Albom

Hyperion announced today that they’ll be publishing The Time Keeper by Mitch Albom on August 28. This is a “magical” new novel about Father Time that casts the fairy-tale figure in a new light: as the person who first attempted to track time. It’s the first novel in six years from Albom, who originally struck literary gold in 1997 with Tuesdays with Morrie, a memoir about the death of his friend and mentor, teacher Morrie Schwartz.

“We are excited once again to share a new Mitch Albom book with his beloved fans and readers,” said Hyperion President and Publisher Ellen Archer. “Mitch taps into an issue we all struggle with these days—our time and what we make of it. His novel will spark a lot of conversation about how we live our lives now—and what we can’t afford to forget.”

Albom’s modern-day parables have moved millions and The Time Keeper isn’t likely to be an exception. Will you look out for it?

Related in BookPage: our past coverage of Mitch Albom’s books, including an interview about his last novel, Have a Little Faith.

Thirty years after his breakthrough debut, the memoir The Invention of Solitude, Paul Auster returns to the medium in Winter Journal.

With the hindsight of Didion, the narrative elegance of Nabokov and the mesmerizing writing for which he himself is known, Auster (now 65) steps into what he calls “the winter of [his] life” by looking back on a lifetime. He shares his memories and the fleeting moments of his body—places it has been, things it has felt (both wonderful and terrible)—through threaded vignettes constructed of languorous sentences that feel much like memory itself. Each fragment careens toward death, a boat against the current.

Auster writes as “you,” a device which could feel like an assault were it not for the accomplished writer behind it. At times, the “you” seems removed, peering at his former self in a distant way, as when he recounts the hours immediately following his mother’s death: “No tears, no howls of anguish, no grief—just a vague sense of horror growing inside you.” At other times, the “you” seems to be surprised and thrilled all over again, such as when he discovers his own penis at age five: “. . . how fitting that you should have a miniature fireman’s helmet emblazoned on your person, on the very part of your body, moreover, that looks like and functions as a hose.” And always, the “you” is hypnosis to trick you, reader, into remembering a life that isn’t your own.

It’s a fast read, never waning to nostalgia, that will move you to chew the cud of your own mortality and (somehow) still find time to disappear into your own memories.

Enjoy the opening:

You think it will never happen to you, that it cannot happen to you, that you are the only person in the world to whom none of these things will ever happen, and then, one by one, they all begin to happen to you, in the same way they happen to everyone else.

Your bare feet on the cold floor as you climb out of bed and walk to the window. You are six years old. Outside, snow is falling, and the branches of the trees in the backyard are turning white.

Speak now before it is too late, and then hope to go on speaking until there is nothing more to be said. Time is running out, after all. Perhaps it is just as well to put aside your stories for now and try to examine what it has felt like to live inside this body from the first day you can remember being alive until this one. A catalogue of sensory data. What one might call a phenomenology of breathing.

Will you keep an eye out for Auster’s new memoir in August?

That’s the thought behind the Buried Life, a group of four grads who set out to achieve the ultimate bucket list: every single crazy thing they wanted to do. Their cross-country Winnebago tour became an MTV reality show and led to What Do You Want to Do Before You Die?. The book is a graphic collection of illustrated dreams of the Buried Life’s fans, plus heartfelt essays by the guys and more.

Meet the four boys who make up the Buried Life in the book trailer from Artisan books:

Is this a book you’d give to a graduate? Do you wish you’d received it when you graduated?

I have always had a soft spot for short fiction, especially when I have limited time. Do you take public transportation to work, or want the satisfaction that comes from reading a complete story before you go to bed (instead of just a few chapters of a novel)? Are you traveling this summer, and want to be able to pick up and put down your book without worrying about losing the plot? Sounds like you need to read some short stories!

Here are a few of our favorite collections. What collections are at the top of your list?

