Literary Fiction These character rich stories will make you think!
The Angel's Game by Carlos Ruiz Zafon; translated by Lucia Graves David Martín makes his living by writing sensationalist novels under a pseudonym. The survivor of a troubled childhood, he has taken refuge in the world of books and spends his nights spinning baroque tales about the city’s underworld. But perhaps his dark imaginings are not as strange as they seem... Like a slow poison, the history of the place seeps into his bones as he struggles with an impossible love. Close to despair, David receives a letter from a reclusive French editor, Andreas Corelli, who makes him the offer of a lifetime. He is to write a book unlike anything that has ever existed—a book with the power to change hearts and minds. In return, he will receive a fortune, and perhaps more. But as David begins the work, he realizes that there is a connection between his haunting book and the shadows that surround his home.
A Case of Exploding Mangoes by Mohanned Hanif This provocative, exuberant, and wickedly clever novel reimagines the conspiracies and coincidences leading to the mysterious 1988 plane crash that killed Pakistan’s dictator General Zia ul-Haq. Junior Officer Ali Shigri of the Pakistan Air Force, the son of Colonel Quli Shigri, who had been one of the dictator General's right-hand men prior to his suicide, struggles to unravel the secrets and motives that led to his father's death and plots his revenge on the Pakistani dictator whom he blames for his father's death.
Death with Interruptions by Jose Saramago ; translated by Margaret Jull Costa "On the first day of the new year, no one dies. This, understanfably, causes consternation among politicians, religious leaders, funeral directors and doctors. Among the general public, on the other hand, there is initial celebration. They have achieved the great goal of humanity: eternal life. Then reality hits home- families are left to care for the permanently dying, life-insurance policies become meaningless, and funeral directos are reduced to arrange burials for pets. Death sits in her chilly apartment, where she contemplates her experiment: What if no one ever died again?
The Elegance of the Hedgehog by Muriel Barbery; translated by Alison Anderson Meet Renee: A sour, homely and stereotypical Parisian concierge at number 7, rue de Grenelle who has attachments to only her cat Leo. Meet Paloma: a twelve year old tenant at number 7, rue de Grenelle who acts the part of a prosaic prepubescent. Neither female is who she seems. Renee savors fine art, philosophy and Japanese culture. Paloma is exceptionally intelligent, journals her profound thoughts while dabbles in Existentialism and Japanese. The two recognize their kindred spirits through another tenant who can see the truth behind the two facades.
Extremely Loud & Incredibly Close by Jonathan Safran Meet Oskar Schell, an inventor, Francophile, tambourine player, Shakespearean actor, jeweler, pacifist, correspondent with Stephen Hawking and Ringo Starr. He is nine years old. And he is on an urgent, secret search through the five boroughs of New York to find the lock that fits a mysterious key belonging to his father, who died in the World Trade Center on 9/11. Along the way he is always dreaming up inventions to keep those he loves safe from harm. What about a birdseed shirt to let you fly away? What if you could actually hear everyone's heartbeat? His goal is hopeful, but the past speaks a loud warning in stories of those who've lost loved ones before.
The Lazarus Project by Aleksandar Hemon 2008 National Book Award Finalist On March 2, 1908, nineteen-year-old Lazarus Averbuch, a recent Jewish immigrant from Eastern Europe to Chicago, knocked on the front door of the house of George Shippy, the chief of Chicago police. When Shippy came to the door, Averbuch offered him what he said was an important letter. Instead of taking the letter, Shippy shot Averbuch twice, killing him. Now, in the twenty-first century, a young Eastern European writer becomes obsessed with Lazarus's story and investigates what really happened, and why.
The Little Giant of Aberdeen County by Tiffany Baker Growing rapidly and unusually large in her small-minded New York community, part-witch Truly comes of age in the shadow of her attractive older sister, whose young son comes into her care unexpectedly, forcing Truly to live with a bullying brother-in-law. A spellbindingly woven tale about a girl who grows physically and emotionally beyond her small town's wildest expectations.
Olive Kitteridge by Elizabeth Strout 2009 Pulizer Prize in Literature The larger-than-life world of Olive Kitteridge, a retired school teacher and unofficial town crier in a small coastal town in Maine, is revealed in a series of luminous stories that explore her diverse roles in many lives, including a lounge singer haunted by a past love, a young man grieving over his lost mother, her stoic husband, and her own resentful son.
Out Stealing Horses by Per Petterson ; translated by Anne Born We were going out stealing horses. That was what he said, standing at the door to the cabin where I was spending the summer with my father. I was fifteen. It was 1948 and one of the first days of July. Set in the easternmost region of Norway, Out Stealing Horses begins with an ending. Sixty-seven-year-old Trond has settled into a rustic cabin in an isolated area to live the rest of his life with a quiet deliberation. A meeting with his only neighbor, however, forces him to reflect on one fateful summer.
The Road Home by Rose Tremain In the wake of factory closings and his beloved wife's death, Lev is on his way from Eastern Europe to London, seeking work to support his mother and his little daughter. After a spell of homelessness, he finds a job in the kitchen of a posh restaurant, and a room in the house of an appealing Irishman who has also lost his family. Homesickness dogs Lev, not only for nostalgic reasons, but because he doesn't belong, body or soul, to his new country-but can he really go home again? Rose Tremain's prodigious talents as a prose writer are on full display in THE ROAD HOME, but her novel never loses sight of what is truly important in the lives we lead.
The Secret Scripture by Sebastian Barry Recording the events of her life from a mental hospital as her hundredth birthday approaches, Roseanne McNulty considers returning to society when she learns that the hospital is about to close, but her situation is complicated by the possibility that Roseanne remembers her life quite differently from what is documented in her patient records.
The White Tiger by Aravind Adiga Balram Halwai is a complicated man. Servant. Philosopher. Entrepreneur. Murderer. Over the course of seven nights, by the scattered light of a preposterous chandelier, Balram tells the terrible and transfixing story of how he came to be a success in life-- having nothing but his own wits to help him along. Relocating to New Delhi when he is offered a new job, Balram Halwai is disillusioned by the city's twenty-first-century materialism and technology-spawned violence, a circumstance that forces him to question his loyalties, ambitions, and past. Balram's eyes penetrate India as few outsiders can: the prostitutes and the worshippers; the ancient and Internet cultures; the water buffalo and, trapped in so many kinds of cages that escape is (almost) impossible, the white tiger. And with a charisma as undeniable as it is unexpected, Balram teaches us that decency can still be found in a corrupt world, and you can get what you want out of life if you eavesdrop on the right conversations.
