Dear Great Book Guru, I just came home from a wonderful evening of Scottish music, drink, and poetry - the annual Burns Night at St. Luke’s here in Sea Cliff. What great fun and great conversations!  One of the musicians mentioned an engrossing new novel he had just read about a man looking back over the decades at moments he remembered and questioning why those moments had significance rather than others.  Familiar with the book? A Fan of Robert Burns

Dear Fan of Robert Burns, I’m guessing the book is BAUMGARTNER  by Paul Auster.  Like Burns, Auster takes the pieces of his life and incorporates it into his fiction. Baumgartner is a seventy-year-old philosophy professor who is deeply mourning his wife’s death ten years earlier.  It was a sudden, avoidable swimming accident and Sy Baumgartner revisits that day over and over imagining what he could have done to prevent the tragedy.  Interspersed with this memory are short vignettes of their time together, early childhood incidents living in Newark, his grandfather’s tales of life in Kiev, his attempts to remarry, and encounters with strangers that change destiny.  Throughout this short novel (220 pages), we see how Baumgartner is attempting to control outcomes and make sense of the tragedies he experiences – his and others.  A very thought provoking look at the power of memory and a beautiful love story also - highly recommended!  

 Dear Great Book Guru,  My book group just read “Two Gallants” a  James Joyce DUBLINERS short story and we had a lively discussion about Ireland then and now.  Of course, my thoughts turned  to Ireland as a setting.   I would love to read a novel or a mystery set in the Emerald Isle - perfect for this time of year or… really any of time of the year!  Lover of an Irish Setting

Dear Lover of an Irish Setting,  A few months ago I came upon a series of literary mysteries by an Irish born writer  Dervla McTiernan  (now an Australian citizen) set in Dublin and Galway.  While I have enjoyed all three, my favorite was THE SCHOLAR. The story delves into the world of international big pharma laced with sinister Irish academic overtones.  Emma Sweeney is a researcher in Galway University and lives with her partner, Detective  Cormac Reilly. Driving home late one night, she comes upon the body of Carline Darcy, heir apparent to the multibillion-dollar pharmaceutical company, Darcy Therapeutics. The company is involved in funding university research, political parties, and a myriad of philanthropic projects.  Emma mistakenly gets Reilly involved and suspicion immediately turns on her. Was she jealous of the young heiress’s recent discoveries or was she afraid her research would be found to be fraudulent? The many faceted world of scientific espionage mixed with familial intrigue leaves the reader wondering who the real villain is and…. could it be our Narrator?

 Dear Great Book Guru, Having rung in the New Year with great enthusiasm, I am now ready to begin a year of intense and pleasurable reading.  Do you have a good book to start me off?  2024 Determined Reader

Dear 2024 Determined Reader, As a Christmas present, I received a very interesting, unusual book I think you might enjoy: BROOKLYN CRIME NOVEL by Jonathan Lethem.  Not a novel in the traditional sense, this is a series of anecdotes, short, short stories, musings - all connected by characters that remain nameless - identified only by nickname or type (Wheeze, Younger Brother, Bully etc.), or sometimes simply a letter (C). The book covers the 1970’s up to 2019 and is set in a small area of downtown Brooklyn - Boerum Hill.  The boys - and they are almost all boys - are living in a world defined by gentrification. Race, class and income all work to separate them but the Dean Street boys as they call themselves are linked by propinquity through the decades. The crimes they experience are at times petty and sometimes horrific, but certainly color their youth and adult lives.  Who is the narrator who recounts these tales? Only at the very end do know for sure. Critics have called this an autonovel - a fictionalized autobiography, but this work is much more: a history of New York City, a paean to childhood, a socioeconomic study of gentrification, but mostly a compelling story of lives shaped by place and time. Highly recommended!

 Dear Great Book Guru,  Looking back on 2023, I was wondering if there were some great books I might have missed. Have you compiled a list of your favorites?  Book Lover 2023

Dear Book Lover 2023,  Every year I look back on all the events I have enjoyed- Village-wide Garage Sale,  the Progressive Dinner, the Holiday Duck Hunt, the Sunset Serenades, the Fourth of July celebration, the Ice Cream Social,  the Halloween Parade, the James Joyce Jaunt…. so many! But I also look back on the books I have read and recommended.  There are always some that stand out and here is my list of ten of these in no particular order. Happy 2024  Reading!

