Authors:
Want your Web site listed in January Magazine’s Author Links?

A Short History of Women by Kate Walbert

A Short History of Women by Kate Walbert

Author Kate Walbert has created an interleaved narrative of five generations of Townsend women, moving across time from England to San Francisco to New York City. In each era another Townsend finds herself fighting for her place among men.

Fishing for Bacon by Michael Davie

I’m beginning to think that 2009 might well be remembered as the year that potential Canadian YA masterworks got lost in the waterfall of mainstream fiction.
Fishing for Bacon by Michael Davie
The French Gardener by Santa Montefiore

The French Gardener by Santa Montefiore

The French Gardener has it all: an attractive mysterious Frenchman -- named Jean-Paul, of course -- arrives to repair both a garden and a damaged family. It’s not just romance, but also family drama traditionally done so well by fellow Brit Rosalind Pilcher, with whom Montefiore is often compared.

East of the Sun by Julia Gregson
Julia Gregson’s debut novel puts one instantly in mind of The Far Pavilions, M.M. Kaye’s epic 1978 novel of mid-19th century India. While there are similarities, they are largely on the surface. As befits its early 20th century setting and the sharp, smart voice of its journalist author, East of the Sun takes a grittier run at India during the time of the British Raj.

A Thousand Deaths Plus One by Sergio Ramirez
Reminiscent of Borges in its maze-like complexity of shadowy figures and surreal situations, A Thousand Deaths Plus One is as unpredictable a work as it is intricate in construction.

Review | A Thousand Deaths Plus One by Sergio Ramirez

Beginner’s Greek by James Collins
First in late 2007 when James Collins’ debut came out in hardcover -- and now that Beginner’s Greek makes its way to my desk again in paper -- I can’t help wondering: what’s with all the fuss?

Etta by Gerald Kolpan
It’s astonishing to think that Katherine Ross’ searing portrayal of Etta Place in Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid was 40 years ago this October. Part of the success of that film -- and that particular character, in fact -- had much to do with Ross’ interpretation of Etta and her relationship with Harry “Sundance Kid” Longbaugh.

Gladiatrix by Russell Whitfield
In their review, Publishers Weekly came up with an elevator pitch for Gladiatrix that eclipses almost anything else that might be said about the book. “Think: girls gone wild -- with swords.” What more need be said?

Twilight of Avalon by Anna Elliott
How is it that the Arthurian legends never seem to run out of steam? Hemlines can rise and fall, hairlines can decline and cultural mores can change from generation to generation, but somehow we always come back to the comfort of the grudges, wounds and triumphs of King Arthur’s golden court.

Shadow Valley by Steven Barnes
Readers familiar with Barnes’ work before 2006’s Great Sky Woman (released in paperback just last month) will have an understandable challenge in knowing what to do with Shadow Valley.

Perfecting by Kathryn Kuitenbrouwer
Kathryn Kuitenbrouwer just keeps getting better. And that’s saying something, because everything she’s offered thus far has been worthy of note.

Sea Changes by Gail Graham
At the beginning of this journey, you think you’re heading off on a beach read. But that’s just wouldn’t describe Sea Changes at all.

Lark & Termite by Jayne Anne Phillips
To describe the plot of Lark & Termite seems almost a disservice, for it minimizes the book’s great beauty. 

Lark & Termite by Jayne Anne Philli

The Believers by Zoë Heller
Heller’s fine novel takes on the Litvinoff family, a tribe of New Yorkers utterly certain in their beliefs until, abruptly, they aren’t.

The Believers by Zoë Heller

Infinity in the Palm of Her Hand by Gioconda Belli
Memoirist, poet and novelist Gioconda Belli here looks at the Western creation myth and weaves it into something magical and self-reflecting.

Pow Wow edited by Ismael Reed with Carla Blank
Pow Wow’s subtitle offers a broad overview of the book: “Charting the Fault Lines in the American Experience -- Short Fiction from Then to Now.” As that subtitle implies, the reader is in for the journey of a lifetime.

A Sandhills Ballad by Ladette Randolph
A Sandhills Ballad is a nearly perfect book. The harsh Nebraska landscape is a complete character in its own right. Unforgiving. Somewhat distant. Aloof. Home. The human characters are more yielding, but only just. And the sum of what author Ladette Randolph creates here is unforgettable.

In the Hands of Anubis by Ann Eriksson
Despite an epic canvas and a delicate touch that sears the heart, there’s something sweetly naive about In the Hands of Anubis (Brindle & Glass) a novel that looks at love and unhappiness in entirely new ways.

