Tour: Book Picks with YA Debut Author Jess Rothenberg

Posted by Julie, A Tale of Many Reviews on February 13, 2012 in Book Tours, Interviews | ∞

We would like to welcome debut author Jess Rothenberg to the blog today! We will soon be posting a review of her YA debut novel The Catastrophic History of You and Me, but today Jess is talking about her favorite books! Check out the cat on her book shelf!

The library my fiancé and I share is pretty extensive! This picture doesn’t quite do it justice, but you can get the idea. Our cat, Charlie, is a big reader as well, as you can see. J We organize by poetry, essays/letters, fiction, nonfiction, and finally children’s and YA. It’s hard to pick just a handful of favorites, but I’ll try…

Sense & Sensibility – This book’s truly got it all. Sweeping English countryside, epic romance, sisterly bonds, comedy, heartbreak, redemption… not to mention one of the best book to film adaptations ever. I still weep like a baby every time I watch poor Kate Winslet (as Marianne Dashwood) wander out into the rain to mourn the loss of her beloved Willoughby. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5WOFLpmDbIs

Charlotte’s Web – T, double E, double R, double I, double F, double I, double C, C, C!

The Witches – Roald Dahl’s writing has always had this way of making me feel special, like he was telling the story just for me and nobody else. He never sugarcoated anything, even when details about the grownup world got mean and scary, and I adored him for it.

The Velveteen Rabbit – Used to break and heal my six-year-old heart, all at once!

The Tale of Peter Rabbit – My grandparents gave me a mini Beatrix Potter treasury set when I was little and I’ll keep it forever. Poor Jeremy Fisher, losing his galoshes!

Who Needs Donuts? – What could be better than a story of a boy whose total donut obsession leads him on a tricycle journey to the big city? The illustrations were awesome and weird and whimsical, and every single page was loaded with secrets to discover.

Harry Potter (Books 1-7, but especially 4). Spellbinding in every way.

The Virgin Suicides – Atmospheric perfection.

Renascence and Other Poems – My grandmother used to read Renascence aloud to me from the porch of her Berkshire’s country house, and to this day Edna St. Vincent Millay always makes me think of her.

Harriet the Spy – I so wanted to be her! (Minus the whole getting busted by her classmates thing.)

Life of Pi – It’s so rare to find a story that’s brilliant and beautiful and funny and sad, not to mention fantastical and realistic and epically adventurous all at once! One of my all-time favorite summer reads.

The Kite Runner – Truly changed how I see and think about the world.

Mrs. Dalloway – So complex, interesting, honest, poetic, and true. I loved reading Woolf’s sentences again and again as a teenager, and feeling something different each time.

Number the Stars – I read this with my best friend in fourth grade, and remember each of us being so moved by Annemarie and Ellen’s story that we promised we’d always be there for one another, too. (Guess what? We still are.)

JESS ROTHENBERG grew up in Charleston, South Carolina, graduated from Vassar College, and spent most of her twenties editing books for teens and middle grade readers. She lives in Brooklyn, New York, where she writes full-time, dances interpretively (just see for yourself: http://bit.ly/xeGlEZ), and dreams of one day owning a sheepdog named Leo. THE CATASTROPHIC HISTORY OF YOU AND ME is her first novel. Visit www.jessrothenberg.com to find out more!