We Recommend...

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Blessing on the Moon by Joseph Skibell reviewed by James MacDougall

Bridget Jones's Diary by Helen Fielding reviewed by Lisa Gesner

Brief Interviews with Hideous Men by David Foster Wallace reviewed by David Kim

Chocolat by Joanne Harris reviewed by Lisa Gesner

Come to Me by Amy Bloom reviewed by Andrea Mason

The Club Dumas by Arturo Perez-Reverte reviewed by Jennifer Zukowski

Defiance by Carole Maso reviewed by W. James MacDougall

The Dispossessed : An Ambiguous Utopia by Ursula Le Guin reviewed by Ben Greenberg

Flying Leap by Judy Budnitz reviewed by Charity Gandolfo

Focus by Arthur Miller reviewed by Arsen Kashkashian

Franz Kafka : The Complete Stories by Franz Kafka reviewed by Chris Weber

Gates of Fire by Steven Pressfield reviewed by Warren Onken

Girl In Landscape by Jonathan Lethem reviewed by W. James MacDougall

Little Altars Everywhere by Rebecca Wells reviewed by Mary McDaniel

Mr. Darwin's Shooter by Roger McDonald reviewed by Charity Gandolfo

The Mistress of Spices by Chitra Banerjee Divakaruni reviewed by Dana Van Kooy

Blessing on the Moon
by Joseph Skibell
reviewed by James MacDougall

Joseph Skibell's first novel is one of horror, humor, and wonder. Chaim Skibelski reunites with his rabbi after his family and entire town have been exterminated by a German squad. He and all of his acquaintances have changed form, and Chaim and the rabbi embark of a magical journey reminiscent of the work of Borges and Gabriel Garcia Marquez. In one scene, Chaim encounters the head of an indignant German guard waiting to be reunited with its body. Always in this novel, the comic is underscored with the despair and anger of incomprehensible loss. Skibell's novel is at once and elegy, a statement, and question. Chaim is an Everyman always wondering why as he trudges toward an unusual ending.

Blessing on the Moon ($21.95 )

Bridget Jones's Diary
by Helen Fielding
reviewed by Lisa Gesner

A very funny, read-it-and-you'll-laugh-out-loud book. Thirtyish Bridget Jones lives in England and works in a publishing house. She begins each entry of her diary with a listing of the previous night's vices, be they alcohol units, calories, chocolates, or cigarettes. From the first scenes where she braves her parents' friends' New Year's Day Turkey Curry Buffet with a raging hangover, you'll be pulled into her world of yuppie bosses, loser boyfriends, and evenings out with girlfriends discussing the shortcomings of the male species. Underneath all the comedy is one young woman trying to maintain a (relatively) even course in a crazy world. I thoroughly enjoyed this novel. Read it before the movie comes out!

Bridget Jones's Diary ($12.95)

Brief Interviews with Hideous Men
by David Foster Wallace
reviewed by David Kim

This latest collection of Wallace's short stories reveals a darkness and sobriety unseen, although hinted at, in his earlier works, (including the much-praised and over-written Infinite Jest and the wildly raucous A Supposedly Fun Thing I'll Never Do Again. Iridescent observations on the human condition are sprinkled through dense layers of depression, disconnectedness and metafiction (or is that depressing, disconnected metafiction?) Always funny, deeply serious and stylistically inventive. Brief Interviews with Hideous Men reaffirms Wallace's status as America's premier young satirist. Highlights include: "The Depressed Person," "Forever Overhead" and the titular "Brief Interviews."

Brief Interviews with Hideous Men ($24.00)

Chocolat
by Joanne Harris
reviewed by Lisa Gesner

When is the last time you read a novel into the wee hours of the morning because you just couldn't stop? Chocolat had that effect on me. Enchanting. Beguiling. Sensual. Chocolat is all of this and more. When Vianne Rocher and her daughter set up a chocolate shop in a tiny French village, people are intrigued at how Vianne just knows what their favorite sweet will be. The village priest is incensed when she opens her store just as Lent begins and decides to turn the town against her. Does he succeed? Is Vianne, with her special "powers" and unearthly goodies, really a witch? To find out, read Joanne Harris' wonderful novel, a book that celebrates human life and the delicious and often simple pleasures that bring us joy.

