Books We Read.
Dear bibliophile friends,
Letting go of books from my library continues; an emotional challenge, but there comes a time to find out which treasured books need to stay.
August 28, 2026
Maya Angelou's Even the Stars Look Lonesome is a 145-page 1996 collection of personal, reflective essays written in a conversational, warm tone. Angelou is an acclaimed American poet, memoirist, and civil rights activist. It serves as a spiritual continutation of her earlier bestselling essay collection, Wouldn't Take Nothing for My Journey.
Angelou explores a wide and heartfelt range of themes and subjects from both big and small moments in life: Solitude and Silence: In the title essay and final piece, she reflects on why being alone is not lonely, noting that silence allows us to listen to and describe ourselves; Aging and Grace: Reflections on growing older and rejecting society's misconceptions about aging; Identity & Black Women: A celebration of Black women ("precious jewels all") and the artistic and historical truth of the African American experience; Fame & Relationships: Profiles and anecdotes, including a touching tribute to her friend and protégé Oprah Winfrey, thoughts on marriage breakdown, and the trials of public visibility; Sensuality, Rage, and Art: Honest meditations on human passion, coping with violence and anger, and how art lifts the human spirit.
August 21, 2026
Vikram Seth's The Golden Gate (1986) is a novel written entirely in verse, using Aleksandr Pushkin's Eugene Onegin in stanza form. It's Seth's first novel before the epic A Suitable Boy. The setting is 1980s San Francisco's young professionals, a circle of affluent, well-read yuppies, centred on John Brown, a lonely computer engineer. John's former girl friend Janet places an ad in the newspaper for him, which is answered by Liz Dorati, a trial lawyer. John and Liz begin a relationship and move toward a de facto marriage, while other friends, including Phil and Ed, navigate complex romantic political shifts. Ideological clashes and jealousy lead to John and Liz's separation. John seeks comfort with Janet, but sadly, Janet and friends to die in a tragic car crash. John is left to stand godfather to Liz and Phil's newborn son. I find it personally nostalgic as the story captures the 1980s Silicon Valley and San Francisco's yuppie culture right before the tech boom and dot-com. The story blends a cool sentimentality with a social satirical observations of corporate life and environmental anxieties. Seth brilliantly keeps the novel's musical rhythm across nearly 600 stanzas, a massive technical and stylish achievement.
July 25, 2026
Points of View by W. Somerset Maugham. The essays collected in this book were the last to be published by Somerset Maugham. They range from an appreciation of Goethe's novels, an encounter with a holy man, an evaluation of the plain prose of Dr. Tillotson, analysis of the short story, the form at which Maugham himself excelled, and criticism of three journalists. Eclectic and illuminating. I was first introduced to this author through his masterpiece, Of Human Bondage, and The Razor's Edge. Since then I've included him in my list of all-time favourite English authors. I couldn't agree more with what Sir Harold Nicolson said about W. Somerset Maugham: "How stimulating are the reflections of this gifted man. His judgements are both modest and authoritative; and his style as always simple and unpretentious...The lessons that underlie these studies of varied personalities are of importance to all men of letters".
June 21, 2026
The Reef by Edith Wharton is her 1912 novel. It is a psychological drama about hidden past entanglements, social conventions, and the emotional fallout of a brief impulsive affair among four Americans in France. American diplomat Geooorge Darrow travels to France to propose to widowed Anna Leath, but when she delays his arrival, Darrow has a short-lived liaison in Paris with Sophy Viner, a bright and poor young woman. Months later, Darrow visits Anna and discovers that Sophy has been hired as a governess for Anna's daughter, and has just become engaged to Owen, Anna's stepson. As past secrets and social snobbery come to light, Sophy breaks off her engagement with Owen and leaves, while the ensuing moral paralysis destroy Darrow and Anna's prospects of future together. Wharton's language is perceptive, but at times the narrative dragged that I just tuned out. A deep cut for me, unlike the heartbreaking Ethan Frome.
June 7, 2026
Psalm at Journey's End by Norwegian author Erik Fosnes Hansen. This is a fictional story about Titanic but from the perspective of the diverse crew on board, that is, instead of focusing on the historical musicians, Hansen invents a motley, multinational ensemble of seven characters of musicians coming from England, France, Austria, Italy, Ireland, Russia, and elsewhere. It’s more about the life stories of the musicians and how they came together, but not a retelling of the lives of the actual musicians. The characters are all fictional.
