Sunday Edition: Novels by Women
This Week’s Sunday Edition we are featuring novels written by women. It is more important than ever that we find space for ourselves and to pleasure read and find space to be in community to share these stories. On display in Azariah’s Cafe, we have twelve novels that we recommend be checked out! Featured first is Roxane Gay’s An Untamed State, a “novel of privilege in the face of crushing poverty, and of the lawless anger that corrupt governments produce.” Meg Wolitzer’s This is Your Life features a story of “daughters of a female stand-up comic who watch as their mother struggles to balance her career with the needs of her children.” Fates and Furies by Lauren Groff “tells the story of an apparently successful marriage from two different perspectives, the husband’s and then the wife’s, and it explores the fierce asymmetry of the two tellings.” If you are interested in short stories, check out Grand Union by Zadie Smith, a varied collection of stories across genres and perspectives. On display is also Pulitzer Prize winning novel The Shipping News by Annie Proulx, “a vigorous, darkly comic, and at times magical portrait of the contemporary North American family.” The Goldfinch by Donna Tartt, a coming-of-age Pulitzer Prize winning novel is also on display. Another coming-of-age story on display is Stir-Fry by Emma Donoghue, “coming-of-age story about Maria, a seventeen-year-old girl from rural Ireland who goes to university in Dublin and accidentally moves in with a lesbian couple.” The Namesake by Jhumpa Lahiri “examines the nuances involved with being caught between two conflicting cultures with highly distinct religious, social, and ideological differences.” A Tale for The Time Being by Ruth Ozeki writes of “how a woman named Ruth finds a diary, letters, and watch belonging to a teenaged girl named Naoka sealed inside a ziplock bag.” The Invention of Wings by Sue Monk Kidd shares a “a fictionalized account of the abolitionist sisters Sarah and Angelina Grimké, and the slave Hetty, given to Sarah on her 11th birthday.” Everything I Never Told You by Celeste Ng shares a story of “a mixed-race Chinese-American family whose middle daughter Lydia is found drowned in a lake.” And finally, on display we have The Plague of Doves by Louise Erdrich “follows the townsfolk of Pluto, North Dakota, who are plagued by a farming family's unsolved murder from generations prior.” The staff at Oberlin College Library hope that these books we are featured will be checked out and read. And if not these ones, there are so many others available to be brought home and enjoyed. Happy reading!
