Sunday Bestseller Post for Boswell, Week Ending August 9--A Sales Pop for Lev Grossman, Nice Event Sales for This Week's Visitors, Particularly Deborah Harkness, Plus the Journal Sentinel Reviews.

Hardcover Fiction:
1. The Book of Life V3, by Deborah Harkness
2. The Magician's Land V3, by Lev Grossman
3. The Good Girl, by Mary Kubica
4. The Hundred-Year House, by Rebecca Makkai
5. The Book of Unknown Americans, by Cristina Henríquez
6. A Discovery of Witches V1, by Deborah Harkness
7. The Silkworm, by Robert Galbraith
8. Shadow of Night V2, by Deborah Harkness
9. Goodnight Darth Vader, by Jeffery Brown
10. The Kills, by Richard House

It starts in post-Hussein Iraq. A civilian contractor is told to disappear. There's an explosion and millions in missing funds. You call something a military thriller and you have one set of expectations. You call it "John Le Carre meets Roberto Bolano" and you have a different set of expectations, especially when the book was long-listed for the Man Booker prize. There are comparisons to Pynchon and also to DeLillo. That's the case with Richard House's The Kills: Sutler, The Massive, the Kill, and The Hit, originally published as four separate ebooks.

Oh, and did you notice that the Viking imprint has five of our top ten books this week, due to two events (Deborah Harkness and Rebecca Makkai) and one very strong first week of sale in Lev Grossman's The Magician's Land. Sarah Lyall writes in The New York Times: "If you loved The Chronicles of Narnia as a child, and particularly if your love was later contaminated by the realization that C. S. Lewis had sneaked a stern religious allegory into his box of delights, you will be pleased by how Mr. Grossman has made the real Fillory diverge from the twee fictional one, revealing it to be nuanced, morally complex and nasty in a way that, to be frank, might have benefited Narnia."

One more fascinating thing with Deborah Harkness's event sales. We often have a nice pop in sales of the first book in a series leading up to an event, but it's rare to have a very strong sale of volume one at the event itself as they were for A Discovery of Witches. The reason, at least as I can speculate from several conversations, is that a decent percentage of her superfans had read the book as ebooks and until the event itself, they had no interest in a physical copy. I know some folks get their ereaders signed, but for the most part, the event is when a lot of folks want trade in their cloud for a physical object. 

Hardcover Nonfiction:
1. The Invisible Bridge, by Rick Perlstein
2. The Keillor Reader, by Garrison Keillor
3. How Not to be Wrong, by Jordan Ellenberg (event 8/19)
4. Milwaukee Then and Now, by Sandra Ackerman
5. Beethoven, by Jan Swafford
6. Augustus, by Adrian Goldsworthy
7. David and Goliath, by Malcolm Gladwell
8. The History of Rock and Roll in Ten Songs, by Greil Marcus
9. The Mockingbird Next Door, by Marja Mills (event 9/4)
10. A Spy Among Friends, by Ben Macintyre

Already on national bestsellers lists is A Spy Among Friends: Kim Philby and the Great Betrayal, by Ben Mcintyre. Richard Davenport-Hynes reviewed the book this week in The Wall Street Journal. I wouldn't say he liked it that much, but he did not it's "a rollicking book...full of pep and (Macintyre) never falters in the headlong rush of his narrative." And David Ignatius in The Washington Post stresses that Macintyre "manages to retell it in a way that makes Philby’s destructive genius fresh and horridly fascinating — and to me, at least, ultimately inexplicable. In an age when every puzzle is thought to have its solution, Philby’s inner motivation remains unfathomable."

Paperback Fiction:
1. A Discovery of Witches V1, by Deborah Harkness
2. Saving Kandinsky, by Mary Basson
3. The Illusion of Separateness, by Simon Van Booy (event 9/30)
4. Shadow of Night V2, by Deborah Harkness
5. An Untamed State, by Roxane Gay
6. Little Mercies, by Heather Gudenkauf
7. The Ocean at the End of the Lane, by Neil Gaiman
8. The Signature of All Things, by Elizabeth Gilbert
9. Sweet Thunder, by Ivan Doig
10. Neverwhere, by Neil Gaiman

Only two authors in our top ten are not current or future guests at Boswell for their books. Eliminate Neil Gaiman and you're left with Ivan Doig, whose novel Sweet Thunder is recently out in paperback. The story follows Morrie Morgan, who first appeared in the much-loved novel, The Whistling Season, who is called back to Butte, Montana, from his honeymoon when he learns that he's inherited a ramshackle mansion. Sandra Dallas reviews Doig in The Denver Post: "A love-hate relationship with place runs through Ivan Doig's books as if it were a character. Indeed, Butte, with its gamblers and plungers, its union strife and corporate greed, is very much a character in a book that is filled with an abundance of rich characters."

Paperback Nonfiction:
1. Bad Feminist, by Roxane Gay
2. One Summer, by Bill Bryson
3. Unbroken, by Laura Hillenbrand
4. Law and Disorder, by Charles M. Sevilla
5. The Boys in the Boat, by Daniel James Brown
6. Alone Together, by Sherry Turkle
7. What We See When We Read, by Peter Mendelsund
8. The Smartest Kids in the Room, by Amanda Ripley
9. Wild, by Cheryl Strayed
10. Steal Like an Artist, by Austin Kleon

One book that appears on the list this week is What We See When We Read. The publisher calls this "a gorgeously unique, fully illustrated exploration into the phenomenology of reading—how we visualize images from reading works of literature, from one of our very best book jacket designers, himself a passionate reader." Mendelsund is in fact the associate art director of Knopf, a sister imprint of Vintage. James Sullivan in The Boston Globe sees the book as "a work of conceptual design, unfolds the author’s ideas about what makes reading a creative, visual act all its own on pages — some packed with text, others just a line or two — that incorporate sketches, clip art, images of classic book covers and more."

