While’s there’s nothing quite like getting lost in a long, epic saga, you can’t deny the satisfaction of finishing an entire book in less than a week! February is a short month – so why not pick up short book? Give yourself a sense of accomplishment without committing to weeks in the company of the same book!
Here are a few books from our shelves that are short on pages but not merit:
The Uncommon Reader by Alan Bennett (120 pages)
“When her corgis stray into a mobile library parked near
Buckingham Palace, the Queen feels duty-bound to borrow a book.
Discovering the joy of reading widely…she finds that her view of the world changes dramatically….the Queen comes to question the prescribed order of the world and loses patience with the routines of her role as monarch.”
Any common reader will enjoy a good laugh from British playwright Alan Bennett’s The Uncommon Reader, which can be consumed in a few spare hours.” –Bookmarks Magazine
Amsterdam Ian McEwan (140 pages)
“On a chilly February day, two old friends meet in the throng outside a crematorium to pay their last respects to Molly Lane… In the days that follow Molly’s funeral, Clive and Vernon will make a pact with consequences neither has foreseen. Each will make a disastrous moral decision, their friendship will be tested to its limit…”
In Amsterdam, a contemporary morality tale that is as profound as it is witty, we have Ian McEwan at his wisest and most wickedly disarming.”
The Guest Cat by Takashi Hiraide (140 pages)
“A couple in their thirties live in a small rented cottage in a quiet part of Tokyo; they work at home, freelance copy-editing; they no longer have very much to say to one another. But one day a cat invites itself into their small kitchen. It leaves, but the next day comes again, and then again and again. Soon they are buying treats for the cat and enjoying talks about the animal and all its little ways…The novel brims with new small joys and many moments of staggering poetic beauty, but then something happens….”
A rare treasure, beautiful and profound; whether you’re a cat lover or not, don’t pass this one up. ultimately, it’s about what it means to love and to lose. Even dog lovers will relate.” (Juan Vidal – NPR)”
Sula by Toni Morrison (174 pages)
“In this brilliantly imagined novel, Toni Morrison tells the story of Nel Wright and Sula Peace, who meet as children in the small town of Medallion, Ohio. Their devotion is fierce enough to withstand bullies and the burden of a dreadful secret. It endures even after Nel has grown up to be a pillar of the black community and Sula has become a pariah. But their friendship ends in an unforgivable betrayal—or does it end? Terrifying, comic, ribald and tragic, Sula is a work that overflows with life.”
The Painted Veil by Somerset Maugham (246 pages)
Today’s hits like The Girl on the Train’ can trace their lineage back to Maugham’s work: “the very first recorded use of the term “psychological thriller” was in an admiring review of The Painted Veil in 1925.”
Set in England and Hong Kong in the 1920s, The Painted Veil is the story of the beautiful but love-starved Kitty Fane. When her husband discovers her adulterous affair, he forces her to accompany him to the heart of a cholera epidemic. Stripped of the British society of her youth and the small but effective society she fought so hard to attain in Hong Kong, she is compelled by her awakening conscience to reassess her life and learn how to love.”
Sanditon & The Watsons (unfinished) by Jane Austen (97 pages)
They’re unfinished…but they’re Jane Austen! “The beloved author left behind two tantalizing unfinished novels: The Watsons, which revisits Austen’s customary milieu of courtship; and her last work, Sanditon, a venture into new territory, amid guests at a seaside resort. More than literary curiosities, these stories are worthy of reading for pleasure as well as for study.”
Annihilation by Jeff Vandermeer (195 pages)
“World Fantasy Award winner VanderMeer turns in a dystopian story with literary overtones that’s winning comparison to works by Margaret Atwood. According to the first expedition to Area X, which has been cut off from civilization for decades, the land there is an unspoiled Eden. But subsequent expeditions have met with catastrophe, and members of the 12th expedition simply hope to stay alive while mapping the terrain.”
A gripping fantasy thriller, Annihilation is thoroughly suspenseful…VanderMeer weaves together an otherworldly tale of the supernatural and the half-human. Delightfully, this page-turner is the first in a trilogy. –Publishers Weekly
The Crying of Lot 49 by Thomas Pynchon (149 pages)
It’s short – but don’t expect an easy ride! “The highly original satire about Oedipa Maas, a woman who finds herself enmeshed in a worldwide conspiracy, meets some extremely interesting characters, and attains a not inconsiderable amount of self knowledge.”
The work of a virtuoso with prose…akin to that of Joyce’s Ulysses.” Chicago Tribune
What’s your favorite short read? Let us know!
(Review text provided by publishers except where noted.)