All by Lillian King
I don’t think I have ever read a pick from Reece Witherspoon’s book club that I haven’t enjoyed, and The Paper Palace is no exception. It almost feels like a darker version of Every Summer After, which I reviewed last month (read review here). So if you like your beach reads with a bit of trauma, this one is for you.
With immigration at the southern U.S. border a hot topic in the news once again, it can be refreshing to read a fictional account of an immigration experience by someone who has actually lived it. Colombian-American writer Patircia Engel has created a memorable and unique story that has stayed with me for weeks after reading it.
If I didn’t have three little kids with all kinds of crazy desires like food, baths, naps, etc, I would definitely have finished this book in just one or two sittings.
Even before Hernan Diaz won the 2023 Pulitzer Prize for Fiction for Trust, I knew I needed to read this book. My husband, Rufus, had read it before me and couldn’t stop talking about it. He was anxious for me to read it too so that we could discuss it. A request of this kind doesn’t come along often, so my interest was really piqued.
I absolutely love when I end up reading the right book at the right time, and Every Summer After lined up perfectly with the first warm days of spring in Toronto. This is a true beach read and a very enjoyable one.
A little less than a year ago my oldest daughter Charlotte and I reviewed The Adventures of Sophie Mouse series (read review here) which were the first chapter books we really enjoyed reading together. It has taken us a while to find a series we love as much, but we are here to recommend the Ivy & Bean series to all of our young book-lovers and parents in the L&L family.
When I think about Pineapple Street, it strikes me as the first fun summer book that I’ve read this year, albeit before summer has technically begun. Set in Brooklyn Heights—and the first novel by Jenny Jackson, a Williams College graduate—the characters and storyline seem very familiar and realistic.
This gorgeous story about four sisters and their relationships with each other, with their overbearing mother and their under-achieving father, is a modern-day recast of Little Women by Louisa May Alcott. I am not sure that Hello Beautiful will stand the test of time to rival that classic in its staying power. Nevertheless, I found it enthralling to read.
The stories and tall tales of the underground railroad which helped thousands of enslaved people escape to the northern United States and Canada continue to fascinate and inspire artists today. Ben H. Winters has taken the concept and imagined what would have happened if Lincoln had been assassinated before becoming President and Congress had reached an agreement which included several southern states maintaining their rights to own human beings.
If ever there was a title for a book to make me less likely to pick it up and read it, I can’t come up with it! Thankfully, Miss Benson’s Beetle was recently selected by my Boston Bates Alumna book club because it is a real jewel. Joyce has written one of the best books about female friendship that I can remember ever reading.
How very fitting that this gorgeous novel about a lifelong friendship between two women should be recommended to me by my very dear friend, Pam. The story begins when Agnes Lee and Polly Wister are in their 80s and navigating a new phase of their friendship at their summer homes on Fellowship Point, Maine. Agnes, a famous author who has never married, has plans to donate her land on her beloved peninsula in Maine as a trust, to ensure that it will remain unspoiled after she dies.
love when I get around to reading a popular book before the buzz has subsided. Not only is this Reid’s 2022 bestseller, but she’s in the media this month because her earlier novel Daisy Jones and the Six has just been released as a TV show on Amazon Prime. While Daisy Jones was not my favorite (too whiny, read my review here), Carrie Soto is well worth a read.
n my non-fiction round-up last month, I mentioned a few books that were difficult to read, but worth it (read round-up here). Just Mercy is an incredible, but devastating addition to that group. You may have seen the 2019 movie starring Michael B Jordan and Jamie Foxx, but I honestly can't imagine the degree of nuance and context that must have been lost in a two-hour movie. And let’s be honest, if you’re an L&L subscriber, I’m sure you’d read the book first anyway!
There is certainly something about a Nigerian upbringing, and the journey to ex-pat life in America, that is causing so many young women to write some of the best novels of the last few years. I don't want to flippantly say “it must be something in the water,” because obviously part of that “something” is the political and social oppression and uncertainty of a country divided by a recent civil war and ongoing ethnic tensions and government corruption. But whatever is inspiring the writers and fueling their novels, I am grateful for each and every one that has come into my life. (read reviews of other books by Nigerian-American authors here).
I was drawn to Black Cake because it seemed everyone, everywhere was reading this debut novel. The story begins with Byron and Bennie, brother and sister, who have been estranged for years, but who are thrust together to hear their mother Eleanor’s lawyer read them her will and last requests.
I have my friend Ellen to thank for recommending Kindred. Written in 1979, Kindred is another landmark Black American novel that I hadn’t read, by a novelist I had always intended to read. Set in modern-day California, Butler tells the story of a newly married woman, Dana, who one day without warning or explanation, finds herself transported to the antebellum South.
Shortlisted for the Booker prize, The Fortune Men, is gripping, harrowing and infuriating. Nadifa Mohamed was born in Somalia and has lived most of her life in London, so she no doubt has experienced extreme examples of racism in the United Kingdom similar to what she writes about in The Fortune Men.
Originally published in 1937 and recognized as one of the most important novels in American Black literature, I somehow never read this gorgeous novel. I think all of my daughters read it in high school – and I can see why.
Whenever my mom or I review a non-fiction book, we comment on the rarity of the genre appearing on our reading lists. And yet somehow, of the last 11 books I’ve read, seven were non-fiction! Year Of Yes I reviewed in November (read review here). But rather than choosing just two books to share with you this month, I’ve written a rapid-fire round-up and hope to spark more non-fiction interest on your reading list.
