For ten months out of the year I complain about plot overload in my reviews, but when it comes to thrillers I'm a lot more forgiving. Especially when the times warrant over-the-top drama to drag my mind off reality, as was the case at the beginning of January. And if you’re tired of hearing me say that, I am damn well tired of having to say it. Hopefully, we’re on a better path ... Read More...
Case Histories: A Novel by Kate Atkinson
What could the disappearance of a little girl in 1970, the violent death of a young woman in 1994, and the missing baby of a woman who brutally murdered her husband have in common? Nothing, except they’re all open cases that have made their way to the desk of Jackson Brodie, private investigator, in Kate Atkinson’s Case Histories. Thirty-four years have passed since ... Read More...
Delicious Foods: A Novel
Everybody black knows how to react to a tragedy. Just bring out a wheelbarrow full of the Same Old Anger, dump it all over the Usual Frustration, and water it with Somebody Oughtas…Then quietly set some globs of Genuine Awe in a circle around the mixture, but don’t call too much attention to that. Mention the Holy Spirit whenever possible. If I were handing out book awards, ... Read More...
Neverhome: A Novel
There comes a point in a reading life where, short of science fiction, it gets harder to be surprised by a novel’s premise but I have never before read a Civil War novel where the protagonist is a female… soldier. I’ve seen articles and photos of real-life women who fought disguised as men but had not come across it translated into fiction. How marvelous then that an author has ... Read More...
The Goldfinch by Donna Tartt
The Goldfinch won the 2014 Pulitzer Prize for Fiction. It will be out in paperback this week so I'm reprising my original review. If you have not read the book yet it is well worth it. If you have, what did you think? Did it deserve the Pulitzer? Donna Tartt’s latest novel is The Goldfinch. Oh My. This is a B.I.G. book, figuratively (Tartt’s first novel ... Read More...
The First Rule of Swimming
It did not help that on Rosmarina there was no such thing as privacy, one house so near to the next that a man could hear his neighbor’s toilet flush. Grudges went back generations and children were judged by things their parents had done, sometimes years before their birth. Magdalena and her younger sister Jadranka live on the island of Rosmarina with their ... Read More...
