The Bookstore Sisters by Alice Hoffman
What a great short story by Hoffman. I love her anthology books for a reason. I have never really been able to get into her novels because I feel like they lose a lot along the way. But she always shines in her short stories. This one follows Isabel Gibson who now in her early 30s is alone and living in New York City. She fled her small town of Maine decades earlier after grieving the loss of her mother and father. She and her […]
Pratical Magic by Alice Hoffman
In one word: Lasting Cannonball Read Bingo: Holiday This is at least my fourth time reading Practical Magic; at this point in my life, I consider both it and Alice Hoffman old friends. We may not talk a lot anymore, but we can always pick up right where we left off. Re-reading it is like taking a mini-holiday as it has become a cozy comfort read, and its magical elements make it perfect for a Halloween-y October book club selection, which is what got me […]
Magic Lessons by Alice Hoffman
This is a prequel to the better known Practical Magic, which I have not yet read. I am knocking a star off the rating, because it has that slight awkwardness of having to back into a previous opening, by their very nature, an issue with prequels. The prequel trilogy of Star Wars is a classic example. But it did make me want to read the original, so mission accomplished, I guess. Magic Lessons covers three generations of a family of witches and their allies. Their […]
Nightbird by Alice Hoffman
“It was a miracle to live as birds do, except for one thing: anyone seen in flight would surely be captured, perhaps even shot down like a crow flying above a cornfield. It’s always dangerous to be different, to appear as a monster in most people’s eyes, even from a distance.” Nightbird by Alice Hoffman is about a town named Sidwell meant for ages 10-13. In Sidwell, people believe in fairy tales. Well, to be more specific, they believe in a monster, the Sidwell monster. […]
Minty Alley by CLR James
Practical Magic by Alice Hoffman
Memoirs of a Fox-Hunting Man by Siegfried Sassoon
The Lazarus Project by Aleksandr Hemon
No One Writes to the Colonel by Gabriel Garcia Marquez
The Lazarus Project This novel came out in 2008 in the middle of the 2008 presidential election. That doesn’t really have much to do with the plot here, but the novel makes several references to the Iraq war as a backdrop to parts of the present action, as well as the Yugoslav wars of the 1990s. In addition, the novel spends a lot of time in early 20th century America, with a special focus on Eastern European immigrants in the US. The novel is mostly […]
The Rules of Magic by Alice Hoffman
The Haunting of Gillespie House by Darcy Coates
Your Fathers, Where Are They? And Your Prophets, Do They Live Forever? by Dave Eggers
Not a Happy Family by Shari Lapena
Near the Bone by Christina Henry
How to Take Smart Notes by Sonke Ahrens
The Lightness by Emily Temple
The Very Nice Box by Eve Gleichman, Laura Blackett
The Other Black Girl by Zakiya Dalila Harris
A Children's Bible by Lydia Millet
Come Tumbling Down by Seanan McGuire
Practical Magic by Alice Hoffman
Franny, Jet, and Vincent Owens take special joy in disobeying their mother’s rules. They wear red shoes and black clothes. They read books about magic. They fall in love. It’s the Lower East Side in the 60s. Who can blame them? I didn’t realize this was a prequel. I just picked it up at an airport bookstore when I had 3 hours to kill and a low phone battery. I’m grateful this is the only book that called out to me. I’m always drawn to […]
