Briar Patch Books

Category: Contemporary literary fiction

  • Of apes, men and a lot more

    Reviewed by Linda C. Brinson THE HIGH MOUNTAINS OF PORTUGAL. By Yann Martel. Read by Mark Bramhall. Random House Audio. 11 hours; 9CDs. $40. I have not read the other books that Yann Martel has written since his much loved and honored Life of Pi, first published in 2001 and made into a movie in…

  • One terrible mistake

    Reviewed by Linda C. Brinson THE GUEST ROOM. By Chris Bohjalian. Doubleday. 318 pages. $25.95. When I tried to tell a friend about the novel I was reading – a story about a man who offers his home for his younger brother’s bachelor party, only to find himself embroiled in a horror involving two murders,…

  • Quiet and powerful

    Reviewed by Linda C. Brinson MY NAME IS LUCY BARTON. By Elizabeth Strout. Random House Audio. Read by Kimberly Farr. Four CDs; four hours. $30. Also available in print from Random House. Elizabeth Strout’s books are so different from anything else I read, indeed, from most of today’s fiction as far as I can tell,…

  • A worthy conclusion

    Reviewed by Linda C. Brinson GOLDEN AGE. By Jane Smiley. Read by Lorelei King. Random House Audio. Nine CDs, 17 ½ hours. $50. Also available in print from Knopf. If you’ve read the first two volumes of Jane Smiley’s Last Hundred Years trilogy, which, by all accounts I’ve found, are masterpieces, all you need to…

  • A fresh perspective: The exotic and the universal

    Reviewed by Nikita Mathur DON’T LET HIM KNOW. By Sandip Roy. Bloomsbury. 244 pages. $25. While the shell of Sandip Roy’s novel Don’t Let Him Know may tackle issues such as the silent taboo of homosexuality in Indian society or the conflicts faced by Indian expatriates in the U.S, the book explores far more deeply…

  • A fresh perspective: Not in control

    Here’s another in our series of reviews by students in the opinion writing class at UNC Chapel Hill’s School of Media and Journalism. Reviewed by Bradley Saacks GOLDEN STATE.  By Stephanie Kegan. Simon & Schuster. 288 pages. $24.99. The fragility of life is a much more subtle universal fear than the always-present worry that we…

  • A fresh perspective: Stephen King’s latest

    Reviewed by Victor James Lewis

  • The language of family

    Reviewed by Linda C. Brinson WE NEVER ASKED FOR WINGS. By Vanessa Diffenbaugh. Read by Emma Bering and Robbie Daymond. Random House Audio. 11 ½ hours; 10 CDs. $40. Also available in print from Ballantine Books. Letty Espinoza had a lot more advantages than many children of Mexican immigrants. She had two supportive, loving parents.…

  • Afloat with love and literature

    Reviewed by Linda C. Brinson THE LITTLE PARIS BOOK SHOP. By Nina George. Read by Steve West and Emma Bering, with Cassandra Campbell. Random House Audio. 11 hours; 9 CDs. $46. Also available in print from Crown. Monsieur Perdu runs a floating bookshop, on a barge moored in the Seine in Paris. But he’s more…

  • History is what we make it

    Reviewed by Linda C. Brinson I approached this book with hope but also some trepidation, having loved The Guernsey Literary and Potato Peel Pie Society so much that I read it in print AND listened to it as an audio book. Annie Barrows co-wrote that wonderful book with her aunt, Mary Ann Shaffer. As its…