Chocolat ($22.95)

The Club Dumas
by Arturo Perez-Reverte
reviewed by Jennifer Zukowski

The Club Dumas, another of Perez-Reverte's intellectual thrillers, combines literature of old with modern, city-edged characters. The result is a harrowing spine-and-brain- tingling escapade into the entwined worlds of musketeers and devil worshippers. Those familiar with Perez-Reverte's Flanders Panel may be disappointed by the selfishly small villains in this piece, but the suspense and brain-cracking riddles of Lucas Corso the bookseller and his strange guardian angel make it difficult to put this one down. What does Dumas's The Three Musketeers and a fifteenth-century rewrite of the Delomelanicon have in common? Who is the mysterious "Rochefort" with the scar? Why is the young Irene Adler trying to protect Corso, and from what? A thrilling mystery for the book detective.

The Club Dumas ($13.00)

Come to Me
by Amy Bloom
reviewed by Andrea Mason

Come to Me is a group of powerful, poignant short stories which speak to memory and the uncertainty of events. Bloom writes in a rhythmic prose which describes unique characters at sometimes subtle, but always significant, turning points in their lives. I recommend Come to Me to readers who seek elusive prose and emotionally evocative stories which may not reveal themselves on the page, but rather in the reader's mind and through the language in which they are written.

Come to Me ($12.00)

Defiance
by Carole Maso
reviewed by W. James MacDougall

In her sumptuous style, Carole Maso layers Defiance in lyric repetition that unsettles the reader. Through the prison death journal of her protagonist, Harvard math professor Bernadette O'Brien, Maso weaves beauty and pain eloquently and builds the novel to a frenzy that leaves the reader despairing and spent. Bernadette has been sentenced to death for the fabulously sexual murders of two of her students, and the journal describes Bernadette's past, her ordered world of mathematics and her passionate, meteoric fall from grace. An immensely compelling novel, I dare you to read this book and resist falling into Bernadette's brilliant but fractured mind. This book is exemplary of why Carole Maso is on the forefront of American literature.

Defiance ($23.95)

The Dispossessed : An Ambiguous Utopia
by Ursula Le Guin reviewed
by Ben Greenberg

Imagine an Earth-like world with a habitable sister planet nearby. During the middle of its cold war, the radicals, disillusioned with both capitalism and communism, leave and set up an utopian colony on the sister planet. A few generations later they have a stable society, complete with advanced universities. One day a physicist comes up with the much sought after connection between relativity and quantum mechanics. He wants to share this highly profitable knowledge with the home planet, which is still in the grips of its cold war, and so the physicist becomes the first traveler to visit the home planet since the colonists left. The Dispossessed is his story from childhood, to his a dventures as an adult. Le Guin's novel is very intelligent, with insightful commentary on human society. Not to mention, it is also very addictive.

The Dispossessed ($5.99)

Flying Leap
by Judy Budnitz
reviewed by Charity Gandolfo

Both the oddball and the ordinary are present in this debut collection of stories and is sure to please any taste. Budnitz has a keen insight into the mannerisms and minutiae of human behavior that allows her to create outrageous yet believable tales, such as the two aunts who berate their nephew for his reluctance to donate his own heart to his dying mother; the composer whose genius waxes and wanes in accordance to his mother's girth; the man in the dog suit who begs at a family's door. At only 24 years of age Budnitz' style is so original and defined it leaves the reader eagerly awaiting her next book.

Flying Leap ($12.00)

Focus
by Arthur Miller
reviewed by Arsen Kashkashian

Written during World War II, Focus is a dark fable of the American homefront. Lawrence Newman lives in an anti-Semitic neighborhood in Brooklyn and works in a large Jew phobic office in Manhattan. When he gets glasses and they set off his oversize nose this typical Christian is suddenly mistaken for a Jew. Confronted with the other side of prejudice, he is forced to examine his own views. Despite his being a bit heavy handed at times a style that served Miller in his play The Crucible this is a fascinating study of America right before the Holocaust became common knowledge.

