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Blindness (Jose Saramago) (January 02, 2008)

The Unknown Terrorist (December 23, 2007)

Touchy Subjects (Emma Donoghe) (July 02, 2007)

Not surprisingly I was most interested by the Babies stories. One ("Sleeping Through the Night") reminded me so much of my own experiences it was uncomfortable. ... (continued)

Finn (Jon Clinch) (June 04, 2007)

As a former student of southern literature, I was excited when Finn was published -- a novel imagining the life of that bogeyman, Pap, who haunts Huckleberry Finn in Mark Twain's book. ... (continued)

My Antonia (Willa Cather) (February 21, 2007)

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"Brokeback Mountain" (Annie Proulx) (February 13, 2007)

There's a woman on Ocracoke Island who says "the book is always better" than the movie. But in this case, I don't think you can say that. ... (continued)

Special Topics in Calamity Physics (Marisha Pessl) (December 28, 2006)

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Basketcase (Carl Hiassen) (December 14, 2006)

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Skinny Dip (Carl Hiassen) (December 07, 2006)

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A Spot of Bother (Mark Haddon) (November 14, 2006)

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A Thousand Acres (Jane Smiley) (November 04, 2006)

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The Time Traveler's Wife (October 05, 2006)

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Case Histories (Kate Atkinson) (September 12, 2006)

Since I read her short story collection Not the End of the World, this author has been a favorite of mine. So when I saw that a new book featuring Jackson Brodie is coming out this fall, I thought I... ... (continued)

Mystic River (Dennis Lehane) (September 01, 2006)

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The Ruins (Scott Smith) (August 28, 2006)

After a positive review in the NY Times Book Review, I thought this thriller/horror story would be a fun book to bring on our summer vacation. (When we have a long drive we like to take a book to read... ... (continued)

Diary (Chuck Palahniuk) (August 23, 2006)

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Amsterdam (Ian McEwan) (August 16, 2006)

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Saturday (Ian McEwan) (August 10, 2006)

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The Subtle Knife (Philip Pullman) (June 27, 2006)

Second in the "His Dark Materials" series, meant for young adult readers but enjoyable for anyone who enjoys a good fantasy/adventure ... ... (continued)

When We Were Orphans (Kazuo Ishiguro) (June 12, 2006)

I loved Remains of the Day, and had high hopes for this. ... (continued)

Dawn (Octavia E. Butler) (June 06, 2006)

Although this science fiction book was published almost 20 years ago, the only time I double-checked the date was at the one mention of the U.S.S.R. The rest of it -- about the end of life on Earth as we... ... (continued)

The Golden Compass (Philip Pullman) (May 31, 2006)

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White Teeth (Zadie Smith) (May 09, 2006)

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A Wrinkle in Time (Madeleine l'Engle) (April 29, 2006)

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Beasts of No Nation (Unzodinma Iweala) (April 23, 2006)

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I Sailed With Magellan (Stuart Dybek) (April 13, 2006)

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Prep (Curtis Sittenfeld) (March 10, 2006)

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Behind the Scenes at the Museum (Kate Atkinson) (February 26, 2006)

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On Beauty (Zadie Smith) (February 08, 2006)

Excellent. Fulfills the promise of White Teeth. More later.... ... (continued)

Extremely Loud and Incredibly Close (Jonathan Safran Foer) (January 26, 2006)

Based on the sometimes-exasperated reviews of Foer's second novel, I imagined it to be irritatingly gimmicky. Photos of keyholes? Nearly blank pages? Nearly black pages? Argh. But ... ... (continued)

The Magician's Nephew (C.S. Lewis) (December 31, 2005)

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A Conspiracy of Paper (David Liss) (December 26, 2005)

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The Lion, the Witch, and the Wardrobe (C.S. Lewis) (December 23, 2005)

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Big Stone Gap (Adriana Trigiani) (December 05, 2005)

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To Kill a Mockingbird (Harper Lee) (November 02, 2005)

I don't know how, but I think I got through the public school system and college (as an English major, no less) without reading this book. ... (continued)

The Great Gatsby (F. Scott Fitzgerald) (October 18, 2005)

