Book of the Month – Page 8 – Princeton Writes

Me Talk Pretty One Day (2000) by David Sedaris

Stephanie Whetstone2018-01-01T09:00:41-05:00

Critical Assessment "The temptation when reviewing a David Sedaris book is simply to quote liberally, and enviously, from his endless stock of pithy one-liners. A humorist par excellence, he can make Woody Allen appear ham-tongued, Oscar Wilde a drag. Me Talk Pretty One Day collects tales from both home and abroad, and picks up from where Naked--in which he first introduced his larger-than-life Technicolor family--left off. While there is an undeniable tang of reheated leftovers, Sedaris writes with the magnificent gusto of the neurotic, who, in overreaching their means, find solace in corkscrew hyperbole." David Vincent, "David Sedaris unleashes a second [...]

Me Talk Pretty One Day (2000) by David SedarisStephanie Whetstone2018-01-01T09:00:41-05:00

Little Fires Everywhere (2017) by Celeste Ng

Stephanie Whetstone2017-12-01T09:00:07-05:00

Critical Assessment "In a place like Shaker Heights, a town built on plans and rules, and for a family like the Richardsons, who have structured their lives according to them, disdain for conformity acts as an accelerant, setting fire to the dormant sparks within them. The ultimate effect is cataclysmic. As in Everything I Never Told You, Ng conjures a sense of place and displacement and shows a remarkable ability to see—and reveal—a story from different perspectives. The characters she creates here are wonderfully appealing, and watching their paths connect—like little trails of flame leading inexorably toward one another to create [...]

Little Fires Everywhere (2017) by Celeste NgStephanie Whetstone2017-12-01T09:00:07-05:00

Under the Volcano (1947) by Malcolm Lowry

Stephanie Whetstone2017-11-01T09:00:18-04:00

Critical Assessment “Today is All Souls' Day, the culmination of Mexico's Day of the Dead and the date on which, in 1938, the events of Malcolm Lowry's Under the Volcano take place. I came to the book knowing only its reputation as a masterpiece of English modernism. I left thinking it one of the greatest novels of the 20th century. Everyone should read it at least twice – Lowry thought several readings were necessary for its full meaning to "explode in the mind" – and 2 November should see Cuernavaca (to which Lowry restores its Nahuatl name of Quauhnahuac) overrun with [...]

Under the Volcano (1947) by Malcolm LowryStephanie Whetstone2017-11-01T09:00:18-04:00

Exit West (2017) by Mohsin Hamid

Stephanie Whetstone2017-10-01T09:00:48-04:00

Critical Assessment “To open out his novel, Hamid intercuts the story of Nadia and Saeed with short, strobe-lit glimpses of other people’s stories around the world in a fashion that recalls a technique David Mitchell has employed in novels like “Ghostwritten.” It’s a technique that underscores the simultaneity of time and experience in our globalized world, reminding us of both the amazing similarities and vast differences among countries and individuals across an increasingly interconnected planet. "By mixing the real and the surreal, and using old fairy-tale magic, Hamid has created a fictional universe that captures the global perils percolating beneath today’s [...]

Exit West (2017) by Mohsin HamidStephanie Whetstone2017-10-01T09:00:48-04:00

Commonwealth (2016) by Ann Patchett

Stephanie Whetstone2017-09-01T09:00:05-04:00

Critical Assessment "Ms. Patchett has long explored the awkwardness, pain and grace that come when total strangers are forced into unexpected alliances. This theme found its fullest expression in her 2001 best seller, Bel Canto, whose glamorous characters were taken hostage at a birthday party. But a far more common form of involuntary companionship — which doesn’t involve guns but often feels like it does — is the blended family. Tolerating your own kin is hard enough. Tolerating someone else’s is harder by a coefficient of 10. “Commonwealth spans over 50 years, and the stories of how these children move uncertainly [...]

