New Leaf Nominations for June • Chasing Rainbows, The World of Colour

[CRussel]

Welcome to the New Leaf Book Club's June Book Nomination thread where we select the book that the New Leaf Book Club will read in June, 2020. The theme is Chasing Rainbows , The World of Colour.

Everyone is welcome to join the nomination process even if they'd rather lurk during the voting and discussion; if that is still a little too much commitment, please feel free to suggest titles without making a formal nomination. Also, don't sweat the links. It's helpful to check availability and prices before nominating in order to eliminate anything that's out of the question, but ultimately our global members with different gadgets and preferences will have to check for themselves.

The nominations will run through 9 AM PDT, May 7, 2020. Each nomination requires a second to make it to the poll, which will remain open for three days. The discussion of the selection will start on June 15, 2020.

Any questions? See the FAQ below, or just ask!

FAQs for the Nomination, Selection and Discussion process

General Guidelines for the New Leaf Book Club

Official choices with two nominations:

• This is How You Lose the Time War by Amal El-Mohtar and Max Gladstone.(astrangerhere,gmw)
  
  Spoiler:

  This epistolatory novel written across time between two female agents in warring factions is possibly one of the most engaging stories I have read in a long time. My wife enjoyed it so much that we actually went out and bought the hardcover for our paper library.
  

  Originally Posted by Goodreads

  Among the ashes of a dying world, an agent of the Commandant finds a letter. It reads: Burn before reading. . Thus begins an unlikely correspondence between two rival agents hellbent on securing the best possible future for their warring factions. Now, what began as a taunt, a battlefield boast, grows into something more. Something epic. Something romantic. Something that could change the past and the future.
  
  Except the discovery of their bond would mean death for each of them. There’s still a war going on, after all. And someone has to win that war.

  202 pp.
  
• The World Unseen by Shamim Sarif. (Bookworm_Girl,CRussel)
  Spoiler:

  I have been wanting to read this author for a while. This book was also made into a movie directed by the author. Only $2.99 at Amazon US and similarly priced in other countries (even Australia - shocking!). This book won the Pendleton May First Novel Award and a Betty Trask Award.
  

  Originally Posted by Amazon

  In 1950's South Africa, free-spirited Amina has broken all the rules of her own conventional Indian community, and the new apartheid-led government, by running a café with Jacob her “coloured” business partner. When she meets Miriam, a young wife and mother, their unexpected attraction pushes Miriam to question the rules that bind her. When Amina helps Miriam’s sister-in-law to hide from the police, a chain of events is set in motion that changes both women forever.
  
  The World Unseen transports us to a vibrant, colourful world, a world that divides white from black and women from men, but one that might just allow an unexpected love to survive.

  322 pp.
• Passing Strange by Ellen Klages.(CRussel,gmw)
  
  Spoiler:

  This is a short book that is reasonably priced and readily available pretty much everywhere, and is DRM-free. I recently read it, and quite enjoyed it, as one of four LGBTQ books in a free Tor omnibus, but it's also available standalone.
  

  Originally Posted by Goodreads

  San Francisco in 1940 is a haven for the unconventional. Tourists flock to the cities within the city: the Magic City of the World’s Fair on an island created of artifice and illusion; the forbidden city of Chinatown, a separate, alien world of exotic food and nightclubs that offer “authentic” experiences, straight from the pages of the pulps; and the twilight world of forbidden love, where outcasts from conventional society can meet.
  
  Six women find their lives as tangled with each other’s as they are with the city they call home. They discover love and danger on the borders where magic, science, and art intersect.
  
  Inspired by the pulps, film noir, and screwball comedy, Passing Strange is a story as unusual and complex as San Francisco itself from World Fantasy Award winning author Ellen Klages.
  
  At the Publisher's request, this title is being sold without Digital Rights Management Software (DRM) applied.

  AmazonUS AmazonCA AmazonAU AmazonUK
  222 pp.
• The Not So Secret Emails of Coco Pinchard by Robert Bryndza (gmw, CRussel)
  Spoiler:

  
  An epistolary contemporary comedy with some romance. It is a bit of a stretch for this theme as the main romance is heterosexual, but there are a few gay characters, and the cover is very colourful ... and it feels like a great big colourful mess, sort of like real life. (Any excuse to mention this fun story is good enough.)

