As I’m sure I’ve mentioned here before, I love exploring backlists. Right now, for example, I’ve been working my way through all of Betty Ren Wright’s books—everyone knows The Dollhouse Murders, but she wrote DOZENS of other chapter books—and after reading Sue Macy’s Motor Girls for the Amelia Bloomer Project, I’ve been working my way through her older books as well.
Here are a few others I’m planning on reading soon:
Because I loved Isabel Greenberg’s One Hundred Nights of Hero, I’ll be looking for her debut, The Encyclopedia of Early Earth
Like Hero, it’s a graphic novel; like Hero, it deals with the power of storytelling and pulls threads through multiple generations of people. I loved Hero for the art, and I loved it for the way that Greenberg took familiar stories and gave them her own spin—it sounds like she does something similar here. Kirkus was iffy on it, but all of those similarities lead me to suspect that my love for Hero might mean that Early Earth will be a better fit for me than it was for the Kirkus reviewer.
Because I loved Francesca Zappia’s Eliza and Her Monsters, I’m going to read her first book, Made You Up
It’s about a girl who is expelled from her private school, so has to attend public school for her senior year. I’m somewhat skittish due to what the Kirkus review had to say about the depiction—and use, in terms of tension-building—of mental illness here, but due to my love of fish-out-of-water narratives and based on the strength of Eliza, I’m going to pick it up and see how it goes.
Because I loved Riley Redgate’s Noteworthy, I’m going to pick up her debut, Seven Ways We Lie
Seven students, seven voices, seven secrets. I love multi-voiced books, so I’d have read this one ages ago if I’d realized that that was the format here. The Kirkus review cautions that it’s a book that’s more about character than plot, but as that’s not generally an issue for me, I’m in.
Because I loved Susan Juby’s The Fashion Committee, I’m going to revisit her Alice MacLeod books
Canadian teenager transitions from homeschooling to public high school. I haven’t read these in YEARS, and I suspect that revisiting them is going to be the Best. Thing. Ever. I remember them as funny and smart and thoughtful and all of the things we’ve come to expect from Susan Juby’s books—and two out of the three of them got stars from Kirkus.
Because I loved Catherine Reef’s Florence Nightingale: The Courageous Life of the Legendary Nurse, I’m going to pick up Frida & Diego: Art, Love, Life
After I finished this book, I found it IMPOSSIBLE to carry on any sort of conversation with ANYONE without shoehorning in DID YOU KNOW facts about Florence Nightingale. It’s straight up nonfiction, but Reef makes the people and the time come alive—she’s got a book out later this year about Queen Victoria that I’m TOTALLY EXCITED ABOUT, but as I’m focused on backlist here, the Frida & Diego book is an obvious pick… because FRIDA AND DIEGO.
You? Are there any books you’ve loved so much recently that you’ve been inspired to go back and READ EVERYTHING ELSE? Let me know!
In addition to running a library in rural Maine, Leila Roy blogs at Bookshelves of Doom and The Backlist, is currently serving on the Amelia Bloomer Project committee, is a contributor at Book Riot, hangs out on Twitter a lot—possibly too much—and watches a shocking amount of television. Her cat is a murderer.
