The Places You Will Go: Reading Room

In this week's roundup of the latest books: time travel, waxing philosophical and a guide to kissing frogs. Kinokuniya Books at Suria KLCC is offering a 25% discount on the tag price of the featured titles - only with the coupon in today's StarTwo.

Back to the future

Compiled by DAPHNE LEE

My Dirty Little Book of Stolen Time
Author: Geoff Ryman
Publisher: Gollancz, 464 pages

THIS re-imagining of Dorothy’s story in The Wizard of Oz, sees the little girl as a sexually-abused orphan who retreats into rage and madness. The lives of others, both real and fictional, connected with the children’s novel and the film of the book also appear in this tale that combines history and fantasy to haunting effect.

A Girl’s Guide to Kissing Frogs
Author: Victoria Clayton
Publisher: Harper, 608 pages

MARIGOLD is a principal dancer at the Lenoir Ballet. Wishing desperately to become prima ballerina, she tries her best to satisfy egoistical company director Sebastian Lenoir’s every whim and wish.

But Marigold’s dreams are dashed when she suffers a bad fall and is forced off centre stage, back to her family home. Luckily, her childhood friend, the delicious Rafe, is waiting and willing. Could he be the Prince Charming she’s always wished for? And what will she do with the toad that’s already in her life?

The Sunday Philosophy Club: The Careful Use of Compliments
Author: Alexander McCall Smith
Publisher: Little, Brown, 256 pages

ISABEL Dalhousie, the editor of The Review of Applied Ethics wishes life would be a lot easier. Not only is she trying to cope with late motherhood, her housekeeper is determined to be the boss where baby is concerned. And as if her passionate relationship with her child’s father (14 years her junior!) isn’t distracting enough, Isabel has to figure out how to make peace with her very rebellious, extremely angry niece, Cat. To cap it all, there’s Prof Dove, sinister and devastatingly handsome, and intent on destroying Isabel’s beloved Review! Sometimes, being philosophical just doesn’t help!

Surveillance: A Novel
Author: Jonathan Raban
Publisher: Picador, 336 pages

IN the not-too-distant future, everyone is under surveillance of some sort and no one is who he/she seem to be. Freelance journalist Lucy Bengstrom is hired by GQ magazine to write a profile of best-selling author August Vanags. But the more Lucy researches his life, the more she is convinced that Vanags’ critically acclaimed account of his boyhood in World War II-England is a work of fiction. In the meantime, the United States steps up its police-state techniques as paranoia about terrorist threats mount. No one is safe and everyone is suspected.

Was
Author: Geoff Ryman
Publisher: Gollancz, 464 pages

THIS re-imagining of Dorothy’s story in The Wizard of Oz, sees the little girl as a sexually-abused orphan who has bouts of rage and madness. The lives of others, both real and fictional, connected with the children’s novel and the film of the book also appear in this tale that combines history and fantasy to haunting effect.

A Boy’s Guide to Track and Field
Author: Sabrina Broadbent
Publisher: Vintage, 224 pages

LEM Gulliver is a 25-year-old maths teacher with no girlfriend, no place of his own, no ambition and no prospects. About the only time his life has an aim and purpose is during his tube journey to work every morning. One morning, on the train, Lem feels that he is falling apart and is determined to sort things out by the time he reaches the end of the line.