BOOKS SALISBURY POST
‘Red Queen’ another part of continuing saga “The Red Queen,” by Philippa Gregory. Touchstone. $25.99.
Deirdre Parker Smith, Book Page Editor
BY M.L. JOHNSON
704-797-4252 dp1@salisburypost.com www.salisburypost.com
Associated Press
Anne Rice renounces Christianity NEW YORK (AP) — Anne Rice has had a religious conversion: She’s no longer a Christian. “In the name of Christ, I refuse to be anti-gay. I refuse to be anti-feminist. I refuse to be anti-artificial birth control,” the author wrote Wednesday on her Facebook page. “In the name of ... Christ, I quit Christianity and being Christian. Amen.” Rice, 68, is best known for “Interview With a Vampire” and other gothic novels. Raised as a Catholic, she had rejected the church early in her life but renewed her faith in recent years and in 2008 released the memAssociAted Press Novelist Anne rice gave oir “Called Out of up vampires, and has Darkness: A Spirnow given up christiani- itual Confession.” In a telephone ty, too. interview Thursday, Rice said she had been having doubts for the past two to three years. She was troubled by the child abuse scandals in the church, and the church’s defensive reaction, and by the excommunication of Sister Margaret McBride, a nun and hospital administrator who had approved an abortion for a woman whose life was in danger. “I believed for a long time that the differences, the quarrels among Christians didn’t matter a lot for the individual, that you live your life and stay out of it. But then I began to realize that it wasn’t an easy thing to do,” said Rice, speaking from her home near Palm Springs, Calif. “I came to the conclusion that if I didn’t make this declaration, I was going to lose my mind.” Rice said she is a Democrat who supports the health care legislation signed into law by President Barack Obama and believes gay marriage inevitably will be permitted throughout the country. Although no longer part of any denomination, she remains a believer and continues to read theology and post Biblical passages on her Facebook page. She has no immediate plans to write about her leaving the church and will continue with her metaphysical fiction series, “Songs of the Seraphim.” Rice will not be taking up vampires again, but she said she is a big fan of the HBO series “True Blood,” enjoyed the first two “Twilight” movies (she has yet to read any of the Stephenie Meyer novels) and is interested in seeing her most famous character, the vampire Lestat de Lioncourt, return to the screen. “We’re in talks about it,” she said. “But then we’ve always been in talks about it. Hope springs eternal in California.”
Rowan bestsellers Literary Bookpost
1. Sh*t My Dad Says, by Justin Halpern. 2. The Passage, by Justin Cronin. 3. The Lacuna, by Barbara Kingsolver. 4. Three Cups of Tea, by Greg Mortenson. 5. Hamlet's Blackberry: A Practical Philosophy for Building a Good Life in the Digital Age, by William Powers Jr. 6. Eat, Pray, Love, by Elizabeth Gilbert. 7. Unsuspecting Souls: The Disappearance of the Human Being, by Barry Sanders. 8. To Kill a Mockingbird, by Harper Lee. 9. Shrimp, Collards, Grits, by Patricia Branning. 10. The Rembrandt Affair, by Daniel Silva.
IndieBound bestsellers Fiction 1. The Girl Who Kicked the Hornet’s Nest, by Stieg Larsson. 2. The Help, by Kathryn Stockett. 3. The Thousand Autumns of Jacob de Zoet, by David Mitchell. 4. The Rembrandt Affair, by Daniel Silva. 5. Faithful Place, by Tana French. 6. The Passage, by Justin Cronin. 7. Fly Away Home, by Jennifer Weiner. 8. The Particular Sadness of Lemon Cake, by Aimee Bender. 9. The Cookbook Collector, by Allegra Goodman. 10. The Glass Rainbow, by James Lee Burke.
Nonfiction 1. Sh*t My Dad Says, by Justin Halpern. 2. Women, Food, and God, by Geneen Roth. 3. Medium Raw, by Anthony Bourdain. 4. Empire of the Summer Moon, by S.C. Gwynne. 5. The Big Short, by Michael Lewis. 6. Born to Run, by Christopher McDougall. 7. War, by Sebastian Junger. 8. The Immortal Life of Henrietta Lacks, by Rebecca Skloot. 9. Outliers, by Malcolm Gladwell. 10. The Obama Diaries, by Laura Ingraham.
