It would be ideal if, every time I had to blog, I’d just read a new book and could talk about it.  But!  That is rarely the case.  It is especially not the case today.  I can say, however, that in preparation for tomorrow’s event (Brad Watson is coming to sign and read!), I read The Heaven of Mercury.  I know it’s not his most recent book – there are other blogs about that – but I have been meaning to read it for ages and figured that there’d be no better time than now.  And it was so good!  I devoured it and aim to read Aliens in the Prime of Their Lives, and just like everybody else in the bookstore I’m really excited about tomorrow.

And to completely change the subject – other than the fact that this deals more with books I haven’t read but want to – this is really interesting: back in 1971, the entry criteria for the Booker prize changed and as a result, a few books published in 1970 slipped through the cracks and lost their chance to snag the award.  And so 40 years later, we have “The Lost Booker Prize“.  Surprise surprise, I haven’t read a single one of the six books shortlisted for the belated award, but I’ve got my eye on Muriel Spark now.  And JG Farrell, for that matter.  If you needed any incentive to go exploring the foreign fiction section – in my opinion one of the richest sections in the store – well there it is.

Here’s some more information on those books.

Susie

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