Books for Kids:
1. Return of the Star Padawan, by Jeffrey Brown
2. If I Stay, by Gayle Forman (we should have screening passes this week)
3. Miss Peregrine's Home for Peculiar Children, by Ransom Riggs
4. Maps, by Aleksandra Mizielinska
5. Life Doesn't Frighten Me, by Maya Angelou
6. Marina, by Carlos Ruiz Zafon
7. Eleanor and Park, by Rainbow Rowell
8. Pout Pout Fish Goes to School, by Deborah Diesen and Daniel Hanna (event 9/18 at Oak Creek Library, 4 pm)
9. President Taft is Stuck in a Bath, by Mac Barnett and Chris Van Dusen
10. Copper Magic, by Julia Mary Gibson (event 9/5 at Boswell)

We've include Pout Pout Fish Goes to School in our back to school displays, promoting our event on September 18 at the Oak Creek Library (at 4 pm). It doesn't hurt that we have adorable Pout Pout Fish on display as well.

In the Journal Sentinel, Jim Higgins reviews the above-mentioned What We See When We Read. He writes that the book "may be the liveliest, most entertaining and best illustrated work of phenomenology you'll pick up this year." Don't forget to check out the photo gallery.

Coming this Tuesday is the new Haruki Murakami, Colorless Tsukuru Tazaki and His Years of Pilgrimage. Chris Foran. He writes (and I lump a few paragraphs together to make them more blog style, and less newspaperish) "When the bottom falls out of your life, you can't always figure out what the hell happened. You just have to get through it. But getting through it and getting past it can be the difference between surviving and living. Colorless Tsukuru Tazaki and His Years of Pilgrimage, Haruki Murakami's accessible and often moving new novel, underscores that difference, and the personal journey necessary to bridge that gap." We'll have more recommendations for the book on Tuesday, as we've had three great reads in house.

Also in the Journal Sentinel, Marion Winik reviews All I Love and Know. It's the story of what happens when a couple in Israel are killed by a suicide bombing, and their children's guardianship is given to the dead man's brother, only the brother is gay, and that means that Israeli law might not accede to the parents' wishes. Winik writes: "The considerable power of Judith Frank's second novel...comes from two sources not always found in combination: first, the seriousness of the social issues it takes on, and second, its psychological, nearly Jamesian style, following its characters tick by tick through their emotions and thoughts." The review originally appeared in Newsday.

The String Diaries, a Boswell favorite is reviewed, reprinted from the Dallas Morning News.  Stephen Lloyd Jones's novel causes a bit of a problem for critic Joy Tipping: "If there’s one thing I hate as a critic, it’s dancing around the possibility of giving too much away in a review. Spoilers are called that for a reason, and critics despise them every bit as much as readers do. Writers, though — crafty little devils — seem determined to concoct spoiler-bait books, titles that are just nigh on impossible to discuss. Which is precisely why this review is so short. Like recent favorites Gone Girl and The Quick, it’s hard to discuss Stephen Lloyd Jones’ The String Diaries without revealing too much." 

What's Milwaukee Talking About? Literary Links to the Shepherd Express, Urban Milwaukee, WUWM's Lake Effect, and Wisconsin Public Radio.

This week's featured review in the Shepherd Express is for Valerie Solanas: The Defiant Life of the Woman Who Wrote Scum (and Shot Andy Warhol), written by Breanne Fahs. Solanas is known for shooting Andy Warhol and for writing The SCUM Manifesto, considered a groundbreaking feminist text. As Mark Borchardt writes: "It was Solanas’ obsession to get her play Up Your Ass produced that ultimately brought her to Warhol. But he was uninterested in the weird socio-political script. And that apathy ultimately set her off. Solanas always saw herself as a writer but her material was so singular, so radical, it could never find an accepting audience. Of course, post-shooting, the media exploitation machine immediately kicked into high gear and finally SCUM Manifesto got the recognition (read: notoriety) she so actively sought."

Nicely paired with the Book Preview feature for Roxane Gay's Bad Feminist. Our Friday event turned out to be a big hit, even for a Friday evening in summer. Attendance was more than triple our first event and we sold out of books at the end of the evening. We'll have stock by Tuesday, and you can get a Bad Feminist button at the same time. Oh, and I have one suggestion for the publisher--being that the black buttons are far outpacing demand for the white buttons, why don't you reprint Bad Feminist with a black cover? McSweeneys periodically does this and so does a certain bookstore when it reorders plastic bags. And then do the third printing in pink. I'm just full of ideas.

Will Stotts, Jr. writes up two books in his Dial/Urban Milwaukee column this week. One recent author featured is Cristina Henríquez, whose novel, The Book of Unknown Americans, struck a chord with the reviewer. He writes: "Ms. Henriquez is a wise and knowing guide through the vagaries of acclimating to a new land. She creates a variety of characters from a multitude of backgrounds with warmth and truth. The microcosm she creates reminds us of the subtle differences among America’s many cultures and their important commonalities. Ultimately, we all want the same things. As this powerful book demonstrates, it is only when we are afraid that we forget our neighbor is one of us."

His local author spotlight is for Julia Mary Gibson, who visits Boswell on Friday, September 5 for her Copper Magic, a book for kids. I love the fact is that her identification with Milwaukee is that her parents were radical activists.

Let's see who was featured in WUWM's Lake Effect this week. I'll try to give you as discrete a link as possible to the interview. Sometimes a segment has its own link, but sometimes it's the whole show only. Monday started off with an all author show:
--Danielle Ofri, discussing What Docors Feel: How Emotions Affect the Practice of Medicine
--Recently Long-Listed for the Man Booker Prize Joshua Ferris, discussing To Rise Again a a Decent Hour
--Biographer Scott Eyden, on John Wayne: The Life and Legend.

