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Brooklyn Girls

July 1, 2013

Brooklyn Girls

  You’re twenty-two, living in Brooklyn (Manhattan's scruffy-but-cool cousin), and have just lost your job for drunkenly Facebooking an indiscreet photo of yourself on top of a bar. Yes, it was a rockin’ good party but your bosses have no sense of humor so what to do now? If you’re Pia Keller, the narrator in Brooklyn Girls, you borrow ten thousand dollars from a loan shark, ... Read More...

2 Comments
Filed Under: Book Reviews, Fiction Tagged: Brooklyn, chick lit, contemporary life, St. Martin's Press

Note to Self

June 28, 2013

Note to Self

While it seems to be a contradiction in terms to describe a novel as both sharp and sluggish, it applies (in the best way) to Alina Simone’s debut, Note to Self. She melds the jagged edge anxiety of an unemployed woman in NYC with the ennui that means getting out of bed is a Herculean task. She woke up in the mornings already exhausted by the possibilities.   The woman is ... Read More...

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Filed Under: Book Reviews, Fiction Tagged: book clubs, contemporary life, debut, Faber and Faber, unemployment, women

Sisterland: A Novel

June 24, 2013

Sisterland

  Violet and Kate are identical twins but they share an even more unusual connection, both are psychic (or as they prefer to call it “having the senses”). They realize their gift at a young age but when it gets out, becoming taunting and being called witches in school, Kate hides her abilities. Violet revels in them and grows up to use them as a source of income after her ... Read More...

5 Comments
Filed Under: Book Reviews, Fiction Tagged: book clubs, contemporary life, family, Random House

How to Get Filthy Rich in Rising Asia

June 21, 2013

How to get filthy rich in rising Asia

  To be effective, a self-help book requires two things. First, the help it suggests should be helpful. Obviously. And second, without which the first is impossible, the self it’s trying to help should have some idea of what help is needed. For our collaboration to work, in other words, you must know yourself well enough to understand what you want and where you want to ... Read More...

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Filed Under: Book Reviews, Fiction Tagged: book clubs, contemporary life, cultural, Riverhead Books, Southeast Asia

Crazy Rich Asians

June 12, 2013

Crazy Rich Asians

  “I don’t think she cares how fat her ankles get. Do you know how much she inherited when her father died? I heard she and her five brothers got seven hundred million each." When a novel begins with a woman and her children being turned away from a fancy hotel and she’s so upset her husband buys the hotel that same night, you can count me in. Kevin Kwan doesn’t miss ... Read More...

4 Comments
Filed Under: Book Reviews, Fiction Tagged: China, contemporary life, cultural, debut, Doubleday, satire, wealth

Darkest: Daddy Love

May 31, 2013

daddy love

  Joyce Carol Oates is a seductress who leads you into whatever world she is exploring. This can be poignant, uplifting, or deeply disturbing. In the case of Daddy Love it’s the latter. The first four chapters recount the same time span in a mother’s life—the moment when her child is taken from her. Yet she was conscious of the terrible loss. The child’s hand had ... Read More...

4 Comments
Filed Under: Book Reviews, Fiction Tagged: contemporary life, Mysterious Press, social issues, suspense

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