Rosalie's Picks
Rosalie's Picks from 2008
Reference librarian Rosalie Bookston contributes this annotated list of some of the best books she has read so far in 2008. See also her recommendations below for 2003, 2004, 2005, 2006, and 2007.
Vargos Llosa, Mario. The bad girl (2007). The narrator begins his love story of erotic infatuation in Peru in the 1950s. Over four decades, from Paris, Tokyo, London and Madrid, Ricardo keeps falling for the bad girl, no matter her disguise or reprehensible behavior. The structure of the novel takes us through this relationship in time and places, beautifully detailed. Intriguing, involving, maddening, and making sense in a skillfully told narrative full of period politics.
Hall, Parnell. The hitman (2007). The hapless New York PI Stanley Hastings takes a hitman as a client so said hitman can retire from unpleasant work. Of course who's following who, and mixed-up identities provide a logical solution to a ridiculous dilemma. The supporting cast of characters are Stanley's smart wife, his long-suffering police officer friend, and his unscrupulous personal injury lawyer employer.
Delson, Rudolph. Maynard & Jennica (2007). A comic love story, of two New Yorkers, 2000-2002. Told from 35 viewpoints (with a helpful list of narrators). Can Maynard, a failed, eccentric, pessimistic musician and neurotic, productive, attractive Jennica find true love? This clever, and well-structured urban comedy is also an ironic commentary on our times.
Litman, Ellen. The last chicken in America: a novel in stories (2007). Twelve interconnected stories of Russian immigrants in Pittsburg, Pa. The different generations, the different personalities, but the common culture and struggles with their new experiences binds these characters together. Poignant, humorous.
Woiwode, Larry. A step from death: a memoir (2007). After a close call in a farming accident, North Dakota author and poet addresses this memoir to his son and recounts his writing , farming and family life. The interior and exterior life are a blend as he reminisces and analyzes. Particularly touching is the author coming to terms with the father/son relationship. The memoir travels back and forth in time and place, from New York and the West.
Borchert, Don. Free for all: oddballs, geeks, and gangstas in the public library (2007). A humorous, accurate, and fond look at the public library. The author has been a library assistant at a southern California urban branch library for a number of years and describes the varied patrons, procedures, and staff. Public libraries in America reflect diversity, democracy and bureaucracy. Funny and endearing anecdotes.
Schwegel, Theresa. Person of interest (2007). A noir, gritty, sensitive police procedural. An undercover Chicago cop is working on a case with the Asian community and drug deals while his wife and rebellious teenage daughter have secrets of their own. How the work/family life interacts amid secrets, lies, and desires. Some graphic scenes. The dialogue, the misinterpretations, the good intentions are painfully realistic.
Faust, Drew Gilpin. This republic of suffering: death and the American Civil War (2008). The historian Faust (who is also the President of Harvard University) has written a history of the Civil War that examines what the huge loss of American lives meant to our country. Careful research and analysis and the use of many primary sources, such as letters, diaries, reports, newspapers, sermons, poetry and more provides a documentary immediacy. These many voices bring us understanding of how all were affected and the legacy for us as a people and nation. Profoundly moving and insightful.
Black, Cara. Murder in the rue de Paradis (2008). Detective Aimée Leduc is determined to find the murderer of her journalist boyfriend. This is the author's 8th novel in this series, all set in Paris. The hostilities of the Turkish and Kurdish émigrés, the Parisian terrorist attacks and the dangerous world of journalists who expose corruption lead Aimee into a contemporary Parisian world of danger, suspense and challenges.
Ozick, Cynthia. Dictation: a quartet (2008). Four long short stories by a master writer. The title story deals with a clever, literary plot by the secretaries to Henry James and Joseph Conrad. The second story is of an aging actor making a comeback. The third story is an American in Mussolini's Italy just before the war—bewitched by a pregnant sixteen-year-old maid. And the final story is a young girl exploring her family's secrets, opinions, and obligations. All the stories deal with deceptions and revenge. The absurd, the tragic and the ordinary are bound by wit and insight.
Brockmeier, Kevin. The brief history of the dead (2006). This novel is told in alternating chapters. The first voices we hear are the recently departed souls who live in the City as long as there is someone who remembers them on earth. The other voice is of Laura Byrd, a researcher in Antarctica battling on her own. A wonderful puzzle/parable and satire/adventure story. Fascinating settings.
O'Neill, Joseph. Netherland (2008). This novel is set in New York City after 9/11. A Dutch financial analyst lives in the Chelsea Hotel and tries to understand his life and marriage when his wife leaves him and takes their young son back to England. The protagonist becomes involved with the sport cricket, a new milieu of immigrants, and especially a Trinidadian who has big dreams in America. A literary novel of place, of a marriage, of male friendship, of ethics, and of identity.
Rosalie's Picks from 2007
Schulman, Helen. A day at the beach (2007). Set in New York on September 11, 2001, this novel juxtaposes the horrors of the day with new insights of the troubled marriage of a struggling, but successful choreographer, his wife, who was his principal dancer and muse, and their young autistic son. Other friends and strangers come into play during the 24 hours. The immediacy of the day brings clarity to this couple's past and what their future will be. Moral predicaments, family relationships, ethnicity, New York lifestyles, art and work, love and meaning in a thoughtful, carefully wrought novel.
Shipley, David. Send: the essential guide to email for office and home (2007). Like a perfect email, this book is clear, short, helpful, and funny. The chapters are: Introduction: Why do we email so badly? -- When should we email? -- The anatomy of an email -- How to write (the perfect) email -- The six essential types of email -- The emotional email -- The email that can land you in jail -- S.E.N.D. -- The last word.
