~ Baking cakes in Kigali, by Gaile Parkin ~ Set squarely in Mma Ramotswe territory is Gaile Parkin’s Baking Cakes in Kigali, featuring a plump entrepreneurial African woman who solves human problems along with the cakes she sells. There are...
Coming-of-age millenial stories must be thick on the ground these days. Without seeking them out, several have come my way in the last few months — two by Sally Rooney, one by Naoise Dolan, and now, Elif Batuman’s The Idiot,...
The novel opens with the protagonist, Andrew (Andy) Nocera) being tried in court for being caught “giving a blow job off Interstate 85 one hot summer night”.The sentence is one year’s probation, during which there must be no more arrests,...
Lifelong Florida resident Carl Hiassen has carved himself a unique niche in the 45-odd years he’s been writing novels. Set firmly in his home state, his novels typically feature a wild cast of environmental activists, law personnel, corrupt politicians and...
If you ever wanted to get inside a marriage of two mismatched personalities, this is an excellent novel for that experience, in so far as one can ever get ‘inside’ someone else’ marriage. Tyler does an excellent job of somehow...
Naoise Dolan’s debut novel, Exciting Times, will inevitably be compared to Sally Rooney’s Normal People and Conversations with Friends. Dolan and Rooney are both young female Irish authors, and both write about young female protagonists who are very self-aware, intelligent,...
~ Snow on Falling Cedars. By David Guterson ~ It is surprising just how difficult it can be to review a book that one has liked immensely. The plot of this novel revolves around a trial in 1954 of Kabuo...
~ Dear Edward, by Ann Napolitano ~ This well-intentioned novel deals with the aftermath of a tragedy — a plane crash in which only one person survives, an 11-year-old boy called Edward. Edward Adler (known as Eddie), his older brother...
~ The Mothers. By Brit Bennett ~ This astonishingly assured first novel centers on a black community in a small Southern California town, and specifically, three young people: Nadia Turner, beautiful, smart and unhappy; Luke Sheppard, the pastor’s son; and...
~ The Lie of the Land. By Amanda Craig ~ Lottie and Quentin, upper-middle class, inveterate Londoners, find themselves forced to move to rural Devon for a year when they realise they cannot yet afford to divorce and sell the...
~ A Suitable Boy, by Vikram Seth ~ It’s been almost three decades since I, and the world, read and loved this novel. Most beloved books get re-read from time to time, but the sheer size (literally. 4.2 lbs on...
~ Grotesque, by Natsuo Kirino ~ This is only Kirino’s second book to be translated into English – her first was Out, also a superb piece of writing – although she is well known in Japan as a crime writer....
~ Grace After Henry – Eithne Shortall ~ I must admit that this is a novel which caught my eye because of its title. It is exactly what it says on the tin – the story of Grace’s life after...
~ My Sister, the Serial Killer. (Oyinkan Braithwaite) ~ A distinctly original addition to the satirical genre, Oyinkan Braithwaite’s first novel is set in her home country of Nigeria. Korede is a capable, accomplished nurse who carries a torch for...
~ The Burning Girl, by Claire Messud ~ Published in 2017, this is the most recent of Messud’s novels. I had enjoyed her other novels previously, particularly The Woman Upstairs, but this I think is quite Messud’s best – the...
The Pennington half-siblings
A short-lived Medici teenager
Food Art
Empowerment through Erotica
Miles to go, during a pandemic
Another novel where the ‘locals’ serve as background colour
Inconsistent Quirkiness
Undignified distortion of a classic character
Asian Cliches: Materialism and Pragmatism
Words of life and death
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