Authors As Readers Advisors
Oprah’s Book Club 2.0 is turning famous authors into readers’ advisors, giving them a platform to suggest titles well worth seeking out in “15 Women Writers Discuss Their Favorite Overlooked Books.”
Elena Ferrante suggests fellow Italian writer, Elsa Morante, particularly her novel History (translated by William Weaver (Steerforth; OverDrive Sample; Feb. 2000) of which she says “One reads with one’s heart in one’s throat.”
Emily St. John Mandel offers J.M. Ledgard’s novel Submergence (Consortium/Coffee House; OverDrive Sample; Mar. 2013) saying it is a “masterpiece” that “both sings with tension and radiates immense humanity and tenderness.”
Ann Patchett, who, as a bookseller as well as author and, has experience advising readers, suggests Geoffrey Wolff’s “brilliant essay collection and memoir,” A Day at the Beach (PRH/Vintage; OverDrive Sample; Nov. 2013). She says it “offers up tales of daring along with expansive thinking, the bright light of humor, and the dark night of the soul, and delivers it all in writing sharp enough to cut your fingers on.”
Ann Beattie, Amy Bloom, Roxane Gay, Elizabeth Gilbert, Jamaica Kincaid, Miranda July, Lorrie Moore, Mary Roach, Karen Russell, Rebecca Stead, Meg Wolitzer, and Jacqueline Woodson, round out the authors making suggestions.
On the site as well is “The 17 Best Books to Pick Up This August.” The list includes the buzzy Siracusa by Delia Ephron (PRH/Blue Rider Press; Penguin Audio/BOT; OverDrive Sample) as well as The Imperial Wife by Irina Reyn (Macmillan/Thomas Dunne; OverDrive Sample) and Champion of the World by Chad Dundas (PRH/G.P. Putnam; Blackstone Audio; OverDrive Sample).