Vampire Academy, by Richelle Mead
Vampire Academy, Richelle Mead’s first book aimed at young adults, is 100% pure slinky fun. This stylish goth-lite novel isn’t breaking any new ground, but Mead's fiercely devoted heroines make her book a welcome entry into the overstuffed teen vampire genre...
The Pinball Theory of Apocalypse, by Jonathan Selwood
Jonathan Selwood obviously worked very hard on making his debut novel, The Pinball Theory of Apocalypse, equal parts amusing and appalling. Too many of his attempts to be shocking fall flat,...
Props from the Seattle PI...
Dude, we're famous!Wordcandy had another exciting first--we had our first press mention in the Seattle Post-Intelligencer's "What's Online" section. Hopefully many more will come!
A commendable goal
Math Doesn't Suck: How to Survive Middle-School Math Without Losing Your Mind or Breaking a Nail, a math guide written by mathematician and actress Danica McKellar (a.k.a. The Wonder Years' Winnie...
Old Friends and New Fancies, by Sybil G. Brinton
Written in 1913, Sybil G. Brinton’s Old Friends and New Fancies was the first Jane Austen sequel ever published, and features characters from all six of Austen’s books. While Old Friends and New Fancies doesn’t quite stand on its own as an independent novel, Brinton’s engaging continuation features a plausible imitation of Austen’s style and tone...
If only I could knit.
Thanks to the fine people at AustenBlog, I've just discovered Yarn Love, an online store that sells several colors of hand-dyed yarn inspired by literary heroines.You can buy Scarlet O'Hara yarn (...
The Off Season, by Catherine Gilbert Murdock
Catherine Gilbert Murdock’s The Off Season is just as thoughtful and engrossing as its critically praised prequel, 2006’s Dairy Queen. Murdock’s quiet, football-playing heroine has gotten more self-confident since the events of Dairy Queen, but her attempt to take charge of her future is still very much a work in progress...
A sight to behold
I love these book covers:They look just like James Bond covers... if James Bond covers had been drawn by the people who draw the cover art for sewing patterns.There are at least three books in thi...
On the hunt
I'm thinking of picking up the first few volumes of Viz's Yakitate!! Japan (story and art by Takashi Hashigushi). A pun-filled cooking comedy about a young man with "otherworldly baking powers"? ...
Peter Ferguson brings the pretty.
The cover art is now available for Magic and Other Misdemeanors, the fifth book in Michael Buckley's Sisters Grimm series, and illustrator Peter Ferguson continues to knock our socks off:This seri...
Ooh, classy!
I totally encourage everybody to check out the trailer for the upcoming "digitally-enhanced live action" movie adaptation of Beowulf--it had me giggling for hours. Literary purists might be a lit...
Grossman interview on SCI FI Wire
Wordcandy writer Austin Grossman, author of Soon I Will Be Invincible, was recently interviewed on SCI FI Wire. Despite the fact that he says things like "The tropes of superhero life were develo...
Austen geeks take note
The people behind the upcoming film adaptation of The Jane Austen Book Club are currently running a contest with an excellent grand prize: a ticket to one of the 2008 JASNA-sponsored tours of Engl...
The Manny, by Holly Peterson
Time for another Wordcandy Book Review Double Feature!
The Manny, by Holly Peterson
Thirty-six-year-old Jamie Whitfield is unhappy. She has a fulfilling career and three beautiful children...
In Memoriam
My godmother Karen died of ovarian cancer in 2003. Karen was an all-around fantastically awesome person who loved to cook and entertain, and her daughter Alison has made a cookbook from her colle...
Poltergeist, by Kat Richardson
Kat Richardson’s Poltergeist (sequel to 2006’s Greywalker) is a sharp, sinister urban fantasy that blends storytelling with Seattle history. Painstakingly researched and intelligent, this series is perfect for fantasy/horror fans looking for something more than a spine-tingling cheap thrill...
*Not* an alphabet book
Roald Dahl fans take note: the paperback edition of Wendy Cooling's D is for Dahl: A Gloriumptious A to Z Guide to the World of Roald Dahl, is due out on August 16th. Dahl was just as weird as an...
The Hollywood gods are smiling.
For once, a trend we can encourage: making movie or tv adaptations of books that we haven't read and don't give a damn about.Example number one:Gossip GirlThe only reason we're even remotely inter...
Lisa Kleypas rides again!
Beloved Wordcandy author Lisa Kleypas will be releasing a new historical romance, Mine Till Midnight, on October 2nd. If interested, you can read a snippet from this novel here.Note: We hate to c...
Could it be...?
Is Scott Westerfeld actually going to give us... closure? Is he feeling feverish? Okay, so our hopes aren't high, but we're happy to see that there's going to be fourth book set in Westerfeld's ...
Will the Vampire People Please Leave the Lobby?, by Allyson Beatrice
Will the Vampire People Please Leave the Lobby?: True Adventures in Cult Fandom, Allyson Beatrice’s collection of essays about her experiences as a hardcore Buffy the Vampire Slayer fan, is a...
*anime-style spinning eyes*
TOKYOPOP has their new website up, and it's totally overwhelming. I hate to say it, because I'm sure their web developers worked really, really hard, but any website that has to feature a huge "H...
Three Bags Full, by Leonie Swann
The set-up is stock casual mystery: in a rural Irish town, a friendly, reclusive shepherd is found dead in his pasture with a spade in his stomach. Everyone in the town had a reason to not only want him dead, but also to fear his death. None of the locals, including the police, care to investigate. Instead, the mystery is left to be solved by a set of lovable amateurs—the shepherd’s abandoned flock...
Wordcandy loves the annotated editions
I love W.W. Norton's collection of annotated classics. I own both The Annotated Alice: the Definitive Edition and The Annotated Brothers Grimm--which we reviewed--and I aspire to one day own a cop...
A Nail Through the Heart, by Timothy Hallinan
Recently, we've been in something of rut here at Wordcandy. If it wasn't a book about a boy wizard (you wouldn't believe how many Harry Potter rip-offs we get), it was a YA romance. Don't get us w...