Sarah M. Broom: The Yellow House (Book Review)
Sarah M. Broom creates a tour de force memoir in The Yellow House. And truthfully, it’s so much more. It’s about her family, her childhood, and the house she grew up in. But it’s also about her home city, New Orleans, including the politics, the racial divide, and the...Jojo Moyes: The Giver of Stars (Book Review)
I think of Jojo Moyes as a contemporary fiction author. So, The Giver of Stars surprised me since it’s solidly historical fiction. Of course, she does tell it through the eyes of a modern woman. The women at the heart of this book grapple with the same things we do...Amy Stanley — Travel to 1800s Japan in Stranger in the Shogun’s City (Book Review)
Amy Stanley is a professor and social historian who specializes in early modern Japan. In her 2020 book, Stranger in the Shogun’s City: A Japanese Woman and Her World, Stanley explores the story of a rebellious woman in a strict time. Her subject is Tsuneno, the...The Glass Palace — Historical Fiction from Amitav Ghosh (Book Review)
Amitav Ghosh creates a compelling multi-generational narrative in his historical fiction, The Glass Palace. As the book opens, Rajkumar is an 11-year-old boy from India stranded in Mandalay, Burma (now Myanmar). He finds himself in King Thibaw’s Glass Palace in 1885...Alka Joshi — The Henna Artist: A Businesswoman in 1950s Jaipur, India (Book Review)
Alka Joshi is a debut novelist who used her mother’s life and her imagination to create The Henna Artist. It’s a very strong story that entranced me from moment one. In a nutshell, our heroine is Lakshmi and the time is 1950s India. Women still aren’t treated like...Lillian Boxfish Takes a Walk by Kathleen Rooney (Book Review)
Lillian Boxfish Takes a Walk is a stroll down memory lane, created by Kathleen Rooney. If you’re curious about the life of women in various decades of the twentieth century, this is for you. Especially if you love melodic language and poetry. Lillian is 84, or...Ruther Coker Burks —All the Young Men: A Memoir of Love, AIDS, and Chosen Family in the American South (Book Review)
Ruth Coker Burks writes about her experiences caring for HIV/AIDS patients in All the Young Men: A Memoir of Love, AIDS, and Chosen Family in the American South. She wasn’t a nurse or other health care provider. She was just a young woman with a big heart and buckets...Jacqueline Woodson: Red at the Bone—A Novel of Family and Struggle (Book Review)
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...The Garden of Promises and Lies by Paula Brackston (Book Review)
The Garden of Promises and Lies by Paula Brackston is book three in her Found Things series. It’s a little bit romance, a solid dash of historical fiction, and a lot of time traveling hijinks. Our heroine Xanthe Westlake partners with her mother Flora in an antique...Stephen Graham Jones: Genre Bending Horror in The Only Good Indians (Book Review)
From Native American author Stephen Graham Jones, The Only Good Indians is horror painted on the unsettled background of reservation life. It also bends the time, space, and being continuums. In other words, you’ll need to suspend all disbelief and just go with it. So...Rachel Mans McKenny: The Butterfly Effect is a Stellar Debut (Book Review)
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...Legal Insights from Ruth Bader Ginsburg in My Own Words (Book Review)
Reading My Own Words by Ruth Bader Ginsburg is like dipping my toe into the world of judges and legal briefs. It’s a marginally vast compilation of lectures, briefs, interviews, and other writings from the Supreme Court Justice. They begin early in life—with a school...Ruth Ben-Ghiat on Strongmen: Mussolini to the Present (Book Review)
Watching real-life strongman moves while reading Strongmen: Mussolini to the Present from Ruth Ben-Ghiat is both surreal and chilling. But given that the book’s publication date was also the U.S. Election Day, comparisons are inevitable. At least to one of the...Dave Cullen on Parkland: Birth of a Movement (Book Review)
Dave Cullen offers the inspirational journey of the students from Margery Stoneman Douglas High School (MSD) in Parkland: Birth of a Movement. Before you think it’s all “happy happy joy joy,” you should know the stories include dark times as well as light. Of course,...More Gwen Proctor Thrillers: Wolfhunter River & Bitter Falls (Series books 3 & 4)
These two satisfying thrillers follow more of Gwen Proctor and her family, which still comprises her teenage son and daughter and now adds a trusted male friend and love interest. If you remember from my recent reviews, she fights vicious Internet trolls and stalkers...Bookshop.Org Affiliate
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