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Fight Club (Chuck Pahlaniuk) (October 02, 2005)

It was better than the movie. Aren't they always?... ... (continued)

Lost in a Good Book (September 21, 2005)

These are not exactly what you would call science fiction but depend upon the premises that a) certain people can jump around in time, changing the course of history and b) certain people can jump in and out of books, interact with their characters, and, if they wish (though it is not legal) change the course of the story. ... (continued)

Moo (Jane Smiley) (September 04, 2005)

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The Secret Life of Bees (August 29, 2005)

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Lullaby (Chuck Palahniuk) (August 20, 2005)

I quite liked this strange, vivid, emotional story. ... (continued)

The DaVinci Code (Dan Brown) (August 14, 2005)

I know what you're thinking: I shouldn't waste time critiquing pulpy thrillers for their antifeminist undercurrents. Well, then pulpy thrillers shouldn't waste my time purporting to be about reverence for the 'sacred feminine'! WARNING: MAJOR SPOILERS AHEAD. ... (continued)

Cold Sassy Tree (August 12, 2005)

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The Kite Runner (Khaled Hosseini) (July 11, 2005)

Although his style took some getting used to (for me) and the emotional tenor of the story spans the spectrum from bittersweet to excruciating, I (and the rest of the world, apparently) have to give it a thumbs up. ... (continued)

Brideshead Revisited (Evelyn Waugh) (July 08, 2005)

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Not the End of the World (Kate Atkinson) (July 02, 2005)

Each of these stories contains the minute details of an unsettling world -- a world, perhaps, where a stray cat grows to man-size, or a dead woman is trapped in limbo, or a young woman discovers the secret to eternal life. ... (continued)

The Coffee Trader (David Liss) (July 01, 2005)

It's a surprisingly exciting mystery about commerce in mid-17th century Holland. ... (continued)

Interpreter of Maladies (Jhumpa Lahiri) (May 10, 2005)

I liked these short stories, Lahiri's first book, even better than The Namesake. ... (continued)

a bunch of short stories (March 09, 2005)

My favorite so far is a Joyce Carol Oates story called "The Cousins," from a 2004 Harper's. ... (continued)

The Birth of Venus (Sarah Dunant) (February 28, 2005)

It's like beach reading with delusions of grandeur. If it's that enthralling, it can't be good for me, right? Bright, beautiful Florence at the end of the fifteenth century. A smart, sassy young woman dying to paint ... ... (continued)

The Namesake (Jhumpa Lahiri) (February 23, 2005)

She has that enviable way of telling the story so simply and elegantly, making it look so easy. (While if you've ever tried to write anything you know how much went into making it look easy.) ... (continued)

The Bell Jar (Sylvia Plath) (February 13, 2005)

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The Known World (Edward P. Jones) (February 09, 2005)

This was a Bamako book club pick. Here's what I wrote up after our discussion: The first thing everyone wanted to talk about, and a subject we returned to frequently over the course of the evening, was the historical nonfiction... ... (continued)

Jonathan Strange & Mr. Norrell (Susanna Clarke) (January 17, 2005)

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My Name Is Red (Orhan Pamuk) (January 01, 2005)

Almost last year's book -- I finished it at 1:30 a.m. after watching the local New Year's Eve celebrations. ... (continued)

The Lovely Bones (Alice Sebold) (December 11, 2004)

Better than I thought it would be for a book narrated from heaven by a murdered girl. But maybe not as good as all the hoo-hah led me to believe. ... (continued)

Alice's Adventures in Wonderland (Lewis Carroll) (December 04, 2004)

Of course, the entire time I had that Jefferson Airplane song in my head. ... (continued)

All Tomorrow's Parties (William Gibson) (November 28, 2004)

I want to like William Gibson, but ... ... (continued)

The House of Sand and Fog (Andre Dubus III) (November 23, 2004)

Reading this book is like watching a terrible car wreck in slow motion, knowing that the victims, if they are lucky enough to survive, will be irrevocably devastated. No, really, you should read it. ... (continued)

What Was She Thinking? Notes on a Scandal (Zoe Heller) (November 14, 2004)

