Before my wife turned vegetarian, I’d always thought of her as completely unremarkable in every way. To be frank, the first time I met her I wasn’t even attracted to her. Middling height; bobbed hair neither long nor short; jaundiced, sickly-looking skin; somewhat prominent cheekbones; her tied, sallow aspect told me all I needed
What the blurb says: So overwhelmed was Marie de Gournay by the work of French essayist and philosopher Michel de Montaigne that when she finally met him, she stabbed herself with a hairpin until the blood ran in order to show her devotion. An awkward, obsessive character, she set herself against the world in
I simply wanted to know — for myself and for my family — what meat is. Where does it come from? How is it produced? What are the economical, social and environmental effects? Are there animals that it is straightforwardly right to eat? Are there situations in which not eating animals is wrong? If this
Horace was alone in the city and he realized that being alone in the city was worse than being alone on the ranch. Because when he was alone on the ranch he had the dream of the city, the dream of what he would become in the city. But now he was there and
Leo had been avoiding his wife, Victoria, who was barely speaking to him and his sister Beatrice who wouldn't stop speaking to him—rambling on and on about getting together for Thanksgiving. Thanksgiving. In July. Leo hadn't spent a holiday with his family in twenty years, since the mid-'90s if he was remembering correctly: he wasn't
What the blurb tells us: Mr. Pooter is a man of modest ambition, content with his clerkly lot. So why is he always in trouble with disagreeable tradesmen, impudent young clerks and wayward friends? And what is he to do about his son Lupin's distinctly unsuitable choice of bride? However hard he tries, life piles
"I have to keep convincing myself", Helen said when they got outside, "that this is really happening. You're all so matter-of-fact about it, but the truth is that he is dying in there and I have to go and tell my mother." Helen's beloved little brother is dying. This brings the family together again
What the blurb tells us about A Visit from the Goon Squad: A Visit from the Goon Squad vividly captures the moments where lives interact, and where fortunes ebb and flow. Egan depicts with elegant prose and often heart-wrenching simplicity, the sad consequences for those who couldn't fake it during their wild youth – madness,