I’ve been putting off writing a review of The Yellow Birds, Kevin Powers’ novel about the Iraq war.  It was a finalist for the National Book Awards, and one of the The New York Times Ten Best Books of 2012.   I feel conflicted about it.  In some ways it is a stunning book; and yet by the end I felt it was seriously flawed. I feel both guilty and insecure about my assessment.  I see on the dust jacket the high praise it has garnered from writers like Alice Sebold, Colm Toibin, Anthony Swofford, and Philip Caputo.  A novel … Read More

I hardly ever listen to books on tape, which I regret and keep meaning to remedy.  However, knowing I had a four plus hour drive ahead of me to Madeline Island in Northern Wisconsin, I dashed into our small, neighborhood library the day before I was to leave to see if I could get a book on discs.  The pickings were very slim; I almost gave up.  But then I saw Geoff Dyer’s Jeff in Venice, Death in Varanasi.  I remembered vaguely reading a review of it when it came out, which had interested me for reasons long … Read More

In my last post I commented that one reason I liked Carol Anshaw’s Carry the One so much was that I felt the writer’s sensibility permeated the novel.  There’s a unique personality behind the curtain, narrating and describing even as the third person point of view ranges among a number of characters.  The novel has what I think of as voice.  I’ve tackled the subject of voice in writing in an article in which I described it as “the external manifestation, in language, of the writer’s sensibility: how she sees the world; her values; what she is attracted to … Read More

Carry the One is a wonderful novel. 

I’ve tried to think what made the book so compelling to me that I felt a sense of loss when I came to the end.  It also gave me a bad case of writer’s envy.  I really, seriously wish I had written Carry the One.  I want to write like Carol Anshaw.

The novel doesn’t have much of a plot, which I considered a strength. Its terms are different.  It starts when several of the characters as young adults are involved in a car accident in which a young girl is … Read More

If you’re following this blog with any regularity, I’m sure you’re relieved that I’m off my JCO’s A Widow’s Story bender.  I’m “recovering.”  Like they say, one day at a time…

I just had a fun weekend in Madison, which I had never been to.  It is a cool, hip, funky, populist town where everyone looks cool, hip and funky.  On Williamson Street where we were staying, I saw a guy sweeping his sidewalk whose hair was pretty much like a large, flattened broom head sticking straight up on top of his skull, held upright by some spackling substance. Very … Read More

In my last post, I talked about how there are a million books out there to read (and listed some places to read reviews of them).  Then I got myself in trouble by saying I wanted to give more thought to how and why I choose certain books and that I would report back.  Now I feel obliged to report back, not that I think anyone is holding his or her breath.  Turns out I don’t know why I pick books, beyond certain X factors that seem to vary from book to book.  It’s usually a combination of things that … Read More

As a child I loved a book called One Million Cats.  A quick Google search reveals it was a picture book written and illustrated by Wanda Gág in 1928.  It won a Newberry Honor award in 1929, one of the few picture books to do so.  One Million Cats is the oldest American picture book in print.

But enough factoids.  This is a great book!  An elderly couple is lonely and the wife wants a cat to love.  So her husband goes out to find one, and comes upon a hillside covered in “hundreds of cats, thousands of … Read More

In my husband’s January 18 Princeton Alumni Weekly, there’s an article by Christopher Shea entitled “The New Tastemakers,” with the subheading “Few newspapers review books these days. So who does?”

I had just finished reading Joan Didion’s Blue Nights, which I didn’t care for (so that’s all I’m going to say about it), and I needed a new book to read.  I had started several books lately that I couldn’t finish, which set me to thinking about how I find books and how I choose what to read.  It’s so fine to have a good book to read–to … Read More

What an evocative and enigmatic title Lost Memory of Skin is.  It may have been what drew me to the book originally, before I knew what it was about, along with wanting to read another novel by Russell Banks, a writer I admire tremendously. Lost Memory turns out to be an ambitious, thoughtful, morally complex and deeply compassionate novel, and while it doesn’t always succeed, it’s an amazing accomplishment. I’m glad I read it, even though it was painful.

It has one of the most fascinating and poignant characterizations I’ve read.  The Kid, a twenty-two year old convicted sex offender … Read More

I’ve just enjoyed what I believe is called a good read.  It was light, sweet, non-demanding and full of sex.  I read it on the way back from NYC, and it made a great airport/airplane novel.  It was also a relief after the weight of We Need to Talk about Kevin.  So I recommend it for your next trip, especially if it’s to Paris. 

 French Lessons by Ellen Sussman is set in Paris, and is built around three young people, Nico, Phillipe, and Chantal, who are French tutors.  Now let’s see if I have this right: Chantal is sleeping … Read More