Books I’ve Read – Page 2 – commonplacebook.com

Books I’ve Read Recently – July 2009 updated

Post author:HFM
Post published:July 7, 2009
Post category:Books I've Read

I’ve finished two of my Project Fill-in-the-gaps books – The Book Thief and Motherless Brooklyn, and filled in with some paperback mysteries and fun stuff. Right now I’m slogging through some titles for work, and enjoying the guilty pleasure of Ana Marie Cox’s thinly-veiled political fiction.

The Book Thief – Markus Zusak

Motherless Brooklyn – Jonathan Lethem

Street Renegades: New Underground Art – Francesca Gavin

Little People in The City: The Street Art of Slinkachu

One for the Money – Janet Evanovich

Two for the Dough – Janet Evanovich

What I’m Reading Now:

Dog Days – Ana Marie Cox

A Project Guide to UX Design – Russ Unger and Carolyn Chandler

Communicating Design – by Dan Brown

Books I’ve Read – April, 2009

Post author:HFM
Post published:April 29, 2009
Post category:Books I've Read

Larry Burrows: Vietnam
by Larry Burrows
A classic, iconographic photography book. Burrows was a Life Magazine photographer covering the Vietnam war, and his images shot over 9 years helped shape the American public’s understanding and opinions about it. He was killed over Cambodia when his helicopter was shot down.

100 Photographs that Changed the World
by the editors of Life Magazine
Exactly what the title says; some of the most recognized and catalytic photos in human history.

Anonymous: Enigmatic Images from Unknown Photographers
by Robert Flynn Johnson and William Boyd
Another great book of photography; this one is a collection of beautiful, unusual and gorgeous “found” photos collected by the authors, gleaned from attics and estate sales.

The 13 Clocks
by James Thurber, (illust. Marc Simont, foreward by Neil Gaiman)
I checked this book out from the Ankeny public library when I was a little kid, and I’ve been looking for a copy to call my own ever since. It just recently came back into print, and I immediately ordered it.

Coraline
by Neil Gaiman
I haven’t seen the movie yet; unfortunately I missed it in 3-D, for which I heard rave reviews. The book was quite good, and I’m given what I’ve heard about the changed ending in the movie, I’m not sure I’ll like the movie as well.
Faking It
by College Humor
I’m only listing this because I read the damn thing, but I won’t link to it. It’s a misogynist piece of crap, and I’m rather ashamed it was published by our company. I’m rather shocked I read the whole thing, but I kept hoping it would get better. It’s didn’t; don’t bother.

The Unfinished Clue
by Georgette Heyer
I’ve been a huge fan of her Regency novels since I was a teen; I have almost all of them in my library and they show up on my reading lists here on the site repeatedly. But I’ve never read any of her mysteries. I’m glad I finally did; her sparkling, witty characterizations are present here, too. Light reading, but lots of fun.

I haven’t completed any of my Project Fill-in-the-gaps titles, but I’m well into two of them. And I have some unfinished reading from earlier this year that I want to complete as well. We’ll see how all that goes.

Books I’ve Read – First quarter 2009

Post author:HFM
Post published:April 3, 2009
Post category:Books I've Read

Wow, I’ve done horribly at documenting my reading for this year. Maybe I need to just give up trying to do posts for every book and just aggregate them into 1 post each quarter. Here’s what I’ve read in the first quarter of 2009:

D’Aulaires’ Book of Norse Myths
by Ingri D’Aulaire
I loved D’Aulaires’ Greek Myths as a child and bought a copy of it as an adult, but never realized they had illustrated Norse Mythology as well until I discovered this in the children’s section last year. It’s excellent; while their illustrations of the sunny Greek Gods and Heroes have always been the pictures in my mind’s eye of those iconic characters, their illustrative style is even more suited to the dark and sometimes grim Norse story telling.

The Various: Book 1 in the Touchstone Trilogy
by Steve Augarde
I picked this up at Unabridged bookstore in Boystown while we were there for the gay games. That independent bookstore has been well-known for many years for it’s staff recommendations (a technique since picked up by large bookstores around the country) and The Various was a highly recommended title in the young adult section. It was very lovely, and reminded me a lot of I Capture The Castle, although this book fits very much in the fantasy genre. I enjoyed it enough to put the second two books on my wishlist. I have to see how it all comes out.

