It’s hard to imagine that an ordinary and ubiquitous household item could be the source of riveting fiction, but in The Last Days of Night it is. Author Graham Moore makes a new, young lawyer the central character in what is an astonishing battle over who invented the light bulb and who would profit from it. For someone who believed Thomas Edison invented the light bulb The ... Read More...
Belgravia by Julian Fellowes
I decided to leave the gloom of October behind and start November with an uncomplicated, lovely novel that opens in a time that seems quiet to us, but was tumultuous for those living it. The novel is Belgravia and it begins with a very real event, the Duchess of Richmond’s ball in Brussels in 1815. In history, this glamorous event, attended by some of the highest aristocrats ... Read More...
Ordinary Monsters: A Novel
In the world of hardcore readers (yes, that is a thing), there is something called a book hangover. It’s when you read a book so good that your mind can’t detach after you finish, leaving you with a period of time where everything you read is just wrong. Very wrong. I’m in that odd, frustrating space right now thanks to J.M. Miro’s Ordinary Monsters, a fantasy novel set in ... Read More...
The Last Castle by Denise Kiernan
One of the main nonfiction backlist books I wanted to read this month is The Last Castle: The Epic Story of Love, Loss, and American Royalty in the Nation’s Largest Home by Denise Kiernan. I loved her book The Girls of Atomic City about the women in America who were part of the effort to win WWII. The Last Castle is about an almost mythical point in American history where money ... Read More...
In Love with George Eliot: A Novel
If you’ve ever read the classics (either for school or pleasure) you’ve heard of George Eliot. If you’re like me, you didn’t know, until later, that Eliot was a pen name and the great English novelist is actually Marian Evans. I learned this decades ago, but beyond that knew nothing about Evans herself. Now, thanks to In Love with George Eliot, by Kathy O’Shaughnessy I’m better ... Read More...
The First Actress: A novel
Born the illegitimate daughter of a French courtesan, Sarah Bernhardt didn’t even live with her mother until she was eight years old. When she did move in with her, Sarah caught the eye of one of her mother’s patrons and was shipped off to convent boarding school. Not for her safety, but because her mother didn’t want the competition. When she returned to Paris at 15 her ... Read More...
- 1
- 2
- 3
- …
- 6
- Next Page »
