Class, gender, and religious differences in post-WWII Manhattan drive this debut novel from the pseudonymous Zeldis in which two worlds literally collide in the opening chapter. Caught in a fender bender, Eleanor Moskowitz and Patricia Bellamy emerge from their respective taxis in a rare chance...
For five preteen Camp Forevermore girls, a simple overnight kayaking trip turns horrifying when their group leader dies mysteriously and the girls must find their way back alone. One insists on remaining with the corpse; the others leave and promise to send help. Interspersed with their...
Race, class, and identity all loom large in Marie NDiaye's (Three Strong Women) latest superb title as generations of mothers and daughters attempt to deny and reclaim one another with onerous consequences. The original Ladivine immigrates to France from an unnamed country, cleaning houses to...
Over the past couple weeks, I've been a bit of an ethnic voyeur, picking up bestselling 'mainstream' titles in search of their APAness. I confess I picked up Wally Lamb's latest purely because I somehow learned the protagonist is named Annie Oh – Oh usually being a Korean...
So I've been mulling over this book for a month-plus, and still remain rather conflicted. The one solid conclusion I can offer is this – if I were to rank Susan Choi's titles, my list would read thusly: American Woman, based loosely on the Patty Hearst...
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...
