Reviews

“Today I moved to a twelve acre rock covered with cement, topped with bird turd and surrounded by water.”  Al Capone Does My Shirts is set in 1935 on Alcatraz where Capone is an inmate working in the prison laundry.

When Thomas Avery’s son, Daniel, is killed in the Pyrenees, Thomas leaves California to retrieve Daniel’s body.  Once he gets to France, Thomas discovers that Daniel was walking the Camino de Santiago, which is a pilgrimage that is, at its roots, spiritual but is taken for many other reasons.  For his own personal motives, which are both glaringly obvious and maddening

Skulduggery Pleasant is an ace detective and master of elemental magic.

I was looking for a mystery for this month’s Mystery Boot Camp, and I came across Alpha, the kind of book I love to read—suspense/thriller. Jad Bell, an expe

In Eden Valley, Alberta, Canada, in July of 1882, Grace Eileen Henderson finds herself in a situation that may end up killing her and her little sister, Belle.  Alone in the world, they listen to Thornton Winch, a man who calls himself a travelling preacher, when he promises them protection and safety.  Instead, he holds Belle hostage in order to for

This story is really three stories woven into one, spanning the entire existence of time itself. That is not to say the story begins with the creation of the universe, but rather the creation of time.

Trishna gives a new twist to the traditional Bollywood cinema.

Shangri-la conjures up images of a utopian kingdom where no one suffers or ages—a la the classic movie.  But the book Lost in Shangri-la is grounded in reality, relaying the harrowing rescue of a band of soldiers during World War II.  A flight of men and w

The Dog Stars has been in my stack for months and months. I picked it up once, read about 15 pages and thought “this is TOO weird.” But then.

Haruf once again sets his story—this slice of life—in Holt, Colorado, a fictional town on the high plains.  Dad and Mary Lewis have been married for over 50 years.  The book chronicles the last few months of Da