SUNDAY, AUGUST 1, 2010 • 5D
SALISBURY POST
Philippa Gregory, author of “The Other Boleyn Girl,” continues her saga of the Wars of the Roses with a fictional biography of Margaret Beaufort, the grandmother of King Henry VIII. The wars between the Houses of York and Lancaster involved on-and-off fighting for about 30 years. They ended when Margaret’s son, Henry Tudor, killed Richard III in 1485 and married his niece, joining the two families. After a half-dozen novels focusing on the Tudor dynasty, Gregory stepped back into England’s medieval period last year with “The White Queen,” about Elizabeth Woodville, the matriarch of the House of York. “The Red Queen” is both a follow-up and companion to that novel, covering the same period from a different perspective. The novels share some of the same scenes, rendered different by the characters’ opposing views. “The Red Queen” starts when mad King Henry VI marries Margaret, his 12-yearold cousin, to his half brother, Edmund Tudor, who is twice her age. Their son, born while Margaret is still a child, comes just as the wars are starting. She vows he will become king and spends the next several decades plotting to return England to her family’s control.
Gregory’s Margaret is an egomaniac who believes herself chosen by God and aspires to be a holy warrior like Joan of Arc. Unloved by her mother and left vulnerable by her father’s suicide, she’s insecure and jealous. Elizabeth Woodville in “The White Queen” gives her little thought, but homely Margaret obsesses about the beautiful woman she believes has taken her rightful place as England’s queen. Edmund dies quickly, and Margaret’s mother marries her off in short order to another English lord. When he, too, is killed in the wars, she marries treacherous Thomas Stanley, who will turn the tide of battle in her son’s favor. There are moments when Margaret could be a sympathetic character: Married at 12, she’s raped repeatedly by a husband intent on producing a potential heir to the throne. Having endured an agonizing birth at the hands of inept midwives, she can’t conceive again. But instead, Gregory chooses — much as she did with Woodville’s power-hungry queen in “The White Queen” — to go against the grain. Her Margaret is self-absorbed, cold-hearted and grandiose in her ambitions. She sacrifices her relationship with the one person she might love, her brother-in-law Jasper Tudor, to marry and plot with Stanley. Near the end of the novel, Margaret reflects that she wouldn’t have much use for her son if he weren’t the focus of her plan to
gain power. Although Margaret is a sour pill, Gregory’s novel is not. She again brings insight to English history, recreating the power
struggle between two of the nation’s most notable women in a tale fresh for modern readers. There’s no question that she is the best at what she does.
Climatologist sees disastrous weather in future “The Weather of the Future: Heat Waves, Extreme Storms, and Other Scenes From a Climate-Changed Planet,” by Heidi Cullen. Harper, $25.99. BY CARL HARTMAN For The Associated Press
Climatologist Heidi Cullen was taken aback at her lecture on the prospects for global warming when a member of the audience came up with a practical question: “Do you think I should sell my beach house?” On reflection, the question seemed less surprising. She foresees a rise in the sea level that would drop the price of beachfront property — besides threatening climate disasters. To limit the rise, she wants governments to make people reduce, over the first half of the 21st century, the millions of tons of carbon that she says have been spewing out as carbon dioxide from their cars, trains, stoves and factories. She accepts weather as a local matter, just as Tip O’Neill, longtime speaker of the House of Representatives, proclaimed all politics to be local. “Most Americans believe that we will not take steps to
fix climate change until after it has begun to harm us personally,” she writes. “Unfortunately, by that point it will be too late. The climate system has time lags. ... So, by the time you see it in the weather on a daily ba-
sis, it’s too late to fix ...” Her book, “The Weather of the Future,” uses a broad itinerary to illustrate the threats she perceives. It predicts more frequent and more violent storms, more hot spells, cold spells, droughts, famines and huge waves of desperate refugees. She also notes threats that range from the possible extinction of the Bengal tiger because of increased flooding on islands off the coast of Bangladesh, and increased danger to dog sleds from melting sea ice in Canada, east of Hudson Bay. She sees lucrative tourism reduced by warming of south Pacific waters — a warmth that blanches the colorful corals of Australia’s Great Barrier Reef — and by the possibility that a hurricane will heavily damage
New York’s transit system by hitting the third rail at the Christopher Street subway stop. That station in Greenwich Village is already 14.6 feet below the level of the Atlantic Ocean, according to her figures. Despite more than ample graphs and statistics, Cullen is likely to attract readers with an insistent style and quotes from people who claim to have been already damaged by global warming. That goes especially for those who remember something of what they learned in Chemistry or Physics 101 classes. The itinerary includes imaginary “weather reports” for a series of future years. The one for New York dated “August 2050” is the most optimistic, though it envisions the Atlantic as warming to “bathtub” temperature. It concludes: “In 2050, when Hurricane Xavier — a category 4 monster, which sprang up from the bathtub that the Atlantic had become finally arrived — people sat back and watched it like the World Series. We knew we had a home team advantage, just like the Yankees.”
