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Powell's Staff:
Five Book Friday: In Memoriam
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Every year, the booksellers at Powell’s submit their Top Fives: their five favorite books that were released in 2023. It’s a list that, when put together, shows just how varied and interesting the book tastes of Powell’s booksellers are. I highly recommend digging into the recommendations — we would never lead you astray — but today...
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Brontez Purnell:
Powell’s Q&A: Brontez Purnell, author of ‘Ten Bridges I’ve Burnt’
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Rachael P.:
Starter Pack: Where to Begin with Ursula K. Le Guin
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Customer Comments
K Magill has commented on (19) products
Cost of Living A Living Autobiography
by
Deborah Levy
K Magill
, May 11, 2019
The Cost of Living is a luminous little book, an autobiographical endeavor that plumbs the depths of femininity, asking what it means to be a wife, mother, and daughter who is also a working writer. Levy writes with wit, candor, and an impeccable eye for detail. She is also an innovative prose stylist; The Cost of Living contains passages which masterfully collapse past and present into surreal scenes. On its surface this is a story of life after marriage, of a woman building a new and freer existence, with all the struggle and hardship that entails. On top of the financial insecurity of leaving "the family home" Levy must grapple with the fact that, even after she abandons the role of wife, she cannot escape our culture's expectations of her as a woman. Levy returns time and again to the lives and work of Simone de Beauvoir and Marguerite Duras, two of her creative icons and women who questioned and defied notions of femininity. While she never mentions Virginia Woolf, I can't help but think that Levy has written a contemporary "Room of One's Own" that will resonate with anyone who struggles to balance domestic obligations with creative work.
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Fates and Furies
by
Lauren Groff
K Magill
, October 01, 2015
I devoured this book. Groff has created a smart, tender, flawed epic that is also a brilliant illumination of the disequality in male-female relationships. Mathilde in particular is a riveting and complex character, cast in the mould of Greek and Shakespearian (anti)heroines; she is virgin, whore, wife, and crone in one fell swoop. I enjoyed the prismatic effect of the two-part narrative: Lotto's half of the story seems so straightforward until Mathilde's perspective comes along and shatters it -- a delightful dismantling of some of our deeply-held assumptions about gender and narrative.
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1004
by
Ben Lerner
K Magill
, January 29, 2015
I am totally jealous of Ben Lerner's ability to craft fiction that is both hip and heartfelt. His words are utterly relatable yet offer a new way of looking at the world around us, of our bodies moving through that world. I already want to read it again.
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Wolf in White Van A Novel
by
John Darnielle
K Magill
, September 29, 2014
Everything I hoped it would be! Those who listen to the Mountain Goats already know that John Darnielle can WRITE. I've been anticipating this novel for a while now, and it has totall y lived up to my expectations. Wry, dark, bittersweet. As an educator who works with teens, it's great to find literature that approaches adolescence with this kind of candor, humour and sincerity.
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Museum of Innocence
by
Pamuk, Orhan
K Magill
, February 27, 2011
Persistence pays off; for the first 500 pages, I was not convinced that this was Pamuk's finest work, but the last soaringly tragic chapters convinced me otherwise. Although the meandering melancholy of the narrator, a lovesick thirty-something from Turkey's upper crust, may at first come off as self-indulgent, Orhan Pamuk is too skilled to craft a simple sad tale of obsession gone awry. In The Museum of Innocence, Pamuk mines deep into every vein of obsession, love, lust, infidelity and fidelity that he can find--in the end, turning on their heads our common notions of virtue, success, and life well lived. Reading, I couldn't help but recall some lines by Sam Beam on the newest Iron & Wine album: "We bricked up the garden and oh, what it means,/ and we've all kissed a virgin as if she were clean." Moreover, Pamuk's ability to bring myriad minute details together into a moving whole is staggering. Not only is this a story of romance between human beings, but of the romance which grows between people and inanimate things. I go through my days now reflecting on the everyday objects that shape me, each one a defining piece of who I am. Pamuk has subtly shifted the way I think about materialism. More Iron & Wine: "I saw strangers stealing kisses,/ leaving only their clothes, only their clothes."
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Tyranny of Kindness Dismantling the Welfare System to End Poverty in America
by
Theresa Funiciello
K Magill
, August 02, 2010
Theresa Funiciello truly speaks truth to power. Her writing is engaging intellectually and emotionally, and her arguments cut right to the heart of how America could solve its poverty problem if the powers that be were so inclined. The greed and self-interest on the part of "not-for-profit" corporations receiving government dollars left and right is astonishing and appalling. What Funiciello knows about poverty, she learned on the ground as a welfare mom and activist. Although the policies and stats (from the 80s and early 90s) are dated, I can't stop talking about what this book has taught me.
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Winged Energy of Delight Selected Translations Poems from Europe Asia & the Americas
by
Robert Bly
K Magill
, July 15, 2010
Picked up this collection because I love Bly's translations of Pablo Neruda, Rilke, and Tomas Transtromer. This selection is a delight to browse through, as Bly has included many lesser-known poets from around the world, including Scandinavian poets Olav Hauge and Harry Martinson. I only wish Bly had featured more women writers; it is difficult to find poetry collections that strike a balance between male and female voices.
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Against Forgetting Twentieth Century Poetry of Witness
by
Carolyn Forche
K Magill
, July 15, 2010
I recommend this book regularly to friends who are curious about twentieth century poetry but don't know where to begin. The voices in this collection come from practically every continent and span the entire twentieth century. These are socially and politically rooted poems that give voice to suffering and sorrow--but there is nonetheless great beauty here. A tribute to the ability to keep singing through the darkest times.
