Tag: Fiction
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“Agnes Sharp and the Wedding to Die For” by Leonie Swann
I enjoyed two previous books in the “Miss Sharp Investigates” series by Leonie Swann and was excited to learn that the third book, “Agnes Sharp and the Wedding to Die For,” is set to be published in 2026. Luckily, I got my hands on the advance copy, thanks to the publisher and Netgalley. It was…
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“Palaver” by Bryan Washington
At what point do strangers become family, and family change into strangers? A mother and a son. The son is young, Black, and gay; he left his family in the States and moved to Tokyo. The mother had a fair share of moving in her life as well: first from Jamaica to Toronto, then…
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“Mockingbird Court” by Juneau Black
Sometimes I feel like reading something lighthearted, whimsical, and relaxing, especially in the fall, when the days start getting shorter and darker, and diving into a book that tackles serious issues doesn’t appeal. The Shady Hollow series latest – and the final – installment fits the bill. Vera Vixen, the village reporter and self-proclaimed detective,…
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“What We Can Know” by Ian McEvan
“What We Can Know” is the new novel by Ian McEwan, and it primarily explores the way we perceive ourselves now, as humanity, in comparison to those who lived before. The year is 2119, and Thomas Metcalfe, a professor of literature from 1990 to 2030, is obsessed with a singular piece of poetry: a cycle…
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“Mayra” by Nicky Gonzalez
Mayra and Ingrid used to be childhood friends, growing up in Hialeah, a Cuban neighborhood west of Miami. At the time, their friendship was for them the most essential thing in the world. Ingrid was a quiet one, while Mayra, wild and mostly free from her mother’s care, initiated adventures that were risky but exciting.…
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“The Lake Escape” by Jamie Day
“The Lake Escape” by Jamie Day is a summer book: something you can quickly pick up and read sitting in a beach chair and sipping iced tea, then promptly put it aside when a seagull tries to steal your snack. In the style of recently popular movies and novels, “rich people behaving badly”, the story…
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“The Bewitching” by Silvia Moreno-Garcia
The latest novel by Silvia Moreno-Garcia is a dark, atmospheric horror/mystery, consisting of three clearly defined storylines. Minerva, a young Mexican woman, is a student at a New England college, writing her thesis. It’s 1998, and strange things happen. She often feels a sense of foreboding, as if she has been watched. At one point,…
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“My Friends” by Fredrik Backman
What a great gift friendship is—for everybody but especially for teenagers in their formative years, when they search for understanding and acceptance, trying to find themselves and moving between excitement and depression, often in a single day. Fredrik Backman’s “My Friends” is a book about friendship that helps them accept that being different is okay.…
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“Twist” by Colum McCann
There is a picture described in Colum McCann’s “Twist”: a simple drawing made by children that shows a tiny ship at the top of the frame and the overwhelming depths of the ocean below, its waters changing from blue to black. The small ship carries a hook that extends to the bottom of the sea,…
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“Bad Nature” by Ariel Courage
Hester, the heroine of Ariel Courage’s debut novel “Bad Nature,” is a 40-year-old New York lawyer with no family and no friends, and to top it off, she is diagnosed with terminal cancer. Refusing the treatment, she instead decides to fulfill her goal, which she has been carrying for years, always sure that it will…
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