2024-04-17 22:56
Vacca Vale is a fictitious Indiana city that was once a
thriving industrial metropolis. Now it
is dying, and developers plan to demolish a sizeable greenspace. The title of the b… Read More
Blog Directory > Books & Literature Blogs > Patti's Pages books-and-literature Blog >
2024-04-10 09:30
Whether
or not I like an author depends a lot on which of their books I read
first. In the case of Elizabeth
McCracken, I loved The Giant’s House,
but if I had read Niagara Falls… Read More
2024-04-03 09:30
Lara and her husband Joe own a Michigan cherry orchard, and
all three of their adult daughters are at home helping out during the Covid
lockdown. It’s the perfect time for Lara
t… Read More
2024-03-31 21:04
Lucy Grealy was an author and poet and a dear friend of Ann
Patchett’s, ever since they were roommates at the Iowa Writer’s Workshop. This homage to Lucy and to her friends… Read More
2024-03-27 09:30
This book's political angle hits uncomfortably close to
home. The Crisis, a period of economic
collapse, yielded way to a dystopian, fascist, xenophobic society with a
Stepford tinge t… Read More
2024-03-20 09:30
Utopia
Avenue is the name of a very talented eclectic band assembled in England in the
1960s. The backdrop of this musical era
helps make this a nostalgia trip worth taking.
Grif… Read More
2024-03-18 22:29
As ghost stories go, this one is not particularly gruesome
or even scary, but it’s a good one nonetheless, and actually, it’s more of a
haunted house story. Every nine year… Read More
2024-03-17 21:11
Jason Taylor is the smart, funny, and especially endearing
first-person narrator of this gem, which takes place in a small English town in
the 1980s. Jason has a stammer, which is
diff… Read More
2024-03-13 09:30
Some
authors have the talent to produce a novel, or at least a short novel, about a
fairly unremarkable life. Such is the case here. Zorrie
Underwood’s life begins with an… Read More
2024-03-06 11:00
So many time travel novels are about someone falling in love
with a time traveler. Such is the case
here as well. Five people are
transported from various times in the past to tw… Read More
2024-02-28 11:00
Three siblings—Matthew, Zoe, and Duncan—happen upon a badly
beaten and barely conscious boy in a field.
This discovery has a marked impact on each of them, as does the
real… Read More
2024-02-25 22:56
Mercury is the name of a very special horse—so special that
Viv has sacrificed all of her ideals for this horse, which she does not even
own. Like Gone
Girl, this novel contains… Read More
2024-02-21 10:30
Whereas Normal
People was about one on-again, off-again couple, two such
couples inhabit this novel, which is largely epistolary. Eileen and Simon, who live in Dublin, have
known each… Read More
2024-02-14 11:00
At first, the title character completely turned me off, with
his five marriages and countless absurd failed business ventures. I thought this book was going to turn out to
be a farce… Read More
2024-02-11 21:26
Tim Farnsworth, a partner in a New York law firm, suffers
from bouts of the ultimate wanderlust.
When the urge to walk hits him, he can’t stop until he drops. He eventually… Read More
2024-02-07 10:30
Jews and Blacks live semi-harmoniously in this
semi-voluminous cast of characters. In
fact, at times I had to remind myself who was Jewish and who was Black, and if
I couldn’t re… Read More
2024-01-31 10:30
This book needs a different title. For one thing, it sounds like it’s about the
family of Israel’s current Prime Minister, Benjamin Netanyahu, and it is to some degree, but… Read More
2024-01-24 10:00
I may not be the target audience, which is probably women in
their thirties, for this juicy novel, but I devoured it with relish. Nina, the first-person narrator, is a
successful autho… Read More
2024-01-17 10:30
Fourteen-year-old Benny Oh and his mother, Annabelle, both
have a problem with inanimate objects.
