Eric Pallant's Book List Home Fiction Reviews Nonfiction Reviews Jewish Books Mystery Recommendations Links Type Book List into Google and 37,200,000 hits come up. So why another one? Because whenever I cross the threshold of a public library the list of books friends have recommended, or reviews of books I swore I'd read, immediately leaves my mind. I'm soon overwhelmed by hundreds of artfully designed book covers and a completely blank mind. That's why I started keeping a list of books I've read and books I'd like to read. Also, I forgot what I've read, or remember I read it, but can't remember what it's about. The following lists includes books I've read and books recommended to me, mostly by my mother, referred to under recommendations as LEP. Mom reads everything from cereal boxes to Melville and reads them faster than I can eat cookies. I think she is an excellent judge of quality. If you have book you would like to recommend or a review you want to add, click on want to contribute? My Home Page. Recent Reads The World to Come by Dara Horn ***(of 4)   On the plus side I learned a lot about Chagall. Dara Horn writes well. She channels the great Yiddish authors like Peretsky, Singer, Sholom Aleichem, and Nachman of Bratslav. She has compiled a modern version of the angst, absurdity, folklife, and culture of Yiddishkeit. But on the minus side, read more... The Know-it-All by A.J. Jacobs**** ( of 4) Proof that passionate writing overwhelms mundane subject matter. AJ Jacobs read the entire Encyclopedia Britannica and writes a book about it.. Naturally, his book begins with A-ak and ends with Zywiec. The interstices are largely filled with esoterica (both short and long), but my what fascinating trivia there is. Read more... Hard to imagine why this book won the 2008 Booker Prize, England's Pulitzer. The protagonist is a low-caste Indian who makes good, but most of the book is supposed to be an antidote...read more... The White Tiger by Aravind Adiga ** (of 4) Palace Walk by Naguib Mafhouz *** (of 4) A larger-than-life father, a household dictator, terrifies his 1920s Cairo household into submitting to his divine will. Divine, in the sense, that his actions are supported by the expectations and practices of Islam. His wife is so subservient, neither she nor her two daughters, have left the house for twenty-five years. Yet, Dad, as strict as he is, spends his evenings drinking and carousing with women. Read more... The Billionaire's Vinegar by Benjamin Wallace *** (of 4)   I had no idea there were still bottles of wine worth drinking from the 18th and 19th centuries or that collectors frequently amassed cellars with thirty, fifty, or one hundred thousand bottles. The Billionaire's Vinegar opens with the 1985 Christie's auction of a bottle of Lafite originally purchased by Thomas Jefferson in Paris in 1787. Read more... Additional Categories Generally speaking the following categories list only books I really liked (*** and ****) in each category. There are others, but you'll have to hunt for the reviews. Best Reads of 2008 Bangkok Haunts, All God's Children Need Traveling Shoes, Beaufort, People of the Book, Red Sea,To Hate Like This is to be Happy Forever, Fire, Plato and a Platypus Walk into a Bar, A Short History of Nearly Everything, The Know-it-All, Beaufort, A Death in Belmont, The Billionaire's Vinegar, Outwitting History Travel Confederates in the Attic, Don't Let's Go to the Dogs Tonight, Holy Land: A suburban memoir, No Man's River, The Places in Between, Walk in the Woods, Winter, Oracle Bones, To Hate Like this is to be Happy Forever, Fire Islam The Attack, Guests of the Sheik, The Looming Tower, Persepolis 1, Persepolis 2, Reading Lolita in Tehran, Shia Revival, A Thousand Splendid Suns, Palace Walk History The March (fiction), A Peace to End all Peace, A People's History of the United States, Martin Dressler: The Tale of an American Dreamer (fiction), 1491, Mayflower, Kristallnacht Foreign Fiction Corelli's Mandolin, The Dew Breaker, A Fine Balance, Interpreter of Maladies, Map of Lost Lovers, Natasha and Other Stories, Small Island Classics East of Eden Favorites The Book Thief, Corelli's Mandolin, The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Nighttime, A Fine Balance, Mila 18, What is the What, The Nine, People of the Book Recommendations by past and present students Hope's Edge, And Still We Rise, Blood Brothers, The Alchemist Memoir and Biography Don't Let's Go to the Dogs Tonight, The Life and Times of the Thunderbolt Kid, No Ordinary Time: Franklin and Eleanor Roosevelt, Persepolis 1, Persepolis 2 , Seabiscuit, All God's Children Need Traveling Shoes