J. Michaels Staff Picks
160 East Broadway # A (541) 342-2002
Of local interest is Megan Kruse’s Call Me Home. Oregon writer, an uncommonly powerful debut novel.
Also in fiction, A Little Life by Hanya Yanagihara. Astonishing, challenging, upsetting and profoundly moving.
And it’s a big year for rediscovering the short story. Three collections, two American women and one South American woman: A Manual For Cleaning Women by Lucia Berlin (see review this issue), The Visiting Privilege by Joy Williams, The Complete Stories of Clarice Lispector.
In non-fiction: Andy Goldsworthy Ephemeral Works 2004-2014, Hold Still by Sally Mann, Maira Kalman’s Beloved Dog, Thing Explainer: Complicated Stuff In Simple Words by Randall Munroe and Mario Vargas Llosa’s Notes on the Death of Culture: Essays on Spectacle and Society.
Tsunami Books Top 10 List
2585 Willamette Street (541) 345-8986
I’ll Give You the Sun by Jandy Nelson. Speak, $10.99. (See review this issue).
M Train by Patti Smith. Alfred A. Knopf, $25. Patti Smith’s M Train is the perfect gift to any artist. A few days spent reading it leaves you eager to get back to your creative work with renewed energy. (See review this issue).
Go Set a Watchman by Harper Lee. Harper, $27.99, but on sale at Tsunami for $16.
Notes on the Assemblage by Juan Felipe Herrera. City Lights Books, $14.95. Herrera is the new poet laureate of the United States.
Rad American Women A-Z: Rebels, Trailblazers, and Visionaries Who Shaped Our History. City Lights Books, $14.95.
Writing Across the Landscape: Travel Journals 1960-2013 by Lawrence Ferlinghetti. Liveright Publishing Corporation, $35.
Between the World and Me by Ta-Nehisi Coates. Spiegel & Grau, $24. (See review this issue).
The Oregon Trail: A New American Journey by Rinker Buck. Simon & Schuster, $28.
The Plover by Brian Doyle. Picador, $16.
Thich Nhat Hanh’s wonderful little quartet: How to Sit, How to Eat, How to Love, and How to Walk. Parallax Press, $9.95 each.
Thurston Book Exchange Top Sellers
5505 Main St., Springfield or call (541)726-7126
In random order, with the new price and the store’s discounted price next to it.
Go Set a Watchman, Harper Lee $27 / $21.
All The Light We Cannot See, Anthony Doerr, $27.99 / $21.25.
The Fault In Our Stars, John Green, $12.99/$9.75.
The Husbands’ Secret, Liane Moriarty, $16/ $12.
Girl on the Train, Paula Hawkins, $26.95/$21.
Any George R.R. Martin Game of Thrones book $9.99 / $7.50.
The biggest sellers of the year are the Creative Haven Grown Up Coloring books $5.99/$4.50. Books can be purchased used and new and can be ordered in “just a day or two.” The used price is half of the paperback price, or $9 for used hardbacks.
Duck Store book department
895 E. 13th Avenue (541) 346-4331
Rare Air: The University of Oregon’s Historic 2014 Football Season by The Oregonian. Pediment Publishing, $34.95.
Good Night Oregon by Dan McCarthy, Joe Veno. Our World of Books, $9.95.
Go Set A Watchman by Harper Lee, Harper. $27.99, 25 percent off, bestseller.
Station Eleven by Emily St. John Mandel Vintage Titles, $15.95, 25 percent off, bestseller and part of the UO’s reading program.
Secret Garden: An Inky Treasure Hunt and Coloring Book by Johanna Basford. Laurence King, $15.95.
100 Things Oregon Fans Should Know & Do Before They Die by Chris Hansen and Rob Moseley. Triumph Books, $14.95.
Infinite Awareness: The Awakening of a Scientific Mind by Marjorie Woollacott (neuroscience faculty at UO). Rowman & Littlefield Publishers, $38.
The Boys in the Boat: Nine Americans and Their Epic Quest for Gold at the 1936 Berlin Olympics by Daniel James Brown. Penguin Books, $17.
Deep Down Dark: The Untold Stories of 33 Men Buried in a Chilean Mine, and the Miracle That Set Them Free by Hector Tobar (Journalism faculty at UO). Picador USA, $16.
The Beer Bible by Jeff Alworth. Workman Publishing, $19.95.
Eugene Public Library
eugene-or.gov/library (541) 682-5450
Rather than tell you the library’s top picks, the Eugene Public Library would like to help you chose your next favorite read.
The moment you finish a great book is bittersweet. You’ve left a whole world. Where will you go next?
The Eugene Public Library’s staff is specially trained in “reader’s advisory.” That’s the professional skill of helping you, individually, find the next book you’ll love. They know just which questions to ask to come up with suggestions to match your tastes. Often, these turn out to be preferences you didn’t even know you had, such as a love of plot over character, or vice versa.
Reader’s advisory is available all the time for fiction and nonfiction, and for all ages. Ask at a desk when you’re at the library; call; or get in touch using online live chat or email.
You can borrow your choices from the library’s shelves. Or download as ebooks and audiobooks at the library’s website, free with your library card, and especially handy when traveling — or snowed in!