Despite the grief and sadness, Billie’s Ghost is ultimately a tale of hope and redemption. This slim volume will haunt you long after you have turned the last page and make you want to re-discover the music of Billie Holliday…
Category: Book Reviews
Book Reviews
A review of Birds Without Wings by Louis de Bernieres
The characters age beautifully, and the reader is eager for more of the quirky and believable Eskibahce characters. de Bernieres has a wonderful sense of character and the delight in the eccentric detail which takes the reader deep into the…
A review of Millard Fillmore, Mon Amour by John Blumenthal
The opening monologue is an ill-tempered attack on romantic love. The author is even cynical about the apparent attachment between a human and the pet dog. The momentary discomfort of having a narrator before one has any characters or a…
A review of A Short History of Nearly Everything by Bill Bryson
The whole book converges on one point: that all life is one, on Earth, and in the wider universe, and that life is a miraculous thing and not something to be taken lightly. Put into the context of this large…
A review of The Last Song of Dusk by Siddharth Dhanvant Shanghvi
Like all good novels, the book raises plenty of questions: Is love enough, or do we need more–support, friendship, companionship, happiness? Is there really no mercy in life? Or are there indeed mercies in little moments, of story, song and…
A review of The Frugal Book Promoter by Carolyn Howard-Johnson
Throughout the book are quotes and suggestions from well known self-publicists and experts in the publicity field, along with a wealth of anecdotal information from Howard-Johnson’s own considerable experience. There are lots of examples, as well as some practical templates…
A review of Broken Land by Coral Hull
This is very powerful, and more so because it doesn’t rely on appealing to the reader’s intellectual sense of right or wrong. It is about pain and beauty, about loss and longing, and the full loss of life is as…
A review of Jake with a Snarly Smile on His Chops by Matthew Ward
This is something of a boys own adventure story, billed by the author as a few hours entertainment, and as that, it succeeds admirably. There are plenty of chuckles, and lots of mouth watering detail which bring the setting, both…
A review of Oblivion by David Foster Wallace
Wallace’s fiction forces the reader to look beneath the surface. His characters, like most human beings find it difficult to communicate directly. More often than not what they are really concerned with must be parsed out through indirection, as though…
A review of Bright Planet by Peter Mews
This is a fast moving, enjoyable adventure tale which resolutely refuses to become too serious about its purpose. Instead it is a very visual, funny, historically rich, and occasionally silly trip through an Australia that may or may not have…