When it’s film awards season, you often hear critics saying something like, “Hollywood loves movies about the film industry.” I picked up The Librarianist using that same logic – I’m a librarian, so I’ll like a book about libraries. I was wrong about the subject of the book – this isn’t really a book about…
In a small village in India, a woman named Geeta keeps mostly to herself. Everyone in the village considers her a witch, or churel, who murdered her cruel husband five years ago – when in reality, he abruptly left her, disappearing without a trace and leaving a pile of debts behind. Hardened and wary, Geeta supports herself by making wedding…
"Smell is the emperor of all senses. In lands far away, where earth and body converge harmoniously, it is regarded as no less important than the language one speaks—essential, intimate, and often even elevated." When was the last time you really paid attention to the smells around you? Most days, our sense of smell is…
The “climate fiction” subgenre has been gaining in popularity these days, and with good reason. Our environment is changing rapidly, and we’re seeing the effects in the headlines, as huge weather events become more commonplace. The Light Pirate presents the author’s vision of what Florida might look like in a not-so-distant future where the seas…
Barbara Kingsolver is one of my favorite authors. Charles Dickens, however, is not. So when I saw that Kingsolver had written a modern-day version of David Copperfield, I knew I would read it, but I wasn't sure if I would like it. I was wrong. Like Dickens's work, Demon Copperhead is a social novel that…
The Whalebone Theatre has such a unique title that I couldn’t resist diving in. What on earth could a “whalebone theatre” be? And why would we want to read about it? As it turns out, the theatre is exactly what it sounds like: a theatre built within the ribcage of a huge whale that washed…
Do you ever finish a book and immediately want to go back and start it all over again? This book did that for me. Luminous, delicate, and poignant, it is the story of Agnes and Polly, two lifelong friends in their 80’s who always spent summers together at their family homes on Fellowship Point, Maine.…
I'm fascinated by Australian mysteries. Something about the Australian landscape lends itself well to crime fiction: the bleak, drought-ridden outback serves as the perfect setting for murder. Dirt Creek fits right into this, as the book is named for the town in which it's set (also called "Dirt Town" by its residents). This small, rural place is slowly dying,…
This pulse-pounding thriller grabbed me from the first page and did not let go! Ariel Pryce, middle-aged wife and mother from New York, wakes up in her Lisbon hotel room one morning to find her husband, John Wright, unexpectedly missing. Almost immediately, she goes to the police and to the American embassy, but neither takes her concerns…
The Deaf community may be getting some long-overdue recognition in our culture right now. First “CODA” won the best-picture Oscar, then spring brought the release of three compelling books featuring Deaf characters: True Biz by Sara Novic (a Reese’s Book Club pick), The Sign for Home by Blair Fell (a Bookies pick from my colleague…
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