Unaccustomed Earth by Jhumpa Lahiri

Unaccustomed Earth is a collection of stories by the author of The Namesake(a great book) and reprises the theme of conflicts between immigrant parents and their children. I used to love short stories and I now find them frustrating: after getting attached to the characters it’s hard to let go and not wonder what happened [...]

The Lake, the River and the Other Lake by Steve Amick

The Lake, the River and the Other Lake starts as a simple story of the residents of a small town by a lake in Michigan and their relationships and conflicts with the affluent summer people who push up the price of real estate and make too much noise with their jet skis. It soon blossoms [...]

My Summer of Southern Discomfort by Stephanie Gayle

Here’s an easy book with enough (mild) action to keep going, not too much to think about so you can take a break as needed, and a reasonably interesting heroin (although she was dumb enough to sleep with her boss – I guess we needed a reason for her to move to Macon, Georgia.)  Natalie [...]

Of Men and their Mothers by Mameve Medwed

Do we really need another novel about mother-in-laws? Sure, if it’s as funny like Of Men and their Mothers. The tale is thin, the characters not exactly developed, but Maisie Grey’s life, including her outrageous mother-in-law, her loser ex-husband, and her sexually precocious (but sweet) son is entertaining. Never mind the inconsistencies (why would she want [...]

Girls Gone Mild by Wendy Shalit

It’s probably unfair to write a review of a book from which I only read 45 pages, but I could not go any further. It’s not that I disagreed with the topic of Girls Gone Mild (the destructive influence on girls of an hypersexual culture.) It’s not that I disagreed that Bratz dolls are inappropriate. It’s [...]

A Wolf at the Table by Augusten Burrows

If you like Augusten Burrows you will like A Wolf at the Table, which is the story of his alcoholic father, the story of his insane mother having been told in Running with Scissors. (His family is amazingly dysfunctional — it’s a miracle he pulled through, although read Dry to see what he had to [...]

The Song of Everlasting Sorrow by Wang Anyi

The Song of Everlasting Sorrow is the story of a Shanghai woman whose adult life starts by starring in a beauty pageant and ends in poverty. It’s always difficult to appreciate translated work. This novel mixes lyrical descriptions (not my cup of tea, admittedly) with stilted considerations on how women must submit to men (not [...]

The Lure of the Bush by Arthur Upfield

The Lure of the Bush has a lot going for it: a detective with the magnificent name of Napoleon Bonaparte (Bony for short), an elaborate mystery a la Sherlock Holmes, in which we know pretty much from the start what happened (well, almost) but need the whole book to confirm it, and the exotic background [...]

Freshwater Road by Denise Nicholas

Freshwater Road is a debut novel by an African-American actress that tells of a college woman who journeys to Mississippi during Freedom Summer to help in the voter registration efforts and who encounters dire poverty, including the lack of indoor plumbing, a fact she details at length, as well as a level of racism that’s [...]

The Palace Council by Stephen Carter

If you like conspiracies you’ll like The Palace Council. I don’t, and as much as I’ve enjoyed other Stephen Carter’s books (New England White and especiallyThe Emperor of Ocean Park), and as much as I got attached to the hero of this book, Eddie Wesley, I found the 500+ pages a bit tedious. I could [...]