DeLillo, Don. Falling man (2007). Staggering out of the World Trade Center on September 11, the main character ends up at his ex-wife's home. Through several points of view, this novel explores the terrible confluence of the political and personal, how the impact of September 11th changed the lives, but not the personalities of these characters. DeLillo's fiction is artful, intense, real, and affecting.
Steinke, Darcey. Easter everywhere: a memoir (2007). Though this memoir covers the usual hard life childhood, inadequate parents, and a rebellious teenager—it is entirely non-judgmental. The focus is on the author's search for spiritual, Christian meaning in her life. She is the daughter of a disillusioned minister who eked out a subsistence living ministering to Carnival employees and mental institution patients. Her mother was a depressed, former beauty queen. The author loved her parents, never blaming them, and became obsessed by Christian ritual and theology. An unusual memoir, in spare, careful, prose.
Swann, Maxine. Flower children (2007). Linked stories of the coming of age of four siblings, raised by hippie parents in rural Pennsylvania. Spare, direct prose chronicles the unique upbringing of the children. Their world collides with other relatives, school, friends and the split and new partners of their parents. Funny, thoughtful, and perhaps a bit disturbing, this novel explores freedom, mores, feelings and growing up.
Volk, Patricia. To my dearest friends (2007). Two sixtyish New York women come together, reluctantly, to understand the letter left to them by a close mutual friend. This is witty, stylish, well written chick lit (hen lit?)—a comedy of manners exploring friendships, personalities, families, and love.
Hamid, Mohsin. The reluctant fundamentalist (2007). A fictional, compelling monologue by a young, thoughtful Pakistani. Changez has graduated from Princeton, has a complicated, affluent American girl friend, and a high-powered, prestigious New York job as a financial analyst. And then September 11 happens. He must reexamine his ties to his family and his people. Which is his home, and where do his loyalties, values, and sense of self reside? Subtle psychological suspense.
Sofer, Dalia. The Septembers of Shiraz (2007). This debut novel deals with an affluent Jewish family at the time of the Iranian revolution, September 1981. The father has been imprisoned and his wife, ten-year-old daughter, and college-age son abroad in the U.S. have no information, though all their lives have changed dramatically. The dilemmas of race, religion, class and politics are complexly portrayed with empathetic characters.
Petterson, Per. Out stealing horses (2007). An award winning Norwegian novelist , in spare, well-paced prose tells the story of a 67-year-old widower who has gone back to live in a remote cabin on Norway's easternmost border. The story alternates with the protagonist coping with the self-imposed hardships in this lovely, but harsh environment that recalls a seminal summer of 1948. This man's sexual awakening and awareness, his boyhood friendships, and most crucially, his relationship with his father are explored. The tragic events and how they play out in peoples' lives and how the main character comes to understand himself and his world are beautifully told.
Kurzweil, Allen. The grand complication (2001). A witty, intellectual romp of a novel. A skilled New York Public reference librarian is hired privately to do research for a mysterious, wealthy and knowledgeable gentleman with his own agenda. Mix it up with library jokes, literary references and a French artistic wife who needs conjugal attention. A literary labyrinth of fun that also addresses issues of identity, collecting, history, work and relationships.
Williams, John. Stoner (1965). A classic novel following the life of a Missouri farm boy born at the end of the nineteenth century. The protagonist-existential hero becomes a college literature teacher. He lives a modest life, full of disappointment and yet stoically and with dignity, also finds happiness and fulfillment. A wonderfully paradoxical portrayal, done simply but recognizing all the tender complexities of life.
Bennett, Alan. The uncommon reader (2007). This witty, delightful novella has the Queen of England discovering the joys of reading. To the consternation of the public and the Queen's staff, reading does change us. If you are a reader, you will chuckle and nod your head while reading this work. You will also add to your list of titles to read.
Hample, Zack. Watching baseball smarter: a professional fan's guide for beginners, semi-experts, and deeply serious geeks (2007). The more you know about baseball, the more you love it. This is a thorough and entertaining guide to all aspects of baseball.
Matalon Lagnado, Lucette. The man in the white sharkskin suit: my family's exodus from Old Cairo to the New World (2007). A wonderful memoir of a family from the 1930s and 40s to present day told by a much loved daughter, born in Cairo and settling in New York. The feelings of culture, time and place are visceral—from clothes, scents, food, religion, politics, work, love and family. Enormous contrasts are made real by the daughter of the man who once wore white suits in old Cairo, but whose world changed.
McDermott, Alice. After this (2006). This is a beautifully wrought novel of a middle-class Irish Catholic family in mid century America. We hear the voices of John and Mary Keene, and each of their four children. Each ordinary vignette shows us a unique character at a specific time. This intimate portrait is perceptive, lovingly amused and understanding of strengths and foibles amid the forces of luck and love, faith and friendship. A fine literary domestic novel.
Prose, Francine. Reading like a writer: a guide for people who love books and for those who want to write them (2006). Chapters include: 1. Close reading -- 2. Words -- 3. Sentences -- 4. Paragraphs -- 5. Narration -- 6. Character -- 7. Dialogue -- 8. Details -- 9. Gesture -- 10. Learning from Chekhov -- 11. Reading for courage: books to be read immediately. Not just for those who write, but truly for those who love to read this book leads to a greater appreciation of good writing and a long list of "must reads". Her examples of excellence are wide-ranging .
Lowenthal, Michael. Charity girl (2007). Historical novel set in Boston, 1918. Young Frieda Mintz has run away from home and is working at Jordan Marsh, in the lingerie department. She impulsively spends the night with a handsome soldier, only to contract a venereal disease and have her life changed by the committee to protect the morals of soldiers and incarcerate young women. Lots of period detail with a spunky heroine in this well-plotted, interesting novel.
