Thursday, March 19, 2009

The Believers by Zoe Heller

Notes on a Scandal by Zoe Heller is one of my favorite books and movies. Besides the story, the detailed (yet subtle) observations of character and biting/humorous dialogue make it a great novel.

So imagine browsing through my daily blogs, and finding on my buddy The Last Noel's blog that not only does Zoe Heller have a new book out, The Believers, but that she was also in L.A. yesterday doing a book reading at Skylight Books, a great independent bookstore in town. I was beside myself for not keeping up with the event calendars of the local stores the past couple weeks.

Anyway, The Believers will be added to my pile o' books to buy and/or read soon. (Thanks to Uncle Sam's and Uncle Arnold's tax return, I carefully selected a few books to splurge on -- carefully is the operative, as we're still in bad economy-ville, and bills and savings come first). It has gotten great reviews.

In brief, it is a satire on family that holds very progressive political and social justice views, until those values are challenged during a family crisis. Of course there's more, and my description doesn't give complete justice. However, many of the reviews say the same thing -- humorous, dark, satirical, great dialogue, and bad characters you want to hate but feel for at the same time.

Review from Newsday.

Zoe Heller interview on NPR.

Have a nice day... take a chance... live it up... say yes instead of maybe. As we've seen in the news recently, you never know...
fs

1 comment:

the last noel said...

I wish I'd known you loved her. I have a feeling the both of you would have gotten along splendidly!