Adult Readers Archives - Page 84 of 154

The Bird King: an artist’s notebook by Shaun Tan

Whenever I open a Shaun Tan book, my face just gets a goofy grin. It's a Pavlovian reaction, guaranteed. Although his latest doesn't come with a straightforward narrative, it does manage to cleverly include tidbits and reminiscences from his entire oeuvre to create a whimsical portrait...

Bend, Not Break: A Life in Two Worlds by Ping Fu with MeiMei Fox [in Bookslut]

05 Feb, by Smithsonian Asian Pacific American Center in Adult Readers, Chinese, Chinese American, Memoir, Nonfiction, Repost

This is not a spoiler: If you take a good look at the cover of the recent memoir Bend, Not Break: A Life in Two Worlds, you know the pages will deliver a happy ending ...

The City of Devi by Manil Suri + Author Interview [in Bookslut]

04 Feb, by Smithsonian Asian Pacific American Center in Adult Readers, Fiction, Indian, Indian American, Repost, South Asian, South Asian American

Let's go back about seven years. So a writer walks into a bar. It's dark, but thankfully not smoky. The majority of the people there are more bookish (including Booker-ish!) than biker brutish. The writer finds a drink, and is standing slightly off the side with...

Oxygen by Carol Cassella

03 Feb, by Smithsonian Asian Pacific American Center in Adult Readers, Audio, Fiction, Nonethnic-specific

A busy Seattle hospital. Hip, young doctors. Desperate patients. Administrative hierarchies. Sound familiar? I heard the latest Carol Cassella title (Healing) even has a character named Addison! I started (because of an alma mater connection), then stopped watching Grey's Anatomy after the first season (although I've had to revisit...

The Unlikely Pilgrimage of Harold Fry by Rachel Joyce

02 Feb, by Smithsonian Asian Pacific American Center in Adult Readers, Audio, British, Fiction

At 65, Harold Fry is a quiet, solitary old man, retired from the brewery where he worked much of his adult life. Although he married Maureen – his one and only love – decades later, their days, weeks, years together are rather lonely and withdrawn....

The Rebellious Life of Mrs. Rosa Parks by Jeanne Theoharis [in Christian Science Monitor]

30 Jan, by Smithsonian Asian Pacific American Center in Adult Readers, Biography, Black/African American, Nonfiction, Repost, Young Adult Readers

Already designated “definitive political biography” on its back cover, The Rebellious Life of Mrs. Rosa Parks by Brooklyn College political science professor Jeanne Theoharis will reside in my personal reading history as the most difficult book I’ve ever reviewed. Never before – and hopefully never...

Jefferson’s Sons: A Founding Father’s Secret Children by Kimberly Brubaker Bradley

29 Jan, by Smithsonian Asian Pacific American Center in Adult Readers, Audio, Black/African American, Fiction, Middle Grade Readers, Young Adult Readers

Let me start with what has been deemed as historical record. According to the Thomas Jefferson Foundation – which not only owns and operates Jefferson's legendary home, Monticello, but maintains the most comprehensive website focused on "Monticello, Jefferson, his family, and his times" – this is the official...

Left Neglected by Lisa Genova

27 Jan, by Smithsonian Asian Pacific American Center in Adult Readers, Audio, Fiction, Nonethnic-specific

So, here's the last of the Lisa Genova oeuvre. If I had to rank her three titles thus far, the #1 slot – shelves ahead of her others – remains her stupendous debut, Still Alice, then continues with this, Left Neglected, trailed by her most recent, Love Anthony. Armed with their Harvard MBAs...

Love Anthony by Lisa Genova

26 Jan, by Smithsonian Asian Pacific American Center in Adult Readers, Audio, Fiction, Nonethnic-specific

So enthralling was Lisa Genova’s Still Alice, I immediately went and got myself her other titles and hit 'play' one after the other. I don't remember the last time I read three books by the same author in such immediate succession. That I got through...

A Bride’s Story (vol. 4) by Kaoru Mori, translated by William Flanagan

25 Jan, by Smithsonian Asian Pacific American Center in Adult Readers, Central Asian, Fiction, Graphic Title/Manga/Manwha, Japanese, Translation, Young Adult Readers

Life along the Silk Road – 19th-century style, imagined by and translated from a 21st-century Japanese original – moves onward west, meticulously detailed in creator Kaoru Mori's breathtaking manga. To catch up, make sure to read the first three installments; you definitely need the back story of young...

