#nick's pick

[universitybookstore]

Rebecca Makkai is too young to have lived through the AIDS crisis, but her recreation of 1985 in THE GREAT BELIEVERS, the fears and lies and suspicions, the urban legends and panic, repeatedly reminded me of things I’d tried to forget and gave me chills of recognition. The last words of the book’s final acknowledgement are “I did my best,” and you never doubt that she is attempting to make that terrible, terrifying time alive in every detail. But this book is about more than that epidemic tragedy: it’s about truth-telling, and believing, and mothering, and what you can do for other people. The convergence of her two plots is thrillingly effective. The central character is one fascinating guy, and I made his moral lapses and mistakes right along with him down the line. It’s a complete emotional experience, skillfully assembled and well-written, with characters you care about and some fine twists and surprises.

THE GREAT BELIEVERS

by Rebecca Makkai

Regular price: $27

20% off at University Book Store for book club members

Our price: $21.60

AN ART BEQUEST AND THE COMING OF AIDS

In 1985 AIDS is just beginning to devastate big cities like Chicago and Paris. Rebecca Makkai’s THE GREAT BELIEVERS is a brilliant replication of those agonizing, outrageous years, weaving together two stories with overlapping characters. One is a woman searching desperately for her estranged daughter.

The other centers on an elderly woman making a staggering art bequest with some unusual conditions. Facilitating this bequest is one of the most decent, likeable gay characters in current fiction. Yale Tishman has a wonderful partner to whom he’s faithful, a good job as development director of a budding art museum, and is about to bring to the collection some outrageously important early work.

But Yale hasn’t been paying close enough attention. And like the twists and turns of life, this novel never goes where it seems to be heading, and has surprises and detours and blind alleys and unexpected blessings, as well as superb writing.

Come discuss the book with us!

Nick’s Picks Book Club

University Book Store

4326 University Way NE

The bookstore café

Monday, February 25, 6 pm

This novel may not be perfect, but I get choked up when I try to talk about it, and not just from memories of the past. It’s a high-impact experience, very human and flawed and touching. Come tell me your thoughts about it – and keep reading the good ones! -- Nick

[universitybookstore]

My November/December pick is so long and is so absolutely gloriously wonderful that if I were you I’d pick up the 857-page novel for December and start it now. It’s five short novels that are all linked. Each one is different. We can discuss the first three in November, the second two in December. Of all my Nick’s Picks this year, this is by far the best novel I’ve read in 2018, hands down. It was riveting right up to the last two wonderful sentences.

PATRICK MELROSE

by Edward St. Aubyn

All five short novels of the Patrick Melrose cycle are now in one volume (and a five-part Showtime mini-series with Benedict Cumberbatch).

You think a novel that’s 857 pages long is going to have a serious length problem. It doesn’t. The pages of this spellbinding book fly past.

You think you’ll be horrified and repulsed by the subject matter: child rape and heroin addiction, infidelity and disinheritance among the super-rich. But you can’t stop laughing.

Edward St Aubyn’s gorgeously literate style, his hilarious metaphors, his fearless writing and compulsively addicting storytelling, come together perfectly in this scathing satire of the human race when it gets its hands on too much money.

PATRICK MELROSE

by Edward St. Aubyn

Regular price: $20

Book club members save 20% off at University Book Store

Our price: $16

Come discuss the book with us!

Nick’s Picks Book Club

University Book Store

4326 University Way NE

The bookstore café

Monday, November 26, 6 pm and

Monday, December 17, 6 pm

I did not want to lug around an 857-page tome. For twenty-one days, I couldn’t make myself go anywhere without it. I never intended it to be a pick. It was ridiculously too long. I never intended to finish it. I just thought I’d read a few pages… Watch out. You’ll be thanking me for this one. -- Nick

[universitybookstore]

To think that all these years I’ve loved CHINATOWN and viewed it over and over, never realizing it was an homage to the very first Raymond Chandler novel to hit America, THE BIG SLEEP. The number of similarities between the two stories is not coincidental! Here’s your chance to read a book that set new rules for detective fiction when it rocketed to popularity. From Ross Macdonald and Jim Thompson to Andrea Camilleri and Georges Simenon, mystery writers ever since have been covering ground that private detective Philip Marlowe first introduced to the world.

THE ANNOTATED BIG SLEEP

by Raymond Chandler

Regular price $25

20% off at University Book Store

Our price $20

THE ORIGINAL TOUGH DETECTIVE’S FIRST CASE

Raymond Chandler’s first Philip Marlowe mystery is where a whole American tradition began. Tough-talking, gun-toting detectives and sexy blondes who love courting danger became staples in a genre Chandler helped invent, taking on all the glitz and heady corruption of Los Angeles in its prime.

This novel has influenced every mystery and crime writer to follow him, right up to the entire plot being re-imagined as Chinatown. Twice filmed, once with Humphrey Bogart and Lauren Bacall, once with Robert Mitchum, its where the stereotypes came from before they were stereotypes.

