British crime writer Kate Atkinson’s novel Started Early, Took My Dog is the fourth book I’ve now read by this author and I can officially add her to my list of favourite writers. Crime Fiction is a genre I never paid much attention to in the past but her writing style and quirky characters get me immediately absorbed into the plot. Started Early, Took My Dog once…
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The Daughter’s Tale illustrates a mother’s unrelenting love for her children
Historical fiction is a genre I particularly love and find hard to resist. Reading as many non-fiction and fiction books as I do, however, about the Second World War can at times become soul-sapping. I’ve just finished The Daughter’s Tale by Armando Lucas Correa, the story of a young Jewish woman’s last-minute escape from Berlin just before the start of World War II. Amanda Sternberg is…
The story behind Dr. Zhivago is as fascinating as the novel itself
It’s not a coincidence that Lara Prescott, the author of The Secrets We Kept is named after one of the main characters in Dr. Zhivago by famous Nobel-prize winning writer Boris Pasternak. With the first name of one of the lead characters, Lara Prescott was obviously born with an inherent interest in the novel and its story. Boris Pasternak was one of Russia’s most famous…
My Life as a Rat was not a fair sentence for an admission of truth
A rat is someone who snitches on another person—someone who breaks a moral code by revealing the transgressions of a friend or family member. In My Life as a Rat, a new novel by Joyce Carol Oates, the snitch is a 12-year-old girl and the price she pays for breaking the code far exceeds what is fair and justified or what she deserved. Violet Kerrigan was…
Jesse Thistle recounts his life From The Ashes of drugs and addiction to a life of helping others
When I saw Jesse Thistle interviewed on CTV’s The Social and heard his remarkable story, I just knew I had to read his memoir, From The Ashes, My Story of Being Metis, Homeless, and Finding My Way. It’s an honest, horrific recounting of his journey from being a homeless drug addict living on the streets of various cities for many years and serving time in prison…
Who was the woman in Hitler’s bathtub and how did she get there?
Elizabeth “Lee” Miller was a fascinating woman and I love books about fascinating women. The Age of Light by Whitney Scharer describing the life of Lee Miller in the city of light is such a book. Miller’s glory days were spent in Paris between the wars when she was the lover, muse and assistant to the famous artist and photographer Man Ray. In a classic…