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(23 of 44 readers found this comment helpful)
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Jamberry
by
Bruce Degen
K Magill
, July 15, 2010
A perennial favorite--great rhymes and nonsense words make it a perfect read-aloud for parents, early child teachers, babysitters, really anyone. And the illustrations are at least as entertaining as the text. All the berry talk leaves my mouth watering.
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Milkweed
by
Jerry Spinelli
K Magill
, June 14, 2010
My middle school aged brother suggested I read this last summer, and I just now got around to it, a year later. This is easily one of the most affecting books Spinelli has written. I'm usually hesitant to read historical fiction, especially when it's geared toward a YA audience. Spinelli, however, is so compassionate and so sensitive to the emotional and moral needs of teenagers, he is truly adept at his craft. Nothing preachy or gimmicky here. Alongside Anne Frank's diary and Lois Lowry's Number the Stars, one of the most enduring works of WWII literature appropriate for an adolescent audience. Rich with opportunities for discussion, Milkweed would be a great addition to a Holocaust studies unit for middle or early high schoolers.
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Anti Oedipus Capitalism & Schizophrenia
by
Gilles Deleuze, Felix Guattari, Robert Hurley
K Magill
, June 14, 2010
Deleuze and Guattari are two great thinkers who truly deserve the title of "philosophers"--a dying breed. Anti-Oedipus picks up where Foucault left off in Madness and Civilization and History of Sexuality, questioning the primacy of the nuclear family construct alongside our global culture's tendency to encourage neurosis while suppressing psychosis. More than just a critique of Freudian psychoanalysis, more than just a work of queer theory, Deleuze and Guattari turn all of our cultural assumptions inside out; read it, and you'll start seeing our reliance on Oedipus everywhere, and how integral that conception is to our current mode of social reproduction. There must be more than father-death mother-love! Deleuze shows us what another world could look like.
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Poems Seven New & Complete Poetry
by
Alan Dugan
K Magill
, June 14, 2010
Poems Seven is a monumental collection by one of the most influential contemporary poets in the US. Dugan is bitterly funny, salty, crotchety, visceral and cerebral at the same time. Funnier, more acerbic, and slower-burning than most of what you'll find in the past 50 years of American verse. Go grab this.
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Powerlines: A Decade of Poetry from Chicago's Guild Complex
by
Parson-Nesbitt, Julie
K Magill
, August 05, 2008
One of my very favorite anthologies of American poetry: it contains such a wide range of voices, all tied together by a sense of place. These poems breathe Chicago.
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Watership Down
by
Richard Adams
K Magill
, July 27, 2008
I first read Watership Down when I was ten years old, and for a long time afterwards it was my very favorite novel: the sense of adventure, the emotionally engaging characters (quite an accomplishment for a tale whose stars are rabbits!), and the lovely pastoral setting make it a perfect match for kids who are big fans of fantasy novels such as the Redwall series but who are looking for something more challenging. This is no children's novel, mind you. I've read Watership Down several times as an adult. Each time I return to it, the story's environmentally-conscious message, Adams' emphasis on man's capacity to destroy the world that he shares with so many other creatures, hits home a little bit harder. The quick-paced narrative makes this a great read-aloud and conversation-starter for folks raising children to be conscious and compassionate world citizens. Of course, this is a rousing good read for those without kids, too!
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Art of the Commonplace The Agrarian Essays of Wendell Berry
by
Berry, Wendell
K Magill
, June 03, 2008
Localvores and potential localvores, check this one out: Wendell Berry has been laying the groundwork for the sustainable-local-organic foods movement for decades. There is some truly beautiful prose here, especially the last essay, "The Pleasures of Eating."
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Poetry Like Bread Poets of the Political Imagination
by
Martin Espada
K Magill
, June 02, 2008
Espada's winderfully accessible anthology, compiled with such passion and a sense of justice, is an inspiration for poets, activists and readers from all walks of life. Global in scope but with an emphasis on the Americas, Poetry like Bread is overflowing with gems: tried-and-true classics alongside the works of lesser-known poets like the Salvadoran revolutionary Roque Dalton, whose work was published posthumously after his death at a very young age fighting in the Salvadoran revolution. This one is an absolute necessity for anyone with an interest in the intersection of poetic consciousness and social consciousness, and a wonderful text for use in high school or college literature classes!
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Straw for the Fire From the Notebooks of Theodore Roethke 1943 63
by
Theodore Roethke
K Magill
, June 02, 2008
Along with On Poetry and Craft, this collection (which includes both jottings and finished pieces of prose and poetry) provides a priceless window into the mind behind one of the most distinctive voices in twentieth-century poetry. It's a delight to simply open this book up at random and slip into the current of Roethke's musings.
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On Poetry & Craft Selected Prose
by
Roethke, Theodore
K Magill
, June 02, 2008
I return to Roethke over and over again, particularly this collection of essays, lecture notes, journal entries, and other tidbits. Not only was the man a remarkable poet, but an accomplished aphorist as well; some of the one-liners here have stayed with me for well over a year now, particularly his observations on teaching. What I wouldn't give to have had Roethke as my poetry professor!
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& Her Soul Out Of Nothing
by
Olena K Davis
K Magill
, April 11, 2008
If you're feeling disillusioned by the state of contemporary poetry, check this out. Davis writes fresh, challenging works: cerebral yet visceral and soulful, with a dry humor but never stale. And she goes about collapsing the distinctions we often like to make between verbal and visual media, weaving a painterly touch into her words. Merits many, many repeat readings.
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(4 of 5 readers found this comment helpful)
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