First, many thanks to BAM Challenger Patty Franz for providing this month’s theme and booklist! If you’d like to contribute to future BAM Challenges, e-mail me at bamchallenge{at}gmail.com.
As it’s August, you’re either wishing for the cold to come back if you’re in the Northern Hemisphere or wishing it would just go away if you’re in the Southern one. Either way, an exploration of the many different meanings of cold is sure to take your mind off of the weather!
Cold Case Mysteries
Barnard, Robert – Bones in the Attic
Barnes, Linda – Cold Case
Buchanan, Edna – Cold Case Squad
Burcell, Robin – Cold Case
Burke, James Lee – Crusader’s Cross
Gourevitch, Philip – Cold Case
Grafton, Sue – A is for Alibi
Hooper, Kay – Chill of Fear
Tey, Josephine – Daughter of Time
Vickers, Roy – Department of Dead Ends
White, Stephen – Cold Case
Cold Feet Romances
Juska, Elise, et al – Cold Feet
Dave, Laura – London is the Best City in America
Places that are Cold
Krakauer, Jon – Into Thin Air
Lansing, Alfred – Endurance: Shackelton’s Incredible Voyage
Ehrlich, Gretel – The Future of Ice: a journey into cold
Nielsen, Jerri – Ice Bound
Taliaferro, John – In a Far Country: the True Story of a Mission, a Marriage, a Murder and the Remarkable Reindeer Rescue of 1898
Time Bandit
Snow Titles
Daheim, Mary – Snow Place to Die
Guterson , David – Snow falling on cedars
Houston, James – Snow Mountain Passage
Miller, Calvin – Snow
Olsen, Gregg – A wicked snow
O’Nan, Stewart – Snow Angels
Naylor, Phyllis Reynolds – Blizzard’s Wake
Pamuk, Orhan – Snow
Park, David – The Big Snow
Parvin, Roy – In the Snow Forest
Shreve, Anita – Light on Snow
Stabenow, Dana – A Fine and Bitter Snow;
Tracy P. J. – Snow Blind
There are probably as many titles with ice in them as cold.
The weather is so cold it affects the book
These are suggestions from one of Patty’s colleagues:
Two books that come to mind immediately to me are Wolves Eat Dogs by Martin Cruz Smith (part of the Arkady Renko series) and In the Bleak Midwinter by Julia Spenser-Fleming. In case you are not familiar with these titles, in both books the main characters are constantly dealing with the cold. So much so that the weather almost becomes a character in the book. Wolves takes place in Chernobyl, when Arkady is investigating a murder by plutonium. In Midwinter, the main character is the new Episcopal priest in a small town in the Catskills. She grew up in the South, and is totally unprepared for winter in New York. It is also a murder mystery.
Ghost Stories that can send chills down your spine
Burchill, James – The Cold, Cold Hand : More Stories of Ghosts and Haunts from the Appalachian Foothills
The Cold War
The Watchmen graphic novels
Other ideas to explore
Cold shoulder
Cold cuts
Cold remedies
Cold beer here (from baseball games)
Coldcock
Cold hard cash
Cold symptoms
Cold day in hell
Cold shower
Winter Holidays
I thought of at least one other title right away:
Neal Stephenson’s Snow Crash
Oh, and for those who may like military scifi, there is David Drake’s Northworld, set in an icy planet.
Have not picked my book yet. But will post when I do. Best.
Then there are also A Brief History of the Dead (I’m being lazy and not looking up the author) that I just re-read, which has large portion set in Antarctica and David Graham’s Down to a Sunless Sea which has the benefit of being both an apocalyptic novel as well as having some Antarctica going on.
There’s also Cold Mountain by Charles Frazier and Peace Like a River by Leif Enger which doesn’t sound like it should be included but much of the story takes place in winter and blizzard conditions that it evokes cold throughout.
I’ve read some great cold themed books that I’d recommend:
No One Thinks of Greenland by John Griesemer (fiction)
Ada Blackjack: a true story of survival in the Arctic by Jennifer Niven (non-fiction)
This Cold Heaven: Seven Seasons in Greenland by Gretel Ehrlich (non-fiction)
For this month, I picked a short graphic novel:
Batman: Snow.
Find my review and the WorldCat record link in my journal:
http://danceswithbooks.livejournal.com/45145.html
The Trap, by John Smelcer, will cool you down if you are sweating. Seventeen year old Johnny’s grandfather hasn’t returned from his trapline in the Alaska wilderness as temperatures drop to 40 below. Alternating chapters present a dark description of Johnny’s life in the village while his grandfather struggles to survive. This is a page turner, and is on the short list for our 2009 community read.
Title: 20th Century Ghosts
Author: Joe Hill
Level: Adult
Genre: Horror
Review: http://blog.threegoodrats.com/2008/08/august-cold.html
Title: Once Upon a Time in the North
Author: Philip Pullman
Level: anything from sixth or seventh grade on up
Genre: Fantasy
Review:http://civillibrarian.blogspot.com/2008/08/book-month-challenge-august.html
This month I selected a book I had been anxiously anticipating. the final battle takes place when “the snow stick to the ground” and the main character becomes a vampire, who is COLD to any humans touch.
Title: Breaking Dawn
Author: Stephenie Meyer
Level: YA
Genre: Fantasy
Review: Breaking Dawn
I am on time for once! I used Wicked Lovely for this month’s book because the threat of Winter’s Chill is mentioned several times as well as the the characters of the Winter Queen and Winter Girl. 🙂
Title: Wicked Lovely
Author: Melissa Marr
Genre: Fiction
Age Group: Young Adult
Review: Wicked Lovely
The link on my review above ^^^^ is broken for some reason – apologies. Here’s the correct link:
Wicked Lovely
Title: The Book Thief
Author: Markus Zusak
Genre: Historical Fiction
Review: http://j0n3zclan.blogspot.com/2008/08/book-month-challenge-august.html
Title:The Future of Ice: A Journey into Cold
Author: Gretel Ehrlich
Genre: Non-fiction
Review:
http://weavinglibrarian.blogspot.com/
Thanks Katie for taking my suggestion. I found everyone’s choices to be intriguing. I would not have picked the Book Thief – but it was a great choice.
Title: The Adoration of Jenna Fox
Author: Mary Pearson
Genre: YA Fiction
Review: here
Title: Ambassador to the Penguins: A Naturalist’s Year Aboard a Yankee Whaleship
Author: Eleanor Mathews
Genre: Nonfiction
Review:
http://krinek.blogspot.com/2008/09/ambassador-to-penguins-naturalists-year.html
Title: Naked
Author: David Sedaris
Genre: Memoir / Humoor
Level: Adult
If you’re “Naked” you tend to be cold. My review is on my blog.
Title: Terra Incognita: Travels in Antarctica
Author: Sara Wheeler
Genre: Travel/History
Level: Adult
Review: If you travel in Antarctica you’re bound to be cold, although according to Wheeler you get used to it.
Title: The Santaland Diaries & Season’s Greetings
Author: David Sedaris, stage adaptation by Joe Morello
Genre: memoir, theatre
Level: adult
My Review