THE GUEST – Emma Cline

GOOD NEIGHBORS- Sarah Langan

FOSTER-Claire Keegan

I HAVE SOME QUESTIONS FOR YOU- Rebecca Makkai

HEAD HITS I REMEMBER- Hank Bjorklund

THERE WILL BE FIRE- Rory Carroll

THE WAGER- David Grann

HARLEM SHUFFLE/ CROOKED MANIFESTO (part of a proposed trilogy) - Colson Whitehead

THE HEAVEN & EARTH GROCERY STORE- James McBride

SMALL MERCIES- Dennis Lehane

 Dear Great Book Guru,  I am filled with the holiday spirit - such a festive time of year!  Do you have a book set in the holidays – please short and compelling - I also feel very distracted!  Holiday Reader

Dear Holiday Reader, I have a book I have been recommending to all my friends: CHRISTMAS GUEST by Peter Swanson. The first half of the book takes place in 1989.  Ashley Smith, a young American studying at Cambridge, plans on spending the holidays alone.  Her parents are dead, and she has little reason to return home to California. When a fellow classmate, Emma Chapman, suggests she join her at Emma’s Cotswolds family home, Ashley is delighted.  A wonderful English Christmas awaits her and we read all this in a diary she keeps throughout the visit.   The parents are less than hospitable but Emma’s twin brother Adam is handsome, unattached, and yes – apparently attracted to Ashley! The trips to the local pub, the exquisite meals, the local characters all make for a delightful holiday read…. until things take a  dark turn.  Ashley very soon learns that the handsome brother is a suspect in the murder of a young woman in the village. The story fast-forwards thirty years and we are in New York, once again celebrating the holidays. This very short novel - truly a novella - is replete with surprises, making us question everything we thought we knew.  Highly recommended!

Dear Great Book Guru,  What an exciting time of year  - every day seems filled with holiday cheer! I’m so looking forward to the Children’s Library annual presentation of The Nutcracker next Saturday, December 23 and then - of course - the Holiday Duck Hunt the following Saturday December 30. As always, I’m looking for a good book to have on hand - something short and fast-moving but meaningful… Happy Holiday Reader

Dear Happy Holiday Reader, I have the book for you: PET by Catherine Chidgey - it’s been on many “must read” lists for 2023. Set in New Zealand, the novel shifts back and forth between two time periods: 1984 and 2014. Justine Crieve is twelve years in 1984. Her mother has recently died, and her father and she are grieving in self-destructive ways. She begins to find solace in school with friends and especially her  teacher Mrs. Price, a beautifully exotic and charismatic figure. Justine wishes desperately to be Mrs. Price’s “pet,” as do all the other girls. When things begin to go missing, and fueled by Mrs. Price’s subtle accusations, suspicion turns to Justine’s friend Amy and soon the entire class sees Amy as the thief.  The story takes a very dark turn as rabid racism and misogyny bring tragic results. We are never sure if Justine is a completely reliable narrator, and until the very end, we wonder how the events of 1984 impact her present 2014 existence.  A deeply engrossing and disturbing novel with a myriad of moral implications - highly recommended!

 

Dear Great Book Guru, There are so many wonderful events coming up in December: the Scrooge Stroll, the Holiday Lighting, Introduction to The Nutcracker, the Hanukah Happening …. How will I find time for a good book?  I’ll definitely need something very compelling. Any ideas?   Devoted December Reader

Dear Devoted December Reader, I recently read a wonderful book that I literally could not put down: DAY by Michael Cunningham. Set on one day - April 5th - over three years – 2019, 2020, 2021 - the novel is a bit reminiscent of Wilder’s OUR TOWN. We meet Dan - an aging 40ish rock star clinging to his tarnished glory days; his wife Isabel - a successful magazine editor in a time when magazines are dying; Robbie - her brother, a middle school NYC teacher; the children, Nathan and Violet - five and ten and each very quirky; and finally Wolfe – a cyber avatar created by Robbie.  Wolfe has a legion of devoted Instagram followers who have no idea he is not real.  In the 2019 piece, the family is introduced, and no one is particularly happy - Robbie has broken up with Oliver and is in search of a new apartment and job; Dan and Isabel are bickering and concerned about their marriage and careers; the children are a noisy distraction.  The only successful character is Wolfe - the cyber creation. Of course, everything has changed when 2020 arrives… or has anything really changed as the Covid lockdown begins?  The final chapters deal with a post-Covid world and we see how each of our characters has fared.  A fascinating look into a complex family facing extraordinary times in the most ordinary of ways.  Highly recommended!