A Word About Awards

THE PERFECT MAN by Naeem Murr   Nominations: Booker Longlist 2006, Dublin Longlist 2008, PEN/Open Book Finalist 2008   Date Read: January 6, 2025   From Kirkus Reviews: “Both literary and lurid, Murr’s third novel ( The Genius of the Sea,  2003 etc.) uses the perspective of an alienated soul to examine a Missouri community in the 1950s stewing in a broth of violence, sexuality, bigotry and secrets.   London-born, U.S.-based Murr stirs many extreme ingredients into the pot. He tells a tale of seething emotions, elegantly-phrased yet feverish, that’s surely destined to erupt in dramatic fashion. The opening serves as a prologue, in which Gerard Travers leaves his illegitimate Indian son Rajiv with his brother Haig in post-World War II London. Rajiv is smart, a talented mimic and a misfit who will be passed on to the third Travers brother Olly, cohabiting with Ruth, a romance writer in Pisgah, Mo.—except that by the time Raj arrives, Olly is dead. But Ruth befriend...

AN UNNECESSARY WOMAN by Rabih Alameddine   Nominations: Dublin Longlist 2016, National Book Finalist 2014, National Book Critics Circle Finalist 2014, PEN/Open Book Finalist 2015   Date Read: July 9, 2024   From Kirkus Reviews: “A  72-year-old Beiruti woman considers her life through literature in an intimate, melancholy and superb tour de force. Alameddine has a predilection for highly literary conceits in his novels:  I, the Divine  (2001) is constructed out of the discarded first chapters of its heroine’s memoir, while his 2008 breakthrough,  The Hakawati , nests stories within stories lush with Arab lore. This book has a similarly artificial-seeming setup: Aaliya is an aging woman who for decades has begun the year translating one of her favorite books into Arabic. (Her tastes run toward the intellectual titans of 20th-century international literature, including W.G. Sebald, Roberto Bolano, Joseph Roth, Vladimir Nabokov and Fernando Pessoa.) T...

DANCING IN THE DARK by Caryl Phillips   Nominations: Dublin Longlist 2007, PEN/Open Book Finalist 2006   Date Read: June 22, 2024   From Kirkus Reviews: “A provocative, illuminating novel that imagines the inner life and explores the cultural legacy of Bert Williams, the first popular black stage performer of America’s early 20th century. Born in the West Indies, Williams delighted white audiences and embarrassed his family and associates by playing the bumbling, slow-witted “coon” or “nigger,” corking his visage in blackface. He considered this stereotype a peculiarly American phenomenon, unknown in his homeland. Was he the artistic creator of his role, or was he the prisoner of it? Williams claimed that the caricature should not offend since it had no basis in reality, but it plainly reinforced a popular prejudice, one that put strict limitations on acceptable roles for a performer of his color. West India–born novelist and cultural critic Phillips ( A Distant Shore,...

THE BANDIT QUEENS by Parini Shroff   Nominations: Carnegie Longlist 2024, PEN/Open Book Finalist 2024, Women’s Prize Longlist 2023   Date Read: March 6, 2024   From Kirkus Review: “ Bonds of sisterhood are forged through murders.   When Geeta’s husband, Ramesh, disappeared from their Indian village five years ago, he left her saddled with debt and the lingering rumor that she murdered him. Geeta simultaneously resents her dubious reputation, wields it to scare local children into compliance, and uses it to make up for her loneliness: “She wasn’t respected here, but she was feared, and fear had been very kind to Geeta.'' Then Farah—a member of the microloan club Geeta belongs to along with fellow female entrepreneurs—has a proposal. Would Geeta help her remove her proverbial nose ring by murdering her abusive husband? While hesitant at first, Geeta ultimately agrees. But, of course, this murder does not go smoothly. From there follow a series of betrayals, the uncover...