Hotel Cuba by Aaron Hamburger
This novel is an odyssey of a kind, focused on the women of a Jewish family in Eastern Europe – a bit of Russia that transformed into a bit of Poland by means of bloody conflict – who make their … Continue reading →
Jim Grimsley
Journey to the Heartland by Xiaolong Huang
I read this book because of the connection to China; I’ve never read a book by a gay man from China and was interested in the premise. I missed the fact that this is a self-published novel, but that likely … Continue reading →
The Days of Bluegrass Love by Edward van de Vendel
This is a young adult novel, very tenderly written, in which Tycho and Oliver encounter one another on the way to an international camp in Tennessee. They are immediately overtaken by each other and fall into a relationship that is … Continue reading →
The Last Cuentista by Donna Barba Higuera
A comet is about to strike Earth and a family chosen to board a colonization starship hurries to their ark of survival. This is a similar plot to any number of science fiction novels, with some variations, but in Higuera’s … Continue reading →
The Three-Body Problem by Cixin Liu
This novel belongs to the sub-genre of science fiction that deals with big splashy ideas, a subset of hard science fiction, which is focused more on science than character or psychology. It is also Chinese science fiction which is something … Continue reading →
A Marvellous Light by Freya Marske
The climax of this book is a climax. The scaffolding on which the romance is hung is a fairly entertaining story about “English magic,” a phrase I associate more with Suzanna Clarke’s novel Jonathan Strange & Mr. Norrell but have … Continue reading →
A Feast Unknown by Philip José Farmer
If I read this book without Philip José Farmer’s name on the cover I would not have paid any attention to it. I found a reference to this novel during some internet roving and thought it sounded interesting, though the … Continue reading →
The Art of Fielding by Chad Harbach
This was a solid book to read and well written from beginning to end. The cast of characters contains people that are different from those in any book I can remember, in particular Henry, the brilliant catcher who loses his … Continue reading →
Someday This Pain Will Be Useful to You by Peter Cameron
This is immaculate writing and is spiced with nice comic touches. James is eighteen and full of angst. His family includes his mother who is both passionately mother-like and mostly indifferent outside times of crisis, and his father, divorced from … Continue reading →
1500 Miles from the Sun by Jonny Garza Villa
This book is undoubtedly a wonderful experience for its target audience, and deals effectively with a painful coming out experience precipitated by overuse of alcohol and careless posting on social media. The aftermath is well studied and would be very … Continue reading →