Sunday, April 3, 2011

Sunday Salon - April 3


First off, I need to say happy birthday to my nephew, who is celebrating his 21st birthday today. I can still vividly remember seeing him for the first time. He weighed over 9 1/2 lbs when he was born; big enough that when my then 3 year old son wanted to hold him, I let him. Love that picture!

This month at Lit and Life, I'm going to be talking a lot about Omaha and Nebraska authors. I realized one day that I had books for review this month from both Timothy Schaffert and Rainbow Rowell and that I also had Mary Helen Stefaniak's The Cailiffs of Baghdad, Georgia on my shelves. I'm always jealous that so many of you get to attend great author events but I suddenly realized that there are plenty of authors right here to be excited about.
Rainbow Rowell

Rainbow Rowell, in addition to be the author Attachments, which I'm currently reading, is a columnist for the Omaha newspaper who just happened to write an article about the same subject and introduced me to a lot of new names.I'll be reviewing Attachments tomorrow then I hope to get to The Bookworm book store next week to have her sign my copy. She'll also be in Des Moines and Kansas City soon. I've been reading Rainbow's articles since she first started writing for the paper (I can't tell you how much I missed that female voice when she left for a while!) so I feel a little bit like I've watched her grow up!

Timothy Schaffert
Timothy Schaffert's latest book is The Coffins of Little Hope which I'll be reviewing next week. I'm also looking forward to seeing Schaffert that week, also at The Bookworm, and having my book signed. You've heard me talk about Schaffert before; he's the driving force behind Omaha Lit Fest which I discovered last year. The Coffins of Little Hope is getting great reviews; no surprise there, it is published by Unbridled Books. They never let me down! Schaffert's going to be hitting the road in May; look for him in Milwaukee, Chicago and Iowa City.

Are any local authors on your reading plans soon?

10 comments:

  1. No local authors but lots of others. Hope you stop by.

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  2. I'm looking forward to reading the reviews.
    'Rainbow Rowell' - what a great name!
    I'm reading Agatha Christie's autobiography (very slowly). The only connection to my area is her own mystery disappearance when she went AWOL, checked into an up-market hotel in the spa town of Harrogate, Yorkshire under the name of her husband's mistress, set off a police hunt and when eventually traced it was put about she had been suffering from amnesia. The mystery was never explained and she doesn't write about the incident in the autobiography, but her life and times is fascinating all the same.

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  3. You're so right about having local authors to visit! There are a few in my area but to see others I have to travel about 2 hours...I did read a Michigan author last month but it turned out that I didn't like her book!! :(

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  4. I just finished reading a book by a Madison author, but I don't currently have plans for any more. I should though -- there are a lot of good Madison authors to choose from!

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  5. How exciting! I am going to be particularly interested in your review for Coffins of Little Hope, because I have been hearing great things about it. We are gearing up for the UCF Orlando Book Festival, and I am pretty excited about it!

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  6. Happy Birthday to your nephew!

    Nothing local for me. I'm really regretting that I met a local sci-fi author when I worked at a bookstore years ago, but didn't read his book because I wasn't "into" sci-fi back then. Tsk tsk. Other than that I just haven't run into any local author's books recently.

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  7. Great post Lisa! I'm so glad you are discovering local authors, and enjoying reading their novels.

    I have The Cailiffs of Baghdad on my TBR list. Are you going to read it this month?

    I'm nervous for you to read The Heretic's Daughter, I'm hope it's as good as I thought it was when I read it! Oh... the pressure :)

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  8. Mari, I am reading "Cailiffs" later this month. I'm sure I'm going to like "Heretic's Daughter!" I can't wait to talk to Kent.

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  9. I haven't really read any local authors, but I definitely think it'd be something good to pursue! I kinda tend to think all the cool authors aren't from my neck of the woods, but maybe I just haven't done enough research. :) Looking forward to your thoughts later on about "Cailiffs"... I've heard good things!

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  10. I also get a little jealous of some of the other pockets of bloggers--both with their wealth of authors and their numbers of bloggers (I'm looking at you Utah!!). I know there are a few local authors in Dallas but there just doesn't seem to be a whole lot going on here. Maybe I'm just looking in the wrong places!

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