Staff Picks

  • Book Review: “An American Marriage” by Tayari Jones

    May 15, 2020Book Review: "An American Marriage" by Tayari Jones
    Newlyweds Celestial and Roy are the embodiment of both the American Dream and the New South. He is a young executive, and she is an artist on the brink of an exciting career. They are settling into the routine of their life together, when they are ripped apart by circumstances neither could have imagined. Roy ...
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  • Book Review: “Dig” by A.S. King (2020)

    May 8, 2020Book Review: "Dig" by A.S. King (2020)
    Marla and Gottfried Hemmings have raised five children and find themselves wealthy in their retirement years after trading in potato farming for real estate development.  Each of their children has left the nest – and none of them come home any more.  Marla blames Gottfried; Gottfried blames Marla. Meanwhile, elsewhere in the story, five teenagers are ...
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  • Book Review: “City of Thieves” (2008) by David Benioff

    May 1, 2020Book Review: "City of Thieves" (2008) by David Benioff
    During the Nazis’ brutal siege of Leningrad, Lev Beniov is arrested for looting and thrown into the same cell as a handsome deserter named Kolya. Instead of being executed, Lev and Kolya are given a shot at saving their own lives by complying with an outrageous directive: secure a dozen ...
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  • Book Review: “One Day” by Gene Weingarten

    April 24, 2020Book Review: "One Day" by Gene Weingarten
    I am cheating a bit, because I haven’t quite finished this book; I am reviewing it because I am sure I will recommend it by the time I have finished. It’s a very good read. Whatever you do, don’t skip the introduction, in which Pulitzer-Prize-winning author Weingarten describes how he pitched the idea for this ...
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  • Book Review: “Gabriel Du Pré” Mystery Series by Peter Bowen

    April 17, 2020Book Review: "Gabriel Du Pré" Mystery Series by Peter Bowen
    I lost a friend this month, a friend known to PFL’s lovers of mysteries: Peter Bowen, the author of the Gabriel Du Pré series set in Montana.  I met Peter decades ago, when I was at the University of Michigan. He once said, “I attended the University of Michigan ...
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  • Book Review: News of the World (2016)

    April 9, 2020Book Review: News of the World (2016)
    In 1870, Captain Jefferson Kyle Kidd is asked to deliver a 10-year-old German girl back to her relatives in San Antonio in exchange for $50 in gold. He agrees. Johanna’s parents had been killed by the Kiowa when she was 6, but she was spared and raised as one of their own for four years. Facing a 400-mile journey ...
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  • Book Review: The Prydain Chronicles

    March 27, 2020Book Review: The Prydain Chronicles
    I started The Book of Three, the first book in this classic fantasy series by Lloyd Alexander, with a great deal of skepticism. First of all (with the exception of the Harry Potter series), I am not fantasy fan. Secondly, the series involves five books, and when you have a reading wish list ...
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  • Book Review: Bread on the Table

    March 12, 2020Book Review: Bread on the Table
    I borrow every baking book we get here and this book by David Norman is my favorite since The Rye Baker by Stanley Ginsberg. They’re similar in scope and difficulty and each provides histories of the breads in each recipe. The difference is that Ginsburg’s book is exclusively rye while Norman’s tackles all sorts of ...
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  • Book Review: The Devil Made Me Do It!: Crime and Punishment in Early New England

    March 5, 2020Book Review: The Devil Made Me Do It!: Crime and Punishment in Early New England
    “The Devil Made Me Do It!”: Crime and Punishment in Early New England, by longtime Bath resident Juliet Haines Mofford, is an excellent and informative read. The book provides detailed stories on the types of crime and the punishments applied in the early days of our country. Whatever the crime — public intoxication, infanticide, ...
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  • Book Review: In Waves

    February 28, 2020Book Review: In Waves
    I am a huge fan of graphic memoirs and have ready many over the last few years as these books have grown in popularity.  One of my top five graphic memoirs is In Waves written and illustrated by AJ Dungo and published in 2019 by Nobrow Press.  This memoir is about surfing, grief, and loss.  ...
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