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The Scarlet Letter is a difficult read for many audiences with its vague symbolism that takes a deep dive to understand.

I recently saw American Fiction. The film was well-reviewed, and I understand why. In fact, enough time has passed since my viewing, that I find myself wanting to re-watch it. Not only was the movie enjoyable and the acting terrific, the story really left me thinking.

“A Gentleman in Moscow '' by Amor Towles is set in 1922 Soviet Russia and follows Count Alexander Rostov as he has to adapt to the changing world while trapped in a hotel. After being convicted of treason, he gets sentenced to house arrest inside a luxury hotel.

Jessamine Chan's debut novel, The School for Good Mothers (2022), was recommended as one of the best novels of 2022, by many top reviewers and news outlets. It's a challenging and provocative read, as Chan herself acknowledges in author interviews. Her hope was that the book would leave readers thinking about the systematic pressures and demands imposed upon mothers, rooted in historical ideals, but ever-increasing due to the influences of technology and social media.

The House on Mango Street by Sandra Cisneros is a tremendous book that is an enjoyable read while having deep themes of racism, sexism, and pride.

When I read that Palace of the Drowned was set in Venice, Italy, off-season, and reminiscent of the novels of Patricia Highsmith, in that the prose is lush, the plot suspenseful in a kind of nagging, slow-burn way, I thought it sounded like my cup of proverbial tea.

The Scarlet Letter written by Nathaniel Hawthorne is a difficult yet intriguing novel. The opinions may differ on this read, but I found it interesting. The author includes many uses of literary devices, one major one being symbolism that kept me reading the book.

Lauren Groff’s The Vaster Wilds (2023) transports the reader back to a horrifying and fascinating time in American colonial history known as the “starving time” at the Jamestown colony in 1609.

Lord of the Flies is an exhilarating novel that demonstrates the reality of parts of human nature.

The Odyssey by Homer, is a book that I severely disliked. This book is one that is forced upon high school students, either through short summaries or having to read it word for word.

There's a new mystery series in town! Scorched Grace (2023), by Margot Douaihy, is the first of the Sister Holiday Mysteries; it also happens to be the first novel published by Gillian Flynn Books.

With her most recent novel, The Book of Goose (2022), author Yiyun Li gives us a coming of age story that explores the fraught friendship of two girls growing up in an impoverished village in rural France during the aftermath of World War II.