Tag: short stories

Ballad of the Sad Cafe

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McCullers, Carson. The Complete Novels: The Ballad of the Sad Cafe. Literary Classics of the United States, 2001.

Reason read: the infamous fight between Miss Amelia and Marvin Macy occurred on Groundhog Day, my birthday.

The question of nurture versus nature. Every major character with The Ballad of the Sad Cafe has a tendency to instigate and agitate. Everyone stirs up trouble in one way or another. Did the impulse to do this come from something nefarious in childhood or were they born to rattle cages from the very beginning? Miss Amelia Evans is a person who, if she didn’t completely understand a situation well enough to have an opinion about it, ignored it completely. Cousin Lymon is a southern Iago, prone to stirring things up with cruel intentions. When Marvin Macy comes to town it is like two criminals recognizing themselves in total strangers; they are kindred spirits, born to raise hell as a team.
Confessional: Everything about the story was sad. I think that was because you didn’t really know why everyone was so uncaring and cruel.

Author fact: McCullers was always in poor health. She ended up passing away at the age of fifty.

Book trivia: Ballad of the Sad Café was reimagined an a film in 1991 starring Vanessa Redgrave.

BookLust Twist: from Book Lust in the simple chapter called “Southern Fiction” (p 222).

A Good Fall

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Jin, Ha. A Good Fall: Stories. Pantheon Books, 2009.

Reason read: Jin’s birthday is in February. Read in his honor.

Twelve stories with themes like immigrants in transition, culture clashes, vanity, identity, and family traditions. Ha Jin’s characters are so well drawn they keep speaking to me after I have closed the book. I could see A Good Fall as a movie with interconnecting stories of Chinese immigrants living in Flushing, New York. Maybe they are all living in the same apartment and pass each other on the stairs? Each suffering their secrets in silence?
I do not think it is a spoiler to say that A Good Fall surprisingly ends on a hopeful note.

  • The Bane of the Internet
  • A Composer and His Parakeet
  • The Beauty
  • Choice
  • Children as Enemies
  • In the Crossfire
  • Shame
  • An English Professor
  • A Pension Plan
  • Temporary Love
  • The House Behind a Weeping Cherry
  • A Good Fall

Lines I liked, “After Zuming came, she would have to become a faithful wife again” (p 177). That sentence is packed with so much drama. And then there is this one, “Keep in mind, yours is not the worst sorrow” (p 236).

Author fact: Ha Jin is also a poet.

Book trivia: Many people have mentioned that the short stories of Ha Jin are very repetitious. For that reason I am spreading out my reading so that it does not become tedious. I have already read Ocean of Words and The Bridegroom. I am also reading Waiting but not until September of 2042.

Nancy said: Pearl did not say anything specific about A Good Fall.

BookLust Twist: from Book Lust To Go in the chapter called “China: the Middle Kingdom” (p 61). Except…most of Jin’s stories take place in Flushing, New York. The characters are immigrants from China.

Krik? Krak!

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Danticat, Edwidge. Krik? Krak! SoHo, 1995.

Reason read: Danticat was born in January. Celebrating her birth month with Krik? Krak! I also needed a book for the Portland Public Library Reading Challenge of 2024 with a book about loss. This definitely fit the bill.

