GREAT READS: GERALDINE BROOKS

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Her latest novel, CALEB’S CROSSING, is fiction about an actual person:  little is known about the real Caleb except that he was a member of the Wampanoag tribe, lived on Martha’s Vineyard, and graduated from Harvard in 1665.  Also try MARCH (about the father of the famous fictional LITTLE WOMEN) and PEOPLE OF THE BOOK (history unfolds via tiny clues caught in an ancient book). 

A SMALL HOTEL by Robert Olen Butler

 

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Instead of appearing in divorce court, Kelly checks into the hotel where her relationship with Michael began twenty years ago.  Meanwhile, Michael and his much-younger girlfriend are waiting to hear that the divorce is final.  Both replay the marriage in this brief, touching novel.  Butler’s other books include HAD A GOOD TIME (stories imagined from the messages on his own postcard collection) and A GOOD SCENT FROM A STRANGE MOUNTAIN (stories about Vietnamese immigrants).

LIME CREEK by Joe Henry

 

In eight episodes, this brief novel tells the story of a Wyoming rancher, his wife, and their two sons.  The bitterness of Wyoming winters, the cycle of life and death, the love for family and the land are all explored in clear, lovely language.

TWO THRILLING TALES: John Verdon

In one, a clairvoyant correspondent;  in the other, a beheaded bride.  In both, Dave Gurney, former star NYPD detective, uneasily retired in the Catskills with an unhappy wife.  Suspense, clever plotting, great characters.  A terrific new writer.

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BIO WOODRUFF: Wickenden, Dorothy: NOTHING DAUNTED: The Unexpected Education of Two Society Girls in the West

Dorothy Woodruff and her best friend, Rosamund Underwood, were two well-connected young women:  graduates of Smith College, Class of 1910, they took the Grand Tour but soon tired of society life;  so they traveled to the snowy Colorado mountains to teach in an isolated schoolhouse.  A story of finding independence, charmingly told.

STORIES FROM THE HEARTLAND: Tom McNeal

McNeal has written two quietly powerful novels set in Nebraska.  The first, GOODNIGHT NEBRASKA, tells the story of long-time residents of and a newcomer to the small town of Goodnight.  His new book, TO BE SUNG UNDERWATER, is about a woman who has traveled far from her Nebraska roots but revisits an old relationship at a crucial time in her life.  Both books remind us that the ordinary events of daily lives can add up to something extraordinary.

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THE DRY GRASS OF AUGUST by Anna Jean Mayhew

North Carolina, 1954:  Jubie Watts, thirteen, feels closer to the family’s maid than to her distant parents.  A road trip deeper into the South awakens Jubie to racial intolerance in this sensitive debut novel.