Books That Caught Our Eye

Here at Mailbox Monday, we want to encourage participants to not only share the books they received, but to check out the books others have received. We encourage you to share the books that caught your eye in the comments.

Here are the books that caught our eye this week:

Serena

Reach for Infinity edited by Jonathan Strahan from Beauty in Ruins.

I’m on a short story kick these days, and I haven’t read a lot of science fiction lately, which is unfortunate. It’s a genre I’ve read off and on for some time, but I find that I haven’t picked any good ones. This seems like a good way to dip back into the genre and find some winners – authors I haven’t read or who I have read – to see what’s new.

Hardheaded Weather: New and Selected Poems by Cornelius Eady from Everything Distils into Reading.

I am always looking for new poetry to read, and this sounds like a good collection from a poet I haven’t read before. I like these collections that examine midlife. It sounds like this has a range of emotions.

Vicki

Finding Arun by Marisha Pink @ Nishita’s Rants & Raves.
19 yr. old Aaron recently lost his mother, and then learns a dark secret from her past which causes him to question everything he’s known.

I love the sound of the book and I can’t wait to find out what the secret is.

The Teahouse Fire by Ellis Avery @ Savy Verse & Wit is the story of two women whose lives intersect in late-nineteenth-century Japan. “It was a period when wearing a different color kimono could make a political statement, when women stopped blackening their teeth to profess an allegiance to Western ideas, and when Japan’s most mysterious rite—the tea ceremony—became not just a sacramental meal, but a ritual battlefield.”

I’m not a big fan of historical fiction, but I recently joined the Diversity Challenge so that I could read more books/authors of different cultures and this sounds interesting. I’m also not a fan of books much over 300 pages, but even at almost 400 I’m still interested, so I hope I love the book as much as I think I will.

Leslie

Earth Abides: The 60th Anniversary Edition by George R. Stewart. Audiobook, narrated by Jonathan Davis and Connie Willis at Martha’s Bookshelf.

I didn’t know this classic science fiction tale (which I haven’t yet read) is now available in audio, performed by a narrator I like, and has an intro by a favorite of mine, Connie Willis. Brief description: “A disease of unparalleled destructive force has sprung up almost simultaneously in every corner of the globe, all but destroying the human race. One survivor, strangely immune to the effects of the epidemic, ventures forward to experience a world without man.”

Season of the Dragonflies by Sarah Creech at Book Dilettante.
A beautiful book cover will always catch my eye and this one is lovely. Plus the mystical plot sounds interesting: “A story of flowers, sisters, practical magic, old secrets, and new love, set in the Blue Ridge Mountains“.