The Elliott Bay Book Company was honored to have our 42nd President, Bill Clinton, sign My Life (Knopf) on June 30th, 2004.
Photo credit: Barbara Earl Thomas, 2004

New Fiction

Soul City
by Touré (Little, Brown)

Imagine a fantasy utopia that personifies the stereotypes of African-American culture. With music as its lifeblood, Soul City is just such a place, and writer Cadillac Jackson is determined to capture the town’s essence in a book that could become his masterpiece. Along the way, he falls in love with a DJ diva named Mahogany. Touré brings this city to life with "jukebox mobiles," buttery biscuits from Heaven, a mayoral race determined by musical taste, and the tricky traditions of an ancient people that can fly. This book is rich with witty social commentary and raw with Touré’s vivid tales. -C. Koehnen

The Secret Goldfish
by David Means (Fourth Estate)

David Means’s talent as a writer of the short story is unique. I was blown away by an earlier collection, Assorted Fire Events, and did my best to introduce everyone I know to those stories—which is difficult, since not many readers actually read short stories. I can’t resist the title story, "The Secret Goldfish," where a fish (our protagonist) lives his life in the gunky murkiness of a fish bowl, or "A Visit from Jesus," where a young woman’s encounter with Jesus produces incredibly disturbing results. The characters in Means’s stories live their lives in not-so-quiet desperation. -G. Berry

A Bit on the Side
by William Trevor (Viking)

Prolific Irish writer William Trevor plumbs the terrain of human interaction in these twelve delicately nuanced short stories. Set in the villages and cities of Ireland, each tale unearths the nuggets of truth, or revelation, in the characters’ situations, like a snapshot carefully magnified so that every detail is understood.

From illicit love in its various forms, to a widow’s surprising reaction to being alone, to a potentially disastrous blind date, to the title story’s deft dissection of an affair ending, these stories all illustrate our common attempts at finding dignity, and integrity, in our dealings with one another. -E. Dorfman

The Double
by Jose Saramago (Harcourt)

How does the Nobel laureate top his string of superlative novels (The Cave, All the Names, Blindness—the list goes back uninterrupted through all eight Harcourt translations, to Baltasar and Blimunda)? Answer: he doesn’t. But he maintains, which is as much as can be hoped for. The Double evolves, in typical Saramago fashion, from an intriguing question: what would happen if a man discovered someone—a complete stranger, unrelated—who was in every physical detail (down to moles and scars) his exact duplicate? What begins in curiosity becomes an obsessive unwinding of identity and relationships on both sides of the mirror. -P. Aaron

Madeleine is Sleeping
by Sarah Shun-Lien Bynum (Harcourt)

A sleeping girl’s fantastic dreams mingle with her reality in a French village. Time means nothing in this gorgeous novel with its imaginative, musical language and a cast of bizarre characters (think gypsies and circus folk!). Written in short snippets, this original story will surprise you. Why must the magical young girl Madeleine remain asleep? What is "real" and what is conjured in her mind? These questions will entice you until you reach the beautifully circular ending.

For a trip through a strange land with endearing characters as your guide, read this novel. -N. Brooks

Heir to the Glimmering World
by Cynthia Ozick (Houghton Mifflin)

Paying homage to the likes of Dickens and the Bronté sisters with a rich story and endearing characters, Cynthia Ozick introduces us to the Bronx in the 1940s. The main character, Rosie—a young orphan woman—draws the reader in, even after an eccentric family of upper-class German refugees is introduced. By the end of the novel, you might even like Mrs. Mitwisser—wife, boss, and general antagonist—but who cares! You will be basking in a blithe sort of infatuation with a family friend, much as Rosie does. -A.P. King

The Egyptologist
by Arthur Phillips (Random House)

Framed in a series of journal entries and letters, The Egyptologist moves from a retirement home in 1950s Australia to the Egyptian deserts and Bostonian high society of the 1920s. An Egyptologist, an apocryphal Egyptian king (renowned for racy poetry), a plucky Australian detective, a delicately devastating American heiress, and a cast of strange characters (including the legendary Howard Carter) drift through this darkly humorous story, reaching for immortality in the various ways available to them.

