Thursday, January 22, 2015

PILGRIMS-JANUARY 2015 BOOK SELECTION

Okay, first things first. I promised a final opinion on A Discovery of Witches by Deborah Harkness. My honest opinion is mixed. First of all it took me a lonnnggg time to finish which is not a good sign. That being said, I did actually enjoy most of it. I truly love fantasy and it was a very original story about fairly well market-glutted character types. This is an accomplishment for the author in itself. She is an excellent, literate writer, which I mentioned in a previous post. However, though I consider myself pretty solidly inured to shock, I found some scenes rather gruesome and hard to take. I was very invested in the welfare of minor characters, while not so much in the main characters. There are two more books in this series, Shadow of Night and The Book of Life. I may read them in the future because of the author’s skill but am not in a hurry to do so. If this is your cup of tea, you may well be entranced.

My book selection for January is a collection of short stories by Elizabeth Gilbert called Pilgrims.

Gilbert is most well-known for Eat, Pray, Love. Looking for more to read by her, I found Stern Men and fell in love with it because of the unusual story and quirky characters. It was a finalist for the PEN/Hemingway Award among other awards.

Pilgrims is wonderful for the same reason plus gives the added gift of enjoying a master writer at work. Each story in the collection features at least one strong female character. These are tough and not-so-tough women dealing with everyday life in interesting, memorable ways. Each story left me wanting more.


Yes. Yes. Yes.


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