March 2015 Reading

Winter just wouldn't leave Connecticut this year. It's April 5th and I still have two piles of snow slowly melting. Yesterday was the first day in months that I could actually open up the house to a couple of hours of fresh air.

I continued, but haven't yet finished The Oysters of Locmariaquer by Eleanor Clark; Pepperpot: Best New Stories from the Caribbean by Peekash Press; and The Complete Cosmicomics by Italo Calvino.

I started  The Art of Flight by Sergio Pitol (excellent); Dimanche and Other Stories by Irène Némirovsky (also excellent)

I haven't felt like doing reviews or comments, the March reads are somewhat in the order that I liked them (most liked to least liked), but there was such a variety that it's hard to rate them. The list shifts every time I look at it.  The only real dud was the Ishuguru. The Lawson was also a bit of a disappointment--I just didn't like it as much as her other books.

I Called Him Necktie; Flašar, Milena Michiko; Sheila Dickie (Translation)
Personal copy

By Night the Mountain Burns; Laurel, Juan Tomás Ávila; Jethro Soutar (Translation)
Personal copy

A God in Ruins; Atkinson, Kate
Free ARC from publisher

I Am Istanbul; Uzuner, Buket; Kenneth J Dakan (Translation)
Personal copy

The World Before Us; Hunter, Aislinn
Free ARC from publisher

The Evening Chorus: A Novel ; Humphreys, Helen
Free ARC from publisher

The Lost Treasures of R&B; George, Nelson
Free ARC from publisher

A Reunion Of Ghosts; Mitchell, Judith Claire
Free ARC from publisher

De Potter's Grand Tour: A Novel; Scott, Joanna
Free ARC from publisher

A Touch of Stardust; Alcott, Kate
Free ARC from publisher 

I Take You;  Kennedy, Eliza
Free ARC from publisher

The Other Side of the Bridge; Lawson, Mary
Library book.

The Buried Giant; Ishiguro, Kazuo
Library book


Online

Two short stories from Pithead Chapel, "a small, independent and volunteer-run literary journal and small press founded in Michigan’s Upper Peninsula. We publish gutsy narratives online every month and a couple of printed chapbooks each year." These two stories are from Volume 4, Issue 3 (March 1, 2015). Earlier issues are archived and feature fiction, essays, and interesting cover art. Sight Reading by Olivia Wolfgang-Smith
Mr. Skull and the Russian by Tasha Coryell

In the January 2015 issue of Asymptote a story from a Cuban writer:
Saxo by Alberto Guerra Naranjo; Translated from the Spanish by John Washington (also available in the original Spanish). A short story told in a single sentence. Thanks to a judicious use of commas it is not difficult to read.

The Winter 2015 issue of VQR (The Virginia Quarterly Review) a short story about family purity and the mikvah :
The Fathoms By Amanda Korman

 A Vindication of Hypnosis by Sergio Pitol; Translated by George Henson

Asymptote

Asymptote

Asymptote

Asymptote