reviews

A Stagnant Seaside Romance Author: Anita Shreve Twenty-nine year old Sydney is once divorced and once widowed. Seeking refuge from a shattered future, she takes a job tutoring the “slow” daughter of the Edwards at their ocean-front, New Hampshire beach house. Seduced by the atmosphere of sand and summer, Sydney watches the Edwards with a curious detachment, especially when their two eldest sons arrive for the summer. Caught in one of her body surfing escapades, the two brothers are fascinated by Sydney. So begins Sydney’s strange love of one brother and suspicious hate of the other. Convinced that three times [...]

A Classic Inspection of Grief Author: Alice Seabold   “My name was Salmon, like the fish; first name, Susie. I was fourteen when I was murdered on December 6, 1973." Susie Salmon, murdered and raped at fourteen by a brutal man, cannot let go of her earth bound existence and all that might have been. Imprisoned in her own heaven, a place which does not solve all calamities (and does not remove loneliness), Susie watches her fractured family and her killer as the years progress. Death does not end the sense of seeking for explanations in brutal places, and while Susie’s [...]

Back on my classics kick, I pulled out my trusty, completely random Google list of the top 100 novels and was pleased to see that, thankfully, War and Peace was not the next in line. Instead, a gothic novella told by my all-time favorite childhood writer, Robert Louis Stevenson, greeted me. The Strange Case of Doctor Jekyll and Mr. Hyde is a story most famous for its reiterations and its seepage into popular culture terms and phrases. Even as a child, watching TV shows, the cartoon characters would act out the story of the mad scientist and a potion that [...]