/ My rereading of this book, which I first encountered in college, was less positive than I expected. I’d had it in mind to read the novel again for a long time but never had done so, unlike other of … Continue reading →
There are only a couple of George Eliot books that I had not read by the age of thirty and this is one. It was a revelation in that it was a book of hers that I could dislike, and … Continue reading →
My first encounter with Sigrid Nunez was through her novel What Are You Going Through, and I was taken by her digressive form, her prose, the accuracy of her paragraphs and insights, and the general shape of the drama. I … Continue reading →
Like many people I loved the books from long ago. When I began to watch the series I read some positive reviews that mentioned the negative reactions of purists who disdained the changes to the television version of the classic … Continue reading →
When I read this book about a week ago at first I had no idea that it would be a balm for the fear of the future that I feel all the time. The title is prosaic and uninviting on … Continue reading →
I’d never have thought to give a mere three stars to a Virginia Woolf book, or to write about its charming qualities, its cuteness, its rather sentimental portrait of dogs, their owners, and poets with strange ailments who languish in … Continue reading →
I used to read references to Saki in long-ago literature classes and yet never actually read him until lately. This novel is short, acerbic, hilarious, sad, and one of the best reads I’ve had in a while. All those fussy, … Continue reading →
When I first encountered Elizabeth Gaskell (Wives and Daughters) I thought that she was one of those writers who ought to get more attention; later I realized my response was indicative of my own ignorance, which is so often the … Continue reading →
This is my first encounter with Nunez and is a remarkable assembly, a meditation about everything, especially the significance of death, and then in the second half something else, the twist of the story. The quiet exit from disease contemplated … Continue reading →
This book is the closing volume of the Beulah Quintet, which I see mentioned on Goodreads as Settle’s best known work. The incidents that are narrated in this novel are mentioned in the introductions to all the previous volumes, the … Continue reading →