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Reviews by Diane P. (Concord, MA)

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Far From True
Far From True: A Promise Falls Novel
by Linwood Barclay
What is in a conclusion? (1/24/2016)
For every admirable aspect of this novel, there is an equally puzzling deficit. Linwood Barclay is a fine writer. By this statement I mean, he avoids clichés, in a genre ("thriller" fiction) given to formulae and banalities. His story line is well-crafted, and despite the …more
Home by Nightfall
Home by Nightfall: A Charles Lenox Mystery
by Charles Finch
Lennox at his best (10/29/2015)
Charles Finch has done it again. He has written an engaging, multi-faceted mystery for his well-honed detective, Charles Lennox, to resolve. Replete with historical insights and intriguing details about London and country life in the late nineteenth century Victorian …more
Everybody Rise
Everybody Rise
by Stephanie Clifford
Not Everybody Can Rise (4/18/2015)
Stephanie Clifford's novel, Everybody Rise, resonates with wit and irony as she presents the resilience of "Edith Wharton"s New York" as it clashes with newcomers who arrive in the city without the pedigree of being raised with the New Yorker on their bedside table or a …more
Whispering Shadows
Whispering Shadows
by Jan-Philipp Sendker
At what cost (1/28/2015)
The unexpected confluence of two events in my own life—the loss of a child and a son's recent wedding in Shenzhen—made my journey through Jan-Phillipp Sendker's novel, Whispering Shadows, startlingly intimate. This coincidence afforded me a clear perspective on the …more
The Life I Left Behind
The Life I Left Behind
by Colette McBeth
A must read (11/11/2014)
The protagonist of Colette McBeth's absorbing novel, The Life I left Behind, Melody characters undoubtedly have last names, but they seem irrelevant, opines that to finish reading the notes Eve left behind is to "lose" her. In every way I too hesitated to finish this novel …more
Island of a Thousand Mirrors
Island of a Thousand Mirrors
by Nayomi Munaweera
The Island of a Thousand Mirrors (9/10/2014)
There is nothing civil about war--perhaps particularly a "civil war." The oxymoron nature of that couplet becomes stunningly poignant in Nayomi Meenaway's compelling novel about Sri Lanka. Two female protagonists provide the first person narratives and persuade the reader …more
In Praise of Hatred
In Praise of Hatred
by Khaled Khalifa
In Praise of Hatred (3/27/2014)
If you are willing to suspend clarity of place and time, entering into Khaled Khalifa's dreamscape novel, In Praise of Hatred, immerses the reader in an intimate sense of modern Syria (1980s) through the eyes of a radicalized, young woman. Her home, albeit the home of her …more
The Headmaster's Wife
The Headmaster's Wife
by Thomas Christopher Greene
Worth the read (1/5/2014)
In this novel, Thomas Greene has adroitly captured the pitch-perfect tone of pre-1960's and 1990's boarding school life, as well as a trenchant understanding of adolescent impunity, along with adult longing and despair. Greene quickly establishes his cynical protagonist, …more
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    The Devil Finds Work
    by James Baldwin
    A book-length essay on racism in American films, by "the best essayist in this country" (The New York Times Book Review).
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