A sliver of sunshine lit up the hardwood floor of the cafe as a thirty-something brunette pushed open the door, dragging a laptop stroller behind. She was dressed in business clothes — crisply pleated dark trousers, a collared shirt and a navy blue blazer. She looked out of place in the hippy café with its multicolored chalkboard menu listings, ads plastered over the walls, and local paintings for sale exhibited all over the seating area.…
fiction
The latest novel by Ann Patchett is an intimate character study of a brother and sister, abandoned by their parents and their fate often tested by life. One day the Conroy siblings find themselves motherless, as Elena Conroy leaves them for a higher calling without ever bothering to say goodbye. This abandonment by their mother, and her picking the needs of strangers over her own kids, leaves a permanent bruise. And it all started with…
British murder mystery novels are my go-to comfort reads. There is something very genteel about them. There is no gore or loud action or twists and turns. The plot peels off in oniony layers, there is suspense but it’s never scary. As a reader, you can sip a cup of tea and breeze through a novel and engage your mind pleasantly for a few hours. Michael Innes’s Death at President’s lodging is the quintessential ‘closed…
Santiago and the Drinking Party is an odd little book. It doesn’t have a plot or a theme. Stuff happens. Why or to what end doesn’t seem to matter. The story starts at an unusual place, deep in the Amazon, where Daniel, our narrator, is backpacking as a student. During a dangerous, almost fatal river crossing he meets Santiago. Santiago is the resident philosopher, who earns his living feeding off the superstition of the tribes. His…
“A story has no beginning or end: arbitrarily one chooses that moment of experience from which to look back or from which to look ahead.” ― Graham Greene, The End of the Affair Isn’t that a beautiful start? I fell head over heels in love with the novel the minute I read that opening sentence. However, as it often happens, it was easier to fall in love than to stay in love. So, What’s It About?…