Category: Fiction

Beautiful Ruins

by Jess Walter, 2012 I got this book from a Little Free Library (I think the one on Smith Street). I LOVED IT! It’s set in Italy on the Cinque Terre, a little village called Porto Vergogna, Port of Shame. The main characters are Dee Moray and Pasquale Tursi. Dee is a beautiful American actress […]

The Loop

by Nicholas Evans, 1998 I got this book from a Little Free Library. It was about wolves, ranchers, and Federal biologists. Set in a fictional town called Hope, Montana. The beginning is SCARY – a big black wolf almost snatches a baby (the rancher’s grandson) out of his carriage on the front porch. The dog […]

My Friends

by Fredrik Backman, 2025 This was disappointing. I’ve loved everything he’s written, and I did love the ending of this book, but it took a while to get through. It’s about 4 friends who live by the sea and have the crappiest parents ever. Some of the parents are so abusive, it’s terrible, terrible. And […]

Fight Night

by Miriam Toews, 2021 This is the 2nd book selection for the Old Town Library Book Club 2025-2026. It was very different, very funny in spots, a wonderment, sometimes irritating, but touching and beautiful. The story takes place in Toronto. There are 4 main characters: Grandma, Mom, Swiv, and Gord. Swiv is 9 years old, […]

Joshua: A Parable for Today

by Joseph F. Girzone, 1995 Danette recommended I read this book, one of her favorites, while I was up in Alaska June 2025. It’s about a modern day Jesus who comes to live in a small American village. He is a simple carpenter, working with wood, but he carves statues that are beautiful. He is […]

Sunrise on the Reaping

by Suzanne Collins, 2025 Book 5 of the Hunger Games series. Hopeless and depressing – the prequel to Katniss and Peeta’s story. This is about the 50th anniversary of the Hunger Games, when Haymitch Abernathy is taken from District 12. He’s a 16 year-old and he narrates the story, and it’s awful – everyone he […]

The Man That Corrupted Hadleyburg

by Mark Twain, 1899 This is the last story in the Pudd’nhead Wilson book. It’s about a town, Hadleyburg, in which the residents pride themselves on their honesty. A man comes to town once and is hurt so badly, he devises a plan to get back at the town and expose their hypocrisy. After a […]

Those Extraordinary Twins

by Mark Twain, 1894 This is the second story in the Pudd’nhead Wilson book. It’s about true Siamese twins, Luigi and Angelo, and it’s crazy! He presents them in all seriousness, though. They come to live with Aunt Patsy Cooper and her daughter, Rowena. The whole town comes to love them. One is serious (Angelo) […]

Station Eleven

by Emily St. John Mandel, 2014 Found this book in a Little Free Library and it happens to be the Old Town Library’s April 2025 book selection. It was a good book, very well written with really interesting characters, but sort of wandering. It’s about a Traveling Symphony in a world after a flu kills […]

Pudd’nhead Wilson

by Mark Twain, 1893 I got this book from a little free library and finally read the first story, Pudd’nhead Wilson. I loved it so much! It’s a treasure of a story. Pudd’nhead Wilson is actually a very smart, very kind, very wise man, who moves to Dawson City and wants to be a lawyer […]

interpreter of maladies

stories by Jhumpa Lahiri, 1999 I got this book from a Little Free Library. It is wonderful! It is 9 short stories about East Indians or Bengali immigrants to the United States, or one or two take place in India. She is such an excellent writer! Each story is so different from the others but […]

The Christmas List

by Richard Paul Evans, 2009 Dee lent me this book to read while in Montana with Adam and Danette in December 2024. It was EXCELLENT! I read it in 2 days. It’s a re-telling of Charles Dickens’ A Christmas Carol. Set in Utah, the main character is James Kier. He’s a ruthless, rich businessman who […]

White Teeth

by Zadie Smith, 2000 In-depth study of London from the eyes of a diverse caste of characters: 1. Bangladeshi immigrants, Samad Iqbal, his wife Alsana, and their twin sons, Millat and Magid. 2. Archie Jones, and his wife, Clara, who is black and the daughter of Hortense, a Jehovah’s witness born in Jamaica. 3. Archie […]

Cold Comfort Farm

by Stella Gibbons, 1932 I ADORED THIS BOOK!!!! I learned about it from my British Classics puzzle. It was one of the classics in that puzzle, and the cover had a little blurb, “Very probably the funniest book ever written.” It was a delight from start to finish. Set in 1930’s England. The main character […]

The Mayor of Casterbridge

by Thomas Hardy, 1886 This book was suggested to me as his favorite classic during the FAC at Susan and Doug’s, by the retired cancer doctor from Indiana who lives in the new MCM house on E. Myrtle Street. I think his name is Jim. This was a soap opera! Main character, Michael Henchard, gets […]

The Secret History

by Donna Tartt, 1992 I read this book because it is by the author of The Goldfinch, which I loved, and which won the Pulitzer Prize in 2014. This was a page-turner, very dark in personalities and setting and plot. Six college-aged students, most very wealthy, are the sole students in a professor’s Greek class. […]

The Little Prince

by Antoine De Saint-Exupery, 1943 This book has been translated from the original French into 505 different languages, second only to the Bible. I was intrigued by it so checked it out from the library. It’s about a “little prince” from a tiny planet who makes his way to earth, where he meets the narrator […]