THE PARTICULAR SADNESS OF LEMON CAKE by Aimee Bender

Ever since the publication of her story collection,THE GIRL IN THE FLAMMABLE SKIRT, Aimee Bender has established herself as a writer of minimalist magic realism, a description that seems contradictory given the lush prose of the founding father of magic realism, Gabriel Garcia Marquez, and the emotional adjective-laden writing of popular American author Alice Hoffman. But Aimee Bender has claimed her niche as a writer who tells stories the way we pass on fairy tales to our children: spare plots that contain wondrous images and, ultimately, wisdom. Her plots center on one or two magic elements in an otherwise ordinary world. In her latest novel, THE PARTICULAR SADNESS OF LEMON CAKE, Bender focuses on narrator Rose, a girl who learns, to her horror, that she can taste the emotions of those who cooked or grew her food, whether that person is her desperate mother or the farmer who grew the organic lettuce in her salad. As Rose matures along with her “gift,” she learns about the peculiar history of her family and gains insight into her odd brother Joseph, who suffers, too, but in a wholly different manner.

June 2, 2010 · Judi Clark · No Comments
Tags: , , , ,  Â· Posted in: 2010 Top Picks, Contemporary, Family Matters, Magical Realism, Reading Guide

BRUNO, CHIEF OF POLICE by Martin Walker

A paean to the Dordogne, an exploration of fractious French history, and the debut of the most self-possessed, accomplished, even-tempered, life-savoring Holmesian character ever, Walker’s first Bruno novel proves once and for all that heavyweight journalists can write mystery novels.

April 30, 2010 · Judi Clark · No Comments
Tags: , , ,  Â· Posted in: 2009 Favorites, France, Sleuths Series, Small Town

THE THREE WEISSMANNS OF WESTPORT by Cathleen Schine

With her trademark wit and empathy, Schine pens another hilarious and affecting domestic comedy (THE THREE WEISSMANNS OF WESTPORT), using the ageless bones of Jane Austen’s SENSE AND SENSIBILITY as a template.

The story opens with 78-year-old Joseph Weissmann announcing to his wife of 48 years, Betty, that he wants a divorce, citing irreconcilable differences. “The name of Joe’s irreconcilable difference was Felicity, although Betty referred to her, pretending she could not remember the correct name, sometimes as Pleurisy, more often as Duplicity.”

April 11, 2010 · Judi Clark · No Comments
Tags: , , , ,  Â· Posted in: 2010 Top Picks, Contemporary, Divorce, Humorous, NE & New York, Reading Guide

OLIVE KITTERIDGE by Elizabeth Strout

Big-wristed Olive Kitteridge is the imposing, even frightful, over-sized woman at the center of this novel. She lives in a small town on the coast of Maine, where traditionally people keep to themselves, living out lives of granite-like individuality. She trucks no silliness, has little patience for people she does not care for, which is virtually everyone, and has no problem speaking her mind, in fact seems genetically predisposed to it. She is a retired high school math teacher, who, her adult son tells her, was the “scariest teacher in the school.” She is one of those individuals you meet and wonder, how does a person get this way?

January 19, 2010 · Judi Clark · No Comments
Tags: , , , ,  Â· Posted in: 2009 Favorites, Award Winning Author, Contemporary, Motherhood, NE & New York, Pulitzer Prize, Reading Guide, Short Stories, Small Town

GO WITH ME by Castle Freeman, Jr.

We actually get to meet the iconic Sheriff Ripley Wingate in Freeman’s acclaimed, dialogue-driven third novel, GO WITH ME. Ripley only appears briefly – at the beginning and the end – but he sets the story going and his existence is something of a reassurance to the good ol’ woodchucks that gather and blather at Whizzer’s defunct sawmill.

A scared, defiant young woman, Lillian, comes to Wingate for protection against the thuggish Blackway. She has offended Blackway and in return he has stalked her, trashed her car and killed her cat. She believes, with reason, he is going to kill her. But Wingate tells her there’s nothing he – the law – can do…

January 15, 2010 · Judi Clark · No Comments
Tags: , ,  Â· Posted in: 2009 Favorites, Humorous, Mystery/Suspense, NE & New York, Reading Guide, Small Town

THE SEMANTICS OF MURDER by Aifric Campbell

Therapists make fascinating fictional characters–just consider the raw material. They listen to the secrets of others all day long, but where do those secrets go? It’s assumed that therapists are rational, ethical, well-balanced individuals. But what if they’re not? This brings me to THE SEMANTICS OF MURDER, the first novel from Irish author Aifric Campbell, recently published by Serpent’s Tail Press.

January 7, 2010 · Judi Clark · No Comments
Tags: , ,  Â· Posted in: 2009 Favorites, California, Debut Novel, Mental Health, Mystery/Suspense, Real People Fiction, United Kingdom