Disgruntled is the story of Kenya Curtis, her family, and her community in West Philly. They are, as the title suggests, disgruntled and with good reason. The story begins in the early 1980s when Kenya is about 10 and follows her for almost a decade. Solomon tells a rich, detailed, powerful story in a mere 287 pages and shows wit, intelligence and humor throughout. Themes dealing with race and class feature prominently and should engender lively discussion among readers. The novel begins with “The Way […]
There’s No Place Like Home
This 2014 National Book Award Finalist is a beautiful affirmation of hope in the face of devastating loss and upheaval. Station Eleven is often characterized as an apocalyptic novel, but I believe this term is too limiting and does a disservice to the author. While the destruction of civilization is at the core of the plot, Mandel is more concerned with the creation of a new world than the destruction of the old one. This is a novel about resilience, about knowing what to hold […]
In the Bleak Mid-Winter
I’ve now read all of two Edith Wharton novels and she is fast becoming one of my favorite writers. With beautiful evocative prose, Wharton creates the socially circumscribed world of early 20th-century East Coast America, a bleak place where romantic tragedies occur. In The House of Mirth, the main character Lily Bart was a beautiful young woman whose family status gave her access to upper class New York society but whose sex and poverty severely limited her ability to function successfully there. In Ethan Frome, […]
The Real World: Little House on the Prairie
I think I read all of Laura Ingalls Wilder’s “Little House” books when I was a kid and I watched the TV show for at least a few years when it ran. While I enjoyed the novels and the TV show, I don’t remember re-reading or re-watching them, so I am what you might call a casual fan as opposed to a fanatic. Still, when I read last summer that the “true story” of Laura Ingalls Wilder’s life — in her own words — was […]
Read it because it will make you sad and angry
This is a short novel that reads very quickly, but at a certain point, when you realize a tragedy is in the offing, it might slow you down. I dreaded finding out what was going to happen to characters whom I liked so much. The Book of Unknown Americans focuses on immigrant families living in the same apartment complex in Wilmington, Delaware. Henriquez allows each family or individual to speak for themselves in each chapter, and so the reader learns about the diversity within. They […]
On Genius
I am very grateful to Cannonballer Mathildehoeg for sending me On Beauty as part of the holiday book exchange. I’ve been wanting to read more of Zadie Smith’s work since reviewing White Teeth a couple of Cannonballs ago. Everything about Smith’s work is so superbly done, so sublime, that I feel ridiculous trying to review it. I’m no writer and have no aspirations to be a writer; I am a grateful reader who simply doesn’t have the words or facility of expression to do justice […]
- « Previous Page
- 1
- …
- 104
- 105
- 106
- 107
- 108
- …
- 116
- Next Page »