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High School Trauma and Drama: Mini-Reviews

January 5, 2017

dangerous

There are few people who look back on high school as the best years of their life and, quite frankly, I don’t trust them. These two novels encapsulate what may or may not be the truth of high school life in America today. Is it accurate? Dear God, I hope not, but I’m so far removed from that time that all I can do is share my thoughts on them as novels. Mostly, they made me ... Read More...

15 Comments
Filed Under: Book Reviews, Fiction Tagged: Atria Books, contemporary life, debut, mini-reviews, Random House, teen years

December Library Checkout

December 30, 2016

december

Happy last day of 2016! Suffice it to say I’m ready to wash my hands of this year. Actually, not the entire year. I had some great personal experiences earlier in 2016 but the second half has been draining and difficult. Like so many people I know, the election results have made staying positive challenging. The bad news seems to keep coming with no respite in sight. Complete ... Read More...

12 Comments
Filed Under: Book Reviews, Feature Tagged: Atria Books, book clubs, contemporary life, lists, mini-reviews, Pantheon, Putnam, thriller

The Private Life of Mrs. Sharma

December 19, 2016

private life

  Often the first person narrative is used by an author to create doubt in the mind of the reader. Ratika Kapur does the opposite in her novel, The Private Life of Mrs. Sharma, with a narrator who calmly tells the truth about her actions from the novel’s beginning to its end. She is a respectable woman—a wife and mother who works at a doctor’s office in Delhi, India. She ... Read More...

1 Comment
Filed Under: Book Reviews, Fiction Tagged: Bloomsbury, book clubs, contemporary life, cultural, India, marriage

Delicious Foods: A Novel

November 14, 2016

delicious foods

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...

6 Comments
Filed Under: Book Reviews, Fiction Tagged: contemporary life, literary, racism, social issues

Small Great Things

October 17, 2016

small great

Jodi Picoult is one of those authors I love for being entertaining yet educational. In each of her novels she takes on a subject and not only turns it into gripping fiction, but informs the reader. In her latest, Small Great Things, the subject is racism and as always she approaches it with a unique moral dilemma. Ruth is a labor and delivery nurse with twenty years of ... Read More...

5 Comments
Filed Under: Book Reviews, Fiction Tagged: Ballantine, contemporary life, racism

It’s Not You, It’s Me: Today Will Be Different

October 12, 2016

it's not you

  If Herman Koch is the master at writing all the unpleasant things we might think about our fellow man, then Maria Semple is the heart behind the tough things we think about ourselves. In her newest novel, Today Will Be Different, that angst is directed at not being nice enough and not being present in life. Every day. All day. It’s a tall order, but one Eleanor Flood is ... Read More...

18 Comments
Filed Under: Book Reviews, Feature, Fiction Tagged: contemporary life, humor, Little Brown and Company, Pacific Northwest, Seattle

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