Empire Falls (Richard Russo)
5 out of 5 stars Cut to the Chase: This is one of my favorite books — frighteningly believable characters who are flawed, layered, and so easy to relate to. These are characters who are middle aged...
View ArticleDifferent Seasons (Stephen King)
5 out of 5 stars Cut to the Chase: This is a collection of four different novellas, and I don’t think that they all deserve 5 out of 5 star ratings, but I think that the first, Hope Springs Eternal,...
View ArticleThe Whore’s Child and Other Stories (Richard Russo)
1.5 out of 5 stars Cut to the Chase: On the one hand, Russo is a talented writer (a Pulitzer winner) who has a melodic style that I never regret reading… on the other, I feel fairly strongly that...
View ArticleThe Painted Bed (Donald Hall)
4 out of 5 stars Cut to the Chase: This is a relatively short collection by a poetry master. Though I don’t often read poetry, when I do pick up a collection, it almost always has Donald Hall’s name...
View ArticleWithout (Donald Hall)
5 out of 5 stars Cut to the Chase: I don’t read much poetry… but what poetry I do read tends to be by Donald Hall and a handful of others. This is without a doubt my favorite single work by Hall,...
View ArticleThe Sun Also Rises (Ernest Hemingway)
3.5 out of 5 stars Cut to the Chase: If you haven’t read this perennial Hemingway before, and are wondering if you should… well… I’m not sure what to tell you. I recently had an excuse to reread it,...
View ArticleUnwell
Unwell is a literary novel, self-published by a friend of ours, edited by friends of ours. While we would definitely recommend it, we cannot do so without first admitting our bias! Still, if you’d...
View ArticleRoom (Emma Donoghue)
4 out of 5 stars Cut to the Chase: The parts of this book that are good are flat 0ut amazing. The first half of the book in particular is riveting. Told entirely from the perspective of a 5-year-old...
View ArticleThe Bookish Life of Nina Hill (Abbi Waxman)
2.5 out of 5 stars Cut to the Chase: I wanted to like this book. I tried to like this book. I even actually liked parts of this book. Yet ultimately, I found it slow and a bit difficult to finish,...
View ArticleAmerican Neolithic (Terence Hawkins)
4.5 out of 5 stars Cut to the Chase: American Neolithic is a dystopian science-fiction novel full of political satire and dark humor. In a world where the Homeland Police has unlimited legal...
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