Since the death of Kenji, Benny’s father, Benny hears the voices of
things like… Read More
2024-01-10 10:00
Two trans women, Reese and Amy, fell in love, but then Reese
cheated with married men, and Amy has detransitioned back to a man, because
being a trans woman was just too difficult. Now… Read More
2024-01-03 11:00
I struggled with this book and don’t understand why it has
received so many accolades. I had a long
career as a software developer, so the technology aspect did not turn me
off… Read More
2023-12-27 10:30
This book might be perfect for readers with a short
attention span, but the format turned me off.
The first half of the book is a series of social media witticisms, and,
if that’… Read More
2023-12-20 10:30
This book makes me wish I had studied Physics. If you’re a science nerd, don’t miss this
blend of fact and fiction, but even if you’re not a science nerd, this book i… Read More
2023-12-13 11:00
The author here is on a mission to prove that Ted Bundy and
other serial killers are not genius masterminds. In this novel, the Ted Bundy character is
known simply as The Defendant, an… Read More
2023-12-06 11:00
Historical
fiction is not really my thing, and since I know that Maggie O’Farrell has a
very fertile imagination, I would prefer that she stay away from semi-true
stories. I like… Read More
2023-11-29 11:00
I love time-travel novels with their tricky handling of
interference with the past. In this one,
the author has conjured up a unique world--a series of identical valleys with a
twenty… Read More
2023-11-22 10:30
Tookie, a Native American woman living in Minneapolis, is
arrested for stealing a corpse. Plus,
said corpse had crack cocaine hidden in his armpits. After ten years in prison rea… Read More
2023-11-20 22:35
Louise Erdrich’s older books, such as this one, read like
folklore that has been passed down through the Ojibwe tribe for generations,
rather than a novel that has sprouted from her im… Read More
2023-11-19 21:36
Lipsha is a young Chippewa man who falls in love with his
uncle’s girlfriend, Shawnee Ray. She has
a good head on her shoulders, and why she would put up with either of these men… Read More
2023-11-15 10:30
After reading The
Feast of Love, I thought I would love every Charles Baxter book, but sadly
that was not the case. Baxter’s prose
itself is entertaining, but the storyline and c… Read More
2023-11-13 22:38
My
biggest problem with this book is that I did not totally understand what
happened. Nathaniel Mason is a grad
student in Buffalo in the 1970s. At a
party he meets Jerome Coolbe… Read More
2023-11-12 22:13
This
is my first Charles Baxter novel, but it most certainly will not be my
last. In fact, I wish all novels could
be as good as this one, as I completely fell in love with the writing… Read More
2023-11-08 11:00
The
title is a MacBeth reference, but
here it’s a New Zealand environmental activist group that surreptitiously
plants vegetables on unoccupied lands they don’t own. Mira f… Read More
2023-11-01 09:30
This is my least favorite Chang-rae Lee book. As expected, the writing is stellar, but the
plot is just too bizarre. Tiller is a
20-year-old, living with thirty-something Val and… Read More
2023-10-30 22:18
Sixty-year-old Jerry Battle works part-time at a travel
agency, now that his son Jack is at the helm of the family landscaping
company. However, Jack’s “lofty”
attemp… Read More
2023-10-29 22:25
Henry
Park is a Korean-American with an unusual job:
he is expected to cozy up to a particular person in order to get dirt on
them. After his assignment to a
psychiatrist turns i… Read More
2023-10-25 09:30
Daniel and Jonah are two key characters in this novel, but
they are both dead from the beginning.
Daniel was a handsome, popular, athletic teenager who disappeared. His body was… Read More
2023-10-18 13:00
I did not like the format of this book, which is a series of
interviews conducted by Sunny Shelton, the editor-in-chief of a music-oriented
publication. I sometimes lost track of
who w… Read More
2023-10-11 09:30
I was reluctant to read this novel, because, for me,
Toibin’s biographical novel about Henry James, The
Master, was a dud.
However, the German author Thomas Mann proves to be a m… Read More
2023-10-08 21:14
Gustave von Aschenbach is an
aging German writer who suddenly decides to vacation in Venice. While there, he becomes obsessed with a
beautiful Polish boy named Tadzio.