Arthur Phillips has written a fascinating puzzle box of a novel—suspenseful, enlightening, charming, witty, and ultimately, in the last few pages, utterly haunting. -V. Verano

The First Desire
by Nancy Reisman (Pantheon)

The First Desire concerns the ties of family and the lengths to which people will go to escape them. In the late 1920s, the Cohens emigrate from Russia to upstate New York. They are seeking a better life, but family tragedy finds them anyway. The mother, Rebecca, sickens and dies. One daughter, Celia, is either autistic or insane. The only son, Irving, escapes into alcohol and gambling. The tension comes to a head when the sensible eldest daughter, Goldie, disappears.

This is a wonderful read, full of subtle insight, and would make an excellent book club selection. -C. Rusczyk

The Plot Against America
by Philip Roth (Houghton Mifflin)

What if aviator Charles A. Lindbergh, admirer of Hitler, had run against and defeated Franklin Delano Roosevelt in the 1940 U.S. presidential election? Philip Roth poses this question in his new novel, a blend of historical fact and speculative fiction, told from the point of view of a young Jewish boy living in Newark. Roth brilliantly takes on isolationist, anti-Semitic, assimilationist America while still recognizing the capacity of otherwise ordinary, sometimes deluded people to act heroically. The aesthetic experience of this exquisitely written novel will encourage multiple readings. -K.M. Allman

The Owner's Box

by Peter Aaron

Here it is—
the first edition of the new Booknotes. As I indicated in the last edition, the changes are motivated by our desire to deliver more timely (bimonthly rather than quarterly) information about more new titles than was possible under the old format. To achieve this goal demands a concision far beyond that previously required. I can tell you from my own attempts, included herein, it's a daunting challenge: to convey the unique and endearing (or at least intriguing) qualities of a book that we've admired, within the constraints of a mere hundred words.

You, of course, will be the judge of how well we've begun, and the efficacy of the undertaking in the first place. I hope that both meet with your satisfaction, and that you'll let us know how we can make Booknotes a more informative and enjoyable resource if it in any way falls short of your expectations.

Finally, if you miss the longer articles we were able to include in the old format, starting in November, we're planning to launch an online magazine, in which our goal is to explore the world of books with greater depth and variety than ever before.

Sincerely,
Peter Aaron

Poetry

What an extraordinary conjunction of the stars when two grandes dames of American poetry deliver new collections in the same month! And the two offerings share more commonalities than mere timing: each of the maestra writes primarily short poems, both with increasingly simple language, achieving a transparency of startling power.

Stone composed the poems of In the Dark while going blind, so that the title might seem bitter, ironic, even self-pitying—until one reads the poems. The only darkness is of the mind, dispelled by the light of imagination, humanity, humility. Almost every poem contains memorable lines which, as with Dickinson, only misleadingly tease the sense of poems which are essentially irreducible.

Clifton’s poems take their subject-matter (there’s no "about" about them) from disease, survival, death, suffering, triumph, loss, love—transformed by her indefatigable sense of the transcendent capacity of humanity. Yes, she delivers a deceptively simple and inexplicably moving (greatness making the near-impossible appear effortless) homily on the endlessly redemptive possibilities of the human heart—of ‘mercy;’ or, what might be a more fitting title for not just this collection but Clifton’s entire poetic opus—‘grace.’ -P. Aaron

Children's & Young Adult Books

Cruise Control
by Terry Trueman (Harper Tempest)

As a young-adult novelist, Terry Trueman has the three Ps covered: her work is powerful, provocative, and poignant. This companion to Stuck in Neutral, the story of wheelchair-bound Shawn McDaniel, looks at Shawn’s older brother, Paul, super jock, ace student, for whom life should be perfect. If only Paul could see through the haze of his overpowering anger. This is an excellent choice for any book club, as the author examines delicate issues of disability and family dynamics, but it is the voice of Paul, uncertain and emotional, that makes this such an unforgettable book. -H. Myers