  Originally Posted by Goodreads

  Coco Pinchard always dreamed of being a successful writer, but then life got in the way. She married young, had a son, and put her dreams on hold. But now she's 40, and her first novel is about to be published! Her husband Daniel has greyed nicely into a silver fox, and her son Rosencrantz is all grown up. Shouldn't it be time to enjoy life?
  
  That is, until the annual family Christmas when her hideous in-laws come to stay, and Coco opens her gift from Daniel. It's not the jewelry she chose, but an iPhone. This marks the start of Daniel's mid-life crisis and Coco catches him in bed with a younger woman.
  
  The iPhone becomes a confessional, and as Coco's life unravels, she documents her seemingly endless (and often entertaining) run of bad luck through emails to loyal friends Christopher, an ageing trustafarian, and Marika, a slightly alcoholic schoolteacher.
  
  Then Coco meets the hunky Adam and she's back in the world of dating as a single 40-something. Listen to the heart warming and often hilarious tale of Coco picking up the pieces, in this fun, feel-good romantic comedy.

  KoboUS KoboCA KoboUKKoboAU
  354 pp.
• Kingsblood Royal by Sinclair Lewis. (Catlady,Bookworm_Girl)
  
  Spoiler:

  Originally Posted by Goodreads

  A neglected tour de force by the first American to win the Nobel Prize in literature, Kingsblood Royal is a stirring and wickedly funny portrait of a man who resigns from the white race. When Neil Kingsblood, a typical middle-American banker with a comfortable life, makes the shocking discovery that he has African blood, the odyssey that ensues creates an unforgettable portrayal of two Americas, one black, one white.
  
  As timely as when it was first published in 1947, one need only open today's newspaper to see the same issues passionately being discussed between blacks and whites that we find in Kingsblood Royal, says Charles Johnson. Perhaps only now can we fully appreciate Sinclair Lewis's astonishing achievement.

  Amazon U.S. Faded Page
  334 pp.
• Rainbows End by Vernor Vinge (JSWolf,issybird)
  
  Spoiler:

  Four time Hugo Award winner Vernor Vinge has taken readers to the depths of space and into the far future in his bestselling novels A Fire Upon the Deep and A Deepness in the Sky. Now, he has written a science-fiction thriller set in a place and time as exciting and strange as any far-future world: San Diego, California, 2025.
  
  Robert Gu is a recovering Alzheimer's patient. The world that he remembers was much as we know it today. Now, as he regains his faculties through a cure developed during the years of his near-fatal decline, he discovers that the world has changed and so has his place in it. He was a world-renowned poet. Now he is seventy-five years old, though by a medical miracle he looks much younger, and he's starting over, for the first time unsure of his poetic gifts. Living with his son's family, he has no choice but to learn how to cope with a new information age in which the virtual and the real are a seamless continuum, layers of reality built on digital views seen by a single person or millions, depending on your choice. But the consensus reality of the digital world is available only if, like his thirteen-year-old granddaughter Miri, you know how to wear your wireless access—through nodes designed into smart clothes—and to see the digital context—through smart contact lenses.
  
  With knowledge comes risk. When Robert begins to re-train at Fairmont High, learning with other older people what is second nature to Miri and other teens at school, he unwittingly becomes part of a wide-ranging conspiracy to use technology as a tool for world domination.
  
  In a world where every computer chip has Homeland Security built-in, this conspiracy is something that baffles even the most sophisticated security analysts, including Robert's son and daughter-in law, two top people in the U.S. military. And even Miri, in her attempts to protect her grandfather, may be entangled in the plot.
  
  As Robert becomes more deeply involved in conspiracy, he is shocked to learn of a radical change planned for the UCSD Geisel Library; all the books there, and worldwide, would cease to physically exist. He and his fellow re-trainees feel compelled to join protests against the change. With forces around the world converging on San Diego, both the conspiracy and the protest climax in a spectacular moment as unique and satisfying as it is unexpected. This is science fiction at its very best, by a master storyteller at his peak.

