Despite its length, this is an engrossing book. It may not rival those great achievements in biography that one can read for their own sake, but everyone with an interest in Perec will find it essential. Although David Bellos rather…
Category: Book Reviews
Book Reviews
A review of King of Cats by Blake Fraina
The book’s merit is in the presentation of a recognizable character, a popular cultural type—a seductive, reclusive, possibly bisexual musician—and the explanation for his character and contradictions and how these things relate to—are made possible by, and influence—the surrounding world.…
A review of The Frugal Editor: Put your best book forward to avoid humiliation and ensure success by Carolyn Howard-Johnson
Contrary to popular misconception, publishers will rarely take on a work that is in obvious need of editing (and to a publisher, every typo is obvious), so authors really need to be capable editors of their own work. Writing guru…
A review of North of Sunset by Henry Baum
This is an immensely enjoyable (at least, for those of us who have long ago heeded Bart Simpson’s wise advice: “If you don’t watch the violence, you’ll never get desensitized to it!”) novel that is successful both as a suspenseful,…
A review of The Book Thief by Markus Zusak
He is recounting a history which is both still vital and yet already finished. In that sense he is directly aligned with the reader and as this extraordinary novel progresses, the reader has the sense that perhaps, in some way,…
A review of The Goldseekers by Greg Bastian
Although there is drama and some dark moments in the story, The Goldseekers is never overwhelmed by them. This is a novel which a good reader as young as six (my six year old enjoyed it greatly) would enjoy and gain from,…
A review of Candy by Luke Davies
Candy is an easy book to read, but not an easy one to deal with. It leaves the reader feeling shattered, as if he or she had been through a similar experience. The verisimilitude in characterisation, setting, and in the…
A review of Wolves of Memory by Bill James.
Among crime writers – among writers in general, come to that – Bill James is something pretty special. Out of a novel about a grass (or, in American parlance, a stool pigeon) trying to resettle into a new life, he…
A review of Ludmila’s Broken English by DBC Pierre
The extraordinary way in which the brothers find their way to Ludmila and the convoluted machinations which everyone takes to get from the beginning to the end of this novel is enough to keep the reader reading, as is the…
A review of Gladiss and The Alien by Warren Thurston
Suspense is built slowly and effectively, as the reader is caught up in Sally’s desperate search for her horse, and the complications of storm and the bad guys. The question of how Gladiss became a mooer instead of a neigher…