Everyone has a skeleton in the closet, and Tanner’s has been dogging him for over 20 years. It followed him from Belize after a two-year Peace Corp stint that was supposed to help him do something good. But Tanner wonders if some people do good things naturally while others have to work a little harder [...]

Narrated by an unnamed man, The Unforeseen gives us a good look at a most uncommon human. The man, who suffers from a perpetual cold, finds himself alone in a strange city. At the mercy of strangers from beginning to end, he starts going by the name “Serge”. Although he often blurts out an embarrassing [...]

Voices of the Lost and Found gives the reader a well-written collection of short stories, each crafted in a distinctively different voice than the one before. How author Dorene O’Brien manages to carry all these personalities around in her head, I can’t even begin to imagine. But this, together with edgy story lines and delicious [...]

Ever read a book that haunted you? One that would not, no matter how you tried, allow you to put it down until the last page was read? If it’s been awhile since you’ve had that type of a reading experience, then it’s time to read Sandrine’s Letter to Tomorrow by Dedra Johnson.
Sandrine, a girl [...]

How often have you been in a public place and found yourself eavesdropping on the table next to yours? Heaven help the unsuspecting couple that dines next to me. I don’t mean to, I really don’t, But if someone nearby speaks loudly, I’m suddenly engrossed in their conversation, nodding my head [...]

Nothing makes for a more absorbing story than a great main character. Leslie Kove is as entertaining as a protagonist can hope to be. A funny, self-conscious girl who sees herself as ordinary (you certainly will not!), Leslie is plopped right in the middle of the ’60s. Living in an era that was already turbulent [...]

One of my purposes with carp(e) libris reviews has been to help you as a reader stretch out and discover literature you otherwise may not have found. I can’t ask you to try something out of the ordinary if I’m not willing to do it myself. For me, this reach is poetry - something I’ve [...]

Travel by book. It’s the only hope most of us have to go globetrotting and see places we’ve dreamed of, always feared, or never even heard of. In Chronicle of San Gabriel, Julio Ramon Ribeyro will take you to a Peru you never knew existed. Based on his own experience, this fictional work recounts one [...]

Home Among the Swinging Stars is a brilliant collection of poems by Jaime de Angulo (1887 - 1950). His reflections of nature in the American West often feel like lyrics of Native American chants, painting images of coyotes, wild stallions, canyons and cactus. In contrast, other poems speak of the difficulties faced by [...]

When I posted about Small Press Month, we talked about finding something different out there in the book stacks. If you’re trying to break out of the ordinary, here’s your escape: Pentti Saarikoski’s The Edge of Europe - A Kinetic Image. Saarikoski has been gone for sometime, but this unusual work of his has just [...]