Published by Back Bay Books, 2004, 294 pages. “When a child is born in Tahiti, her placenta is buried under a tree and the child and the tree grow together. A healthy tree means a healthy child just as a sick tree means a sick child.” Set in Tahiti, this book is about the relationship …
The Blue Sky—A Novel: Galsan Tschinag
Translated from German by Katharina RoutPublished by Milkweed Editions, 2006, 209 pages. Original version published in 1994. “Grandma was human silk. That’s what Father said, and what he said was always right. Always. And she had been sent to me by the sky.” The Blue Sky is a coming-of-age story about a boy living in …
Everything the Light Touches–A Novel: Janice Pariat
Published by Fourth Estate/Harper Collins, 2022, 491 pages. “Not everything the light touches can be seen.” “‘To strive, to seek, to find, dear Evie,’, her grandmother would sing, ‘and never to yield.’“‘Never to yield to what?’ she would ask. ...“‘A life bereft of wonder.’” Four people, separated by time and place, embarking on four journeys, …
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Travelling the World through Books
Photo: Triff via Shutterstock A young girl runs away to search for the illegitimate child she has had to give up. A boy leaves his family to look for his older brother. A woman tries to build bridges with her estranged son. A man tries to make sense of his younger brother’s death. When I …
Death and the Penguin: Andrey Kurkov
Translated from Russian by George BirdPublished by Vintage Books, 2003, 228 pages. Original version published in 1996. Victor lives in Kyiv with his pet penguin, Misha, whom he acquired when the local zoo was giving away animals they could no longer feed. Viktor makes a living writing obituaries (obelisks) for the newspaper Capital News. His …
The Shining: Stephen King
Published by Hodder & Stoughton, and Anchor, 1977, 497 pages. “Now his ears were open and he could hear them again, the gathering, ghosts or spirits or maybe the hotel itself, a dreadful funhouse where all the sideshows ended in death... It was a living sound, but not voices, not breath. ... [T]o Danny it …
Fireflies: Luis Sagasti
Translated from Spanish by Fionn PetchPublished by Charco Press, 2017, 97 pages. Original version published in 2011. “Ever since people raised their heads for the first time to observe the stars and began telling them apart by nothing more than the invisible threads of frozen silver that link them, they also began to tell stories.” …
Exploring Memory: An Interview with Davina Quinlivan
Davina Quinlivan is a British writer and lecturer. Her book Shalimar: A Story of Place and Migration is a mix of memoir, travel and nature writing. Davina is a lecturer in the Department of English and Creative Writing at the University of Exeter, and Writer in Residence with Literature Works/Quay Words and the Royal Devon …
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The Forgotten Promise: Paula Greenlees
Published by Penguin, 2022, 512 pages. Two girls grow up together in 1920s British Malaya: Ella, the daughter of the English owner of a tin mine and his Malayan wife, and Noor, the daughter of the family’s cook. The girls are inseparable, even though Ella’s mother does not seem to approve. The girls swear a …
Swiss Watching—Inside the Land of Milk and Money: Diccon Bewes
Published by Nicholas Brealey Publishing, 2018, 352 pages. What does Switzerland mean to most people? Cows, chocolate, banking, cheese and mountains—these were some of the responses Diccon Bewes got when he put the question to 100 non-Swiss people. Yes, Switzerland is all these things but there is so much more to this country. In his …
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Talking About Books 