When indecision hits!

I know I've talked before about some of my reading hangups, the ones that especially show my eccentric TBR tendencies.

Each weekend begins with a sense of promise -- a stack of books I'm determined to make my way through, taking advantage of the two and half days of seemingly no responsibility. (But really, who ever has a weekend with nothing to do? It takes maximum effort to take a weekend off since it's time you can be using to finish up things that couldn't be done during the work week.) And then by the time Sunday night rolls around, I'm struck with the overwhelming disappointment that I, in fact, got nothing at all accomplished.

Truly.

I would tell you how I spent my weekend (embarrassingly, countless hours playing Naughty Bear), but one of the massive ways that I waste time on these particular weekends is by trying to decide what book to read next. I know! I get so stuck on making a decision, that I can't make a decision! By the time I settle on a read, I've wasted precious weekend time off that I can't get back. Argh! It's the same indecision that causes me to pack more books than I can carry on any trip I take, swapping books in my carry on as I'm walking out the door for the airport.

I guess it's just one of the many curses of being a book junkie. So many books, so little time : )

New Releases 10/12/10

Some of the new titles hitting shelves this week are:

Beautiful Darkness by Kami Garcia & Margaret Stohl

Banished by Sophie Littlefield

The Sleepwalkers by Paul Grossman

The Half-Made World by Felix Gilman

American Assassin by Vince Flynn

The Scorch Trials by James Dashner -- sequel to The Maze Runner

Great House by Nicole Krauss

The Prostitutes' Ball by Stephen Cannell -- Shane Scully #10

Dark Prophecy by Anthony Zuiker and Duane Swierczynski -- A Level 26 thriller

The Charming Quirks of Others by Alexander McCall Smith -- Isabel Dalhousie series

Booky Wook 2: This Time It's Personal by Russell Brand

Our Kind of Traiter by John Le Carre

Fatal Terror by F. Paul Wilson -- Repairman Jack

Revolution by Jennifer Donnelly

The Tenth Song by Naomi Ragen

Ghost in Trouble by Carolyn Hart

Forbidden Places by Penny Vincenzi

Christmas at the Forbidden Bookshop ed Otto Penzler

The Secrets Sisters Keep by Abby Drake

The Perfect Love Song by Patti Callahan Henry

New on DVD:

Jonah Hex

How to Train Your Dragon

Coffin Rock

Four Boxes

New reviews at Bookbitch.com:

The Scorch Trials

Clementine by Cherie Priest

The Debutante by Kathleen Tessaro

Petty Magic by Camille DeAngelis

Alpha by Rachel Vincent

Pre Pub Book Buzz -- The Half-Made World by Felix Gilman

Oh, I love steampunk. Even better, I've got a steampunk dystopian westerns on my bedside table for review this week. Sweet!

I love the idea of weird westerns, a sub genre that I think hasn't been played up enough lately, but surely goes hand in hand with the new steampunk trend. King's Dark Tower series can sort of be considered weird western. The failed Jonah Hex was definitely one. Technically, Firefly was also weird western.

So what is weird western you ask? Well, Wikipedia describes it as western plus any other genre. Yep. That's it. It goes on to say usually fantasy or horror, which is great in my book. So Felix Gilman's The Half-Made World, due out October 12, definitely fits the bill according to the tag line that came in my promo a few weeks ago: steampunk western dystopian for fall.

Here's a little bit more about the book:

The world is only half-made. What exists has been carved out amidst a war between two rival factions: the Line, paving the world with industry and claiming its residents as slaves; and the Gun, a cult of terror and violence that cripples the population with fear. The only hope at stopping them has seemingly disappeared--the Red Republic once battled the Gun and the Line, and almost won. Now they're just a myth, a bedtime story parents tell their children, of hope.

To the west lies a vast, unchartered world, inhabited only by the legends of the Hill People, immortal and powerful, who live at one with the earth and its elements. Liv Alverhyusen, a doctor of the new science of psychology, travels to edge of the made world to a spiritually protected mental institution to study the minds of those broken by the Gun and the Line. In its rooms lies an old general of the Red Republic, the one man whose shattered mind just may hold the secret to stopping the Gun and the Line. And either side will do anything to understand how.

My copy literally just arrived so I've not had a chance to dive in yet, but I'm really chomping at the bit to get to it.

