A Word About Awards

WOMEN TALKING by Miriam Toews   Nominations: BookTube Finalist 2020, Dublin Longlist 2020   Date Read: January 30, 2023   Although short, this is a powerful piece about faith, safety, and the power of women when they realize their own worth. Further, Women Talking is a testament to the importance of knowledge and the education of women. The women of a secluded Mennonite sect in Bolivia have been drugged and sexually assaulted, often many times over, by the men in their sect. What makes this worse is this novel is based on true events.   Toews has given the women a voice here, debating whether they should stay and forgive their abusers – their fellow fathers, brothers and sons – and move forward as if nothing ever happened or to leave and start over on their own somewhere else. What these women experienced is nothing short of horrific and add to that that many victims were children, one as young as three years old and the reader is left with disbelief that men could be so vile.   Told t

AUTUMN OF THE PATRIARCH by Gabriel Garcia Marquez   Awards: Nobel Winner 1976, PEN/Translation Winner 1977   Nomination: National Book Award Finalist 1977, NY Times Finalist 1976   Date Read: January 28, 2023   Autumn Of The Patriarch is an ode to the solitude of power. Marquez wrote this novel after the Venezuelan dictator Marcos Perez Jimenez fled from the country, a person Marquez became especially fascinated by. The Patriarch in this novel is an amalgamation of South American dictators in general, their ability to cling to power in the most brutal means and how isolating absolute power is.   The book isn’t so much a novel as it is a series of vignettes about the life of a despot, a solitary man wandering idly in a huge palace, living a life of mythic proportions – living for over 200 years, fathering 5,000 children, growing a third set of teeth at 150. Although he has every material comfort one could ever want at his fingertips, he lacks all the qualities that make life worth livin

HENDERSON THE RAIN KING by Saul Bellow   Award: Nobel Winner 1960   Nomination: National Book Finalist 1960   Date Read: January 24, 2023   Henderson The Rain King is a brilliant work by Bellow, combining a bumbling oaf of a man with meaning of life discourse to provide an overall entertaining and compelling work of art. Eugene Henderson has always been a man of privilege, however, in his middle age he has discovered his life lacks purpose and he cannot shake an inner voice that chants, “I want. I want.” Not knowing exactly what it is he wants, he embarks on a trip to Africa to discover that which is unknown.   From the get-go, Henderson proves to be a bumbling, but well-intentioned, idiot. When he splits off from his original traveling companions to seek more remote and untraveled roads, his hired man and he meet the Arnewi tribe. Realizing they are in the midst of a drought because of a plague of frogs, Henderson devises a means to rid the tribe of the frogs by blowing up their water

CALLING FOR A BLANKET DANCE by Oscar Hokeah   Award: PEN/Hemingway Winner 2023 Nominations: Aspen Words Finalist 2023, Carnegie Longlist 2023, LA Times Finalist 2022   Date Read: January 18, 2023   A young Native American man, Ever, struggles to carve the outlines of his life through upheaval both familial and personal. Ever never had it easy. His father was abusive. He was raised in poverty and, like most kids who find themselves in that position, he rebelled by becoming a hellion – angry and violent.   Ever, though, was one of the fortunate ones who was able to put his life back together and join the military. Through that experience, he was able to learn responsibility and accountability, all while his personal life was crumbling back at home. Prior to leaving, Ever married his girlfriend Lonnie, who in his absence, began an affair and became addicted to meth. He had no choice but to leave her, but only after they had three kids together.   Throughout this novel comprised of various

PURPLE HIBISCUS by Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie   Nominations: Booker Longlist 2004, Women’s Prize Finalist 2004   Date Read: January 15, 2023   The father of a prestigious Nigerian family attempts to maintain control over a family slipping away from his authoritarianism, while the country around them spins out of control. Papa Eugene has always been abusive toward his family, all in the name of God. His warped Catholic beliefs cause him to excessively punish his wife and children – from broken fingers and bones to a beating that results in Beatrice’s, his wife’s, miscarriage. As the novel progresses, his violence becomes even more egregious and puts Kambili in the hospital, clinging to life and causes yet another miscarriage. To muddy the waters and emphasize that no one person is all good nor all bad, Papa Eugene is also overwhelmingly generous to his community.   Jaja and Kambili have learned how to be invisible, to swallow their rage, to never – even for a moment – lose themselves in j

THE AFFAIRS OF THE FALCONS by Melissa Rivero   Nominations: Aspen Words Longlist 2020, Center For Fiction Longlist 277, PEN/Hemingway Longlist 2020   Date Read: January 12, 2023   The Affairs Of The Falcons is such an intense and exhausting book that I’m almost glad it’s over. Almost. Rivero so masterfully conveys the desperation, impossible choices and hopefulness of those living in the U.S. as illegal immigrants and how that status causes life to be so uncertain and unfair. When the worst of the “illegal” blaming goes on in politics, I cannot help but think how much bravery it must take to leave the comfort of the known to uprooting yourself and your family to face an uncertain future and to live like a fugitive in a country that doesn’t want you. I get so disgusted at the lack of compassion and the lack of understanding that “… there by the grace of God go I.”   Ana has been reviled from her very first encounter with the Falcons. Her skin is too dark, her roots too rural and her bac