The Limerick Trick
by Scott Corbett
I picked this up at Midland Antique Mall because Scott Corbett was the author of a childhood favorite book of mine – The Great Joke Game. This was cute, but not as exciting – a young man needing to write a poem for class invokes a spell and ends up spouting limericks unintentionally. Fortunately, none of them had anything to do with Nantucket.

The Fourth Bear: A Nursery Crime
by Jasper Fforde
I’ve been a fan of Jasper Fforde’s literary comic mysteries, and like the Tuesday Next series, the Nursery Crime series is clever and quite funny.

The Book of General Ignorance
by John Mitchinson and John Lloyd
A fun book of trivia and arcane factoids that challenge common wisdom, old wives tales and some of the rather general notions handed down in our elementary school textbooks.

The Graveyard Book
by Neil Gaiman
This year’s Newbery award winner. It’s excellent, and quite worth it. Pick it up to read.

The Eight
by Katherine Neville
I bought this thinking it was a book about a jeweled chess set that I’ve been hunting for many years. It turned out not to be the book I remember, but it was quite engaging. Katherine Neville was Dan Brown years before Dan Brown, and she was much better at it. The story of the mysterious lost chess set of Charlemagne; this book spans several centuries and continents as various players race to gather up the pieces and unlock the mystery encoded there centuries ago.

Fresh Styles for Web Designers: Eye Candy from the Underground
by Curt Cloninger
A revised edition covering more modern styles of site design; a must-own book for web designers.
Wow, practically everything I’ve managed to finish so far this year is a children’s book. Yeesh! That’s sad, right there. I know I’ve been busy, but this is pretty unprecedented, even for me. But here’s the reason why….

Books I have in progress:
I’m in another one of those stuck modes where I keep getting distracted and picking up and putting down books. Here’s what I have on my plate to work through:
The Day Wall Street Exploded: A Story of America in its First Age of Terror
by Beverly Gage
This is a really engaging book and one that I will absolutely finish. I especially enjoy walking around saying “The day Wall Street asploded.” I am a mental five-year-old, after all.

The Writer’s Idea Book
Jack Heffron

The Creative Habit: Learn It and Use It for Life
by Twyla Tharp

The Element: How Finding Your Passion Changes Everything
by Ph.D., Ken Robinson and Lou Aronica

Cities in Civilization
by Peter Hall

The Lovecraft Lexicon: A Reader’s Guide to Persons, Places and Things in the Tales of H.P. Lovecraft
by Anthony Brainard Pearsall

H.P. Lovecraft Unabridged
by H.P. Lovecraft
I have finished quite a few of his short stories, but this is a complete set, so it’ll be awhile before I get through them all.

The Moment It Clicks: Photography secrets from one of the world’s top shooters
by Joe McNally
This is a great book for any photographer. McNally and Scott Kelby are great for people who have some experience with photography in understanding technical proficiency. However I keep picking it up, and then returning to the more technical other photography book I’m reading to fill in the gaps…

Photography (9th Edition)
by Barbara London (Author), Jim Stone (Author), John Upton (Author)
This is the best book I’ve read so far at explaining the fundamentals of how a single lens reflex camera actually works – at helping me sort out what I need to know about aperture, focal lengths, depth of field, etc. I had learned all that back in photography class in college, but in the 20 years since then, I managed to spring a leak in my brains and all those bits of data fell right out. This book has helped me put them back in again.

Castle Waiting
by Linda Medley
Publisher’s weekly explains it might better than I could – “A set of linked nouveaux fairy tales, this graphic novel extends the story of Sleeping Beauty into a modern, feminist Chaucer for happy people.”

Addendum to Books I Read in 2008

Post author:HFM
Post published:January 8, 2009
Post category:Books I've Read

I had the time to get some extra reading in over the holidays, and I managed to add a couple of books to my list at the end of the year. And good ones, too.

The Big Book Of Lesbian Horse Stories
by Alisa Surkis and Monica Nolan
No, the horses aren’t lesbians. The lesbians love horses. But not in THAT way. Very much a comedic book — the cover is filled with racy, pulp-fiction-like quotes, that that’s the closest the book actually gets to racy; it’s a collection of rather sweet, very funny short stories about girls who love other girls and who also love horses.

