It's no secret that books are marvelously subjective--unless of course, they're badly written, in which case, of course, they must be ignored completely. Still, for every reader who loves spy thrillers there is one who does not. Even within genres there can be books that appeal to some but for whom others don't feel the same way. Along those lines, I'm adding a new type of ... Read More...
The Buried Giant: A Novel
The Buried Giant by Kazuo Ishiguro begins as a tiny tale set in a drab village that amounts to little more than huts huddled around a rabbit’s warren of cave dwellings but grows into an epic tale set in the ashes of King Arthur’s reign. The land is quiet now after the decades of battle between the Saxons and the Britons but, while the peace is a welcome one, it ... Read More...
I Think You’re Totally Wrong: A Quarrel
I Think You're Totally Wrong: A Quarrel is an intellectual version of the Bickersons, as authors David Shields and his former student Caleb Powers spend four days in a cabin in the Cascade mountains of Washington and disagree about everything from movies to major life issues. In the course of this dialogue there are no holds barred and, in its own way, it has a certain ... Read More...
Monday January 12th: What Are You Reading?
It’s the second Monday in January but feels more like the beginning of the year. Or maybe I just wish it was because, two weeks in and I’m not being bowled over by anything I’m reading. At the end of the year, I was reading a book that rocked me so hard (Vanessa and Her Sister) I’m going to break all the rules and include it in my best of 2015 when next December comes around. ... Read More...
Some Luck: A Novel
Some Luck is the first book in Jane Smiley’s The Last Hundred Years trilogy and in it she covers the lives of the Langdons. They are an Iowa farming family and it’s evident by the loving care with which she portrays them that Smiley is happy to return to her roots. In 1920 Walter Langdon is twenty-five and the proud owner of his own farm. He and his wife Rosanna live there ... Read More...
Dept. of Speculation
Dept. of Speculation by Jenny Offill is a tiny slip of a novel, small in size, only 156 pages long, and yet it chronicles a young woman’s life with as much intimacy as novels of greater length. Somehow, Offill uses words to their maximum advantage in a minimum of space. The narrator, who remains unnamed throughout the novel, recounts her life from her days as a single woman ... Read More...
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