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2010 - 2011
The Imperfectionists
by Tom Rachman
Lloyd Burko is having troubles with his sources, with his technology at the paper, and with his family. Deadline is closing in and he is falling apart. The Imperfectionists is a novel about the quirky, maddening, endearing people who write and read an international newspaper based in Rome: from the obituary reporter who will do anything to avoid work, to the young freelancer who is manipulated by an egocentric war correspondent, to the dog-obsessed publisher who seems less interested in his struggling newspaper than in his magnificent basset hound, Schopenhauer. www.tomrachman.com
Questions (pdf: 30kb)
True Confections
by Katharine Weber
Alice Tatnall Ziplinsky's greatest ambition is to belong, to feel truly entitled to the heritage she has tried so hard to earn. Which is why Zip's Candies, her husband's family's company, is so much more to her than just a business. In True Confections, Alice looks back on the family-owned-and-operated candy company, now in a crisis of intergenerational struggle over succession. www.katharineweber.com
Questions (pdf: 29kb)
Old Filth
by Jane Gardam
After a brilliant legal career in Hong Kong, Sir Edward Feathers retired with his wife Betty to Dorset, England. Now widowed, he finds himself lonely and isolated, and his thoughts slip back to his past with increasing frequency and intensity. Although he is over 80, Sir Edward is still troubled by memories of his unhappy childhood. His mother died when Edward was born and his father ignored him. Like many other “raj orphans,” as they were called, he was sent back to Britain and put in the care of a cruel foster mother. Sir Edward, nicknamed “Old Filth,” which stands for “failed in London try Hong Kong,” contemplates his long legal career, his courtship and marriage and past relationships - an eventful life lived in an eventful era.
Questions
Map of the Invisible World
by Tash Aw
Karl, a Dutch painter living in Indonesia, becomes a victim of nationalistic anti-Western sentiment incited by President Sukarno. When Karl is taken away by soldiers, his adopted son Adam is left on his own. Adam travels from Nusa Perdo, the island where he lives with Karl, to Jakarta. Following leads from his father’s photographs and diaries, Adam locates his friend Margaret Bates, who teaches at the university. “Will you help me get my father back?” he begs her. While Margaret tries to get information about Karl through her embassy contacts, Adam’s thoughts drift to his “invisible world” – his past life in the orphanage with his brother Johan. As revolutionary fervor takes over the city, Margaret and Adam’s situation becomes increasingly dangerous.
Questions
My Ántonia
by Willa Cather
Orphaned at age 10, Jim Burden is sent to live with his grandparents in Nebraska. An adaptable and optimistic child, he adjusts quickly to life on the prairie. Shortly after his arrival he and his grandmother visit the Shimerdas, a newly-arrived immigrant family from Bohemia. They speak little English and live in a squalid dugout. Ántonia , the older Shimerda daughter immediately befriends Jim and they become constant companions. Their friendship grows into a relationship of mutual respect and deep affection. Although Jim eventually attends law school at Harvard and moves to New York, his memories of his childhood in Nebraska and of Ántonia remain strong. He meets her again when they are adults and is moved to write about her.
Questions
The Breaking of Eggs
by Jim Powell
What if you found out your most fervently-held beliefs were based on lies? This is what happens to Polish-born Feliks Zhukovski , now 61 and living in Paris. When he and his brother were children, the Nazis invaded their country. Their mother sent them to safety in Switzerland, where they grew up. Feliks despised Fascism and placed his faith in the promise of Communism. Although he later resigned from the Party, he remained sympathetic to an ideology which, he believed, improved the lives of many in Eastern Europe. His naive faith is shattered when he locates his long-long brother, now living in America, and finds out what happened to his mother. How can Feliks remake his life after everything he thought he knew is proved wrong?
Questions
The Color of Lightning
by Paulette Jiles
In 1863 freed slave Britt Johnson moved with his wife Mary and their children from Kentucky to Texas with the expectation of making a better life and escaping the racism of the deep South. They escaped from a war, only to enter into a different kind of conflict. When the men of their settlement return home from a supply expedition, Britt finds that his oldest son has been killed and his wife and younger children, along with others from the settlement, have been taken captive in an Indian raid. Britt vows to ransom his family, but has to wait out the winter alone in his cabin. Meanwhile, Samuel Hammond of Philadelphia travels west, tasked with pacifying the Kiowa and Comanche by improving their lives. The backdrop of Britt’s and the Indians’ stories is the clash of cultures and of economic and political interests that fueled the Indian Wars in the Southeast.
Questions
Lima Nights
by Marie Arana
Carlos Bluhm, grandson of German immigrants, lives an orderly, protected life in a prosperous Lima neighborhood where the shops are guarded by armed sentries. He’s a successful camera importer with an elegant wife, bright, talented sons and a doting mother. He goes out drinking with his buddies and plays around a bit with women – but it’s what all the men of his class do. When he meets Maria in a tango bar, she gets under his skin like no other woman ever has. His friends disapprove of her and try to warn him, not only because she is very young, but because she is Indian. Why would he throw away his comfortable middle-class life for a chola? Twenty years later, Carlos is still asking himself this question.
Questions
The Little Stranger
by Sarah Waters
What is causing the bizarre and frightening events at Hundreds Hall, the once elegant but now crumbling mansion, residence of generations of the Ayres family? Dr. Faraday, whose mother was once a servant at the Hall, is now physician to the family. He has also developed a sentimental bond with Caroline, the Ayres daughter. As he observes the physical ruin of the house and the intensifying mental distress of its residents, he seeks a rational explanation for the mishaps that keep occurring. Is it possible there is no rational explanation? Can the house be haunted?
Questions
The Housekeeper and the Professor
by Yoko Ogawa
He had been a brilliant mathematics professor until the accident. Now he can only remember his life before the accident and the events of the previous 80 minutes. She is a single mother raising her son. She is the tenth housekeeper assigned to clean the professor’s house; the others quit in frustration with this old man who forgets everything, including their names. Unlike the others, the Housekeeper understands the professor’s frustration and finds ways to communicate with him. The strongest bond between them is her son, whom the Professor nicknames Root because the flat top of the boy’s head reminds him of the square root sign. It is not an easy life for either of them, but they form comfortable routines, until the professor’s sister-in-law has the Housekeeper removed from the job.
Questions
Titles Selected by Suzanne Fisher, Librarian
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