Essays, Short Stories, and a Fantasy: Sunday Salon

 In my mailbox

I requested this book because of its use of Japanese mythology in its storytelling.

The Lost Souls of Benzaiten

by Kelly Murashige Pub Date Jul 23 2024

Soho Press, Soho Teen, Sci Fi and Fantasy, Teens and YA, OwnVoices

Description

This heartfelt and quirky young adult fantasy debut follows a young outcast on a journey of transformation . . . into a robot vacuum cleaner.

A fresh twist on Japanese mythology that doubles as a deep, honest dive into mental health.

“I wish to become one of those round vacuum cleaner robots.” That’s what Machi prays for at the altar of Japanese goddess Benzaiten. Ever since her two best friends decided they want nothing to do with her, Machi hasn’t been able to speak. After months of online school and a carousel of therapists, she can no longer see the point of being human. She doesn’t expect Benzaiten to hear her prayer, much less offer a different prayer on Machi’s behalf—that Machi  discover the beauty of humanity, ultimately restoring her to her previous self.

From an author to watch, The Lost Souls of Benzaiten is a highly original debut about the nature of happiness and the potential for healing.

Thanks to Soho Press for a review copy of this book.

Ebook Downloads

The cover and the title grabbed me. Besides, I wanted to read more short stories from a woman's point of view.

Miss Kim Knows

And Other Stories

by Cho Nam-joo, Jamie Chang (translator)

October 29, 2024; Liveright, NetGalley

Description

From the international best-selling author of Kim Jiyoung, Born 1982, a collection exploring the intimacies of contemporary Korean womanhood.

A woman is born. A woman is filmed in public without consent. A woman suffers domestic violence. A woman is gaslit. A woman is discriminated against at work. A woman grows old. A woman becomes famous. A woman is hated, and loved, and then hated again.

Miss Kim Knows follows eight women, ranging from preteens to octogenarians, as they confront how gender shapes and orders their lives. “Despite her characters’ hardship and disappointments, there is mischief and glee to be found in these pages” (Hephzibah Anderson, Observer), resulting in another riveting read from an essential voice in world literature.

Collection of Essays

Dancing on My Own

Essays on Art, Collectivity, and Joy

by Simon Wu

Published June 25, 2024; Harper

Description

An essay collection on the aesthetics of class aspiration, creating art and fashion, and the limits of identity politics by emerging art critic and curator Simon Wu

Some interesting and revealing quotes from the essays about being artistic, and being an immigrant:

"...we had chosen to follow our passions into precarious creative professions where few others looked like us and our parents could offer little help. Children of immigrants who pursue creative careers often contend with the perceived opportunity cost of endangering the economic foothold their parents carved out for them." (from "For Everyone")

Simon Wu is a curator and writer involved in collaborative art production and research, and is currently in the PhD program in history of art at Yale University. His family immigrated to the U.S. from Myanmar. 

 What are you reading/watching this week?  

Memes: The Sunday Post hosted by The Caffeinated Bookreviewer. Also, It's Monday: What Are You Reading, Sunday Salon, and Stacking the Shelves 

Sunday Salon: In the Mail

 New books:

What's Coming to Me by Francesca Padilla, August 2, 2022, Soho Teen

Genre: contemporary YA with some romance 

Seventeen-year-old Minerva Gutiérrez plans revenge on her predatory boss by trying to find the spoils taken by armed robbers of the ice cream stand where she works.

Kalmann: An Icelandic Mystery by Joachim B. Schmidt, May 19, 2022, Bitter Lemon Press

Kalmann Odinsson is the self-appointed Sheriff of his town. Day by day, he treks the wide plains which surround the almost deserted village, hunts Arctic foxes and lays bait in the sea....  One winter, after he discovers a pool of blood in the snow, the swiftly unfolding events threaten to overwhelm him.

What are you reading this week? 

Memes: The Sunday Post hosted by The Caffeinated Bookreviewer. Also,  It's Monday: What Are You Reading, and Sunday Salon, Stacking the Shelves, Mailbox Monday

Book Beginning: Lemon by Kwon Yeo-sun

 

Lemon by Kwon Yeo-sun is described as loosely following the structure of a detective novel. The mysterious death of a high school beauty is revisited seventeen years later; the story is told mainly by the victim's sister and also by others at different time periods. The book "explores grief and trauma, raising important questions about guilt, retribution, and the meaning of death and life."

