Translated by Ann Goldstein About the Book: The Story of the Lost Child is the concluding volume in the dazzling saga of two women — the brilliant, bookish Elena, and the fiery, uncontainable Lila. Both are now adults, with husbands, lovers, aging parents, and children. Their friendship has been the gravitational center of their lives. Both … Continue reading Book Review: The Story of the Lost Child by Elena Ferrante
Foreign Translated Novels
Book Review: The Pachinko Parlour by Elisa Shua Dusapin (trans. Aneesa Abbas Higgins)
About the Book: It is summer in Tokyo. Claire finds herself dividing her time between tutoring twelve-year-old Mieko in an apartment in an abandoned hotel and lying on the floor at her grandparents: daydreaming, playing Tetris, and listening to the sounds from the street above. The heat rises; the days slip by. The plan is … Continue reading Book Review: The Pachinko Parlour by Elisa Shua Dusapin (trans. Aneesa Abbas Higgins)
Book Review: Violeta by Isabel Allende
About the Book: One extraordinary woman. One hundred years of history. One unforgettable story. Violeta comes into the world on a stormy day in 1920, the first daughter in a family of five boisterous sons. From the start, her life is marked by extraordinary events. The ripples of the Great War are still being felt, … Continue reading Book Review: Violeta by Isabel Allende
Book Review: The Survivors by Alex Schulman
About the Book: A suspenseful, haunting novel about three brothers and their reckoning with the events of one disputed, disastrous summer. Benjamin sees the shape of his two brothers trying to kill each other. It's no worthy finale, but perhaps it's also no surprise. How else had they expected this to end? Three brothers return … Continue reading Book Review: The Survivors by Alex Schulman
Book Review: People Like Them by Samira Sedira (trans. Lara Vergnaud)
About the Book: Winner of the Prix Eugène Dabit There are no monsters. Only humans. Anna and Constant Guillot and their two daughters live in the peaceful, remote mountain village of Carmac. Everyone in Carmac knows each other, leading simple lives mostly unaffected by the outside world – that is until Bakary and Sylvia Langlois … Continue reading Book Review: People Like Them by Samira Sedira (trans. Lara Vergnaud)
Book Review: Whereabouts by Jhumpa Lahiri
About the Book: The new novel from the Pulitzer Prize-winning, Man Booker Prize-shortlisted author: a haunting portrait of a woman, her decisions, her conversations, her solitariness, in a beautiful and lonely Italian city. The woman moves through the city, her city, on her own. She moves along its bright pavements; she passes over its bridges, … Continue reading Book Review: Whereabouts by Jhumpa Lahiri
Book Review: Winter in Sokcho by Elisa Shua Dusapin (trans. Aneesa Abbas Higgins)
About the Book: Winner of the Prix Robert Walser — a beautiful, unexpected novel from a debut French-Korean author. It’s winter in Sokcho, a tourist town on the border between South and North Korea. The cold slows everything down. Bodies are red and raw, the fish turn venomous, beyond the beach guns point out from … Continue reading Book Review: Winter in Sokcho by Elisa Shua Dusapin (trans. Aneesa Abbas Higgins)
Book Review: Olga by Bernhard Schlink
Olga... Translated by Charlotte Collins About the Book: The life of one woman - Olga - from late 19th century Prussia to modern Germany. A novel of love, passion, and history, from beloved modern master Bernhard Schlink. Olga is an orphan raised by her grandmother in a Prussian village around the turn of the 20th … Continue reading Book Review: Olga by Bernhard Schlink
Book Review: Those Who Leave and Those Who Stay by Elena Ferrante
Those Who Leave and Those Who Stay... Translated by Ann Goldstein About the Book: Since the publication of the acclaimed My Brilliant Friend and The Story of A New Name, Elena Ferrante’s reputation has grown enormously. Her novels about the friendship between Lila and Elena, about the mysteries of human relationships, are utterly compelling. In … Continue reading Book Review: Those Who Leave and Those Who Stay by Elena Ferrante
Book Review: The Lying Life of Adults by Elena Ferrante
The Lying Life of Adults Translated by Ann Goldstein About the Book: A powerful new novel set in a divided Naples by Elena Ferrante, the beloved best-selling author of My Brilliant Friend. Giovanna's pretty face has changed: it's turning into the face of an ugly, spiteful adolescent. But is she seeing things as they really … Continue reading Book Review: The Lying Life of Adults by Elena Ferrante
Theresa Smith Writes 