The Man Who Died Twice combines murder and intrigue with the banality of life and growing old in a way that is simultaneously fast-paced and gripping and delightfully comic.
Tag Archives: Books
The Word is Murder (Anthony Horowitz)
As always, reading a book as well-written as this one is, for me, as much an education as it is entertainment. It informs my own writing in an invaluable way.
The Thursday Murder Club (Richard Osman)
The story is light-hearted, but the plot is intelligent enough to fulfill all your mystery expectations. Clever, modern, and charming, it ticks all the boxes, but from the novel perspective of an older and wiser cast.
Learning Facts From Fiction
It is, admittedly, ironic to think of absorbing facts from works of fiction. But understanding human nature and our history without consuming the stories we tell would be impossible. So read books. Read difficult books. Read stories that make you uncomfortable, sad, uplifted, angry, triumphant, shocked, devastated, hopeful.
The Things We Leave Behind
A diverse and engaging anthology, The Things We Leave Behind will resonate with a wide variety of readers. I found myself drawn in from the opening line.
Into the Wild (Jon Krakauer)
At first glance, I was sure that it was a clear-cut case of some stupid rich kid, feeling invincible, overconfident, running away to a wilderness where he had no business being.
I was wrong.
Can “Write What You Know” Be Taken Too Far?
If you are a writer yourself, at some point you will have come across the advice: “Write what you know.” When we’re fledgling writers we tend to take that advice far too literally.
Ella Minnow Pea (Mark Dunn)
Like vocabulary crack for a linguistic junkie, I defy you to read this book and not learn a new word or several, not to mention the delicious challenge of trying to best Nollop’s own pangram along with the cast of characters.
Millicent’s Lebkuchen
Perhaps knowing that someone you love has made them makes a cookie taste better than one you made yourself.
The Book Thief (Markus Zusak)
At its core, it is a story about the power of words, and it is one that will sit heavy in my heart for a long time to come.