Tag: Fiction
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Prague Stories
Review: Something a little different for me with this volume. I will admit that I knew nothing about Prague, Czech Republic or Czech people other than Jaromir Jagr is from there. But now thanks to Everyman publishing I know a lot more. I still had to refer to my map of Europe to place all… 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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Underworld
Review: I didn’t read this book as much as I experienced this book. What an absolutely brilliant novel. From the first sentence to the last word this was stunning, emotional, captivating. I originally heard of this book when reading an old newspaper piece by Salman Rushdie when he was reviewing some of his favorite reads… Read more
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The House Gun
Review: This was awful. I made it 107 pages and I feel that some sort of prize should be awarded in recognition of my tenacity and determination. It doesn’t have to be a Nobel Prize. I’d be happy with, say, a Rolo. This book made me want to: Re-evaluate my priorities, namely why I would… Read more
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Links
Review: 20 years after publication and still contemporary with the new every day. Somalia is a shithole. An inside look at just exactly what it’s like everyday there, which is to say awful. An excellent novel, a brilliant novelist. Dark, disturbing, but an important novel. This book made me want to: read more from this… Read more
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British Short Stories – Classics Criticism
Review: From Kipling to Huxley, Conrad through Greene, this collection covered a broad cross-section of early 20th century British short fiction. Wow. Lots of casual, routine racism. All of these stories were excellent. None very happy, some downright depressing. I didn’t “get” all of them, but maybe nobody does, stories hit or miss with each… Read more
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Islands in the stream
Review: I bailed on this. Got through about 30% and just had to move on. I wanted to like this. I wanted it to live up to A Farewell to Arms or the short stories. But no. Drinks, bars, descriptions of making drinks, descriptions of bars, descriptions of drinking drinks in bars. I would have… Read more
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Youth and the Bright Medusa
Review: Superb Cather at her very best. Opera stories. Just the way I like it! I was surprised by the veiled, and not so veiled, references to sexy times. Interesting that in one story she killed off the protagonist on the Titanic, and I don’t mean a schlocky tale of Titanic romance. Just a description… Read more
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Sapphira and the Slave Girl
Review: The final Willa Cather novel. This was written and published around 1939-1940, but set in 1856. Pre-Civil War America in the south. I’m not sure who was meant to be the hero of this one. Every character seemed to be very human, very flawed. I was expecting a sort of anti-slavery treatise, but I… Read more
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Smoke and Mirrors
Review: My first Neil Gaiman experience and it definitely won’t be my last. At times haunting, at other times laugh out loud funny. Atmosphere is everything. From dark and gloomy to sun bleached and gently nostalgic, the tales weave in and around their settings. Effortlessly. Some of these little beauties merit a second reading at… Read more