Author Archives: John Sloan

Kane, Jessica Francis. Rules for Visiting. Penguin New York 2019. F;7/19. An excerpt of this nice novel appeared in Granta, who have published other of Kane’s work. This is a memoir-style story about a woman preoccupied with and employed at … Continue reading →

Hay, Elizabeth. All Things Consoled. McClelland Stewart, Toronto. 2018. Memoir;6/19. I liked Hay’s Late Nights on Air, although I haven’t reviewed it. It had true Canadian down-home style like Annie Proulx’s, Sinclair Lewis’s, and of course Alice Munro’s. I have … Continue reading →

DeWitt, Patrick. French Exit. Anansi, Toronto. 2018. F;6/19. I liked DeWitt’s Sisters Brothers . Here he takes a different clear-cut genre (Comedy of Manners as opposed to Classic Western) and (calling it a Tragedy of Manners) combines clever old-fashioned high-class dialogue … Continue reading →

Lee, Andrea. Lost Hearts in Italy. Random House, New York, 2006. F;6/19. This is a love triangle, or really more like a pentagon or hexagon, involving wealthy highly-educated cosmopolitan characters who are almost without exception drop-dead gorgeous. Sex and big … Continue reading →

Savas, Aysegul. Walking on the Ceiling. Riverhead, New York, 2019. F;9/19 This first novel was not as sharply gripping as the short story Canvas in a recent New Yorker, but it had intriguing and thought-provoking complexity. Nunu is a young … Continue reading →

Reichl, Ruth. Save Me The Plums. Penguin Random House 2019. NF;6/19. I didn’t enjoy this memoir as much as Reichl’s Garlic and Sapphires, in which as the new New York Times restaurant critic she famously presented herself to a fancy self-important restaurant first as the critic, … Continue reading →

Orringer, Julie. The Flight Portfolio. Knopf New York, 2019. F; 6/19. I was really impressed with Orringer’s other two books The Invisible Bridge and How to Breathe Underwater, but this one didn’t work for me. It tells the story of … Continue reading →