Picture books are full of things to spark imagination BY SARA GRAJEK Rowan Public Library
Some of the best books are those that leave you with a sense of wonder and pique your imagination. These are not books that contain stories about everyday life, but rather ones in which dinosaurs roam the streets, monsters are just looking for a sandwich, and where you can’t quite tell where one picture ends and another begins. Here are a few from the picture book collection at Rowan Public Library that are sure to amuse and spark the imagination of readers of all ages. “When Dinosaurs Came with Everything,” by Elise Broach and illustrated by Caldecott Awardwinning artist David Small, imagines a time when children received a dinosaur as a treat. No balloons, stickers or buy-one-getone free coupons for the residents of this town. Instead, you got a full-sized, living, breathing, dinosaur who would faithfully follow you home. Why, they even helped with the chores! Who wouldn’t want a triceratops to help with the laundry? Even mom gets on board when she discovers this. Amy Krouse Rosenthal and Tom Lichtenheld’s cleverly drawn book of optical illusions in “Duck! Rabbit!” is sure to make you question what you are seeing. Is it a duck? Is it a rabbit?
Who can tell for sure? Either way, this book will create a lot of talk at storytime as you and your child try to decide what is on the page. “Frankenstein Makes a Sandwich and Other Stories You’re Sure to Like Because They’re All About Monsters, and Some of Them are Also About Food,” by Adam Rex is a funny book of poems that includes many of the classic monsters. In one poem, Frankenstein just wants to borrow some cheese from his neighbors, but he ends up scaring them and the whole town starts throwing food as a means to chase him off. He is sad at first, but quickly discovers he has the makings for a feast! “The Creature from the Black Lagoon” makes an appearance, along with a mummy, a zombie and Dracula. For not so scary monsters, try this book and its sequel, “Frankenstein Takes the Cake.” Sarah Thompson and Rob Gonsalvas are the creative team behind “Imagine a Day,” “Imagine a Night” and “Imagine a Place.” This trio of books and their, at times, Escher-like illustrations transport readers to a place where a house floats away on the water, but with a closer look, you realize the house on land is actually a boat. You’ll find dancers twirling across a dance floor in delicate dresses. But where do the dancers end, and the curtains start?
Each picture will make you pause for a second, third and maybe fourth look as you examine the details of each illustration. The beauty of books is that they are a free trip anywhere you want to go, whether a real destination or not. So stop by Rowan Public Library soon for a stack of books and turn your imagination loose. Computer classes: Computer help sessions — make an appointment for 30-minute, one-on-one lessons in basic computer skills. Call 704-216-8243 for questions or to make an appointment. Headquarters — no classes in August. East — no classes in August. South — Aug. 12, 11 a.m., Travel Resources on the Web; Aug. 23, 7 p.m., Meet the Mouse. Classes are free. Sessions are approximately 90 minutes. Class size is limited and on a firstcome, first-serve basis. Dates and times at all locations are subject to change without notice. Salisbury Rowan Reads family events: For the second summer, the city of Salisbury and Rowan County are partnering to encourage parents to read to their children. They are promoting reading through local libraries, from 5-7 p.m. • Wednesday, South Rowan Regional Library, China Grove. • Aug. 11, Cleveland Elementary School, Cleveland. Parents are invited to bring their children, preschool to grade 12, to these locations to register
for a free library card (or bring the child’s current library card) and receive a free book for each child. Children can also register to win a free Nintendo Wii. One will be given away each week. Movie ‘Ramble Through Rowan’s History’: Join in an evening of Rowan history on Tuesday, Aug. 24 at 7 p.m. in Stanback Auditorium. You are invited to the premiere of our newest installment in the “Ramble Through Rowan’s History” series. Both Parts I and II, “The Struggle for Liberty,” will be shown followed by a presentation and refreshments. Summer Reading Challenge: Rowan Public Library and Waterworks Visual Arts Center present the 6th annual Summer Reading Challenge. Dr. Jim Spiceland of the Center for Faith & Arts will lead discussions on the novel “Olive Kitteridge by Elizabeth Strout on Wednesday, Aug. 18 at 4 p.m. and Thursday, Aug. 19 at 7 p.m. in the Stanback Auditorium at the library headquarters in Salisbury. Refreshments will be provided. Displays: Headquarters — Woodwork by Steve Martin; South — lunch box collection by Sharon Ross; East — clown collection by Elizabeth Ellenburg. Literacy: Call the Rowan County Literacy Council at 704-2168266 for more information on teaching or receiving literacy tutoring for English speakers or for those for whom English is a second language.