Her Book Self

On his blog this week, author R.A. Salvatore announced the cover of his newest book Neverwinter Wood to be released in fall of 2011.  Let's all take a moment to sigh over this drool-worthy cover.

I am an R.A. Salvatore addict.  

 In the past I've used Fairy Tale Fridays as a chance to explore classic fairy tales such as those by Hans Christian Andersen and The Brothers Grimm.  However, I also want to use this meme and my 2011 Fairy Tale Challenge to focus on some modern books that very easily fit into the fairy tale genre.  Today's pick is from an author that composes fiction for readers of all ages.  I previously read and reviewed her novel The Actor and The Housewife, but today I want to spotlight a different book by Shannon Hale.

Princess Academy is a cute fairy-tale story perfect for youth or young adults but easily enjoyed as a light novel for grown readers too. The book tells the story of Miri, a young girl from a mountain village who feels useless to her town since she is forbidden to work in the rock quarry with her family. One day an emissary from the king comes to the mountain and reveals that the king's priests have determined that the prince's bride is to be chosen among the girls from Miri's village.

Miri and all her friends are sent to a special Princess Academy to learn the ways of royalty but as Miri progresses through the school she finds that, even more than becoming a Princess, what she really longs for is a place to belong. With themes of the importance and potential of all people, and with a story that is sweet and yet unpredictable, Shannon Hale's Princess Academy is a charming tale that deserves all the accolades showered upon it.

I don't want to give away too much of this story, but I will say that it's a lovely fairy tale.  For those looking for a recent publication of an ages-old genre, this is definitely a short novel that you won't want to miss!

"You know you've read a good book when you turn the last page and feel a little as if you have lost a friend." ~ Paul Sweeney

Have you ever felt a bit of an emotional let down after finishing a really excellent book?  How would you finish the sentence: "You know you've read a good book when..."?

Set in a strange dystopia where lovesickness is much more associated with sickness than with love, Delirium by Lauren Oliver introduces readers to Lena, a young teen who dreams of her eighteenth birthday when she will receive "the cure" - a procedure designed to vaccinate against love. Of course as the date of her long awaited step into adulthood approaches, Lena begins to question the world around her: Is the cure all it is promised to be? Is love as dangerous and deadly as she has been taught? Is there something missing in what she has been told about her family's strange history? Amidst these tumultuous questions, Lena then does the unthinkable and dares to fall in love.

I was impressed with the creative premise of Delirium and enjoyed Lauren Oliver's writing, which drew me fully into the world and characters she created. What started out as a somewhat predictable setup took several unexpected twists and turns, and I was pleased to see Oliver take the story on a more intriguing path than what I expected. Many young adult writers seem content to deliver a simple, entertaining narrative but Delirium is a book to challenge readers and inspire thought outside the tale it tells. This book works as a standalone novel, but with the complex setting and protagonist, I would be plenty pleased to see a sequel to this captivating work.

I received an Advance Review copy of this work from LibraryThing's Early Reviewers program.  This review represents my honest and unbiased opinions.  Delirium is on sale Tuesday, February1st.

In a rare stroke of generosity author J.C. Phelps declared a multi-way tie for second place and allowed me to award multiple copies of the second place prize (Color Me Grey).  In other words, if you left a comment, you won!  Thank you so much to all of you for reading, following, and commenting at Her Book Self and for entering this contest!  But... for the super special winners, I'd like to congratulate:


for winning first prize which was a code for Color Me Grey and Shades of Grey!  And super duper congratulations to:


who has won the grand prize containing codes for Color Me Grey, Shades of Grey, and Reflections of Grey - the entire Alexis Stanton Chronicles thus far! 

Thanks to everyone for entering the contest and I hope you all enjoy the book(s)!  For those that want to know a little more about J.C. Phelps (besides what she shared in our interview) check out her great blog to find out more about she's currently reading and writing!

Last September, I was introduced to a charming blogger named Tif and her delightful blog Tif Talks Books!  Amidst her book reviews and literary conversations, Tif had a meme that I fell in love with called Fairy Tale Fridays!  I joined in for several weeks (my posts can be found with the tag "FTF") but discovered this month that Tif had been blogging Fairy Tales since last January and only planned the meme to last for a year.  Knowing how much I enjoyed the weekly trek into Fairyland and seeing how a few of my Fairy Tale posts remain in my top ten most read posts of all time; I definitely want to continue posting about fairy tales, which is why I am delighted to see Tif present her readers with the 2011 Fairy Tale Challenge!

Now, I'm not normally big on challenges and generally prefer to let whimsy dictate my reading material, but this is blogging goal that I want to place upon myself.  I'm stepping into this challenge full throttle and going for the highest level of Happily Ever After (check out Tif's challenge post for level descriptions) and will aim to post a review or analysis of a fairy tale 12 times from now until December, which should figure to be about once a month!  For convenience sake, I'll still call these posts "Fairy Tale Fridays" - to maintain my already existing "FTF" tag - but technically they are now part of the 2011 Fairy Tale Challenge.  If you have any great tales (classic or modern) to recommend or that you want to hear my thoughts about, feel free to leave me comments and if this challenge sounds like fun to you, hop over to Tif's blog and sign yourself up!

