Welcome to MarshaReads.com. You will find a collection of short essays about books I’ve read starting in spring 2016. Your comments are welcomed.
Since this list has grown substantially since I started this website, I provide two tables to help you find a particular book or a particular author.
Because I’m not an expert webmaster, I have the two tables on two pages to minimize your need to scroll seemingly endlessly.
This page has a table with the books aphabetized by title.
“Books by Title” has a table with the books aphabetized by author’s last name. If “The” or “An” is in the title, the second word is used for aphabetization.
NOTE: I’ve decided to classify any book that was published >50 years ago as “Classic”. This is my personal definition. If we’re still reading a book published more than 50 years ago it must have something that continues to resonate with readers today and likely in the future. Good enough definition for me.
The list is not exhaustive prior to spring 2016.
Author Last Name Author First Name Title Haruf Kent All Souls At Night Doerr Anthony All the Light We Cannot See Stegner Wallace All the Little Live Things McCarthy Cormac All the Pretty Horses Quindlen Anna Alternate Side Jones Tayari American Marriage , AnWinspear Jacqueline The American Agent (12)Woodard Colin America Nations: A History of the Eleven Rival Regional Cultures of North America El Akkad Omar American War Winspear Jacqueline Among the Mad (6)* Tolstoy Leo Anna Karenina Bachman Fredrik Anxious People Sophocles Antigone Mahfouz Naguig Arabian Nights and Days Strout Elizabeth Anything is Possible Halliday Lisa Asymmetry Lewis Sinclair Babbitt Sudbanthad Pitchaya Bangkok Wakes to Rain Updike John Bech: A Book Lefteri Christy The Beekeeper of Aleppo Patchett Ann Bel Canto Haurf Kent Benediction Winspear Jacqueline Birds of a Feather (2) * Oates Joyce Carol Black Water Walker Martin Black Diamonds Hillerman Tony The Blessing Way Didion Joan Blue Nights Hood Ann Book That Matters Most, The Huxley Aldous Brave New World Brockmeier Kevin Brief History of the Dead, The Strout Elizabeth Burgess Boys , TheIshiguro Kozuo Buried Giant, The Walker Martin Bruno: Chief of Police Charmock Anne Calculated Life , AMiller, Jr Walter A Canticle for Lebowitz Winspear Jacqueline Care and Management of Lies: A Novel of the Great War , TheGalbraith Robert Career of Evil Vonnegut Kurt Cat’s Cradle Heller Joseph Catch 22 Galloway Steven Cellist of Sarajevo, The Russo Richard Chances Are… Black Benjamin Christine Falls Tyler Anne Clock Dance McBride James The Color of Water Patchett Ann Commonwealth Twain Mark Connecticut Yankee in King Arthur’s Court Winspear Jacqueline The Consequences of Fear Hillerman Tony Coyote Waits Gaskell Mrs (Elizabeth) Cranford Stegner Wallace Crossing to Safety Galbraith Robert The Cuckoo’s Calling Hillerman Tony Dance Hall of the Dead Bradbury Ray Dandelion Wine Winspear Jacqueline Dangerous Place (11)* , AWalker Martin The Dark Vineyard Hillerman Tony The Dark Wind Napolitano Ann Dear Edward Munro Alice Dear Life Williams Pip Dictionary of Lost Words, The Walker Martin The Devil’s Cave Tyler Anne Dinner at the Homesick Restaurant Le Guin Ursula Dispossessed, The Walsh M. O. Don’t Take My Sunshine Walsh M.O. Don’t Take My Sunshine Russell Mary Doria Dreamers of the Day Tokarczuk Olga Drive Your Plow over the Bones of the Dead Patchett Ann Dutch House, The Smiley Jane Early Alert Westover Tara Educated Black Benjamin Elegy for April Windspear Jacqueline Elegy for Eddy (9)* Greene Graham The End of the Affair Jaswal Balli Kaur Erotic Stories for Punjabi Widows Russo Richard Everybody’s Fool Haruf Kent Eventide Hamid Moshin Exit West Wolitzer Meg Female Persuassion Valdez Qunade Kristin The Five Wounds Groff Lauren Florida Nunez Sigrid Friend, The Guskin Sharon Forgetting Time , TheContreras Ingrid Rojas Fruit of the Drunken Tree Tripp Dawn Georgia Towles Amor A Gentleman in Moscow Howell Georgiana Gertrude Bell: Queen of the Desert, Shaper of Nations Hyeonseo Lee Girl with Seven Names, The Zgheib Yara Girls at 17 Swan Street, The Rao Shobha Girls Burn Brighter Erpenbeck Jenny Go Went Gone Mandel Emily St John Glass Hotel, The Smiley Jane Golden Age O’Nan Stewart The Good Wife Dickens Charles Great Expectations Conroy Pat The Great Santini Dweyer Carol Growth Mindset Adichie Chimanda Ngozi Half of a Yellow Sun O’Farrell Maggie Hamnet Atwood Margaret Handmaid’s Tale Atwood Margaret Heart Goes Last , TheKelly Jack Heaven’s Ditch Shetterly Margot Hidden Figures Vance JD Hilbilly Elegy Shamsie Kamila Homefire Lami Laila Hope and the Pursuit of Other Dangerous Things Urrea Luis Alberto House of Broken Angels Warton Edith House of Mirth Ogawa Yoko Housekeeper and the Professor, The Marais Bianca Hum If You Don’t