Right away, you know you are in the presence of a great writer when you read the very first short story of Krik? Krak! In “Children of the Sea” two teenagers who are in love keep journals when they are separated by dictatorship. Danticat keeps the two first person narratives clear by using capitalization and punctuation for one voice but not the other. The educated boy, a member of the Youth Federation, has escaped Haiti on a boat bound for Miami, Florida, while his young love (who does not use capitalization of punctuation) is left behind to endure military abuses. This was probably one of my favorites. Each subsequent story builds upon the next with the tiniest of threads. A minute detail will tie one story back to another.
“Nineteen Thirty-Seven” is a painful story about a woman visiting her mother in prison. Her mother is accused of flying. The government believes she is a witch, capable of rising like a bird on fire.
“A Wall of Fire Rising” tells the short but devastating story of a family barely making ends meet.
“Night Women” demonstrates the lengths a woman will go in order to provide for her child.
“Between the Pool and the Gardenias” is another heartbreaking story about loss.
“The Missing Peace” illuminates innocence abandoned.
“Seeing Things Simply” shares the story of an artist looking for beauty while ugliness crowds all around her.
“New York Day Women” demonstrates just how much a mother’s love can suffocate a daughter.
“Caroline’s Wedding” weaves a tale of expectation in age old customs.
“Women Like Us” is a message to daughters.
“In the Old Days” is an additional story for the twentieth anniversary edition of Krik? Krak! It tells the story of a woman asked to visit her dying father, a man she has never met.

The short stories of Krik? Krak!:

  • Children of the Sea
  • Nineteen Thirty-Seven
  • A Wall of Fire Rising
  • Night Women
  • Between the Pool and the Gardenias
  • The Missing Peace
  • Seeing Things Simply
  • New York Day Women
  • Caroline’s Wedding
  • Epilogue: Women Like Us
  • New to the 20th Anniversary Edition: In the Old Days

Quotes to quote, “At times I feel like I can just reach out and pull a star down from the sky as though it is a breadfruit or a calabash or something that could be of us to us on this journey” (“Children of the Sea” p 8), “I want him to forget that we live in a place where nothing lasts” (“Night Women” p 73), “They kept their arms close to their bodies, like angels hiding their wings” (“Nineteen Thirty-Seven” p 137).

Author fact: I am reading five books by Edwidge Danticat. Brother, I’m Dying in the last one.

Book trivia: reviewers call Krik? Krak! virtually flawless, passionate, lyrical, devastating, moving and luminous. I couldn’t agree more.

Nancy said: Pearl did not say anything specific about Krik? Krak!

BookLust Twist: from More Book Lust in the chapter called “The Contradictory Caribbean: Paradise and Pain” (p 55)

Return of Sherlock Holmes

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Doyle, Arthur Conan. The Complete Sherlock Holmes: The Return of Sherlock Holmes. Doubleday & Company, 1930.

Reason read: I am still working my way through Sherlock Holmes. I obviously took a little break, but now I am back.

The Return of Sherlock Holmes is comprised of thirteen adventures. There is a certain formula to Doyle’s writing. Someone is always trying to scam, blackmail, or extort something from someone else. Clients come to Holmes when Scotland Yard thinks the case is out of their league. Scandal, public embarrassment, or out and out trickery is usually the name of the game. Sherlock is always the master of disguises; a chameleon of identity. He is always seeing details others commonly miss. Confessional: I got a little tired of his smug attitude. I love love Watson, though.

  • “Adventures of the Empty House”
  • “Adventure of the Norwood Builder”
  • “Adventure of the Dancing Men”
  • “Adventure of the Solitary Cyclist”
  • “Adventure of the Priory School”
  • “Adventure of Black Peter”
  • “Adventure of Charles Augustus Milverton”
  • “Adventure of the Six Napoleons”
  • “Adventure of the Three Students”
  • “Adventure of the Golden Pince-Nez”
  • “Adventure of the Missing Three-Quarter”
  • “Adventure of the Abbey Grange”
  • “Adventure of the Second Stain”

Author fact: Doyle tried to kill off Sherlock but his fans wouldn’t let him.

Book trivia: The Return of Sherlock Holmes was published in 1905 as a collection. The stories came out individually from 1903 – 1904.

Nancy said: Pearl never mentions The Return of Sherlock Holmes because it is within The Complete Sherlock Holmes.

BookLust Twist: from Book Lust in the chapter called “I Love a Mystery” (p 117).

Memoirs of Sherlock Holmes

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Doyle, Arthur Conan. The Complete Sherlock Holmes: Memoirs of Sherlock Holmes.

Reason read: It’s Sherlock.

