Literary Post

It is no big surprise that I am a reader. In fact, lately I have read so many good books, I thought I would declare their greatness to the world. Okay, maybe not "the world" but at least my loyal readers.

1. A Fine Balance by Rohinton Mistry

"With a compassionate realism and narrative sweep that recall the work of Charles Dickens, this magnificent novel captures all the cruelty and corruption, dignity and heroism, of India."

2. Ahab's Wife by Sena Jeter Naslund

"The daughter of a tyrannical father, Una leaves the violent Kentucky frontier for the peace of a New England lighthouse island, where she simultaneously falls in love with two men. Disguised as a boy, she earns a berth on a whaling ship where she encounters the power of nature, death, and madness, and gets her first glimpse of Captain Ahab."

3. Snow Flower & the Secret Fan by Lisa See

"In 19th Century China, in a remote Hunan country, a girl named Lily, at the tender age of seven, is paired with a laotong, or "old same," in an emotional match that will last a lifetime."

4. In the Woods by Tana French

"... three children leave their small Dublin neighborhood to play in the surrounding woods. Hours later, their mothers' calls go unanswered. When the police arrive, they find only one of the children, gripping a tree trunk in terror, wearing blood-filled sneakers, and unable to recall a single detail of the previous hours."

5. The Billionaire's Vinegar by Benjamin Wallace

"... tells the true story of a 1787 Chateau Lafite Bordeaux - supposedly owned by Thomas Jefferson - that sold for $156,000 at auction and of the eccentrics whose lives intersected with it."

6. The Lace Reader by Brunonia Barry

"Towner Whitney, the self-confessed unreliable narrator of The Lace Reader, hails from a family of Salem women who can read the future in the patterns in lace, and who have guarded a history of secrets going back generations..."

7. East to the Dawn The Life of Amelia Earhart by Susan Butler

"Amelia Earhart (1897 - 1937) captured the hearts of America after becoming the first woman to fly across the Atlantic in 1928. Nine years later, her disappearance on an around-the-world flight brought her extraordinary life to an abrupt and mysterious end."