All posts tagged: bookstagrammer

lyrical and hauntinly sublime literary fiction from yaa gyasi about race in america, but also about depression, anxiety, addiction, spirtuality & science in transcendent kingdom

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By Leslie Lindsay  One woman’s reckoning with her family of origin, its dysfunctional aspects, a suicidal mother, a tragic event with a brother, science, and so much more.   ~WEDNESDAYS WITH WRITERS|ALWAYS WITH A BOOK~ FEBRUARY SPOTLIGHT: WOMEN WRITERS OF COLOR A TODAY SHOW #ReadWithJenna BOOK CLUB PICK! INSTANT NEW YORK TIMES BEST SELLER I had a feeling I would like TRANSCENDENT KINGDOM (Knopf, September 2020), I had no idea how much I would *LOVE* TRANSCENDENT KINGDOM. Yaa Gyasi is animmensely talented writer who tells a dark story with such luminous grace and compassion. Quick take: Gifty is a sixth-year neuroscience PhD candidate at the Stanford University School of Medicine. She’s studying the reward-seeking behavior of mice and the neural circuits in depression and anxiety and addiction, and with good reason. As often the case, many scientists study what they study because they have somehow been touched by the issues personally. In Gifty’s case, it’s her family members who have. Gifty’s brother, Nana, was a talented athlete with much promise, but before all of that, the family immigrated from Ghana to Alabama(and …

Edgy & LUMINOUS, a twisted tale of love, friendship, art, & so much more in this hot debut–luster–by Raven Leliani

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By Leslie Lindsay  Luminous and edgy, LUSTER is a raw examination of friendship, sex, intimacy, art, and more. ~WEDNESDAYS WITH WRITERS|ALWAYS WITH A BOOK~ February Spotlight: Women Writers of Color A NEW YORK TIMES NOTABLE BOOK OF THE YEARA BEST BOOK OF THE YEAR: NPR, O Magazine, Vanity Fair, Los Angeles Times, Glamour, Shondaland, The New York Times Book Review, Boston Globe, Buzzfeed, Kirkus, Time, Good Housekeeping, InStyle, The Guardian, Literary Hub, Electric Literature, Self, The New York Public Library, Town & Country, Wired, Boston.com, Happy Mag, New Statesman, Vox, Shelf Awareness, Chatelaine, The Undefeated, Apartment Therapy, Brooklyn Based, The End of the World Review, Exile in Bookville, Lit Reactor, BookPage, i-DA FAVORITE BOOK OF THE YEAR: The New Yorker, Barack ObamaA BEST BOOK FOR HOLIDAY GIFTS: AV Club, Chicago Tribune, New York Magazine/The Strategist, The Rumpus WINNER of the Kirkus Prize and the Center for Fiction First Novel PrizeAN INSTANT NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLERNATIONAL INDIE BESTSELLER * LOS ANGELES TIMES BESTSELLER * WASHINGTON POST BESTSELLER I’ll admit to *not* wanting to read LUSTER (FSG, September 2020) because, well…it was on so many lists and so frequently talked about in literary circles. But then I wrote to the biblioracle at the Chicago Tribune, where I offered the last five books I’d read …

KATHERINE MAY’S NYT BESTSELLER: WINTERING & HOW IT RELATES TO A PERIOD OF TIME IN MY LIFE

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By Leslie Lindsay How does one care for and repair ourselves when we find ourselves slipping through the cracks? ~NONFICTION SPOTLIGHT|ALWAYS WITH BOOK~ NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLER A meditation in what it means to winter, this intimate, part-memoir, part exploration, part essay, WINTERING by Katherine May (Riverhead, November 2020) explores all the ways winter is a lesson in self-care, healing, and rejuvenation. I once believed I could live in the northern climate of Minnesota. My mother scoffed, “It’s one of the coldest places we have in the U.S. Why would you want to go there?”  Simple: I had a job at the Mayo Clinic. I also wanted to get away from my wildly unstable, mentally ill mother. Still, her warning, her motherly instinct to shelter me from the harsh realities of a 6-8 month long winter, was somewhat…comforting. As children had been doing for eons, I defied her. I moved to Minnesota. Encapsulated in the snowy drifts and what I am sure was my first real blizzard, I hunkered down. I sat in the bay …

2020 FICTION FAVORITES As CURATED BY YOUR HOST, LESLIE LINDSAY

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By Leslie Lindsay  My top fiction reads for 2020. Agree or disagree. Give them. Gift them. Keep one for yourself. Photo by Claire Morgan on Pexels.com ~WEDNESDAYS WITH WRITERS|ALWAYS WITH A BOOK~ 2020 FICTION ROUND-UP 2020 has been an unprecedented year. A pandemic. A very charged election year. Equality and violence. Natural disaster. Personal ones, too. I am beyond grateful to be by your side every week, sharing these fabulous books with you. Because I think reading is healing. It helps us cross bridges and become more sympathetic. We can live another person’s life or experiences for a short period of time. That, in turn, makes us more multidimensional, more relatable. Reading is not just about words on a page. It’s not just about the story we ingest at that moment, but the residue, the residual it leaves in its wake. A year ago, I had no idea COVID-19 would upend our lives as we knew it. I had no idea bookstores would close. I had no sense that debut authors and bestseller authors would …

INSTANT NYT BESTSELLING AUTHOR christina baker kline talks about her ravishing new historical fiction, THE EXILES, women convicts, mothers, writing, TREES & asks me a question, too