Know the Words Kang Han Human Acts Sklott Rebecca Immortal Life of Henrietta lacks , TheSilber Joan Improvement Capote Truman In Cold Blood Godden Rummer In This House of Brede Winspear Jacqueline In this grave hour Winspear Jacqueline Incomplete Revenge (5) *, An Desai Kiran Inheritance of Loss , TheHaruf Kent Introduction–Kent Haruf Berry Wendall Jaybar Crow DeFoe Daniel Journal of the Plague Year Windspear Jacqueline Journey to Munich (12)* Ishiguro Kauzo Klara and the Sun Grann David Killers of the Flower Moon: The Osage Murders and the Birth of the FBI Levin Ira A Kiss Before Dying Benedict Marie Lady Clementine Austen Jane Lady Susan Doig Ivan Last Bus to Wisdom Goodwin Doris Kearns Leadership in Turbulent Times Ko Lisa Leavers , TheWindspear Jacqueline Leaving Everything Most Loved (10)* Geer Andrew Sean Less Winspear Jacqueline Lesson in Secrets (8)* , AVida Vendela Let the Northern Lights Erase Your Name Galbraith Robert Lethal White Ulrich Laurel Thatcher Life of Martha Ballard Based on Her Diary 1785-1812 , TheTowles Amor The Lincoln Highway Saunders George Lincoln in the Bardo Forman, Jr. James Locking Up Our Own Mandel Emily St John Lola Quartet, The Allende Isabel A Long Petal of the Sea Moore Liz Long Bright River Lusisella Valerie Lost Children Archives Atwood Margaret Madd Addam Lewis Sinclair Main Street Joukhadar Zeyn Map of Salt and Stars, The Winspear Jacqueline Mapping of Love and Death (7)* , TheWinspear Jacqueline Massie Dobbs (1) * Ogawa Yoko Memory Police, The Winspear Jacqueline Messenger of Truth (4)* Haig Matt The Midnight Library Cain James M. Mildred Pierce Quindlen Anna Miller’s Valley Langer Ellen Mindfulness* Dweck Carol Mindset: The New Psychology of Success Watson Brad Miss Jane Modiano Patrick Missing Person Wilke Collin Moonstone , TheLombardo Claire The Most Fun We Ever Had Que Mai Nguyen Phan Mountains Sing, The Hijuelos Oscar Mr. Ives’ Christmas Macy Caitlin Mrs. Ben-Moshe Danny My Lost Family du Maurier Daphne My Cousin Rachel Strout Elizabeth My Name is Lucy Barton Choo Yangsze Night Tiger , TheRusso Richard Nobody’s Fool* Toibin Colm Nora Webster Gaskell Elizabeth North and South Strout Elizabeth Oh William Strout Elizabeth Olive Again! Vuong Ocean On Earth We’re Briefly Gorgeous Quindlen Anna One True Thing Atwood Margaret Oryx and Crake Dinensen Isak Out of Africa Powers Richard Overstory, The Lee Min Jin Pachinko Winspear Jacqueline Pardonable Lies (3) * Patchett Anne The Patron Saint of Liars Enger Leif Peace Like a River Hillerman Tony People of Darkness Wilde Oscar Picture of Dorian Gray, The Haruf Kent Plainsong Doig Ivan Prairie Nocturne Austen Jane Pride and Prejudice Sparks Muriel Prime of Miss Jean Brodie , TheKingsolver Barbara Prodigal Summer Schnittman Suzanne Provocative Mothers and their Precocious Daughters Hansberry Lorraine Raisin in the Sun Chevalier Tracy Remarkable Creatures Stegner Wallace Remembering Laughter Wright Cameron Rent Collector , TheDeFoe Daniel Robinson Crusoe Larson Kate Clifford Rosemary: The Hidden Kennedy Daughter Patchett Ann Run Orczy Baroness Scarlet Pimpernel , TheBrooks Geraldine Secret Chord, The George Alex Setting Free the Kites Yun Jung Shelter Zimmer Carl She Has Her Mother’s Laugh: The Powers, Perversions, and Potential of Heredity Galbraith Robert The Silkworm Ward Jesmyn Sing Unburied Sing McTiernan Dervla The Sisters Hillerman Tony Skeleton Man Brennan-Jobs Lisa Small Fry Lang James Small Teaching Banville John Snow Smiley Jane Some Luck McDermott Alice Someone Darznik Jazmin Song of a Captive Bird Iweala Uzodinma Speak No Evil Stegner Wallace Spectator Bird Mandel Emily St John Station Eleven Quindlen Anna Still Life with Bread Crumbs Dawson Evan Summer in a Glass Winspear Jacqueline A Sunlit Weapon Chancellor Bryn Sycamore Michener James Tales of the South Pacific Hardy Thomas Tess of d’Ubervilles Atwood Margaret The Testaments Friedman Mandelbaum Thomas L Michael That Used to be us: How America Fell Behind in the World it invented and how we can come back Orange Tommy There, There Adichie Chimamanda Ngozi Thing Around Your Neck, The O’Brien Tim The Things They Carried Hillerman Tony A Thief of Time Kahneman Daniel Thinking Fast and Slow Frankel Laurie This Is How It Always is Haynes Natalie A Thousand Ships Haruf Kent Tie That Binds , TheShakespeare William Tragedy of Julius Caesar, The Galbraith Robert Troubled Blood Stowe Harriet Beecher Uncle Tom’s Cabin Ullmann Linn Unquiet: A Novel Bennett Brit The Vanishing Half Kang Han Vegetarian , TheAppanah Natacha Waiting for Tomorrow Gundar-Goshen Ayelet Waking Lions Tolstoy Leo War and Peace Rum Etaf A Woman is No Man Woolfe Virginia Waves, The Roberts Cokie We Are Our Mothers’ Daughters Kadish Rachel Weight of Ink, The Tompkins Joanne What Comes After