Steady yourself for this true story of ships, storms, starvation and survival. Written by American journalist and author David Grann (who also wrote Killers of the Flower Moon), and with a biggest bibliography I ever did see, The Wager is a stunning re-telling of a doomed British naval voyage that took place in 1741. The […]
Author Archives: Ms A
April
25
Until August by Gabriel Garcia Márquez
posted by Ms A
Gabriel Garcia Márquez, the Colombian, Nobel Prize winning author of Love in the Time of Cholera and One Hundred Years of Solitude, died in Mexico City in 2014. He had started work on Until August many years before but, with the onset of dementia, decided it wasn’t worthy of publishing and asked that it be […]
April
18
Martyr! by Kaveh Akbar
posted by Ms A
Kids, this is a complex one. A quote on the front cover promises “Elegant, dizzying, playful” but I think “Dark and difficult” would have been more apt. With themes of suicide, addiction, racial tension and grief, it is not exactly a breezy, crowd-pleaser, but please read on if you dare. Martyr! tells the story of […]
April
02
The Covenant of Water by Abraham Verghese
posted by Ms A
I think I injured my knee reading this book. That’s what happens when you find yourself immersed in a heavy book in the same awkward position for two hours at a stretch, especially when you are over 50. The irony of my reading injury is that the book was recommended to me by a doctor. […]
March
12
Prophet Song by Paul Lynch
posted by Ms A
In his 2023 Booker Prize winning book, Paul Lynch imagines the Republic of Ireland slipping into totalitarianism. Things kick off with a sinister knock on the door and it’s a slow but steady descent from there. The door belongs to Eilish; a scientist, wife, mother of four and primary carer of her elderly father, who […]
February
20
Calypso by David Sedaris
posted by Ms A
How I wish I was related to David Sedaris. In my imagination, he would inch up to me at family dinners just to hear my latest story and pick me for conspiratorial bitch sessions under the table. In this book (written in 2018) David Sedaris walks the oh so precious path between laugh out loud […]
October
06
The Vaster Wilds by Lauren Groff
posted by Ms A
This novel is nothing short of a masterpiece. Pouring over it, made me want to read, review and even yearn to write. Alas, few could write like Lauren Groff. It’s winter in the early 1600’s, and a young servant girl escapes the unspeakable conditions of a colonial settlement in the Americas into the wild. This […]
August
03
Yellowface by Rebecca F. Kuang
posted by Ms A
Yellowface opens with two friends who are both young writers. Charismatic Asian American, Athena Liu has hit the ground running with a multi-book deal, offer from Netflix and doting agent whereas jealous June Hayward has published her first flop. Their friendship is fraught from the start. When Athena suddenly chokes and dies on a pandan […]
July
18
Demon Copperhead by Barbara Kingsolver
posted by Ms A
First, I need to thank my friend Kate who handed me this read on holidays. That small gesture would have lightened her luggage considerably (this is not a slender book) broke my book drought and instantly put my data worries to an end. Who needs to ride reels by the pool when you’ve got Demon […]
December
12
Small Things Like These by Claire Keegan
posted by Ms A
If you do nothing else this Christmas…. Read and/or gift this little book about an Irish Catholic coal merchant in the days leading up to Christmas in 1985. At only 114 pages, you won’t find a single word or sentiment wasted in this story of the most precious kind. Bill Furlong “had come from […]
Readhead 