  Overdrive AmazonUK KoboUS KoboCA ebooksUK AmazonUS
  404 pp.
  

(Note: We're continuing our experiment of only requiring a nomination and a second again this month. However, everyone still gets three tickets to use for nominations or seconds. This is likely the last month we'll call this an experiment. By next month, we'll see what folks think.)

[CRussel]

Nominations awaiting a Second:

[Catlady]

The best laid plans ... From the day this theme was chosen, I had a perfect book in mind to nominate; perfect, that is, until I checked availability. And it's a no-go. But I'll mention it anyway:

Trans-Sister Radio by Chris Bohjalian (2000, 370 pp.).

From the bestselling author of Midwives comes a thought-provoking story about gender, love, and new relationships.

When Allison Banks develops a crush on Dana Stevens, she knows that he will give her what she needs most: attention, gentleness, kindness, passion. Her daughter, Carly, enthusiastically witnesses the change in her mother. But then a few months into their relationship, Dana tells Allison his secret: he has always been certain that he is a woman born into the wrong skin, and soon he will have a sex-change operation. Allison, overwhelmed by the depth of her passion, finds herself unable to leave Dana. By deciding to stay, she finds she must confront questions most people never even consider. Not only will her own life and Carly’ s be irrevocably changed, she will have to contend with the outrage of a small Vermont community and come to terms with her lover’s new body–hoping against hope that her love will transcend the physical.

Just in case anyone's interested in this, note that the only available audiobook version in the U.S. is abridged.

Back to the drawing board.

[astrangerhere]

I will nominate This is How You Lose the Time War by Amal El-Mohtar and Max Gladstone. This epistolatory novel written across time between two female agents in warring factions is possibly one of the most engaging stories I have read in a long time. My wife enjoyed it so much that we actually went out and bought the hardcover for our paper library.

From Goodreads:

Among the ashes of a dying world, an agent of the Commandant finds a letter. It reads: Burn before reading. . Thus begins an unlikely correspondence between two rival agents hellbent on securing the best possible future for their warring factions. Now, what began as a taunt, a battlefield boast, grows into something more. Something epic. Something romantic. Something that could change the past and the future.

Except the discovery of their bond would mean death for each of them. There’s still a war going on, after all. And someone has to win that war.

The book is available on Kindle and Kobo for 9.99USD

[gmw]

I second This is How You Lose the Time War by Amal El-Mohtar and Max Gladstone.

I've had this on my wish list since it came out. I just wish the price was more reasonable - it is only a novella.

[gmw]

I'm not well prepared this month, still looking for inspiration.

(Since no one as posted since I am) Editing to add:

I wondered whether to nominate Sacre Bleu by Christopher Moore, because it fits the theme so well, and it is sort of interesting from an art history perspective, but it's my least favourite of the Moore stories I've read so far. I plan on giving it a second chance one day (it's possible my first reaction was a mood thing) but there are probably better choices out there for a club read.

I have come up with another ... but keeping it as a fallback while my search continues.

[JSWolf]

I'm having trouble finding a book of colour. I can only find books of color.

[gmw]

The "problem", as you call it, is half the fun.

Or maybe I'm just perverse. (You don't have to respond to that. )

[JSWolf]

I'll nominate The Wind in the Willows by Kenneth Grahame. It is nicely illustrated.

When Mole rebels and abandons the spring cleaning of his burrow, he little knows what the future holds. He soon meets the steady and practical Water Rat, then the impulsive and boastful Mr. Toad, and wise old Badger. Many new adventures await, from travels on the open road, to getting lost in a snowstorm in the Wild Wood, to simply “messing about in boats.” Along the way, Toad lands in jail for stealing a motorcar, and the four friends must do battle to reclaim Toad Hall from the invading weasels and stoats.

This book is a testament to the enduring bond of friendship and the charm in homely pleasures, and can be enjoyed by the young and the young-at-heart. (Recommended for ages 9 to 90.)

ePub: https://www.mobileread.com/forums/sh...d.php?t=328102
KF8: https://www.mobileread.com/forums/sh...d.php?t=328101

[gmw]

The Wind in the Willows was fully nominated last month. Love the book, but books are not eligible if they have been fully nominated in the last six months - see the rules here.

