I try to read a book every week. Sometimes I succeed. Here are my takes on a few recent reads.
Great Circle by Maggie Shipstead
Great Circle is an epic, immersive novel featuring a dual timeline—historical and present day—and two heroines: Marian, a pioneering pilot, whose quest in the early 20th century is to fly a "great circle" around the world, and Hadley, the 21-century actor portraying her in a film. This big sweeping narrative is intricately structured and filled with vivid imagery and gorgeous sentences, like these:
Hitler bullies and bargains his way to the Chancellorship. When he gives speeches, his head snaps back as though his own words are punching him in the jaw.
She's starting to have work done. In twenty years she'll be a skin balloon with eyeholes.
Dawn had been a red slit, night sliced open with a scalpel...the bristly silhouettes of Joshua trees raising their clubbed arms against it.
The Love Songs of W.E.B. Du Bois by Honorée Fanonne Jeffers
This debut novel by American poet Honorée Fanonne Jeffers is a coming-of-age and intergenerational tale, spanning from Colonial times to present day. It’s the kind of novel you’ll keep thinking about long after you’ve read the last word. The backstory of enslaved Africans who forged liaisons with Creek Native Americans (both brutalized by European traders) weaves around a contemporary story of descendants of the enslaved. It is enthralling, moving, and informative. As Ron Charles of the Washington Post put it, "The Love Songs of W.E.B. Du Bois is the kind of book that comes around only once a decade. Yes, at roughly 800 pages, it is, indeed, a mountain to climb, but the journey is engrossing, and the view from the summit will transform your understanding of America."
The Magician by Colm Tóibín
Colm Tóibín is an Irish poet, playwright, journalist, and novelist. I loved his novel Brooklyn. The Magician is about the life of the German novelist Thomas Mann, the Nobel Prize-winning author of The Magic Mountain and Death in Venice, books banned by the Nazis. One of my favorite parts is how Mann's wife, Katia, was instrumental in the development of his art. His visits with her at a creepy tuberculosis sanitarium inspired his novel, The Magic Mountain. Needless to say, I'm adding The Magic Mountain to my reading list.
The Promise by Damon Galgut
The Promise, winner of the British Booker Prize, is a novel about the decline of a white family during South Africa's transition out of apartheid. The omniscient point of view is particularly effective; a clever storyteller pans in and out, capturing the distinctive landscape and setting, evoking the inner lives of a family in four sections, each one centered on family funeral.
Crossroads by Jonathan Franzen
Crossroads is the first in a family trilogy. Set in suburban Chicago in pre-Watergate 1970s, amid Vietnam War protests, Crossroads follows the lives of the Hildebrandts, a family of six headed by Russ, an associate pastor of a liberal church, as each family member confronts crises of faith and morality. No matter where you stand on Franzen’s controversial “Franzenfreude” reputation, it’s hard not to admire this novel’s vivid characterization, expert pacing, and moving portrait of a fractured family. Crossroads “does everything a great novel should do,” said Slate, urging readers to “forget all of the controversies and just read it.”
A Touch of Jen by Beth Morgan
In this wildly imaginative and smart debut novel, a young couple's toxic Instagram crush spins out of control. Yes, A Touch of Jen reckons with our social media–fueled society, but it's a millennial sex comedy peppered with witty dialogue and a dash of horror. Immensely entertaining.