Catherine Lacey’s new novel, The Answers appealed to me because of its premise: intimacy in the modern world of technology. At the novel’s center is Mary, a young woman, who used to be known as Junia, born in the Tennessee mountains to a … [Read more...]
Startup: A Novel
If your goal in writing a novel is to start conversation than Doree Shafrir succeeds in Startup. On the surface the novel is a quick-read satiric look at the young tech industry springing up in NYC, but underneath, business is the least of … [Read more...]
5 Star Week: The Takedown
This doesn't happen very often, OK, never now that I think about it, but this week I have not one, not two, but three 5 star books that make me all evangelical. Only today's is a new release, but beyond that all three cover a diverse range of reading … [Read more...]
The Arrangement: A Novel by Sarah Dunn
How to describe Sarah Dunn’s new novel The Arrangement? All that is in my head is the Seinfeld episode where Jerry and Elaine decide to break the standards of friends and become friends-with-benefits. They are oh-so-careful with rules and … [Read more...]
Take It or Leave It: Contemporary Life
Contemporary life almost always makes for good fiction, but needs to be done right. That’s why the 'take it or leave it' theme today. I recently read two light fiction novels and only one struck the right note. Take It Nine … [Read more...]
Sweetbitter
“You know what I dislike? When people use the future as a consolation for the present.” Tess arrives in NYC in the summer of 2006 from somewhere, but it doesn't matter where because as far as she is concerned she didn't exist … [Read more...]
Tuesday Nights in 1980
When art dealer Winona George throws a fabulous party on New Year’s Eve 1979 to welcome in the 1980s there’s no way of knowing who and what will converge in her art filled apartment in downtown Manhattan. That James Bennett and his wife Marge … [Read more...]
Mrs. Houdini
Bess Rahner met Ehrich Weiss the summer of 1894 at Coney Island where both were performers—she a singing and dancing girl and he doing an escape act with his brother. Little did she know that this brash, confident young man would become Harry … [Read more...]