All in Fiction
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.
It’s always thrilling when I hear that Barbara Kingsolver has written a new book. She has authored some of the best books I’ve read over the past several years: The Poisonwood Bible; Unsheltered; Flight Behavior; and Animal, Vegetable, Miracle to name a few. In Demon Copperhead, Kingsolver reimagines Charles Dickens’ David Copperfield and sets her story in modern-day Appalachia. Her protagonist, like Dickens’, is left to navigate a society where children are powerless, unseen and must fight for survival.
Recommended by the owner of my favorite independent bookstore in Kennebunkport, Maine (Fine Print Books), I wasn’t sure what to expect from Hester. I knew it was set in Salem, Massachusetts and had something to do with witches and Nathaniel Hawthorne and The Scarlet Letter. But that’s about it. So, I was thrilled to discover that this is an absolute jewel of a novel!
I picked up No One Is Talking About This because it was shortlisted for the Booker Prize this year – a sure sign of a great book. Patricia Lockwood, who recently turned 40, won the Dylan Thomas Prize in 2022, given to young writers for literary excellence. She has previously published two volumes of poetry and a memoir. No One Is Talking About This is her first novel.
Grey Bees is a novel that I would likely never have found without a recommendation from one of my favorite people: Diana Harding. Although it is written by an internationally known Ukrainian author and translated by an award-winning translator, Ukrainian fiction has not until now been on my reading radar. I’m thrilled to be able to alert all of you to this quiet, heartfelt, gorgeous book.
Previously mentioned as a must-read by my mom in her review of Bennett’s The Vanishing Half (read review here), I am here to chime in with an enthusiastic full review of this engrossing and heart-wrenching book. Set in southern California, Bennett uses the older women of a local church, “the mothers,” as a kind of Greek chorus to narrate throughout the story and tease out the secrets that are slowly revealed.
Elizabeth Strout’s gorgeous new novel Lucy by the Sea brings back her iconic characters Lucy Barton and her ex-husband William who we first met in My Name Is Lucy Barton and then saw again in Oh, William! (read review here) Lucy and William have been amicably divorced for a while and as Lucy by the Sea begins, William, who is a biologist, convinces Lucy to leave her New York City apartment and join him at a rented Victorian house in a small town in Maine
If there was any doubt that Colson Whitehead is one of the greatest US writers living today, Harlem Shuffle should erase it. One of few authors to have won two Pulitzer Prizes (Underground Railroad and The Nickel Boys), Whitehead once again has published a superb novel.
Fowler’s previous book We Are All Completely Beside Ourselves was one of the best books I have ever read. When I saw that she’d written a new book, I couldn’t wait to read it. Very different from her previous book, Booth is equally stunning.
What Strange Paradise is an incredibly difficult read emotionally, but one I have to recommend for its tragic portrayal of the hope we all harbor as humans and what good can come from reaching out to one another.
Elin Hilderbrand has perfected her trademark Nantucket summer story in this gem of a book. There are many reasons why it sat in the number one spot for weeks on The New York Times Fiction Bestseller list. The Hotel Nantucket follows protagonist, Lizbet Keaton, after she breaks up with her longtime boyfriend and leaves the restaurant where they both worked.
The second book I’ve read by Alice Hoffman (review of The Marriage of Opposites here), I am once again impressed by her ability to weave factual historical events with a fantastical love story that borders on magical.
A newly published book by Geraldine Brooks will always make my “Must Read” list. And Horse surpassed all of my expectations. Based on an actual mid-nineteenth century racehorse, named Lexington, Brooks deftly weaves three stories together.
I truly believe that Emily St. John Mandel is well on her way to Margaret Atwood status in terms of Canadian authors we (yes, I’m Canadian-ish now) delight in bragging about. My only caveat to demanding that you run out and buy this book and then read it immediately is that if time travel annoys or confuses you, maybe give this a pass.
In The Sentence, Louise Erdrich has written another compelling novel, this time about a Native American woman named Tookie, who is working in an independent bookstore in Minneapolis after being released from a long prison sentence.
In West with Giraffes, Lynda Rutledge has written the best story I can remember reading since Great Circle by Maggie Showstead (reviewed here). Thank you, Karen, for recommending it! At age 105, our protagonist, Woodrow Wilson Nickel, learns that giraffes may be going extinct. In response, he feels compelled to write down his story from 1938, when as a 17-year-old with plenty of real-life problems of his own, he became part of a caravan that transported two giraffes across country from New York City to the San Diego Zoo.
I was really looking forward to reading Richard Powers’ Bewilderment, his newest book since The Overstory, which is one of the best books I’ve ever read – and which won the Pulitzer Prize for Fiction. But, I postponed reading it for a while after learning what the story was about because I was afraid it would be too depressing. Despite the book’s subject matter, though, I found it a beautifully written story about a father and a son and I encourage everyone to read it.