The story was not what I thought it would be, in a very good way. On the surface, it is about a (female) teacher who has an affair with a (male) teenage student. ... (continued)

The Dogs of Babel (Carolyn Parkhurst) (November 07, 2004)

My book club scoffed at the premise of this story: A linguistics professor tries to teach his dog, the only witness to his wife's death, to speak. Was it an accidental fall from the top of the apple tree, or was it suicide? Only the Rhodesian Ridgeback can tell him. ... (continued)

Bel Canto (Ann Patchett) ()

This book was different the second time I read it. Less enchanting -- perhaps because I knew how it would end. ... (continued)

The Killer Angels, Michael Shaara (October 08, 2004)

This is another "fiction, sort of" book, like The History of the World in 10½ Chapters. It covers only a few days out of the U.S. Civil War, the days that would come to be known as the battle of Gettysburg. ... (continued)

The History of the World in 10½ Chapters (Julian Barnes) (September 20, 2004)

I suppose this is fiction, but it reads more like a series of unusual essays. ... (continued)

The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night-Time (Mark Haddon) (September 05, 2004)

I read this book not too long ago and loved it. My book club is discussing it on Thursday so I read it again, in one day, at the Sobo Bade hotel in Toubab Dialaw, Senegal. I liked it, but... ... (continued)

The Old Man and the Sea (Ernest Hemingway) (August 29, 2004)

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The Fourth Hand (John Irving) (August 22, 2004)

It's hard for me to judge this book because there wasn't a lot competing for my attention when I read it; I was hospitalized at the time. ... (continued)

The Nanny Diaries (Nicola Kraus & Emma McLaughlin) (August 16, 2004)

Whose bright idea was it to leave me in charge of a used-book sale? They will be lucky if there is anything left to sell. Well, they will be lucky if there's anything left besides Danielle Steele and Dean Koontz. ... (continued)

The Swallows of Kabul (August 06, 2004)

My book club read this book and in general, we were disappointed. ... (continued)

The Cold Six Thousand (by James Ellroy) (July 22, 2004)

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East is East (T. Coraghessan Boyle) (June 28, 2004)

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Cruddy (Lynda Barry) (June 11, 2004)

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Pride and Prejudice (Jane Austen) (May 28, 2004)

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Summer Sisters (Judy Blume) (May 21, 2004)

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Disgrace (J.M. Coetzee) (April 15, 2004)

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Pattern Recognition (William Gibson) (April 04, 2004)

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Cryptonomicon (Neal Stephenson) (March 27, 2004)

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Oryx and Crake (Margaret Atwood) (March 04, 2004)

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Friend of the Earth (T.C. Boyle) (February 17, 2004)

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The Spy Who Came In From the Cold (John LeCarre) (February 10, 2004)

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Five Quarters of the Orange (Joanne Harris) (February 02, 2004)

A Bamako book club selection, by the woman who wrote Chocolat. I loathed that awful, kitschy movie they made with Juliet Binoche and Johnny Depp, so I may have started this book with the wrong attitude. The story, of a... ... (continued)

Prague (Arthur Phillips) (January 16, 2004)

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The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night-Time (Mark Haddon) (January 12, 2004)

The best, most original book I've read this year. An autistic teenager, who is brilliant at math and logic but has tremendous difficulty understanding people and their feelings, finds his neighbor's dog dead in her front yard and sets out... ... (continued)

Quarantine (Jim Crace) (January 10, 2004)

Brief, quiet, mildly interesting novel about Jesus's 40-day fast in the desert and the others with him on the "quarantine" for their own reasons: "Madness, madness, cancer, infertility."... ... (continued)

Snow Falling on Cedars (David Guterson) (December 12, 2003)

Eh.... ... (continued)

A Passage to India (E.M. Forster) (November 19, 2003)

I found this book especially interesting as a contemporary expatriate. Forster asks whether colonists and the colonized can be friends on equal terms. The book (written in 1924, mind) answers: "and then," [Aziz] concluded, half kissing him, "you and I... ... (continued)