Among the Missing
by Dan Chaon
Dan Chaon’s Among the Missing contains stories of families that have stepped off the path to the American dream, with characters left to figure out where and how they stumbled. (If you like this one, check out his new collection, Stay Awake, which came out in February.) Read more>>

Animal Crackers
by Hannah Tinti
It’s hard not to like Hannah Tinti even before you read Animal Crackers. She’s the lone editor and half of a two-woman crew at the avant-garde literary magazine One Story, which consists of one story per issue. While anyone who can persist at such a labor of love and still manage to put Ramen noodles on the table deserves admiration, Tinti also somehow found time to pen a stunningly original collection of stories on the human condition. Read more>>

Before You Suffocate Your Own Fool Self
by Danielle Evans
Danielle Evans’ book of eight stories, Before You Suffocate Your Own Fool Self, is long anticipated. Her first story, “Virgins,” was published in the Paris Review and then selected for The Best American Stories 2008. “Virgins” is a quietly devastating tale of two teenage girls navigating the rocky road to adulthood. Read more>>

Blueprints for Building Better Girls
by Elissa Schappell
Mothers, daughters, friends, wives and lovers—from the late ’70s to the present day—fill the pages of Elissa Schappell’s wise and witty linked short story collection, Blueprints for Building Better Girls. Schappell, a contributing editor at Vanity Fair with an impressive literary pedigree, paints a multifaceted portrait of modern womanhood with the conflicted, interconnected female protagonists of her eight compelling stories. Read more>>

The Boat
by Nam Le
The single-author short story collection has its devoted fans. But The Boat is so engaging, so unequivocally well done, that it’s sure to appeal to any fan of good writing. From the opening tale of The Boat, it’s hard not to be giddy: Wait, was that a brilliantly self-conscious and humorous slice of the writing life, which doubled as a poignant story about fathers and sons and family tragedies? Yes. Yes, it was. Read more>>

Burning Bright
by Ron Rash
The short stories in New York Times bestseller and PEN/Faulkner award finalist Ron Rash’s new collection, Burning Bright, flow so seamlessly into each other that the reader is tempted to devour them all in one sitting like a novel. But doing so would mean losing the formidable power of each individual story. Read more>>

Going Away Shoes
by Jill McCorkle
Jill McCorkle’s Going Away Shoes concentrates on the plight of mostly middle-aged women struggling with the consequences of their flawed relationships. McCorkle is an acute observer of the foibles of domestic life, blending empathy for her characters’ predicaments with an unsparing take on those grim circumstances. Read more>>

Gold Boy, Emerald Girl
by Yiyun Li
In Gold Boy, Emerald Girl, Yiyun Li explores the big themes—individuality, honor, family ties and love—and sets them against a richly detailed tapestry of Chinese life. Though each story takes place in modern-day China, they are formally rigorous and crafted with an elegance that harkens back to stylists like Chekhov and William Trevor. Read more>>

Magic for Beginners
by Kelly Link
Kelly Link’s second short story collection is aptly titled Magic for Beginners, for the short fiction she presents here is truly magical, with masterfully crafted stories that are as dark as they are delightful. Link’s first story collection, Stranger Things Happen (2001), became a cult favorite, with surreal and bizarre stories such as the Nebula Award-winning “Louise’s Ghost.” She gained considerable industry attention when she turned down offers to publish her second collection with a major publishing house, choosing instead to stick with Small Beer Press, the independent press she co-owns with her husband Gavin Grant (a BookPage contributor). Read more>>

Natasha and Other Stories
by David Bezmozgis
David Bezmozgis’ Natasha: and Other Stories,  seven stories about growing up a poor Russian Jewish immigrant in Toronto are so Russian in tone they should be read with a glass of tea at hand and a cube of sugar between one’s teeth. Yet they are so Western in theme that even if you’ve never set foot outside your hometown, they’ll make your heart ache.  Read more>>

St. Lucy’s Home for Girls Raised by Wolves
by Karen Russell
Karen Russell’s startlingly original collection, St. Lucy’s Home for Girls Raised by Wolves, features graceful and seductive prose that transports the reader into surreal and yet utterly plausible realms. Many of the stories are set in Russell’s native region of South Florida, but it’s not the familiar territory of high-rise condos and golf courses. Read more>>

Where the God of Love Hangs Out
by Amy Bloom
Amy Bloom has what I might have thought were magical powers if I hadn’t learned that she’s spent time as a psychotherapist. She can jump from one character’s perspective to another’s in the space of a paragraph, fully inhabiting each, as smoothly and unmistakably as if she were doing impressions of famous people onstage. In two lines she can telegraph the essence of a character’s personality, the sum of his years, the battles he’s won and lost and the ones that still rage. The stories she tells in her new collection, Where the God of Love Hangs Out, vary widely, but she never overreaches or missteps. Read more>>

This week’s Monday contest features five suspense superstars that are sure to add some thrills and chills to your summer reading list.

