Tag: book-review
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The Correspondent, An Epistolary Novel
The Correspondent by Virginia Evans is an epistolary novel (written in letters and documents [newspaper articles, journal entries, email, etc.] and today includes social media and other documentation.) Think Bram Stoker’s Dracula, or Frankenstein by Mary Shelley, or more recently Bridgette Jones’ Diary by Helen Fielding or The Color Purple by Alice Walker (a girl’s…
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Transcription, a novel by Ben Lerner
I just finished this short novel (maybe 40,000 words in 130 pages) that’s been hailed as one of the first books to take on the issue of dependence on our phones. But it also addresses relationships and provides “dreamlike” narratives. From the Amazon introduction: “The narrator of Ben Lerner’s new novel has traveled to Providence,…
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This Tender Land by William Kent Krueger
Krueger has, over a long career, brought the Midwest, or maybe more directly, Minnesota into the literary mainstream. His novels include his 2014 Ordinary Grace, the story of a small town and the people in it, all with larger implications for the human condition. Read it! But now, I’ve just finished his 2019 novel This…
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About Grace, A Novel by Anthony Doerr
Doerr is most recently known for his novel All the Light We Cannot See, which I’ve read and agree with the critics that it’s phenomenal accomplishment (also made into a short series for TV.) Literary, lyrical, and heartbreaking for much of the plot, a blind girl with only street memory has to overcome attacks from…
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Rabih Alamenddine and the “True, True” truth about his National Book Award novel.
“The True, True, Story of Raja the Gullible (and His Mother) won the National Book Award for fiction in 2025. Written in English, billed as a dark comedy, the novel, like so many others I’ve read from award winning authors with different ideas, jumps all over the place – although the cover blurb says “the…
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Tropic of Capricorn by Henry Miller
Some time ago I posted a review of Miller’s Tropic of Cancer. It was a cautionary post that suggested the content, and especially its treatment of women – while always wrong – was now so far beyond the norms of decency that his approach and his writing might be justifiably dismissed. It’s misogynistic, often horrifically…
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Small Things Like These by Claire Keegan
Small Things Like These by Claire Keegan Small Things Like These is another prize-worthy book of fiction. As maybe a unique element, it’s a novella of less than 30,000 words. It was published in 2021 and was cited by the New York Times as a top-rated book and top seller and it was winner or…
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Willa Cather as Soulmate of the Land
O Pioneer by Willa Cather I just finished Willa Cather’s (1873-1947) O Pioneer, the story of Alexandra Bergstrom who at a young age took the reins of their Nebraska farm as her father died. Supported by 3 brothers, 2 of them became farmers under her guidance just as their father had wished. The 3rd brother…
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The Dangers of Literary Hero Worship
In a previous post I praised John Updike’s writing and the story he told in his 2006 novel Terrorist. I still hold that all I said then is true. Yet now I’ve just finished his 1996 novel In the Beauty of the Lilies, and I have mixed feelings. With a career that started in the…
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Revisiting John Updike
I just finished reading John Updike’s Terrorist. Written in 2006, the shadow of 9/11 was still great over America. In this novel, Updike follows the development of a religious young man, Ahmed, and his journey toward terrorism through mentors using the words of the Quran that served as grooming by those wishing to punish America…
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