A Crack in the Line
by Michael Lawrence (Greenwillow)

Teenagers often have lives that resemble a train wreck. For Alaric Underwood, the protagonist in this beautifully stark and poetic thriller, the analogy is more real than he can understand. Two years after his mother is killed in a railway accident, Alaric doesn’t have much hope. At his most desperate moment, he finds himself transported to another dimensioncone in which his counterpart is a girl, his home is intact, and most importantly, one in which his mother is still alive. This book explores a world of probability and fluxcall the cracks or ‘what-ifs’ that happen in a life. -J. Schurk

Wild About Books
by Judy Sierra
illus. by Marc Brown (Knopf)

Lions and tigers and bookmobiles, oh my! The animals at the zoo are devouring bookscllamas reading Anton Chekhov, Tennessee Williams, and George Bernard Shaw; a kangaroo who adores Nancy Drew. Books on skyscrapers are for giraffes, while bears love titles on picnicking and rabbits fancy Margaret Wise Brown. Where can it all lead? To writing, of course! With insect haiku, and all manner of four-legged memoirs and novels. It’s a delightful diversion (dedicated to a devoted doctor of noteworthy children’s literature), with rollicking rhymes and capricious illustrations. -H. Myers

A Sound Like Someone Trying Not to Make a Sound
by John Irving
illus. by Tatjana Hauptmann (Doubleday)

Yes, that John Irving—this soothing and simple bedtime story comes from Irving’s novel A Widow for One Year. In it, Tom wakes to a disturbing sound, but his baby brother Tim sleeps on. Tom wakes his dad to describe the sound, and the two eventually find a very nonthreatening explanation for the noise. The rhythm of narration between son and father, monstrous and temperate, is perfectly matched to the sublime deep-toned, soft-focus pencil illustrations. This is an absolute treasure. -H. Myers

Nonfiction & Current Affairs

The Wimp Factor: Gender Gaps, Holy Wars, and the Politics of Anxious Masculinity
by Steven Ducat (Beacon)

Whether you are a person with a penis or not, you will enjoy this witty and complete social study of gender, masculinity, and current American politics. From the introduction, titled "Fear and the Phallus," to the end chapter, nothing concerning gender and politics is left untouched: George W. Bush, Hillary Clinton (as well as Eve, of course), and "fundamentalist femiphobia." This is more than just an exposé of the current climate, however. It’s a definitive, much-needed book on complexities of gender. -A.P. King

Persepolis 2: The Story of a Return
by Marjane Satrapi (Pantheon)

Persepolis 2 seems the exact opposite of Satrapi’s Persepolis: The Story of a Childhood: no politics, no war stories, no torture. This is simply the story, in graphic-novel form, of how Satrapi came to Europe and sailed the volatile seas of adolescence: a coming-of-age tale. As Satrapi experiences the teenage love affair with revolutionary politics, and as she goes home to Iran, we discover that in one’s journey, politics are implicit. The way that Satrapi shares how every life is a political event makes Persepolis 2 the perfect kind of sequel: it expands on the original to make both volumes essential reading. -P. Constant

Magical Thinking
by Augusten Burroughs (St. Martin’s)

Brace yourself for this smartly depraved, heart-wrenching, belly-buckling collection of autobiographical vignettes. In Magical Thinking, Augusten Burroughs manages, as in his previous books, to narrowly avoid cloying self-deprecation—favoring his brand of, well, purgative, self-effacing hysteria that (hopefully) manages to provide the author as much twisted comfort as it does his readers. Particularly impressive is Burroughs’s ability to effectively veer from one distinct mood to another in a single paragraph. This is the first collection of raw personal histories that made me laugh until my cheeks cramped, whimper shamelessly, and gag like a stuck pig—simultaneously! It’s crass, delightful stuff. -M. Stearns

Why Some Like It Hot: Food, Genes, and Cultural Diversity
by Gary Paul Nabhan (Island Press)

Gary Nabhan’s new book unravels some of the bigger mysteries in my dietary life, like why my stomach is so genuinely disinterested in Indian curry dishes and why my eyes will not cease to water after a helping of hot sauce on my favorite Mexican food dish.