On Wednesday, Rebecca Makkai discussed The Hundred-Year House with Bonnie North. From the website: "The possibility of reinvention lies at the heart of Rebecca Makkai’s newest novel, The Hundred Year House. Part mystery, part family drama, part ghost story, and wholly engaging and entertaining, The Hundred Year House is set in a fictional house in the Midwest that once housed an artist’s colony, and which has many, many secrets left a century later."

Thursday's feature is with Oliver Potzsch, whose novel The Ludwig Conspiracy is now in paperback. Lake Effect timed the interview to air in conjunction with the Milwaukee Film Festival's showing of "Ludwig II." The website notes that "The Ludwig Conspiracy is a historical novel that ties together some conspiracy theories about Ludwig’s death with real, documented history. Pötzsch, who is from Germany, spoke with Lake Effect’s Dan Harmon about how the subject matter in this new novel differs from the history he’d written about before."

On Wisconsin Public Radio's Kathleen Dunn this week, John Munson is keeping the seat warm. Wednesday's guest was Michael Wolraich, author of Unreasonable Men: Theodore Roosevelt and the Republican Rebels Who Created Progressive Politics. I was going to make an argument that this book almost goes in our Wisconsin history section as the Fighting Bob LaFollette is a key player, but American history seems okay too. WPR writes: "Host John Munson is joined by the author of a new book about Wisconsin's Progressive Trailblazers...It recounts the battle between Wisconsin Senator Robert 'Fighting Bob' La Follette and Illinois Congressman 'Uncle Joe' Cannon, the House Speaker."

On Joy Cardin, Thursday's guest was Benoit Denizet-Lewis, whose Travels with Casey: My Journey Through Our Dog Crazy Country is a memoir and an exploration of dog culture. Yes, it's 32 months in a motor home. I saw the author is traveling to St. Louis and Kansas City on his book tour, but I'm not sure if that is also in an RV. I did not ever think of Joy Cardin as a crazy cat lady, but she defends herself by saying she's had a lot of dogs over the years too. Casey is a yellow lab, for folks who need to know that and the author was also featured in USA Today. In Virginia, dogs are allowed into restaurants. Take note, Wisconsin!

Several book-related guests appeared on Central Time this week. On Monday, Shauna Singh Baldwin reflects on the two-year anniversary of the Sikh Temple shooting. And then on Tuesday, Euly Hong talks to Gene Purcell about the book, The Birth of Korean Cool: How One Nation Is Conquering the World Through Pop Culture. I guess Psy's Gangnam Style is the hook here, but the really interesting thought is that this cultural export is government driven.

Our Seasonal Top 25: Now Starring Elizabeth Gilbert, Daniel James Brown, and More.

Jason has updated our top 25 case. Here is a list of our seasonal bestsellers:

1. The Signature of All Things, by Elizabeth Gilbert
2. The Boys in the Boat, by Daniel James Brown
3. Everything That Remains, by Joshua Fields Millburn and Ryan Nicodemus
4. The Fault in Our Stars, by John Green
5. Saving Kandinsky, by Mary Basson
6. The Rosie Project, by Graeme Simsion
7. The Goldfinch, by Donna Tartt
8. The Silkworm, by Robert Galbraith
9. The Future of the Mind, by Michio Kaku
10. Going Somewhere, by Brian Benson
11. Studying Wisconsin, by Martha Bergland and Paul G. Hayes
12. The Interestings, by Meg Wolitzer
13. Burial Rites, by Hannah Kent
14. Sinner, by Maggie Stiefvater
15. The Ocean at the End of the Lane, by Neil Gaiman
16. Gone Girl, by Gillian Flynn
17. Knocking on Heaven's Door, by Katy Butler
18. The Horse Lover, by Alan Day and Lynn Wiese Sneyd
19. Americanah, by Chimananda Ngozi Adichie
20. The Book of Life, by Deborah Harkness
21. All the Light We Cannot See, by Anthony Doerr
22. TransAtlantic, by Colum McCann
23. A Tale for the Time Being, by Ruth Ozeki
24. The Truth about the Harry Quebert Affair, by Joel Dicker
25. And the Mountains Echoed, by Khaled Hosseini

Events count, but bulk sales do not.

New at Boswell: A Plot to Poison a Burgundy Vineyard, a Chronicle of Teaching Teachers to Teach, an Arctic Advenuture, and Several Takes on the Watergate Era.

I'm not sure what puts me in the mood to read about underhanded business dealings, but that leads me in the direct of Shadows in the Vineyard: The True Story of the Plot to Poison the World's Greatest Wine (Twelve). Here's the publishers take: "In January 2010, Aubert de Villaine, the famed proprietor of the Domaine de la Romanée-Conti, the tiny, storied vineyard that produces the most expensive, exquisite wines in the world, received an anonymous note threatening the destruction of his priceless vines by poison-a crime that in the world of high-end wine is akin to murder-unless he paid a one million euro ransom." Maximillian Potter covered the story for Vanity Fair, and the enthusiastic response led to this book. Stephen Meuse wrote in The Boston Globe "Potter’s effort for the magazine is a tightly-written and engaging story that hits all the right notes — a bit of the history of Burgundy and the development of its vineyards under centuries of monastic custodianship; a peek at the chain of ownership of the property from the time of the cunning, duplicitous Prince de Conti, confidante of Louis XV, to the present day."

