Currently Reading
The Foundling by Ann Leary
Inspired by a true story about the author’s grandmother, The Foundling offers a rare look at a shocking chapter of American history. This gripping page-turner will have readers on the edge of their seats right up to the stunning last page…asking themselves, “Did this really happen here?” — from the Publisher
Ann Leary is one of my favorite authors, so when I saw she had a new book, I requested it from NetGalley. The Foundling is set in 1927, in a departure from her other novels, which had contemporary settings. Raised and educated in a Catholic orphanage in Pennsylvania, Mary, the main character, is an intelligent, academically inclined young woman who works for the charismatic and persuasive head of the Nettleton State Village for Feebleminded Women of Childbearing Age; she finds herself with an ethical dilemma and divided loyalties when she starts questioning what she has been told.
Read this interview with the author for more about the real-life inspiration and family connection with the state institution the fictional one is based on.
I haven’t finished The Foundling yet, but I highly recommend it already, and it’s going to make a great book club selection. The pub date is May 31, 2022, and if you haven’t read anything by Ann Leary yet, check out her two earlier novels, The Good House (2013) and The Children (2016).
The Great Man Theory by Teddy Wayne
The Great Man Theory by Teddy Wayne is an ARC from NetGalley. I always meant to read The Loner by this author, but I never did. I like novels about academics and writers and the depressed main character in The Great Man Theory is an adjunct English instructor at a second-string college struggling to write the book he has under contract.
I hope, very much for the author’s sake, that the book is pure fiction, and not drawn from life, unless things turn around for the writer character in the book soon!
Happy Holidays by Craig O’Connor
I’m reading this holiday-themed collection of short horror by a local author, month by month this year. I’m up to Easter!
Recently Read
Our Country Friends by Gary Shteyngart
I forgot I hadn’t finished Our Country Friends before going on a cruise the week before last when I read books set on cruise ships instead, so I finished it this week! I wrote a little bit about this tragicomic novel by the author in a previous “It’s Monday” post, but now that I’ve come to the end, I’ve given it 4 (out of 5) stars on LibraryThing, which means I liked it a lot but didn’t absolutely love it.
Continue reading “It’s Monday, What Are You Reading? 04-25-22 #books”