Category: books

Leo Tolstoy, Translated By Richard Pevear and Larissa Volokhonsky

On Amazon.com

Leo Tolstoy’s novel about love and life is as poignant today as ever. Anna’s stormy affair with Count Vronsky speaks to today’s world of unhappy marriages and struggles of divorce. While Levin pushes through the hurtles life sets down before him, as well as those he sets down for himself in a struggle to find happiness. No character is one-dimensional in Tolstoy’s Russia. Marriage for love is a concept that has really only been employed in a large scale for a few hundred years and Tolstoy shows us that the struggles we endure in the name of love today are nothing new, his characters are caught between social tradition and popular ideas and they can teach us all something.

Joseph Heller

On Amazon.com

Catch-22 is a hilarious account of life as a bomber pilot during WWII. Yossarian’s classic struggle to survive his tour of duty is beset on all sides by crazy people and people who want to kill him. The tongue-n-cheek humor and hilarious situations that Yossarian finds himself in are set against the all-too-real tragedy and horror of war. Many of the situations are humorous, but they are black humor and we need only turn our TV to CNN to be frightened into thinking how close we are to living those horrors out yet again.

Paulo Coehlo, Translated By Alan Clarke

On Amazon.com

The Alchemist is short, simple and profound. The idea of following your dreams is simple but in the hands of Paulo Coelho it is profound. Santiago leaves his life as an Andalusian shepherd behind to follow fate in search of his treasure. Only after many adventures and when his journey has come full circle does he discover what the true treasure is. The Alchemist is uplifting and reaffirms all that is truly good in life, a true fable—timeless in it’s themes.

Umberto Eco, Translated by William Weaver

On Amazon.com

The Name of the Rose is an amazing book. Eco’s story is set amid a turbulent time in European history, filled with references that more than a few times sent me to the encyclopedia to look up things. At it’s heart Name of the Rose is a mystery but the history, theology, philosophy and myriad of other subjects Eco covers will suck you in and leave you, like the main characters, hungry for knowledge. Having seen the movie you may expect that you know the answer to the mystery and that this may spoil your reading of the book. This is in no way the case—the book is so much more complex and gripping than the movie was.

(If like me you do not speak German, Latin, French, Italian and Greek then I recommend getting The Key to The Name of the Rose which contains translations of all the passages not translated into English in the American version of Name of the Rose.)

Truman Capote

On Amazon.com

Capote weaves a beautiful tale of a unique personality. Holly Golightly is such a deplorably lovable character that men cannot help but fall endlessly in love with her. As the narrator recounts the times he spent with Holly I could not help but compare the power of her personality to that of a girl I once knew—she could get anything she wanted from almost any man but no matter how much they tried none of them could ever posses her or her love wholly. Breakfast at Tiffany’s is easy to read but filled with meaning and wit. And that damn scene with the cat will rip your heart out!