Commonwealth (2016) by Ann PatchettStephanie Whetstone2017-09-01T09:00:05-04:00

Astrophysics for People in a Hurry (2017) by Neil DeGrasse Tyson

Stephanie Whetstone2017-08-01T09:00:04-04:00

Critical Assessment "Perhaps no one has done more to educate the nonscientific community about the universe than Tyson. As director of the Hayden Planetarium at the American Museum of Natural History, an author and a popular television personality, Tyson is, for many, the face of astrophysics—and for good reason. He is passionate about astrophysics and wants everyone else to be, too. This book, a compilation of 12 essays he wrote for Natural History magazine, is infectiously enthusiastic, humorous and, above all, accessible. Tyson is able to convey complicated concepts with clarity. Deborah Mason, "Astrophysics for People in a Hurry. A Sprightly " [...]

Astrophysics for People in a Hurry (2017) by Neil DeGrasse TysonStephanie Whetstone2017-08-01T09:00:04-04:00

The Little Prince (1943) by Antoine de Saint-Exupéry

Stephanie Whetstone2017-07-01T09:00:54-04:00

Critical Assessment "My friend Nell knew a little boy who was a real terror, and, much to her surprise, he grew up and turned out to be a superb father. 'How do you do it?' she once asked. 'What makes you such a good dad?' 'The Little Prince,' he told her. 'I've always loved that book, and whenever I need help, I just think about what advice it has.' Yes, this is a book that teaches the important things in life, and teaches [them] well. Nell's friend is hardly alone in his reverence, since The Little Prince is said to be [...]

The Little Prince (1943) by Antoine de Saint-ExupéryStephanie Whetstone2017-07-01T09:00:54-04:00

The Idiot (2017) by Elif Batuman

Stephanie Whetstone2017-06-01T15:02:20-04:00

Critical Assessment "The novel’s ability to seduce readers with its alternate, and invariably more attractive, versions of reality was much lamented in the 19th century. Thomas Jefferson blamed literature for encouraging 'a bloated imagination, sickly judgment and disgust towards all the real businesses of life.' But it is this very power — to inspire us to insist a flock of sheep is an opposing army — that is literature’s true subject, according to the critic and journalist Elif Batuman. Novels are about other novels — and how they make us suffer, she wrote in her 2010 essay collection, 'The Possessed: Adventures with [...]

The Idiot (2017) by Elif BatumanStephanie Whetstone2017-06-01T15:02:20-04:00

Monsignor Quixote (1982) by Graham Greene

Stephanie Whetstone2017-05-01T12:00:26-04:00

Critical Assessment "In this seriocomic offshoot of Cervantes's gigantic fable, we encounter once more that unstable compound of Catholic faith and Communist sympathy that has contributed its peculiar tension to so much of Greene's fiction. But what was once corrosive has become mellow, and the explosive potential of the mixture has been reduced to the benign effects of a robust nonvintage wine. Set is Spain at some point in the late 1960's (after the Second Vatican Council and the abolition of the Latin mass), this quasi novel recounts the adventures of a humble priest -- one of God's holy innocents -- [...]

Monsignor Quixote (1982) by Graham GreeneStephanie Whetstone2017-05-01T12:00:26-04:00

A Fine Balance (1995) by Rohinton Mistry

Stephanie Whetstone2017-04-01T12:00:52-04:00

Critical Assessment “American readers hearing the name of yet another important English-language novelist from Bombay probably want to know how he compares with Salman Rushdie, so I'll give it a try: Less hyper, to start with the obvious, less given to flashy virtuoso display, more open to genuine wonder and sorrow at the ways people manage to endure. When both authors are at their very best, Mr. Mistry brings to mind Bruegel, Mr. Rushdie Hieronymus Bosch.” A. G. Mojtabai, "An Accidental Family," The New York Times, June, 23, 1996. First Excerpt "Dina's father had been a doctor, a GP with a [...]

A Fine Balance (1995) by Rohinton MistryStephanie Whetstone2017-04-01T12:00:52-04:00

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