Jenny Offill, Dept. of Speculation **** 1/2

Antelopes have 10x vision, you said. It was the beginning or close to it. This means that on a clear night they can see the rings of Saturn.

This first paragraph hooked me: an interesting "fact" followed by a thought-provoking and somewhat humorous commentary. The whole (short) book consists of these sorts of lapidary tidbits.

I found a book called Thriving Not Surviving in a box on the street. I stood there, flipping through it, unwilling to commit.

Dept. Of Speculation tells a conventional story about marriage and parenthood using unconventional means. The style reminded me of Wittgenstein's Mistress, although applied to a traditional plot. Reviewers keep mentioning Renata Adler's Speedboat, which I suppose I'll have to check out.

Of course it [parenthood] is difficult. You are creating a creature with a soul, my friend says.

Despite the detached prose style, Offill manages to convey both positive and negative emotions strongly.  

Jo Nesbø, The Son ***

My first taste of au courant Scandinavian crime fiction, from its most popular author. It has all the trademarks of the genre: the serial killer, the cop struggling with personal demons, the mysterious conspiracy, the woman who falls in love with the doomed protagonist, the overly complicated plot mechanics that rely on poor police work. (During a nationwide manhunt, they never consider checking the killer's family home?) As you might expect from the title, it also features unsubtle Christian iconography -- there's even a character named Pontius!

I'm getting tired of the genre.

Richard Ford, Let Me Be Frank with You ****

The four stories are slight, and they feel like excerpts from a longer novel, but it's a great pleasure to hear Frank Bascombe's voice again.

Jeannette Walls, The Glass Castle ****

In the first chapter of this memoir, Walls is in a taxi on her way to a fancy party in New York City when she sees her mother scrounging through a dumpster. Her parents are homeless while she lives on Park Avenue. She meets her mother for lunch a few days later and asks how she can help. Her mother suggests that she, the author, is the one who needs help. "You're way too easily embarrassed. Your father and I are who we are. Accept it."

This story captures the tone of the memoir as a whole. Walls tells an entertaining tale of her itinerant childhood with her unsuitable parents. She is honest about the sad facts, but presents her parents' views in a sympathetic light. They always have a rational argument for why their way is best!

Michel Faber, The Book of Strange New Things ****

The Book of Strange New Things shares a premise with Mary Doria Russell's The Sparrow: a religious man travels to an alien world to minister to its inhabitants. The similarity provides an added layer of suspense, given how things go bad in The Sparrow -- and in most accounts of cross-cultural contact.

Faber is not interested in the science part of his science fiction story, but he does create an intriguingly foreign world. He also captures his protagonist's uneasiness, which comes from him not being sure about his fellow humans' motivations much less the aliens'. The story raises questions about our ability to communicate in the absence of shared experience. Peter wonders how his flock understands God, and he becomes increasingly estranged from his wife who is experiencing travails back on Earth.