Sarah Lyall Book Recommendations & Book Mentions

Sarah Lyall

It's so good as a psychological study and it focuses on one character…who isn't as fabulous as the other kids…and is trying so hard to fit in and that's part of what I loved about the book, just looking at it from his perspective was a great insight into all these people.

Sarah Lyall

The book touches on adultery, divorce, alcoholism and — unique among Austen’s work — makes explicit references to the slave trade that, in this book, forms the basis for the fortune of Fanny’s uncle, Sir Thomas Bertram.

Sarah Lyall

A sendup of Gothic novels and a bit of a Gothic novel itself...[is] full of youthful energy and high spirits. It has a lovable, unworldly heroine,.. and a forbidding old abbey that may or may not harbor murderous secrets. It’s also a love letter to fiction.

Sarah Lyall

A story about sisters...[with] two radically different approaches to love and life...It’s not entirely clear whose point of view Austen leans toward at the end.

Sarah Lyall

This beautiful, exciting book is also a head-spinning, sometimes confusing trip. It helps to pay attention to the discussion of Hannah’s own mother, a brilliant physicist who became mentally ill... But the novel is at its best when it portrays Hannah’s love for Jack.

Sarah Lyall

Surely the gateway drug to Austen is 'Pride and Prejudice,' the most crowd-pleasing of the novels, with its indelible portrait of the Bennet family.

Sarah Lyall

A high-concept mash-up of different genres that transcends its wackadoodle premise with an affecting portrayal of a family careening toward crisis.

Sarah Lyall

Of course Anne Elliot, the supposedly elderly spinster at its center, is just 27 years old...A short but significant exchange near the end of “Persuasion” provides a valuable window into the author’s views about writing as a woman at a time when such a thing was rare.

Sarah Lyall

Austen's most charming and funny novel...“Emma” has some of the best characters and most delicious set pieces in all of Austen’s work..the book brings one delight after another.

Sarah Lyall

A rager of a psychological mystery about toxic men, murderous women and the art of constructing fake realities… a novel as audacious as it is intricately plotted.