ROOM is narrated by five year old Jack, who has never left the room in which he lives with his Ma. On his fifth birthday, his Ma reveals to him that there is indeed a world beyond Room's walls, and she then tries to involve him in her efforts to leave Room once and for all. It is a chilling story that could easily have gone pulpy, but instead Emma Donoghue writes with such deftness and heart, exploring a relationship between mother and son that makes the pulse-pounding plot an incidental plus.
Reading Laura Lamont’s Life in Pictures is like watching your favorite movie from Hollywood’s Golden Age that you never knew existed. Emma Straub has created a character whose life would make a wonderful story even without the glamor of tinsel town in the background, but the setting makes her journey that much more delicious to follow. The novel follows the life and times of Elsa Emerson, a homegrown Wisconsin girl, who goes west to become Laura Lamont -- a woman who rides the roller coaster of Hollywood fame with varying degrees of ease. Sharply written and wickedly addictive, Laura Lamont is a treat for every kind of reader.
St. Lucy's Home for Girls Raised by Wolves is Karen Russell's debut collection of short stories, written before she expanded one of the stories into Pulitzer nominated (and jilted) Swamplandia! A true wunderkind, Russell was only 26 when this collection was published, but her prose explodes with the confidence and outrageous imagination of a writer in her prime. Every story in this collection lives within its own fully realized world, from summer camps for children with other worldly dreams to an Oregon trail-like caravan of humans and minotaurs. The depth of Russell's characters and her deftness with plot and metaphor will stick with you years after reading.
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