Sunday, April 19, 2020

The Truants by Kate Weinberg

The TruantsThe Truants by Kate Weinberg
My rating: 3 of 5 stars

The Truants is a swift read with some fine writing describing a college foursome, their overlapping loves, and an admired professor who teaches and confounds using Agatha Christie's novels in a class called "Murdered by the Campus." A puzzling death of one of the four tosses them into a storm of dissention. Suicide or accident or murder? An interlude on an Italian island raises the fear level. There's even something nasty going on in the protagonist's father's garden shed. The dialogue is believable. I found it one of the few books capable of holding my attention in pandemic quarantine.


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Weather by Jenny Offill

WeatherWeather by Jenny Offill
My rating: 4 of 5 stars

I read for the writing and this is my book. As someone has written "each paragraph is a polished gem and each sentence" a perfect facet of that gem. I thought Dept. of Speculation was one of my favorites and this funny, quirky, anxious tale joins the bandwagon.
Weather is comforting even though the main character, Lizzie, is worried about environmental collapse and her brother is hovering at breakdown and her marriage is going through a rough bit, she is comforted by the survival techniques she reads about at the library where she works as a feral librarian (meanng not degreed). She relates hilariious moments with patrons. I looked forward to the style and tidbitty factoids offered and liked Lizzie, identified with her concerns even if I'm not a youngish mother working fulltime and trying to help a disintegrating brother in the midst of a divorce.


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