Perhaps the highest profile nonfiction release this week, at least for our customers (because I think several know the author personally), is The Invisible Bridge: The Fall of Nixon and the Rise of Reagan, from Rick Perlstein (Simon). Billed as the third in a history of modern American conservatism, Perlstein's eye turns from Goldwater to Nixon and now Reagsan. The book is today's front page feature in The New York Times Book Review. Frank Rich writes: "It says much about Perlstein’s gifts as a historian that he persuasively portrays this sulky, slender interlude between the fall of Nixon and the rise of Reagan (as his subtitle has it) not just as a true bottom of our history but also as a Rosetta stone for reading America and its politics today. It says much about his talent as a writer that he makes these years of funk lively, engrossing and on occasion mordantly funny." Being that the author is from Milwaukee, we're hoping to eventually somehow host the author, but alas, were not able to get onto the initial tour, but perhaps something will come together for later in the fall. Meanwhile, his detractors get their say in The New York Times.

I sense a theme coming, perhaps due to it being the fortieth anniversary of Watergate. From Viking comes The Nixon Defense: What He Knew and When He Knew It , written by John W. Dean, former White House counsel and one of the (per the publisher) last surviving figures of this historic event. Both books are rounded up in this Philadelphia Inquirer review, promoting both authors' appearances at the Philadelphia Free Library. Carolyn Kellogg reviews the book for the Los Angeles Times, noting that "Dean shapes those conversations into a readable, dense narrative." She also notes another book released in conjunction, The Nixon Tapes, 1971-1972 (HMH), by Douglas Brinkley and Luke Nichter, an even more intense effort to digitize the entire Watergate tapes.  I think the world is screaming for a Watergate table. I might get to work on that tomorrow.

Shifting gears, August usually offers a nice selection of books on the state of education. One of this year's entries is Building a Better Teacher: How Teaching Works (and How to Teach It to Everyone (Norton). The book appears to have its origins in this story that ran in The New York Times Magazine several years ago, which notes that in the history of teaching teachers to teach, the possible deviation from constructive training came when universities took over the Normal Schools, which made teaching conform to the theoretical constructs of social science. She notes a 2006 study where only 12% of faculty members in education departments had taught K-12.  The article follows one person, Doug Lemov, but the book opens up the scope of the issue, following a half dozen shaker-uppers. Paul Tough offers praise: "This beautifully written, defiantly hopeful book points the way to a better future for American teachers and the children they teach." It also has a quote from Amanda Ripley: "A must-read book for every American teacher and taxpayer." These are the two best-selling education books we've sold in the past few years, which is saying something.

I mentioned on our Sunday post that we always need new books to recommend to folks who liked Unbroken and The Boys in the Boat. Today is the release of In the Kingdom of Ice: The Grand and Terrible Polar Voyage of the USS Jeannette (Doubleday), Hampton Sides' new chronicle of a daring and dangerous 19th century mission. Our buyer Jason is a fan: "First thing not to do: Don't go on-line and look up what happened to this expedition. It is a breathtaking tale of the USS Jeanette, led by George De Long, as they attempt to find the North Pole. At the time of this adventure, the North Pole was another Manifest Destiny facet the U.S. wanted to get to first. And De Long had been struck by Arctic Fever and needed to make a valiant attempt. While the journey started out with extreme enthusiasm, it wasn't long before ice blocked their path and made life harrowing. Hampton Sides is unrelenting in his narrative approach, and I could not stop gripping this book during the last 100 pages!" If you don't want to take Jason's word, Howard Schneider also reviews the book in The Wall Street Journal.

Monday, event post--Deborah Harkness Tonight (Come Early), Mary Kubica and Heather Gudenkauf Tuesday, Rebecca Makkai and Cristina Henríquez Wednesday, and Roxane Gay Friday.

Monday, August 4, 7 pm, at Boswell:
Deborah Harkness, author of A Discovery of Witches, Shadow of Night, and The Book of Life.

After traveling through time in Shadow of Night, the second book in Deborah Harkness’s enchanting series, historian and witch Diana Bishop and vampire scientist Matthew Clairmont return to the present to face new crises and old enemies. At Matthew’s ancestral home at Sept-Tours, they reunite with the cast of characters from A Discovery of Witches—with one significant exception. But the real threat to their future has yet to be revealed, and when it is, the search for Ashmole 782 and its missing pages takes on even more urgency. In the trilogy’s final volume, Harkness deepens her themes of power and passion, family and caring, past deeds and their present consequences. In ancestral homes and university laboratories, using ancient knowledge and modern science, from the hills of the Auvergne to the palaces of Venice and beyond, the couple at last learn what the witches discovered so many centuries ago.

Boswellian's Jen Steele and Pam Stilp agreed that the series delivered until the final page. Here's Jen's recommendation: "Witches and Vampires and Daemons, oh my! The moment of truth has arrived; the past, the present and the future for all creatures. Diana and Matthew are back from their time-walk in London, 1590 and are faced with new losses and new beginnings. Reunited with their family, they must get to the Ashmole 782 before old enemies get to it. A combination of magic, mystery, science, romance and suspense--these threads, like a weaver’s knot, wrap you up in this book's powerful spell! Sink your teeth into the final installment of the All Souls Trilogy. Once you sit down to start it, you will not want to stop."

This event is free. Boswell will start giving out line letters at 5 pm. Ms. Harkness will sign new books, backlist, and pose for photos.

Tuesday, August 5, 7 pm, at Boswell:
Heather Gudenkauf, author of Little Mercies.
and Mary Kubica, author of The Good Girl.

Veteran social worker Ellen Moore has seen the worst side of humanity--the vilest acts one person can commit against another. She is a fiercely dedicated children's advocate and a devoted mother and wife. But one blistering summer day, a simple moment of distraction will have repercussions that Ellen could never have imagined, threatening to shatter everything she holds dear, and trapping her between the gears of the system she works for. Meanwhile, ten-year-old Jenny Briard has been living with her well-meaning but irresponsible father since her mother left them, sleeping on friends' couches and moving in and out of cheap motels. When Jenny suddenly finds herself on her own, she is forced to survive with nothing but a few dollars and her street smarts. The last thing she wants is a social worker, but when Ellen's and Jenny's lives collide, little do they know just how much they can help one another.

