I have to confess - I'm not a fan of Margaret Atwood's writing. I tell people this like I'm confessing a guilty secret. Something a little dirty; certainly not something a good Canadian feminist reader and writer should think. But there it is and it's the truth. Don't get me wrong, I fully appreciate that… Continue reading Book Review: The Heart Goes Last by Margaret Atwood
Reading a book that you end up not enjoying is disappointing enough but it feels extra disappointing when you're able to see the possibilities of how good that book could have been. The God of Small Things was that kind of read for me. The story follows twin brother and sister, Estha and Rahel, and… Continue reading Book Review: The God of Small Things by Arundhati Roy
I wasn't familiar with Jenny Lawson before I read this book but she is best known for her website, The Bloggess. This is her second book and largely consists of personal stories, focusing on her own struggles with mental illness. I really applaud Lawson's honesty and her work to mitigate much of the stigma surrounding… Continue reading Book Review: Furiously Happy by Jenny Lawson
If you're familiar with Yann Martel's work (and you probably are, because he wrote Life of Pi), you know that he does things a little unusually. He writes books with taxidermied animals as the main characters (read my review of Beatrice & Virgil) and he leaves you wondering about the truth of that tiger in… Continue reading Book Review: The High Mountains of Portugal by Yann Martel
We spend too much time teaching girls to worry about what boys think of them. But the reverse is not the case. We don't teach boys to care about being likeable. We spend too much time telling girls that they cannot be angry or aggressive or tough, which is bad enough, but then we turn… Continue reading Book Review: We Should All Be Feminists by Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie
While I didn't find this to be Lewis' most compelling or convicting book, I think there's still a lot of good stuff here. It's no secret I'm a major C.S. Lewis fan. As well as enjoying his novels, he's one of my favourite Christian thinkers and he's had a major influence on my faith. In… Continue reading Book Review: Letters to Malcolm by C.S. Lewis
This is Rebecca Makkai's third book, following two novels. This short story collection is cohesive, yet diverse. There's reality television and professional musicians and family legend. Indeed, fact and fiction are mixed together here. Spliced in between the fictional stories, Makkai includes interludes of her own family history, namely that of her grandparents. Her grandmother,… Continue reading Book Review: Music for Wartime by Rebecca Makkai
A few years back, during the cold and snowy Chilliwack winter that Peter and I first subscribed to Netflix, I watched the first two seasons of Mad Men. Everyone seemed to be telling us that we had to watch this show. How clever it was, how realistic, how engaging. In the end, I don't think… Continue reading Book Review: The Company She Keeps by Mary McCarthy
Let the Great World Spin was the best book I read in 2013. The next book I read by Colum McCann (later that same summer) was Zoli, which I also enjoyed a lot. Thirteen Ways of Looking and Transatlantic are McCann's most recent novels, from 2013 and 2015 respectively, and while they're both solid, well-written… Continue reading Book Review: Two Books by Colum McCann
Life After Life was probably my favourite read of 2014 so I was excited and nervous to find that Kate Atkinson had written a sequel to the novel. Excited because Life After Life was so rich and unique and enjoyable. Nervous because I wondered if a sequel was necessary and if Atkinson could recapture the… Continue reading Book Review: A God in Ruins by Kate Atkinson
Karissa Reads Books 