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2022 Underrated Gems

December 26, 2022

gems

Nothing like waiting until the last week of the year to put out best-of lists. Today I want to share five gems that I adored that didn’t get as much love and attention as they deserve. Hopefully, you got gift cards and pick up at least one of these remarkable novels.   Title links go to my full review     This debut novel from a Native American author ... Read More...

11 Comments
Filed Under: Book Reviews, Feature Tagged: contemporary life, favorite books, historical fiction, literary, mini-reviews

Joan: A Novel by Katherine J. Chen

August 15, 2022

joan

Fresh week and time to really start sharing my summer reading. I’m coming in hot with a 5-star novel that is on track to be a favorite of the year. It’s Joan by Katherine Chen. The novel is about Joan of Arc, but is cast from the same mold as renderings of great men from historical times with few written records. Embellishing? Maybe, only this time, I’m here for it. What is ... Read More...

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Filed Under: Book Reviews, Fiction Tagged: 15th century, France, historical fiction

Brown Girls: A Novel

February 21, 2022

brown girls

Who are the brown girls? When Daphne Palasi Andreades’s novel, Brown Girls, opens it’s Nadira, Khadija, Anjali, Yesenia, and Sophie, a group of 10-year-olds growing up in the “dregs of Queens”. In under 250 pages they pass from childhood to old age in lives that are as singular as they are relatable. Not to mention riveting. Andreades makes bold stylistic choices in Brown ... Read More...

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Filed Under: Book Reviews, Fiction Tagged: book clubs, contemporary life, debut, literary

Joan is Okay

February 2, 2022

joan

Joan is happy with her life. She loves her job as an ICU doctor at a NYC hospital. Her boss thinks she’s amazing. She has a nice apartment in a doorman building. Why then do so many of the people around her think she needs fixing? Her older brother believes there’s something wrong with her because she’s not married with children. Her new neighbor thinks she needs friends and ... Read More...

4 Comments
Filed Under: Book Reviews, Fiction Tagged: contemporary life, literary, women

Where the Grass is Green and the Girls are Pretty

June 4, 2021

grass

It was only a matter of time before the Ivy League college admissions scandal was memorialized in fiction. I was happy to see that the first responder is a favorite contemporary chronicler, Lauren Weisberger, of The Devil Wears Prada fame. She’s back with Where the Grass is Green and the Girls Are Pretty and it’s exactly what you’d expect from a world where entitled white ... Read More...

2 Comments
Filed Under: Book Reviews, Fiction Tagged: contemporary life, New York City, vacation reading

Klara and the Sun by Kazuo Ishiguro

April 7, 2021

klara

In an unspecified place, sometime in the future, Klara waits inside a store for her new best friend. Days pass and she moves from section to section, often gazing out the main window onto the street, observing and absorbing what’s happening in the world outside. She has a strong sense of who her new friend will be, a girl that only she can help, so when Josie arrives, she knows ... Read More...

8 Comments
Filed Under: Book Reviews, Fiction Tagged: literary, science fiction

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