Here's Boswellian Sharon K. Nagel's recommendation for The Good Girl: "When Mia Dennett, a 25 year old art teacher goes missing, there are various theories. Her mother is horrified and worried that she has been abducted, her father thinks that she just ran off to be difficult, and police detective Gabe Hoffman isn’t sure what happened, but is doing his best to locate her. Told by rotating points of view, both before and after Mia’s disappearance, this debut novel takes the reader on quite a ride, providing some unexpected plot twists and emotional tangles. A terrific thriller for summer or vacation reading."

Two Midwestern writers penning very different books--one will warm your heart, and the other will chill your soul. We met them both when they met us for lunch on a pre-publication tour, and I know you will enjoy them as much as we did.

Wednesday, August 6, 7 pm, at Boswell:
Cristina Henríquez (photo credit Michael Lionstar), author of The Book of Unknown Americans
and Rebecca Makkai (photo credit Philippe Matsas), author of The Hundred-Year House.

We've got two dual author events in a row. This time we asked if the authors would appear together, and it turns out they did know each other. They are also both on their second novels. Sometimes folks worry about a sophomore slump, but Makkai and Henríquez have written sophomore slam dunks!

Here's Boswellian Sharon's reommendation for Cristina Henríquez's The Book of Unknown Americans: "Everyone who comes to America from another country has a dream of how they want their lives to be. For Arturo and Alma Rivera, it is that their fifteen-year-old daughter, Maribel, will get better and once again be the person that they remember. She sustained a brain injury while on her father’s construction site. The family left Mexico in order to find a good school for Maribel to get the help she needs. They settle in Delaware where Arturo has a job, and make friends within their community. There are no minor characters in this novel. Everyone has a story to tell of where they came from and why. The author has done a phenomenal job of defining home and country, and the many different ways that it can be interpreted."

And here's my rec for Rebecca Makkai's The Hundred-Year House: "Zilla (Zee) and Doug move into her mom’s carriage house while Zee works at the nearby college and Doug finishes up his biography of poet Edwin Parfitt. The only problem is that Doug’s secretly working on a completely different project, Zee is sabotaging a department colleague, and new in-laws have been invited to share their living quarters. Alright, maybe there’s more than one problem. The home was once an artists’ retreat that numbered among its guests the very Edwin Parfitt, but the family made the house private again to give to Zilla’s ne’er-do-well father. There also seems to be a ghost making trouble. While the odds are on Violet, the family matriarch, to be the culprit, there are several other former residents that could be in the running. What starts as a combination academic-drawing room comedy heads into reverse to reveal the secrets of both the home and the family and become a moving meditation on family, money, art, and reinvention. "

Friday, August 8, 7 pm, at Boswell:
Roxane Gay (photo credit Jay Grabiec), author of Bad Feminist and An Untamed State.

We had such a great time with Roxane Gay for An Untamed State that she went back to her publisher and asked if we could be added to the tour for Bad Feminist. We're hoping that all the folks who attended told two more folks, and the results would be similar to an old shampoo commercial that finally put the powers of two in perspective.

Just as Bad Feminist is being released (it's on-sale date is Tuesday, August 5), An Untamed State has received another rave, this time in the "Briefly Noted" section of The New Yorker: "How does one survive thirteen harrowing days in captivity? The question animates this commanding début, whose protagonist, Mireille, is kidnapped in broad daylight while driving to the beach in Port-au-Prince with her husband and young son," it begins.

Boswellians Sharon (yes, this is really her week!), Carly Lenz, and I all read and recommend Bad Feminist. Here's Carly's take: "Roxane Gay does a fantastic job articulating an array of thoughts and ideas that people hoping to practice 'good feminism' struggle with verbalizing. Her collection of essays reads more like a sassy raconteur's memoir than a pointed feminist manifesto, though she offers a passionate spectrum of opinions in these pages. Gay explores issues concerning the conveyance of feminism in pop culture, encompassing movies, books, and television shows, as well as in every day actions and colloquialisms. She also touches upon racism, classism, and the nature of privilege. Gay's narrative voice is one rife with humor and seriousness simultaneously, which makes for an entertaining and eye-opening read."

Yesterday's Journal Sentinel column talks up the visit. Jim Higgins asks, "Are you really a bad feminist?" Gay replies "Oh, I'm a terrible feminist...I'm a human being, and that most bad feminists are just like me — human. So yes, we have contradictions, but ultimately we believe in the equality of women. Not only women who look like us, but women who embody different identities as well. I think it's very hard to be a 'good feminist.' So I openly embrace being a bad feminist, so I feel like I can be me and still connect to the movement in some way."

Next week we've got just two events and glory be, they are both on Tuesday. Come out for one or the other and go have some fun doing something else for the rest of the week. J.A. Jance is at the Milwaukee Public Library at 6:30 for Remains of Innocence and at 7 pm, we'll have Jeff Miller, author of Scoop, at Purple Door Ice Cream, in conversation with Mitch Teich. Just to be warned, Purple Door is a pretty small place with very limited seating

Boswell's Sunday Bestseller Post, Week of August 2, 2014--Links, Asides, Newly Added Events, and The Journal Sentinel Book Page.