Tears of the Giraffe (Alexander McCall Smith) (November 15, 2003)

Smith's first book starring independent African businesswoman Mma Ramotswe, The No. 1 Ladies' Detective Agency, was original and enjoyable, if not especially complex or thought-provoking. Unfortunately Tears of the Giraffe dumbs down the lady detective story too much. As if... ... (continued)

The Eyre Affair (Jasper Fforde) (November 13, 2003)

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Everything is Illuminated (Jonathan Safran Foer) (November 08, 2003)

I told a friend: "I both looked forward to this book's publication, having read an excerpt of it in the New Yorker debut fiction issue a couple years ago, and dreaded it, because it's another brilliant debut by a young... ... (continued)

The Baron in the Trees (Italo Calvino) (November 06, 2003)

A boy climbs a tree on a whim, and never comes down again. This brief story feels too episodic at times, but Calvino pays attention to the details, and the ending has just the right poetic touch.... ... (continued)

Water Music (T.C. Boyle) (October 26, 2003)

I might never have found my new favorite book, T. Coraghessan Boyle's Water Music, if not for the friend who recommended it (thanks M.Co!). Unfortunately, Eric got to it first and I was forced to endure much snickering and chuckling... ... (continued)

An Instance of the Fingerpost (Iain Pears) (October 17, 2003)

I wanted to read this book for a long time but was always daunted by its thickness, assuming it would be equally dense and difficult. So when I finally dove in, I was pleasantly surprised by how easy it was... ... (continued)

The Crimson Petal and the White (Michel Faber) (September 15, 2003)

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The Dive From Clausen's Pier (Ann Packer) (August 15, 2003)

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Dangerous Angels: The Weetzie Bat Books (Francesca Lia Block) (July 15, 2003)

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Every Man for Himself (Beryl Bainbridge) (July 01, 2003)

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The No. 1 Ladies' Detective Agency (Alexander McCall Smith) (May 16, 2003)

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Life of Pi (Yann Martel) (May 09, 2003)

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Plainsong (Kent Haruf) (April 21, 2003)

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The Cement Garden (Ian McEwan) (April 14, 2003)

On the plane back from London last summer, my neighbor saw that I was reading Ian McEwan's most recent novel, Atonement, and remarked that his earlier stories were much darker. Indeed. In just a couple hours yesterday I read... ... (continued)

Anna Karenina (Leo Tolstoy) (March 15, 2003)

When I began reading Anna Karenina this year, for the third or fourth time, I was determined to finish it, even if it required dogged perseverance to get through all 800+ pages. The new translation (Richard Pevear and Larissa Volokhonsky)... ... (continued)

Coraline (Neil Gaiman) (February 10, 2003)

Coraline made me wish I was a girl again. Old enough not to be too frightened by Coraline's "Not-Mother" (with her black button eyes), but young enough to throw myself completely into Coraline's world and the parallel one she discovers... ... (continued)

The Autograph Man (Zadie Smith) (January 20, 2003)

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Middlesex (Jeffrey Eugenides) (January 10, 2003)

This book was half of a gift (its companion was Donna Tartt's The Little Friend). I loved both. In Middlesex, the author of the Virgin Suicides returns years later with a mammoth novel that spans the 20th century; ranges from... ... (continued)

The Little Friend (Donna Tartt) (December 20, 2002)

If you're wondering if it's good -- oh, it's good. How good is it? I finished it three days ago. I'm not ready to loan it to anyone yet because I just want it near me. I can't start reading... ... (continued)

Lost (Gregory Maguire) (October 20, 2002)

Wicked was an original and complex character study with a compelling story; Tales of an Ugly Stepsister was not as good but good enough. Maguire's third adult novel, Lost, would be different, I knew, but I had guardedly optimistic expectations.... ... (continued)

Slammerkin (Emma Donoghe) (October 15, 2002)

Wonderfully gritty historical novel, sparing the reader no details about chamberpots, 18th century abortions and treatments for the clap. Slammerkin is based on sketchy reports of a Mary Saunders, a 16- or 17-year-old maid who was hanged or burned or... ... (continued)

Hope (Glen Duncan) (October 05, 2002)

