If you wanted to completely change the face of American politics, what would you do? If you had nothing left to lose, what risks would you take? In Steve Martini’s The Rule of Nine, one character decides on a dramatic plan to change the political scene for decades to come. The Old Weatherman is dying — he has nothing left… Read more
The other day, as I was browsing my cookbook shelf, looking for something that didn’t actually require cooking, it occurred to me that I have a lot of cookbooks that deserve a review. I’m a big fan of cookbooks — I like serious, gourmet cookbooks, ethnic cookbooks, theme cookbooks — all kinds of cookbooks! Rock & Roll Diner (Menus and… Read more
Proust’s Overcoat: The True Story of One Man’s Passion for All Things Proust is an interesting little read — a case study in obsession. It is the story of a book lover, his connections to the Proust’s family, and his obsession with preserving the author’s writings and possessions. Author Lorenza Foschini does an excellent job of pulling the threads of… Read more
Sometimes, a book is not at all what you expected it to be. You pick up a novel for the mystery but get sucked into the romance along the way, or a piece of historical fiction turns out to be more educational than any college textbook. Of course, this can also be disappointing, as in the case of Refuge on Crescent… Read more
Welcome to another edition of Wondrous Words Wednesday, where we share all the interesting words we’ve learned in the past week. Most of my words come from the book I just finished, The Rule of Nine by Steve Martini. Fabulous political thriller – I really enjoyed this one. But my first word is one I came across on a blog… Read more
Angel and Apostle takes up the story of Hester Prynne and her illegitimate daughter, Pearl, and fills in the gaps left in Nathaniel Hawthorne’s The Scarlet Letter. At the end of the earlier novel, Hester and Pearl leave Boston and no one knows of their whereabouts. Years later, Hester returns to Boston alone, still wearing her scarlet A. There are… Read more
In Ice Cold by Tess Gerritsen, an unhappy woman makes an impulsive decision that leads to tragedy. Stranded, cold and in danger, she has plenty of time to contemplate the choices that lead her here. Pretty standard stuff, really, as far as mysteries go. Luckily, Ice Cold has a handful of plot twists that keep the story moving along. Good… Read more
I love a good memoir! I tend not to enjoy celebrity memoirs as much as I do those books written by relatively ordinary folks who have lived really interesting lives. I’ve reviewed a number of them over the last few years, but The Bucolic Plague: How Two Manhattanites Became Gentlemen Farmers is by far the funniest — from the title,… Read more
What makes someone a freak? It’s the question at the heart of The Transformation of Bartholomew Fortuno by Ellen Bryson. The story revolves around P.T. Barnum’s American Museum and the “freaks” who entertained the masses there. There were midgets and fat ladies, savages from exotic lands, musclemen and other oddities. But what made them freaks, and what would they choose,… Read more
Okay, ladies, we’re all readers here, right? And we know that seeing a guy with a book instantly ups his appeal — we immediately know that we will have something to talk about (books!), he is smarter than the average bear (he’s reading, after all), and we can tell a lot about him by what he’s reading. Now, someone has… Read more