Hardcover Fiction:
1. California, by Edan Lepucki
2. Tigerman, by Nick Harkaway
3. The Goldfinch, by Donna Tartt
4. The Book of Life, by Deborah Harkness (event 8/4)
5. The Silkworm, by Robert Galbraith
6. The Invention of Wings, by Sue Monk Kidd
7. All the Light We Cannot See, by Anthony Doerr
8. The Vacationers, by Emma Straub
9. The Stories of Jane Gardam, by Jane Gardam
10. Lucky Us, by Amy Bloom

Two non-Hachette books sneak into the top five. Nick Harkaway's debut, Tigerman, got some extra momentum from former Boswellian Hannah, who offered the Tigerman personality quiz and celebratory cupcakes on the day of release, while Harkness is still building momentum for her event tomorrow for The Book of Life, on August 4. Don't forget, it's free but we'll close doors when we reach capacity.

The Stories of Jane Gardam has been out for several months, and finally got the well-deserved review in The New York Times Book Review today. Christopher Benfrey writes: "Gardam’s sly and bighearted stories will give Americans another welcome opportunity to become familiar with her varied body of work. In their finely tuned mastery of Shorty Shenfold’s chosen form, but missing the nastiness, they should inspire a well-deserved double take."

Hardcover Nonfiction:
1. Milwaukee Then and Now, by Sandra Ackerman
2. The Mockingbird Next Door, by Marja Mills (event just added, 9/4!)
3. Can't We Talk About Something More Pleasant, by Roz Chast
4. Preparing the Ghost, by Matthew Gavin Frank
5. The Museum of Mysteries, by Elea Baucheron
6. David and Goliath, by Malcolm Gladwell
7. The Elephant Company, by Vicki Croke
8. How Now to Be Wrong, by Jordan Ellenberg (event 8/19)
9. A Spy Among Friends, by Ben Macintrye
10. The Tastemakers, by David Sax

Our buyer Jason's instinct to feature Elea Baucheron's The Museum of Mysteries, was right on the money, with the book hitting this week's bestseller list. I asked him why we got the books relatively late, and it turned out he waited for the publisher's freight program to kick in. Those books are heavy!

Two return appearances on the bestseller list this week are now for upcoming events. Both Jordan Ellenberg, Madison mathematics professor, and Marja Mills, Chicago journalist who was also born in Madison, are coming to Boswell, Ellenberg for How Not to be Wrong on August 19 and Mills for The Mockingbird Next Door on September 4. Both books are also national bestsellers, and both events are free. How exciting! Now I just need to get Roz Chast to start following our bestseller lists.

Paperback Fiction:
1. Saving Kandinsky, by Mary Basson
2. The Illusion of Separateness, by Simon Van Booy (event 9/30)
3. A Tale for the Time Being, by Ruth Ozeki
4. Gone Girl, by Gillian Flynn
5. The Discovery of Witches, by Deborah Harkness (event 8/4)
6. The Ocean at the End of the Lane, by Neil Gaiman
7. Vampires in the Lemon Grove, by Karen Russell
8. The Cuckoo's Calling, by Robert Galbraith
9. The Valley of Amazement, by Amy Tan
10. Fear, by Gabriel Chevalier

I was just writing to some friends in Nashville about Mary Basson's Saving Kandinsky, as Pompidou-curated show moves there for the fall, after a very successful run in Milwaukee. Our two best-selling Kandinsky titles after Basson's novel is Barb Rosenstock's The Noisy Paint Box and Kandinsky's own Concerning the Spiritual in Art. The show continues here through August.

One book that has popped onto my radar is Gabriel Chevallier's Fear: A Novel of World War I, republished by NYRB Classics and translated by Malcolm Imrie. Thomas Kenneally wrote in The New York Times Book Review: "Chevallier’s narrative remains radioactive with pure terror, frightening in a way later accounts don’t quite manage. It’s hard to believe, given the powerful, almost American casualness of his voice, that this is its first American appearance. His tone is so inveigling and so amiable as he inducts us like witnesses into that great European madness with which the past century began, decades before most who will read this translation were born. It’s also hard to believe, once we’re deeply engaged with the book, that Chevallier is dealing with events that are nearly a hundred years in the past, deploying prose that’s almost as old. We are lucky his voice came through."

Paperback Nonfiction:
1. Unbroken, by Laura Hillenbrand
2. Cooked, by Michael Pollan
3. The Boys in the Boat, by Daniel James Brown
4. Pretty Good Joke Book, by Garrison Keillor
5. I Know Why the Caged Bird Sings, by Maya Angelou

The top 3 this week is pretty much what any bookseller would recommend to customers looking for lively nonfiction. The problem of course is what to offer when they've read these. This week I've tried a little Turn Right at Macchu Picchu, and a helping of The Girls of Atomic City. I always think of The Boys in the Boat as more of a World War II story, or maybe adventure, but we actually have it shelved in sports, a la Born to Run, and if truth be told, a lot of folks who came to our event were connected to crew, which makes me think that the initial audience for this book would have looked there to find it. It really doesn't matter now that it's on the front table, but eventually we'll probably have to argue that one out.

Books for Kids:
1. President Taft is Stuck in the Bath, by Mac Barnett (event 10/14 with Jon Klassen)
2. A World without Princes, by Soman Chainani
3. Wonder, by R.J. Palacio
4. The Fault in Our Stars, by John Green
5. The Noisy Paint Box, by Barb Rosenstock with illustrations by Mary GrandPre
6. The Day the Crayons Quit, by Drew Daywalt with illustrations by Oliver Jeffers
7. Numberys, by William Joyce and Christina Ellis
8. Four: A Divergent Collection, by Veronic Roth
9. Graduation Day, by Joelle Charbonneau
10. The Glass Sentence, by S.E. Grove

The illustrations from President Taft is Stuck in a Bath are by Chris Van Dusen, but he's not part of our October 14 event. Maybe another time! Meanwhile, we had a nice pop for William Joyce and Chritina Ellis's Numberlys, the new picture book that tells of a world with no letters, only numbers. Needless to say, our five heroes have this feeling that something is missing from their lives and get to work solving it.

