I really disliked this book at first. The main character seemed irritating and petty to me. I like I was being asked to be on his side, and I didn’t want to be. But Ha Jin is a master, and I should’ve trusted that he was leading me someplace great. […]
I reviewed this novel from Jonathan Lethem for BookPage, and to be honest this was a tough one for me to get through. I liked Lethem’s Motherless Brooklyn, but this new one wasn’t for me. Why? I get into it a bit over on my BookPage review of A Gambler’s […]
This science fiction story that I reviewed for BookPage was a lot of fun to read. It’s kind of about social media and kind of about telepathy, and there’s a pretty good romance in there, too. Read about it in my Crosstalk review at BookPage. This book was a review […]
I really enjoyed Teddy Wayne’s The Love Song of Jonny Valentine, so I jumped at the chance to review Loner for BookPage. This one is great work, but it was a lot harder to get through because the main character is devolving throughout the story. I won’t get into why […]
Here’s what I have to say about Sweetness #9 in my BookPage review: “Chemical flavoring stands for our obsession with immediacy, our single-serving, isolationist culture and our inability to stomach anything nourishing, either culinary or emotional.” Want more? Read the review! This book was a review copy, which means I […]
Yesterday, J.K. Rowling released Harry Potter and the Cursed Child, a new Harry Potter story, and the world — including me — was skeptical. Instead of writing a new novel (the profits of which undoubtedly would’ve allowed her to buy a couple of castles or maybe a small country), she […]
It’s clear where Camille Perri is trying to go in this Robin-Hood-meets-chick-lit story, and she hits all the highlights of living New York and drinking too much and being catty with girlfriends from work. What she forgets, though, is relationship and fun — The Assistants attempts both but didn’t do […]
Apparently Love in Lowercase was a hit in Europe, but it never really gelled for me. Overall, the situations seemed overly quirky and under realistic, but it had its moments. My review of Love in Lowercase is at BookPage. This book was a review copy, which means I got it […]
I get asked pretty frequently if I know I look like Zooey Deschanel. Yes, I do know. People tell me I look like Zooey even when I don’t have bangs, so when we have similar haircuts, it happens all the time. The weird thing isn’t just that I look like […]
In Vanessa Diffenbaugh’s The Language of Flowers, she turns the idea that the maternal instinct is universal on its head. The theme (one that I think is important) is similar in her newest, We Never Asked for Wings. My full review of We Never Asked for Wings is up at […]
I went to a bunch of bookstores this spring on the book tour for The Localist, and I talked to a bunch of booksellers — partly because it’s super rude not to talk to people who are hosting you for a book signing, and partly because I’m a greedy reader […]