DISGRACE by J.M. Coetzee   Awards: Booker Award 1999, Nobel Winner 1999   Nominations: Dublin Longlist 2001, National Book Critics Circle Finalist 1999, NY Times Finalist 1999   Read Date: January 8, 2023   An older, twice-divorced professor living in South Africa finds himself embroiled in a scandal. Dr. David Lurie, by no means past his prime, has randomly found himself besotted with one of his students. His downfall? She makes herself available to him, never saying no. Then again, she never seems to enjoy their brief encounters and basically endures all of their liaisons. I never understood why she would go along with this unless she felt her academic future was in jeopardy if she didn’t comply?   Regardless, Coetzee has created another masterpiece here, diverting readers with this preliminary affair. After the student files a complaint with the university, David’s secret is laid bare for all his colleagues to dissect. In disgrace (hence the title), he resigns in a fit of pique. His

ANNIE JOHN by Jamaica Kincaid   Nomination: LA Times Finalist 1985   Date Read: January 8, 2023   Annie John is a beautiful, quiet and slow-paced novella about a girl coming of age and the conflicts she is forced to navigate as she comes into her own. If I told someone that not much happens in this book, it wouldn’t be a lie, however, so much of it is relatable to the teenage experience. Whether male or female, Antiguan or not, the process of becoming an adult resonates beyond any boundaries.   Annie John is the apple of her parents’ eye. Her father is a carpenter who makes all her furniture and adores his daughter. Her relationship with her mother is more complicated and she often finds herself in conflict with her mother’s methods of doing things, beliefs about clothing and nuances of behavior. Not all of her mother’s reprimands are unfounded as Annie tests the boundaries of her mother’s affection and plays marbles, lies and steals as all kids are bound to do at some point.   Annie i

ABUNDANCE by Jakob Guanzon   Nominations: Aspen Words Longlist 2022, National Book Longlist 2021   Date Read: January 6, 2023   Abundance is ultimately a commentary on poverty and the justice system, particularly what happens to felons after they serve their time. Guanzon paints an indelible picture of the odds parolees face when the deck is stacked against them from the moment they step foot outside their cell.   Henry Sr. is an immigrant from the Philippines with lofty aspirations for a PhD. He never quite gets there and is forced to relinquish his dream in order to survive. Henry Jr.’s parents are both well-educated and they hold out hope that he will be able to rise above his parent’s status. When Henry Jr.s mom dies, however, all hope is lost in the struggle for mere survival.    In his way, Henry Sr. sets Junior for success by teaching him a trade and encouraging him in his studies. As all rebellious teens do, though, Junior has his own ideas. He spends any surplus cash he can ma

THE TREES by Percival Everett   Nominations: Booker Finalist 2022, PEN/Faulkner Longlist 2022, PEN/Jean Stein Finalist 2022   Date Read: January 3, 2023   The Trees is a puzzler – part historical fiction, part sci-fi zombie apocalypse – but oh so satisfying. What you initially think are a couple of local murders of retribution become a national phenomenon, gathering white bodies in a cosmic search for justice that never came.   The initial murders we are privy to follow a pattern – the white victim is strangled with barbed wire, beaten horrifically and his balls are chopped off. Making this even more macabre is the body of a black man is always found at the scene and often goes missing after it’s been bagged.    The initial victims in Money, MS are members of the white mob that killed Emmett Till, as well as his accuser, a white girl at the time, who later recanted and confessed she contrived the entire thing. The heartbreaking part of this is that it’s all true. Till’s original accuse

ABSURDISTAN by Gary Shteyngart   Nominations: Dublin Longlist 2008, NY Times Finalist 2006   Date Read: January 1, 2023   Within the first five pages of Absuridstan, I realized this was a cross between A Confederacy Of Dunces meets A Russian Debutantes Handbook. Only after this thought did I realize that Russian Debutantes and Absurdistan were both written by Shteyngart (derp!). I’m not sure what compelled him to recreate his first novel again but from a different point of view. I felt like he was a dog with a bone he just can’t let go of.   Misha “Snack Daddy” Vainsberg is the anti-hero here, a morbidly obese man who has been coddled all his life and bumbles from one absurd (see what I did there?) situation to the next. He intends to do good, only if it doesn’t cause him too much trouble or inconvenience. Yet, he brags about these barely thought out good intentions as if he had already done them, circumnavigating the need to do anything at all.   While Misha would prefer to be in New