Category: Uncategorized

Songs for the Brokenhearted, by Ayelet Tsabari

Random House, 2024.  352 pages.

This beautifully conceived and crafted novel brings to life a lesser known immigrant experience:  that of the Yemeni Jews who arrived in Israel in 1949 and 1950.  Their story opens up a world of tragedies and beauties.

8/20/24

There Are Rivers in the Sky, by Elif Shafak. Knopf, 2024.  464 pages.

One of the best novels I have read this year. Please see “Reviews-Fiction.”

Blue Hawk by Chloe Turner. Deixis Press, 2024. 304 pages.

Those interested in fabric arts as well as women’s history will enjoy this novel, based on historical records of the 17th century cloth industry.

Absolution, by Alice MacDermott.  Farrar, Straus, Giroux, 2023.  324 pages.

In this novel, an 83 year-old woman looks back at her time as a young wife with her CIA-advisor husband in 1963 Viet Nam.

 Wrinkled Rebels, by Laura Katz Olson.  July 23, 2024, 281 pages.

As a slightly younger constituent of the 80 year olds in Wrinkled Rebels, I appreciate both the history lessons of 1960’s social justice efforts, and the utopian possibility at the book’s end.

7/15/24

Spy Coast, by  Tess Gerritsen

Thomas and Mercer, 2023, 341 pages.

Five former CIA agents in their 60’s and 70’s, friends for over 30 years, have retired to a small town in Maine.  The past of one brings them all into action again in a story valuing friendship and loyalty as much as mystery and more than action.

7/1/24 – For July 4th, 2024

An Unfinished Love Story:  A Personal History of the 1960s, by Doris Kearns Goodwin.

Simon and Schuster, April, 2024.  480 pages.

Presidential historian Doris Kearns Goodwin brings her insightful and engaging focus to the life of her husband, Richard (Dick) Goodwin, whose words and ideas shaped some of the most powerful policies of the 1960s.

Please see “Reviews – Non-Fiction,” and have a happy 4th.

6/25/24

How the Light Gets In, by Joyce Maynard. William Morrow, 2024, 430 pages.

This big novel reads like a fairy tale of fractured relationships and people, dealing with contemporary personal, social, and political issues.

6/18/24

Sandwich, by Catherine Newman. Harper, June 18, 2024. 236 pages.

Motherhood, marriage, and menopause interweave in this book about a family’s annual summer vacation.

6/11/24

The Last List of Mabel Beaumont, by Laura Pearson

Boldwood Books, 2023, 314 pages

Arthur, 89, and Mabel, 86, have been married for 62 years.  This novel begins with their peaceful last days together, and moves on to Mabel’s life as a widow.