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By Leslie Lindsay  A powerful, emotionally resonant novel that captures the hardship, oppression, opportunity and hope of four women’s lives—three English convicts and an orphaned Aboriginal girl—in nineteenth-century Australia. ~ALWAYS WITH A BOOK|WEDNESDAYS WITH WRITERS~ HISTORICAL FICTION SPOTLIGHT Gorgeous, sweeping historical novel about women convicts seeking refuge and freedom set in the nineteenth century England and Australia. AUTHOR OF THE PHENOMENAL #1 NYT BESTSELLER ORPHAN TRAIN Instant New York Times, USA Today, Publishers Weekly, and Indie Next bestseller SEPTEMBER 2020 “20 Great Reads” List, Indie Next THE BEST BOOKS OF 2020, REAL SIMPLE Optioned for television by Bruna Papandrea/Made Up Stories (“Big Little Lies”) …and more… I fell in love with THE ORPHAN TRAIN and felt the anxiety and inner turmoil in A PIECE OF THE WORLD, and when THE EXILES was published (WilliamMorrow/CustomHouse, August 25 2020), I dove head-first into the lucid prose. THE EXILES absolutely swept me away.  Kline takes a trio of young women and makes them so whole, so flawed, so authentic, it feels like they are right there with you, …

Anna Solomon talks about her ravishing and darkly sexy The Book of V., about female friendships, Biblical Esther, the imbalance of power, the structure of writing and so much more

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By Leslie Lindsay  Bold, elegant, blisteringly raw and delicately complex reimagining of the biblical Queen Esther, interwoven with contemporary characters, about being a strong, passionate woman in a male-dominated world. ~WEDNESDAYS WITH WRITERS|ALWAYS WITH A BOOK~ Recommended by: People Magazine, Entertainment Weekly, Real Simple, The Washington Post, Good Housekeeping, The New York Post, CNN, The Skimm, and more… plus… A Good Morning America & An Emma Roberts’ Belletrist Book Club Pick Bold, elegant, blisteringly raw and delicately complex reimagining of the biblical Queen Esther, interwoven with contemporary characters, about being a strong, passionate woman in a male-dominated world. I just finished THE BOOK OF V. (Henry Holt, May 2020) by Anna Solomon, and this book…oh this book! I cannot rave about it enough. I scrambled to order everything else she has ever written and am anxiously awaiting their arrival. This book made me think, it made me talk, it made me write. “The Book of V. asks complicated questions about power, desire, and the evolution of women’s roles.” —Real Simple, Top Picks for Every Taste THE BOOK OF …

Debut literary thriller about a family man grappling with his sense of self, a downward spiral, plus true-crime inspiration, character development and so much more in A GOOD MAN

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By Leslie Lindsay  Debut thriller about a man grappling with his sense of self after his life spirals out of control.  ~WEEKEND READING|ALWAYS WITH A BOOK~ Ani Katz will have readers on edge the entire time they are immersed in her riveting debut, A GOOD MAN (Penguin Books Original, January 14 2020). Katz plays with the dysfunctional family dynamic, an unstable/unreliable male narrator, and the picture-perfect family. Thomas Martin is a devoted family man with a beautiful wife, a sweet daughter at a private school, a home on Long Island, a job as an ad man. He has an eccentric family of origin he’s running from–but sheltering–at the same time. In a sense, A GOOD MAN is a fairy tale, complete with flittering glimmers of dysfunction. Thomas Martin is a devoted family man with an enviable life: a beautiful wife and daughter, a well-appointed home on Long Island, a job at a prestigious Manhattan advertising firm. He’s also a devoted brother and son, yet this family of origin is disturbingly sheltered. What happens when Thomas’s life—and ego—are rocked to …

Colleen Oakley talks about her hypnotic, emotional, lucid new book, YOU WERE THERE TOO about dreams and fate, plus what she’s working on next, two favorite books, and more

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By Leslie Lindsay  A unique premise featuring love, grief, fate, dreams, and more, YOU WERE THERE TOO is an emotional roller-coaster filled with twists and turns that will leave you breathless.  This is my first novel from Colleen Oakley and she takes all the elements I love in women’s fiction—fate, free-will, happenstance, and relationships—and melds them into a cohesive whole. YOU WERE THERE TOO (Berkley, Jan 7th 2020), is a stunning story delving into the intricacies of human relationships, dreams, and dispels the myth of ‘happily ever after.’ Maybe we are happy after all, but on what terms? And who’s to decide? Mia’s life is pretty perfect. She’s an artist and married to a physician husband. They’re new to a small town where everyone knows everyone else (I love this small-town vibe and this comes through in many of the books I read). But still, Mia is restless. Something is missing. She’s struggled to have a baby for a while now, and looking into other options. But that’s not her only dream. She’s also having nightly dreams featuring a stranger …

THE HEART KEEPER came to Alex Dahl ‘very insistently,’ about cell memory, organ donation, the lengths a grieving mother will go to reconnect; plus her experiences abroad and a fabulous reading list

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By Leslie Lindsay Delightfully dark tale about two mothers and one little girl; about anger, grief, sadness, and more as the after-effects of organ donation.  THE HEART KEEPER (Berkley, July 16 2019) is a raw, gut-wrenching read from critically acclaimed thriller writer, Alex Dahl (THE BOY AT THE DOOR, 2018). This harrowingly, gritty read follows a grief-stricken mother who is desperately trying to seek a way to overcome the pain of losing her beloved only child, Amalie, who drowned. Alison becomes disturbingly fixated on a the life of a small girl who becomes the donor recipient of her daughter’s heart. She feels she can reconnect with her own daughter by becoming close to this little girl. On the surface, Alison is an affluent middle-aged mother (to step-son), Oliver, and appears to have it all together–gleaming luxury SUV and attractive husband, nice home. But she doesn’t have her daughter. She would do anything to get her back. We fall down a grim hole of mysterious interest and sinister intentions. Grief is a strange thing–it will cause even the most ‘typical’ person to come …