (starred review)

What's on your to-read list?

4 comments:

Anonymous said...

I enjoyed State of Wonder and I'm biding my time waiting for T to finish Art of Fielding. Right now I'm reading Wolf Hall and loving it. I just finished The Newlyweds, which felt a bit too long to me. One plot twist too many. But the writing was quite good. I think it'll be a big hit in paperback.

Andie East said...

We have both of these! I could have lent them to you. Not that it's not good to buy them. I loved State of Wonder. I am in the middle of reading White Like Me by Tim Wise which I have found very eye-opening.

Aralena said...

Patchett is also on my about-to-read pile, but Hollinghurst's The Stranger's Child is coming with me on vacation.

Hannah said...

Melissa, you have to let me know how you like Wolf Hall. Like I mentioned on your blog, I've been wanting to read it for ages, but just can't pick up something so hefty at the moment. I need light reading or at least a book I can get into and out of in less than two months. Gah! I'm reading so slow these days.

Andie, good to hear you liked State of Wonder! I'll check in with the Atwood library before making a purchase next time. :)

Lank, let me know how you like The Stranger's Child. It's still on my to-read pile...