Nabhan takes an in-depth look at cultural diversity and the importance of localized diets, and shows how they still are relevant today. Following ancestral roots, we see how dietary traditions have protected people from disease. This book succeeds in combining the entertainment of a cooking essay with the depth of a well-researched paper. -C. Reid

All I Did Was Ask
by Terry Gross (Hyperion)

Read Mario Puzo candidly discussing autobiographical details of the Corleone family, or Johnny Cash reminiscing about the evolution of his singing style, and his tour with 19 year-old Elvis. Puzo and Cash are among the many icons and great American artists, performers, and writers included in Terry Gross’s book of interviews taken from the transcripts of her talk show, Fresh Air. Gross’s up-front and personal style of interviewing brings the voices of Jodie Foster, Andre Dubus, Eric Clapton, Chuck Close, and many more to the page as if they were in your living room telling all that you would ask. -A.C. Jennings

Hallelujah! The Welcome Table
by Maya Angelou (Random House)

Sometimes even the most delectable veal medallions require a few drops of Tabasco. Southern memories are easily recalled with spoon bread, fried apples, homemade biscuits, and sausage, proving that what language cannot provide, a good meal most certainly will. When faced with writing her fourth book, poet and author Maya Angelou retreated to her kitchen, where whipping up twelve eclairs was the perfect remedy for writer’s block. Nothing will warm your heart or fill your belly more than this collection of stories will. -S. Riley

The Twelve Little Cakes
by Dominika Dery (Riverhead)

Dominika Dery recounts a fairy-tale-like story of her childhood as the cherished youngest daughter of Czech dissidents. Despite pressure on her family to abandon their beliefs, and the hardships they endured as a result, her story is never bitter. Instead, she has written a loving testament to her parents’ bravery, wit, and ingenuity, and a magical account of everyday Czech life. In the Czech literary tradition of laughing in the face of tragedy, even the communist bureaucracy is treated as an inept source of amusement. This is a genuinely heartwarming book, and a fascinating look at a time of great transitions and political unrest. -S. Keliher

My Life
by Bill Clinton (Knopf)

It is indeed 957 pages and three pounds, with an index that’s longer than many short stories. My Life is also an affirmation of American democracy; a country boy of humble origins, with nothing but brains, energy, and charm, becomes President of the United States. In many countries, this book would be fiction.

It’s a rambling, personal, witty political history that won’t keep you up late at night, but will draw you back for one more story until the last page (and probably a month of your life) is over. -J. Brown

Devil in the Details: Scenes from an Obsessive Girlhood
by Jennifer Traig (Little, Brown )

Jennifer Traig’s account of her teenage years with obsessive-compulsive disorder (in particular, with scrupulosity, characterized by religious fervor), is one of the funniest books I’ve ever read. What could have been an exercise in self-pity becomes instead a fierce, comic masterpiece, as she recounts the disastrous collision of teen angst with OCD. High school’s bad enough without worrying if your classmates are ritually impure or whether water is actually clean. Throughout, Traig never loses her compassion for either her younger self or for her beleaguered family, making this a touching as well as a hilarious read. -S. Keliher

The Know It All: One Man’s Humble Quest to Become the Smartest Person in the World
by A. J. Jacobs (Simon & Schuster)

Do you have know-it-alls in your life? Maybe you should put them head to head with A.J. Jacobs, a brave if quixotic young writer who reads the Encyclopedia Britannica from beginning to end. Each chapter is a mini-encyclopedia of trivia mixed with laugh out loud stories from Jacobs’s own life. His list of ten ways to ensure your own place in the prestigious Encyclopedia Britannica includes: (1) get beheaded, (2) explore the Arctic, (7) get castrated (men only), (9) become a mistress to a monarch (ladies only), and (10) become a liturgical vestment. May the smartest reader win! -K. Leuschke

