The Goldfinch, by Donna Tartt, haunts me because I hated it so much. I know it won the Pulitzer Prize for Fiction in 2014. I also know I hated it. Earlier this year, I wrote a review of the book on Goodreads that read “While this book is well written, […]
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Haunting Book: The Luminaries, by Eleanor Catton
This month I’m writing another series of book reviews on “haunting books.” I haven’t read that many really good mysteries or thrillers by new authors this year, though I recommend to readers that you try any book by Tana French (see review of In the Woods here) or William Landry (see review […]
Continue readingHaunting Book: In the Woods, by Tana French
I like well-written murder mysteries and police procedurals, and In the Woods, by Irish author Tana French qualifies. A writer friend of mine told me about Tana French. I have now read her first three books, and her fourth is on my shelf waiting. In the Woods was the first […]
Continue readingHaunting Book: Wild, by Cheryl Strayed
Wild: From Lost to Found on the Pacific Crest Trail, by Cheryl Strayed, is the only non-fiction book I’m reviewing in my haunting books this year. I almost didn’t review this book, because I was disgusted with the author throughout most of the time I was reading her memoir. But […]
Continue readingHaunting Book: Life After Life, by Kate Atkinson
This week’s haunting book is a novel about a privileged Englishwoman, Ursula Todd, born in 1910. She is born over and over throughout the novel, living a series of lives, each life slightly different from the one before. Life after life poor Ursula lives, some lives happy, others not. This […]
Continue readingHaunting Book: Defending Jacob, by William Landry
This week’s haunting book is the story of a family in turmoil. The protagonist is Andy Barber, a prosecuting attorney whose teenage son Jacob is arrested for murdering a classmate. Did Jacob kill the other boy or not? The reader is left wondering throughout the book. Andy’s instant reaction is […]
Continue readingHaunting Book: Still Alice, by Lisa Genova
My posts last October about the “haunting books” I had read are among some of my most viewed posts, so I have decided to review more haunting books this year. (See here for the last haunting book of 2012, a book similar to today’s choice.) My first haunting book for October […]
Continue readingHaunting Book: Turn of Mind, by Alice LaPlante
The last book in my October series of haunting books is Turn of Mind, by Alice LaPlante. I would not have known about this book, except that it was a Stanford Alumni Association Book Salon choice for September 2012. When I learned Turn of Mind was the September selection, I […]
Continue readingHaunting Book: Gone Girl, by Gillian Flynn
I’m turning now from haunting books that deal with violence and man’s inhumanity to man on a global level (The Hunger Games trilogy, The Sandcastle Girls, and Unbroken) to a novel that haunts because of the violence and inhumanity within a family. Gone Girl, a bestselling novel by Gillian Flynn, […]
Continue readingHaunting Book: Unbroken, by Laura Hillenbrand
The third haunting book I’ve read in recent months is Unbroken, by Laura Hillenbrand. Unbroken is the true story of Louis Zamperini, a man who lived a life that can only be called “larger than life.” During his boyhood in California, Louie Zamperini was a juvenile delinquent. To keep Louie out of […]
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