Made to Stick: Why Some Ideas Survive and Others Die
by Chip Heath and Dan Heath
A great analysis of ideas that are successfully communicated and why they are unforgettable — what it takes to make your ideas stick. If you have anything to do with marketing, this is a must-read book; as I was reading it, I found myself wanting to give copies of it to people I thought would get a lot from it.

Outliers: The Story of Success
by Malcolm Gladwell
While many people have innate talents – the people who are truly Outliers are those who come from a background that nurtures their talent and gives them opportunities to practice what they have a passion for – and thousands of hours of practice make them truly great in their field. Publishers Weekly: “Gladwell tears down the myth of individual merit to explore how culture, circumstance, timing, birth and luck account for success–and how historical legacies can hold others back despite ample individual gifts.”

Books I Read in 2008

Post author:HFM
Post published:December 7, 2008
Post category:Books I've Read

It’s my 12th Annual end of the year reading recap. Grand total: 30 books. I don’t think that’s my lowest total, but it’s no 98 titles like in 1997. And boy, oh boy did I hit the genre fiction this year. It did help to have lots of fun light reading while all the wedding planning and such was going on — too much to think about during all that to be reading weighty tomes.

Maybe I’ll finally get that “year of reading Proust” started in 2009. Ha! Who am I kidding? I started Swann’s Way more than once and kept falling asleep. I should go back to it just to cure my insomnia. I have lots of other good books on my shelves, so I need to range further afield in the coming year, though.

The Dangerous Book for Boys by Conn Iggulden and Hal Iggulden
The Geographer’s Library by Jon Fasman
Locked Rooms (Mary Russell Novels) by Laurie R. King
The Art of Detection by Laurie R. King
Standard Hero Behavior by John David Anderson
The Best of MAKE (Make) by Mark Frauenfelder and Gareth Branwyn
Buffy the Vampire Slayer Season Eight, Volume 1: The Long Way Home by Joss Whedon, Andy Owens, Georges Jeanty, and Jo Chen
Marvel 1602 by Neil Gaiman and Andy Kubert
The Areas of My Expertise by John Hodgman
Jane and His Lordship’s Legacy (Jane Austen Mysteries, book 8) by Stephanie Barron
Justice Hall (Mary Russell Novels) by Laurie R. King
The Game (Mary Russell Novels) by Laurie R. King
The Somnambulist by Jonathan Barnes
The Secret of Lost Things by Sheridan Hay
The Archivist: A Novel by Martha Cooley
The Egyptologist: A Novel by Arthur Phillips
Here Lies the Librarian by Richard Peck
Maps and Legends by Michael Chabon
The Fencing Master by Arturo Perez-Reverte
Schulz and Peanuts: A Biography by David Michaelis
The Code of the Woosters by P.G. Wodehouse
The Digital Photography Book by Scott Kelby
Night Work (Kate Martinelli Mysteries) by Laurie R. King
A Grave Talent (Kate Martinelli Mysteries) by Laurie R. King
To Play The Fool (Kate Martinelli Mysteries) by Laurie R. King
With Child (Kate Martinelli Mysteries) by Laurie R. King
The Spice Box by Lou Jane Temple
Slammerkin by Emma Donoghue
Snobs by Julian Fellowes
Bel Canto by Ann Patchett

Books I’ve Read – November and December 2008

Post author:HFM
Post published:December 7, 2008
Post category:Books I've Read

A Grave Talent (Kate Martinelli Mysteries)
by Laurie R. King
To Play The Fool (Kate Martinelli Mysteries)
by Laurie R. King
With Child (Kate Martinelli Mysteries)
by Laurie R. King
Earlier this year, I read the fourth and fifth books in the Kate Martinelli Series. This time I circled back around and read the first three to get caught up. These aren’t terrible, but I don’t enjoy them as much as I liked King’s other series – The Mary Russell mysteries, set in Sherlock Holmes’ era. The Martinelli mysteries seem much darker and grimmer. But still interesting reading; I obviously read them all the way through and picked up others. 🙂
I actually also started but couldn’t finish another Laurie R. King novel — A Darker Place. Set in a cult – it started out too creepy for me so I couldn’t finish. Maybe I’ll pick it back up in the summertime.
The Spice Box
by Lou Jane Temple
A nicely-written mystery. I’ll look forward to reading more from this series. — “The first of a new food-themed historical series, Temple’s charming tale of New York City in the Civil War era introduces Bridget Heaney, a clever, streetwise Irish immigrant. The day Bridget starts as an assistant cook in the Manhattan household of wealthy merchant Isaac Gold, she makes a terrible discovery: the body of the family’s youngest son, Seth, who’d been missing, crammed inside a dough box.”
Slammerkin
by Emma Donoghue
“Donoghue takes scraps of the intriguing true story of Mary Saunders, a servant girl who murdered her mistress in 1763, and fashions from them an intelligent and mesmerizing historical novel.” — I just thought it was grim and upsetting. I read it on recommendation from several people who loved it. I did not feel the same.
Snobs
by Julian Fellowes
Fellowes also wrote the script for Gosford Park. Snobs is an entertaining comedic look at the snobbery of British upper class, set in the 1990s.
Bel Canto
by Ann Patchett
Invoking the first and second rules of book club.

