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Illustration of a bird flying.
  • A mother’s love, a mother’s war

    This fine first novel by a North Carolina author has its official debut this week. Reviewed by Linda C. Brinson MEASURE OF DEVOTION. By Nell Joslin. Regal House Publishing. 254 pages. $20.95, hardcover. Susannah Shelburne has more than her share of worries when we meet her in late October of 1863. The deprivations of the…

    May 19, 2025
  • A family saga, set in a coastal Eden

    Reviewed by Linda C. Brinson WHERE THE RIVERS MERGE. By Mary Alice Monroe. William Morrow. 352 pages. $30, hardcover. This is a lovely book, a well-written novel that spans 80 years of a remarkable woman’s life in the South Carolina Low Country. We first meet Eliza Rivers when she’s eight years old, in 1908, and…

    May 13, 2025
  • Stories from the heart

    Paul O’Connor recently listened to Al Pacino’s memoir. He encourages us to do the same. Reviewed by Paul T. O’Connor SONNY BOY: A MEMOIR.  By Al Pacino. Penguin Audio. 12 hours, 28 minutes.  $45. Read by Pacino. Also available in hardcover: Penguin Press. 384 pages. $35. It sounds almost contradictory to say, but there are…

    May 7, 2025
  • Flutes, feathers, fly-tying and a surprising mystery

    Paul O’Connor takes a look at a true-crime book published six years ago, one that should satisfy those who love reading truly orReviewed by Paul T. O’Connor THE FEATHER THIEF: BEAUTY, OBSESSION, AND THE NATURAL HISTORY HEIST OF THE CENTURY By Kirk Wallace Johnson. Viking. 243 pages, hardcover. $27. Also available in softcover, $18, by…

    April 8, 2025
  • Politics, power and pillow talk

    Kingmaker or gold digger? Paul O’Connor takes a look at a recent biography of the most famous seductress in the 20th century. Reviewed by Paul T. O’Connor KINGMAKER: Pamela Harriman’s Astonishing Life of Power, Seduction and Intrigue. By Sonia Purnell. Penguin Random House Audio. Read by Louise Brealey. 16 hours, 58 minutes. Also available in…

    April 2, 2025
  • A recipe for trouble

    Paul O’Connor takes a look at a memoir from someone who’s seen in person how Vladimir Putin operates and what he’s trying to achieve. The author puts what’s happening in the U.S. now into troubling perspective.. Reviewed by Paul T. O’Connor. MIDNIGHT IN MOSCOW: A MEMOIR FROM THE FRONT LINES OF RUSSIA’S WAR AGAINST THE…

    March 14, 2025
  • A cat, books, a story … need we say more?

    Need a change of pace? Bob Moyer reviews a novel that is probably unlike anything you’ve read in a long time. Reviewed by Robert P. Moyer THE CAT WHO SAVED BOOKS. By Sosuke Natsukawa. Translated by Louise Heal Kawai. Harpervia. 208 pages.  $15.19, paperback. A cat. Books. What more do you want you want? Well,…

    February 28, 2025
  • Good story, great writing

    Reviewed by Robert P. Moyer BEEN WRONG SO LONG IT FEELS LIKE RIGHT: A King Oliver Novel.  By Walter Mosley. Mulholland Books. 336 pages. $29. “You been wrong so long it feels like right to you.” That’s just one of the great sentences in book three of Walter Mosley’s Joe King Oliver series, in which…

    February 20, 2025
  • The personal, and the political

    Bob Moyer says this accomplished new novel by Bernhard Schlink tells us a lot about modern-day Germany and the new-Nazi movement. Reviewed by Robert P. Moyer THE GRANDDAUGHTER. By Bernhard Schlink. HarperVia. 336 pages. $28.99 Bernhard Schlink gave us one of the most accomplished novels of the 20th century, capturing the zeitgeist of post-war Germany.…

    February 15, 2025
  • A good story, and some pointers too

    Do you need some really entertaining reading – escape reading, in more ways than one? Bob Moyer offers a review of a book he thinks you’ll find a good distraction in these troubled times. Reviewed by Robert P. Moyer HERO. By Thomas Perry. Mysterious Press. 277 pages. $27.95 $27.95 Thomas Perry gives the reader not…

    January 24, 2025
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