Book Club Girl - Book Group Recommendations, Reading Group Guides, Audio Book Club Podcasts

Get Inspired! Inspire Others! Experience Neil Gaiman’s Make Good Art

About this time last year, Neil Gaiman gave the commencement address at Philadelphia’s University of the Arts. He spoke about his own journey to success as a writer, and offered his advice to the graduating class on how they too can go out into the world and continue to create art. Gaiman’s speech was so inspiring that the YouTube video went viral and has nearly half a million combined views (it’s been posted more than once).

Gaiman’s fantastic speech is now available in a keepsake edition, beautifully designed by renowned graphic artist Chip Kidd. It’s gorgeous. When Make Good Art arrived on my desk a few weeks ago (seeing finished books before they’re on sale: one of the perks of the job!) I stopped everything and paged through it, cover to cover. Ah, now this is what it means to be a book: heavy paper stock, words on every page that ring true, a jacket design that insists on looking you full in the face (none of this spine-out nonsense). Clearly, Make Good Art was written to be read aloud, because I found myself reciting bits to myself as I turned the pages.

It’s natural to suggest Make Good Art as a gift for any graduate in your life. But this book would be just as apt a present for someone taking a new job, buying a new home, moving to a new town, or switching relationship status. Gaiman’s words are as encouraging as they are inspiring. After I read this book, I had the overwhelming feeling that everything was going to be alright.

I remember when my older cousin gave me Shel Silverstein’s The Giving Tree as a gift from high school graduation. More than 20 years later, I still have the copy that she inscribed for me. After I read Make Good Art, I could imagine myself inscribing copies of Gaiman’s book to the generations behind me, for years to come.

Experience Make Good Art yourself. Watch the video, or flip through a few of the pages. Here are the links to purchase from your favorite retailer, and like Neil Gaiman on Facebook to stay up-to-date with all his creative news.

Book Club Girl Welcomes Sheramy Bundrick Author of Sunflowers on 11/2!

I'm so pleased to annouce the first Book Club Girl on Air show for November will feature the author Sheramy Bundrick, who will talk to us about Sunflowers, her new historical novel about Vincent van Gogh.

A novel of Vincent van Gogh, Sheramy Bundrick’s Sunflowers is an arresting and beautiful tale of a young French prostitute’s passionate, doomed relationship with a troubled artist. Vividly evoking a bygone time and place, Bundrick brings her characters to breathtaking life as she seamlessly blends historical fact with riveting speculation.

A young prostitute seeking temporary refuge from the brothel, Rachel awakens in a beautiful garden in Arles to discover she is being sketched by a red-haired man in a yellow straw hat. This is no ordinary artist but the eccentric painter Vincent van Gogh—and their meeting marks the beginning of a remarkable relationship. He arrives at their first assignation at No. 1, Rue du Bout d'Arles, with a bouquet of wildflowers and a request to paint her—and before long, a deep, intense attachment grows between Rachel and the gifted, tormented soul.

But the sanctuary Rachel seeks from her own troubled past cannot be found here, for demons war within Vincent's heart and mind. And one shocking act will expose the harsh, inescapable truth about the artist she has grown to love more than life.

Publishers Weekly called Sunflowers "a knockout debut novel...an impressive volume of suspense, delight, and heartbreak," and Susan Vreeland, author of the New York Times bestseller The Girl in Hyacinth Blue, says it "lays bare in rich, compelling scenes the mystery of the trubulent and misunderstood final two years in van Gogh's life."

Bundrick is an Art Historian, a Professor of Art at the University of South Florida at St. Petersburg,  and the author of several scholarly publications. Sunflowers goes on sale on 10/13, but if you sign up to participate in the show, you can read a copy before it goes on sale! The first 15 people to comment that they'd like to participate will receive a free copy of the book to read in preparation for the show on Monday, November 2nd at 7 pm ET.

Be sure to check out Bundrick's website and her Van Gogh's Chair blog, the reading group guide to Sunflowers, and set your reminder for the show on November 2nd.

Merry Christmas!

Sorry for my absence the last few days, getting everything ready for Christmas with a three-week-old baby takes its toll....We had a wonderful holiday and I hope everyone else did as well. We missed out on our girl being the Baby Jesus at church on Wednesday night because I didn't raise my hand quickly enough, darn it, but it was nice to debut her anyway ;). The kids got a lot of books yesterday and my favorite so far is Make Van Gogh's Bed, a book that introduces toddlers to great works of art by Renoir, Monet, Degas and Van Gogh. If you have a bookstore gift certificate burning a hole in your pocket, I definitely recommend it. And it looks like it's part of a series. Another early fave is A Pocket for Corduroy, which we didn't have. We enjoyed that last night with my son adorned in his new Corduroy pajamas.

Book Blogger Appreciation Week Starts on Monday - Vote for Your Favorite Blogs Until Midnight Tonight!

As you know, Book Bloggers Appreciation Week is next week and there will be tons of great giveaways happening on all the blogs that are registered, so check in for announcements throughout the week. I'll be holding a special giveaway as well, and will have a BIG giveaway running on My Friend Amy's blog. Stay tuned!

Today is the last day you can vote for your favorite blog -- if Book Club Girl is one of them, you can vote for me until midnight tonight here. I'm nominated for Best Book Club blog and Best Publishing/Industry blog. And really, it's an honor just to be nominated (but winning wouldn't be terrible ;)) And check out all the nominated blogs, your next favorite is probably on this list!

Bat Segundo Interviews Book Designer Chip Kidd about his New Book The Learners

Listen to The Bat Segundo Show, where the aforementioned host Bat Segundo interviews Chip Kidd -- the legendary book cover designer and author. They have a wonderful discussion about, among other things, form vs. content and the inner workings of publishing and how books are made. His new novel, The Learners, is just out and I can't wait to read it. His first novel, The Cheese Monkeys, told the story of an aspiring young art student and the mentor who inspired him. In The Learners, Kidd continues the tale of Happy, fresh out of art school, landing his first job as an art assistant at an advertising agency. Augusten Burroughs called it a "gleefully roguish satire of 1960's-advertising-gone-mad [that] is delightfully shrewd, droll and urbane."

After listening to the interview, answer this question in the comments -- can you judge a book by its cover (or interior) design? and you'll be entered to win a copy of both The Learners and The Cheese Monkeys, now newly reissued with a restored scene.

If you're not familiar with Chip Kidd's name, you probably are familiar with some of his groundbreaking cover designs, I've posted a few here. Note that The Secret History was designed with Barbara de Wilde.
 

Literature and Impressionism Come Together in Mademoiselle Victorine

A beautiful novel is just out in stores, from debut novelist Debra Finerman. Mademoiselle Victorine tells the story of Victorine Laurent, a composite of one of Edouard Manet's models and the tempestuous courtesan, the Countess of Castiglione. We first meet Victorine at 17. She has just arrived in Paris and is introduced into the world of Manet, the first Impressionist and becomes one of his models, and lovers. Thrust into his artistic and political milieu, Victorine also draws the attention of Phillippe de Lyon, advisor to Napoleon, with whom she also starts an affair. Her rise in Parisian society during the tumultuous 1860s is a fascinating read and her journey to discover herself is highly discussable.

The book has a really nice website featuring some gorgeous paintings, the history behind the book and more on Finerman herself. Here is the reading guide, and you can email the author to have her join your book club chat. And if that weren't enough -- it is a paperback original, making it very affordable for your group!