Dublin Dead by Irish author Gerard O’Donovan is about National Drugs Unit cop Mike Mulcahy and his sidekick, reporter Siobhan Fallon. Harbor Nocturne is the latest installment in Joseph Wambaugh’s Hollywood Division series, featuring the usual zany cast of characters. Nicci French’s Blue Monday is the first in a new series featuring loner psychotherapist Frieda Klein. Born to Darkness, the first book in a new paranormal romantic suspense series from Suzanne Brockmann; it was the Top Pick in Romance in our April issue. Beautiful Sacrifice by Elizabeth Lowell is a romantic suspense novel starring archaeologist Lina Taylor and former customs enforcement officer Hunter Johnston. It comes out next week and is Top Pick in Romance in our June issue.

TO ENTER: Comment on this post with the title of your favorite suspense novel.

CONTEST DETAILS: One winner will be chosen by random.org from among entries received by 5 pm CST on Friday, May 18. The winner will receive the five books listed above. Prize must be shipped to a North American address, and Rhode Island residents are not eligible. (Full contest rules here.) Good luck!

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There’s a new blog in town for literature fans. Talking Covers interviews authors and designers about their book jackets. It’s a fun look behind the scenes of the book business.
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Proust playing air guitar is just the beginning

Flavorwire has put together a slideshow of serious writers in “extremely silly poses.” If you’ve ever wanted to see Susan Sontag in a bear costume, or Marcel Proust playing air guitar, or Nabokov hunting butterflies . . . this is your chance!

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What links have you discovered this week? Share in the comments!

If you’re already a fan of Erdrich, you will be delighted to hear about her newest book, The Round House, which is out on October 2. This is part two in a trilogy that started with 2008′s The Plague of Doves, which takes place in Pluto, North Dakota. Pluto is a fictional town that was founded by whites in the late 1800s, on the edge of an Ojibwe Indian reservation. The story is about a young woman who becomes obsessed with a horrifying event in the town’s history—a murder of a white family, and the innocent Native Americans who are accused of the crime.

The Round House will continue this story, focusing on 13-year-old Joe, the son of two characters from The Plague of Doves. According to publisher Harper, it’s a “riveting, exquisitely told story of a boy on the cusp of manhood who seeks justice and understanding in the wake of a terrible crime that upends and forever transforms his family.”

Erdrich’s publisher has likened the vivid North Dakota Ojibwe Reservation to Faulkner’s Yoknapatawpha County. Do you agree with that assessment?

Will you look for The Round House in October?

Check out the rest of our Fall fiction posts, or browse all posts about 2012 releases.

I suspect that many readers will also find themselves at commencement ceremonies of some sort in the coming days. You might realize that the grad-of-honor has already received three copies of Oh, the Places You’ll Go!, and you want to buy an original gift. Luckily, the five books featured in this year’s graduation roundup range from inspirational, to informative, to practical.

• Charles Wheelan’s 10½ Things No Commencement Speaker Has Ever Said will soothe the job-hunting grad who is going to have a panic attack if a job offer doesn’t appear—stat.
• Chesley “Sully” Sullenberger’s Making a Difference will give aspiring leaders plenty of good examples, not to mention a history lesson about important (but obscure) figures in our history.
• What Do You Want to Do Before You Die? by The Buried Life (of MTV fame) features awesome and inspiring artwork that I would have totally ripped out to decorate my first apartment. That will come in handy for a grad with blank walls and no budget.
• In the practical category, I want to give my sister Worth It… Not Worth It? by Jack Otter and Getting from College to Career by Lindsey Pollak when she graduates from college next year. The former details when it makes sense to splurge or save. Either/or scenarios are helpful—for example, buy the rental car insurance, or skip it? LinkedIn spokesperson Pollak gives truly helpful advice on networking and first-time job-hunting. As every adult knows, these are indispensable skills!

