The Buried Giant Kazuo Ishiguro Alfred A. Knopf Release Date: March 3, 2015 ISBN 978-0-307-27103-7 It’s the dusk of Arthurian England; an uneasy peace lies over the land. Britons Axl and Beatrice, an elderly couple, leave their village to travel to the town where they believe their estranged son lives. […]
Due to my participation in NaNoWriMo, I again beg your indulgence in allowing me to revisit a Gimbling that first ran in 2013. It’s been updated just a touch, but I kind of like it even now! Hope you do, as well. ~ * ~ * ~ In ancient times, […]
A God in Ruins Kate Atkinson Little, Brown and Company Release Date: May 5, 2015 ISBN 978-0-316-17653-8 According to her Author’s Note in A God in Ruins, Kate Atchinson originally wanted to write a novel with World War II as a backdrop; however, she soon realized such an effort was […]
Leaving Time Jodi Picoult Ballantine Books Release Date: October 14, 2014 ISBN 978-0-345-54492-6 Jodi Picoult is one of our greatest storytellers. She is able to conjure up characters that not only feel real, but who move about in their scripted days as though they were real, rather than some kind […]
Station Eleven Emily St. John Mandel Alfred A. Knopf Release Date: September 9, 2014 ISBN 978-0-385-35330-4 The world has come to an end as we know it. A deadly virus has eradicated over 90 percent of Earth’s population within the space of a few weeks, too quickly and too thoroughly […]
The Ocean at the End of the Lane Neil Gaiman William Morrow/Harper Collins First Edition: June 18, 2013 ISBN 978-0-06-225565-5 It might be easy to mistake Neil Gaiman‘s latest novel, The Ocean at the End of the Lane, as a children’s book. It’s a slender volume, quickly read, and told […]
Life After Life Jill McCorkle Algonquin Books of Chapel Hill First Edition: March 26, 2013 ISBN 978-1-56512-255-0 Joanna has returned to her childhood home of Fulton, North Carolina, to be with her father in his last days; something she was not able to do for her mother. Afterwards, she ended […]
Queen Victoria’s Book of Spells Edited by Ellen Datlow and Terri Windling Tor Books First Edition: 3/19/13 ISBN 978-0-7653-3227-1 Take 19 established and talented writers. Give them the chance to craft stories full of fantasy, magic, gaslight, alternate history and/or visceral horror. Mix in a Victorian-era mindset and a nod […]
A Land More Kind Than Home Wiley Cash William Morrow Paperbacks Release Date: January 22, 2013 ISBN 978-0-06-208814-7 —♦— Debut novels shouldn’t be this good. They just shouldn’t. In his first novel, Wiley Cash draws on his rural North Carolina upbringing to weave a story both touching and tragic. Using […]
The Cloud Matt Richtel First Edition: January 29, 2013 HarperCollins Publishers ISBN 978-0-06-225668-3 —♦— In Matt Richtel’s new novel, The Cloud, Nathaniel Idle is not your typical hardass investigative reporter with a steely jaw and even flintier eye. Yes, he is an investigative reporter and has won some accolades exposing […]
On this day, December 3, in 1857, Joseph Conrad was born in Berdichev, Imperial Russia (modern
Ukraine, then a part of Poland). While he settled in England and wrote in English, he always considered himself a Pole. Heart of Darkness, one of the most famous of his 20 novels (which explores colonialism and the attitudes regarding what constitutes a barbarian versus civilized society) is considered one of the best English novels of the 20th century, as is his novel Lord Jim, which chronicles a crew’s abandonment of its disabled ship. Conrad died in England in 1924 at age 66.