A Word About Awards

THE BLIND ASSASSIN by Margaret Atwood   Award: Booker Winner 2000   Nominations: Dublin Finalist 2002, Women’s Prize Finalist 2001   Date Read: February 21, 2024   From Kirkus Reviews: “ Atwood’s skillfully woven tenth novel is her most ambitious and challenging work to date, and a worthy successor to her recent triumph,  Alias Grace  (1996).   It tells two absorbing stories that cast an initially enigmatic, ultimately pitilessly revealing light on each other. The central one is octogenarian Iris Griffen’s bitter reminiscence of her life as the privileged daughter of a prosperous Ontario family, the Chases, and later as wife to Richard Griffen, the businessman who effectively inherits and firmly directs the Chase fortunes. The counterpart story,  The Blind Assassin , is a strange futuristic tale that dramatizes in unusual (faux-Oriental) fashion a nameless woman’s obsession with a science-fiction writer whose imaginings blithely mirror and exploit...

SCHINDLER’S LIST by Thomas Keneally   Awards: Booker Winner 1982, LA Times Winner 1983 Nomination: NY Times Finalist 1982   Date Read: April 14, 1999   From Kirkus Reviews: “Like Raoul Wallenberg, Oskar Schindler was one of those precious few "righteous gentiles" personally responsible for the saving of Jewish lives (estimated at about 1300) during the Holocaust. But what makes Schindler's story of compelling interest to novelist Keneally--who terms this book a "nonfiction novel," an act of reconstruction and homage prompted by meeting one of the Schindlerjuden survivors in a Los Angeles store--seems to be Schindler's moral stance, a more equivocal one than that of brave, heedless Nordic-knight Wallenberg. Schindler owned and operated Nazi-sponsored factories--first one producing enamel-ware in Cracow; then a munitions plant in Brinnlitz, near Auschwitz. And the Jews whom he put on his list worked for him under S.S. guard, providing material for the Reich. S...

NARROW ROAD TO THE DEEP NORTH by Richard Flanagan   Award: Booker Winner 2014   Nominations: Carnegie Longlist 2015, Dublin Finalist 2015   Date Read: October 19, 2020   I am not a fan of war novels and so was dreading this a bit. Now having read Narrow Road, I realize I had every right to. And yet. This is by far one of the best war novels I have ever read. Flanagan explores the nuances of what it means to go to war, the moral and personal complexities involved for those who are forced to participate, some willingly but most unwillingly.    This harrowing journey that I am so happy to have end largely takes place in a Japanese POW camp in the jungles of Thailand (Siam at the time). Australian officers are forced to build a railroad into Burma, a task the British deemed either impossible or requiring many years. At the expense of human lives, the Japanese push their “slaves” to complete it in mere months.   Through Flanagan’s intense prose, I felt as i...

LINCOLN IN THE BARDO by George Saunders Award: Booker Winner 2017 Nomination: Carnegie Finalist 2018, Center For Fiction Longlist 2017, Dublin Finalist 2019, Goodreads Finalist 2017 Date Read: March 7, 2020 Lincoln In The Bardo is written in a unique style, with a multitude of voices pondering the significance of death. Based on a historical fact, President Lincoln loses his son Willie to an illness, Saunders uses this historical moment to convey the varying responses to the permanence of losing someone dear to you. Instead of wandering away after the funeral, Lincoln returns to the crypt to hold his boy again and again, unable to let go. These scenes are heart wrenching. Behind the scenes, the cemetery is made up of a host of characters, some good, some bad, that are forced to co-exist (yes, I understand the humor in this word choice) for eternity. These souls believe they are sent to this place to recuperate from their varying illnesses and must live i...