Book Blogger Hop October 8-11

In the spirit of the Friday Follow, the Book Blogger Hop is a place just for book bloggers and readers to connect and find new blogs that we may be missing out on! This weekly BOOK PARTY is an awesome opportunity for book bloggers to connect with other book lovers, make new friends, support each other, and generally just share our love of books! It will also give blog readers a chance to find other book blogs that they may not know existed! So, grab the logo, post about the Hop on your blog, and start HOPPING through the list of blogs that are posted in the Linky at Crazy-For-Books!!

The Hop lasts Friday-Monday every week, so if you don't have time to Hop today, come back later and join the fun! This is a weekly event!

Your blog should have content related to books, including, but not limited to book reviews.

This week's question comes from Suko who blogs at Suko's Notebook.

What's your favorite beverage while reading or blogging, if any? Is it tea, coffee, water, a glass of wine, or something else?

My answer: Tea of course! Iced tea, hot tea, milky tea, it doesn't matter. Tea it is!

And the story behind the story is just as fascinating...

I may have asked before, but do you read the Author's Notes? The acknowledgments, dedications, introductions, forewords, afterwords? You should. You learn some fascinating things. Further readings, inspirations, or just seeing who is important to the person who created the work you've just enjoyed. It's a peek inside their lives. Just a peek, and it may not hold any meaning for anyone except those closest to them, but I love it either way.

And when you find out where a story came from, I think it's completely rewarding.

On a recent business trip (so odd to say that), I had the pleasure of reading Kathleen Tessaro's latest, The Debutante.

The Debutante is the story of a young woman trying to leave behind a relationship and move on with her live. She travels to London where her aunt gives her a job helping to catalog the contents of an old estate called Endsleigh House, the owner of which has just passed away, leaving no heirs. Cate is fascinated by the house and the story of the owner, particularly the part that involves Baby Blythe, a debutante (and sister of the recently deceased) who disappeared decades ago. In her search of the house, Cate comes across a shoebox containing a collection of items: a pair of shoes, a framed portrait of a soldier, and an expensive Tiffany bracelet. Cate suspects the items, cleverly hidden behind a collection of children's books, must have belonged to the long missing Baby Blythe, and she becomes obsessed with learning the story.

In reading Tessaro's note after the book, I was fascinated by the inspiration for the story. Two events in UK history that prompted the beginnings of The Debutante. What's more, there's even a story behind the shoebox itself. I won't tell you what it is, but the shoebox served as a catalyst in shaping The Debutante and the events that inspired the story really do prove that truth is stranger than fiction!

Brief But Interesting Pub News

So just some things I've come across on the web today:

Katherine Heigl to star in the movie adaptation of Gabaldon's Outlander? Could be. She's up next in One for the Money as the beloved Stephanie Plum. I think if she can pull it off and please the multitude of Janet E fans, she might be capable of anything. Here's the article with the teensy Outlander nod.

Tim Burton to direct Abe Lincoln. What?! I certainly hope so. Rumor has it that Burton is set to produce the film version of Seth Grahame-Smith's Abraham Lincoln: Vampire Hunter.

I checked out the American remake of Let the Right One In this weekend. More on that in another post, but I hadn't realized that it was a Hammer film. Hammer, a horror production co that's been defunct for a while now has been revived. Let Me In is just the first of the new films slated to hit screens in the coming months AND (and this is a big and for horror fans) they've teamed up with Random House to release a line of horror novels as well! Sweet! Here's more. Seems to be the UK division of RH, but we can hope the books make it across the pond, no?

(movie news hiding in here) I don't know about you, but I'm particularly fond of John Carpenter's The Thing. Something about creepy creatures in the snow... Anywho, there's a prequel set for release next year. We'll have to see how it turns out, but I'll be in line to see it for sure (if it gets theater distribution, that is).

New Releases 10/05/10

Some of the new titles hitting shelves this week are:

And Then There Was One by Patricia Gussin

Kill the Dead by Richard Kadrey

The Debutante by Kathleen Tessaro

Crooked Letter, Crooked Letter by Tom Franklin

Desperate Souls by Gregory Lamberson

Innocent Monster by Reed Farrel Coleman

By Hook or By Crook by Ed Gorman & Martin Greenberg

Lord of Emperors by Guy Gavriel Kay (reissue)

Velocity by Alan Jacobson

Voltaire's Calligrapher by Pablo de Santis

Petty Magic by Camille deAngelis

The Dead Path by Stephen M. Irwin

New on DVD:

Nightmare on Elm Street

Splice

Four Boxes