Aschenbach… Read More
2023-10-04 10:00
We know from Rebecca Makkai’s The
Great Believers that she can write vivid characters, but this
book is more plot-driven. It’s basically
a murder mystery that takes place t… Read More
2023-09-27 09:30
I had misgivings about this book, as there is so much bad
historical fiction out there. However, I
found myself engrossed in this story and wondering how factual it was. (The aut… Read More
2023-09-20 10:00
A Colombian family of three—Elena, Mauro, and baby Karina—go
to the U.S. to escape the violence in their home country. Ironically, the constant stream of shootings
in the U… Read More
2023-09-13 10:00
Strange hybrids inhabit this novel. Chapman is a faun—half man, half beast—who,
along with his brother Nathaniel, marches westward during the early settlement
of this count… Read More
2023-09-06 10:00
William’s
3-year-old sister dies when William is 10 days old. The behavior of his parents after this tragic
loss causes William to feel that he should have been the child who die… Read More
2023-08-30 09:00
Drinking molten gold?
That I’d never heard of until I read this book, which is a tale of
alchemy, deception, and thievery, along with a will-they-or-won’t-they love
story… Read More
2023-08-23 09:30
At first, I thought this book was primarily aimed at
parents. However, I am not a parent, and
now I wonder if perhaps that is a good perspective to have when reading this
book. E… Read More
2023-08-16 09:30
I expect an emotional response to a good book, but this
novel just made me angry. This is the
second book I’ve read lately in which a man hides a huge financial fiasco from
his w… Read More
2023-08-09 09:00
In the interest of full disclosure, I have not read David Copperfield, the book that
inspired this one. Here we have
first-person narrator Damon Fields, aka Demon Copperhead, whose tee… Read More
2023-08-02 09:00
Inspired by the life of a twelfth century poet, this novel
about a reluctant nun never really gave me a reason to keep reading. Deemed unmarriageable because of her unusual
height, sev… Read More
2023-07-26 19:20
I think the author had a lot more fun
writing this book than I had reading it.
It’s either darkly comic or comically dark; in any case, it is cheekily
macabre—sort of like… Read More
2023-07-19 09:30
Ivan Doig died eight years ago and left a body of work about
the West--more in the vein of Mark Twain than, say, Cormac McCarthy. This has got to be the most wholesome,
G-rated book I… Read More
2023-07-16 20:42
Theo Ryan is a drama professor at a well-respected
university in North Carolina. He has
written several plays but knows that only “Foolscap” has any merit. His friend… Read More
2023-07-12 09:30
The “Hell” part of this book’s title is certainly
appropriate, and the subject matter is very timely. Jason Mott makes crystal clear the
life-and-death hazards of bei… Read More
2023-07-09 20:31
I honestly have never pondered what it would be like if the
dead returned to life, completely intact.
In this novel, that is what happens, and the “Returned” person may sho… Read More
2023-07-05 09:30
Lai Zhen, an expertise on survival, finds herself under
attack at a shopping mall. She squeezes
through ductwork as her assailant draws closer.
Then an unknown app called AUGR be… Read More
2023-06-28 09:30
This
book is a difficult read on several levels.
On the one hand, it waxes poetic in too lyrical and metaphorical a
fashion and has too many internal soliloquies and musings. All… Read More
2023-06-21 10:00
Rachel,
our first-person narrator, has trouble finding a happy medium. She has an unhealthy fixation on
calorie-counting, partly thanks to her body-shaming mother, but when she does
th… Read More
2023-06-14 09:00
A
book this long—too long, really—is bound to be immersive. It chronicles the
lives of multiple generations of multiple ethnicities, as depicted in the
multi-page family tree sho… Read More
2023-06-07 09:30
My
favorite thing about this novel is the title.
