by Barbara the Bibliophage | Nov 22, 2022 | RELAX: Other Relaxation
Emma Straub crafts a time-travel story for everyone who’s ever lost a loved one in her new book, This Time Tomorrow. As the story opens, we meet Alice. She’s a born-and-bred New Yorker with a famous author for a father. She works at the tony private school she...
by Barbara the Bibliophage | Sep 25, 2022 | RELAX: Other Relaxation
Mad Honey is a compulsively readable novel by two of my favorite authors, Jodi Picoult and Jennifer Finney Boylan. It’s about two single moms in small-town Adams, New Hampshire, and their high school-age kids. Olivia is a beekeeper and entrepreneur. Her son Asher is...
by Barbara the Bibliophage | Jun 12, 2022 | RELAX: Other Relaxation
Elsewhere from Alexis Schaitkin is a melancholy, unsettling book. The setting is an imaginary town, high in the mountains. It’s so near the mountaintop that the clouds settle in there during the evenings. And some mornings, the townspeople wake up to a terrible event....
by Barbara the Bibliophage | Nov 21, 2021 | RELAX: Other Relaxation
Just River by Sara B. Fraser is a novel about hopeless people in Wattsville, a small upstate New York town. Once a place with a booming factory, it’s now slower and sadder. It’s the kind of town people leave as soon as they can. And yet, Carol raised her daughter...
by Barbara the Bibliophage | Nov 10, 2021 | RELAX: Other Relaxation
Wish You Were Here, to be released in late November by Jodi Picoult, is a pandemic novel. But it’s also so much more. It’s about the necessity of malleable hopes and dreams, whether we want to adjust or not. It focuses on one relatively young, upwardly mobile couple...
by Barbara the Bibliophage | Nov 4, 2021 | RELAX: Other Relaxation
In Red Island House, Andrea Lee introduces us to Shay and Senna, as well as the island nation of Madagascar. Shay is a California-born African American, working as a university professor in Milan. Her husband Senna is a successful Italian businessman. As Europeans do,...
by Barbara the Bibliophage | Aug 13, 2021 | RELAX: Other Relaxation
Etaf Rum writes an affecting debut novel in A Woman is No Man. This broke my heart like someone was sitting on my chest in every chapter. The oppressive cultural aspects of this Palestinian-American family make even the most conservative households seem progressive....
by Barbara the Bibliophage | Jul 31, 2021 | RELAX: Other Relaxation
Mohsin Hamid creates a unique refugee story in Exit West. It’s partly delicate but cannot entirely be classified that way since it’s rooted in aggressive, war-torn circumstances. Still, the main characters, Nadia and Saeed navigate life despite the obstacles. And...
by Barbara the Bibliophage | Jun 1, 2021 | RELAX: Other Relaxation
On paper the new book from Laurie Frankel, called One Two Three, is a perfect fit for me. Triplet teenage Erin Brockoviches investigate and maybe even save their town from villainous chemical company. I love a good feminist, strong (young) women book! Trouble is that...
by Barbara the Bibliophage | Jan 14, 2021 | RELAX: Other Relaxation
Black Buck by Mateo Askaripour is many things—racial justice commentary, social satire about the sales industry, debut novel, and maybe even a morality play. But at its heart, it’s a good story with a compelling main character who indeed sold his ideas effectively to...
by Barbara the Bibliophage | Dec 31, 2020 | RELAX: Other Relaxation
Jacqueline Woodson does it again with Red at the Bone. In my opinion, there’s no other living author that imbues so much emotion and grace into so few pages. This story is all about family and self-realization at any age. It’s a story of Melody, a teen whose parents...
by Barbara the Bibliophage | Dec 21, 2020 | RELAX: Other Relaxation
Reading two books about two boys in very different eras and situations warmed my heart at the start of this cold, dark winter. I began Bud, Not Buddy by Christopher Paul Curtis with my 10-year-old granddaughter. And then I started The Absolutely True Diary of a...
by Barbara the Bibliophage | Dec 16, 2020 | RELAX: Other Relaxation
In the debut novel from Rachel Mans McKenny, The Butterfly Effect, Greta Oto is more a spiny caterpillar than beautiful butterfly. Even though she’s an entomology graduate student, specializing in the winged creatures. She’s not socially comfortable in most...
by Barbara the Bibliophage | Nov 29, 2020 | RELAX: Other Relaxation
Taffy Brodesser-Akner shines a light into the darkness of dysfunctional marriage and divorce in Fleishman Is in Trouble. Set in the world of Manhattan’s social climbing thirtysomethings, we meet Toby Fleishman first. He’s experiencing the unstable world of newly...
by Barbara the Bibliophage | Oct 13, 2020 | RELAX: Other Relaxation
Lindy West reviews classic movies from the last several decades in Shit, Actually: The Definitive, 100% Objective Guide to Modern Cinema. These are her favorites, meaning she likes to pick them apart and point out all the plot holes, weird characters, and clunky...
by Barbara the Bibliophage | Oct 6, 2020 | RELAX: Other Relaxation
Gun Island is my first Amitav Ghosh, but certainly not my last. I love his style and this book. I’m particularly drawn to Ghosh’s ability to weave various current news topics into a compelling story. It grounds the narrative solidly in our own time period, and...
Recent Comments