Charles Shulz, The Code of the Woosters, Digital Photography

Post author:HFM
Post published:September 9, 2008
Post category:Books I've Read

Stuff I’ve read lately:

Schulz and Peanuts: A Biography
by David Michaelis
Who knew that Charles Schulz was such a prickly pear? And a fascinating artist. His rise to prominence as a cartoonist occurred when I was a tiny tot in the late 60’s and early 70’s, and the perspective I had of the Peanuts cartoon from that age is thrown into quite a contrast by this biography — and for the better, I’d say. It’s interesting to discover that a cartoon I have such strong childhood memories of was originally aimed at and popular with the college students of it’s generation.

The Code of the Woosters
by P.G. Wodehouse
One of the few remaining Wodehouse books I haven’t read; funny as always.

The Digital Photography Book
by Scott Kelby
A really handy book for people who are picking up a DSLR camera for the first time and learning what it can do. Kelby leaves out the dry boring crap and tells you “here’s how I would set up my camera in this situation.”

Night Work (Kate Martinelli Mysteries)
by Laurie R. King
Fourth book in the series. I seem to be reading them backwards; I haven’t read the first 3 yet. That hasn’t impaired my enjoyment at all.

Words that end in “-ist” for a thousand, Alex

Post author:HFM
Post published:August 26, 2008
Post category:Books Books I've Read My Writing

In creating my current “recently read” list today, I noticed an oddity in my reading choices…

The Archivist: A Novel by Martha Cooley
The Egyptologist: A Novel by Arthur Phillips
Here Lies the Librarian by Richard Peck
Maps and Legends by Michael Chabon
The Fencing Master by Arturo Perez-Reverte

Previously, my reading list included The Sonambulist, and a few years back, one of my very favorite books was The Intuitionist. I also recently enjoyed The Illusionist on DVD.

I know there’s at least one other “-ist” title in my “recently read” list, but when I started to go back and look for it, I realized I have 11 years worth of book lists to look through, and I decided I was too lazy for that. You’d think I’d keep a running list after all these years, but, well, refer to previous sentence re: lazy.

“The suffix -ist is used to denote a person who either practices something or a person who is concerned with something or a person who holds certain principles, doctrines, etc.”

Yes, well people seem to like to write lots of books about such people, don’t they? I have not read The Alchemist, or The Alienist, but I’m not going to be compulsive about it and put them on my “to read” list. The first doesn’t interest me, and the second I heard about from others and I’m pretty sure I might not like it.

The Impressionist is on my bookshelf now, and I’ll probably give it a read.

Given the prominence of the suffix in published works, I thought I might title my own future novel with an “-ist” ending, so I began reading through 1201 such words.

Alas, both The Balloonists, and The Little Balloonist are taken, so it seems that non-engine powered aeronautics covered.

I could go with the Anarchist – there doesn’t seem to be a novel by that name, although there is a Cookbook, and apparently, they are in the Library of late. (that last one is on my reading list, BTW. The first is probably going to get me on watchlists just for linking.

So, how about the Aviarist, or The Bronchioscopist? Well, maybe not that last one. That sounds a bit squishy. The Anecdotalist? That sounds a bit like Auntie Gert telling stories with endless tangents and no endpoint.

An “aquarellist” is a person who paints water colors.

A “cinquecentist” is a poet or artist in 16th century Italy. Both would require me to do research. See: lazy.

The Deconstructionist! Ugh. I think I’d rather shoot them that write about them.