For me, it refers to good deeds that could have been performed but were
not—sins of omission. Also, if one
purpose of readi… Read More
2023-06-04 20:44
Full of implausible coincidences and near misses, this novel
still brings to life two strong Italian characters, Enza and Ciro. Enza comes from a large family and meets Ciro
when he is… Read More
2023-05-31 09:30
When do we get to the good part? This is the question I asked myself through
the first two sections of this novel.
(There are four in total). The
first section is a novel a… Read More
2023-05-24 10:00
The Hildebrandt family
members are basically all at a crossroads, but the title also is the name of a
Sunday night youth group at their church in a Chicago suburb. Russ Hildebrandt, th… Read More
2023-05-17 10:00
A
more appropriate title for this book would be Broken Promises. Wedding
vows are broken. A priest divulges the
details of a woman’s confession to her husband.
A man… Read More
2023-05-10 09:30
Novels
about troubled marriages are a dime a dozen, but this one is better than
most. Malcolm is gorgeous and gregarious
but is dishonest with Jess, his wife, about his plans for buyin… Read More
2023-05-03 09:30
Superstar actress Katie Barstow, along with her husband,
her brother and his pregnant wife, and five other Hollywood A-listers,
celebrate Katie’s wedding with a Serengeti safari in 196… Read More
2023-05-02 21:27
Chris Bohjalian rarely disappoints, and this novel is one of
his most gripping. I am amazed at how
prolific he is and how each of his novels is totally different from the
last. I… Read More
2023-05-01 22:19
As a history lesson about the Armenian genocide in the early
1900s, this novel is terrific. The love
story, on the other hand, and the discovery of family secrets generations later
are… Read More
2023-04-30 21:06
Stephen Drew is a disillusioned pastor in Vermont, where
homicides are rare. When one of his
parishioners, Alice Hayward, and her husband die in an apparent murder-suicide,
he decides… Read More
2023-04-26 09:30
This novel has many similarities to A Separation, but I found it to be both less suspenseful and more
satisfying. Again, we have an unnamed
narrator who is an interpreter (versus a boo… Read More
2023-04-23 16:40
What do you do when your mother-in-law calls, asking about
the whereabouts of your husband, when you’ve been separated from him for six
months? Our nameless first-person
narrator… Read More
2023-04-19 09:30
Two women, both running away from dangerous men, swap
tickets and identities in an airport.
The implausibility of this occurrence becomes less so, thanks to a
revelation late in the bo… Read More
2023-04-12 09:30
An
American oil company called Pexton has polluted the soil, air, and water of the
fictional village of Kosawa. Several
Kosawa men, including Thula’s father, travel to the capita… Read More
2023-04-05 09:30
I have lots of adjectives for this novel—gripping, chilling,
creepy, disturbing, to name a few, in a Silence
of the Lambs sort of way. No, Ansel
is not a cannibal, but he is a se… Read More
2023-03-29 09:30
David Winkler’s dreams come true—literally. However, sometimes they are nightmares, such as the one in which he fails to save his infant daughter from a flood. Rather… Read More
2023-03-22 09:30
Theo is an astrobiologist whose 9-year-old son Robin is prone to outbursts and may be on the autism spectrum. Robin’s behavior has deteriorated since his mother died in a car acc… Read More
2023-03-15 09:30
Victor Tuchman is dying, but none of his family members will miss this cruel and secretive man one bit. In fact, their attitude is more one of good riddance. Barbra, his ab… Read More
2023-03-08 10:30
It’s ironic that a book about a fast horse proceeds at a slow trot rather than a gallop. It does gather speed in the home stretch but not enough. Part of my problem is that… Read More
2023-03-01 10:30
Wallace is an overweight gay Black biochemistry grad student who feels like he is swimming upstream in an all-white world. He describes himself as shy, but the dialog indicates otherwi… Read More
2023-02-22 10:30
History does tend to repeat itself, especially where families are concerned. Mick Riva abandons his wife and children, multiple times, after he becomes a superstar singer. His gl… Read More
