Friday's Forgotten Books

Just about seven years ago, we began Friday's Forgotten Books and have never missed a week. I am two weeks early here because I will be moving houses that week. These were the first books reviewed. Most of these people have stopped blogging but Bill Crider has gone on, never missing a week. I will collect today's links later in the day but I wanted to remind you of where we began.I never expected the series to last more than an month or two. Or that reviewers would want to do it week after week. Life is full of such surprises.  Thanks to the regulars you will see here at 11:00 am.

 Thursday, April 24, 2008

FRIDAYS: The Book You Have to Read

This is the first of what I optimistically hope will become Friday recommendations of books we love but might have forgotten over the years. I have asked several people to help me by also remembering a favorite book. Their blog sites are listed below. I also asked each of them to tag someone to recommend a book for next Friday. I'm worried great books of the recent past are sliding out of print and out of our consciousness. Not the first-tier classics we all can name, but the books that come next. Here's my choice.

Desperate Characters by Paula Fox (Patti Abbott)

It's difficult to remember, thirty years on, New York in the seventies, The City was facing bankruptcy, the streets were dangerous, frequent strikes left unattended garbage for the rodents, buildings crumbled. Paula Fox's novel Desperate Characters perfectly captures that time along with the similarly disintegrating marriage of Sophie and Otto Bentwood. The story begins with an unexpected cat bite. "Because it's savage," Otto answers Sophie's puzzled, "why?" It was a cat she was trying to feed that bit her. This well-intentioned act, this McGuffin, sends the couple off on a weekend odyssey, where ominous events continue to haunt the childless couple. They find little solace in each other and there is no easy resolution at the end. The quiet desperation that suffuses their story is heart-breaking. The writing is haunting, lucid, and succinct.
Fox has also written two books about her life (Borrowed Finery and The Coldest Winter), a few other novels (The Widow's Children) and many children's books. But nothing is finer than this one for me.

Check out other recommendations here:
http://billcrider.blogspot.com/
http://bofexler.blogspot.com/
http://anthonyneilsmith.typepad.com/crimedog_one_the_internet/
http://sandrascoppettone.blogspot.com/
http://patrickshawnbagley.blogspot.com/
http://sandrablabber.blogspot.com/
http://josephinedamian.blogspot.com/
http://traviserwin.blogspot.com/
http://randomactsofunkindness.blogspot.com/

http://eudaemoniaforall.blogspot.com/

http://crimespace.ning.com/profile/BrianL