Books

Check out our picks of this month’s page-turners.
—Michael Bandler

Bridge of Sighs • Richard Russo
• (Knopf, $26.95)

There’s a soothing familiarity to Richard Russo’s lovingly sketched landscapes and characters that have engaged his fans for years. More, perhaps, than any other writer of his generation, he can be considered the bard of small-town northeastern America in decline. What this Pulitzer Prizewinning author (for Empire Falls) does with the citizenry of these decaying dots on the landscape— with their shuttered mills and factories—is what energizes his literature, despite its leisurely, expansive recounting (usually, as here, in more than 500 pages). His latest book, told largely in flashback, introduces two men just past 60. Louis, the owner of a trio of corner groceries in sharply contrasting sectors of the town he’s never left, is writing a narrative of his family’s “small, significant journey.” The other, Bobby, is a painter who fled to Europe after high school, never to return, except on his evocative canvases. How resolute were those choices, how fixed those destinies, Lou wonders. Was there an alternate life, a shadow version that might have been truer? What might have been? Invariably, in our own minds and hearts, we all ask these questions. Quietly and poignantly, Russo brings his characters to that moment, eliciting meaningful, memorable answers.

The Kingdom of Bones Stephen Gallagher
(Shaye Areheart Books, $24.95)

On page 139 of this elegantly written, relentless thriller about a serial killer in Victorian England, set in the world of an itinerant theater troupe, we learn the murderer’s identity. So now what’s the writer to do, over the next 220 pages, to keep the reader’s attention? Quite simply, map out a spirited chase across two continents and a couple of decades, with an enchanting young actress on the run, alternately as pursuer and prey. Gallagher’s gripping tale has a pivotal supernatural component that tends to distract at times. Still, it aff ords him the opportunity to spice his mix of invented characters with one actual figure—Bram Stoker, author of Dracula—for his particular expertise. Th e result is quite mesmerizing. If you have some quiet time, say, deep into the evening of October 31, this is the book for you.

Musicophilia: Tales of Music and the Brain Oliver Sacks
(Knopf, $26)

Given hints that surfaced in his earlier writings, plus episodes in his own personal history, it was perhaps inevitable that someday, neurologist Oliver Sacks would delve into the impact of music on humankind. It is, he argues, the “extraordinary tenacity” of musical memory and its power to pierce the heart directly that so motivates him. He also focuses on the innate musicality in everyone—as opposed to other art forms—and how it surfaces, for instance, in the mentally and physically challenged. He is further captivated by the seeming appearance of music in people’s minds, thoughts and dreams when there is no ready explanation or pattern for it. With musical hallucinations, absolute pitch, rhythm and music therapy placed within the context of science and art, the book tends to be somewhat esoteric at times; yet for the average reader, Sacks’ diverting case studies illuminate his skillfully delineated path.