THE LUMINARIES by Eleanor Catton Award: Booker Winner 2013 Nomination: Dublin Longlist 2015, Women's Prize Longlist 2014 Date Read: October 10, 2019 I am currently also reading Cloud Atlas and the first chapter is eerily similar to The Luminaries. Set in the New Zealand gold rush, each character is uniquely drafted based upon a sign of the Zodiac or heavenly bodies in the solar system. This practically translates to a cast of characters that are not only interdependent but interrelated as a sorted story begins to unfold, centering on the death of one Crosbie Wells. While I embarrassingly feel this novel just went on and on, I can't help but marvel at how Catton told such an intricate story with such depth of character. My wonder, however, started to dwindle around page 600. With all the trappings of a great mystery - tainted opium, secret letters, long-lost siblings, adultery, murder, gold with unknown origins, a half-burned bequest - I felt this novel dragged on lo...

THE LIFE & TIMES OF MICHAEL K by J.M. Coetzee Awards: Booker Winner 1983, Nobel Prize Winner 1983 Nominations: NY Times Finalist 1984 Date Read: July 2, 2019 Michael is a gardener. Born with a mild cleft-palate and presumed to be slow, he was raised by his single mother in a special needs environment, during a time of war and upheaval in South Africa.  His entire purpose in life is to care for his mother and upon her death, his life is set adrift. Michael wanders aimlessly, wanting nothing and striving for nothing. While everyone around him wants something from him, he is wholly unable to bend himself to their will. In his wanderings, Michael is captured by guards and set to a work crew. He meets an unnamed prisoner who reminds him, "There's nothing special about you. There's nothing special about any of us." Truer words were never spoken. I believe one of the worst illusions we have as human beings is that our lives are more important or ourselves more ...

MILKMAN by Anna Burns  Awards: Booker Winner 2018, Dublin Winner 2020, National Book Critics Circle Winner 2018 Nomination: Rathbones Folio Finalist 2019, Women's Prize Finalist 2019 Date Read: April 25, 2019 After the first paragraph, I could tell that Milkman would be refreshingly different from other novels I've been reading lately. Yet, this same difference would soon grate on me about half-way through.  Milkman is set in some sort of dystopian present, where danger lurks everywhere and life is lived in extremes. A world where certain names are banned, citizens are surveilled, teenagers are expected to marry and communities are segregated based on religion and political leanings. These same members of the community harass one another into conformity. Differing communities loathe each other for, what can only be presumed as, the slightest of differences, which I couldn't help thinking of The Butter Battle Book. For this very reason, Middle Sister immediately ...

THE INHERITANCE OF LOSS by Kiran Desai Awards: Booker Winner 2006, National Book Critics Circle Winner 2006 Nominations: Dublin Longlist 2008, Women's Prize Finalist 2007 Date Read: April 10, 2019 All I can say about this novel is just Wow! The content is so rich and the story is compelling. It's difficult to sum up all of my thoughts.  The Inheritance Of Loss primarily follows Sai and Biju as they follow very different paths that converge in the end. Sai is orphaned and sent to live with her grandfather in India. Biju is an Indian national who is sent to the US but ultimately decides to return to India. Both characters provide unique glimpses into being Indian, being a foreigner in the US, life in a post-colonial society and the hardships of youth finding their way in a complex world. With Biju, readers see an inside view of the reverse racism that occurs among immigrants. Biju is harshly judged for being Indian, being illegal, being odiferous, for just being. He qui...

THE REMAINS OF THE DAY by Kazuo Ishiguro Awards: Booker Winner 1989, Nobel Winner 1989 Nominations: NY Times Finalist 1989 Date Read: February 22, 2019 The Remains of the Day is a lovely, hauntingly quiet novel with a glimpse into a world that has long gone by. Stevens is a butler of one of the fine estates in England and decides to take a motor trip to visit an old colleague, who it becomes clear he has feelings for. He meets unexpected acquaintances and conducts an inner appraisal of what it means to be an accomplished butler, which he clearly believes himself to be. I would agree. Stevens served Lord Darlington with unflinching loyalty, although Darlington himself was a deeply flawed man, allying himself on the wrong side of fascist ideals, and bringing bigotry and prejudice to Darlington Hall. Stevens can never fully acknowledge Darlington's flaws because his own life's purpose and indirect influence on the course of world events, the very things that defin...