With Christmas a week away and holiday parties likely on the agendas of many of us, it's a good time to take one more look at books that make great gifts, for host and hostess, for passionate book lovers, and, as each book features photos or original illustrations, for anyone who appreciates great visuals.
"Shakespeare's Restless World: A Portrait of an Era in Twenty Objects" by Neil MacGregor
With this book, British art historian MacGregor continues a project he began at the British Museum and with his bestselling book "A History of the World in 100 Objects": using artifacts to trace and narrate history.
For this installment, MacGregor collaborated with the Royal Shakespeare Company and the BBC to select 20 objects that tell the story of Shakespeare's age, one characterized by restless curiosity about the larger world, geographically, spiritually, technologically. With color photographs, maps, sketches, and sustained entries, this fascinating book may just be the next best thing to a time machine.
"My Ideal Bookshelf" edited by Thessaly La Force with art by Jane Mount
Book lovers probably won't want to hide this book on a shelf. La Force interviewed 100 chefs, food writers, cultural figures, fashion designers, musicians, and authors and collected their reflections on the books that have inspired them. To accompany each entry, Mount created stunning original paintings of each contributor's selected titles, rendered in eye-popping colors with hand-lettered book spines.
Besides being beautiful, the book inspires readers to think about the books that have inspired them and what reads they would select for their ideal bookshelves.
Readers who enjoy what is playfully referred to as book porn may also enjoy discovering the actual libraries of a baker's dozen of famous writers.
Harvard English professor Price, who writes about old and new media and how people read, offers a peek into the personal libraries of 13 acclaimed novelists, among them Junot Diaz, Edmund White, Rebecca Goldstein, and Steven Pinker. Each writer shares his collection and includes color photos of their libraries, their books, and themselves with their books.
Passionate readers tend also to be passionate about where they shop. Rice's collection celebrates independent bookstores, the books within them, and the relationship among writers, the books that inspired them, and the shops that provided them. Over 80 beloved writers contribute short essays describing his or her independent bookstore, the pivotal one that supported their growth and development.
The essays are beautifully crafted, funny, moving, and they may quite possibly inspire readers to drive to their nearest indie straightaway. The book begs to be browsed through, just as one would in a bookstore. Each entry includes a black and white sketch of the bookstore under discussion, so it's pretty, too!