2005
Two Trains Running
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I was mildly disappointed with Andrew Vachss’ sprawling new novel; I had read several of the author’s well-known, gritty Burke series, and ...Read Review
Sacagawea’s Child
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This is a great book for the Lewis and Clark enthusiast, for it was on that exploration that Sacagawea’s child, Pomp, was ...Read Review
The Minister’s Daughter
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Young Nell the merrybegot converses with piskies and fairies. Her grandmother, the healer and midwife in their English village, fosters her connection to ...Read Review
The Song of Hannah
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First-time novelist Etzioni-Halevy puts flesh on the bones of the Old Testament story of Hannah. As related here, Hannah and her girlhood friend ...Read Review
Island Wilderness: Imagining the Early Years of Martha’s Vineyard
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In June of 1671, Governor Thomas Mayhew was sole proprietor of Martha’s Vineyard. When Island Wilderness begins, he has ruled for twenty-nine years. ...Read Review
Fort Zion
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Foster creates a fictional “advance guard” of Mormons going west in 1844 to blaze the trail for the rest of the faithful. Joseph Smith, ...Read Review
Sand Mansions
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This novel, covering the years 1876 to 1905, starts out in Liberty County, Missouri. Young Nathaniel Larabee attempts to rob a bank in revenge for ...Read Review
Jass
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Swimming in the muddy waters of New Orleans jazz culture, circa 1908, private security guard and sometime detective Valentin St. Cyr roams the sordid ...Read Review
Vita
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“There’s no sense crying over misfortune. Who’s to say it’s not a fortune instead? And there’s no point in ...Read Review
Borges and the Eternal Orangutans
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In Borges and the Eternal Orangutans, the theme is that there is no such thing as a coincidence. The narrator—a meek translator ...Read Review