Together Tea

Together Tea by Marjan Kamali is a book as comforting and sweet as Persian tea sucked through a cube of sugar held between the teeth.

It tells the story of a displaced Iranian family living in America after escaping the revolution. The men in the family seem to have adjusted to life in the States, but for Darya and her daughter Mina, home still means Iran.

A well written enjoyable read, bursting with Persian culture.

Behind the Beautiful Forevers

Behind the Beautiful Forevers, Life, Death, and Hope in a Mumbai Undercity, is an incredible book by Pulitzer Prize winning journalist Katherine Boo. Although non-fiction, it reads like a novel and the story will captivate you. Boo spent years researching Annawadi, a Mumbai slum built up right next to the luxury resorts surrounding the airport. While India is experiencing massive economic growth and its rich and middle class are getting richer, it's poor are still stuck in dire poverty and trying to find a way out.

This book is heartbreaking, captivating, intelligent, filled with humor and compassion; not one you will easily forget. Highly recommended read.

I Do Not Come to You by Chance

I Do Not Come to You by Chance by Adaobi Tricia Nwaubani is a novel that explores the strange and dangerous world of Nigerian email scams. In a poor country overrun by corruption, sometimes a University degree is not enough to ensure a good job and money to feed your family.

Kingsley, the protagonist of the story, finds this out the hard way as his girlfriend leaves him and his father's hospital bills are more than the family can afford. Against his better judgement, he goes to work for his corrupt, but very rich uncle and his world changes overnight.

A fascinating look into a hidden part of Nigerian culture by an accomplished new writer.

We Are Called to Rise

We Are Called to Rise by Laura McBride is a novel set in Las Vegas. It tells the story of 8 year old Bashkim, a brave Albanian boy living with his immigrant parents and baby sister, Luis, a wounded young Mexican-American veteran just back from Iraq, and Avis, a 53 year old woman who has lived in Vegas her whole life and just finds out her husband is leaving her.

McBride draws us in as each of their stories unfold and eventually intersect. Heartbreaking, beautiful, hopeful, I couldn't put this book down. A recommended read.

Brick Lane

Brick Lane by Monica Ali is a novel about Bangladeshi immigrant families living in London. Nazneen, married to a man twenty years older and living in London, leaves her small village in Bangladesh and leaves behind everything she knows for a new life that she doesn't understand. She speaks very little English, and hardly leaves the apartment, yet somehow, slowly she begins an internal journey that is even greater than the external journey she has already made.

Her sister stays behind and marries for love, then struggles though many hardships. Part of the book is written in letters between Nazneen and her sister. A beautifully written, powerful novel that unfolds slowly and draws you in, as Nazneen navigates her way between accepting her fate and making her own choices. A good read.

Magic or Madness

Magic or Madness by Justine Larbalestier is a book about a young girl named Reason living with her mother in the Australian outback, hiding from her wicked Grandmother in Sydney who is supposedly a witch. When Reason's mother has a nervous breakdown and is sent to a mental institution, Reason is forced to go live with her Grandmother. From the moment she arrives, she tries to reconcile the stories her mother told her all her life with the clean beautiful house she finds herself in. Trying desperately to escape, she unlocks a mysterious back door and finds herself in the dead of winter in New York City and realizes magic is real.

This could have been a good book, but being the first in a trilogy, Larbalestier didn't give anything away, the reader was left completely hanging at the end. Reason's questions were never answered and I felt as frustrated as she did. A disappointing read.

The Hypnotists Love Story

The Hypnotists Love Story by Liane Moriarty is a novel about a clinical hypnotherapist in Sydney, Australia, who falls in love then finds out her boyfriend is being stalked by his ex-girlfriend. At the beginning, she is more intrigued than frightened, until things begin to get creepy.

Moriarty is one of my favorite writers, she makes you empathize and care about all her characters, in this case even the stalker. She shows that nothing is black and white; she examines all the shades of gray, the different motivations that cause us to behave the way we do and the consequences of our actions.

Intelligent, funny, thrilling, a great read by a great writer.

Mambo in Chinatown

Mambo in Chinatown by Jean Kwok is a novel about a girl who has always been awkward, clumsy, not good in school and ends up washing dishes in the restaurant where her father is the noodle maker.

Her younger, smarter, more beautiful sister helps her find a job working in a Ballroom dancing studio and suddenly her whole life and self image begin to change. Kwok is a great writer, she creates well drawn characters that we can't help but care for, and draws us completely into their world.

I loved Kwok's earlier novel, Girl in Translation a bit more, but Mambo is still a really good read. It just felt a little to easy for Charlie, the protagonist, to transform so completely in such a short time.

The Secret of the Nightingale Palace

The Secret of the Nightingale Palace by Dana Sachs is a novel about a road trip taken from NY to SF by a grandmother and her estranged grandaughter. The story moves back and fourth between present day and 1940's San Francisco.

I didn't really like the grandmother, but the writing is good and there are enough twists and turns that keep the story interesting all the way until the end. Also, wonderful images of early Japanese Tea Gardens in San Francisco's Golden Gate Park. A good, but not great read.

First Frost

First Frost by Sarah Addison Allen is a follow up to her novel Garden Spells. Centered around the Waverley sisters and their mysterious apple tree, the book is full of Southern charm and magic.

Allen creates likeable characters that draw you into their story and their magical world. Although not my favorite of her books, First Frost is a quick, easy, enjoyable read; it goes perfect with a hot cup of tea on a chilly Fall day.