In the Journal Sentinel book pages, the featured story is an interview by Polly Drew, with recent visitor Katy Butler, author of Knocking on Heaven's Door. Drew writes: "Today most people state that they want to die at home but fewer than half do. Many of us will end our lives in a web of tubes and emotional wreckage that will be left for loved ones to untangle. Even those who enter hospice must be doctor-determined to have a life expectancy of less than six months. How did we go from dying with great attention paid to the actual passage to having one's death assigned to the artificial state of medical intervention?"

There's also a nice write-up about Roxane Gay's visit on Friday, August 8th for her essay collection, Bad Feminist.

Connie Ogle writes about the new novel from Jojo Moyes. "The delightful, comic One Plus One is as likable a book as you will come across this summer, light and funny, with surprisingly subtle commentary on how the income gap separates people emotionally as well as financially." This review originally appeared in the Miami Herald. Of course you know Moyes from her national (and Boswell) bestseller Me Before You.

From the Los Angeles Times, David Ulin is dazzled by the graphic novel, Lena Finkle's Magic Barrel, by Anya Ulrich. While some might compare the work to Marjane Satrapi and Harvey Pekar, Lena Finkle's Magic Barrel has no antecedents, that it transcends its influences so thoroughly it creates a form, a language, all its own."

And don't forget about the Journal Sentinel piece earlier this week about the Milwaukee County Zoo, written by Darlene Winter, Elizabeth Frank and Mary Kazmierczak. "While not a definitive history of the institution, Milwaukee County Zoo is a browsable look at a popular venue. Families who visit the zoo regularly may enjoy it as a virtual substitute on the days they can't visit, and as a starting point for discussions about the purpose and mission of zoos."

Media Round Up from the Shepherd Express, WUWM, and Wisconsin Public Radio.

From the Shepherd Express Book Preview, a highlight of next Monday's event with Deborah Harkness, author of The Book of Life. Jenni Herrick writes "Blending Old World knowledge with modern science, this heart-pounding, sprawling saga is filled with suspense, romance, magic and mystery. Diana and Matthew, the much beloved husband and wife duo who have recently returned from time-walking in 16th-century Europe, now face new crises and reunite with old friends as they ultimately come to realize the extreme power that one’s actions have over generations to come. The Book of Life is a lively and enchanting story with broad appeal to fantasy fans everywhere." Our event is Monday, August 4, 7 pm. It's free, but it might fill up, so come early.

Reviewed in the Shepherd Express this week, Steve Kushing's Pioneers of the Blues Revival is list priced at $75, and because the book is net priced to us, the actual selling price in our store is higher. It's not about the Black blues musicians, but the White enthusiasts of the 1950s. Luhrssen calls the stories "eye opening."

On WUWM's Lake Effect, Tuesday was "Wisconsin Authors Day." The stories included:
--James Marten, author of America's Corporal: James Tanner in War and Peace
--Bobby Tanzilo, author of The Hidden History of Milwaukee
--Mona Simpson, author of Casebook
--Sandy Brehl, author of Odin's Promise.

The write: "It’s an all Wisconsin authors edition of the show, starting with Marquette professor James Marten’s book that tells the story of a little known witness to President Lincoln’s death. OnMilwaukee.com’s managing editor Bobby Tanzilo takes us on a virtual tour of some of hidden Milwaukee. The young hero of Green Bay native Mona Simpson’s newest novel tries to figure out his parents – and life – using the best sleuthing techniques, and Milwaukee area writer Sandy Brehl’s new novel takes young readers to Norway during the German occupation of World War II."

The authors continued on Wednesday, when James Magruder discussed Let Me See it, his linked stories about two cousins, and Amanda Petrusich was on for her new book (which has a staff rec from Josh), Do Not Sell at Any Price: The Wild, Obsessive Hunt for the World's Rarest 78 rpm Records.

The music continue into Thursday, when Tom Doyle is interviewed for Man on the Run: Paul McCartney in the 1970s. The author observes: "He is twenty-seven years old, and he's suddenly redundant"

I guess you are beginning to observe that the Milwaukee critics like books on music.

Moving to Wisconsin Public Radio, Central Time hosted the following authors this past week: --Seyed Hossein Mousavian, author of Iran and the United States
--Peter Rhee,the surgeon who treated Gabrielle Giffords, author of Trauma Red: The Making of a Surgeon in War and in America's Cities
--On Harry Potter's birthday, a discussion about favorite young adult novel
--Laura Miller on Sherlock Holmes
--Deborah Harkness, author of the previously cited The Book of Life. "I think of Ashmole 782 as the third main character in the book. Ashmole 782 is a real missing alchemical manuscript at Oxford's Bodleian Library that I stumbled across..."  The event is still on August 4, just like at the beginning of the post.

John Munson filled in for Joy Cardin this week. His literary guests:
--Richard Weissbourd on raising nice kids. His last book is The Parents We Were Meant to Be.
--The buzz on beards, with Allen Peterkin. His 2002 book is called One Thousand Beards.
--On Friday, Munson talked to Roxane Gay, author of Bad Feminist. Hooray, Gay is coming to Boswell on Friday, August 8, 7 pm for Bad Feminist. The book is out on Tuesday, August 5.

Kathleen Dunn was on vacation this week. As part of their "best of" rebroadcasts, Michael Waldman's interview about The Second Amendment was rebroadcast.