Aciman, André. Call me by your name (2007). This sensual novel is a coming of age and erotic love story. A teenage boy falls in love with a visiting male graduate student while at his parents summer Italian Riviera place. Graphic descriptions of desire, the affair and the summer setting sets this novel sizzling into a poignant discovery of love that will affect both characters their whole lives.
Trillin, Calvin. About Alice (2006). A short, loving tribute-memoir to the author's wife. The author is a humorist, and this is his most heartfelt, poignant piece—first published in the New Yorker.
Appelfeld, Aron. All whom I have loved (2007). Nine year old Paul narrates his family story of Eastern European Jews in the 1930s. Though we know the Holocaust looms, we are taken back in time, when Paul's world is impacted by the divorce of his parents and his pull between them. His mother falls in love with a gentile. His father is alcoholic, volatile, brilliant, and withdrawn. We see the world through Paul's eyes. He is loved, but abandoned and his world is breaking apart. In this novel, memories are sensual, vivid and heartbreaking.
Westlake, Donald. What's so funny? (2007). This is the thirteenth comic caper novel featuring the hapless criminal John Dortmunder. An ex-cop blackmails Dortmunder into a heist of a 700 pound gold, jewel-encrusted chess set that's been in a midtown Manhattan bank vault for 60 years. Warring heirs, feckless teenagers, the quirky criminal gang, inept cops and robbers all have their part to play in this romp.
Danford, Natalie. Inheritance (2007). This novel alternates between the voices of Olivia, in present day and her immigrant Italian father, during his lifetime. Olivia seeks to understand her father and his past . After her father's death, Olivia finds a key and a deed to a home in Urbino, Italy and goes to discover the family and the life her father never talked about. Secrets and love stories of both generations in California and Italy.
Chabon, Michael. The Yiddish policemen's union (2007). In this noir and comic novel, Sitka, Alaska, rather than Israel has become the homeland after World War II. Your typical hard luck, hard drinking, hard boiled cop, with his half-Tlingit partner investigates the murder of a heroin-addicted possible Jewish messiah. A crazy world of Yiddishkeit.
Ferris, Joshua. Then we came to the end (2007). A contemporary comedy of manners set in a Chicago advertising agency. The tight-knit world of competition, love affairs, pranks, and above all gossip. With layoffs looming, this world of work, with personalities and relationships, quirky and familiar deals with life. A comic satire that also captures the humanity, complexity and weirdness of one's fellow workers.
Englander, Nathan. The Ministry of Special Cases (2007). This first novel is set in 1976 in Argentina during its "dirty war" of kidnappings and disappearances. The story centers on a Jewish father, mother and college age son, who disappears. The convincing voices of the characters, their personal dilemmas and relationships are poignantly funny and heartbreaking. This political novel feels intensely personal.
Leon, Donna. Suffer the little children (2007). The sixteenth novel in a mystery series featuring a good hearted Venetian policeman. There is a baby snatching, a police raid, fraud among doctors and pharmacists, illegal adoption, and a wonderfully human mixture of politics, ethics, morality and judgments. You care about the characters and are glad to be in Venice.
McEwan, Ian. On Chesil Beach (2007). This novel focuses on a young, very much in love English couple that has grown up in the 1950s. A compelling portrait of a particular man and woman facing issues of class, sexuality and communication in an achingly tender rendition of a honeymoon night.
Rosalie's Picks from 2006
Spiotta, Dana. Eat the document (2006). In this novel an idealistic, political activist from the early 1970s recounts her life underground after a violent, gone-wrong political action. The focus shifts between time, characters and generations. The irony, humor and suspense are deftly combined. Vulnerability, identity and moral issues seem palatably real with well drawn characters, place and popular culture. Questioning, rebellious teenagers are convincing.
Stassen, Jean-Phillipe. Deogratias, a tale of Rwanda. Translated by Alex Siegel (2006). In this graphic novel, the comic book format makes even more powerful, frightening, and sad the story of Rwanda. The protagonist is a young Hutu boy coming of age in 1994. Through flashbacks and current storytelling, we see the painful ravage of civil war and genocide of Rwanda. The illustrations are as poignant as the text and make one realize we are all morally responsible for this tragedy.
McKeithen, Madge. Blue peninsula: essential words for a life of loss and change (2006). A mother turns to poetry for some order, meaning, even hope when her teenage son comes down with a mysterious, degenerative disease. In eight years, there is never a clear, named diagnosis, but there is a wonderful exploration of poetry as words are examined in how they connect our lives to life and all its complexities. The author brings the same intense focus and determination to understand her son?s undiagnosable illness to an array of poems.
Stewart, Ian. Letters to a young mathematician (2006). This is part of an Art of Mentoring series. The distinguished mathematician addresses what math is and why it is important (and beautiful) through a series of letters. The subjects are wide ranging and the author brings clarity, humor and insight to all things mathematical. A wonderful introduction that could persuade anyone to study mathematics.
Roberts, Michele. Reader, I married him (2006). Feminist chick-lit literary genre spoof. Three times widowed, fifty-year-old lapsed Catholic English Aurora decides to visit Italy and her ardent feminist friend who is now an abbess at a convent. There ensues a romp of sex, politics, mistaken identities, religious theatrics and more through the voice of a funny, if unreliable, narrator.
Strout, Elizabeth. Abide with me (2006). Set in the 1950s of a small, Maine town, a Congregational minister must face grief, gossips and loss of faith after his vivacious, beautiful and difficult wife dies. The good, if naïve, Reverend Caskey struggles with the secrets of himself, his family and his parishioners. Gentle, probing, and complex with a quiet sense of humor and irony.