I love to laugh almost as much as I love to read and I consider it something of a double bonus when a good book makes me laugh out loud... even when this leads to others casting me odd glances on my city's public transportation system.  So it is with great pleasure that I can introduce all of you to an author that did make me laugh in his memoir, Life in the Slow Lane.  Join me in welcoming Thomas M. Sullivan!

*applause, applause*

Tell us a little bit about yourself. How did you get started as a driving instructor?

I had been a teacher for a number of years before teaching drivers ed. I taught computer software (things like Microsoft Word and Excel) to people retraining for new careers. When my wife and I moved to Portland, Oregon I tried being a computer draftsman for a state agency, but the climate was too grim to continue. So, I started looking for teaching jobs, landed on the drivers ed thing, and figured “Why not, this could be fun.”

How and when did you make the decision to record your teaching experiences as a memoir?

We had very erratic scheduling, so I would end up with a few hours between lessons and little to do. So, about a month into the job I started jotting down notes on funny stories (like the girl who couldn’t practice at home because Mom wrecked the car at a Starbucks drive-thru). Then I decided to tell the whole story, and the longer book emerged from those chunks of time.

Were you interested in writing before tackling driver's ed as a career?

I’d always been an avid reader, but I hadn’t considered writing. And if you want to write, there’s always the question of what to write about. So, when I got into drivers ed I figured it was a strange and unique enough experience to warrant a book.

You have great stories in your book about life as an instructor, but do you have any anecdotes from when you were a teenager learning to drive?

I was a well behaved student, so my learning phase was fairly mundane. I did, however, blow out a clutch on the family Camaro just after getting my license. I was thinking about something else and got the gears mixed up while downshifting. I went from 3rd gear to Reverse coming down a hill. Big grinding noise, smoke, etc. I’m not one for multitasking and try to avoid it.

One of the things I loved about your book is that parts of it had me literally laughing out loud! Do people generally consider you a funny person or do you save your humor for your writing?

I’d say that people think I’m pretty funny. That or they’re just humoring me so I’ll go away and let them get back to work. I’m learning that the humor that “works” among friends often should be avoided at the DMV or airports or with the police. Humor is a very objective thing and it goes nowhere with grim people, so anticipating your audience can be tricky.

The company you worked for displayed appalling levels of poor management and unprofessionalism. What kept you from simply walking away from the job?

Probably the same things that keep anyone mired in a bad job. You’re hoping things will change when problems are identified. You don’t want to look for another job. You don’t want to forego the income. You don’t want to add to the workload of others. And so on. You assume the CEO will figure out the email system and stop sending those inappropriate photos to every employee in the company – but he doesn’t.

Mostly, I’d worked so many different short-run jobs in the few years prior that I didn’t want to job hunt again. One thing I’ve learned over the past twenty years is that bad businesspeople are usually stubborn creatures, a quality that makes them awful at what they do. It’s best to get out sooner rather than later.

Are you planning to write any more books? What projects are you currently working on?

I’m finishing up a collection of nonfiction/humor essays that I hope to publish at some point. The stories range in topic from an encounter with a Flowbie-wielding hair stylist to a strange run-in at the DMV to a ridiculous encounter with a road-rager. The weirder life gets the more fun it is to write about.

Where can we find out more about you and your work?

A number of the essays I mentioned above have appeared in online journals. I have collected several of these and linked them to my author website. If anyone would like to read these, they can go to www.thomassullivanhumor.com.

Thanks for the interview!
 Check out Life in the Slow Lane - available now!

Driver's Education is a teenage rite of passage for many in the United States, and like most, I can recall an anecdote or two of the successes and mishaps from my first times behind the wheel.  However, I never gave much reflection to the people who accompanied me on those first perilous driving trips: the driver's ed instructors.  This perspective changed when I picked up a great new book.

Thomas M. Sullivan opens the door to the life of a driving instructor in his nonfiction memoir Life in the Slow Lane. From the bureaucracy of the company he worked for (and argued with), to the past-their-prime cars he used, and the unpredictability of a job centered around teenagers overly-confident or excessively nervous; Sullivan takes a direct and witty approach to his narrative. The appalling stories of demands placed on him by his employer are juggled with hilarious anecdotes and observations from his time with his students.

For anyone who ever wondered what a teacher was thinking when they stepped on the instructor's brake, Life in the Slow Lane offers a unique glimpse through the eyes of the passenger in a driver's ed car. Cleverly crafted and highly entertaining, Sullivan genuinely captures the humor of the mundane. Whether you fondly recall "Student Driver" as a rite of passage or a terrible teenage travesty, this is a book that will shed a green-means-go light on the world of driver's ed.

I'd highly recommend this book to readers who enjoy humorous memoirs.  I'm always trying to incorporate more nonfiction in my reading repertoire, so Life in the Slow Lane was a delightful discovery!

Stay tuned this week for my interview with author Thomas M. Sullivan!