Why Aren't There More Reverse Chronology Novels? A Celebration of Rebecca Makkai's "The Hundred-Year House" (Event is August 6, With Cristina Henriquez)

The first time I read a backwards novel, as I called them, I was almost taken aback. I wasn't even aware you can do this. The book was First Light, by Charles Baxter, and it was the first of many books I would read by that wonderful author. It was about Dorsey and Hugh Welch, a brother and sister with a complicated relationship. It was almost as much a revelation as the first time a read a novel with shifting perspectives. That turned out to be The Well Wishers, by Edward Eager. Hey, I made that revelation when I was ten. Life-long learning and all that.

So you'd think that with such a unique premise, we'd see reverse chronology novels all over the place, but I would say they are relatively rare. A visit to the Wikipedia site listed a few, most notably Martin Amis's Time's Arrow.  I thought I'd be able to think of more, but the only book that came to mind was Anita Shreve's The Last Time They Met. This has turned out to be one of my favorite Anita Shreve novels (and I've read many),  though I remember one of my friends telling me she threw it against a well. That's not so much because of the reverse chronology, but its Atonement style twist. I'd do a post on those types of novels, but everyone would be pissed at me for giving away a whole bunch of endings. So it ain't happening.

This almost degenerated into a blog post about possible post topics, which made my brain explode. One that I had always wanted to do was a list of books with multiple protagonists where they live on the same street (like Capital, by John Lanchester) or even in the same building (like The Death of Vishnu, by Manil Suri), but the structure of these novels is a little more specific than a simple multi-character perspective because the characters together become a discussion about a particular issue. Lo and behold, we have an author's novel being featured that does that very thing and it turns out to be Cristina Henriquez's The Book of Unknown Americans, and she's appearing with Rebecca Makkai on Wednesday August 6. And we've got great reads on that too, from Sharon Nagel and Jen Steele.

But today we're talking about backwards, and one novel that does this particularly well is The Hundred-Year House, by Rebecca Makkai. For this to work, you've got to have a few secrets up your sleeve. We know where everybody is, but why are they like that, and what exactly happened to get them from A to B. You've also got to have a few interesting characters in the backstory, and it doesn't hurt to have a few red herrings.

Here's my take on Rebecca Makkai's The Hundred-Year House: "Zilla (Zee) and Doug move into her mom’s carriage house while Zee works at the nearby college and Doug finishes up his biography of poet Edwin Parfitt. The only problem is that Doug’s secretly working on a completely different project, Zee is sabotaging a department colleague, and new in-laws have been invited to share their living quarters. Alright, maybe there’s more than one problem. The home was once an artists’ retreat that numbered among its guests the very Edwin Parfitt, but the family made the house private again to give to Zilla’s ne’er-do-well father. There also seems to be a ghost making trouble. While the odds are on Violet, the family matriarch, to be the culprit, there are several other former residents that could be in the running. What starts as a combination academic-drawing room comedy heads into reverse to reveal the secrets of both the home and the family and become a moving meditation on family, money, art, and reinvention." --Daniel Goldin

My friend Arsen Kashkashian of Boulder Book Shop is also a big fan of The Hundred Year House. Here's what he wrote: "The Hundred-Year House is a fascinating and entertaining read from the end to the beginning. Makkai, in a brilliant narrative gamble, tells the history of an Illinois' estate from the near present back to its founding in 1900. The curiosities of the opening chapter become clearer as we go back in time. Along the way we get a host of characters, including the eccentric family that built the house and the numerous artists who inhabited when it was an artists colony. Makkai's structure results in numerous moments of discovery for the reader. Her writing is crisp, clear and witty. It's a deeply satisfying novel."

And finally, my friend Ann Wolters, who was of late at Lake Forest Book Shop, which of course is where the novel is set (the writer's colony is Ragdale, of course) also wrote to tell me how much she liked Makkai's novel. She wrote: "Once an artists' colony, now a luxurious private home, the "hundred-year house" has a profound effect on its residents and visitors. Using an innovative narrative structure -- the book begins at the dawn of the 21st century and travels back in time to 1900 -- Rebecca Makkai draws us in to a world filled with artists, poets, academics, heirs and heiresses . . . and perhaps a ghost. Rebecca's gorgeous writing enthralled me from the first page. She lives and works in the Chicago suburb where our store is located and where the story takes place, but I would have been just as mesmerized even if I hadn't been curious about her portrayal of our town."

So then after I told the publisher how much I liked the book, the quote made its way to her agent, and of course I should have known it was the wonderful Nicole Aragi. We started corresponding about my love of reverse chronology novels and I asked her what inspired her to try her hand at it? And guess what, it wasn't a novel at all, but the Seinfeld episode, "The Betrayal," which in itself was inspired by another seminal backwards play (and book), Harold Pinter's Betrayal.

Read more about The Hundred Year House in S. Kirk Walsh's review in The Boston Globe. And here's Ana Castillo's review of The Book of Unknown Americans in The New York Times Book Review.

And yes, we have a staff rec on Christina Henriquez's novel as well. Here is Sharon K. Nagel's recommendation of The Book of Unknown Americans: "Everyone who comes to America from another country has a dream of how they want their lives to be. For Arturo and Alma Rivera, it is that their fifteen-year-old daughter, Maribel, will get better and once again be the person that they remember. She sustained a brain injury while on her father’s construction site. The family left Mexico in order to find a good school for Maribel to get the help she needs. They settle in Delaware where Arturo has a job, and make friends within their community. There are no minor characters in this novel. Everyone has a story to tell of where they came from and why. The author has done a phenomenal job of defining home and country, and the many different ways that it can be interpreted. Sharon K. Nagel, Boswell Book Company, Milwaukee, Wisconsin"

So there you have it. Do you have your own favorite reverse chronology novel? Feel free to share them here. And please join us on Wednesday, August 6, 7 pm, at Boswell, for a great evening with Rebecca Makkai (photo credit Philippe Matsas) and Cristina Henriquez (photo credit Michael Lionstar).