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"It circulated for five years, through the halls of fifteen publishers, and finally ended up with Vanguard Press, which as you can see is rather deep into the alphabet. "


— Patrick Dennis

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Browsing all posts tagged 'fiction'

Icelandic Clashes

Arctic Chill

Title: Arctic Chill
By: Arnaldur Indridason

Arctic Chill opens with the stabbing death of Elias, a half-Thai and half-Icelandic boy of ten. Paralleled with Elias’ death is the murder case of a new wife by her unfaithful husband. Unlike his previous four mysteries, Arnaldur’s fifth book is haunted by a series of polemic clashes. Apart from ... [Read more]


fiction, mystery
0 Comments

Justice and Atonement and Capital Punishment

Change of Heart

Title: Change of Heart
By: Jodi Picoult

Change of Heart is a thought provoking and compelling novel about religion, murder, incest, organ donation, and the death penalty. As the characters in the book reevaluate their beliefs and feelings about these issues, the reader is compelled to do the same. Picoult skillfully weaves together a story of all ... [Read more]


fiction, audiobook
0 Comments

Sleuthing Fun in San Francisco

Revenge of the Spellmans

Title: Revenge of the Spellmans
By: Lisa Lutz

Everybody's favorite thirty-something, Guinness-drinking private investigator with a checkered past is back in this third installment of the Spellman mysteries. Isabel Spellman continues to entertain as only she can in this heavily footnoted, case file format mystery set in San Francisco. Isabel's court-ordered therapy, insomnia, and secret new digs, along ... [Read more]


fiction, mystery
0 Comments

A Swede in Zambia

The Eye of the Leopard

Title: The Eye of the Leopard
By: Henning Mankell

Henning Mankell, the creator of Kurt Wallander mysteries, does not restrict himself just to the boundaries of Sweden, his native country. By working as director at Teatro Avenida in Maputo, Mozambique since 1985, he has truly made Africa his second home. The Eye of the Leopard has shown us a ... [Read more]


fiction
0 Comments

The Summer Everything Changed

Out Stealing Horses

Title: Out Stealing Horses
By: Per Petterson

The beautiful, spare prose of this short novel helps create an atmosphere and characters that will be remembered long after the last page has been turned. Set in Norway, the story moves back and forth in time--from the summer of 1948 to the present. The narrator, aging widower Trond Sander, ... [Read more]


fiction
0 Comments

Tale of Two Sisters

Shanghai Girls

Title: Shanghai Girls
By: Lisa See

Sometimes I think I am the only person who didn't enjoy Lisa See's earlier novel Snow Flower and the Secret Fan. For this reason I was reluctant to try Shanghai Girls, but I found myself with a copy in my hands and decided to give it a chance. I'm glad ... [Read more]


fiction
1 Comment

Midwifery on Trial

Midwives

Title: Midwives
By: Chris Bohjalian

Reading this book was my first taste of Chris Bohjalian and it leaves me hungry for more. The story is told by Connie, who is fourteen the fall of her mother's trial. Her mother, Sibyl Danforth, is charged with manslaughter for the death of a mother in a home birth ... [Read more]


fiction
0 Comments

A Wild Romp Through the French Quarter!

A Confederacy of Dunces

Title: A Confederacy of Dunces
By: John Kennedy Toole

This book made laugh so hard that I literally cried. Ignatius J. Reilly is one of the most colorfully hilarious characters I have ever come across. This is the best tour through the French Quarter that I could ever possibly take, without actually going there, especially with a paradoxically intelligent ... [Read more]


fiction
2 Comments

Like Reading an Episode of "The Wire"

Lush Life

Title: Lush Life
By: Richard Price

Reading Lush Life is like reading an extended episode of HBO's series "The Wire." Not coincidentally, Price writes for the series and was recently nominated for a Writers Guild of America Award for his writing on the show. The novel starts with the murder of a young screenwriter and bartender ... [Read more]


fiction
0 Comments

Cathedrals, Fog and Gothic Suspense

The Unburied

Title: The Unburied
By: Charles Palliser

If your brain is ready for a workout, you might want to try this intricately plotted atmospheric thriller set in Victorian England. It is a framed story--a mystery within a mystery wrapped in yet another mystery. And it has all of the elements you might expect in this genre: missing ... [Read more]


fiction, mystery
0 Comments

Six Degrees of Separation in London

London Bridges

Title: London Bridges
By: Jane Stevenson

An affectionate homage to the classic English detective story, London Bridges is set in 1990s London. Its plot centers on a treasure lost in the Blitz and newly discovered by an unscrupulous lawyer, who is tempted by greed into a series of crimes leading to murder. A diverse cast of ... [Read more]


fiction
0 Comments

Perfect Book for a Long Flight

Balzac and the Little Chinese Seamstress

Title: Balzac and the Little Chinese Seamstress
By: Dai Sijie

This is a lovely funny book which can easily transport you from a cramped seat in economy to an elegantly constructed world in China. Set in the Chinese countryside during the Cultural Revolution, Sijie tells us the story of two city boys sent to be re-educated by poor peasants in ... [Read more]


fiction
0 Comments

Correspondence from the German Occupation

The Guernsey Literary and Potato Peel Pie Society

Title: The Guernsey Literary and Potato Peel Pie Society
By: Mary Ann Shaffer and Annie Barrows

Upon a strong recommendation and kind provision of the book, I started to embark on the reading of The Guernsey Literary and Potato Peel Pie Society. However I had a slow start. For some reason, I was deterred by its format consisting of letters or correspondence between the protagonist Juliet ... [Read more]


fiction, history
4 Comments

Short Stories in a Northern Setting

Island: The Complete Short Stories

Title: Island: The Complete Short Stories
By: Alistair MacLeod

Modern Library named Canadian author Alistair MacLeod one of the greatest writers in the English language since 1950. After spending some time with this collection of stories, it is clear why. These short stories, set for the most part in the stark but evocative landscape of Cape Breton Island, are ... [Read more]


short stories, fiction
1 Comment

Book Discussion KitsCheck Out Our Book Discussion Kits!

To help your book discussion group, we've gathered a collection of popular paperback titles and sorted them into kits which can be sent to you upon request.