Editorial reviews

Readers undeterred by the narrative left turn will be enthralled by Burian’s eerie depictions of the Sedona community and left pondering the deep emotional complexities of parent-child relationships.

Kitses is a deft writer, capable of contrasting the mixed social fortunes of a small decaying town with the thrumming pressures of a metropolitan workplace, and the complicated fortunes of individual souls – workers, partners, offspring.

You won’t see the ending looming in this fine and well-balanced thriller.

This is an offbeat, suspenseful meditation on memory and longing by a writer like no other.

The Mentor is a rich, rewarding thriller that offers plenty of suspense and a few satirical laughs.

Too Fat, Too Slutty, Too Loud is important in helping us identify underlying attitudes that are not always as obvious as one might think.

Though it’s no comic classic, The Rise and Fall of D.O.D.O. is big, roomy and enjoyable. The historical scenes are refreshingly unembarrassed by their hey-nonny-nonnyisms.

Gay says hers is not a success story because it’s not the weight-loss story our culture demands, but her breaking of her own silence, her movement from shame and self-loathing toward honoring and forgiving and caring for herself, is in itself a profound victory.

In his fascinating story, Michael Finkel not only wrests quotes from the reluctant hermit, he comes up with a number of quotable lines of his own.

The estimation of Hemingway’s place in American fiction — the esteem his short stories still commands — is not altered by this biography. But a more nuanced portrayal emerges in this empathetic, if still critical, study of a conflicted man and artist

Tóibín is of course free to re-create ancient figures in our own image. Who would want to say such an artistic appropriation, especially one done so well, is off limits? So let’s instead acknowledge Tóibín’s brilliant version of this story — and then go back to the weird brilliance of the original.

Mormama, like the house that is ostensibly its central concern, is less frightening than exhausting, more dust than dread.

The Chalk Artist is dedicated to Goodman's teachers — 20 of whom are listed by name — and on one level it is a lovely paean to teaching and the patience and passion required for reaching and awakening not always receptive minds.

“Priestdaddy” gives “the conviction that good books sometimes give: that life can be holdable in the hand, examined down to the dog hairs, eaten with the eyes and understood.”

“The Force” recalls Sidney Lumet’s great New York police films (“Serpico,” “Prince of the City”) and makes their agonies almost quaint by comparison.

In “You Don’t Have to Say You Love Me,” Alexie lingers on insults to his body and mind that could have been avoided. He was sexually abused as a child, and mistreated in other ways.

The Essex Serpent is a bit of a dense read. And yet, it's undeniably a page turner as well.

The Essex Serpent is so painfully lovely that it removes a bit of that padding, only just as much as we can bear.

Weigel is an astute observer, and he knows full well how ridiculous prog can seem to anyone who doesn't regularly listen to ten-minute, orchestral rock songs about extraterrestrial travel.

It's not surprising that So Much Blue is such a perfectly structured novel; Everett is an author who started his career off strong and just keeps getting better.