A romantic novel with some social commentary, Sonali Dev’s ‘Pride and Prejudice and Other Flavours’ very loosely follows the Austen original. This is all to the good, as most Austen retellings are pale shadows of the originals. (see ‘A Multitude...
~ The Farm, by Joanne Ramos ~ This is definitely a debut novel. It was a pleasant read, but was flawed in many of the typical ways a debut novel too often is, if lacking editorial support. The title of...
~ City of Girls, by Elizabeth Gilbert ~ After reading Eat Pray Love, and then its sequel Committed: A Skeptic Makes Peace with Marriage, I was not very keen to read any more of Elizabeth Gilbert’s writing. So much so...
~ Big Sky, by Kate Atkinson ~ How thrilling it is when a new Jackson Brodie novel arrives in the post! Every one of Atkinson’s novels about Brodie, the retired military man turned cop turned private detective, has been a...
~ Celestial Bodies, by Jokha Alharthi ~ This is the first Omani novel I have read; Celestial Bodies, winner of the 2019 Man International Booker seems a good starting point (albeit in translation). First impressions are that this is indeed a very...
~ The Wife: Book and Movie ~ As a college student at Smith, Joan falls for her married professor, Joe Castleman, fascinated by his brilliance. It kills me to say it, but I was his student when we met. There...
~ Three Daughters of Eve, by Elif Shafak ~ An engaging novel, characterised by a distinctive writing style which demonstrates a fine-tuned consciousness and critical awareness. Particularly enjoyable are the author’s acerbic but good tempered observations on Turks, Turkey, and...
~ Olivia and Sophia, by Rosie Milne ~ This is a version of Sir Thomas Stamford Raffles and his two sojourns “Eastward” from the perspective of his two wives, Olivia and Sophia. It is not historically accurate; the author says...
It is a truth universally acknowledged that few authors can resist the allure of Jane Austen’s deceptively simple plots. Many retellings of her books have emerged over the years, but (spoiler alert!) few of them come close to the wit,...
~ Once Upon a River, by Diane Setterfield ~ As the title suggests, this novel is all about storytelling. Having not as yet had the pleasure of making the acquaintance of Setterfield’s best seller, The Thirteenth Wife, I had no...
~ Prairie Fires: The American Dreams of Laura Ingalls Wilder, by Caroline Fraser ~ Once upon a time, sixty years ago, a little girl lived in the Big Woods of Wisconsin, in a little grey house made of logs. Many...
~ The Hunger, by Alma Katsu ~ This historical fiction novel tells the story of families of pioneers in wagon trains setting out from Springfield, Illinois, on 15th April 1846, attempting to reach California for a new life. The novel...
~ The Silver Dark Sea, by Susan Fletcher ~ This novel of Fletcher’s has a few distinctive elements in common with some of her other novels, like the House of Glass, and Let Me Tell You About A Man I...
~ The Silence of the Girls, by Pat Barker. ~ It must have been more than 20 years ago when Pat Barker kindly granted me an interview in my MA research. I was then studying her earlier novels in juxtapositon...
~ The Golden State, by Lydia Kiesling ~ Motherhood is tough when money is tight, when the parent is effectively single and has little family support. Yet, as most mothers know, there are private pleasures in a baby’s unique, special...
Quiet desperation in the suburbs
Gossip Girls in Gujarat
Three generations of Filipino-Americans
No Place Like
1.5 millions tons per second
Mycelium: “a way of life that challenges our animal imaginations”
Sloppy and cloying
Lost in a Blissful Translation
Suspense, stoicism and survival in wartime Britain: two novels by Pat Barker
A Story of New Beginnings
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