Reading Suggestions for the Characters of "How to Get Away with Murder"

How to Get Away with Murder is hands down my favorite show on television right now. If you enjoy a twisted, character-driven mystery that plays with non-linear storytelling (flashbacks into the future), you should go watch the first season right now because I wouldn't want to spoil a minute. If you're up to date on the first episode of the second season, you're safe to read on with no spoilers.

When it comes to reading suggestions for the characters of HtGAwM, almost every character could benefit from browsing the books shelved under 646.77 (aka Dating & Relationships).

Professor Annalise Keating: I wouldn't dare to give Professor Keating any sort of advice on anything ever.

Wes: Cinnamon Roll Murder by Joanne Fluke. Enough said.

Rebecca: Stiff: the curious lives of human cadavers by Mary Roach. Too soon?

Nate: The Suspicions of Mr. Whicher by Kate Summerscale. The story of the Victorian detective who inspired Arthur Conan Doyle to write Sherlock Holmes, and the case that destroyed his career.

Laurel: The Secret History by Donna Tartt. Someone needs to read this book. Seriously guys, murder is never a good extra-curricular.

Connor: Boy Meets Boy by David Levithan. Connor deserves the escape of an upbeat, whimsical love story.

Asher: The Trophy Kids Grow Up by Ronald Alsop. Honestly? I picked this for the title. I don't think Asher is likely to read anything.

Michaela: I've Got Your Number by Sophie Kinsella. An upbeat, romantic tale about a lost wedding ring and an engagement to the wrong man that has absolutely no murders and a happy ending? Just what Michaela needs.

Bonnie: Confessions of a Sociopath by M.E. Thomas. An exploration of the traits used to identify psychopaths, including a helpful checklist.

Frank: The Psychopath Test by Jon Ronson. In fact, maybe Frank and Bonnie should just start a book club. Seriously, those two scare me.

If you enjoyed reading this, you should check out Aisha's reading suggestions for the characters of Scandal.

~Sarah, Adult Services

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Staff Review: Interpreter of Maladies by Jhumpa Lahiri

I love short stories. They are the perfect thing for a busy schedule. Short enough to read in a single sitting, but in the hands of a skilled writer still complex enough for character development and a satisfying plot arc. Jhumpa Lahiri is an incredibly skilled author of short stories, and she has the Pulitzer Prize to prove it.

The Interpreter of Maladies, her first collection of short stories, was awarded a Pulitzer Prize for Fiction in 2000, and it is one of the five books I'd take with me to a desert island.

Lahiri writes characters that feel so real to me as a reader, it's almost as if they are people I met once at an airport or a party. These are characters who feel out of place in their own lives, in homes they do not recognize. Many are immigrants in a foreign land, perhaps returning home after years abroad, or maybe they never left but have watched the world around them change into something unfamiliar.

Lahiri's second collection, Unaccustomed Earth, while still powerful, is somewhat less of a personal favorite. There's a stronger focus on the ties and changing pressures of family relationships, and three of the stories revisit two characters at different points in their lives. While I love how she explores similar themes in her story collections, I prefer the focus of her standalone pieces over the linked stories or her longer novels where I sometimes become lost in the details of her beautiful descriptions.

~Sarah, Adult Services

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Staff Review: A Trio of Recent(ish) Novels

I am woefully behind in my fiction reading, an unfortunate situation caused, in part, by a long detour into Nonfictionland. In an attempt to catch up, I just blew through a trio of novels I missed over the past two or three years.

My favorite was The Burgess Boys by Elizabeth Strout (of Olive Kitteridge fame), which tells the story of three adult siblings from a Maine family racked by a tragic childhood event (one of the three accidentally killed their father in an incident relayed in the novel's first pages). Oldest son Jim Burgess is a hot-shot corporate lawyer heading for a fall, Bob Burgess works for Legal Aid and seems rather spineless, and Susan Burgess is a frumpy, jilted wife whose only son is in a world of legal trouble.

The author seeds a rich plot woven of dramatic family interactions with real-life, local-to-Maine hot topics, like the unlikely presence of a large Somali community within economically-depressed and homogeneous Lewiston, Maine (the old mill town upon which the novel’s fictional setting is based). The story moves at a fast clip and resolves so satisfactorily (a real accomplishment in a time of often-disappointing conclusions), with a big truth revealed, certain characters getting their comeuppance, and others finding redemption or peace.  

My second favorite was Flight Behavior by Barbara Kingsolver, a novel that tackles climate change in a compelling but not story-clobbering way. Set in present-day Appalachia, Kingsolver’s novel serves up a strong female lead in the person of Dellarobia Turnbow, who finds herself trapped in a way-too-small life with a sweet but slow hulk of a husband. 

Monarch butterflies by the millions suddenly appear in her small mountain town, a cohort of scientists moves in, and over the course of events Dellarobbia blossoms into the sort of capable and confident woman who’s bound to land a bigger life.

The third novel on my catch-up fast-track was the fine debut novel The Wild Child by Eowyn Ivey, a book that has garnered glowing reviews and that I figured would pull me into different territory with its quasi-fantastical elements. Set in the homesteaders’ Alaska of the early twentieth century, the novel’s main characters are an older couple, left bereft by the stillbirth of their only child, who leave Pennsylvania to set up in the rugged outback of Alaska, where they encounter (or do they conjure?) a young child named Faina who seems to live, and even thrlve, all alone in the frigid, wolf-haunted wilderness. 

The author’s depiction of Alaska’s pristine landscape bowled me over (wolves, wolverines, bears, moose, icy waters, looming peaks, killing cold), but I was less compelled by the elusive Faina (I admit I am fantasy-resistant), whose pale presence nevertheless constitutes the novel's central question: is she real flesh-and-blood or the fairy-tale snow child of the book's title?     

~Ann, Adult Services

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