Tracy's Reviews

I was floored by this novel. Told by Kevin, the blind protagonist, Touch and Go follows a road trip halfway across the nation to deliver a handmade casket to a dying grandfather in Florida. 

Set in the near future, in a totalitarian theocracy which has overthrown the United States government, The Handmaid's Tale explores themes of women in subjugation. The character is one of a class of individuals kept as ‘handmaids’ for reproductive purposes in an era of declining births. The images of emptiness are one of the most striking aspects of this novel-the effect is chilling.

Focusing on a 15 year old runaway, Kafka, and the old man Nakata, whose childhood trauma deprived him of his memory, Murakami weaves these characters towards each other in a magical world where cats talk and fish fall from the sky. None of the characters in Kafka on the Shore is as powerful as the forces of fate that drive them, and none even try to resist.

Biff, the childhood friend of Jesus who was then known as Joshua, provides the long-awaited gospel of Jesus’ life before he became Christ. The story Biff has to tell is a miraculous one, filled with remarkable journeys, magic, healings, kung fu, corpse reanimations, demons, and hot babes. This book had me laughing so hard I had to calm myself down before reading further!

A heart-wrenching and beautiful novel that surrounds a South Carolina family over four decades. The novel surrounds Tom Wingo, a man stuck in New York with his sister’s therapist trying to resolve the troubled past that haunts both Tom and his sister Savannah. The drama and intrepid themes make this a wholly engrossing novel which I continue to reread again and again.

This is a tremendous saga about a family surviving in the Australian Outback. The lavish descriptions of the wild setting are background to the incredible and impossible love story between the beautiful red-golden-headed Meggie Cleary and Father Ralph de Bricassart, the ambitious priest. The Thorn Birds has made a great impact on my ideas of what a great book should be.

Self-proclaimed "whore to hear his own voice" Kevin Smith (known formerly as Silent Bob) reads aloud his newest memoir Tough Sh*t. Not only does Smith give a riotous outline of his own life but he also gradually gives advice based on his own successful experiences. Smith has a particularly funny and poignant perspective on life. I've loved listening to this!