MADAME BOVARY by Gustave Flaubert

FIC

FLAUBERT

Emma is the daughter of a simple farmer. She marries Dr. Charles Bovary, a equally simple doctor. Emma becomes disillusioned with marriage, and terrible bored. In truth, she craves the passion and romance she has read about in books.

Madame Bovary embarks on an affair with Leon, a law clerk. After he leaves her, Rodolphe is next. She steadily loses control, taking risks, borrowing more and more money. The hapless doctor is oblivious. Rodolphe's desertion precipitates her downfall.

MISTRESS OF THE ART OF DEATH by Ariana Frankllin

FIC

FRANKLIN
A serial child murderer is on the loose in 12th-century Cambridge and suspicion has fallen on the local Jewish population. King Henry II wants to find the killer (and needs the Jewish tax revenues). He sends for a medical examiner, or master of the art of death, from one of the most advanced medical schools of the time, the University of Salerno. What he gets is a “mistress of the art of death” in the form of young Dr. Adelia Aguilar who must do her work in secret because of the English prejudice against female doctors. The mystery is entertaining but perhaps more interesting are the many historical details of life in this distant time.

LIFE, DEATH AND BIALYS: A FATHER/SON BAKING STORY by Dylan Schaffer

BIOG

Schaffer
Schaffer, an attorney and author of two legal thrillers, receives a call from his father, Flip, asking him to participate in a bread baking class. Flip is dying of cancer and the class is seven months away. Schaffer has doubts whether his father will live long enough to attend, yet agrees to sign up. Flip had abandoned Schaffer and his brothers thirty years before to life with a mentally unstable mother; there had been little contact since. Throughout the week-long class Schaffer realizes his father is asking for forgiveness. Schaffer has to work through years of pain and rejection , accepting his father’s flaws before it is too late.
This is a humorous, touching memoir, an honest account of a complicated relationship.

LICK CREEK by Brad Kessler

FIC

KESSLER

Emily Jenkins and her widowed mother Ada live in the hills of West Virginia in the 1920s. Power is coming to the valley along with “electric men” who make a deal with the women for the right of way on their land. All turns to dust when the supervisor, Robert Daniels, plies her with liquor and rapes her. Overwhelmed with rage, Emily vows revenge on the power company through acts of sabotage.
Her life is altered when a young lineman, Joseph Gershon, is struck by lightning and brought to the Jenkins house to recuperate. His tales of immigration from Russia enthrall Emily and the two fall in love. Only Emily’s obsessive hatred for Daniels stands in the way of their happiness. A dramatic conclusion brings the story full circle.

KNITTING CIRCLE by Ann Hood

FIC
HOOD
Mary Baxter loses her only child, little Stella.
In their grief Mary and her husband find themselves isolated and disconnected, even fromeach other. Mary’s mother encourages her daughter to go to Big Alice’s shop to learn to knit. At the knitting circle six ladies surround Mary: Scarlet, Lulu,Beth,Harriet, Ellen and Alice. Each member shares with Mary a new knitting technique, along with her own story of loss and recovery. Initially, Mary is reluctant to tell her story. Eventually hours of knitting and listening help her to relate her own experience of suffering. Soon Mary begins to reclaim her life and rediscovers a renewed love for her husband.

AN ARSONIST'S GUIDE TO WRITERS' HOMES IN NEW ENGLAND by Brock Clarke

FIC
Clarke
Sam Pulsifer served 10 years in jail for accidentally setting fire to Emily Dickinson’s house, killing two occupants. He rebuilt his life after being released and is now happily married with two children. All goes well until the son of the two persons killed reappears and other famous writers’ homes go up in flames. Guess who’s the obvious suspect? This offbeat novel is both funny and moving.

The Obituary Writer by Porter Shreve

FIC

SHREVE

Gordon Hatch is a 22-year old aspiring newspaper reporter,trying to live up to the
legacy of his late father, who covered the JFK assassination. He is a lowly obituary writer, inflating his position to his mother and ex-girlfriend. He senses his chance has come when he gets a phone call from Alicia, a young widow promising an enthralling story. As they become lovers and her story emerges, her capacity for falsehood makes him look like an amateur. Alicia’s lies (and his own) offer a choice between truth and fiction that must be resolved before he can evolve into the kind of newspaperman his father would have respected.