I just finished Pachinko by Min Jin Lee and highly recommend it. I’m a sucker for novels about immigrants and this book doesn’t disappoint–it’s the story of an ethnic Korean family living in Japan and the discrimination the family members experience at the hands of the Japanese–the story opens with the family living in Korea, which has been annexed by the Japanese. Later, the family relocates to Osaka, Japan. I learned a great deal about the dynamics between Japanese and Koreans in the mid-twentieth century, which I didn’t know. Plus, there’s lots of family drama. The book was a finalist for the National Book Award.
It’s been a really long time since I’ve read that …
Another recommendation here for The Woman in the Window. The Audible narrator is also very good.
Just finished News of the World. Thank you for the recommendation. Sweet story.
I’m going to dive right into The Captured, the author highly recommends it for more history on European-Americans captured by NA tribes.
Two thumbs up for another Louise Penny Inspector Gamache book. Number 4 “The Brutal Telling”. Love this series!
Sanderson is my younger son’s favorite author. I think he’s too wordy and his world building is too complicated, but I keep reading his books anyway.
@Bromfield2, I’m so happy to read your post (#4882) because we just chose Pachinko for the next CC book discussion in June.
“Defending Jacob” William Landlay-
You won’t want to put this one down once you start- you’ve been warned !
I just finished The Woman in the Window. Enjoyed it!
@Bromfield2 Agree with you about Pachinko. Great book and I learned a lot too.
Late to the party, but finally reading “Where’d You Go Bernadette.” Wanted to read it before movie comes out. Enjoying it - particularly the talent of the narrator on Audible - actor Kathleen Wilhoite.
I admit, I didn’t really care for the Bernadette book. Flakey people don’t do it for me.
^^^^I enjoyed Defending Jacob and read it when it first came out (2012). I’m surprised that Landay hasn’t published any books since then. I’d definitely buy one of his new works.
Just finished reading How to Stop Time by Matt Haig. Wow. Amazing. Written from the perspective of someone born in the 1500s, who ages very very slowly.
Sort of a more philosophical and historical Tuck Everlasting with some mafia thrills thrown in. Really got me thinking about the nature of life, love, and loss, and how to find meaning and purpose.
And it had an actual ending! So many books these days seem to stop short. I like everything wrapped up and this book did, very nicely.
I wasn’t wild about The Leavers, but it was a hit with my book club, and the discussion was lively and lengthy. I have to pick a book for the group in a few months, and I always feel anxious at the thought of forcing 12 people to read my selection, so if anyone has had great success with a fiction or non-fiction book club choice (meaning most, but not necessarily all, liked it, and the discussion was in-depth and enthusiastic), I’d love to hear about it. (A Gentleman in Moscow was a recent choice adored by all.) There are many books I’ve enjoyed recently, but they don’t necessarily work for book club purposes. Oldies but goodies are welcome, too.
I thought some of the best CC bookclub discussions were for The Storied Life of A. J. Frikry and a collection of short stories by Alice Munro. We also had a great discussion about A.S. Byatt’s Possession.
Various friends & family have raved about “Defending Jacob”. I may be alone in my opinion. I listened (audiobook) to just after Jacob was arrested, and felt strongly that this NEVER would have happened. The actions of Jacob’s parents seemed completely unbelievable to me. (There are lots of stories that require a suspension of disbelief. But this one didn’t pass, for me.)
@downtoearth The Woman in the Window is an I can’t put this down/must see what happens book!
I wasn’t wild about “Defending Jacob.”
Here are a few of my recent reads that I recommend: “The Inheritance,” a very readable nonfiction book about research on Alzheimer’s disease, focusing on one family in which many family members have had early-onset Alzheimer’s. “32 Yolks,” by Eric Ripert, a well-known chef, about his life until he came to the United States. “The Anatomy of Dreams,” by Chloe Benjamin, a novel about dreams and relationships; much of the action takes place in Madison. “All Grown Up,” a novel by Jami Attenberg, about a single woman in her late 30s and her relationships and family.
@MommaJ
These two non-fictions have left lasting and strong impressions:
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one is “evicted, poverty and profit in the American city”. The author went to live in low-rent apartment and got to know the renters and landlords in Milwaukee, the many working-poor’s plights and daily struggle to keep a roof over their heads are pretty sad to see. I just listened to an interview of him and as it turned out, his family lost their home to foreclosure when he was in school.
https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/25852784-evicted -
Another one is about the great migration of the African Americans during the first half of the 20th century “the warmth of other sun”, the author herself is a child of blacks who migrated to DC area. She followed three separate blacks and traced their lives in the south and the subsequent migration to Chicago, NYC, and LA respectively. She also interviewed hundreds of others, it is a great historical record of the period, and allows me to better understand this important part of American history.
https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/8171378-the-warmth-of-other-suns?ac=1&from_search=true