Steinberg, Michael and Larry Rothe. For the love of music: invitations to listening (2006). An enthusiastic, informed, witty, opinionated collection of essays that invites anyone to listen to music. From personal essays on how the authors fell in love with music to sketches of first rate and second rate composers. Wonderful reminiscences. Included are essays on the influence and quirks of the music critic B.H. Haggin, an essay on Brahms and Schoenberg, recognizing the sacred and the profane in music, the wary friendship of Rachmaninoff and Stravinsky, the Hollywood connection to classical music, the genius of Mozart, Schubert and Schumann and much more from Bach to Lou Harrison.
Pessl, Marisha. Special topics in calamity physics (2006). A darkly humorous, literary, coming of age novel. The narrator is the brilliant Blue Van Meer, motherless since age five and raised by her brilliant, itinerant, academic, womanizing, and adored father. Finally, they settle in North Carolina for her senior year at a posh, private school where Blue becomes a member of a group of kids called the Bluebloods and led by an eccentric, mysterious film teacher. A literary structure and elaborate plot, a murder mystery and puzzle with references to the real and imaginary make for an intriguing stew of identity issues and growing up. Does great knowledge help us understand ourselves and the world, and/or provide fine entertainment?
Atwood, Margaret. Moral disorder: stories (2006). A circle of stories centering around Nell, her family responsibilities and relationships. Theses short stories feel like Atwood's memoirs, but they are fictionalized: bittersweet, funny stories that capture the life of a Canadian girl born in the late 1930s. Humane, touching, complex, simple, specific, universal and humorous.
Messud, Claire. The emperor's children (2006). A modern, literary, ironic comedy of manners set in New York city in 2001. Three privileged, well-educated friends are 30 years old and trying to make their way in the city—sorting out who they are, what they want to do, and whom they love. In this well wrought novel, the characters and place and times are detailed and true. Examining generational relationships and identity contribute to a sparkling, thoughtful, well-crafted story with much to think about.
Jacobson, Sid and Ernie Colón. The 9/11 report : a graphic adaptation (2006). Based on the final report of the National Commission on Terrorist Attacks upon the United States. The fitting dedication to the book is in memory "of those who lost their lives in the tragedy of 9/11 and with the hope that this book can help the rest of us to understand better what happened that day and in the years leading up to it." The book does just that. This graphic adaptation of the report is compelling and informative.
Steinhardt, Arnold. Violin dreams (2006). A wonderful memoir of the Guarneri String Quartet's first violinist of his love affair with the violin and its music. Thematically structured around his constant search for a beloved violin and what playing the violin has meant to him—with a recurring response to Bach's Chaconne from the Partita no. 2 in d minor. The book also includes a CD with performances of the Chaconne by Steinhardt—25 years apart.
Haddon, Mark. A Spot of bother (2006). The author follows his successful The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night-Time with this British domestic comedy of manners. 61-year-old retired, decent and dull George is having a nervous breakdown confronting his mortality, but his son, daughter and wife are too beset by their own dilemmas to recognize what is going on. The setting is an upcoming wedding, where family relationships are at the forefront. This novel, from several points of view, manages to be funny, crazy and endearing—like a family.
First half of 2006
Harr, Jonathan. The lost painting (2005). A true account that follows the discovery of a lost Caravaggio painting. Over a number of years, with much research, and many art experts involved, we see how a painting is authenticated. This non-fiction account reads like a face-paced thriller, opening with a young Italian woman art history graduate student who stumbles on clues. She pursues all leads and experts. The author captures the unique and magical quality of this brilliant Renaissance painter.
Lurie, Alison. Truth and consequences (2005). An esteemed architecture historian professor suffers, very ungracefully, from back pain. His conscientious wife looks after him, but the resentment tests the relationship, especially when a parallel couple enters the scene. Flamboyant, sexy, manipulative Delia arrives on campus with her caretaking husband. When affairs develop, relationships, art, truth, love, and personality are carefully portrayed and examined in this comedy of manners.
Dew, Robb Forman. The Truth of the Matter: a novel (2005). Widowed Agnes Scofield raises her four children mid-century, in the Midwest. Though the protagonist is Agnes, we see the situations and developed relationships over a variety of points of views over time. Agnes struggles to understand herself, her children and those she loves and her place and role. This is a quiet novel with telling details of character, family secrets and gentle, questioning lives.
Herrin, Lamar. House of the deaf (2005). This novel explores the intersection of loss, grief, political terrorism, and different cultures. Ben goes impulsively to Madrid 3 years after his older daughter is killed accidentally by Basque terrorists. His other daughter Annie also struggles with the loss and her family relationships. Alternating chapters of Ben and Annie's voices ultimately come together after a suspenseful search for understanding and revenge.
Yoshino, Kenji. Covering: the hidden assault on our civil rights (2006). The author is gay, Japanese-American, and a brilliant, poetic, thoughtful Yale Law professor. He defines covering as a kind of assimilation to majority norms and a loss of personal identity. He deals with issues of identity, multiculturalism, civil and human rights concerning gays, minorities, women, the disabled. This work is analytical, clear, personal and elegant.
Hustvedt, Siri. A Plea for Eros: essays (2006). These sensitive, intelligent essays span personal memoir to literary understanding of Dickens, Fitzgerald and Henry James. Hustvedt explores her Norwegian, Minnesota background and coming of age as a feminist. Honest and personal, these essays delineate how this writer, and other writers understand gender, sexuality, memory and art.