Book beginning: 

 I imagine what happened inside one police interrogation room so many years ago. By imagine, I don't mean invent. But it's not like I was actually there, so I don't know what to actually call it. I picture the scene from that day, based on what he told me and some other clues, my own experience and conclusions.

Page 56:

Mother, with her voice shaking, ordered me not to go anywhere, to lock the door and stay put. 

 

 Lemon by Kwon Yeo-sun, October 12, 2021, Other Press

Would you read on?

The Friday 56. Find any sentence that grabs you on page 56 of your book. Post it, and add your URL to Freda's Voice. Also visit Book Beginnings at Rose City Reader.

Book Review: Leaving Blythe River by Catherine Ryan Hyde

A Young Adult novel and coming-of-age story that adults and the young will enjoy.

Leaving Blythe River by Catherine Ryan Hyde, published May 24, 2016 by Lake Union Publishing
Genre: YA, adventure, coming of age
Objective rating: 5/5

Ethan Underwood is only seventeen-years-old, scrawny and looking young for his age. He is determined to find his missing father whom he was visiting at Blythe River, when his father didn't return from his daily run in the woods.

Ethan tries going alone with his dog to find his dad in the wilderness, but defeated, is finally helped by three local people who accompany him into the deep woods. Ethan does not want to give up, although the others later think their continued search will be fruitless. How he handles this challenge and becomes confident enough to push ahead is the subject of this book. This is basically a coming-of-age novel, set in a natural wilderness, lovely but treacherous in areas. We follow Ethan as he makes decisions, becomes determined and more confident along the way.

The novel is well-written with characters we come to care about and a suspenseful search we take along with Ethan and his older, more seasoned pals.  I wished for a different ending in terms of how the father and son defined their relationship, but I guess it was more realistic.

Definitely a five star read that YA readers and older adults will enjoy.

Click here for the tour stops and more reviews of Leaving Blythe River at TLC Book Tours

Book beginning: 

Three months before his father disappeared 

Ethan remembers the shaking most clearly. Probably because it was the first moment of the shaking. The most familiar of things making an initial appearance. 

When he thinks back on that night, it's that bone-deep trembling - the out-of-control shivering, the chattering teeth - that still feels vivid. He tried to stop it, to calm it. But he was powerless, in more ways than one. 

About the author:
Catherine Ryan Hyde is the author of thirty published and forthcoming books. Her bestselling 1999 novel Pay It Forward, adapted into a major Warner Bros. motion picture starring Kevin Spacey and Helen Hunt, made the American Library Association’s Best Books for Young Adults list and was translated into more than two dozen languages for distribution in more than thirty countries. Her novels Becoming Chloe and Jumpstart the World were included on the ALA’s Rainbow List; Jumpstart the World was also a finalist for two Lambda Literary Awards and won Rainbow Awards in two categories. More than fifty of her short stories have been published in many journals, including the Antioch Review, Michigan Quarterly Review, the Virginia Quarterly Review, Ploughshares, Glimmer Train, and the Sun, and in the anthologies Santa Barbara Stories and California Shorts and the bestselling anthology Dog Is My Co-Pilot. Her short fiction received honorable mention in the Raymond Carver Short Story Contest, a second-place win for the Tobias Wolff Award, and nominations for Best American Short Stories, the O. Henry Award, and the Pushcart Prize. Three have also been cited in Best American Short Stories.

Connect with the author at her Website | Blog |Facebook | Twitter

Thanks to TLC Book Tours and the publisher for a review copy of this book. 

Meme: Visit Book Beginning at Rose City Reader.

Uncaged: The Singular Menace by John Sanford and Michele Cook

Waiting on Wednesday is a weekly event, hosted by Breaking the Spine, that spotlights upcoming releases that we're eagerly anticipating.

Uncaged: The Singular Menace

You don't have to wait for this one. It was actually released July 8, 2014 by Knopf Books for Young Readers. What I found interesting is that this new thriller series is aimed at the huge market of young adult readers. I always think of thrillers as adult material that YA readers generally stay away from

This book features two young protagonists, Shay Remby and her brilliant hacker brother, Odin. I can see the potential in this combination, and also because it's written by an established thriller writer John Sanford and his co-writer, Michelle Cook.

