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A Review of Lois Lowry’s Son (by Jill)
Son was the longest of the books in The Giver Quartet, and by far the best of the series, in my opinion. It ties all of the prior books together and wraps things up pretty well, though there is … Continue reading
A Review of Jeanette Winterson’s The Gap of Time (Hogarth Shakespeare Series, Volume 1) (by Bethany)
The Hogarth Shakespeare series is off to a fantastic start: Jeanette Winterson’s The Gap of Time captures the weird intensity of The Winter’s Tale (my thoughts on the original are here and here), mirroring Shakespeare’s plot and characters while also … Continue reading
A Review of William Rosen’s Justinian’s Flea: The First Great Plague and the End of the Roman Empire (by Bethany)
This is the sort of history book I love – multidisciplinary, oriented around synthesis rather than analysis, and not afraid to go into detail about a sex act that a certain former empress of the Eastern Roman Empire liked to … Continue reading
A Review of Lois Lowry’s Messenger (by Jill)
With Messenger, the worlds of The Giver and Gathering Blue finally begin to weave together. Kira’s friend Matt, now Matty, is the protagonist here, and it turns out that the community Kira’s dad came from is the one that … Continue reading
A Review of Lois Lowry’s Gathering Blue (by Jill)
Remember like a year ago when I read The Giver? Yeah, I thought not. For those of you who don’t remember, The Giver is a dystopian young adult novel in which a twelve year old named Jonas is chosen to … Continue reading
Thoughts on Ta-Nehisi Coates’ Between the World and Me (by Bethany)
I read this book in spite of its popularity, not because of it. I read it in a day and can’t quite imagine doing otherwise – this isn’t the sort of volume from which one can be easily distracted. In … Continue reading
Final Thoughts on Michel Houellebecq’s Submission (by Bethany)
This really isn’t the sort of book that lends itself to worries about “spoilers,” but you should know that I do clearly state the novel’s ending in the second-to-last paragraph. Please avoid this paragraph if you would like to be … Continue reading
A Review of Shilpi Somaya Gowda’s Secret Daughter (by Bethany)
I have a love-hate relationship with book clubs. Officially I am a member of several (oh, all right – about twenty. I am a serial book-club joiner) – I cruise Craigslist and Meetup fairly often and love learning about new … Continue reading
Thoughts on Ray Bradbury’s Fahrenheit 451, with Digressions (by Bethany)
I think most lifelong readers must have mental lists of the gaps in their reading experience – the books that everyone else has read but that they haven’t. Fahrenheit 451 has been on my list for years – and, actually, … Continue reading
A Review of Brian Morton’s Florence Gordon (by Bethany)
First thing’s first: why would anyone give a novel a title that rhymes with his name? Seriously – try saying it five times fast: Brian Morton Florence Gordon. See the problem? What does that even mean, psychologically speaking? Is it … Continue reading
Postcards From Purgatory 