What Was She Thinking?
What Was She Thinking? is narrated by a spinster history teacher who befriends a new colleague who winds up shagging one of her students
Picture Book Picks for Kids
Research shows that children who are read to from birth develop key skills (page-turning, reading left to right, narrative understanding, faster
The Uncommon Reader
Alan Bennett's The Uncommon Reader is a clever turn of the ages-old idea that if you want to keep your subjects in line, keep them in the dark.
The Adventures of Frog and Toad
Arnold Lobel's Frog and Toad Are Friends, published in 1970, is the first in a series of four books about these two famous friends
A Woman in Berlin: Eight Weeks in the Conquered City
You'd never call A Woman in Berlin: Eight Weeks in the Conquered City light summer reading
LaBute’s Razor
In Fat Pig and This Is How It Goes, LaBute gives voice to all those ugly things that propel the human tendency toward selfishness and approval-seeking.
Frankenstein – The Modern Prometheus
Mary Shelley's Frankenstein is a gothic tale of classic romanticism, the creature is inherently good. It is society that turns Frankenstein's creature to evil.
The Night Watch
By choosing WWII as a setting, Waters sets up dramatic symbolism in The Night Watch, as the physical destruction that's wreaked on London
The Queen’s Gambit
The Queen's Gambit, by Walter Tevis, is one of those rare books that as soon as I had I finished it, I started reading it again. It's that good.
The Flanders Panel
The Flanders Panel, by Arturo Perez-Reverte, is about art conservator uncovering an inscription hidden for nearly five centuries
The Fairy Tales
The Fairy Tales are also appropriate, despite their darker elements, for children who have perhaps overindulged on the sugar-coated Disney versions
The Adventures of Frog and Toad
Arnold Lobel's Frog and Toad Are Friends, published in 1970, is the first in a series of four books about these two famous friends
The Moonstone
The Moonstone is a very long tale about a precious gem stolen from the brow of a Hindu deity that wreaks havoc on an English family
Blaming
Blaming by Elizabeth Taylor is the story of an unlikely friendship that forms between Amy, an Englishwoman, and Martha, an American