Little Family by Ishmael Beah
In an abandoned field hidden by a maze of thickets, trees, and shrubs is a downed airplane. When it crashed is unknown, but in this unnamed African country it has become home for four young people and...
View ArticleWhat I’m Reading in June
Hello, June and welcome, summer. I’m not sure what to expect here in Michigan, but so far, humidity seems to be a very real thing. Thankfully, even though I’m not going anywhere anytime soon, I have a...
View ArticleExciting Times by Naoise Dolan
At 22 Ava decides the best way to have a happy life is to move as far from Dublin as possible. She chooses Hong Kong where she is hired by a private elementary school to teach English grammar. She...
View ArticleA Burning: A Novel by Megha Majumdar
Jivan is a young woman living with her parents in a slum in India. She is a sales clerk at a nice clothing store. Everyone around her is shocked then when she is arrested for the bombing of a commuter...
View ArticleAll This Could Be Yours
After another evening spent sniping at his wife about her excessive spending, 73-year-old Victor staggers off to bed and suffers a heart attack that leaves him unconscious and at the edge of death for...
View ArticleConvenience Store Woman: A Novel
Japan is known as having a culture that prizes social conformity and adherence to societal values. In such a country, what would it be like to be a young woman whose nature keeps her from understanding...
View ArticleAnna K: A Novel by Jenny Lee
One of the staples of fiction is the modern retelling of a classic novel. It’s a bit dicey—sometimes it works and other times it goes awry. Anna K is Jenny Lee’s reimagining of Tolstoy’s Anna...
View ArticleThe Golden Cage: A Novel
The story is not a new one in fiction: intelligent woman meets man in college, gives him great business idea, he runs with it, they marry, have children, and she finds herself left with nothing when...
View ArticleThe Majesties: A Novel
Sometimes novels that begin with a bang end with a fizzle. That’s not the case with The Majesties, which opens with Gwen, the main narrator, lying in a coma. After being poisoned by her sister,...
View ArticleThin Girls: A Novel
The opening pages of Thin Girls take place in a treatment facility for people with anorexia. The key protagonist, Rose is sharing her thoughts on group therapy and they fairly crackle off the page with...
View ArticleThe Boys’ Club: A Novel
Klasko & Fitch is a massive law firm where the best of the best work, so Alex Vogel is thrilled to be hired there. When she learns the most powerful and lucrative group in the firm is Mergers &...
View ArticleWhen These Mountains Burn
There are few things I love more than an evocative writer. Someone who makes me feel what and where they’re writing about. Two that come to mind immediately: Pat Conroy in Prince of Tides, not only for...
View ArticleHis Only Wife: A Novel
In a small town in Ghana, Afi Tekple lives in a house with her widowed mother. It’s in a compound owned by her avaricious uncle and his many wives and their children. Afi did not go to university, but...
View ArticleThe Last Story of Mina Lee
Even though her mother is the only family she has, Margot Lee has never felt close to Mina. Margot left L.A. for Seattle for college and never moved back. She would dutifully call regularly, but...
View ArticleTranscendent Kingdom by Yaa Gyasi
There are so many things I wish I could forget, but maybe “forget” isn’t quite right. There are so many things I wish I never knew. Transcendent Kingdom is a novel that lies at the intersection of...
View ArticleAnxious People by Fredrik Backman
In my post about the fall books I was ready to read I made special note of my excitement about Fredrik Backman’s new book, Anxious People. The novel is about a group of eight people held hostage by a...
View ArticleMonogamy: A Novel by Sue Miller
Recently, my reading has involved both unusual plots and characters. Today I’m back with Sue Miller’s Monogamy, a novel that is, appropriately for this week, about grief. Annie McFarlane’s husband,...
View ArticleWhat I’m Reading this Week
Hello, lovely readers! Everyone still managing to hold onto at least a semblance of their sanity? Mine is questionable so I’ll stick to my reading today. You may already know this, but in case you...
View ArticleHomeland Elegies: A Novel
These days, I’m attuned to fiction that takes my mind off reality. Not necessarily easy or soothing, but novels that grab me with their drama (Against the Loveless World) or distract me with their...
View ArticleLeave the World Behind
When Clay, Amanda and their children, Archie and Rose, arrive at the secluded house they’re renting on Long Island they’re thrilled to be escaping Manhattan for a week in the summer. The house is...
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