The New Yorker Stories, by Ann Beattie. Scribner, 2010. Print length: 528 p. SHORT STORIES. EW's slant: "...an in-depth study of a subculture and a staggering almanac of emotions." Amazon customer rating: none yet. Kindle edition $14.99 (Hardcover $19.80). Text-to-Speech: Disabled.
"When Ann Beattie began publishing short stories in The New Yorker in the mid-seventies, she emerged with a voice so original, and so uncannily precise and prescient in its assessment of her characters’ drift and narcissism, that she was instantly celebrated as a voice of her generation. Subtle, wry, and unnerving, she is a master observer of the unraveling of the American family, and also of the myriad small occurrences and affinities that unite us. Her characters, over nearly four decades, have moved from lives of fickle desire to the burdens and inhibitions of adulthood and on to failed aspirations, sloppy divorces, and sometimes enlightenment, even grace. Each Beattie story, says Margaret Atwood, is 'like a fresh bulletin from the front: we snatch it up, eager to know what’s happening out there on the edge of that shifting and dubious no-man’s-land known as interpersonal relations.'"Sterling's Gold: Wit and Wisdom of an Ad Man, by Roger Sterling. Grove Press, 2010. Print length: 176 p. POPULAR CULTURE. EW's slant: "For Mad Men fans in severe withdrawal...too bad this handsome-looking book turns ot to be little more than a collection of quips uttered by the silver fox on the show." Amazon customer rating: 2 1/2 stars (3 reviews). Kindle edition $9.29 (Hardcover $11.53). Text-to-Speech: Enabled.
"Advertising pioneer and visionary Roger Sterling, Jr., served with distinction in the Navy during World War II, and joined Sterling Cooper Advertising as a junior account executive in 1947. He worked his way up to managing partner before leaving to found his own agency, Sterling Cooper Draper Pryce, in 1963. During his long and illustrious career, Sterling has come into contact with all the luminaries and would-be luminaries of the advertising world, and he has acquired quite a reputation among his colleagues for his quips, barbs, and witticisms. Taken as a whole, Roger Sterling’s pithy comments and observations amount to a unique window on the advertising world - a world that few among us are privileged to witness first-hand - as well as a commentary on life in New York City in the middle of the twentieth century." - www.groveatlantic.com/.
The Last Days of Ptolemy Grey, by Walter Mosley. Riverhead, 2010. Print length: 288 p. NOVEL. EW's slant: "A series of bizarre plot twists...cloud and blur Ptolemy Grey's story line..." Amazon customer rating: 4 1/2 stars. Kindle edition $12.99 (Hardcover $17.13). Text-to-Speech: Enabled.
"Ptolemy Grey is a 91-year-old African American living alone in violent South Central L.A. Frail and suffering from dementia, largely forgotten by his extended family, he can’t remember to eat, his mind 'scattered over nearly a hundred years.' He relives events marked by racism, lynching, poverty, and longing for his long-dead wife. His great-grand nephew, Reggie, takes him to the grocery store and prompts him to eat. When Reggie is killed in a drive-by shooting, Ptolemy’s days appear to be numbered. But Robyn, a beautiful, resourceful 17-year-old, steps in. As she sees to Ptolemy’s needs, she awakens his desire for the lucidity he once had.. a deeply thoughtful, provocative, and often beautiful meditation on aging, memory, family, loss, and love. Ptolemy and Robynare truly indelible characters. Mosley’s story is ultimately life affirming, and his writing is by turns gritty and sublime..." - Thomas Gaughan for Booklist.
An Object of Beauty, by Steve Martin. Grand Central Publishing, 2010. Print length: 304 p. NOVEL. EW's slant: "...a dramedy of manners that doubles as an immersion course in the rarefied world of high-end art...wry, wise, and keenly observant." Amazon customer rating: 4 1/2 stars (3 reviews). Kindle edition $12.99 (Hardcover: $14.50). Text-to-Speech: Enabled.
