The Most Addictive Books of the Last 25 Years
Here they are, in no particular order: the books we passed on to our closest friends,
fought over at book club, lugged with us on every move and think about still. You can
view the full list or start with...
17 of 34
Where'd You Go, Bernadette?
By Maria Semple
352 pages;
Back Bay Books
Because we laughed so hard it was
almost unseemly.
You
don't have to know Seattle to get Maria Semple's broadly satirical novel, Where'd You Go, Bernadette. The title character, a
middle-aged Los Angeles transplant, lives in the Emerald City with her
15-year-old daughter, Bee, and her husband, Elgin, a big-deal executive at
(where else?) Microsoft. Once a brilliant young architect, Bernadette now pours
her energy into ranting about the flaws of her adopted city: slow drivers, ugly
hair, too many Canadians. Eventually, Bernadette goes missing and her family
uses e-mails and other documents to try to find her. Underlying the
nontraditional narrative are insights into the cost of thwarted creativity and
the power of mother-daughter bonds, although a reader may be having too much
fun to notice.
— Karen Holt
Published 04/03/2015