Maeve Brennan: Homesick at The New Yorker
by Angela Bourke (Basic Books)

Angela Bourke’s much anticipated historical biography of enigmatic Irish essayist and fiction writer Maeve Brennan will engage both Brennan’s many admirers and those interested in New York’s literary and cultural history. Brennan, a contemporary of New Yorker editors Wallace Shawn and William Maxwell, wrote for over thirty years as the "Long-Winded Lady" of the magazine’s "Talk of the Town" section. Bourke skillfully weaves information based on interviews and archival research with passages from Brennan’s essays, fiction, and letters into a fascinating, sometimes troubling portrait of a complicated artist. - K.M. Allman

The Man Who Outgrew His Prison Cell: Confessions of a Bank Robber
by Joe Loya (Rayo)

Joe Loya’s new memoir is an old story: innocent East Los Angeles boy grows up in a broken home and acts out with an assortment of reckless behaviors. But Joe’s story is anything but ordinary. This innocent boy fights back against an abusive father by stabbing him in the neck and robbing countless banks, sometimes stealing as much as $250,000.

While serving an eight-year prison sentence, Joe has plenty of time to reconsider his life and future. After a correspondence with a well-known author, Joe is able to escape his past and tell his story through this book and a theatrical one-man show. -C. Reid

Will in the World: How Shakespeare Became Shakespeare
by Stephen Greenblatt (Norton)

From one of the world’s leading scholars on Shakespearean plays comes this fascinating new exploration of how Shakespeare became not only the greatest playwright of his time, but of all time. Part biographical portrait, part text analysis, and part historical interpretation, Greenblatt’s insightful examination traces Shakespeare’s life and the world around him with an in-depth, yet extremely engaging look at the events that shaped the man and his writings. Will in the World is the perfect must-read book for anyone interested in Shakespeare, Elizabethan England, or theatre in general. -D. Hsieh

The Journey of Crazy Horse: A Lakota History
by Joseph M. Marshall III (Viking)

Mention the name ‘Crazy Horse’ and what comes to mind? Custer and the Battle of the Little Big Horn, of course. But who was this Indian warrior, how did he live with his Lakota tribe, and what drove him to this battle? Marshall answers these questions and more in this very personal and intriguing biographical narrative. The author, a Sioux who speaks Lakota as his first language, uses numerous sources from various Lakota tribes, as well as accounts from his life on the reservation, to paint an in-depth portrait of Crazy Horse. Enjoy the journey! -C. Kirchner

Shanghai Diary
by Ursula Bacon (M Press)

Ursula Bacon relates the story of her family fleeing Germany in 1939, along with 20,000 other middle-European Jews, for the only free and open port in the world at the time: Shanghai, China. She was eleven years old at the time of their arrival in Shanghai and chronicles the trials and great difficulties of living in a very strange land. Shanghai makes a fascinating central character. This is a story I was previously unfamiliar with, and I was thoroughly absorbed in Bacon’s story, which proves to be buoyant and absolutely life-affirming. -G. Berry

New Fall Paperbacks

Fiction

The Early Stories by John Updike (Ballantine) September
Old School by Tobias Wolff (Vintage) September
Waxwings by Jonathan Raban (Vintage) October
The Girl Who Played Go by Shan Sa (Penguin) October
Dream Jungle by Jessica Hagedorn (Penguin) October
The Stranger at the Palazzo D'Oro by Paul Theroux (Mariner) October

Non-Fiction

Mountains Beyond Mountains by Tracy Kidder (Random House) August
The True Notebooks by Mark Salzman (Vintage) September
A Short History of Nearly Everything by Bill Bryson (Broadway) September
Hegemony or Survival by Noam Chomsky (Owl) September
Living to Tell the Tale by Gabriel Garcia Marquez (Vintage) September
The Bookseller of Kabul by Asne Seierstad (Back Bay) October