Acts of violence and devotion, rape and worship, funerals and betrothals, love-scenes and convent-life, adultery and illness: this medieval saga has so many facets to it that I was not expecting. Not the least of which being that it gripped my attention more tightly than any of the contemporary novels
Ann Patchett's works have long had the attention of the Orange Prize juries. The Magician's Assistant was shortlisted for the 1998 Orange Prize, and Bel Canto won in 2002; it wasn't surprising to see State of Wonder make the jury's shortlist in 2012. The most striking element of the novel is its
Of course fantasy readers will gravitate towards this series. My shelves are clogged with Tolkien, Donaldson, Eddings, Williams and Kay, and I have had a copy of the first novel in this series since it was published in paperback. But readers of the historical saga will be smitten too:
The first story in The Moons of Jupiter is a two-parter, the first originally published in "Chatelaine" and the second in "Saturday Night", in 1979. In later collections, interconnected stories were not necessarily set apart within a collection, but these two stories are exceptionally tight-knit. And because of this, with
Last summer, walking in Little Jamaica in Toronto, I picked up a copy of a community newspaper with a cover image of protesters overseas burning the cover of Lawrence Hill's The Book of Negroes. HarperCollins, 2007 Book burning: it's a headline-grab alright. It certainly captured this reader's attention.