Still Alice by Lisa Genova

19 Jan, by Smithsonian Asian Pacific American Center in Adult Readers, Audio, Fiction, Nonethnic-specific

I'm not quite sure how this 2009 debut novel actually ended up on my iPod (surely I ordered it at some point) and why I decided to click on it when I did. How ironic that missing memory quickly became a point of concern when...

21st Century Boys (vol. 01) by Naoki Urasawa, with the cooperation of Takashi Nagasaki, English adaptation by Akemi Wegmüller

16 Jan, by Smithsonian Asian Pacific American Center in Adult Readers, Fiction, Graphic Title/Manga/Manwha, Japanese, Translation, Young Adult Readers

First things first ...

House of Stone: A Memoir of Home, Family, and a Lost Middle East by Anthony Shadid

14 Jan, by Smithsonian Asian Pacific American Center in Adult Readers, Lebanese, Lebanese American, Memoir, Middle Eastern, Nonfiction

The late Anthony Shadid is back in the headlines today with happy news: the double-Pulitzer winner's resonating memoir is one of the autobiography finalists for the National Book Circle Critics awards for the publishing year of 2012. House of Stone recounts Shadid's restoration of his great-grandfather's home...

Olive Kitteridge by Elizabeth Strout

13 Jan, by Smithsonian Asian Pacific American Center in Adult Readers, Audio, Fiction, Nonethnic-specific

Through the 13 intertwined, overlapping stories of her 2009 Pulitzer winner, Elizabeth Strout’s eponymous protagonist Olive Kitteridge emerges from multiple angles – captured in close-ups and faraway distances; her intimate portrayal is greatly enhanced by sharing the lives of her fellow residents in the small...

Vietnamerica: A Family’s Journey by GB Tran

12 Jan, by Smithsonian Asian Pacific American Center in Adult Readers, Graphic Title/Manga/Manwha, Memoir, Nonfiction, Southeast Asian, Southeast Asian American, Vietnamese, Vietnamese American, Young Adult Readers

Both the inside and outside covers here are exactly the same: a mostly well-ordered, three-generation family tree ...

The End of Your Life Book Club by Will Schwalbe

05 Jan, by Smithsonian Asian Pacific American Center in Absolute Favorites, Adult Readers, Audio, Memoir, Nonethnic-specific, Nonfiction

The Japanese word, kokoro, means 'heart' ...

This Is How You Lose Her by Junot Díaz

04 Jan, by Smithsonian Asian Pacific American Center in Adult Readers, Audio, Caribbean American, Fiction, Short Stories

Thus far, mega-award winning Junot Díaz (also recently bestowed the "Genius" moniker by the MacArthur Foundation) hasn't written a book without his sort-of autobiographical stand-in Yunior de las Casas. Díaz's 1996 fiction debut, Drown, introduced Yunior through interlinked short stories; a decade-plus later, Díaz turned over full narrative control to his...

The Book of Jonas by Stephen Dau

03 Jan, by Smithsonian Asian Pacific American Center in Adult Readers, Audio, Fiction, Middle Eastern, Nonethnic-specific, Young Adult Readers

Need the verdict first? READ THIS. Stephen Dau's The Book of Jonas is one of those rare, shattering, lingering, breathtaking-at-unexpected-moments debut novels that arrive so perfectly formed you're left both haunted (wondering what you could possibly read next to dispel the terror) and grateful (utterly so, that...

Little Century by Anna Keesey

31 Dec, by Smithsonian Asian Pacific American Center in Adult Readers, Audio, Fiction, Native American/First Nations/Indigenous Peoples, Nonethnic-specific, Young Adult Readers

On this final day of 2012, this could easily be me (replacing 'Esther' with my name and 'her journey' with this year): "Though she would not have admitted to any fixed expectations, Esther is still confounded by what meets her at the end of her...

Equal of the Sun by Anita Amirrezvani

27 Dec, by Smithsonian Asian Pacific American Center in Adult Readers, Audio, Fiction, Iranian, Iranian American, Persian, Persian American

"Based on the life of Princess Pari Khan Khanoom" seems to be the dominant short-hand description (even on its own back cover) of Anita Amirrezvani's historical novel set in 16th-century Persia, now modern Iran. Some might find that description misleading, and expect this to be...

BookDragon Adult Readers