Here are the short stories that make up The Memoirs of Sherlock Holmes:

  • “Silver Blaze” – who killed a jockey and where is the famous horse, Silver Blaze?
  • “Yellow Face” – this was my favorite mystery of the book.
  • “Stock-broker’s Clerk” – What is a true connection and how can it be bought?
  • “The Gloria Scott” – a glimpse into Holmes’s past. We learn of a friendship that comes from a dog bite.
  • “Musgrave Ritual” – my favorite line came from this story, “Pistol practice should be an open air pasttime.” Amen to that.
  • “Reigate Puzzle” – holmes is supposed to be resting after an illness but cannot help getting involved with a murder mystery.
  • “Crooked Man”- it was at this point that I decided it would be exhausting to have a conversation with Shelock Holmes; to have all of his observations and elementary deductions punctuating his every sentence.
  • “Resident Patient” – Watson picks up on Sherlock’s method of deducation.
  • “Greek Interpreter” – it is revealed Sherlock Holmes has a brother, Mycroft. The two brothers share the same powers of deduction so a conversation with them would be twice as annoying.
  • “Naval Treaty” – we meet a college friend of Watson’s.
  • “Final Problem” – the story that makes everyone think Homes has died.

As an aside, what constitutes a fabulous forehead?

Author fact: Doyle studied medicine. I think that education helped his writing.

Book trivia: Memoirs of Sherlock Holmes is odd in the sense that it was published in 1893 with a ’94 date.

Nancy said: Memoirs of Sherlock Homes was so under the radar or Pearl since she only indexed The Complete Sherlock Holmes.

BookLust Twist: from Book Lust in the chapter called “I Love a Mystery” (p 123). Confessional: when I realized I would be reading more than one title within a single book, I started listing out the individual titles. For example, Remembrance of Things Passed has seven volumes (seven titles). I am listing each title separately because there is no way I can read Remembrance in its entirety in one month. So. Same with the Complete Sherlock Holmes. Pearl doesn’t mention each compilation of short stories or novel within but since that’s how I’m reading them, I decided to list them that way. My true confessional is that I have started to list out the short stories and this is where I have gotten myself confused. I haven’t been listing out the short stories in other collections, so why now?

Hateship, Friendship, Courtship, Loveship, Marriage

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Munro, Alice. Hateship, Friendship, Courtship, Loveship, Marriage: Stories. Alfred A. Knopf, 2001.

Reason read: Munro’s birth month is in July. Read in her honor.

Munro has a way with words, as everyone knows. Here are four words I never thought I would see stitched together, “bug-eyed pickle ass”. Go figure.
Hateship, Friendship, Courtship, Loveship, Marriage is a collection of short stories with a common theme: relationships:

  1. Hateship, Friendship, Courtship, Loveship, Marriage – a childish prank backfires.
  2. Floating Bridge – a woman deals with positive news concerning her cancer.
  3. Family Furnishings – a college student learns about a secret her aunt was keeping.
  4. Comfort – the suicide of a husband.
  5. Nettles – childhood taunts.
  6. Post and Beam – when a house is more than a house.
  7. What Is Remembered – the memory of an affair with a pilot lingers long after the romance has died.
  8. Queenie – A sister’s abandonment.
  9. The Bear Came Over the Mountain – An adultery gets his comeuppance.

Lines I really liked, “Her teeth were crowded to the front of her mouth as if they were ready for an argument” (p 3), “See the conquering hero comes” (p 125), “A stealthy, considering, almost married glance, its masquerade and its bland intimacy arousing to those who were after all not married” (p 233), and “As if he dared anybody to breathe while he was in there” (p 252).

Author fact: Munro has won a bunch of awards for her writing including the National Book Critics Circle Award.

Book trivia: I have six different Munro books to read on my list. I have already read Friend of My Youth and The Love of a Good Woman.

Nancy said: Pearl said Munro is among the authors who have “distinctly evoked sense of place that distinguishes Canadian fiction” (Book Lust, p 50).