Here is what the publisher has to say about Uncaged:

Shay Remby arrives in Hollywood with $58 and a handmade knife, searching for her brother, Odin.
Odin’s a brilliant hacker but a bit of a loose cannon. He and a group of radical animal-rights activists hit a Singular Corp. research lab in Eugene, Oregon. The raid was a disaster, but Odin escaped with a set of highly encrypted flash drives and a post-surgical dog.
When Shay gets a frantic 3 a.m. phone call from Odin—talking about evidence of unspeakable experiments, and a ruthless corporation, and how he must hide—she’s concerned. When she gets a menacing visit from Singular’s security team, she knows: her brother’s a dead man walking.
What Singular doesn’t know—yet—is that 16-year-old Shay is every bit as ruthless as their security force, and she will burn Singular to the ground, if that’s what it takes to save her brother.

I know a few YA readers and adult readers who might be interested. How about you?  

Guest Post: Jeffrey Blount, author of Hating Heidi Foster

Title: Hating Heidi Foster by Jeffrey Blount
Published October 25, 2012; Alluvion Press

Goodreads: "Hating Heidi Foster, is a young adult novel about the place of honor true friendships hold in our lives. It is about suffering and loss and the ethics of grief. It is about a deep and painful conflict, the bright light of selflessness and sacrifice and the love that rights the ship and carries us safely to port."

The Hating Heidi Foster Background Story
by Jeffrey Blount

The Hating Heidi Foster Background Story

Jeffrey Blount

It was a simple and probably inconsequential moment in time for my daughter, Julia and her long-time friend, Emily;  the two of them sharing a brief spell of laughter as they passed each other in a room full of friends.  For me it was much, much more.  In that instant, my smile reflected years of memories.  At this particular instant, they were seniors in high school, but I was drawn backwards to the vision of two little girls laughing together.  I could see them growing and sharing life in the way true best friends do. I became nostalgic and at the same time a little fearful.  In only a few months, they would be graduating, going off to different colleges and then on to adulthood where they might be half a country or world apart. When life intruded, how much of their friendship would they remember?  Would they be able to continue to make time for each other?  Would their children ever know about the bond they shared?

I loved to write.  The manuscripts hiding in drawers in my desk or in folders on my computer were a testament to that fact.  What if I wrote them something? It might be the perfect tribute. They could carry a book with them and if they lost track of each other, maybe they'd pick it up from time to time even if just to pack it in another box.  But while moving it, the story might bring them back to each other and maybe even inspire a phone call or two and a trip down memory lane. Most importantly, it might remind them of just how important they were to each other’s development as a human being.

In the early mornings and late at night, I wrote and when they graduated, I handed each of them a double-spaced manuscript in a binder bought at a local pharmacy. They both were touched by the gift.  I don't know which they appreciated more, the effort or the manuscript.  Either way, I had achieved my goal of a written tribute to a very special friendship.  As an added bonus, I thought I'd also created a very good story.

A friend of mine is a literary agent for adult fiction.  Even though I knew this was young adult material, I sent the book to her and she responded by saying that she couldn't put it down and that it brought her to tears.  She only had one contact within the YA genre and she sent it off to that publishing company.  I waited and waited.  Months went by. Finally, we heard that while the book had enjoyed quite a lot of support within the company, the final decision was not to publish. I thanked my friend for her efforts and left the book in another folder on my laptop.

Maybe two years later, a good friend of mine and regular tennis partner asked about the manuscript.  I told him that I had filed it away.  I told him that I had tired of the whole agent/publisher thing.  It took too long and I was too busy.  He said he understood, but also wondered whether it wouldn't be nice to put a real book in Julia's and Emily's hands.  After thinking about it some more, I agreed.   Not long after, Alluvion Press teamed up with 1106 Design to create the wonderful cover and to provide editing and typesetting.  Alluvion then contracted with The Cadence Group to prepare an online presence and marketing and finally New Shelves Distribution for warehousing, distribution and additional marketing.

Four years after the manuscripts in binders were delivered, the real book, Hating Heidi Foster, was published.  Julia and Emily received their books as young adults, just months after graduating from college, both of them now teaching in inner-city teaching programs, half a country apart. 

But it seems that I shouldn’t have been too worried.  Julia and Emily are still very much in touch, having visited each other in college, logging Skype hours and even as I write this, they have plans to be together over the holidays.  Still, I am happy that they have the book.  Just in case.

