Tag: American literature
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Where Late the Sweet Birds Sang
Overview This is a masterpiece. You are likely thinking, “Neilos says things like that in a lot of his reviews.” That’s true, but rather than saying, “no this time I really mean it” I will say that the reason is I read a lot of great books. Not all of them, what fun would that Read more
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R is for Rocket
Overview: This was amazing. Overview with more than three words: Published in 1962 by Doubleday (and subsequently as the version I read, a popular Bantam paperback), R is for Rocket serves as a curated introduction to the lyrical prose and speculative imagination of Ray Bradbury. While many of the seventeen stories had appeared in earlier Read more
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The Touchstone
Review: It’s been a while, a long time really since I read anything by Edith Wharton and I realize now how much I have missed that. Edith Wharton rarely disappoints and this is no exception. The Touchstone was Wharton’s first published novel, although she did have one self published in her teens called Fast and Read more
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Babbitt
Review: This was an extraordinary novel, and I was not expecting that at all. How I came to read this was due to a trivia question that I got wrong a few weeks ago. The question was: Who was the first American author to receive a Pulitzer Prize? So I looked at the choices and Read more
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In the Beauty of the Lilies
Review: The title of this book sounded interesting so I grabbed it off the shelf, so having said that I had no idea what to expect. That’s two random selections in a row. I see a pattern here. But on with the review. This was good, and John Updike is a great writer, great as Read more
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Icy Sparks
Review: Meh. This is a woman’s book. It’s good and the writing is excellent but I could not identify with the woman protagonist as I am not a woman. Male characters were women with moustaches. Sort of 2-D cardboard cut-outs of what the author thinks her men would be like, not how they really are. Read more
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Shadows on the Rock
Review: Like all Willa Cather novels the prose is exquisite. Unlike most Willa Cather novels this was not set in the Great Plains. It was a novel of 17th century Quebec. Go Canada! Had to dust off my French skills as there were quite a few bits and pieces en français with no translation. Usually Read more
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Death Comes for the Archbishop
Review: I held off on reading this for a long time. I’m nearly done the complete works now and decided not to put it off any longer. This is because: But I was wrong in putting this one off for so long. There is a reason that this is one of Cather’s most recognized and Read more
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A Lost Lady
Review: Post operative I really needed this. I was reading a collection of Ray Bradbury’s short fiction and bailed on it. Not that I don’t love Bradbury but I needed a novel to identify with the characters, to feel and see the scenery from a different time and place. To take me out of myself Read more
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One of Ours
Review: Obviously I’m biased, being a Willa Cather devotee. But I believe that objectively this is a really good novel. Also it’s set in and around the Great War so again I’m almost bound to like it. This is the story of Claude Wheeler, from small town American whose life and the lives of all Read more