David Abrams's Blog, page 8

Sunday Sentence: Say Uncle by Becky Mandelbaum

Simply put, the best sentence(s) I’ve read this past week, presented out of context and without commentary.




I once lifted a picnic table over my head to cheer up a woman who was so sad she sometimes ate nothing but cabbage and Tic Tacs for days at a time.

Cry Uncle by Becky Mandelbaum

Friday Freebie: Big Holiday Giveaway

Congratulations to Carl Scott, winner of last week’s Friday Freebie contest: The Current by Tim Johnston.


This week, I’ve donned a Santa Claus suit and put together a big, multi-book giveaway, just in time for the holidays. I have a stack of eleven books up for grabs. One lucky reader will win them all. Will it be you? Keep scrolling for more information on the book and how to enter the contest...


The Western Wind by Samantha Harvey: It’s 1491. In the small village of Oakham, its wealthiest...

Front Porch Books: December 2019 edition

Front Porch Books is a monthly tally of new and forthcoming books—mainly advance review copies (aka “uncorrected proofs” and “galleys”)—I’ve received from publishers. Cover art and opening lines may change before the book is finally released. I should also mention that, in nearly every case, I haven’t had a chance to read these books, but they’re definitely going in the to-be-read pile.


Cargill Falls
by William Lychack
(Braddock Avenue Books)

Jacket Copy:  There is good reason why...

War-mocker: New Interview in Mount Hope magazine

There’s a new interview with yours truly in the latest issue of Mount Hope magazine, published by Roger Williams University’s Department of English and Creative Writing. My thanks to writer Hannah Little and editor Edward J. Delaney (author of The Big Impossible ) for giving me the space to talk about my war novels Fobbit and Brave Deeds . Other topics of discussion: the transition from military to civilian life, James Mustich’s 1,000 Books to Read Before You Die , my second (and current) career...

The First Time Ever I Saw Her Face

We got married in a blizzard.

December 3, 1983 was supposed to be our day, the date we had set for the wedding ceremony in my hometown of Jackson, Wyoming; instead, Mother Nature laughed at our puny human plans and said, “Watch this.”

The storms began in early November and never really let up, dumping record amounts of snow across the peaks of the Grand Tetons and blanketing the valley. The morning of our wedding dawned cold and bright with a surprise appearance from the sun reflecting off the...

My First Time: Barbara J. King

The First Book My Mother Didn’t Read
On my bookshelf at home sits Still Alice by Lisa Genova. The novel, which tells the story of cognitive psychology professor Alice Howland’s struggles with early-onset Alzheimer’s, is 292 pages long; nestled at page 265 is my mother’s bookmark. Before she could finish reading, my mother, Elizabeth King, died of COPD and vascular dementia at age 88.

Through her 80s, thanks to the crush of those oxygen-robbing diseases, my mother read increasingly slowly and...

Sunday Sentence: Dad’s Maybe Book by Tim O’Brien

Simply put, the best sentence(s) I’ve read this past week, presented out of context and without commentary.


My buddies were grunts, 11-Bravo, and they did the daily, nasty, grinding, lethal work of war. They slept in the rain; they fought the firefights; they spent their nights lying in ambush and their days trudging through minefields out on the Batangan Peninsula; they were not cooks or clerks or mechanics or supply specialists; they were infantry; they lived in the war, and the war lived in...

Friday Freebie: The Current by Tim Johnston

Congratulations to Jenn Phalen, winner of last week’s Friday Freebie contest: Still Come Home by Katey Schultz.

This week’s giveaway is for The Current by Tim Johnston, author of Descent . Here’s what The New York Journal of Books had to say about his new novel: “Tim Johnston has given us the gold standard of lush narrative description—captivating, mesmerizing, stunning. It's doubtful you'll ever read a more beautifully written book than The Current.” I have a new paperback copy of the novel...

Where the Books Went

The books had become a burden.

That’s not a sentence I would ever have dreamed of writing when I was younger. “Younger” meaning eighteen months ago. Until recently, I went around saying things like “There’s no such thing as too many books, only too little time in which to read them.” I declared I would measure my coffin according to the number of volumes I could squeeze inside its piney confines. Part with my books? You might as well cut my arm off with a rusty saw.

And yet, the timbers of my...

Sunday Sentence: Being Mortal by Atul Gawande

Simply put, the best sentence(s) I’ve read this past week, presented out of context and without commentary.


I learned about a lot of things in medical school, but mortality wasn’t one of them.

from Being Mortal by Atul Gawande