Redhead by the Side of the RoadAuthor: Anne TylerCopyright: 2020Type: FictionFinished: May 3, 2020 Rating: ★★★★★ Image from Amazon What a fantastic novel! Micah Mortimer is a loner – but not a rebel; he’s just a bachelor who lives a very quiet, very regulated life. “You have to wonder what goes through the mind of …
Rhino RanchAuthor: Larry McMurtryCopyright: 2009Type: FictionFinished: April 28, 2020 Rating: Image from Amazon Ironically my longest write up of the Duane Moore series is for the shortest volume. This final novel of the Thalia/Duane Moore trilogy is a study of the tension between the small town of Thalia and outsiders. Duane is pulled back into …
When The Light GoesAuthor: Larry McMurtryCopyright: 2007Type: FictionFinished: April 27, 2020 Rating: ★★★ Image from Amazon Years or even decades pass between the Thalia stories of “The Last Picture Show”, “Texasville”, and “Duane’s Depressed” but only 2 weeks have passed between the previous events and “When The Light Goes”. (However, the books were published 8 …
Duane’s DepressedAuthor: Larry McMurtryCopyright: 1999Type: FictionFinished: April 23, 2020 Rating: ★★★ Image from Amazon The novel opens a few years after the end of “Texasville” when Duane is 62. He comes home one afternoon, puts his pickup key in an old cracked cup and starts to walk everywhere. Everywhere. This is beyond strange in a …
Texasville Author: Larry McMurtryCopyright: 1987Type: FictionFinished: April 12, 2020 Rating: ★★★★ Image from Amazon Texasville picks up life in the small Texas town of Thalia about 30 years after “The Last Picture Show”. That first novel focused on Sonny, this one has his old best friend Duane in the crosshairs. Duane is an oil man …
Pronto Author: Elmore LeonardCopyright: 1993Type: FictionFinished: April 4, 2020 Rating: ★★★ Image from Amazon Harry Arno, a bookie for the Florida mob, gets crosswise with the local boss who authorizes a hit. Raylan Givens, US Marshall, is assigned to keep Harry safe but loses him – for the second time in Raylan’s career. Raylan follows …
Before We Were Yours Author: Lisa WingateCopyright: 2017Type: FictionFinished: January 24, 2020 Rating: ★★★ Image from Amazon In real life of the 1920s into the 1950s a woman named Georgia Tann ran the Tennessee Children’s Home Society in Memphis. From the outside it looked like Tann was performing a noble service by connecting orphans with …
Olive, AgainAuthor: Elizabeth StroutCopyright: 2019Type: FictionFinished: December 10, 2019 Rating: ★★★★ Image from Amazon As she did with her character Lucy Barton in Anything Is Possible, Elizabeth Strout returns to one of her characters through a series of short stories. Olive Kitteridge is present to one degree or another in the various stories. Sometimes she …
City of Thieves Author: David BenioffCopyright: 2008Type: FictionFinished: September 7, 2019 Rating: ★★★★★ Image from Amazon I went from the pure escapism of Son of Tarzan to one of the grittiest, intense novels I’ve ever read, in City of Thieves by David Benioff. The protagonist, Lev, is a teenage watchman in his apartment building in …
The Son of Tarzan Author: Edgar Rice BurroughsCopyright: 1915 (Original)Type: FictionFinished: August 31, 2019 Rating: ★★★ Image from Amazon For a misogynistic, racist, and scientifically inaccurate novel, this is a fun read. Lord Greystoke (Tarzan) is living back in London with his wife and teenage son, Jack. They keep Jack in the dark about his …