What I love about this book is its heart-rich and humorous exploration of what it means to be human.
A somewhat jaded alien arrives on Earth with a mission to “save us from ourselves” by eliminating people too close to a revolutionary math theorem. The idea is that we can’t be trusted to use STEM knowledge responsibly. I get that. Nuclear warfare, anyone?
Our alien takes the form of a renowned professor (the creator of said revolutionary theorem), which means living with a disgruntled wife, a misunderstood son, and a wise dog named, of course, Newton (I adore Newton!).
The home scenes are the parts of the book I loved the most because things change for everyone—including for the alien who brings readers along on a journey to discover who really are the humans.
After an 'incident' one wet Friday night where he is found walking naked through the streets of Cambridge, Professor Andrew Martin is not feeling quite himself. Food sickens him. Clothes confound him. Even his loving wife and teenage son are repulsive to him. He feels lost amongst an alien species and hates everyone on the planet. Everyone, that is, except Newton, and he's a dog.
Who is he really? And what could make someone change their mind about the human race . . . ?
Hello Beautiful explores intergenerational family and family connections in all its messiness and love.
The book primarily follows five characters—four of them sisters, and all of them compelling. There are no bad guys, just people who love each other but struggle to find where they belong. And that sometimes means hurting each other.
The author writes lovely passages, but even better, she writes passages that delve into the very souls of the characters.
Though all the characters are special, everyone in my book group was in love (there’s that word again!) with Sylvie.
Sylvie is the kind of intuitive, generous sister we all want to call our own. Every page I spent with Sylvie was a joy.
Throughout the book, I thought about family and connections, what we gain, and what we lose. I kept thinking about all that long after I turned the last page.
From the New York Times bestselling author of Dear Edward comes a poignant and engrossing family story that asks: Can love make a broken person whole?
“Hello Beautiful is exactly that: beautiful, perceptive, wistful. It’s a story of family and friendship, of how the people we are bound to can also set us free. I loved it.”—Miranda Cowley Heller, author of The Paper Palace
William Waters grew up in a house silenced by tragedy, where his parents could hardly bear to look at him, much less love him—so when he meets the spirited and ambitious Julia Padavano in his freshman…
I really enjoyed this book, and so did everyone in my book group.
With so many details and subplots that the author weaves into the novel, you’ll want to go back for a second read to really absorb how she mixed sci-fi and time travel elements into historical and futuristic settings.
I’m a fan of the slow build. I had started the author’s earlier novel, Station Eleven, but put it down because of all the different subplots and dizzying time shifts. By contrast, I found Sea of Tranquility a joy to read with its greater focus on intriguing characters that I wanted to spend time with.
And there was plenty of story as well, zipping from a moon colony to 20th century Canada to a pandemic-ravaged, future Earth. Great read!
NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLER • The award-winning, best-selling author of Station Eleven and The Glass Hotel returns with a novel of art, time travel, love, and plague that takes the reader from Vancouver Island in 1912 to a dark colony on the moon five hundred years later, unfurling a story of humanity across centuries and space.
One of the Best Books of the Year: The New York Times, NPR, GoodReads
“One of [Mandel’s] finest novels and one of her most satisfying forays into the arena of speculative fiction yet.” —The New York Times
Kendra JinJu MacGregor can resist
neither the antique Korean doll in the dusty warehouse nor the handsome Hiro
Peretti who sells it to her. Once she brings the doll home, the ethereal,
brooding NanJu manifests herself, and Kendra begins her travels through time to
16th-century Korea into a history of conflict and intrigue. Kendra is about
to discover the dark past of her ghostly visitor.
Now it’s up to Kendra, with Hiro by her side,
to interpret the past and prevent murder. Everything depends upon Kendra’s
success, even—she discovers to her horror—her own life.
My grandsons love this book because of its imaginative rhymes and colorful illustrations. They also enjoy all the funny things that happen to the witch as well as the way the characters come together to defeat the evil antagonist.
Room on the Broom is also an excellent book parents can use to teach problem-solving and cooperation skills.
How the cat purred and how the witch grinned, As they sat on their broomstick and flew through the wind.
A very funny story of quick wits and friendship, Room on the Broom is another smash hit from the unparalleled picture book partnership of Julia Donaldson and Axel Scheffler, creators of The Gruffalo.
The witch and her cat fly happily over forests, rivers and mountains on their broomstick until a stormy wind blows away the witch's hat, bow and wand. Luckily, they are retrieved by a dog, a bird and a frog, who are all keen for a ride on…
