When I decided to do this Summer Reading Spectacular series of authors, one of the first authors I wanted to contact was Gwenda Bond, whose new novel is The Frame-Up. She was one of the very first authors who was on the podcast, when I was teaming up with Allison Tran from the Authors Are Rockstars! podcast. At the time, Gwenda was a brand-new author at her first American Library Association conference to promote her books. Gwenda, Allison, and I sat on the floor outside the Exhibit Hall and chatted about Christopher Pike, using the library to research her first novel Blackwood, and what it was like back when Twitter was fun.
Now, thirteen years later, Gwenda is back, and this time, we avoid the subject of Twitter but discuss her work on licensed properties like Lois Lane and Stranger things, her move from YA to adult audiences (for now!), the vibrant writing community she has helped foster in Lexington, Kentucky, and so much more!
Check out my interview with Gwenda Bond now, either as a podcast or the transcript, and don’t forget to stick around for the end of the show to hear another new segment of The Circ Desk to get some great recommendations and readers’ advisory tips!
Dani Poissant is the daughter and former accomplice of the world’s most famous art thief. There was no job too big for Maria and her loyal crew. The secret to their success? A little thing called magic, kept rigorously secret from the non-magical world. They seemed unstoppable... until a teenage Dani turned her mother over to the FBI.
Ten years later, with Maria still in prison, Dani finds herself approached for a job that only Maria and her crew could pull off... if any of them were still speaking to her. But it’s the job of a lifetime and might just be the lure Dani needs to reconcile with her mother and be reunited with her mother’s old gang—including both the love of her life and her former best friend.
The problem is, it’s an impossible task—even with the magical talents of the people she once considered family backing her up. It’s a heist that needs a year to plan, and Dani has just over a week. Worse, the more Dani learns, the more she understands that there’s far more at stake in this job than she ever realized.
Summer Reading List
One of the things I’m enjoying is putting together a Summer Reading List, with each guest author adding a book or two of their choosing. I’ll update the list with each episode until we have our complete list at the end of the summer!
The Steerswoman (Cory Doctorow’s pick)
How to Solve Murders Like a Lady; Children of Anguish and Anarchy; Georgette Heyer; Saara El-Arifi; the Daevabad Trilogy (City of Brass, Kingdom of Copper, Empire of Gold) (Amita Murray’s picks)
How the Word Is Passed (Kirsten Miller’s pick)
James Madison's Notes on the Debates in the Federal Convention, May 25, 1787 (A. J. Jacob’s pick)
Summer Romance; Expiration Dates (Jessie Rosen’s picks)
Bitter Seeds (Andy Runton’s pick)
The Villa (Gwenda Bond’s pick)
Ready Reference
Mentioned on the podcast:
Circulating Ideas: Gwenda Bond - Librarians are Rock Stars! (2013)
Lois Lane series: Fallout, Double Down, Triple Threat
The Circ Desk
🎶 Here they go again on their oowwnnnnn 🎶: Rebecca Vnuk from Library Reads and Yaika Sabat from NoveList are back for another shift on The Circ Desk! This week, they discuss romantasy!
The Circ Desk recommends:
The Crane Husband by Kelly Regan Barnhill
The Very Secret Society of Irregular Witches by Sangu Mandanna
Portrait of a Thief by Grace D. Li
The Unmaking of June Farrow by Adrienne Young
Steve Thomas is a public library manager who lives in the suburbs of Atlanta with his wife, two kids, and one dog. He has worked in libraries since the year 2000 and has hosted the Circulating Ideas podcast since 2011. He really likes Coke Zero.
Currently Reading: That Librarian by Amanda Jones