“There is very little peace for a man with a body buried in his backyard.” A year after killing a man and burying him in his backyard, Jason Getty is just starting to come to terms with his actions and to get a handle on the guilt. As he begins to think that the body in the backyard will just be his dark secret, a landscaping crew unexpectedly uncovers two other graves in the front yard to Jason’s surprise. As the police swoop in to […]
The review equivalent of a shrug
The Lost Daughter opens with Brooke and Alex as seventeen-year-olds trying to deal with an unwanted pregnancy on their own via a home remedy late-stage abortion. Flashforward fifteen years and Brooke’s husband Sean can’t understand why Brooke doesn’t want to have a second child when they are so happy with their seven-year-old daughter Megan. Meanwhile, Alex comes back into Brooke’s life for the first time since high school, still grieving from his son’s recent death and bringing guilt from his actions fifteen years ago. He’s […]
Girls in this book are all named things like Dylan, Zadie and Tempest
Amelia didn’t jump. This is the text message Kate receives after her daughter Amelia allegedly jumps off the school roof. This prompts Kate to look further into Amelia’s death beyond agonizing about what more she could have done as a single parent working a bazillion hours a week as a lawyer. Amelia was a fifteen-year-old star student accused of plagiarizing an English paper, which the police attribute as the motive for suicide. As Kate investigates more, suicide becomes more and more unlikely. The story is […]
Americanah
Last year I read Half of a Yellow Sun by Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie, which is a brilliant fictionalized portrayal of Nigeria before and during the civil war, and was blown away by both the story and her writing. Once I heard she had this new book out, I put myself on the 70-person wait list for Americanah and finally picked it up last Friday. Americanah is about a young woman named Ifemelu who grows up in Nigeria and due to the multiple strikes at her […]
Prayers for the Last Page
Karen Nichols appears to have the picture perfect life, but she comes to Patrick Kenzie, PI, when she starts having problems with an aggressive stalker. (Quick side note: someone who reviewed this book on Goodreads kept referring to Karen’s “stocker” problem, which made it sound like someone was forcibly stocking her pantry). Patrick takes care of the stalker and goes on about his life. Six months later, Karen kills herself. Patrick takes it personally, assuming that he could have done something more to help her. […]
Jesus: The Lost Years
Since my mother has been recommending Fool by Christopher Moore to me for years (which I still haven’t read – sorry, Mom), I picked up Lamb for some light holiday reading. Levi who is called Biff has been resurrected by the angel Raziel two thousand years after his death to write the next Gospel of Jesus’ life. Biff first meets Joshua (the original translation of Jesus’ name) when they are six years old living in Nazareth and sticks with him throughout the rest of their […]