Gabriel Jones lives only for his expensive visits with a haughty and enigmatic prostitute named Hope. His life in modern-day London is lonely and grim in the wake of Anna, his beloved girlfriend who he lost years ago because of... ... (continued)

Bilgewater (Jane Gardam) (September 25, 2002)

Ugly-duckling coming-of-age story, unpretentious and laugh-out-loud funny at times. Marigold Green, aka Bilgewater, is the headmaster's daughter at a boys' school in Northern England.... ... (continued)

The Ice Storm (Rick Moody) (September 20, 2002)

I finished this book in the afternoon and watched the Ang Lee movie for the first time that night. In such close succession, I was hyperaware of the way the movie followed the same high-level structure as the book, but... ... (continued)

Sarah (J.T. Leroy) (September 05, 2002)

I wanted to find out if the hipster hype about Mr. Leroy is well-founded, and maybe I wanted to like the book. I liked it, a little. I've certainly never read a book that writes so lightly about some dark... ... (continued)

Mamaw: A Novel of an Outlaw Mother (Susan Dodd) (September 01, 2002)

I am loving loved this novel about Zerelda James, mother of the famous outlaws Frank and Jesse. Dodd seems faithful to the facts of history: names and places and events, and her imagination comes into play as she creates an... ... (continued)

The Grand Complication (Allen Kurzweil) (August 20, 2002)

If you are anal retentive and obsessive-compulsive, you may find this book hilarious. I, however, could not force myself through more than 50 pages of this cheesy crap. From the opening paragraph, the heavy-handed library metaphors grate. The overly clever... ... (continued)

Atonement (Ian McEwan) (July 28, 2002)

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Girl With a Pearl Earring (Tracy Chevalier) (July 24, 2002)

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The Prime of Miss Jean Brodie (Muriel Spark) (July 22, 2002)

A quick read, full of dry and intelligent wit, quite enjoyable while traveling in Edinburgh.... ... (continued)

About a Boy (Nick Hornby) (July 21, 2002)

I was less moved by this book than I was by, say, Bel Canto, but I thank Mr. Hornby for giving us ladies a peek inside a man's mind. One of those maddening men who hates to talk about feelings.... ... (continued)

Bel Canto (Ann Patchett) (July 15, 2002)

Have you seen people on the subway, on the plane, reading this book? That's because it's EXCELLENT. A brief, momentarily beautiful, ultimately sad tale of hostages and their captors, and the living, mysterious bond that the rest of us know... ... (continued)

Sputnik Sweetheart (Haruki Murakami) (July 07, 2002)

If you were frustrated by the dangling threads at the end of The Wind-Up Bird Chronicle, you will find Sputnik Sweetheart slightly more satisfying. Murakami wraps up things more tidily here. There are still many mysteries, but they mostly center... ... (continued)

Beasts (Joyce Carol Oates) (July 01, 2002)

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We Were the Mulvaneys (Joyce Carol Oates) (June 21, 2002)

A long family saga and much of it is kind of a downer. There wasn't quite enough to keep me interested all the way through, but I made it.... ... (continued)

How to Be Good (Nick Hornby) (June 14, 2002)

Recommended by Jenny: "I thought this book was funny, but people in relationships think it's hilarious." I guess it was funny. I don't tend to laugh out loud at books, no matter how funny they are. A not-particularly-funny passage that... ... (continued)

The Amazing Adventures of Kavalier and Clay (Michael Chabon) (June 01, 2002)

This fantastic 600+ page novel tackles twenty years, three continents, and an amazing array of subjects: American reluctance to become involved in World War II, New York in the 30s and 40s, magic, circuses, comics, pulp fiction, the Empire State... ... (continued)

Becoming Madame Mao (Anchee Min) (May 10, 2002)

This portrait is suggestive and lyrical; not a deep source of Chinese history for those unfamiliar with it (although the author draws from historical documents and translations). The woman ultimately known as Jiang Ching is driven by ambition and descends... ... (continued)

The Woman Who Cut Off Her Leg at the Maidstone Club (Julia Slavin) (April 01, 2002)