BookLust Twist: from Book Lust in the chapter called “Canadian Fiction” (p 50).

Lottery

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Jackson, Shirley. The Lottery. Amereon Limited, 1976.

I don’t think I have to explain the plot to anyone. In one sentence: it is the short story of a community that annually choses someone to stone to death. I had so many questions as a teenager reading The Lottery in high school. Who was the third person narrator and why do they never express emotion or share the thoughts and feelings of other characters? It’s as if the scene they describe is too horrible for humanity and they purposely keep their distance by staying out of the other characters’ heads. As a result, the dialogue has to be heavy and masterful enough to carry the action. Otherwise, no one would understand what is truly going on. The other questions I had: Who was Mr. Summers and why does he get to conduct the lottery? Who came up with the black box in the first place? If everyone avoids the black box and keeps their distance from it, why have it around at all? No one wanted to help Mr. Summers even move it. Did this community continue using the box just because of tradition? Lastly, how does Jackson as a young mother come up with something like this?

Reason read: Shirley Jackson was born in December. Read in her honor.

Author fact: Jackson is bets known for her horror.

Book trivia: The Lottery first appeared in “The New Yorker in 1948. It was awarded the O Henry Award in 1963.

Nancy said: Pearl described The Lottery as “endlessly anthologized.”

BookLust Twist: from Book Lust in the chapter called “Ghost Stories” (p 100).

Everything That Rises Must Converge

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O’Connor, Flannery. Everything That Rises Must Converge. New York: The Library of America, 1988.

Reason read: September is Southern Writers Month.

Flannery O’Connor’s short stories are like the crack of the whip dangerously close to your head. Sometimes humorous, sometimes peculiar, often times violent, but always breathtakingly true. Imagine the nervous laughter that bubbles up when you realize that whip has missed your face. You laugh because you want it to be a skillful miss as opposed to a clumsy mistake. Imagine the quirkiness of characters who are dangerously misunderstood. There is always something a little sinister about O’Connor. She enjoys the abrupt turn of events that take her readers by surprise. She holds us witness to the good, the bad, and the ugly of humanity.
Everything That Rises Must Converge is a compilation of nine short stories:

  • “Everything That Rises Must Converge” – we start with the discomfort of a mother’s obvious prejudice.
  • “Greenleaf” – a fight over property and propriety.
  • “A View of the Woods” – a punch to the gut when you least expect it.
  • “The Enduring Chill” – another tale about an overbearing mother.
  • “The Comforts of Home” – mother and son disagree about taking a brash girl into their home.
  • “The Lame Shall Enter First” – a widower tried to take in a second son with horrible results.
  • “Revelation” – another story heavy on the racism.
  • “Parker’s Back” – a man obsessed with tattoos
  • “Judgement Day” – an elderly and racist father is terrified of dying in New York City.

Quotes I liked, “There was a continuous thud in the back of Asbury’s head as if his heart and got trapped in it and was fighting to get out” (p 565), and “Behind the newspaper Julian was withdrawing into the inner compartment of his mind where he spent most of his time” (p 603), and “In addition to her other bad qualities, she was forever sniffing up sin” (p 655).

Author fact: Flannery O’Connor died too young at the age of thirty-nine. Imagine the books and stories she could have written had she lived to a hundred!

Nancy said: Pearl didn’t say anything specific about Everything That Rises Must Converge in “Growing Writers” or “Southern Fiction” but she did mention O’Connor as a great fiction-writer and a classic.

BookLust Twist: from Book Lust twice. Once in the chapter called “Growing Writers” (p 107), and again in the chapter called “Southern Fiction” (p 222).

Olive Kitteridge

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Strout, Elizabeth. Olive Kitteridge. New York: Random House, 2008.

Reason read: In Rockland, Maine, there is a festival dedicated to lobsters. Read Olive Kitteridge in honor of the critters.