The Fabulist — I think that’s it. Yes, the Fabulist. Damn it — that’s already written. And about that fine fellow Stephen Glass, too. That title almost makes him seem whimsical.

A Feist is a small dog – or a singer whichever you prefer.

A funambulist is a tight-rope walker.

Where the hell am I in this list? F? This could go on forever. or perhaps all the way to
Z. Best quit now.

la·zy·ish: \-zē-ish\ adjective – a: disinclined to activity or exertion : not energetic or vigorous. Indolent, Slothful.

2022-03-13 Update:
I have since read The Alchemist, The Alienist,and The Impressionist.

I did avoid the Anarchist Cookbook. I am still thinking about the The Anarchist in the Library.

And I’m thinking there are more books with -ist since 2008. I may do a revisit. Alas, still la·zy·ish; I may not.

Book Meme: What I’ve Read

Post author:HFM
Post published:July 1, 2008
Post category:Books Books I've Read Memes Reading Lists

(via Publishing Careers)

The National Endowment for the Arts has an initiative you may have heard of called the Big Read. According to the website, its purpose is to “restore reading to the center of American culture.” They estimate that the average adult has only read 6 of the top 100 books they’ve printed.

Here’s what you do:

1) Look at the list and bold those you have read.
2) Italicize those you intend to read.
3) Underline the books you LOVE.
4) Reprint this list on your own blog.

1 Pride and Prejudice – Jane Austen
2 The Lord of the Rings – JRR Tolkien
3 Jane Eyre – Charlotte Bronte
4 Harry Potter series – JK Rowling
5 To Kill a Mockingbird – Harper Lee
6 The Bible
7 Wuthering Heights – Emily Bronte – loved this in high school, but don’t care for it now.
8 Nineteen Eighty Four – George Orwell
9 His Dark Materials – Philip Pullman
10 Great Expectations – Charles Dickens
11 Little Women – Louisa M Alcott
12 Tess of the D’Urbervilles – Thomas Hardy
13 Catch 22 – Joseph Heller
14 Complete Works of Shakespeare
15 Rebecca – Daphne Du Maurier
16 The Hobbit – JRR Tolkien
17 Birdsong – Sebastian Faulks
18 Catcher in the Rye – JD Salinger
19 The Time Traveller’s Wife – Audrey Niffenegger
20 Middlemarch – George Eliot
21 Gone With The Wind – Margaret Mitchell
22 The Great Gatsby – F Scott Fitzgerald
23 Bleak House – Charles Dickens
24 War and Peace – Leo Tolstoy
25 The Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy – Douglas Adams
26 Brideshead Revisited – Evelyn Waugh
27 Crime and Punishment – Fyodor Dostoyevsky
28 Grapes of Wrath – John Steinbeck
29 Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland – Lewis Carroll
30 The Wind in the Willows – Kenneth Grahame
31 Anna Karenina – Leo Tolstoy
32 David Copperfield – Charles Dickens
33 Chronicles of Narnia – CS Lewis
34 Emma – Jane Austen
35 Persuasion – Jane Austen
36 The Lion, The Witch and The Wardrobe – CS Lewis
37 The Kite Runner – Khaled Hosseini
38 Captain Corelli’s Mandolin – Louis De Bernieres
39 Memoirs of a Geisha – Arthur Golden- (started this)
40 Winnie the Pooh – AA Milne
41 Animal Farm – George Orwell
42 The Da Vinci Code – Dan Brown
43 One Hundred Years of Solitude – Gabriel Garcia Marquez
45 The Woman in White – Wilkie Collins
46 Anne of Green Gables – LM Montgomery
47 Far From The Madding Crowd – Thomas Hardy
48 The Handmaid’s Tale – Margaret Atwood
49 Lord of the Flies – William Golding
50 Atonement – Ian McEwan
52 Dune – Frank Herbert
53 Cold Comfort Farm – Stella Gibbons
54 Sense and Sensibility – Jane Austen
55 A Suitable Boy – Vikram Seth
56 The Shadow of the Wind – Carlos Ruiz Zafon
57 A Tale Of Two Cities – Charles Dickens
58 Brave New World – Aldous Huxley
59 The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night-time – Mark Haddon
60 Love In The Time Of Cholera – Gabriel Garcia Marquez
61 Of Mice and Men – John Steinbeck
62 Lolita – Vladimir Nabokov
63 The Secret History – Donna Tartt
64 The Lovely Bones – Alice Sebold
65 Count of Monte Cristo – Alexandre Dumas
66 On The Road – Jack Kerouac
67 Jude the Obscure – Thomas Hardy
68 Bridget Jones’s Diary – Helen Fielding
69 Midnight’s Children – Salman Rushdie
70 Moby Dick – Herman Melville (started it)
71 Oliver Twist – Charles Dickens
72 Dracula – Bram Stoker
73 The Secret Garden – Frances Hodgson Burnett
74 Notes From A Small Island – Bill Bryson
75 Ulysses – James Joyce
76 The Bell Jar – Sylvia Plath
77 Swallows and Amazons – Arthur Ransome
78 Germinal – Emile Zola
79 Vanity Fair – William Makepeace Thackeray
80 Possession – A. S. Byatt
81 A Christmas Carol – Charles Dickens
82 Cloud Atlas – David Mitchell
83 The Color Purple – Alice Walker
84 The Remains of the Day – Kazuo Ishiguro
85 Madame Bovary – Gustave Flaubert
86 A Fine Balance – Rohinton Mistry
87 Charlotte’s Web – EB White
88 The Five People You Meet In Heaven – Mitch Albom
89 Adventures of Sherlock Holmes – Sir Arthur Conan Doyle
90 The Faraway Tree Collection – Enid Blyton
91 Heart of Darkness – Joseph Conrad
92 The Little Prince – Antoine De Saint-Exupery
93 The Wasp Factory – Iain Banks
94 Watership Down – Richard Adams
95 A Confederacy of Dunces – John Kennedy Toole
96 A Town Like Alice – Nevil Shute
97 The Three Musketeers – Alexandre Dumas
98 Hamlet – William Shakespeare
99 Charlie and the Chocolate Factory – Roald Dahl
100 Les Miserables – Victor Hugo

