Hello
This week we throw a spotlight on a veritable smorgasbord of different topics from 1980s New York to 1940s India and the repercussions of Partition. Along the way we meet Shakespeare's muse and the Writers & Readers book club. Viet Thanh Nguyen's debut novel The Sympathizer has been much in the news this week due to it winning this year's Pulitzer Prize for Fiction. You can read our review and "beyond the book" article; and browse "readalikes" to other similar books. A couple of weeks ago we included a new feature of notable books published that week and asked whether you would like this to be a regular addition. The answer was a resounding "yes"! So " Published This Week" is back, and will be included in many future issues. Last, but far from least, we have 50 copies of The 100 Year Miracle by Ashley Ream to give away!
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  1. First Impressions: Members Recommend
Each month we give away books to U.S. resident members to read and review (or discuss). Members who choose to participate receive a free book about every three months. Here are their opinions on one recent release.  The Dark Lady's Mask by Mary Sharratt Publisher: Houghton Mifflin Harcourt
Publication Date: Apr 2016
Historical Fiction, 416 pages
Number of reader reviews: 24
Readers' consensus: 4.3/5.0
Members Say "I couldn't put down The Dark Lady's Mask and I didn't want it to end. The story is a rich tapestry, finely woven with exquisite details of place, well-developed characters, highly evolved themes. It is a novel of Shakespeare's muse, yet more deeply it is a story of an educated woman and the on-going challenges faced by educated women. This book is wonderful in all aspects and especially in its portrayal of women, society, religion, arts, and commerce of the Elizabethan age. A must read!" - Grace W. (Corona del Mar, CA) "A gripping novel that brings alive the historical poet, Aemeia Bassano Lanier... Beautifully researched and filled with rich historical details, this is a great read for those who love historical fiction or those who would enjoy a vivid story." - Lois P. (Hillsborough, NC) "Part way through I had to do some research to see what was real about this character, and, to my surprise...it all was! And that is what made it really interesting and a great read. A wonderful addition to my Shakespeare trivia." - Peggy H. (North East, PA) More info | Read all the reviews Buy at Amazon | B&N | Indie
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 2. Editor's Choice 
An Unrestored Woman by Shobha Rao
Hardcover (Mar 2016), 256 pages.
Publisher: Flatiron Books.
BookBrowse Rating: 5/5, Critics' Consensus: 5.0/5
Reviewed by Naomi Benaron
On August 15, 1947, the British pulled out of India after eighty-nine years of Colonial rule. In their haste to leave, they agreed to demands by the All India Muslim League (a political party led by Muhammad Ali Jinnah) and partitioned the territory into two countries -India and Pakistan - along an ill conceived and carelessly drawn boundary known as the Radcliffe Line. Partition resulted in the displacement of approximately 15 million people and roughly one million deaths, as masses fled the resultant explosion of violence between Hindus, Sikhs, and Muslims. The twelve stories in Shobha Rao's debut collection, An Unrestored Woman, circle outward from the event of Partition like ripples from a stone thrown into a lake. In breathtaking, expansive prose, she reveals the devastating effects of Partition that still reverberate today, crossing the ocean to Europe and the New World with the immigrants who seek a better life there. The stories focus largely on the violence done to women and children, whom Rao calls "the most vulnerable" of victims, but beyond that, they illuminate the terrible choices one is forced to make when the known world spirals out of control, and the resultant trauma that passes down to future generations like mutations in the cultural DNA. continued... Full access to our reviews & beyond the book articles are for members only. But there are always four free Editor's Choice reviews and beyond the book articles available.
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 3. Beyond the Book India's Partition and Its Lingering Effects Every time BookBrowse reviews a book we also explore a related topic. Here is a recent "beyond the book" article written by Naomi Benaron for An Unrestored Woman by Shobha Rao  At the stroke of midnight on August 15, 1947, Britain withdrew from India and the country split into two so as to form an independent Muslim country to the north-east and north-west of India. Although the British withdrew essentially without incident, the decision to partition India set off a tsunami of violence and what is considered the largest single episode of human migration in history. Somewhere between 12 and 15 million people - depending on the source - abandoned their generational homelands and fled, Muslims to West and East Pakistan (now Bangladesh), and non-Muslims, including Hindus, Sikhs, and Christians, to India. Between 1 and 2 million people were murdered... Partition remains one of the defining moments in Indian and Pakistani culture, leaving deep trans-generational wounds. continued.... Read this article in full | More about this book
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 4. Author Interview  Molly Prentiss discusses her first novel, Tuesday Nights in 1980 - a debut novel that follows a critic, an artist, and their shared muse as they find their way - and ultimately collide - amid the ever-evolving New York City art scene of the 1980s.