Mattison, Alice. In case we're separated: connected stories (2005). These 13 short stories are connected by characters, similar issues and the structure of each story. Spanning the twentieth century, we see a family from its Russian émigrés to their American children, grandchildren and great grandchildren. The characters search for love and meaning. Foibles and assets are portrayed with a compassionate sense of humor. Human connections are deftly portrayed.
Williamson, Kate T. A year in Japan (2006). An exquisite and charming little book by a young woman who spent a year in Japan. The author illustrates this journal with luminous watercolors of the things and scenes she saw in Japan - from washcloths, bicycle riding on Kyoto's streets to cherry blossoms, festivals and food. An eye for detail, it is the quirky and telling details that describe Japanese culture. Whether the book is a cross between a graphic novel and a journal or a sketchbook, it is a treasure.
McGahern, John. All will be well: a memoir (2006). In lyrical, evocative prose, McGahern describes growing up in rural Ireland in the '40s and '50s. The book is a tribute to his beloved mother who dies when he is only eight years old. In spite of his father's manipulative, tyrannical violence, McGahern infuses the story with his love of his mother and Ireland. The oldest of seven children, he portrays the loving relationship with his five sisters and the dynamics of this religious, ordinary, if dysfunctional family. The ordinary is made extraordinary with a beautiful sense of place.
Roth, Philip. Everyman (2006). A wryly humorous musing by the protagonist on his life and death. This "everyman" is a well drawn, detailed, specific man dealing with his aging, deteriorating physical being. The narrator looks at his failed marriages, and his loving parents, brother and devoted daughter. Fearful of his mortality, he reminisces about all that has brought him pleasure and pain - life in short, the physical body, human connections. The time shifts back and forth - beginning and ending at the cemetery - with an "alas poor Yorick" quality.
Oz, Amos. How to cure a fanatic (2006). This distinguished Israeli writer of both fiction and nonfiction, weighs in on the Israeli-Palestinian conflict. He declares both sides are right and need an amicable, workable, shared custody divorce. The dispute is not over religious beliefs or cultural differences, but simply over land. While irreverent and humorous, Oz's work is also serious, hopeful and practical. This short work includes the essay "Between right and right" and an interview with the author.
Tyler, Anne. Digging to America (2006). Two very different couples, one Iranian born, meet at the Baltimore airport as they await their Korean adopted babies. This novel explores their unlikely friendship, assimilation, cultural differences and what it means to be an American and to belong. Tyler's domestic fiction is seemingly simple with a gentle, compassionate sense of humor but her characters are both singularly defined and complex - as are real people.
Rosalie's Picks from 2005
Hall, Donald. The best day the worst day: life with Jane Kenyon (2005). The poet Donald Hall chronicles the life of his poet wife, their life together, her illness and her death. This unsentimental, detailed memoir is affecting and loving.
Norman, Howard. In fond remembrance of me, a memoir of myth and uncommon friendship in the Arctic (2005). Nearly 30 years ago, the author, in his 20s, was in the Arctic translating into English the Inuit "Noah stories" and became good friends with an older Anglo-Japanese woman who is translating the stories in Japanese. The author's friend and that time is lovingly recalled--with admiration and humor for his friend who is very wise, gifted and dying of cancer.
Gaines, James R. Evening in the palace of reason: Bach meets Frederick the Great in the Age of the Enlightenment (2005). Frederick the Great, when he is young, powerful, Frenchified, bitter, bisexual, clever and cruel gives the great, elderly, pious, contrapuntal genius Bach a devilishly difficult but seemingly simple theme to improvise. The result is Bach's "The Musical Offering". The two great men could not have been more different in temperament. The author creates each personality and the times they represent so that they come alive for the reader.
Rowling, J. K. Harry Potter and the half-blood prince (2005). This is the sixth of the seven Harry Potter books. If you haven't yet plunged in, give yourself over to wizardry, fantasy, jokes, and issues of good, evil, love and death.
Farhi, Moris. Young Turk (2005). This fine collection of 11 stories interweaves the coming-of-age stories of a group of friends in Turkey before and after World War II. The group is as diverse as the emotions and lives explored of Muslims, Jews, Christians, Gypsies, Armenians, Kurds and Greeks. The author's great gift for storytelling makes these stories romantic, humorous, tragic, suspenseful, and erotic as they reflect the troubled times and the ambitions, hopes and losses of these young people in this unique place.
Sfar, Joann. The Rabbi's cat (2005). This young comic graphic artist provides an unusual tale of a widowed rabbi, his daughter, and their talking cat set in Algeria in the 1930s. Like Art Spiegelman, the format of the comic graphic novel with contemporary language and ideas applied to philosophical and theological questions is a story that deals with religious beliefs and practices seems an odd mixture that works well. The cat wants to be Bar Mitzvahed and study Kabbalah. The daughter falls in love and marries a French rabbi and all go to Paris dealing with the mundane and the profound, all in a humorous vein. Irreverent, touching, and funny storytelling.
Doctorow, E. L. The march (2005). There is a varied cast of characters in this historical novel set during General Sherman's march through Georgia and the Carolinas at the end of the Civil War. We hear the voices of Rebel and Union soldiers and officers, an army surgeon, a beautiful light-skinned freed slave, slave-owners and their family members, and many others. There is comedy and tragedy - love, life and death and you will feel as if you were there.
Prose, Francine. Caravaggio: painter of miracles (2005). This succinct, clear and insightful biography will send you searching out Caravaggio's paintings. This Italian painter of the sixteenth century led a violent, passionate life and he powerfully melded the sacred and the profane. The author makes you see and appreciate the humor, the beauty, the technique of these awesome paintings.