Read more in our graduation roundup. What books would you give to a new grad?

Love this vegetarian take on French toast!

Lazy Oven French Toast

Basically a strata, this dish is composed of layers of eggs, milk, and bread, plus your choice of flavorings. Stratas can be sweet, enhanced with chopped dried fruit, nuts, chocolate, or booze (that’s for another book, though), or savory, layered with cheese, ham, and so on. This one cooks up much like a French toast casserole. The title of the recipe implies that your oven is lazy, which of course is ridiculous. Rather, it’s the perfect brunch dish for a lazy weekend morning because everything can be assembled the night before and transferred in the morning from the fridge to the oven.

Serves 6 to 8

Vegetarian

• Butter or nonstick cooking spray, for greasing the baking dish
• 4 cups milk (see Note)
• 6 large eggs
• 2 tablespoons granulated sugar
• 2 tablespoons maple syrup, plus more maple syrup for serving (optional)
• 1 teaspoon pure vanilla extract
• 1⁄2 teaspoon ground cinnamon
• 1⁄2 teaspoon kosher or coarse salt
• 1 large loaf challah bread, preferably slightly stale, sliced 3⁄4 to 1 inch thick
• 3⁄4 cup whole raisins, chopped dried fruit, or chopped nuts (optional)
• Fresh fruit such as berries, sliced peaches or pears, and/or confectioners’ sugar, for serving

1. Grease a 13 by 9–inch baking dish with butter or spray it with cooking spray.

2. Place the milk, eggs, sugar, maple syrup, vanilla, cinnamon, and salt in a medium-size bowl and whisk to mix well. Set the milk mixture aside.

3. Arrange half of the slices of bread in the prepared baking dish, cutting the bread so that it fits in a solid layer. Pour half of the milk mixture over the bread, then evenly distribute about half of any dried fruit or nuts, if using, on top.

4. Repeat, creating a second layer of bread and then pouring the rest of the milk mixture on top and distributing the rest of the fruit or nuts over the bread. Lightly press the bread down into the liquid.

5. Cover the baking dish with plastic wrap and refrigerate it overnight. The bread will have absorbed almost all of the milk mixture. Uncover the baking dish and if there are dryer looking pieces on top, take them off and carefully tuck them underneath the bread on the bottom so that the more milk-soaked pieces are now on top (this is messy but it all works out in the baking). Note that any dried fruit sitting on the top of the French toast will get pretty chewy when baked and nuts on top will get toasty; the fruit and nuts that are tucked into the French toast will be softer, so disperse the fruit and nuts as you see fit.

6. Preheat the oven to 425°F.

7. Bake the French toast, uncovered, until it is puffed and golden, 30 to 35 minutes.

8. Let the French toast sit for 5 minutes to firm up a bit, then cut it into squares and serve it hot with your choice of maple syrup, fresh fruit, and/or confectioners’ sugar.

Note: This is luxurious made with whole milk, but 2 percent or 1 percent milk works fine. Conversely, for an even more decadent dish you can replace one of the cups of milk with a cup of cream or half-and-half if you like.

Excerpted from The Mom 100 Cookbook: 100 Recipes Every Mom Needs in Her Back Pocket. Copyright 2012 by Katie Workman. Used by permission of Workman Publishing Co., Inc. New York. All Rights Reserved. Photo credit Todd Coleman. Read our review of this book.

I chatted with them about the books they were obsessed with as teenagers, embarrassing moments, character BFFs and more.

The authors were so much fun to talk to (as you can tell from the video!) and I am excited about reading all three of their novels. Here are quick plot descriptions:

Belles is about a teen girl who is forced out of her comfort zone when she moves in with preppy relatives. Take a Bow takes place at an elite performing arts high school (we interviewed Eulberg about it for Children’s Corner!). Purity is about a teen girl who struggles with honoring her mother’s dying wishes while still remaining true to herself (we interviewed Pearce about her “Little Red Riding Hood” re-telling a couple of years ago).

Just for fun, I’ll ask you a few of the questions I asked the authors: What book were you obsessed with when you were a teen? If you could be friends with any book character . . . who would it be?

My answers are a) A Ring of Endless Light and b) Hermione Granger. Duh!