The Safekeeper by Esther Archer Lakhani. 3/5 This is an ok SFF novel in which a young woman becomes a Chosen One, animals can talk, and aliens take vacations by inhabiting human bodies and experience Earth life. There are a …
Book reviews: early modern murders, dystopias, and poetry Read more »
My review of Rae Linda Brown’s The Heart of a Woman: The Life and Music of Florence B. Price is out now in Insights: Notes from the Coordinating Council of Women in History and is available at Humanities Commons CORE …
Book review: The Heart of a Woman: The Life and Music of Florence B. Price Read more »
The Cartographer’s Secret by Tea Cooper. 5/5 This is a great novel, full of well-developed characters, a rich setting, and a compelling plot. Letitia is mourning the death of her brother. Undertaking what she thinks will be a simple errand, …
A handful of reviews, including Questlove and novel in verse Read more »
The Peculiarities by David Liss. 2/5 David Liss is known for his somewhat baroque novels usually dealing with finance or speculation or similar matters revolving around money, and this novel is no different. In an England where people are turning …
Other People’s Comfort Keeps Me Up At Night by Morgan Parker. 2/5 This did not do much for me. There were excellent passages but as a whole it felt frenetic and often jumbled, a very free stream-of-consciousness output but one …
Reviews: gorgeous poetry, Asian-inspired fantasy, and more Read more »
The Mismatch by Sara Jafari. 2/5 This book is an excellent illustration of the damage done to women by misogynist, patriarchal religions–not just more conservative forms of Islam, but also various flavors of Judaism and Christianity–in which women are owned …
Reviews: Jewish SFF, material history, nonfiction, and lots of witches Read more »
Paradise by Lizzie Johnson. 5/5 This is a compelling and very clear account of the Camp Fire that destroyed most of Paradise, California. Johnson has done enormous amounts of research to get the human details of this story right, and …
Reviews: horror, non-fiction, and a novel in verse Read more »
This Shining Life by Harriet Kline. 1/5 My Recommendation This is a despicable book, full of the kind of thinking that leads parents and other caregivers to kill their autistic children and themselves. I read this on the International Disability …
Mrs. Rochester’s Ghost by Lindsay Marcott. This is a smart and well-crafted retelling of Jane Eyre in the period immediately before Covid-19. Jane, a writer needing work, takes on a job tutoring Sophia, daughter of the wealthy Evan Rochester. This …
reviews: Indigenous lit, beautiful horror, and more Read more »
The past year’s 5-star books from Net Galley. Fiction Bear, Elizabeth. Machine. Bojalian, Chris. Hour of the Witch. Brooks, Max. Devolution. Butler, Octavia E. Kindred. Fledgling, Collected Stories (LOA #338). Burdick, Serena. Find Me in Havana. Campisi, Megan. Sin Eater. …