The Awkward Turtle Breeding Ground

 Friend of Dorothy Wilde: Discount Armageddon by Seanan McGuire

It wasn’t the October Daye novels that got me into McGuire’s ouevre.

Nor was it the Newsflesh books, written by her evil twin Mira Grant.

Nope. It was her list of 100 Surreal Things that Happened in My Life, which popped up on Livejournal all the way back in 2003.

The same sense of whimsy and the absurd (with a healthy appreciation for dangerous physical feats and bizarre creatures) permeates the InCryptid series.

Verity Price, your workaday ballroom dancing, freerunning daughter of the Price clan (a family that went rogue when the Convenant of St. George got awfully transparent about cleansing the world of cryptids—supernatural creatures) is concerned about her disappearing coworkers and agitated neighbors. When a Covenant boy comes knocking around, ready to stab anything that looks at him funny, Verity’s got her hands full keeping him out of her beloved city’s cryptid population, finding out what’s got them all agog—-and what’s this about a dragon sleeping under the island of Manhattan?

It all started when a certain hardcover was just breaking my heart, because I couldn’t reconcile the price with my budget. Okay, I thought, just this one…

Well, readers, next thing I knew, a dozen fresh, shiny novels were staring back at me.

I don’t have an ereader, yet. (I’m thinking of just getting an Ipod Touch, cause I’d rather have my media all in one place.) I’m still feeling a little iffy about them. But I think that it’s really awesome and amazing that authors who work in certain niches can market directly to their readers—niches which I am VERY interested in, myself.

I’ve already reviewed one beauty (One Solstice Night by Elora Bishop). Here’s what else I’m reading (Yes. All at the same time. That’s what multiple tabs are for):

 Friend of Dorothy Wilde: What’s On My (Kindle) Cloud

 Friend of Dorothy Wilde: It Came from the Midlist: 5 Books Just as Dark and Creepy as The Hunger Games

New post! Dystopias, teen serial killers, zombies, the usual

asseenelsewhere:

theartofanimation:

James Gurney

Eff Yeah Flying Books and Dinosaurs!

 This is exactly how books work.

 Friend of Dorothy Wilde: Out of Time by Paula Martinac

Lesbians! Mysteries! Matinee idols and scrapbooks and New York City!

Encyclopedia of the Exquisite is a lifestyle guide for the Francophile and the Anglomaniac, the gourmet and the style maven, the armchair traveler and the art lover. It’s an homage to the esoteric world of glamour that doesn’t require much spending but makes us feel rich.

Taking a cue from the exotic encyclopedias of the sixteenth century, which brimmed with mysterious artifacts, Jessica Kerwin Jenkins’s Encyclopedia of the Exquisite focuses on the elegant, the rare, the commonplace, and the delightful. A com­pendium of style, it merges whimsy and practicality, traipsing through the fine arts and the worlds of fashion, food, travel, home, garden, and beauty.

Each entry features several engaging anecdotes, illuminating the curious past of each enduring source of beauty. Subjects covered include the explosive history of champagne; the art of lounging on a divan; the emergence of “frillies,” the first lacy, racy lingerie; the ancient uses of sweet-smelling saffron; the wild riot incited by the appearance of London’s first top hat; Julia Child’s tip for cooking the perfect omelet; the polarizing practice of wearing red lipstick during World War II; Louis XIV’s fondness for the luscious Bartlett pear; the Indian origin of badminton; Parliament’s 1650 attempt to suppress Europe’s beauty mark fad; the evolution of the Japanese kimono; the pil­grimage of Central Park’s Egyptian obelisk; and the fanciful thrill of dining alfresco.

Cleverly illustrated, Encyclopedia of the Exquisite is an ode to life’s plenty, from the extravagant to the eccentric. It is a cele­bration of luxury that doesn’t necessarily require money

| Encyclopedia of the Exquisite: An Anecdotal History of Elegant Delights by Jessica Kerwin Jenkins 

This one’s for you, whineandbeer!

Friend of Dorothy Wilde: My New Favorite Internet Toy: Pinterest!

I natter about my new favorite internet toy, which I’m using as an internet bookshelf full of shiny things.

My friend Carey recently linked me to In Which a Girl Reads’s posts on her desire for books about teens and twentysomethings, something to bridge the unrelenting optimism of YA and the endless drudgery of litfic. (My biases, are they showing? No? Good.) I started rattling off a list of titles in my head, and realized that they’re all queer coming-of-age stories.

There’s a thesis in that, but I’ll let you write it for yourself. Instead, let me tell you about a really excellent queer coming-of-age I just devoured twice in the past week.

Friend of Dorothy Wilde: Bottle Rocket Hearts by Zoe Whittall

 Friend of Dorothy Wilde: Some new finds! A scrapbook, orphans, and geek girls!

In which I ramble on about my new relationship with Housing Works and some cool ARCs that have found their way to me.

Friend of Dorothy Wilde: Love Spell by Karen Williams

Here’s another! It’s for a nice little lesbian romance between a veterinarian and a witch, just right for reading in autumn.

 Friend of Dorothy Wilde: How To Be An Explorer of the World: Portable Life Museum by Keri Smith

I did some reviews! Here’s one! Still working towards a sustainable model for blogging and I think I’ve hit on it. In the meanwhile, here is an awesome book.