tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-37077435059622905662024-02-18T19:07:27.615-08:00BookishReviews of books of many stripes.Judith Lautnerhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/14318642708071727398noreply@blogger.comBlogger160125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3707743505962290566.post-34976847002542553572014-01-07T22:18:00.000-08:002014-01-07T22:19:10.733-08:00Someone - by Alice McDermott
I like Alice McDermott's work. But this one never really engaged me. I don't know why.
It is the story of Marie Commeford, a life in glimpses. Somewhere in the middle she says she wants to find someone who will love her. Perhaps this is the "someone" of the title, but more likely it is Marie herself, an ordinary person who is still "someone". Perhaps we all want that more than anything else: Judith Lautnerhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/14318642708071727398noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3707743505962290566.post-62747812728485210692013-12-12T20:36:00.005-08:002013-12-12T20:36:58.259-08:00Middlesex, by Jeffrey Eugenides
You could call this a different kind of coming-of-age novel. Or a historical novel. Or whatever Mendel's Dwarf is called. Curiously, my copy of Mendel's Dwarf was classified as a "romance" by the library it came from. I don't think this is the right category, although both books do involve romance.
Calliope Helen Stephanides was born twice, you'll read in the first line of the book. Cally was Judith Lautnerhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/14318642708071727398noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3707743505962290566.post-70146931574455065332013-11-10T04:22:00.002-08:002013-11-10T04:24:00.319-08:00City of Bones, by Michael Connelly
One of Connelly's best.
Harry Bosch is sent out to see a bone unearthed by a citizen's dog. The discovery leads to the remains of a twelve-year-old boy, at least 20 years old, in the hillsides of the Santa Monica mountains.
As with all cases, Harry is impatient and wants to find the apparent killer immediately. He works night and day to identify the body,then track down possible suspects. In Judith Lautnerhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/14318642708071727398noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3707743505962290566.post-52014767184356029102013-10-13T08:36:00.005-07:002013-11-10T04:23:35.032-08:00Bone by Bone, by Peter Matthiessen
There is a lot to recommend this book. It provides remarkable pictures of the US, in particular Florida, during the turn of the 19th to the 20th century. It provides one way to view the world of E.J. Watson, a legendary character in Florida in that time. It offers a bit of a cautionary tale about ecology, albeit in the background. Yet for me its story of Watson was almost relentlessly awful. Judith Lautnerhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/14318642708071727398noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3707743505962290566.post-66841837367003581452013-10-06T09:22:00.000-07:002013-10-06T09:23:21.866-07:00Atonement, by Ian McEwan
I finally got around to reading this. I saw the movie version a few years ago and loved it. I remembered it perhaps too well, so wondered if I would enjoy the book, knowing the ending.
It really is very different. The book is long - 480 pages in my paperback version - so covers a great deal more ground.
As in the film, the book essentially starts out with 13-year-old Briony Tallis viewing, byJudith Lautnerhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/14318642708071727398noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3707743505962290566.post-86411297038426087442013-08-03T14:13:00.000-07:002013-08-03T14:13:10.727-07:00Dark Places, by Gillian FlynnDark places, inhabited by unstable, unpredictable characters.
The main character, Libby Day, is 31 at the opening, a bitter, angry young woman not given to trusting others. Or even having others in her life. She's always been a bit standoffish but events in her early life sent her down a road of manipulation and guardedness.
At the age of seven, in early 1985, Libby was in the house when she Judith Lautnerhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/14318642708071727398noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3707743505962290566.post-52104984894881666652013-07-27T18:18:00.001-07:002013-07-27T18:23:17.232-07:00What We Talk About When We Talk About Anne Frank, by Nathan Englander
This collection of short stories is varied in style and point of view but all represent Englander’s perception of his Jewish faith. One story tells of his investigation into his own family history. Others approach the Jewish holocaust experience. Others let us into the lives of those who experience prejudice. And there are insights into just what it is to be a “good Jew”.
There is some wit or Judith Lautnerhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/14318642708071727398noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3707743505962290566.post-30100499298316002182013-07-06T12:04:00.000-07:002013-07-06T12:04:28.143-07:00Salvage the Bones, by Jesmyn Ward
I found this book, at times, difficult to read. But ultimately highly rewarding.
The story features fifteen-year-old Esch, living with her family in New Orleans, who discovers that she is pregnant. Her father, who drinks too much, doesn't have a lot to offer the family, other than the land held by his family over generations. Her older brother Randall is hoping for a career in basketball, Judith Lautnerhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/14318642708071727398noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3707743505962290566.post-23108023329654751882013-05-02T19:27:00.001-07:002013-05-02T19:27:32.964-07:00Bury Your Dead, by Louise Penny
Complexity! And lots of it!