Thanks to author Jeffrey Blount and The Cadence Group for this guest post.

Book Feature/YA Fantasy: Last Kiss in Venice

Title: Last Kiss in Venice (Legend of the White Snake #1)
Author: Martin Chu Shui
EBook, 189 pages; July 11, 2012
Genre: fantasy, YA, martial arts

"In the misty valley of the Er Mei Mountain, after the young and handsome scholar had rescued Caitlin from the eagle’s talons and started talking to her as if she was a human girl, she wondered how it was possible that she understood his words. Perhaps she just had natural ability to understand human words, or maybe instead of understanding the words, she received the messages by observing the scholar’s emotion and body language. No matter how she was able to do it, the result was the same: Caitlin, then the three-foot-long white snake, knew exactly what the scholar was talking about." (from Last Kiss in Venice)

Book description: “Last Kiss in Venice” is a reinterpretation of one of China’s most famous love stories, ‘Legend of the White Snake’. It combines eastern and western culture to tell a story of love and hate, loyalty and betrayal, revenge and justice. It is a supernatural love epic that combines magic and sword fighting in a timeless legend.

Beside a bridge over a canal in Venice, Charlie is spellbound by a girl he has just met, by Caitlin’s absolute beauty and also by what seems like a mythical bond between them. As they admit their love for each other in Paris, then move to settle down in Australia together, it looks like the start of Happily Ever After. But neither of them realizes that this is just the start of a heart-wrenching journey.

After a lifetime of searching, Caitlin finally finds her true love, settles down in the beautiful rolling countryside of outback Australia, and starts to raise a family, but her enemy is never far away. She loves Charlie deeply but can never reveal her secret; he must never know who she really is, and that is her downfall. Information in the hands of her enemy brings her life crashing down around her. To save all she has worked for, she must fight for the right to survive.(based on goodreads)

Martin Chu Shui of Australia has written two other martial arts fantasy novels, Dragon's Pupils: The Sword Guest, and Dragon's Pupils: The Peak. This is his third YA novel.

Dragon's Pupils: The Peaks by Martin Chu Shui

 Here are the opening sentences for the fantasy YA novel,Dragon's Pupils: The Peaks (Dragon's Pupils Series Book 2). Opening sentences can reveal the tone of a novel and give readers the flavor of a book.

"A group of shadowy figures swiftly negotiated their way among the giant gum trees. In silence, gliding over the green moss and rotten vegetation that covered earth, they approached the lone farm house situated at the edge of a large forest.

 Underneath the thick blanket of midnight’s darkness, their black-clothed bodies were almost invisible. Walking around the house and carefully avoiding the faint light emitted from the windows, they peeked inside: Around a desk, two teenage girls were reading books beside a pair of flickering candles.

One of the ghostly figures turned around scanning the surroundings one more time and then nodded to the others. Rising from the shadows suddenly, he strode towards the house.

With a loud cracking noise, he broke down the front wooden door with one powerful kick." (Part I)

Title: Dragon's Pupils: The Peaks by Martin Chu Shui
Kindle Edition , Dec. 3, 2011
Genre: fantasy, YA, martial arts

Product description: " Powerful and invincible they ride across vast desert landscapes, hunting and slaying vampires under the cover of night. Jian Ke, the sword guests are more famous than ever! Admired by millions of TV fans around the nation as they pursue a life of action and adventure: a splendid tapestry depicting Liz, Henry and Sue at the top of their game. With her paintbrush in hand Liz is prepared to take on a hoard of vampires, an army of aliens and even her first kiss from the man of her dreams, Sue’s handsome older brother.

Life couldn’t be better until everything falls to pieces. Liz must now face her biggest fears as the world she once knew slips through her fingers. No-one will be left untouched by the chaos which ensues. Armed only with her knowledge of Tai Chi, Liz must fight for what she has lost and begin the climb of her life. An unforgettable journey will take her to the Peaks.

Dragon's Pupils - The Peaks the second instalment of the Dragon’s Pupils series, follows the drama of Liz’s life as she fights monsters, wields magic and longs for forbidden love. It is a journey which will take you through Australia’s most beautiful landscapes and ultimately witnesses the transformation Liz undergoes, as she rises to meet her latest challenge."

I received a review copy of the ebook.