My score: 63/100

What I’ve Read Recently

Post author:HFM
Post published:June 19, 2008
Post category:Books I've Read

The problem I had with being unfocused and skipping from book to book seems to have passed, post-wedding. At one point, I believe I had 9 books partially read. I haven’t gone back to finish any of them, but started fresh with some lighter summer reading in order to carry paperbacks on the plane with me.

The Areas of My Expertise
by John Hodgman
John Hodgman is a writer and comedian who has appeared on the Daily Show and is the “PC” in the Mac/PC commercials from Apple. It’s a very funny book, but I think I’d prefer to hear him read this out loud though – his deadpan delivery is what really sells his offbeat humor.

Jane and His Lordship’s Legacy (Jane Austen Mysteries, book 8)
by Stephanie Barron
While I still can’t quite reconcile this mystery series’ rendition of Jane Austen with the woman I see in my mind’s eye after reading her biographies, the series is pretty entertaining.

Justice Hall (Mary Russell Novels)
by Laurie R. King
and
The Game (Mary Russell Novels)
by Laurie R. King
Looping back to pick up the two mysteries in the series that I skipped over accidentally. Justice Hall is the 6th in the Mary Russell series, and for those that may not have read my previous reviews, Mary is married to detective Sherlock Holmes. They’re pretty well written, and I enjoy Mary’s character, although Holmes seems at times to take a back seat and plot is sometimes a bit ambiguous.

The Somnambulist
by Jonathan Barnes
Wow. For a debut novel, this is a killer job. I really loved this book. Edward Moon is a British magician in Victorian London, with an unusual, hulking silent partner called “The Sonambulist” who participates in his acts and helps him solve the odd mystery on the side. Moon’s career is on the wane after years of popularity, mainly because his act has been the same for years and people have tired of seeing the same old thing. He’s drawn into the investigation of an actor’s murder, and manages to stumble into a full-blown conspiracy to destroy the city of London, which he must quickly get to the heart of before doom strikes the city. The book is funny, quirky and full of Dickensian-like oddballs. Can’t wait for the sequel. I hope there is one.

The Secret of Lost Things
by Sheridan Hay
Rosemary Savage comes to America at age 18 to settle in New York City after the death of her mother in her home country of Tasmania. She finds a job in the Arcade Bookshop (similar to the real bookshop the Strand) and stumbles into a mystery of a lost Herman Melville manuscript, and those who want to profit from it.