Comprised of thirteen short stories with varying narratives, Strout cleverly tells the story of Olive Kitteridge. Olive is lurking in most of each connecting tale. Sometimes characters gossip about her, like in the story called “Winter Concert.” In the first story “Pharmacy” Olive’s husband, Henry Kitteridge, doesn’t seem to have a happy life since he retired from his old fashioned pharmacy. Olive is presented as a woman who doesn’t suffer fools easily. She shows the world an angry and proud face most of the time. I think they call it “Yankee stoicism.” Other stories:

  • “Incoming Tide” – Olive is present when a woman tries to commit suicide.
  • “The Piano Player” – Angela O’Meara plays the piano for ungrateful guests.
  • “A Little Burst” – Olive’s only son is getting married to a woman she doesn’t like.
  • “Starving” – Harmon is starving in his marriage while he befriends a girl with anorexia.
  • “A Different Road” – a couple are victims of a crime by being in the wrong place at the wrong time.
  • Winter Concert” – A couple attends a concert where the wife learns of her husband’s secret rendezvous.
  • “Tulips” – bitterness.
  • “A Basket of Trips” – a death cuts a marriage short.
  • “Ship in a Bottle” – a girl is stood up on her wedding day.
  • “Security” – Olive tries to visit her son in New York; a story about expectations.
  • “Criminal” – the story of a neurotic kleptomaniac.
  • “River” – My favorite story of the the bunch. Olive is a widow and learning to be polite.

Author fact: Strout also wrote Amy & Isabelle and Abide with Me. Both are on my Challenge list. I read Amy & Isabelle in 2007 and I read Abide with Me in 2013.

Book trivia: Olive Kitteridge won a Pulitzer in 2008.

Playlist: “Good Night, Irene,” “Have a Holly Jolly Christmas,” “Bridge Over Troubled Water,” “The First Noel,” “We Shall Overcome, “”Fly Me to the Moon,” “My Way,” “Feelings,” “O Come All Ye Faithful,” Beethoven, “Fools Rush In,” “Whenever I Feel Afraid,” Phish, Grateful Dead, Jerry Garcia, “Some Enchanted Evening,” “I’m Always Chasing Rainbows,” and Debussy.

Nancy said: Pearl said Olive Kitteridge would be an excellent choice for a book club.

BookLust Twist: from Book Lust To Go in the curious chapter called “The Maine Chance” (p 135).

Bad Haircut

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Perrotta, Tom. Bad Haircut: Stories of the Seventies. New York: Berkey Books, 1994.

Reason read: June is short story month.

Comprised of ten short stories:

  • The Wiener Man – Your past is never far behind you. A mother connects with an old friend.
  • Thirteen – Coming of age is terrible when trying to help a best friend get the girl.
  • Race Riot – Which side are you on? Racial tensions and peer pressure and a bad combination.
  • Snowman – revenge is not as sweet as you think.
  • Forgiveness – standing for the flag is a choice.
  • A Bill Floyd Christmas – Bill loses his wife and latches on to another family to fill the void.
  • You Start to Live – take chances in life.
  • The Jane Pasco Fan Club – Dating in high school can be dangerous.
  • Just the Way We Were – prom memories.
  • Wild Kingdom – sometimes people can be animals.

Lines I liked: “The world was a still as a photograph” (p 61) and “She had that voice special tone of voice that she only used when she had company,” (p 119).

Author fact: Perrotta is from New Jersey.

Book trivia: all of the short stories are linked and are in chronological order.

Setlist: “We May Never Pass This Way Again,” Billy Joel’s “Just the Way You Are,” Aerosmith’s “Dream On,” The Carpenters, Perry Como, Bing Crosby, Donny Osmond, Aerosmith, Grateful Dead, a couple of Jim Croce songs, “I’ve got a Name” and “Operator.”

Nancy said: Pearl called Bad Haircut “heartfelt yet unsentimental.”

BookLust Twist: from More Book Lust in the chapter called “Near Novels: Linked Short Stories” (p 175).

Diving Pool

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Ogawa, Yoko. The Diving Pool: Three Novellas. New York: Picador, 2008.

