Hogarth Press Archives - The Gilmore Guide to Books

The Loneliness of Sonia and Sunny

Catherine — Thu, 12 Feb 2026 08:16:24 +0000

I love Indian writers and fiction so was very excited for Kiran Desai’s The Loneliness of Sonia and Sunny, but this story of two strangers from India who have been trying to make life in America work went all kinds of wrong for me. Sunny’s and Sonia’ families still live in India and are known […]

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October Reading

Catherine — Fri, 04 Nov 2022 07:56:23 +0000

October has come and gone and my book reviewing has not rallied as I hoped it would. I’m still reading, but still finding it hard to corral my thoughts. I’m not sure where this is headed, but thanks for sticking with me. If you need more reading ideas I am still co-hosting a podcast—somehow talking […]

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Ten Best Books of 2019

Catherine — Fri, 20 Dec 2019 05:30:48 +0000

Well, what do you know. Rather than being my usual contrarian self, I actually have ten books I consider to be the best of 2019. Of course, that doesn’t include the eight debut novels I wrote about on Wednesday, but let’s not split hairs. The point is: ALL of these books are marvelous. Even […]

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August Reading Wrap-Up

Catherine — Mon, 02 Sep 2019 07:26:21 +0000

What a month! I hope you all had a more vacation-y time in August than I did. The month wasn’t bad, it was just a time of adjustment—Jed moved to Ann Arbor for his job, I stayed here and began the process of wrapping up our Seattle life, prepping to move, and preparing our house […]

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Dark Fiction: A Ladder to the Sky

Catherine — Fri, 07 Dec 2018 08:59:29 +0000

So far this week I’ve reviewed two very dark, but outstanding novels. It’s time to wrap up the week and I’m back with a surprising (to me) author: John Boyne. His last novel, The Heart’s Invisible Furies was one of my favorites from last year so it’s with a heavy heart I say that I […]

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Anatomy of a Miracle

Catherine — Mon, 26 Mar 2018 07:55:31 +0000

Cameron Harris is a patriotic young man who goes to Afghanistan and returns home paralyzed from the waist down after stepping on an IED. When Jonathan Miles’s new novel, Anatomy of a Miracle opens he is back in his hometown of Biloxi, Mississippi living with his sister Tanya. Days are spent watching TV, smoking, taking […]

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The Heart’s Invisible Furies

Catherine — Tue, 07 Nov 2017 08:42:13 +0000

Cyril Avery’s birth was not a propitious one. He came into the world onto the floor of a tiny apartment, next to the unconscious body of his mother’s roommate, with the roommate’s lover lying dead on the stairs below. It was Ireland in 1945 and the roommate and the lover were also teens, but […]

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Beautiful Animals: A Novel

Catherine — Wed, 19 Jul 2017 07:52:33 +0000

But things settled down and flowed on, because it was the law of summers among the rich that the season of leisure should flow like a large and charming river. The imperative was to have a good time and float on the luminescent surface. Meet Naomi, a bored, twenty-three-year-old Brit vacationing on the beautiful Greek […]

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White Fur by Jardine Libaire

Catherine — Mon, 19 Jun 2017 07:32:21 +0000

Two weeks ago I wrote about The Heirs, a novel that surprised me by going well beyond its blurb to become a 5-star read. I had a similar surprise with White Fur by Jardine Libaire except it’s not the blurb that is surpassed, it’s the beginning of the novel itself—which is a much greater […]

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