Didion, Joan. The year of magical thinking (2005). This poignant, deeply personal memoir chronicles the year after the author's husband of forty years very suddenly died and their daughter was deathly ill. The beautifully spare, reportorial style transforms this individual account into a universal understanding of grief.
Garcia Marquez, Gabriel. Memories of my melancholy whores (2005). Garcia Marquez's beautifully, slyly, and humorously deals with the three major themes of literature: love, sex and death in unmatched storytelling. The narrator of this story is celebrating his ninetieth birthday.
Atwood, Margaret. The Penelopiad (2005). It isn't just Odysseus who should be considered wily. The point of view of the long-suffering, but smart Penelope and her 12 maids, acting as a chorus gives us a new take on the Odyssey The poet-author's voice is smart, sassy and thoughtful in a storytelling tradition that is oral and draws on mythology and other sources.
Dine, Carol. Places in the bone: a memoir (2005). The author is a poet and so this story of childhood, abuse, parents, lovers, cancer and life is full of metaphors and spare, purposeful language. Disturbing, honest and life-affirming.
Fox, Paula. The coldest winter: a stringer in liberated Europe (2005). The acclaimed author, particularly of children and young adult fiction, recounts in very spare prose, her trip to England and Europe in 1946 when she was just 22. She worked as a journalist in postwar Europe and her accounts of London, Prague, Paris, Warsaw and Spain are as chilling, clear and biting to the bone, as the weather. An unusual coming of age story that focuses more on people and places of that time, than the author herself.
Dominguez, Carlos Maria. The house of paper (2004). A short, snappy, ironic story of academics and bibliophiles by an Uruguayan author. The story opens with a professor who is killed crossing the street while reading Emily Dickinson - proof positive that books can change one's life. Mysteries ensue after a book is mailed to her after her death. Beautifully, eerily illustrated by Peter Sis.
Gottlieb, Robert. George Balanchine: the ballet maker (2004). From his lonely childhood in Bolshevik Russia, his accidental enrollment in ballet school to his varied dance career to the most influential ballet choreographer, Balanchine's life was dances and dancers. His personal life inspired and mirrored his creativity, but all his emotional life was more in his dances than in his relationships. A loving memoir of an exceptional genius.
Robinson, Marilynne. Gilead (2004). A Midwestern preacher is writing a memoir to his young son, reflecting back on his life and fathers and sons. A most tender, thoughtful, amusing portrait. Robinson's ability for verisimilitude and storytelling brings a convincing voice to her character as she spans the range of theological wonderings to particular details of a time, place and characters.
Atkinson, Kate. Case histories (2004). Three cases of loss and violence are tied together by a middle-aged private detective who faces his own losses. This novel examines relationships of siblings, parent-child, and marriages. There are secrets, suspense, and a deft mixture of comedy and tragedy. An ironic, comedic tone helps deal with the most profound issues that any life must face.
Faber, Michel. The Courage consort: three novellas (2004). Finely drawn, distinct characters, ironic humor, sexual and romantic yearnings, mental instability and carefully described situations infuse all three novellas. The title story is a quintet of singers, each very different from the other dealing with artistic and personal differences. The second story is of a wounded young woman who finds a romantic interest and makes the acquaintance of an exuberant, friendly dog. The final story is a parable of two young children in a remote Arctic setting dealing with unusual, indifferent parents. In spite of the wounds and losses, the characters, different as they are, find some resolution and happiness. Most notable are the stories' compassionate sense of humor amid the troubles the characters face.
Huxtable, Ada Louise. Frank Lloyd Wright (2004). This brief, thorough, sensitive, informed biography captures the man and his work. Wright changed the nature of architecture. He was a complicated genius suffering great tragedy and was outrageous in his personal life. Wright was a fascinating, contradictory, paradoxical, difficult, determined, architectural genius.
Korelitz, Jean. White rose (2005). This novel draws on the opera Der Rosenkavalier for its central metaphor, structure and characters. But it is also a witty, biting, penetrating satire and comedy taking place in New York City. It opens with a steamy scene of a 48-year-old woman scholar and her 28-year-old lover interrupted by a boorish, older, social climbing cousin who has come to visit. From sex to farce to quite thoughtful and poignant reflections on love and relationships.
Fleming, Renee. The Inner Voice: the making of a singer (2004). This is essential reading not only for any singer, but also for any audience member who is transported by opera and songs. Opera star Fleming covers her family, education, mentors, colleagues, the business, performances and backstage. She is honest, personal, informative, instructive and enchanting. This is a unique and compelling voice and look into the opera world.
Prose, Francine. A Changed Man (2005). A Neo-Nazi young man has a change of heart and decides to work for a human rights organization headed by a Holocaust survivor who sends the young man to stay with his assistant, a worried, heartfelt single mom with two sons. A comic satire on social issues, doing good, philanthropy and the serious class issues we all face. A very funny novel dealing with those who are nickel and dimed and those of privilege and seriously exploring our common humanity in this comic novel.
Pelecanos, George. Drama City (2005). The mean, gritty streets of Washington, D.C. are as real as the vulnerable, complex, believable characters in this crime novel. Lorenzo Brown is an ex-con, trying to go straight, employed by the Humane Society, known in his old neighborhood as "The Dog Man". His probation officer is Rachel Lopez, with her own set of problems. You understand these characters - the lost souls, those trying to make it, and turn the pages to see the drama unfold.
Ferri, Linda. Enchantments (2005). A series of vignettes, told in memoir flashbacks in the voice of a privileged, affluent young Italian girl who comes of age in Paris and Tuscany. The commonality of any young child wrestling for her parents' affections, experiencing sibling rivalry and asking questions about her life and its meaning. John Casey ably, fluidly translates from the Italian.