Chief Inspector Armand Gamache (of the Surete) is pulled into a strange case while taking a leave of absence. An amateur archeologist, bent on discovering the grave site of the founder of Quebec, is found murdered in the basement of the Literary and Historical Library, an old and treasured library of books in English. The local police ask Gamache's informal Judith Lautnerhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/14318642708071727398noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3707743505962290566.post-89316747821748222552013-04-27T22:34:00.000-07:002013-04-27T22:34:19.222-07:00The Red Door, by Charles Todd
A different kind of mystery, at least to me. Shortly after the end of WWI, Inspector Ian Rutledge is assigned two investigations: into a man who has been attacking people at night, and into the disappearance of a prominent citizen. He sets his own pace, however, not always showing up where he is expected to be.
The disappearance is of a former missionary, Walter Teller, followed his Judith Lautnerhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/14318642708071727398noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3707743505962290566.post-69660395545045241772013-03-23T09:13:00.002-07:002013-03-23T09:14:35.645-07:00Freedom - by Jonathan Franzen
The main character of this large book appears to be Patty Berglund. Her husband Walter figures prominently as well, as do several other characters. But Patty is the only one who gets to write portions of her own "autobiography", oddly in the third person.
Patty was an athletic young girl who got knocked off the track to a basketball career when she injured her knee. She changed her dreams, Judith Lautnerhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/14318642708071727398noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3707743505962290566.post-86406702370494094682013-03-15T11:35:00.000-07:002013-03-15T11:35:02.916-07:00Drift: by Rachel Maddow
Rachel brings us a clear, well-documented account of how our military has expanded and changed since WWII. She takes us from the entry into Vietnam, through Johnson's and Reagan's presidencies, and on through to Iraq, Pakistan, and beyond. She shows us how each step was taken that led to where we are now. And where are we?
A president can wage war now without bothering the rest of us. Fewer Judith Lautnerhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/14318642708071727398noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3707743505962290566.post-2277122218056980822013-02-25T07:44:00.002-08:002013-02-25T07:44:53.589-08:00The Worst Hard Time, by Timothy Egan
An extraordinary book about the dust storms on the High Plains in the 1930s. This book takes us into the lives of several people who made up the "nesters" - farmers, along with cowboys, ranchers, doctors, teachers, and newspapermen. We follow the history of the plains from the early twenties, when land was free or cheap and hopes were high, when government policy fed the ambitions of the Judith Lautnerhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/14318642708071727398noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3707743505962290566.post-56638781603152392952013-02-09T08:39:00.000-08:002013-02-09T08:39:58.775-08:00Started Early, Took My Dog - by Kate Atkinson
Kate Atkinson's novels just delight me. I get great pleasure reading them. There are books that I like but these I love.
As in the others, this novel features a range of characters, some central and some peripheral. Jackson Brodie is again featured, former detective now supposedly retired. He falls for one more case: to find out who gave birth to a woman, Hope McMaster, a woman who now lives Judith Lautnerhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/14318642708071727398noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3707743505962290566.post-24307780907192050852013-02-08T02:02:00.000-08:002013-02-08T02:02:00.594-08:00The Secret River, by Kate Grenville
Curious story. A kind of historical fiction that I can live with.
In 1806 William Thornhill, illiterate waterman, is convicted of theft and sentenced to hang. By paying for letters pleading his case to be sent to authorities, he manages to get his sentence commuted. He is sent to New South Wales (now Australia), along with his wife and small children, to live out a life sentence there.
The Judith Lautnerhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/14318642708071727398noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3707743505962290566.post-34992465260977677192012-12-29T06:42:00.002-08:002012-12-29T06:42:34.057-08:00State of Wonder. by Ann Patchett
Ah, to have another novel with the same sense of wonder as Bel Canto! And even named "State of Wonder" to boot.
