A VIRTUOSO RIFF ON AN AMERICAN classic: the inimitable Percival Everett retells the story of Huckleberry Finn from Jim’s perspective, transforming it from a familiar picaresque to a more complex adventure and a meditation on code-switching. A MINUS
A FORMER CHILD INFLUENCER comes to terms with how the exploitation of her image changed her life. More than just a “problem novel,” this thoughtful book deftly takes on issues of family trauma, love, friendship, racial and national identity. A MINUS
"For the generation that included #Jewish#literary heavyweights like Bernard Malamud, Saul Bellow and Alfred Kazin, college attendance, especially at public institutions like New York’s City College, became commonplace. Meanwhile, pro-Nazi organizations like the German-American Bund enjoyed alarming popularity, and xenophobic immigration clampdowns reminded recent arrivals that they were barely tolerated. As #American#Jews put the dire economic straits of Yezierska’s generation behind them, new obstacles to feeling at home in America arose — and new #novels addressed them."
"... the Undying were weighed down by the huge burden of the past, each locked into a separate world.
... The present is just a surface bubble of sensation surrounding a great bubble of memory. You forget how to see, to hear; you forget how to talk to people. You forget other people even exist. You sink inwards into yourself, thinking about the past. Living on and on without end."
STUMBLING TOWARD ENLIGHTENMENT in Seoul: university friends now in their thirties find heartbreak and lesser forms of anomie in this eloquent, multivocal experimental novel rich with details of life in today’s South Korea. B PLUS
"Everybody looks at everybody all the time and you don't need to be a celebrity to feel the need for privacy. I myself was recently in big trouble with my Confessor for being slow to post a birthing video. I'm not talking about being either an extrovert or an introvert: I'm talking about people who don't believe privacy is a perversion, people who think it might even be a virtue."
THE LONG-AWAITED SEQUEL TO Jasper Fforde’s enigmatic 2011 novel Shades of Grey is a fascinating, mysterious science fiction picaresque where decoding the secrets behind the worldbuilding is part of the fun. B PLUS
A TALE OF LOVE AND MONSTERS is a heart-stopping, action-packed fantasy adventure, a unique romance, and a deep, wise parable about self-sacrifice and family stories. Beautifully crafted kaleidoscope of distinctively new and classic legends. A MINUS
This week, I started writing The Ninety-Three, a murder-mystery set in 1918, during the closing months of the Great War. The narrator is Dr Anna Richards, a sociologist, suffragette and socialite. The story opens in Downing Street with someone hurling a brick through the prime minister’s window…
A DELICATELY HAUNTING THAI novel unfolds like a late-night story from its protagonist, a monk in his 90s telling tales of his youth in the remote jungles of the late 19th century, where tigers and crocodiles lurked in the darkness. Stunning. A MINUS
Two items brought to my attention today, in relation to Eve’s Peace, my Heroines of SOE sequel. One, the proof copy of the paperback version. Two, this wonderful review. “Love, distrust, trust, & secrets galore. Woven superbly by the author makes for wonderous reading, hard to put down book. Rating the book a 9 1/2 only because now I must look for sequels & prequels for this wonderful series...”
INTERTWINED NARRATIVES OF MOTHERHOOD and madness weave a subtly unsettling spell in this little gem of a novel of psychological horror and suspense. B PLUS