2023-02-15 10:30
The title character of this bleak, semi-autobiographical novel is a gay boy growing up with an alcoholic mother in Glasgow, and to describe it as dreary and depressing is a huge understateme… Read More
2023-02-08 10:30
It’s Thanksgiving in 1941 in Honolulu, and we readers know what’s coming. Joe McGrady, a police detective investigating a double homicide, heads to Hong Kong to track down… Read More
2023-02-01 10:30
Edie is a 23-year-old Black woman who is barely subsisting in every way and whose roach-infested apartment is about to be yanked out from under her. So is her job, for that matter, and… Read More
2023-01-25 10:00
Stephen King is a master of suspense, and this book exudes it, despite its overly familiar plot devices—a book within a book and a hired assassin planning to retire after one last lucr… Read More
2023-01-18 10:00
After I finished his book, I was stunned to discover that the author is a woman. Her focus is on four male characters who meet in college and become lifelong friends; the female charac… Read More
2023-01-11 10:30
Larry Lavin was a smart and charming guy who came to be a massive cocaine dealer while attending the University of Pennsylvania. After college he indulged in a hedonistic lifestyle, fu… Read More
2023-01-04 10:30
The Oppenheimer triplets despise one another, for reasons that I never understood. Their family is extremely wealthy, but true affection is in short supply. In fact, Sally and Le… Read More
2022-12-28 10:30
In a moment of pique, Giovanna's father says that Giovanna's face has become like that of his estranged sister, Vittoria. Having never met the much maligned Vittoria, Giovanna becomes… Read More
2022-12-21 10:30
Piranesi is a sweet and innocent young man who inhabits a world of fifteen people, thirteen of whom are dead. The only other living person he has ever seen is an older man whom he call… Read More
2022-12-14 10:30
Dr. Mahmoud Ezzedine arrives at Elizabeth I’s court as part of a Turkish diplomatic retinue in the late 1500s. He springs into action when a baron has an epileptic seizure in the… Read More
2022-12-11 22:28
In 1990 Budapest—not Prague—a group of half a dozen twenty-somethings congregate at bars and jazz clubs. All are expats, trying to make their mark. John, a journalist… Read More
2022-12-07 10:30
Why are so many atrocities committed in the name of religion? I was not familiar with the Irish Magdalene Laundries until I read this book, and I still can’t believe they existed… Read More
2022-11-30 10:30
This sprawling, multi-generational novel takes place in Zambia, beginning with its colonial beginning as Northern Rhodesia. The family tree shown at the beginning of the novel is inval… Read More
2022-11-23 10:30
Naamah is Noah’s wife, as in Noah of the Old Testament. This is not a biography by any stretch. Magical realism abounds, but then the premise of having two of every animal… Read More
2022-11-16 11:00
Adana Moreau, wife of a pirate and mother to Maxwell, writes a sci-fi novel called The Lost City. She pens a sequel but destroys the manuscript shortly before her death in New Orleans… Read More
2022-11-09 11:00
Among the plethora of recent novels about women working in counterintelligence during wartime (The Lost Girls of Paris, The Book of Lost Names), this one stands out and ranks right up there… Read More
2022-11-02 10:00
This novel revolves around three characters, whose pivot point is Jivan. She quit school, where PT Sir was her physical education teacher, after passing her 10thgrade exams. Jiva… Read More
2022-10-26 09:00
Historical fiction can be educational, as is this novel about the Richmond Theatre fire of 1811. I had never heard of this disaster, which Patrick Henry’s daughter, Sally, surviv… Read More
2022-10-19 09:30
Joy Delaney has gone missing, but her four adult children and her husband take their sweet time about reporting her disappearance to the authorities. She left them all a cryptic text m… Read More
2022-10-12 09:30
Antonia is still mourning the death of her beloved husband, Sam, after almost a year and finds herself at loose ends, until suddenly she has too much on her plate. Her oldest sister, I… Read More
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