by Roddy Doyle (1984)
In this national bestseller and winner of the Booker Prize, Roddy Doyle, author of the "Barrytown Trilogy," takes us to a new level of emotional richness with the story of ten-year-old Padraic Clarke. Witty and poignant--and adored by critics and readers alike--Paddy Clarke Ha Ha Ha charts the trumphs, indignities, and bewilderment of Paddy as he tries to make sense of his changing world.
Carol Shields
This is the poignant story of Daisy Goodwill, twentieth-century pilgrim, from her calamitous birth in Canada to her death in a Florida nursing home nearly ninety years later. Struggling to find her place in the world, she listens and observes, becoming a witness to her own life and death in this rich tale that reflects and illuminates our own unsettled era. ~from the back cover
David Malouf
In the mid-1840s, thirteen-year-old Gemmy Fairley is cast ashore in the far north of Australia and taken in by Aboriginals. Sixteen years later, when settlers reach the area, he moves back ino the world of Europeans. Given shelter by the McIvors, Gemmy seems at first to be guaranteed a secure role in the settlement, but there are currents of fear and mistrust in the air. -- back cover.
James McBride
Cults, culture, and the law is a celebrated work by James McBride (National Book Award Winner), recognized for masterclass storytelling and lasting literary resonance.
Ruth Prawer Jhabvala
Set in India, HEAT AND DUST is the story of Olivia, a beautiful, spoiled, bored English colonial wife in the 1920s who is drawn inexorably into the spell of the Nawab, a minor Indian prince deeply involved in plots and intrigues. Olivia outrages the tiny, suffocating town where her husband is a civil servant by eloping with the captivating Nawab. It is also the story of Olivia's step-granddaughter who, fifty years later, is drawn to India by her fascination with the letters left behind by the now dead older woman, and by her obsession with solving the enigma of Olivia's scandal. A penetrating and compassionate love story, this brilliant novel immerses the reader in the heat, dust, and squalor of India, while providing a compelling mixture of the spiritual and the sensual.