This version is so full of footnotes and photos that the novel opens up like never before. And it still reads like gangbusters eighty years later.

Come discuss the book with us!

Nick’s Book Club

UNIVERSITY BOOK STORE

4326 University Way NE

The bookstore café

Monday, October 29, 6 pm

[universitybookstore]

Let’s start the new year with a new author. Talk about a voice you’ve never heard before! In his new, 184-page novel, THE GURUGU PLEDGE, Juan Tomas Avila Laurel writes with the devastating authority of personal experience about living homeless in a mountain cave of Equatorial Guinea. His novel invites you to join him, eavesdropping on conversations, surviving on nothing, as a wretched group of misfits prepare to attempt crossing over into Europe. I’ve never read anything like it.

THE GURUGU PLEDGE

by Juan Tomas Avila Laurel

Regular price $15.95

20% off at University Book Store

Our price $12.76

AN AFRICAN MIGRANT PAYS TRIBUTE

TO THOSE WHO DIDN’T MAKE IT

Meet Peter Ngambo, whose father was accused of writing a seditious poem. Meet Peter Darb, who saw a little girl change into an old woman. Meet Mangu, who is forced to undress in front of a duck and two chickens. They live in a cave on Mount Gurugu in Equatorial Guinea, the only Spanish-speaking country in Africa. They beg in the nearby town for a spare carrot or potato. They play soccer to keep warm. They do their best to avoid the brutal Moroccan police. They are preparing to make the crossing to the land of the albinos.

Avila Laurel’s voice is one you haven’t heard before. It presents a nightmarish vision of life, told with a bracing honesty and interrupted occasionally by laugh-out-loud humor. Spend a couple weeks with the truly wretched of the earth, as they discuss the spiritual component of soccer or the meaning of African pride.

You listen spellbound while they tell their stories, interrupting each other, correcting each other. Sometimes heartbreaking, sometimes horrifying, this simple, powerful novel gives you essential information for understanding our troubled times.

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Come discuss the book with us!

Nick’s Picks Book Club

UNIVERSITY BOOK STORE

4326 University Way NE

The bookstore café

Monday, January 29, 6 pm

Sometimes rough novels are worth it. Something inside me really trusted and bonded with this author. The rough parts are never excessive. I gasped out loud but I never stopped reading. It shows meanness without being mean. I saw 5 copies on the shelf at University Book Store, correctly alphabetized in the “A’s” under Avila Laurel. Go get one. Or phone, we ship for free. Mention you’re a book club member to get your discount. Have a wonderful holiday with people you love and read a few good books! -- Nick

[universitybookstore]

Have I got a discovery for you! This little gem, THE BOOK OF EMMA REYES, is a posthumous memoir told in 23 letters that were published ten years after the author’s death. This woman survived a childhood of abject poverty – abandoned by her mother, raised by a garbage heap in Bogota, Colombia, subjected to a full work shift by the age of five – to become a painter who rubbed shoulders in Europe with Jean-Paul Sartre, Frida Kahlo and Pier Paolo Pasolini. Gabriel Garcia Marquez phoned her to encourage her! In the first 30 pages you’ll watch slum children erect a god out of garbage, and the first nightmarish automobile arrive in town – electrifying moments. Here’s an example, the author as a child talking to a child friend: “he asked me if I had a dad and a mom, and I asked him what those were, and he said he didn’t know either.” It’s a physically gorgeous little book, with a cover featuring art by Emma Reyes, and interior pages with samples of her longhand script and several unforgettable drawings. Translated and introduced by Daniel Alarcon, a brilliant young writer on his own. Are you looking for a woman writer with determination, talent, and some unforgettable tales to tell? Meet Emma.

THE BOOK OF EMMA REYES

by Emma Reyes

(translated by Daniel Alarcon)

Regular price $24

20% off at University Book Store

Our price $19.20

CHILDHOOD NEAR A GARBAGE HEAP IN BOGOTA

Emma and her older sister, Helena, grew up abandoned by their mother, living near the garbage heap in a windowless room without toilet or water or electricity.

Illiterate until her late teens, Emma made her way across South America to Europe, working and learning and painting, until she was befriended by Frida Kahlo and Diego Rivera, Jean-Paul Sartre, and Pier Paolo Pasolini.

This posthumous memoir composed of 23 letters was first published ten years after Emma Reyes’ death. It’s a truthful, child’s-eye view of abject poverty and the grim unfairness of life, and how they shape a strong woman artist.

*

Come discuss the book with us!

Nick’s Picks Book Club

UNIVERSITY BOOK STORE

4326 University Way NE

The bookstore café

Monday, September 25, 6 pm

Only 175 pages, gorgeous images, swift, honest style from a determined writer – really, what more could you ask for? – Nick

[universitybookstore]

I didn’t expect to fall in love with this book. To be honest, I was just reading the first couple pages to dismiss it, and somehow it hooked my attention and with every page it won me over further. Dr Morayo de Silva is a genuinely good woman and a joy to spend time with. Boy, did I grow to like her! She’s weak and elderly, but her books matter to her more than almost anything, and she’s kind to homeless people and loves living in San Francisco where gay men are polite to her. For two days I got to spend time in her presence, accompanying her through a rather unexpected difficulty, learning what she was really made of. Pure pleasure! What the book lacks in plot or suspense it makes up in the delight of Morayo’s startling, incandescent life.

