Fiction by Howard Norman
It's 1918 in Nova Scotia. "Come to the window," says Elizabeth Frame to her new husband, as she stands in the moonlight looking from their honeymoon hotel room. She has seen a whale beach itself and finds the sight moving, but her husband doesn't come to look at it. So... she shoots him in the head.
Wait, what?
Yes, this is a weird book. I didn't really like it.
Fiction by Justin Pick
This book is set in 1998; technically, I'd say that's historical fiction, although it pains me to admit it.
In the story an eighteen-year-old boy called Liam Donohue goes to the police station to confess murder, and insists on telling a long convoluted story about it. A long-suffering detective listens to the whole thing with measured skepticism.
It's hard to tell what's real and what is imagined in Liam's recollections, so the detective isn't wrong to suspect his veracity. The reader also cannot be sure of the truth, and indeed the plot stretches believability quite a bit. The ending is definitely a surprise.
It was a pretty good story but I didn't love it.
Fiction by Helen Phillips
Molly is a mother of two young children and a paleobotanist, and she's having trouble juggling both roles but still mostly managing. Then her husband has to go away for a week and she hears an intruder in the house one evening. Or is she imagining it?
The beginning of this story was good and grabbed my attention. I was sometimes not sure what was real and what was not. The plot was interesting but also very strange. I did not like the ending at all, but the whole thing was certainly thought-provoking. It would be fun to discuss in a book club.
Fiction by Catherine Ryan Hyde
Walter is a soldier killed on a Pacific island during World War Two; Michael is a pot farmer in the early 1980's. What could connect these two? It's definitely weird.
This was a strange story from an author I usually love. The characters were pretty good in this book, but it's not nearly as compelling as her other books.
Fiction by Dean Koontz
Michael Mace dies at the beginning of this story, but he doesn't stay dead.
This is not a zombie book, however. Michael comes back as Something Else, but he's also still Michael.
It's a pretty interesting story, and in classic Koontz style you never have to wonder who the good guys and bad guys are. It's quite clear; if Michael were wearing a literal halo (and the bad guys forked tails) it would not be more plain.
This story has good characters and an interesting plot.
I also read recently by this author: The Bad Weather Friend
Fiction by Drew Magary
Ben is away from his home in Maryland on a business trip when he takes a small hike and ends up very far from where he expected. Instead of a wooded trail in Pennsylvania, he is... Somewhere else...
This was a very strange book that leaves the reader wondering what is really happening and what Ben is imagining. It was interesting.
Fiction by Scarlett Thomas
Luke is twenty-five years old and has never been outside his house. He has some sort of disease that his mother vaguely defines as being "allergic to the sun." Staying inside has been okay for Luke, especially because he has accumulated a motley group of friends who visit him a lot. But he's been increasing obsessed with the idea of Going Out...
This was an interesting character story, but it was pretty strange, I'm not sure about the ending.
Fiction by Ratika Kapur
This was a strange little story set in India. Renuka Sharma is a married lady who lives with her teenaged son and her elderly in-laws in a small city apartment while her husband works overseas to try to earn money for a better life. But when Renuka gets lonely she doesn't want to admit it. Instead she begins a weird sort-of relationship with a younger man that the reader can tell will not end well.
Fiction by Edan Lipinksi
This was a strange book. I suppose it should have been obvious from the weird title that it would be.
The book begins with an odd monolguey introduction by Time personified, but the story is about a woman called Ursa, beginning a little after 1950. Ursa has a gift for time travel, but only in a very limited way. This gift (or curse) is a major plot point but doesn't actually influence the narrative line. Therefore it doesn't really pull the novel all the way into fantasy, in my opinion. I decided to classify it as weird historical fiction instead.
Really it's more of a character story, about Ursa and the lives she influences, for better or worse. (Mostly worse.) It was a good story with an ending I didn't expect.
Fiction by Dean Koontz
This story begins with a mysterious package, sent from Florida to California, from an old man to a young one. When 23-year-old Benny Catspaw receives the package, it's identified as a "blessing that will transform your life," coming from an uncle he never realized he had. The uncle's message tells him, cryptically, "There is no reason to be afraid, though there may seem to be...."
Then some strange things start to happen!
This was an interesting a fun story. It's less creepy than one expects from Dean Koontz but still weird.
Fiction by Kevin Wilson
Frankie Budge is an adult now; she’s a mother and wife and a professional writer. Still she can’t forget something that happened to her --or, more accurately, something she did-- as a teenager twenty years ago, a sort of cultural phenomenon that the whole country has heard about but that no one knows she started.
That explanation doesn’t really make sense but you have to read the book to understand it.
This was a strange story but I really liked it.
I also read recently by this author: Perfect Little World
Audible Original Fiction by Ben Winters
Jack Diller is an affable loser who wants to be an actor but is currently a food delivery driver. When he tries listening to a new self-help audiobook called "the Killer Instinct," he doesn't expect much real help, but he hopes for something useful. What he gets is REALLY unexpected...
This was a fun and unusual story. I really liked it!
Fiction by Christopher Moore
Is Death a person? You know, like The Grim Reaper, with the scythe and the black robe and whatnot? Well, no, not literally. But what if....
In this story there are people who are Agents of Death, people unseen by anyone but the dying person, who usher the decedents into the afterworld, or whatever. And Charlie Asher, a bumbling San Francisco thrift shop owner, unexpectedly becomes an Agent of Death. Also he's a widower with a newborn. How will he navigate this new (under) world?
This was an original story with fun characters, but it got weird. (YES, weirder than that description I just gave, believe it or not!) I'm still not sure about the ending.
Fiction by Dean Koontz
At the center of this story is Quinn Quicksilver, an orphan with an unusual name. Leaving the orphanage where he was raised, Quinn embarks on an independent life at age eighteen, but soon is forced to go on the run by circumstances beyond his control.
This was a fun caper-style story with some dark (but not despairing) elements.
I also read recently by this author: The Other Emily
Fiction by Dean Koontz
Fiction by Ron Currie Jr
This book should actually have been called “Nothing Matters,” because that seemed to be the author’s point.
It began with the birth of a child who —for reasons never explained— was born with the knowledge that the world would end in destruction by fiery comet before his 40th birthday, and nothing could change that. I don't want to put any spoilers here, but... what would you do if you knew this? Try to prevent the disaster? Give up in despondency?
I did not like this book.
Fiction by Adam Johnson
Fiction by Sharon Guskin
Fiction by Stephen King
Fiction by Jordan Crouch and Blake Crouch
