Novels Now

Olive Kitteridge
By Elizabeth Strout
Completed August 13, 2008
Olive Kitteridge by Elizabeth Strout was a novel comprised of thirteen short stories about people living in rural Maine. Several of the stories were based on the title character, but many of the stories only showed us a glimpse of Olive. From any perspective, Strout provided her readers with […]

Popularity: 13% [?]

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Resistance
By Owen Sheers
Completed June 27, 2008

I think poets make great novelists. Joyce Carol Oates, Margaret Atwood, even Shel Silverstein all embrace a stunningly descriptive way of writing that makes their stories and characters just flow through your mind. Like his poetic counterparts, Owen Sheers used this lyrical style in his debut novel Resistance.
Resistance is an […]

Popularity: 27% [?]

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Janeology
By Karen Harrington
Completed June 15, 2008
Nature versus nurture – it’s an old question and still a widely debatable one. Do genes rule our own impulses? Does one’s environment shape who we become?
It’s this theme that formed Karen Harrington’s debut novel, Janeology. In this book, Jane Nelson decided that she was “done being a mother” and […]

Popularity: 29% [?]

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America America
By Ethan Canin
Completed June 8, 2008
Corey Sifter was an average boy, living with his working-class parents in New York, when the wealthy, well-connected Metarey family employed him to work on their estate. Liam Metarey, the family’s patriarch, took a shining to Corey and gave him important jobs at the mansion as well as paid […]

Popularity: 29% [?]

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Becky: The Life and Loves of Becky Thatcher
By Lenore Hart
Completed May 29, 2008
I must admit that I am a sucker for a good companion novel. Last year, I read Finn by Jon Clinch, which was a story about Huck Finn’s infamous father. My latest read was the feminine side of this group of friends – […]

Popularity: 30% [?]

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Songs for the Missing
By Stewart O’Nan
Completed May 25, 2008

I cannot imagine one of my sons disappearing into thin air. The panic, the fear, the anger, the questions – it would be all too much to bear. In Songs for the Missing, Stewart O’Nan tackled this topic head on, and after finishing this page-turner (I finished […]

Popularity: 34% [?]

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Looking For Salvation at the Dairy Queen
By Susan Gregg Gilmore
Completed May 24, 2008

Looking for a light but entertaining poolside read this summer? If so, then I would recommend Susan Gregg Gilmore’s debut novel, Looking For Salvation at the Dairy Queen.
It’s the story of Catherine Grace Cline, the preacher’s daughter, of Ringgold, Ga. Catherine Grace had […]

Popularity: 35% [?]

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Skeletons at the Feast
By Chris Bohjalian
Completed May 12, 2008 
Many books have explored the exodus of Europeans and Jews who fled the approaching German army during World War II. In Skeletons at the Feast, Chris Bohjalian examined another type of evacuation – this time of a Prussian family trying to stay steps ahead of the vengeful […]

Popularity: 30% [?]

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The Story of Forgetting
By Stefan Merrill Block
Completed April 20, 2008
Stefan Merrill Block made a strong debut with The Story of Forgetting– a tale of families, memories and how secrets can destroy relationships. Indeed, The Story of Forgetting is really a story of remembering – your family, your memories, your way of life. Central to this […]

Popularity: 28% [?]

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For 22 days in 1992 during the siege of Sarajevo, local cellist Vedran Smailovic played in the spot where a mortar killed 22 people who were standing in line for bread. At any time while he played, he could have been shot by a sniper, but he survived each day, committing a small but significant […]

Popularity: 46% [?]

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