In the Hands of Anubis by Ann Eriksson

Come, Thou Tortoise by Jessica Grant
If you were to somehow meld the stylish dysfunctional humor of Lisa Lutz and the arms akimbo stylings of Miriam Toews, it would likely look something like Jessica Grant’s debut novel, Come, Thou Tortoise.

Advice for Italian Boys by Anne Giardini
Giardini’s second novel (after 2005’s The Sad Truth About Happiness), Advice for Italian Boys is breathtaking.

The Kindly Ones by Jonathan Littell
By any measurement, this is not a lightweight book. Measured page-wise, it's a 975-page behemoth. Measured plot-wise, it's a complex, detail-laden brick that's a memorable -- but far from great -- read.

Review | The Kindly Ones by Jonathan Littell

The Housekeeper and the Professor by Yoko Ogawa
Think 50 First Dates without all the zany antics or Memento without the buckets of blood and you have the central conceit of The Housekeeper and the Professor, the latest translation from contemporary Japanese literary icon Yoko Ogawa.

The Ten Year Nap by Meg Wolitzer
Wolitzer’s terrific novel follows the lives of four women who have left the workforce to raise children. Happily married New Yorkers when their babies arrive, those babies change everything. 

The Ten Year Nap by Meg Wolitzer

Rifling Paradise by Jem Poster
Rifling Paradise is a work of historical fiction and the history here -- Australia in the Victorian era -- is pitch perfect. Rifling Paradise looks like a book, but it’s really a time machine.

Mr. Darcy’s Dream by Elizabeth Aston
One of the most amazing things about Jane Austen’s Pride and Prejudice is how, almost 200 years after the death of the author, her characters continue to inspire others to enter her world, sometimes in the most public of ways.

War and Peace by Leo Tolstoy
Reading multiple translations of War and Peace becomes a study in linguistics and a crash course in the power of words.

Life Class by Pat Barker
It’s difficult to imagine a more perfectly soft backdrop over which to juxtapose the harsh outlines of war: an art class -- actually, a life class -- in the summer of 1914 and a group of friends in art school forever touched and altered by the onset of war: the first Great One.

The Hour I First Believed by Wally Lamb
In places a dark novel, but it’s shored up by intense flashes of light. And, like previous works by this author, much of the writing is truly lovely. Even that which is ugly is given to us with the clear immediacy of the master craftsman.

The Curious Case of Benjamin Button: A Graphic Novel
a sort of weird movie tie-in that stands entirely on its own merits, the graphic novel of The Curious Case of Benjamin Button (Quirk Books) is only slightly short of wonderful, and only then so because I don’t like to rave.

This One Is Mine: A Novel by Maria Semple
This One Is Mine doesn’t really work, but the writing? The writing really, really does. Semple carts us away to her world: and it’s a place a lot of people really love to go.

City Wolves by Dorris Heffron
Though City Wolves (Blue Butterfly Books) has a lot going on, at its core, Dorris Heffron’s latest novel is about the secret lives of wolves and how they relate to humans.

Swallowing Darkness by Laurell K. Hamilton
Since 1993, the author has been dishing up her special blend of paranormal eroticism. Clearly, not everyone’s cup of hot beverage, but millions upon millions of fans line up.

Novel About My Wife by Emily Perkins
Emily Perkins isn’t widely known in North America, which is a shame, as Novel About My Wife, her fourth book, is amazing.

Lion Eyes by Claire Berlinski
What one feels, throughout the pages of Lion Eyes is a sort of disconnect, almost disassociation. For the most part, the feeling is delicious. It’s a sensation of wondering, throughout much of the book, “Is this real?” or “Is this part fabrication?” We know that both things are a possibility and therein lies that pleasurable confusion.

The Fire by Katherine Neville
While a few reviewers have been somewhat cool about Katherine Neville’s long-awaited sequel to 1988’s The Eight, we predict that The Fire will still manage to find its way under a lot of trees this holiday season.

Entitlement: A Novel by Jonathan Bennett
Canada owns a contemporary tradition of producing authors who are also working poets. In recent years wordsmiths like Helen Humphries, Andrea MacPherson and Anne Simpson have made room between books of poetry to write novels that are understandably quite unlike those being created by authors whose backgrounds are less focused on the sound a single word makes when dropped upon the page.

Breakfast at Tiffany’s by Trumane Capote
Half a century on, Holly Golightly is as fresh and compelling as she was the day Truman Capote first skated her across the page.

The Book of Lies by Brad Meltzer
The Book of Lies is an interesting, even arresting read.

The New Annotated Dracula by Leslie S. Klinger
In 2004 he rocked us with The New Annotated Sherlock Holmes, a look at the classic fictional detective that was closer -- and in some ways more intimate -- than any that had gone before.

See previous reviews -->