S.J. Parris
S.J. Parris writes about her inspiration for Heresy, which masterfully blends true events with fiction into a page-turning murder mystery set on the sixteenth-century Oxford University campus.
Adam Haslett
A conversation with Adam Haslett, author of Union Atlantic, a deeply affecting portrait of the modern gilded age, the first decade of the twenty-first century.
Since their mother's death, Tip and Teddy Doyle have been raised by their loving, possessive, and ambitious father. As the former mayor of Boston, Bernard Doyle wants to see his sons in politics, a dream the boys have never shared. But when an argument in a blinding New England snowstorm inadvertently causes an accident that involves a stranger and her child, all Bernard Doyle cares about is his ability to keep his children—all his children—safe.
Set over a period of twenty-four hours, Run takes us from the Museum of Comparative Zoology at Harvard to a home for retired Catholic priests in downtown Boston. It shows us how worlds of privilege and poverty can coexist only blocks apart from each other, and how family can include people you've never even met. As in her bestselling novel Bel Canto, Ann Patchett illustrates the humanity that connects disparate lives, weaving several stories into one surprising and endlessly moving narrative. Suspenseful and stunningly executed, Run is ultimately a novel about secrets, duty, responsibility, and the lengths we will go to protect our children.
Book Reviews
BookBrowse - Lee Gooden
There is a magical quality to the writing - not a hocus-pocus abracadabra, pull a rabbit out of the hat magic, but a more primal magic that makes one shiver in realization that below the mundane every-day world is a shimmering substrata of unconditional love. Full Review (members only, 811 words).
Library Journal - Sarah Conrad Weisman
[A]n engrossing and enjoyable novel. While there are a few unexpected turns, the reader very quickly figures out where the plot is headed, but that does not detract from the pleasure of reading.
Publishers Weekly
[T]he book is lovely to read and is satisfyingly bold in its attempt to say something patient and true about family. "Signature review" by Andrew O'Hagan.
The Boston Athenaeum
As the fates of her exquisitely rendered, wholly sympathetic characters unfold, Patchett has much to tell us about ourselves and how we choose to live our lives.
The Times - Helen Dunmore
Chance and accident rule this novel. Ann Patchett’s characters may believe that they possess their lives and construct their own stories, but as the narrative twists and swerves these assumptions are swept away. Just as a regulated and smoothly-running city can be paralysed by a snowstorm, so the five people who step out of the Kennedy School will never live out the futures they hold in their heads.
The Guardian - Patrick Ness
This is above all a book about good people who try to do their best by each other. Patchett's great strength is to accomplish this without sentiment or stupidity. While there may never be a great, evil Ann Patchett villain, there is sadness, and if it is surrounded by compassion rather than starkness, by good humour rather than bitterness, why should that make it any less affecting?
The Telegraph (UK) - Judith Hawley
This is a humane and sympathetic novel. It shifts between characters, linking them through verbal echoes. We move easily from the dreams of one to the reveries of another without feeling that liberties are being taken with the reader's trust.
You are about to travel to Edgecombe St. Mary, a small village in the English countryside filled with rolling hills, thatched cottages, and a cast of characters both hilariously original and as familiar as the members of your own family.
The Postmistress is an unforgettable tale of the secrets we must bear, or bury. It is about what happens to love during wartime, when those we cherish leave. And how every story-of love or war-is about looking left when we should have been looking right.
Masterfully blending true events with fiction, this blockbuster historical thriller delivers a page-turning murder mystery set on the sixteenth-century Oxford University campus.
Kostova's masterful new novel travels from American cities to the coast of Normandy, from the late 19th century to the late 20th, from young love to last love. The Swan Thieves is a story of obsession, history's losses, and the power of art to preserve human hope.
Lisa See has written a great book! This story is satisfying on many levels, some scenes horrifying, but seemingly truthful, and her handling of the ...
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I was sorry to see that there were so few reviews. I started reading COAL and could not stop. The only thing I am going to say is that I wish ...
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The tragedy, the sorrow, the loss, is almost too much for me to recommend this; on the other hand Mistry made me believe I knew these characters. I ...
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Amazon 'buy button' rumors abound(Mar 18 2010) Rumors swirled today that Amazon could revoke the buy buttons for books by Simon & Schuster, HarperCollins, Penguin, or Hachette if the major publishers can't...
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Amazon's e-pricing threats(Mar 18 2010) With Apple's iPad launch just weeks away, Amazon raised the stakes again when it threatened to stop directly selling the books of some publishers online...
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Run
(members only, 811 words).
Library Journal - Sarah Conrad Weisman
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