Isabel Allende is one of the best and most beloved literary authors of our time, and if you’ve never read her, The Japanese Lover would be a great place to start. In this lovely, lyrical book, Alma Belasco comes to the United States as a young child in 1939, bewildered and sad from having had…
Sorcerers, witches, politics, and prejudice in Regency England: it’s all here in this rollicking fantasy. (Take one look at that cover and you know this book is going to be cool.) Zacharias Wythe, who is of African descent, becomes Sorcerer to the Crown, attaining the highest position in England’s Society of Unnatural Philosophers. Wythe has a big…
There was a big buzz in the publishing world about this book. The manuscript sparked a bidding war, and Simon & Schuster actually started a new imprint, Scout Press, around it. The reviews from the book journals were glowing. So I had to read it for myself, and yes, I had to agree that it…
I like a good, deep literary novel as much as anyone. There’s a place in my reading world for Ian McEwan or Lionel Shriver, but sometimes I just need a good, funny book, preferably one that can make me laugh out loud. So here are a few I’ve read lately. The first two are mysteries,…
Melissa DeCarlo The Art of Crash Landing Takes a potentially clichéd premise and turns it into an interesting story that you won't want to put down. Mattie Wallace, a broke, pregnant woman who’s made a lot of bad choices, learns she’s received an inheritance from a grandmother she never knew existed. She goes to…
This is one of those books where I had an instant connection to the protagonist/narrator, Alice Pearse. First, she’s a book lover, and much of this novel is dedicated to the magic and importance of books. Second, Alice is struggling to balance work and family. Yes, that topic might feel like a cliché by now,…
This is a brilliant book, one that unflinchingly tackles the race question in America. Given all that’s happened in our country recently with regard to race, it’s a really topical read right now. What I especially liked about this book is that Adichie skewers everyone equally: much as she criticizes those who are racist, she…
This is an adult dystopian novel that sits just too close for comfort to our current reality. In the not-too-distant future, the water shortage in the American Southwest has led to all-out chaos: Texas has collapsed, militias guard state borders from refugees seeking shelter and water, and Las Vegas and California have developed almost military…
It’s been a long time since we’ve seen any adult fiction from Annie Barrows, who co-wrote The Guernsey Literary and Potato Peel Society with her aunt, Mary Ann Shaffer, in 2008. (Barrows is also the author of the Ivy & Bean series for kids.) However, The Truth According to Us is worth the wait. In…
Jan-Philipp Sendker at Cook Park Library This new book by Jan-Philipp Sendker is hard to categorize, as some of the best books are. It has elements of mystery, romance, and family drama, while offering in-depth character exploration and an insighful look at modern China. Paul Leibovitz, an expat living in Hong Kong, loses his son…
