Mukiwa: A White Boy in Africa
Rating: Mukiwa: A White Boy in Africa, by Peter Godwin. Grove Press (1996), 418 pages. “I think I first realized something was wrong when our next-door neighbor, oom Piet Oberholzer, was murdered. I must have been about six then.” Is this not a just-right...
Let’s Take the Long Way Home
Rating: Let’s Take the Long Way Home: A Memoir of Friendship, by Gail Caldwell. Random House (2010), 190 pages. Let’s Take the Long Way Home is Caldwell’s story of her friendship with the writer Caroline Knapp who died of cancer in 2002....
Stitches
Rating: Stitches: A Memoir, by David Small. W.W. Norton & Company (2009), 329 pages. This memoir is the biggest surprise of the year for me. I had not intended to read Stitches as I’m not much of a graphic book fan, but the nonstop rave reviews it kept...
Sickened
Rating: Sickened: The Memoir of a Munchausen by Proxy Childhood, by Julie Gregory. Bantam Books (2003), 246 pages. This is the most one-of-a-kind memoir I’ve ever read. It is incomparable in its horror—even within the subcategory of memoirs featuring...About Us
The Book Shark began as an independent book review website created by Cindy Pinto and Donna Long in 2002.
From the beginning our goal was not only to write great reviews, but also to recognize the most well-written books we read each year with an award...
Gustine Awards
The Gustine Awards were named in honor of the main character in one of our favorite books—The Dress Lodger, by Sheri Holman. Awards have been given out yearly since 2002 in three categories: fiction, nonfiction, and memoir...
Cover Art
A book’s cover is as important as the writing within it. We are aware that this may offend some authors who have toiled for years on their books and believe their words are the only thing that matters...
Reader Reviews
What’s the best or worst book you’ve ever read? What’s the most recent book that you’ve had a strong reaction to? Send us your thoughts, and we’ll post them in this spot.