A little boy washed up on an alien shore. A teenage girl lonely and unloved in a house on a hill. Can she save him from monsters? Such is the premise, in one sense, of Omar El Akkad's second novel, What Strange Paradise. It has fairy tale bones—children in dangerous situations, helping each other, facing … Continue reading A Strange Paradise Indeed: Review of ‘What Strange Paradise’ by Omar El Akkad
Fiction
Take a Break: Three Fun Reads
The last time I read Edith Wharton's House of Mirth I vowed it would be the last. I had read it before, three or four times, and by this point I found the slow decline of Lily Bart painfully tragic because it is so pointless. And I wanted to yell at both her and Selden, … Continue reading Take a Break: Three Fun Reads
Forgotten But Not Gone: Edna Ferber’s ‘So Big’
For my birthday in January, I received a message from my brother, Paul, informing me that my birthday present might be a few days late. "Okay. No worries," I replied, curious but not concerned. And yet when the package arrived, I had not envisioned a behemoth of an old book by an author I'd never … Continue reading Forgotten But Not Gone: Edna Ferber’s ‘So Big’
Rosemary and Pansies, Remembrance and Thoughts: Maggie O’Farrell’s ‘Hamnet’
"There's rosemary, that's for remembrance. Pray you, love, remember. And there is pansies. That's for thoughts."—Ophelia, Hamlet, act IV, scene V. There is something remarkable in the state of Stratford, at least as rendered in Maggie O'Farrell's Hamnet: A Novel of the Plague. Something I turn over and over, like an array of items rising … Continue reading Rosemary and Pansies, Remembrance and Thoughts: Maggie O’Farrell’s ‘Hamnet’
Choose! Your Dead Author Quarantine House
Which group of dead authors would you choose to quarantine with, if forced (able) to choose? That is the question of the week. Each has, by design, pros and cons. Is Zora Neale Hurston worth being stuck inside with Normal Mailer? Could you stomach Ayn Rand if it got you Maya Angelou? These are the … Continue reading Choose! Your Dead Author Quarantine House
Summertime Reading
What to do when you write about books and the reading life, you have lots of good books to choose from, and yet you find yourself without much inspired to say about them? I find myself in this predicament, whether from the ongoing pandemic, the lure of summertime, the dumpster fire state of the world, … Continue reading Summertime Reading
How to Read More Short Stories (or Essays or Poems or Other Short Form Pieces)
James Joyce's "The Dead" changed how I think about people and human relationships. One of my favorite Tales of Teaching comes from when I taught Ursula LeGuin's "The Ones Who Walk Away from Omelas" to 40 undergraduates. Just the other night, after having finished the Shirley Jackson biopic Shirley, I read the entirety of "The … Continue reading How to Read More Short Stories (or Essays or Poems or Other Short Form Pieces)
Totems
Emerald green leaves with darker stripes like paint splotches, called calithea lancifolia, in a specked, sky-blue pot; a rippled peperomia, the other houseplant I've managed not to kill, purpley green leaves and magenta stems; a beeswax candle that smells of pine; a framed thistle I carried home with me, pressed into a book, from Scotland. … Continue reading Totems
The Wheelhouse Project: Story
Go here for an introduction to the Wheelhouse Project. I read a lot and fairly widely. I really like books. Which means that when thinking about which of Nancy Pearl's four Doorways to reading—Story, Character, Setting, Language—I react more with, "Yes, those," rather than identifying with one alone. That said, I find one of these … Continue reading The Wheelhouse Project: Story
Raincheck
Reading Friends: I had family in town this weekend so did not find time to get a post together. Briefly though, I want to recommend a remarkable novel that I loved: Normal People by Sally Rooney. This story of young lovers showcases the bonehead ways that people often act when figuring out how to be … Continue reading Raincheck
Dogs, Coffee, & Books 