Focus ($14.95)

Franz Kafka : The Complete Stories
by Franz Kafka
reviewed by Chris Weber

This beautifully designed volume contains all of Kafka's fiction with the exception of his three novels. It is also a necessary presence in the library of any serious student of literature. Classics like "The Metamorphosis", "In the Penal Colony", and "A Hunger Artist", are juxtaposed with shockingly clever parables like "The Truth About Sancho Panza" and "The Venture" which are all expertly translated to read smoothly. The modernist self-conscious angst that breathes through his writing stayed with Kafka until his death - he requested that all but six of his works be burned - luckily they were not. In this age of uncertainty and crisis of culture, it is no wonder that Kafka's work continues to move readers. his biting criticism of society and incisive wit mesmerizes both the mind and soul.

Franz Kafka : The Complete Stories ($15.00)

Gates of Fire
by Steven Pressfield
reviewed by Warren Onken

In 480 BC a picked force of 300 Spartan warriors held the narrow mountain pass at Thermopylae until they were overwhelmed by a huge Persian army. Their stand inspired and rallied the quarreling Greek city-states to finally expel the invaders the following year. Pressfield's graphic dramatization of this celebrated story delineates the brutal ferocity of ancient warfare as well as the fierce ethics of the Spartans, both men and women. Perhaps above all, in illuminating the perilous world of the 5th century BC, the author echoes the classic historians Herodotus and Thucydides by connecting the blood sacrifice of Thermopylae with the nurturing of western democracy

Gates of Fire ($23.95)

Little Altars Everywhere
by Rebecca Wells
reviewed by Mary McDaniel

Rebecca Wells's first novel, Little Altars Everywhere, is a companion to the hot best seller The Divine Secrets of the Ya-Ya Sisterhood. In Little Altars Everywhere, each chapter is told by a different family member, from various years throughout their lives. The stories, memories, celebrations, and tragedies of each person intertwine to tell the tale of this interesting southern family. A must-read, especially if you've read The Divine Secrets of the Ya-Ya Sisterhood.

Little Altars Everywhere ($13.00)

Mr. Darwin's Shooter
by Roger McDonald
reviewed by Charity Gandolfo

At the age of 15, Syms Covington was already a seasoned sailor before sailing on a survey ship and meeting a man who would change not only his life but the lives of all God fearing men and women. The ship was the H.M.S. Beagle and the man was young Charles Darwin. Covington becomes Darwin's assistant, shooting and collecting specimens, and forming a strange partnership that lasted seven years. A devout man, Covington is greatly distraught when, years later, he receives a copy of Origin of the Species. He is tormented by the realization that his work helped prove evolutionism over creationism, and brought mankind's very faith in God to question

Mr. Darwin's Shooter ($25.00)

The Mistress of Spices
by Chitra Banerjee Divakaruni
reviewed by Dana Van Kooy

Tilo, powerful Mistress of Spices, willfully chooses to be sent to assuage the pains of her people in the new land: Oakland, California. This is a land of so much promise, so alluring, and yet so dangerous is where Tilo must, like a phoenix, enter the fires of transformation. Oakland is a crucible where desire, passion, violence, and hatred are crushed together and re-formed into an intense will to redefine the lives of these lost souls newly arrived from India. All of this is forbidden to the Mistress, who is guided by the laws of a tradition which forbids her to become personally involved with her people, which also prevents her from seeing who she really is, which gives her the power to help only if she loses herself completely and absolutely. This is Tilo's story, as she enters a forbidden land and risks all that she is to meet the pressing need for change.

The Mistress of Spices ($12.00)

You'll find these reviews and many more in our award-winning Recommended Reading section on the main floor and in sections throughout the store. If you have a review you'd like us to post either here or in our section, e-mail Bevin Campbell, Recommended Reading Coordinator at info@boulderbookstore.com.