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Reviews of novels, movies and writing events.

Ghost Novel Review in Honor of Banned Book Week

Ghost Novel Review in Honor of Banned Book Week

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Read a banned book! Celebrate your subversive inner self! I came across an interesting post at Insatiable Booksluts. Did you know this is banned book week? This year it takes place from September 24th to October 1st. The American Library Association sponsors this week to promote awareness of our right to free speech and free (as in unhindered) reading. Think about the literary censorship and mind control of the Nazis and the Cultural Revolution and our very own McCarthy. In fiction,…

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Ghost Novel Review: Black Rose by Nora Roberts

Ghost Novel Review: Black Rose by Nora Roberts

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  Black Rose by Nora Roberts This is not Hamlet, nor was meant to be. Instead, it is a fun romp through the land of the good and the haunted with a satisfying measure of revenge thrown in. The prologue introduces Amelia, a jilted Victorian mistress (circa 1892), who wields revenge for her suffering from beyond the grave. To read my post on prologues, click here. Enter modern day Roz—tough but fair, hard-driven but forgiving—with ex-beau complications of her own….

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Book Review: The Distant Hours

Book Review: The Distant Hours

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The Distant Hours by Kate Morton Atria Books, 560 pages. I hesitated to review this book because the supernatural element is so subtle–as subtle as the wisp of a ghost’s gown, a ghost more suggestion than apparition. Yet within these pages you will find whispering stones and unexplained stains and distant laughter. Even a ghostly glimpse here or there. Or was that merely a trick of the light? Things go bump in the night, but, generally speaking, they assume humanoid…

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Book Review: The Keep

Book Review: The Keep

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Ghost Novel Review: The Keep by Jennifer Egan I had gone in search of A Visit from the Goon Squad for Laurie’s book group. My library didn’t have it, but I stumbled upon The Keep instead. Intrigued by the title, I picked it up and read the jacket. The only other Egan book I had read was The Invisible Circus, which I liked but didn’t love, yet I decided to give The Keep a try—possibly because of the hint of…

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Guest Review: The Haunting of Hill House

Guest Review: The Haunting of Hill House

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The Haunting of Hill House by Shirley Jackson Publisher: Penguin Classics, 182 pages Format: paperback Source: Guest review Hi Everyone, Today we are hearing from one of our dedicated readers, Allegra Johnson, who is offering her thoughts on a classic ghost novel. Thank you, Allegra, for sharing your insights! From Allegra: My path to reading The Haunting of Hill House by Shirley Jackson, a long-time favorite of mine, really started with a movie—a bad movie at that.  I’m not above saying…

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The Blob Monster

The Blob Monster

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Hi, guys. My apologies. I know you have been anticipating the next installment of ghost novel reviews, which is now officially overdue. I was away all weekend at a family reunion in Squirrel, Idaho–beautiful, idyllic spot–and then arrived home with a virus. You know: sore throat, headache, that swirling feeling. To get an idea of how I look, at least on the inside, check out this picture.     The good news is that each day is better, so I…

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Book Review: The Story of Edgar Sawtelle

Book Review: The Story of Edgar Sawtelle

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  The Story of Edgar Sawtelle by David Wroblewski Publisher: Harper Collins, 562 pages Format: Hardcover Source: Purchased What it’s about: The Story of Edgar Sawtelle begins, unexpectedly, in 1952 Busan with a secret night meeting between a US serviceman and a Korean herbalist. The service man offers penicillin in exchange for poison. The herbalist says, “I think here we trade one life for one life” (5).     The prologue ends without naming the serviceman, and chapter one begins with…

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Ghost Novel Review: The Turn of the Screw

Ghost Novel Review: The Turn of the Screw

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The Turn of the Screw by Henry James Publisher: Dover Thrift, 87 pages Format: Paperback Source: Purchased What it’s about: Perhaps you know the gist of the story: naïve, love-starved governess seeks countryside post teaching suspiciously angelic children who are wards of a handsome, mysterious, unavailable (emotionally as well as geographically) landowner. The novella opens in a fireside gathering of friends eager to share ghost stories. The women are particularly thirsting for bloody and gory narratives. The host explains the…

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Ghost Novel Review: Heart-Shaped Box

Ghost Novel Review: Heart-Shaped Box

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The Heart-Shaped Box by Joe Hill Publisher: Harper Collins, 366 pages Format: Paperback Source: Purchased What it’s about: Ex-rock star Judas Coyne (born Justin Cowzinski) has seen it all and done everything good and bad, or believes he has. Now he collects grisly artifacts or memento mori just to make himself feel alive.When he hears about a ghost for sale on an auction site, he cannot resist purchasing it. Once the black heart-shaped box arrives, Judas opens it to discover…

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Take an Author to Book Group

Take an Author to Book Group

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Bringing Home an Author I’ve mentioned Laurie’s book group before. We are a mixed group of mature (interpret this word as you wish!) and urbane women who meet monthly to chaw over books as diverse as The Invisible Man (Ellison’s, not Wells’) and Persuasion (Austen’s not Lakhani’s). Plus women’s fiction and exposés and mysteries and story collections. For our last meeting we read Breaking Out of Bedlam by Leslie Larson. As a special treat, the author Herself graced our gathering….

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Ghost novel review: Her Fearful Symmetry

Ghost novel review: Her Fearful Symmetry

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Her Fearful Symmetry by Audrey Niffenegger Review Part Two Endings are so hard, aren’t they? At Laurie’s monthly book group, concerns about conclusions run high. When I listen to people describe a book, satisfaction or dissatisfaction with the ending always figures into the discussion, which generally falls into three categories. The first category involves quilting metaphors. I hear, “the threads were tied up too neatly” or “not tied up neatly enough” or “story threads were left hanging.” In the second…

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Book Review: Her Fearful Symmetry

Book Review: Her Fearful Symmetry

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Her Fearful Symmetry by Audrey Niffenegger Scribner, 406 pages. A set of twenty-year-old twins, children of a twin, receives a mysterious inheritance—a London flat adjacent to Highgate Cemetery in which the twin girls must live together for one year before assuming ownership. Soon after arrival, Julia and Valentina mix with their quirky, lovable neighbors—Martin, housebound neurotic and puzzle mastermind; Robert, cemetery scholar and leal lover of the deceased. Not to be outdone, the cemetery itself dons a quasi-character role. Into…

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Ghost Novel Review: Saving Fish from Drowning

Ghost Novel Review: Saving Fish from Drowning

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Saving Fish from Drowning by Amy Tan I so wanted to love this book. I loved the idea—a novice ghost follows her museum friends on an ill-fated tour through Myanmar. I loved Tan’s trademark fusing of myth to narrative, particularly the satiric vignette detailing how one goes about saving a fish from drowning. I loved the comforting heft of the book as I settled beneath my Tree of Life quilt and snapped on the bedside lamp. What I didn’t love…

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