LIKE A MULE BRINGING ICE CREAM TO THE SUN

by Sarah Ladipo Manyika

Regular price $14.95

20% off at University Book Store

Our price: $11.96

A GENUINELY GOOD OLD WOMAN TOUCHES MANY LIVES

Meet elderly Dr. Morayo de Silva, half-Nigerian citizen of San Francisco, who values her books above everything and has a kind word for everyone.

A good author can reveal a person’s character in their interactions during a normal day. Sarah Ladipo Manyika does that expertly in her very short novel with the very long title, and then she adds a few surprises.

Told through multiple voices, it’s a slight but very touching story of age and time and kindness, allowing you to enjoy the company with a woman any sane person would want as their best friend.

Come discuss the book with us!

Nick’s Picks Book Club

University Book Store

4326 University Way NE

The bookstore cafe

Monday, August 28, 6 pm

This one is short enough to read in a couple days. It’s perfect for a fun summer read that still has substance and heart. I’d love to have you stop by the bookstore café at the end of August and tell me what you thought of it. And what in the world the title means. -- Nick

[universitybookstore]

For the last three days, I have been devouring a short novel by Mozambican writer, Mia Couto called CONFESSION OF THE LIONESS – unless it’s really been devouring me. I feel like I’ve been attacked. I’ve gasped every few pages, hit by shock after shock. Sometimes I have to put the book down until my breathing becomes normal again. I don’t see Couto’s surprises coming; they just sort of erupt out of the darkness and hit you. This is not magical realism; it’s taking another belief system as real. With a name that sounds like an African woman, this white African man known as Mia Couto writes like no one else, and yet all the classic conventions of a novel are there underneath the shocking African newness. My first impulse on finishing it was to start at the beginning and read it over again, to see how the hell he did that! It’s quite a performance in plotting and suspense, with writing that’s consistently brilliant until it blows up on itself at the end.

CONFESSION OF THE LIONESS by Mia Couto Regular price $16 20% off at University Book Store Our price: $12.80

LIONS HAVE SURROUNDED THE VILLAGE

Mariamar knows that her sister, Silencia, was the most recent victim of the lions attacking the villagers of Kulumani in Mozambique. She also knows the hunter who has arrived to kill the marauding animals – they’ve met years before, when the moody charmer Archie Bullseye saved her from the unwanted attentions of the village policeman.

Now Archie and Mariamar are the only two who suspect what is really happening as village terror mounts and the lions are not the only danger. The real danger may be that Archie is in love with someone else.

Told in alternating diaries between Mariamar and Archie, this plunge into ancient African religion and deadly contemporary jealousies builds to an unforgettable encounter.

Come discuss the book with us!

Nick’s Picks Book Club UNIVERSITY BOOK STORE 4326 University Way NE The bookstore café Monday, July 31, 6 pm

You’ve never read anything quite like this before. Take the plunge. It’s a real rollercoaster of an experience, so be ready for the floor to drop out from under you! -- Nick

[universitybookstore]

NICK'S PICK FOR MAY

By now you’ve heard about THE UNDERGROUND RAILROAD. It’s won the National Book Award. It’s won the Pulitzer Prize. It is one troubling, unforgettable reading experience. But it is also unstoppable reading. Once you start it, you’re compelled to go on. Wincing and yelping, cringing and gasping, I couldn’t put it down. What kind of experience is this? It’s not reading for pleasure – but there’s a huge satisfaction in having someone spell out the truth. You’re going to be hearing a lot about this novel for years – so why not read it now, and find out how it hits you, and share your opinions with others? I can’t wait to hear your thoughts!

THE UNDERGROUND RAILROAD by Colson Whitehead Regular price $26.95 20% off at University Book Store Our price $21.56

THE NIGHTMARE OF SLAVERY COMES TO LIFE

Cora’s mother abandoned her at the age of ten and fled to the freedom of the North. Cora is now a young woman and says she’s not running away, but Caesar talks her into it. They plan on escaping together – until Lovey surprises them by showing up and insisting on going with them.

The most successful slave catcher in America is on their trail. We watch him shoot a bothersome slave in the face, so we know he puts up with no nonsense. Cora’s mother got away from him. He’s not going to let Cora do the same thing.

Colson Whitehead gives us Cora’s escape attempt in thrilling chunks of story, interrupted by meditations by some of the characters and realistic period advertisements for runaway slaves. Whitehead can tackle just about any topic with panache and reality. Are you ready for a slave narrative like no other?

Come discuss the book with us!

Nick’s Book Club University Book Store 4326 University Way NE The bookstore café Monday, May 29, 6 pm

I’d love to see some of you old friends again. Surprise me, read this one, and join us! -- Nick