After weeks of subsisting on crossword puzzles and magazines, I needed to ease back into serious reading with short stories. I picked up this book months ago from a used bookstore; I'd read a Washington Post review and added it... ... (continued)

Moby Dick (Herman Melville) (March 01, 2002)

Far more entertaining than I expected, yet strangely soporific. I got bogged down just after the folio-quarto-octavo discussion of whales, and had to give up after carrying it around for weeks without opening it.... ... (continued)

Ahab's Wife (Sena Jeter Naslund) (February 01, 2002)

Ahab was neither my first husband, nor my last. How can you not be drawn in by that opening line? I was, deeply, and did little but eat, sleep, and read this book for 10 days. Una, born on the... ... (continued)

The Return of the King (J.R.R. Tolkien) (January 20, 2002)

Starts off slow, with Minas Tirith under siege and all the players getting into place. But things start rolling soon enough. And lo! The Men are overly flowery in their speech, but the Hobbits are down-to-earth as ever.... ... (continued)

The Two Towers (J.R.R. Tolkien) (January 10, 2002)

I simply had to read this after seeing the movie version of the Fellowship of the Rings, which despite its length ended too soon. A great adventure with just a few giggles at Tolkien's antiquated language, its momentum sent me... ... (continued)

Confessions of a Wicked Stepsister (Gregory Maguire) (November 01, 2001)

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The Wind-Up Bird Chronicle (Haruki Murakami) (October 01, 2001)

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Cold Mountain (Charles Frazier) (September 01, 2001)

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Rules of the Wild (Francesca Marciano) (August 01, 2001)

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The God of Small Things (Arundhati Roy) (July 01, 2001)

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Geek Love (Katherine Dunn) (June 01, 2001)

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Cloudsplitter (Russell Banks) (April 01, 2001)

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Demonology (Rick Moody) (March 01, 2001)

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Being Dead (Jim Crace) (January 01, 2001)

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For the Relief of Unbearable Urges (Nathan Englander) (November 01, 2000)

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The Archivist (Martha Cooley) (October 01, 2000)

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Black Water (Joyce Carol Oates) (September 01, 2000)

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A Heartbreaking Work of Staggering Genius (Dave Eggers) (August 01, 2000)

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Blonde (Joyce Carol Oates) (July 01, 2000)

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Close Range: Wyoming Stories (E. Annie Proulx) (June 01, 2000)

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Glamorama (Bret Easton Ellis) (May 01, 2000)

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The Snows of Kilimanjaro (Ernest Hemingway) (April 15, 2000)

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The Dress Lodger (Sheri Holmes) (March 15, 2000)

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White Oleander (Janet Fitch) (March 01, 2000)

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Wicked (Gregory Maguire) (February 15, 2000)

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Stranger in a Strange Land (Robert Heinlein) (February 01, 2000)

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Wuthering Heights (Emily Bronte) (January 15, 2000)

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Miss Wyoming (January 01, 2000)

Meet the older, wiser Douglas Coupland. His latest novel, Miss Wyoming, loses the flaws that mar his weaker novels -- too much style, not enough substance; pseudo-profound ramblings; and self-absorbed, unsympathetic characters. Instead, Miss Wyoming contains some of Coupland's best... ... (continued)

Ethan Frome (Edith Wharton) ()

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The Last Life (September 01, 1999)

"I am American now," Sagesse LaBasse declares at the opening of Claire Messud's second novel, The Last Life. Readers will be thankful that she doesn't tell her story American style. In contrast to a nation full of people who compete... ... (continued)

Geographies of Home (March 01, 1999)

You might expect Dominican-American Loida Maritza Perez's remarkable first novel to brim with warm, hazy memories of the homeland (and be cut with the immigrant's shock of immersion in a new culture). That's why the intimate scale of Geographies of... ... (continued)

The Fall of a Sparrow (July 01, 1998)

Readers familiar with Robert Hellenga's first novel, The Sixteen Pleasures, will hear its echoes in his second, ruminative book, The Fall of a Sparrow. Hellenga again explores the subtle details of the creation and preservation of beauty, this time through... ... (continued)