"Martin compresses the wild and crazy end of the millennium and finds in this piercing novel a sardonic morality tale. Lacey Yeager is an ambitious young art dealer who uses everything at her disposal to advance in the world of the high-end art trade in New York City. After cutting her teeth at Sotheby's, she manipulates her way up through Barton Talley's gallery of 'Very Expensive Paintings,' sleeping with patrons, and dodging and indulging in questionable deals, possible felonies, and general skeeviness until she opens her own gallery in Chelsea. Narrated by Lacey's journalist friend, Daniel Franks, whose droll voice is a remarkable stand-in for Martin's own, the world is ordered and knowable, blindly barreling onward until 9/11... Martin (an art collector himself) is an astute miniaturist as he exposes the sound and fury of the rarified Manhattan art world..." - Publishers Weekly. Briefly Mentioned: Other Steve Martin Titles Available in Kindle Editions:
Born Standing Up. Scribner, 2007. Print length: 224 p. MEMOIR. Amazon customer rating: 4 1/2 stars (264 reviews). Kindle edition $11.99 (Paperback $10.20). Text-to-Speech: Disabled.
"At age 10, Steve Martin got a job selling guidebooks at the newly opened Disneyland. In the decade that followed, he worked in Disney's magic shop, print shop, and theater, and developed his own magic/comedy act. By age 20, studying poetry and philosophy on the side, he was performing a dozen times a week, most often at the Disney rival, Knott's Berry Farm. Obsession is a substitute for talent, he has said, and Steve Martin's focus and daring - his sheer tenacity - are truly stunning. He writes about making the very tough decision to sacrifice everything not original in his act, and about lucking into a job writing for The Smothers Brothers Show. He writes about mentors, girlfriends, his complex relationship with his parents and sister, and about some of his great peers in comedy - Dan Ackroyd, Lorne Michaels, Carl Reiner, Johnny Carson. He writes about fear, anxiety and loneliness. And he writes about how he figured out what worked on stage." - Amazon.
Late for School. Grand Central Publishing, 2010. Print length: 32 p. CHILDREN'S FICTION. Amazon customer rating: 5 stars (5 reviews). Kindle edition $9.99 (Hardcover $12.23). Text-to-Speech: Enabled.
"Getting to school has never been quite this difficult - or hilarious. Celebrated writer and performer Steve Martin and dynamic artist C. F. Payne (illustrator of John Lithgow's children's books) have teamed up to tell a story of the adventure, danger, and laughs of the journey to school."
The Pleasure of My Company. Hyperion, 2003. Print length: 176 p. NOVEL. Amazon customer rating: 4 stars (168 reviews). Kindle edition $6.99 (Paperback $9.00). Text-to-Speech: Enabled.
"Readers expecting something zany, something crudely humorous from Steve Martin's second novel, The Pleasure of My Company, will discover much greater riches. While the book has a sense of humor, Martin moves everywhere with a gentler, lighter touch in this elegant little fiction that verges on the profound and poetic. Daniel Pecan Cambridge is the narrator and central consciousness of the novel (actually a novella). Daniel, an ex-Hewlett-Packard communiqué encoder, is a savant whose closely proscribed world is bounded on every side by neuroses and obsessions. He cannot cross the street except at driveways symmetrically opposed to each, and he cannot sleep unless the wattage of the active light bulbs in his apartment sums to 1,125. Daniel's starved social life is punctuated by twice-weekly visits from a young therapist in training, Clarissa; by his prescription pick-ups from a Rite Aid pharmacist, Zandy; and by his 'casual' meetings with the bleach-blond real estate agent, Elizabeth, who is struggling to sell apartments across the street. But Daniel's dysfunctional routines are shattered one day when he becomes entangled in the chaos of Clarissa's life as a single mother..." - Patrick O'Kelley for Amazon.com Review.
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