50 Underwear Questions by Tanya Lloyd Kyi
Adventures in Cartooning: Characters in Action by James Sturm
Angus, Thongs and Full-Frontal Snogging by Louise Rennison
The Awakening by Kelley Armstrong
Bachelor Brothers' Bed & Breakfast by Bill Richardson
Blameless by Gail Carriger
The Cat Who Had 60 Whiskers by Lilian Jackson Braun
Chopping Spree by Diane Mott Davidson
The Crows of Pearblossom by Aldous Huxley
Daffodil by Noël Kingsbury
The Dark Wind by Tony Hillerman
Double Shot by Diane Mott Davidson
Flowers for Mrs. Harris by Paul Gallico
Gulp by Mary Roach
How They Croaked by Georgia Bragg
Ideas and Opinions by Albert Einstein
Into the Gauntlet by Margaret Peterson Haddix
Mr. Flux by Kyo Maclear
Rooftop Cat by Frank Le Gall
Scholastic Dictionary of Spelling by Marvin Terban
Should I Share My Ice Cream? by Mo Willems
Song for Papa Crow by Marit Menzin
Soulless: The Manga, Vol. 1 by Gail Carriger
This Perfect Day by Ira Levin
Super Boys by Brad Ricca
Trash Can Days: A Middle School Saga by Teddy Steinkellner
The Voyage of the Space Beagle by A.E. van Vogt
Waterless Mountain by Laura Adams Armer
Way Station by Clifford D. Simak
Where Do The Animals Go When It Rains? by Janet S. Crown
Way Station: 09/14/13
Way Station by Clifford D. Simak won the 1964 Hugo for best novel. I chose to read it based on the award. I should mention that I'm not a Simak fan. I read some of his novels as in college and wasn't impressed. I even threw one of them across the room, The Goblin Reservation. Knowing this one was so well received, I decided I should give it a chance. I should note that I've also repeatedly tossed Huck Finn across the room even though I love most of Mark Twain's books.
Way Station has a contemporary setting — the mid 1960s. The U.S. government has been monitoring a hermit — Enoch Wallace — for decades. As anyone can guess, he's been there since the Civil War.
The government investigation has a Twin Peaks feel to it and had it stayed focused on it, I would have loved it. But the focus changes to Enoch's point of view. Rather than discovering his secret we're told out right that, yes, he's really more than a hundred years old and here's the reason why.
Through Enoch we're in turn introduced to a character named Ulysses who loves to reminisce. Those memories end up being the bulk of the book as well as lengthy discussions on humankind's fate and it's inability to adapt to alien technology. Thus, the drama and mystery of the first few pages is replaced with a rather humdrum dialog between an altered human and his alien guest.
Recommended by Dan Tannenbaum