Hailed by Salon as "the first great war novel of our generation," The Farther Shore follows a group of young American soldiers as their mission in an unnamed African city falls apart just moments after their boots hit the ground. Pitting morality against the rules of engagement, Eck’s debut novel exposes the fragility of order and its consequences—certainly a timely and important novel.
Unemployed and seeing his days living amongst the rich and elite numbered, Charley Stranger wants nothing more than to murder his unsympathetic and uncompromising botox-filled wife. He wants his own downfall to launch him into superstar status that includes interviews with Barbara Walters and a movie about his crimes and trial. Actually, Charley is going to murder his whole family just to insure his primetime spot. The people who have used him and shrunk him into nothingness will be his tool to explode into the world of celebrity. Grimsley’s novel, though humorously delusional, is a sad reminder of how small the media can make us feel in its plasma-screen glow. Forgiveness is an especially interesting novel for our times.
Ishiguro continues to solidify his stance as one of today's most important authors. Kathy H. shares with us her youth in a childcare system much different than anything we've ever known. Hailsham is an institution much like an orphanage in which children are encouraged to be creative and happy but live in a world eerily secluded from the outside. We come to find out that Hailsham is only one of many institutions that are actually homes for cloned children, all sharing the same very dismal future. Ishiguro asks us to consider what humanity is and what atrocities will we (and will not) allow for the "larger good." This novel questions whether meaning is given to us or if it is ours to create. If Ishiguro's purpose for this book is to make the reader feel feeble and enraged, then he has succeeded. You will find yourself crying, smiling, and shaking your fists all in the same sitting.