Reason read: Japan celebrates a national Cultural Day on November 3rd.

Comprised of three novellas:

  • The Diving Pool
  • The Pregnancy Diary
  • The Dormitory

Here is what you need to know before you dive into Ogawa’s work. At the height of tension the story ends. Period. If you don’t care for cliffhangers you should make up your own endings or just don’t read Diving Pool at all. It’s that simple. Ogawa’s writing is like a subtle psycho-killer movie. Instead of the monster being front and center, there is absolutely nothing tangible to confront. The hairs on the back of your neck stand up, not because a blood-dripping ghoul is staring you down, but because there is nothing to see. The darkness is a wisp of toxic smoke, a hint of danger darting in the corners of your periphery. In Ogawa’s stories it is what isn’t being said that is far scarier than the certainty. In the title story Jun admits he is aware of the protagonist’s cruelty. Then what? You don’t know what happens next. In “The Pregnancy Diary” a sister gives birth to a child who may, or may not, have a birth defect. In the last story, “The Dormitory” a cousin hasn’t been seen for days and the manager of his dormitory always has an excuse for his absence. After you have read these stories you are left without resolution and without resolution your imagination questions the reality.

Favorite lines, “Perhaps it’s because he’s falling through time, to a place there words can never reach,” “When we grow up, we find ways ti hide our anxieties, our loneliness, our fear and sorrow,” and “The baby haunted the shadows that fell between us.” Can’t you just feel the ominous chill between the lines?

Author fact: Ogawa also wrote Hotel Iris (on my Challenge list) as well as The Housekeeper and the Professor (finished).

Nancy said: Pearl had a couple of mistakes on this title. She called it “Divining Pool” (both in the chapter and the index), and she referred to Yoko Ogawa as a male.
About The Diving Pool she said it was like The Housekeeper and the Professor, “delicate and retrained” (Book Lust To Go p 117).

BookLust Twist: from Book Lust To Go in the chapter called “Japanese Journeys” (p 116).

My Fence is Electric: and Other Stories

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Newman, Mark. My Fence is Electric: and Other Stories. Australia: Odyssey Books, 2020.

Reason read: as part of the Early Review program for LibraryThing I was selected to read and review My Fence is Electric.

It would have been great If Newman had called his book, My Fence is Electric: and Other Eclectic Stories because the stories are both electric and eclectic. Twenty seven in all; ranging from a single paragraph to several pages long, they run the gamut of plot, theme, character, voice and emotional impact. Newman’s talent as a writing chameleon is apparent in every paragraph. The very first story reminded me of Lovely Bones while another had me thinking of the Daley twins. Despite the entire volume being extremely short, take your time with this one. Savor the stories as if you would an elaborate charcuterie. Each bite is a different adventure.

Author fact: Newman has a a website here.

Adventures of Sherlock Holmes

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Doyle, Arthur Conan. The Complete Sherlock Holmes: The Adventures of Sherlock Holmes. New York: Barnes and Noble Classics, 2003.

Reason read: Doyle died in July. Read in his memory.

If you were to read the Complete Sherlock Holmes in chronological order, you would not start with the Adventures of Sherlock Holmes. The short stories in The Adventures of Sherlock Holmes, twelve in all, start after Holmes and Watson have gone their separate ways and are no longer sharing rooms of a flat together. Watson is by this time married with a house of his own while Holmes is still on Baker Street. One constant that remains throughout all the stories is Holmes’s ability to confuse people with his keen sense of observation. “How could you know that?” is a constant refrain. Another constant is that all of the stories are told in first person from Watson’s point of view.