Atlas, James. My life in the middle ages (2005). Both poignant and self-involved, Atlas looks at his life: parents, money, death, love, physical and mental health in a wry, frank, humorous, chatty and literary manner. He makes no bones about being privileged, of the "lower upper middle class" on the upper West side of New York.
Pouncey, Peter. Rules for old men waiting (2005). A retired history professor and World War II veteran spends a winter in his Vermont home. His wife has died, and he is ill and so he makes a list of rules, which includes writing complete stories. Learned, poignant, literary, and very entertaining.
McCall Smith, Alexander. In the company of cheerful ladies (2005).Precious Ramotswe, of the No. 1 Ladies' Detective Agency, in Botswana, solves mysteries both personal and otherwise. Cheerful and wise.
Westlake, Donald. Watch your back! (2005). John Dortmunder and friends plan to rob a wealthy New York penthouse (suitably despicable, absent rich man) but also want to protect from the mob their favorite hangout bar (where the regulars' deep conversation is hysterical). Overlapping plots provide slapstick fun in this comic caper novel.
Rosalie's Picks from 2004
Leavitt, David. The Body of Jonah Boyd (2004). This story contains stories within stories and easily combines the best of satire, humor, academic mystery, and psychological fiction. A secretary-mistress is the narrator. The plot centers around the disappearance of a famous writer's novel in progress. A clever examination of intellectual ideas and property, and the romantic entanglements of a psychology professor, his wife, a mistress, a son, a best friend and a writer.
Toibin, Colm. The Master (2004). A beautifully written, moving novel in the voice of Henry James. Toibin portrays place, character, identity and relationships. Both the outer and inner worlds of this character,and the portraits of Americans, Britons, and expatriates are many faceted. One of the central questions the author examines is how much of James' writing life substituted for his "real" life. As James brought depth and life to his characters, how did he relate to the real men and women on whom they were based. A fascinating, reflective, psychologically penetrating work of fiction that makes us wonder about the very nature of reality and art.
McGraw, Erin. The Good life (2004). Eleven short stories. The characters and voices range from suburban young couples to older Catholic priests. The dialogue is wry, humorous, and penetrating.Old fashioned storytelling in a modern voice which move and affect us as we identify with characters examining relationships and identity.
Seierstad, Åsne. The Bookseller of Kabul (2003) A journalist lives with an Afghan family shortly after the fall of the Taliban. This remarkable non-fiction work explores the lives of the bookseller, the patriarch, and his family with insight, compassion and understanding of a very different culture as they struggle with the modern world and their traditional beliefs in a world made different by war. A wonderful glimpse through the eyes of the bookseller, his sons, sisters, wives and mother.
Hiaasen, Carl. Skinny dip (2004). This hysterically funny novel, where the bad guys are really bad (and bumbling dumb too), is set in south Florida. A no-good, corrupt, macho biologist (who loathes the environment) works for a sleazy businessman, falsifying water pollutant statistics concerning the Everglades. The bad biologist throws his wife overboard on an anniversary cruise, but is foiled when she survives and wreaks revenge on him.
Ozick, Cynthia. Heir to the glimmering world (2004). Rose, an 18 year old orphan in 1933 accepts a job with the strange, compelling, refugee Mitwisser family. The family is sporadically supported by the heir to a famous children's author. Conflicts abound in the Bronx, NY household as each character, from the professor, his brilliant, mad wife, the three unruly boys, and the oldest, poised daughter. The prose glitters with satire and insight. This artful novel provides layers of thought and pleasure amid a complicated plot with colorful characters.
Spiegelman, Art. In the shadow of no towers (2004). A graphic novel, as powerful and personal as the author's earlier work Maus. As a New Yorker and comic artist, Spiegelman beautifully captures how his world, our world has changed since 9/11. Using his art through a historical perspective of comic illustration he conveys angst, fear, patriotism, loss and much more.
Spark, Muriel. The Finishing school (2004). An ambitious, arrogant, aspiring novelist and his wife run a small finishing school in Switzerland. When one of the talented students has great success writing a novel, he unleashes jealousy, rivalry and sexual competition. Spark provides her usual wry, dark satire with an unexpected ending.
Roth, Philip. The Plot against America (2004). A scary, believable, suspenseful alternative history with Charles Lindbergh winning the 1940 presidential election. Told from the remembered viewpoint of an impressionable, vulnerable child of 8, Roth poignantly captures this American Jewish experience of the 1940s. This is a page turner as the reader tries to find out what "really" happened.
Frank, Thomas. What's the matter with Kansas: how conservatives won the heart of America (2004). Though written before the election of 2004, this reporter vividly explains the results of the last election and how the previous working class Democrats have turned to ultra-conservatism and the Republican party. The author, born in 1965, grew up in Kansas and chronicles the very specific history of this state which reflects a nationwide trend. Well documented, convincing, and disturbing in showing how cultural and social values and stereotyping have led to a disconnect with economic and social welfare issues when mixed up with politics.
Bezmozgis, David. Natasha and other stories (2004). A collection of stories centering around a community of Jewish Russian émigrés in Canada. The narrator is a young boy who chronicles his coming of age in this unique neighborhood. Poignant, funny and touching.
Lansky, Aaron. Outwitting history: the amazing adventures of a man who rescued a million Yiddish books (2004). More than just a story of collecting Yiddish books and founding the National Yiddish Book Center, this is the story of a language, its culture, its people and history.A wonderful combination of storytelling and individual lives balanced with a profound respect for the accomplishments, joys and sorrows of Yiddish and those whose lives it has affected.
