Coming Next Week
It’s a slow week for book releases. During this big shopping season, publishers assume that booksellers are out front selling, rather than unpacking new shipments from publishers.
As a result, major releases are slim next week and are all for younger readers.
The Gift (Witch and Wizard Series #2) by James Patterson and Ned Rust (Little Brown Books for Young Readers), ages 10+, about teen sibling magicians, elicits utter contempt from Kirkus: “There are no characters that even rise to the level of stereotypes and no genuine emotions in this embarrassing attempt at a ‘fantasy’ series that insults both genre and audience at every turn… A new low in children’s publishing.”
Entice by Carrie Jones (Bloomsbury Children’s Books) is the latest book in the bestselling paranormal romance series. Kirkus says, “Fans of the first two will continue to swoon, enjoying prose that’s idiosyncratically casual and indulgently, oh-so-teen-like angsty.”
The Vixen by Julie Larkin (Delacorte for Young Readers) is the first in a new series, set in the 1920’s. Like the Luxe series, in which Gossip Girl meets Edith Wharton, this one could be considered Gossip Girl meets F. Scott Fitzgerald. PW called it a “frothy debut,” but felt “the plot doesn’t live up to scrutiny.”
Coming for adults is the followup to last year’s How to Sew On a Button: And Other Nifty Things Your Grandmother Knew (which is still showing holds in several libraries):
How to Build a Fire: and Other Handy Things Your Grandfather Knew, by Erin Bried, (Ballantine Books) imparts the skills the Greatest Generation supposedly knew, from chapters on “How to Buy Meat” to “How to Plan a Date.”