Weekly Words About New Books in
Independent Bookstores
June 23, 2024
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Powerful Story of Love, Loss, and Obsession Defies Easy Categorization, and Heartwarming Family Vacation Should Spread Summer Cheer | |
All the Colors of the Dark by Chris Whitaker. I am a big of fan of Whitaker's last novel, We Begin at the End, and I continue to recommend it to anyone looking for a good read. One of its strengths is the author's storytelling ability, which is compelling. Another is the characters Whitaker creates, including the wise-beyond-her-years Duchess - a young teenage girl fiercely protective of her young brother and determined to survive family failure. Given that, I was awaiting his new book both with anticipation and an awareness that it might not live up to my high expectations.
Not to worry. I know it's only June, but it's hard to imagine I will read a better work of fiction this year. Two misfit teens, Patch and Scout, become soulmates over more than two decades - and steal your heart almost from page one. At the book's outset, Patch saves a girl from a serial predator, then gets captured himself, and is placed in total darkness with a young woman being held in captivity with him. After he escapes, his obsession to find her leads him on a years-long Quixotic journey of heartbreak and Robin Hood-styled lawlessness. Through it all, he and the equally determined Scout stay connected, and events from his past impact both their lives. The story is impossible to pigeonhole - part mystery thriller, part family drama, part wrenching love story - but it's the characters that will grab you and not let you out of their grip until the final page.
And it's not just me raving. In its starred review, Publishers Weekly wrote, "With deeply affecting characters and ambition to spare, Whitaker has conjured a dazzling epic that defies easy categorization. It's astonishing."
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Sandwich by Catherine Newman. Given the critical buzz and bookseller enthusiasm surrounding this novel, Sandwich looks to be one of big summer reads of 2024. The story takes place in Cape Cod during a multi-generational family's annual week-long summer vacation. At the center is Rocky, sandwiched (sorry) between her grown children and fully aging parents while dealing with her own middle age struggles and oncoming menopause. Fortunately, unconditional love and lots of laughs are in plentiful supply, but when a chain of events sends Rocky into her past to relive a handful of long-ago summers, she comes comes face to face with her family's history and future.
Among the many glowing reviews is this from the New York Times Book Review: "Occasionally a writer comes along who seems able to turn every domestic triumph and tear, every dinner concocted, co-sleep endured and I.P.A. swallowed (or not) - in other words, the ordinary stuff of first-world life - into material rife with wit, humor and soul-bearing openness. Catherine Newman. . .is that sort of writer. . . .Impassioned, crackling, vividly detailed writing and utter hilarity. . . .If you want to laugh out loud, tear up and rush to pull out a book in the 35 seconds between subway stops, this sweet, savory, tenderhearted Sandwich fits the bill, and goes down like (bread and) buttah."
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