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 5. Book Club Q&A  Writers As Readers is an offshoot of In Print, a professional writers' organization, based in Rockford, IL. They currently have eleven active members, all women, between the ages of 48 and 78, and they are all at different stages of their writing careers. They read their book club selections with both the eye of a reader and the red pen of a writer. Read the Q&A
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 6. Readalikes for The Sympathizer 
Winner of 2016 Pulitzer Prize for Fiction. The Sympathizer is a startling debut novel featuring one of the most remarkable narrators of recent fiction: a conflicted subversive and idealist working as a double agent in the aftermath of the Vietnam War.
More about this book
If you liked The Sympathizer, try these:
Hardcover & ebook Aug 2015, paperback Aug 2016
A thrilling and cinematic work of sophisticated suspense and haunting lyricism, set in motion by characters who can neither trust each other nor trust themselves.
Paperback Dec 2015, also in hardcover & ebook
In January 1991, when civil war came to Mogadishu, two-thirds of the city's population fled. Among them was eight-year-old Asad Abdullahi.
Paperback & ebook Aug 2015
Three American ex-POWs are accused of murdering their former prison guard, and Cordell Logan - pilot, aspiring Buddhist, and former military assassin - is sent to Vietnam to investigate.
Paperback Feb 2015, also available in hardcover & ebook
These stories - based on traditional Vietnamese tales - blends the old world and the new with fantastical, chilling, and original explorations of the ghosts that continue to haunt us: those of the Vietnam War.
Paperback Jul 2014, also available in hardcover & ebook
A magnum opus that brings to life an intricate portrait of catastrophic events that led up to the war on terror and the America we are today.
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 7. Published This Week
Interested to know what notable books published this week? Click on any of the book jacket images to view info about the book on BookBrowse.
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 8. Fifty Hardcover Copies to Give Away!
 The 100 Year Miracle by Ashley ReamPublished May 2016
320 pages
Enter the Giveaway From the Jacket Once a century, for only six days, the bay around a small Washington island glows like a water-bound aurora. Dr. Rachel Bell, a scientist studying the 100-Year Miracle and the tiny sea creatures that create it, knows a secret about the phenomenon that inspired the region's myths and folklore: the rare green water may contain a power that could save Rachel's own life (and change the world). When Rachel connects with Harry and Tilda, a divorced couple cohabiting once again as Harry enters the last stages of a debilitating disease, Harry is pulled into Rachel's obsession and hope as they both grasp at this once-in-a-lifetime chance to save themselves. But the Miracle does things to people. Strange and mysterious things. And as these things begin to happen, Rachel has only six days to uncover and control the Miracle's secrets before the waters go dark for another hundred years. Reviews The 100 Year Miracle is a rich, enthralling novel, full of great characters, with an unpredictable plot and a fascinating premise built around an eternally crucial human question: to what ends will people go to save themselves? Ashley Ream is a terrific writer --fluid, intelligent, literary, and ballsy --and she never loses the courage of her convictions or pulls any punches. I loved this book from the riveting opening scenes to the darkly powerful ending." --Kate Christensen, author of The Great Man, winner of the 2008 PEN/Faulkner Award for Fiction "A novel of loss, obsession and secrets, The 100 Year Miracle asks how far any of us would go to end our pain - physical, emotional - even if it had devastating repercussions. Ashley Ream's Olloo'et Island is a lonely place, but not unforgiving; that's why you should visit." - Miranda Beverly-Whittemore, New York Times bestselling author of Bittersweet 50 people will each win a hardcover copy of The 100 Year Miracle. This giveaway is open to residents of the USA only. Enter the giveaway Past Winners
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