One of the things we did at retreat was, inevitably, recommend books to each other. I did not record who recommended what, but here follows the eclectic selection of titles that came up during one of our discussions.
Links are to the authors’ own sites when possible, both because I just think that’s preferable and because I’m in the midst of planning to redesign mine and so hey, here are a bunch of examples of how folks are designing author sites.
Grave Mercy, Robin LaFevers
Anna and the French Kiss, Stephanie Perkins
I Hunt Killers, Barry Lyga
The Night Circus, Erin Morganstern
A Monster Calls and The Knife of Never Letting Go, Patrick Ness
Deathless, Catherynne M. Valente
Mechanique, Genevieve Valentine
Ashfall, Mike Mullin
The Troupe, Robert Jackson Bennett
The Girls of No Return, Erin Saldin
Wonder, R.J. Palacio
Out Of My Mind, Sharon Draper
A Greyhound Of A Girl, Roddy Doyle
Are You My Mother?, Alison Bechdel
Code Name Verity, Elizabeth Wein
The Wicked and the Just, J. Anderson Coats
Writing The Other, Nisi Shawl and Cynthia Ward
Fatale, Ed Brubaker & Sean Philips
Anya’s Ghost, Vera Brosgol
Courtney Crumrin and the Night Things, Ted Naifeh
Girl of Fire and Thorns, Rae Carson
Slaughter-House Five, Kurt Vonnegut
Don’t Sleep, There Are Snakes, Dan Everett
Wherever I Wind Up, R. A. Dickey
Let’s Pretend This Never Happened, Jenny Lawson
Wild, Cheryl Strayed
Lone Survivor, Marcus Luttrell
War, Sebastian Junger
The Things They Carried, Tim O’Brien
On Killing, Dave Grossman
The Wednesdays, Julie Bourbeau
Altered, Jennifer Rush
Charlie Joe Jackson’s Guide to Not Reading, Tommy Greenwald
The Strange Case of Origami Yoda, Tom Angleberger
The People vs. George Lucas (a documentary, not a book, but came up as a sidebar to Origami Yoda)
Radiant Days, Elizabeth Hand
Signal to Noise, Neil Gaiman and Dave McKean
Daughter of Smoke and Bone, Laini Taylor
Only Begotten Daughter, James Morrow
…and finally at the end of that long list I also jotted down an unrelated, unattributed quote: “Cleavage is kind of the beard for ladies.” I don’t remember who said it, but I believe the context was Things On A Body Wherein Food Can Accumulate.