Sunday Bestsellers for the Week Ending March 30--And We're Open Today from 10 am to 5 pm.

 Stop by and say hi to Stacie, Halley or I on your way to or from your egg hunt.

Hardcover fiction.
1. The Supremes at Earl's All-You-Can-Eat, by Edward Kelsey Moore (at left, playing the cello at Boswell)
2. Leaving Everything Most Loved, by Jacqueline Winspear
3. Little Known Facts, by Christine Sneed
4. The Selector of Souls, by Shauna Singh Baldwin
5. The Burgess Boys, by Elizabeth Strout

Oh, remember that year when Elizabeth Strout was on our top three of paperback fiction every week? now here new novel is out, The Burgess Boys, and there's likely some pent-up demand for it. This Brock Clarke review in the Boston Globe says the theme of the book is that life is a mess and the structure reflects it, but that makes it his favorite of all her novels.

Jacqeline Winspear's tenth mystery featuring Maisie Dobbs, Leaving Everything Most Loved,  has her investigating the death of an Indian governess. Kirkus says that the newest "delves deeply into her complicated relationships and hints at a compelling future." If you're hoping to see Winspear, she'll be at Andersons in Naperville tomorrow, April 1, 7 pm.

Hardcover nonfiction:
1. Bike Tribes, by Mike Magnuson
2. The Drunken Botanist, by Amy Stewart (event on April 10)
3. Lean In, by Sheryl Sandberg
4. Lessons from the Heartland, by Barbara Miner
5. The Girls of Atomic City, by Denise Kiernan

Regarding Amy Stewart's new book, The Drunken Botanist, has this enthusiastic write up from Lauren Viera in The Chicago Tribune. "There are plenty of interesting historical anecdotes (in some instances, such as the section on juniper, the base berry for gin, Stewart takes us all the way back to the second century). But The Drunken Botanist isn't a straightforward armchair read. It's organized as a light-reading reference book that's bound to be of equal interest to gardening nerds and boozehounds. It's an original concept executed well."

Don't forget that Amy Stewart is appearing at Great Lakes Distillery on Wednesday, April 10, 7 pm with doors opening 5:30. This event is co-sponsored by Boswell, The Great Lakes Distillery, and the Friends of the Boerner Botanical Gardens.

Paperback fiction:
1. The Great Gatsby, by F. Scott Fitzgerald
2. The Paris Wife, by Paula McLain
3. Wife 22, by Melanie Gideon
4. The Unlikely Pilgrimage of Harold Fry, by Rachel Joyce
5. A Game of Thrones, by George R. R. Martin

Wife 22, just out in paperback, is the story of a woman who, finding problems in her career and marriage, turns to an online marriage survey with novel-plot-creating results. Meredith Maran in the San Francisco Chronicle notes "That Gideon can take all-too-familiar elements and craft them into something fresh and funny is a tribute to the humor and imagination she brings to the telling of the tale...Gideon weaves Facebook posts, e-mail exchanges, phone calls and potluck party dialogues through the narrative, which centers on an online marriage survey that Alice (under the pseudonym Wife 22) decides to take in secret, with remorse that morphs into rapidly escalating chagrin."

Paperback nonfiction:

1. More Than They Bargained for, by Jason Stein and Patrick Marley
2. Sherman Park, by Paul Geenen
3. How To be Interesting (in Ten Simple Steps), by Jessica Hagy (events 4/3 and 4/4)
4. Milwaukee Garage Bands, by Peter Roller
5. While America Sleeps, by Russ Feingold

Unless you are Barack Obama, it's rare for the paperback edition of a political work to have a strong paperback shelf life, but it's probably different when you are an ex-senator that made a national impact. We'll see what kind of legs Feingold's While America Sleeps has for us. As a reminder of what the Senator touched on, here's a link to his interview with NPR's Steve Inskeep.

I'll have more on Jessica Hagy's events in tomorrow's event write ups, but I should remind you that both of her appearances request registering. Her talk at the Lynden Sculpture Garden on Wednesday April 3, 7 pm is ticketed--$15 gets you admission to the grounds, refreshments, wine, and a copy of How to Be Interesting (such a deal). Her talk on Thursday, April 4, 7:30 am, at Open Mike on the 2nd floor of the Plankinton Arcade, co-sponsored by the Business Journal of Greater Milwaukee, is free, but registration is also requested.

Books for Kids:
1.Unwind, by Neal Shusterman
2. Full Tilt, by Neal Shusterman
3. Everlost, by Neal Shusterman
4. Everwild, by Neal Shusterman
5. Schwa was Here, by Neal Shusterman
6. I am a Bunny, by Ole Risom and Richard Scarry
7. Wildwood, by Colin Meloy and Carson Ellis
8. Eleanor and Park, by Rainbow Rowell (appearing April 4 at Greenfield Public Library)
9. Otis and the Puppy, by Loren Long
10. The One and Only Ivan, by Katherine Applegate

We hosted a school event for Mr. Shusterman!

The big book splash in the Journal Sentinel is Chris Foran's roundup of baseball tiles. Each book is not only described, but Foran tries to find a local angle whenever he can. His top pick looks to be The Bird: The Life and Legacy of Mark Fidrych, by Doug Wilson. Foran savors that this book is "A reminder that there's still joy in the game, in playing and sharing the experience." And who doesn't want that?

Also in today's Journal Sentinel, Mike Fischer reviews 87-year-old James Salter's All That is. Fischer notes that the novel "Isn't ostensibly about flying at all, even if its protagonist does a brief stint in a plane toward the end of World War II. But the experience of reading this book is akin to one's panoramic view, when aloft and moving fast. You can see a lot, albeit briefly and often not very well."

Jim Higgins tackles the new C.S. Lewis biogaphy from Alister McGrath titled, of course, C.S. Lewis. Thought Higgins's eyes "Alister McGrath quickly piles up good reasons for a reader to like Lewis. The writer disliked denominational squabbling and literary theory; he stood in favor of animals, alcohol and reading old books." We missed this one on first pass, but we should have it in the store by Wednesday.