The story takes place over the five days of the luxury liner's crossing from Southampton to the collision with the iceberg. It is divided into parts, each part focusing on one musician, showing us how they became a musician and why they came to work on the Titanic. There are a lot of common themes running through the stories. The musician’s life paths are full of uncertainty, music in their life is more of a way finder that helped them navigate their life journey rather than a job. Many details about how actual musicians work is impressively accurate. As the ship strikes the iceberg and sinks on April 15, 1912, the musicians play their final psalm on deck. Their death becomes a metaphor for the end of an era and the destruction of old European civilization. Hansen's Psalm at Journey's End is a classical tale of experience and coming of age, of friendship and love, and of growth and demise.
July 25, 2025
The Bridges at Madison County by Robert James Waller is a deeply moving and beautiful love story. It is a compelling novel which is short enough to read in a single sitting. It is haunting and powerful. The story is a brief affair between two unlikely characters - Francesca, a 45 year-old farmer's wife from Iowa, and Robert, a 52 year-old photographer from Washington. Together they ignite an incredibly deep and spiritual passion which only grows over the following years of separation.Their story is based on letters and journals only discovered after Francesca and Robert had both passed away. Francesca's children believe that the story of their mother and Robert was worth the telling. It reads like poetry and the power of love touches me that I'm tempted to let it stay a bit longer in my bookshelf.
May 13, 2025
The Feel of Steel by Helen Garner is not a traditional novel with a single plot, but a collection of non-fiction essays, sketches, and personal reflections that weave together to form an intimate memoir. Instead of a linear storyline, the book follows Garner's personal life and observations across several recurring topics: (1) life after divorce: many pieces reflect her life following the end of her third marriage in the mid-1990s, capturing the disorientation of living in Sydney temporarily before returning to Melbourne; (2) fencing: the title piece refers to the old French fencing phrase le sentiment de fer ("True Feel of Steel"), describing her return to fencing lessons with her childhood and adult teacher, Leslie Fadgyas; (3) family and aging: tender and humorous pieces explore becoming a grandmother, watching her daughter in the schoolyard (My Child in the World), and supporting a family member through Alzheimer's disease; (4) eclectic observations: the collection ranges widely. I appreciate her intimate personal focus.
March 24, 2025
Not a Penny More, Not a Penny Less by Jeffrey Archer. This is the first novel by my favourite storyteller Jeffrey Archer. At the hands of an experienced embezzler, Harvey Metcalfe, four wealthy men from very different backgrounds find themselves penniless overnight. The professor, the earl, the doctor, and the art dealer join forces to recover their swindled fortunes. But, being inherently honest, they are determined to recover only the exact amount they lost - not a penny more, not a penny less. An imaginative and clever story with twists and humour, and a touch of romance.
March 12, 2025
Ten Little Niggers (modern standard title: And Then There Were None, with all historical racial slurs and references removed from the text and nursery rhyme) by Agatha Christie. I never get tired rewatching and rereading Agatha Christie's books and DVD adapted from her book. Ten Little Niggers was made into a successful movie called And Then There were None. Perhaps it's because I've read it moons ago, rereading it still kept me on the edge of my seat to the very last page. This story is different from my all-time favourite crime writer's writings because there is no detective - the reader is the detective. which makes it different, still exciting, even without my favourite Hercule Poirot and Miss Marple.
Ten people are invited to holiday on a luxurious and remote island, Nigger Island. On the first night, the terror starts as an eerie voice accuses them all individually of a murder in their pasts. Bizarre events start to take place. One by one they meet their deaths in a series of unfortunate accidents.
14 February 2025
The Bridge Across Forever by Richard Bach. This book is an autobiographical love story about the author's real-life quest to find his soulmate and his relationship with actress and writer Leslie Parrish.
It is a moving and tortuous journey of learning to love, and breaking down his barriers of self-protection. Haunted by his vision of a soulmate, he embarks on a spiritual and personal journey to find his soulmate, an ideal partner who shares his deepest longings and sense of direction. Along the way, he deals with past relationships, financial ruin,and emotional turmoils as he fights his fear of losing hiss independence. After his long and active search, he meets Leslie Parrish, a beautiful and brilliant woman who challenges and frees him that led to a transformative partnership. The book explores the idea that life's events and challenges are self-imposed for spiritual growth, and that true intimacy goes far beyond simple togetherness. Thus, he begins his deep and fascinating journey of discovery. A beautiful story.
(c) February 14, 2025. Updated October 12, 2026. Tel. Inspired Pen Web. All rights reserved.
