Books on the Nightstand, Episode 48 (24:31)

I’m back from my short BOTNS family leave (though, since we prerecorded a few episodes, it’s like I was never away!). Finn is two weeks old and very cute, but he’s seriously cutting into my reading time… these days, I’d rather just stare at him!

A quick reminder to please call our voice mail line with your story of a book you loved that you heard about here on Books on the Nightstand. We’d love to include several of these in our 50th podcast episode. Please call in by Wednesday, October 21st, so we’ll have time to put the episode together for 10/28.

Over at our Goodreads group, Stephanie started a discussion thread asking for suggestion for spooky reads for the Fall. We here at Books on the Nightstand have decided to name October Spooky Books Month, since so many of us set our sights on those kinds of books this month anyway! On that discussion, some of the suggestions included Fragment, The Amityville Horror, The Graveyard Book, ‘Salem’s Lot, The Strain and The Terror. Ann and I reminisce about reading John Saul as teenagers and Ann talks about reading his current book, House of Reckoning, and his storytelling is just as good as she remembers! Ann also talks about Great Tales and Poems by Edgar Allan Poe, which is part of the NEA’s Big Read, and is the book that Ann’s town is currently reading.

Ending this segment on spooky books, I need your help remembering a supremely creepy short story. In the podcast, I mention thinking that it was written Arthur C. Clarke or Ray Bradbury, but now I’m pretty convinced it was an Isaac Asimov story. I still can’t remember the title though! It is a very short story (just under 2 pages or so, I think), that involves a bunch of scientists who see the face of the devil in the footage of a mushroom cloud that they are analyzing. It gives me shivers just thinking about it! [UPDATE: Thanks to Sibylle who solved the mystery! The story is by Asimov and is called Hell-Fire. Sibylle even posted a link to the story online! Go read it and tell me if it freaks you out as it did me!]

This week’s book I can’t wait for you to read is The Man Who Loved Books Too Much, a non-fiction look at John Charles Gilkey, a man who stole rare books, just so he could add them to his personal library. Also included is the story of Ken Saunders, self-proclaimed “bibliodick,” who makes it his mission to catch Gilkey. Ann’s choice for this week is Orhan Pamuk’s new novel The Museum of Innocence, which is about Kemal, a young man in 1970s Istanbul, who is in love with Füsun, a woman society forbids him from being with. He responds to this denial by creating a museum of everything Füsun touches. Interestingly, Orhan Pamuk has opened a museum to preserve items of everyday Turkish culture. You can read more about the museum here.

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The Graveyard Book by Neil Gaiman, HarperCollins hardcover 
‘Salem’s Lot by Stephen King, Pocket mass market 
The Strain by Guillermo del Toro and Chuck Hogan, William Morrow hardcover 
The Terror by Dan Simmons, Little, Brown and Company mass market 
The Exorcist by William Peter Blatty, HarperTorch mass market 
The Omen by David Seltzer, Signet mass market
anything by John Saul, including House of Reckoning, Ballantine hardcover 
Great Tales and Poems by Edgar Allan Poe, Vintage trade paperback 
The Man Who Loved Books Too Much by Allison Hoover Bartlett, Riverhead hardcover 
The Museum of Innocence by Orhan Pamuk, Knopf hardcover