Teachout, Terry. All in the dances: a brief life of George Balanchine (2004). A fabulous biography of the greatest ballet choreographer and his establishment of American ballet.After reading this book you will want to see the Balanchine ballets.
Lahiri, Jhumpa. The namesake (2003). A young Bengali couple move to America and name their son Gogol. With this unusual name and the story behind it, we enter a world of assimilation and generational differences. In this beautifully crafted novel are themes of identity, family relationships, cultural differences and coming of age.
Tyler, Anne. The amateur marriage (2004). This is the story of Michael and Pauline who meet in 1941 and despite very different personalities, amidst love and misgivings, marry. We follow their lives over 60 years. This couple, their families and friends will seem familiar and real. Tyler perfectly captures the uniqueness and universality of relationships.
Leonard, Elmore. Mr. Paradise (2004). A Detroit detective handles a double homicide involving a wealthy older lawyer, a hip personal aide, a beautiful model and her glamorous roommate escort and other assorted characters. With snappy dialogue, a tense culminating scene and a wry sense of humor, expect to be entertained.
Groopman, Jerome. The Anatomy of hope: how people prevail in the face of illness (2004). From a pre-eminent physician and researcher who draws on his 30 years of practicing medicine to examine the psychological and medical aspects of hope.
Sterba, Jim. Frankie's place: a love story (2003). Frankie is the Pulitzer Prize winner Frances Fitzgerald and her place is the family summer cabin on Mt Desert Island, Maine. The author is a journalist, former foreign correspondent and it is his story of falling in love with Frankie and her place. A lovely romantic, gently humorous, unsentimental memoir with a number of other elements (like a few recipes) thrown in.
Márai, Sándor. Embers (2001). This Eastern European novel, set in 1940, was written in 1942, and recently rediscovered and translated. Two men, the very closest of friends during boyhood and adulthood meet 41 years later after a revealing, dividing, alienating event. The conversation between these two men raises old-fashioned and timeless questions concerning friendship, love, hate, loyalty and character.
Garcia Marquez, Gabriel. Living to tell the tale (2003). This autobiography-memoir is as charming, funny, moving and fantastical as the author's fiction. What a memory and imagination he has! This is the first of a trilogy, dealing with the author's life (up to the age of 30), his family, his friends and colleagues. The prose is beautiful.
Kermode, Frank. The Age of Shakespeare (2004). An excellent overview of Elizabethan times and places, the actors and the theaters where Shakespeare was performed. Also, discusses briefly each of the plays and puts the Bard's life and work in context.
Olson, Steve. Count down: six kids vie for glory at the world's toughest math competition (2004). Six high school kids compete in the international mathematics Olympiad. This account counters stereotypes of "math nerds" and we learn more about American math phobia, talent, competitiveness, gender studies, creativity and innate ability.
Dunn, Jane. Elizabeth and Mary: cousins, rivals, queens (2004). The two very different queens who never met, but whose lives profoundly influenced each other, and history. The personalities and times come alive in this page-turning, well-documented, history.
Silverstein, Ken. The Radioactive boy scout: the true story of a boy and his backyard nuclear reactor (2004). A moving, frightening, eye-opening story of a geeky, unhappy, nuclear-obsessed teenage boy coming of age in the 1990s and a clear -eyed portrayal of American culture at this time.
Fowler, Karen Joy. The Jane Austen book club (2004). Five women and one man, all Californians, meet once a month to discuss the six books of Jane Austen. Of course we hear the story of each of the characters in a book that is its own comedy of manners. Entertaining fiction.
Rosalie's Picks from 2003
Hustvedt, Siri. What I loved (2003). The narrator, an art historian, looks back on the long friendship with an artist. The lives of two families, husbands, wives and sons as they interact, suffer loss, understand love. The reader gains insights into art, creativity, family and friendship. Fiction
Daum, Meghan. The Quality of life report (2003). Television lifestyle reporter Lucinda Trout takes on the idealized Midwest after her survival in New York is tested by high rents and superficiality. A comic novel and one of the better "chick lit" pieces. Fiction
Satrapi, Marjane. Persepolis (2003). Graphic novel, comic-book memoir, a mixing of genres, of fiction and non-fiction. A young girl (ages 8-14) from a leftist, well-connected Persian family, comes of age in a conflicting time in Iran. Margi tells her story of rebellion and growing up during Iran's violent revolution and imposition of fundamentalist ruling and the violent Iraq-Iran war. The juxtaposition of ordinary, if privileged life, in a turbulent time is furthered heightened by the beguiling, comic book format and a child's narrative. Comic book
Singer, Peter. Pushing time away: My grandfather and the tragedy of Jewish Vienna (2003). A poignant and fascinating memoir based on the author's grandfather's letters and work and the vibrant world he lived in. Nonfiction
Meloy, Maile. Liars and saints (2003). We follow a family of three generations over five decades. This Catholic family deals with faith, sin, well-intentioned lies, love and loss. Cleanly told from different characters' points of view, the beautiful, clear prose moves us as we explore this normal, complicated family. Fiction
Battles, Matthew. Library: an unquiet history (2003). From a Harvard librarian, an elegant, ruminative, world-wide history of libraries, the concept, the building, the librarian. He highlights certain collections, their destruction and survival. For anyone who uses a library. Nonfiction
Fuller, Alexandra. Don't let's go to the dogs tonight: An African childhood (2001). A surprisingly funny, candid and moving memoir with well drawn portraits of her family, community and most powerfully Africa. This is a white family, with all their bigotry, alcoholism, hard