I found this book about a marriage in Nigeria fascinating and meaningful, although it wasn’t quite what I expected. The story begins with a married couple who now live apart. Yejide is going to see her husband after many years for his father’s funeral. Then the story takes us back to the early years of…
This summer I’ve been reading a lot of great science fiction and fantasy. This batch is all science fiction, although I’m finding the distinction is somewhat blurred in a lot of what I read. I suppose that’s because I don’t read too much traditional science fiction (which I think of as relying on technological and…
This month I torpedoed my 20 Books of Summer list by signing up for a pile of NetGalleys and ARCs. I’m not saying I regret those reads, which were quite good; something just made me go “off-list” this month. Otherwise, my July was all about my sister – I got to visit her in Wisconsin…
I liked this book a lot more than I expected to, and I find myself referring to it often. It’s well-written and Vance tells his story in an engaging and meaningful way. More importantly, he humanizes the people living in the Appalachian area while not idealizing them. In fact, he argues very clearly that this…
Here are three more science fiction and fantasy mini-reviews, brought to you by the 20 Books of Summer Challenge. Since it’s pretty difficult to review books that are part of series, I’m keeping these short. I recommend all three if you’re looking for good, but not too heavy, summer reads. Good Omens: The Nice and…
The Sympathizer is a first novel by Viet Thanh Nguyen, which won last year’s Pulitzer Prize for literature. It’s a fascinating look at the Vietnam War and its aftermath from the perspective of the Vietnamese. Right away it makes you realize how much Americans only see the Vietnam War from our own perspective, not those…
746 Books is once again hosting Twenty Books of Summer, which is a good way to think about and organize my summer reading. I hope I’ll be able to cover more than 20 books by September 3, but it’s always hard to stick to a list when you hear about new and exciting books. My…
I don’t normally write catch-up reviews, for two reasons. First, I read these books in the middle of July so I don’t remember them so well, and I wasn’t exactly taking notes. And second, I’m not a big fan of the mini-review. You know I like to go on and on about a book. But…
Hello readers! My August wrap-up is also my 20 Books of Summer Wrap-Up, and it will tell you something about me that I ended up at exactly 20 books at the end of the month (hint: I’m a bit on the goal-oriented side.) I’m always sad when summer ends. As a kid, summers meant long,…
One of my favorite reads of the summer, this book has it all: great characters and story; a fun, almost movie-like plot (it will be a movie this fall); and really thoughtful writing. It’s a book I’d recommend this book to both science fiction lovers and non-science fiction readers (similar to, say, The Martian). It’s…
As August comes to a close, I’ve finished 18 books for the 20 Books of Summer Challenge, but here are a couple I didn’t make it through. I don’t really change my reading in the summer. I’m not a fan of the “summer page turner.” But if you’re on a plane or on the beach,…
July was a fantastic month because of our trip to Hawaii. When I travel, I don’t necessarily try to tie my reading to my trip location. But on this trip I noticed a few interesting parallels. First, I read The Dictionary of Mutual Understanding, which is about the atomic bomb dropped on Nagasaki, while we…
The Book Stop 