Synopsis:
When elderly Ginny’s sister returns home for the first time since she was a girl, old memories surface that threaten Ginny’s carefully ordered existence.
Review:
I’m incredibly thankful for the Queens Library for getting The Sister to me so quickly–I can’t remember the last time I read a book so recently published. The review in the [...]
Popularity: 23% [?]
Tags: British Literature
Synopsis:
Accused of murder, a troubled young woman tries to piece together the odd facets of her life, starting with her supposed immaculate conception.
Review:
The chapters in Madapple alternate between a teasingly opaque courtroom case, and defendant Aslaug’s reminiscences about life with her disturbed mother and eventual reunion with her long lost aunt and cousins. Nothing [...]
Popularity: 28% [?]
Tags: American Literature
Synopsis:
While working on a novel in Tunisia, a writer encounters his own heart of darkness.
Review:
I had written a truly brilliant review of Patricia Highsmith’s The Tremor of Forgery, but it got eaten. Fie! The salient points were:
Patricia Highsmith plays cat and mouse with the reader just like her most famous creation Tom Ripley [...]
Popularity: 40% [?]
Tags: British Literature
Synopsis:
Deanna’s lived under a dark cloud ever since her dad caught her having sex when she was just 13, and her dreams of getting out just might expire under the weight of his disapproval.
Review:
I’m a latecomer getting to Sara Zarr’s National Book Award Finalist novel Story of a Girl, though it’s been on my radar [...]
Popularity: 48% [?]
Tags: American Literature
Synopsis:
Soldier Son Nevare’s adventures culminate in a battle within his divided self for mastery of his body in defiance of the magic.
Review:
When last we saw Nevare, he was grossly fat and resigned to a life on the outside. A Soldier Son of modest ambition, Nevare’s soul was cleft in two during a battle with [...]
Popularity: 43% [?]
Tags: American Literature
Synopsis:
Fearful of her husband’s sexual advances, a young mother falls into a spectacular case of hysteria–that might not be all in her head.
Review:
Angelica is yet another neo-Gothic tale, set in a Victorian England conjured more from literature than from history. It has all of the elements you’d want: repressed sexuality, midnight visions, hysteria and [...]
Popularity: 40% [?]
Tags: American Literature
Synopsis:
A legendary folk hero tells the first part of his life story, encompassing his early years as a vagabond and his time spent at University studying alchemy and magic.
Review:
It’s not for nothing that The Name of the Wind has been touted as a great fantasy debut. It absolutely is. I am leery of [...]
Popularity: 42% [?]
Tags: American Literature
Synopsis:
The last of a dying breed, a proper English butler reflects on his life in service.
Review:
I had no idea I would love The Remains of the Day as much as I did. To be honest, I love Kazuo Ishiguro’s Never Let Me Go so much that I was afraid that if I didn’t like [...]
Popularity: 29% [?]
Tags: British Literature
Synopsis:
The premature baby of Fifth Business was kidnapped by roustabouts, grew up a circus performer, and has grown into the greatest magician in the world. His life story offers the final piece to the question posed in The Manticore: “Who killed Boy Staunton?”
Review:
Robertson Davies’s masterful Deptford Trilogy deserves to be on more must-read lists. [...]
Popularity: 37% [?]
Tags: Canadian Literature
Synopsis:
One man’s harrowing journey up the Congo in search of enlightenment.
Review:
Blogging really wasn’t invented for talking about a book like Heart of Darkness. I am utterly incapable of coming up with anything approaching an instant reaction to this book. I need to sit with it for a long time, then read it again, [...]
Popularity: 33% [?]
Tags: British Literature