[CRussel]

Jon, you have your ticket back. The book is not eligible yet.

I've got a couple I'd like to nominate, but they'll have to wait until late this afternoon, when I get back.

[astrangerhere]

Originally Posted by gmw

I second This is How You Lose the Time War by Amal El-Mohtar and Max Gladstone.

I've had this on my wish list since it came out. I just wish the price was more reasonable - it is only a novella.

Honestly, it was worth the $15 I paid for the hardcover in print. I am certain I will read it again.

[JSWolf]

Another nomination is Rainbows End by Vernor Vinge

Four time Hugo Award winner Vernor Vinge has taken readers to the depths of space and into the far future in his bestselling novels A Fire Upon the Deep and A Deepness in the Sky. Now, he has written a science-fiction thriller set in a place and time as exciting and strange as any far-future world: San Diego, California, 2025.

Robert Gu is a recovering Alzheimer's patient. The world that he remembers was much as we know it today. Now, as he regains his faculties through a cure developed during the years of his near-fatal decline, he discovers that the world has changed and so has his place in it. He was a world-renowned poet. Now he is seventy-five years old, though by a medical miracle he looks much younger, and he's starting over, for the first time unsure of his poetic gifts. Living with his son's family, he has no choice but to learn how to cope with a new information age in which the virtual and the real are a seamless continuum, layers of reality built on digital views seen by a single person or millions, depending on your choice. But the consensus reality of the digital world is available only if, like his thirteen-year-old granddaughter Miri, you know how to wear your wireless access—through nodes designed into smart clothes—and to see the digital context—through smart contact lenses.

With knowledge comes risk. When Robert begins to re-train at Fairmont High, learning with other older people what is second nature to Miri and other teens at school, he unwittingly becomes part of a wide-ranging conspiracy to use technology as a tool for world domination.

In a world where every computer chip has Homeland Security built-in, this conspiracy is something that baffles even the most sophisticated security analysts, including Robert's son and daughter-in law, two top people in the U.S. military. And even Miri, in her attempts to protect her grandfather, may be entangled in the plot.

As Robert becomes more deeply involved in conspiracy, he is shocked to learn of a radical change planned for the UCSD Geisel Library; all the books there, and worldwide, would cease to physically exist. He and his fellow re-trainees feel compelled to join protests against the change. With forces around the world converging on San Diego, both the conspiracy and the protest climax in a spectacular moment as unique and satisfying as it is unexpected. This is science fiction at its very best, by a master storyteller at his peak.

Overdrive: https://www.overdrive.com/search?q=r...d+vernor+vinge
Amazon UK: https://www.amazon.co.uk/Rainbows-En.../dp/B006L7RAPO
Kobo US: https://www.kobo.com/us/en/ebook/rainbows-end
Kobo CA: https://www.kobo.com/ca/en/ebook/rainbows-end
ebooks UK: https://www.ebooks.com/en-gb/book/83...d/vernor-vinge
Amazon US: https://www.amazon.com/Rainbows-End-.../dp/B004M8SR2O
ebooks US: https://www.ebooks.com/en-us/book/65...d/vernor-vinge

[Bookworm_Girl]

I have a handful of possibilities. I will post a nomination on Sunday.

[CRussel]

My first nomination was going to be: Me, Myself, They: Life Beyond the Binary, by Joshua M. Ferguson, a leader in the fight for non-binary rights in Canada and beyond. An interesting and important book with some flaws, but none that were critical. However, it's not available as an eBook in Australia, and it has gone up in price in North America, so I think I'll have to pass. But having said that, I'd encourage those of you who can get your hands on a copy to read it. If you don't learn something, and don't have to do a bit of re-examination, then you've probably already gone beyond the basic cisgendered pronouns. However, I encourage you to avoid the audio book. A perfect example of why authors shouldn't read their own books in the vast majority of cases.

I'll be back tomorrow with a nomination. Or two.