Dr. Marina Singh, employed by a pharmaceutical company, follows fellow scientist Anders Eckman into the Amazon at the behest of her boss (and lover), Mr. Fox. Mr. Fox had received a letter from a field scientist, Dr. Swenson, saying that Eckman, who had come to urge her to provide Judith Lautnerhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/14318642708071727398noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3707743505962290566.post-69218611655720718222012-12-29T06:39:00.002-08:002012-12-29T06:39:52.850-08:00Hateship, Friendship, Courtship, Loveship, Marriage. by Alice Munro
Short stories by a master. This collection features stories about man-woman relationships, as the title suggests. Some of the stories have unexpected and delightful endings. All of them are rich with detail and humanity. Judith Lautnerhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/14318642708071727398noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3707743505962290566.post-23924408129415544962012-12-29T06:32:00.000-08:002012-12-29T06:32:06.913-08:00The Grandmothers. By Doris Lessing
Doris Lessing used to be one of my favorite writers. Perhaps she still is, with reservations. Over time I found some of her work to be heavily imbued with her political positions, and they were positions I did not especially like. Perhaps if I were on the same track I would have liked them more.
In this case, just one of the stories - The Reason For It - reeks of a kind of moral position. It Judith Lautnerhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/14318642708071727398noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3707743505962290566.post-24014087149375946092012-12-28T16:49:00.000-08:002012-12-28T16:49:27.409-08:00Reading Lolita in Tehran. By Azar Nafisi
There was a faded receipt left in the book, a few pages from the beginning. I couldn't read it all, but read this much: it was purchased new from a shop in San Francisco on August 16, 2004. The buyer paid $12.08 for it. Somehow the book found its way from SF to Jackson, New Jersey and eventually to me. It may be that I am the first to have actually read it.
I read about this book in various Judith Lautnerhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/14318642708071727398noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3707743505962290566.post-85399794269968847662012-12-28T16:20:00.001-08:002013-10-06T09:26:15.003-07:00Man Crazy. by Joyce Carol Oates
I have read many books by Joyce Carol Oates. She may be the first contemporary writer that I have accorded a special position in my mind. That's because she can create characters and situations that touch me, that I can recognize, identify. Characters whose lives sometimes make me cry. I don't usually leave a book behind if it was written by her.
This one differs from many of her others in Judith Lautnerhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/14318642708071727398noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3707743505962290566.post-14738527340571328772012-12-28T16:15:00.001-08:002012-12-28T16:15:41.674-08:00Blindness. by Jose Saramago
A remarkable book in several ways.One by one, the citizens of an unknown country (or perhaps the world) are struck blind, with a "white blindness". The first to go blind is at a stoplight when it happens. A stranger takes him home in his car, where he waits for his wife. The following day he goes to see an opthamologist, who can find nothing physically wrong with his eyes. He calls a fellow eyeJudith Lautnerhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/14318642708071727398noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3707743505962290566.post-54319134101391432112012-12-28T16:11:00.002-08:002012-12-28T16:31:31.527-08:00Cheever: A Life. By Blake Bailey
I have read many of Cheever's short stories and I may have read a book or two as well - but am not sure about that. His stories are usually engaging and sometimes brilliant, but I did form the opinion that he was a misogynist. In his stories he always seems to be creating unsympathetic women, and men who are caught in their webs. I was curious about his own life. And it all became clear here.
Judith Lautnerhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/14318642708071727398noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3707743505962290566.post-37069671711088023232012-05-09T19:46:00.001-07:002012-05-09T21:29:08.226-07:00The Story of Edgar Sawtelle, by David Wroblewski
I had no idea what this would be about when I got it. I thought it would be about a photographer in the 1800s who specialized in photographs of Native Americans. I don't know why I thought the name was Sawtelle- I think the name I really meant was Curtis. In any case, I thought this would be an account of this photographer, nonfiction.
Not so. It is a lengthy first novel, finely crafted, Judith Lautnerhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/14318642708071727398noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3707743505962290566.post-25619872629712897122012-05-04T14:47:00.000-07:002012-05-04T14:54:34.257-07:00Out Stealing Horses, by Per PettersonI put off reading this because of the title. I had it on my list because it has received honors from several places. But the title made me think of...stealing horses....and I did not like the idea. I thought maybe it would be cowboyish, that horses would come in for some ill treatment.
But the title doesn't mean what it says. It has more than one meaning in the book, but neither has to do Judith Lautnerhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/14318642708071727398noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3707743505962290566.post-11512745334798130212012-01-25T21:24:00.000-08:002012-02-01T15:09:26.499-08:00The Most Dangerous Thing, by Laura Lippman
Lippman takes "thrillers" in a different direction. I don't know if it's even fair to describe this book as a member of any genre, really.
A group of five young people find each other. There are two girls and three boys, the three boys all brothers and the two girls friends. They do a lot of exploring together, and one day happen upon a shack far from anywhere, and learn that an old black man Judith Lautnerhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/14318642708071727398noreply@blogger.com0