Short stories:

  • “Scandal in Bohemia” – a Duke and heir King is blackmailed by an actress. Sherlock, with the help of Holmes, attempts to end the threat but the woman outsmarts them.
  • “Red-Headed League” – what do you get when you mix a redhead, an Encyclopedia, a bank, and a scam? Answer: a Sherlock Holmes mystery, of course!
  • “A Case of Identity” – How far will a man go to keep his stepdaughter from marrying?
  • “The Boscombe Valley Mystery” – Did a man really murder his father or is there more going on?
  • “The Five Orange Pips” – a curse has come down through the generations, terrorizing a family.
  • “The Man with the Twisted Lip” – This was my favorite. A man goes missing and is believed to be dead while his wife has faith he is alive.
  • “The Adventure of the Blue Carbuncle” – Who stole this precious jewel?
  • “The Adventure of the Speckled Band” – another crazy story about a father not wanting his daughters to marry because of losing the inheritance.
  • “The Adventure of the Engineer’s Thumb” – is it a spoiler to say this is one story where the criminals get away?
  • “The Adventure of the Noble Bachelor” – Just what the title says, a guy does the right thing.
  • “The Adventure of the Beryl Coronet” – family devotion illustrated with a coronet.
  • “The Adventure of the Copper Beaches” – a really interesting story about trying to thwart a wedding (another common theme for Sherlock).

Author fact: rumor has it, Sherlock Holmes is somewhat modeled after Dr. Joseph Bell, a professor of Dolye’s at Edinburgh University.

Book trivia: Despite publishing two novels previously, Doyle’s career didn’t take off until he started writing short stories. The twelve listed above were published together in 1892.

Nancy said: Pearl included the Complete Sherlock Holmes in a list of private-eye mysteries.

BookLust Twist: from Book Lust in the really long chapter called “I love a Mystery” (p 117).

February’s Finale

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What to tell you? I spent February in a tailspin of old memories. To blame it on one singular event would be too simplistic. As they say, it’s complicated. Very. In other news I have been running! Successfully, I might add. February saw 40 miles conquered. Here are the books planned and completed:

Fiction:

  • Anna In-Between by Elizabeth Nunez (EB & print).
  • Little Havana Blues edited by Julia Poey and Virgil Suarez (EB & print).
  • The Crimson Petal and the White by Michael Faber (EB, AB & print).
  • The Last Good Kiss by James Crumley (EB & print).

Nonfiction:

  • All Deliberate Speed: reflections on the first half century of Brown v. Board of Education by Charles J. Ogletree, Jr (EB & print).
  • Barrow’s Boys by Fergus Fleming (EB & print).
  • Rome and a Villa by Eleanor Clark (EB & print).

Early Review for LibraryThing:

  • The 21: a journey into the land of the Coptic martyrs by Martin Mosebach (just started reading).

Leisure (print only):

  • Migrations: Open Hearts, Open Borders: The Power of Human Migration and the Way That Walls and Bans Are No Match for Bravery and Hope by ICPBS.
  • Pharos Gate by Nick Bantock.
  • Morning Star by Nick Bantock.
  • The Museum at Purgatory by Nick Bantock.
  • Alexandria by Nick Bantock.
  • The Gryphon by Nick Bantock.

February Fixed

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I am consistently running (yay). My head is finally screwed on straight – somewhat (yay). Things are not perfect but I can say February is mostly fixed.

Fiction:

  • The Crimson Petal and the White by Michael Faber – in honor of Charles Dickens and his birthday being in February. Weird, I know.
  • Anna In-Between by Elizabeth Nunez – in honor of my childhood.
  • Little Havana Blues: A Cuban-American Literature Anthology edited by Virgil Suarez and Delia Poey – in honor of Cuba’s reformed constitution.
  • The Last Good Kiss by James Crumley – in honor of February being friendship month.

Nonfiction:

  • Rome and a Villa by Eleanor Clark – in honor of Clark’s birthday.
  • All Deliberate Speed: Reflections on the First Half Century of Brown v. Board of Education by Charles J. Ogletree, Jr. – in honor of February being Civil Rights month.
  • Barrow’s Boys: A stirring Story of Daring, Fortitude, and Outright Lunacy by Fergus Fleming – in honor of Exploration month.

Leisure:

  • Making Tracks by Matt Weber – a Christmas gift from my sister.