A Gentleman in Moscow by Amor Towles

This was a lighthearted historical novel with wry humour. While it did not shy away from describing the historical realities for some of the characters in Soviet Russia, it did not dwell on it. This is a novel of hope and optimism. It bordered on being twee since there were hijinks and there was no real villain. It was not gritty historical fiction. It was decently written with characters, setting, and world building worked well. I got the sense the author spent a lot of time in nice hotels. A nice read.

November 24-25, 2025.

The Orchid Thief by Susan Orlean with Jennifer Jay Myers (Narrator)

As this is my third Orlean book, I firmly like her style. This is her most famous work having been adapted very loosely in the movie “Adaptation”. I watched the film years ago and found it funny and knew it was not like the book. While I like the micro history on orchids, some of the other tangents in the book felt aimless including the anticlimactic end where she does not even see the Ghost Orchid. I understand she wanted to write a longer book from her original essay, but this may have had one too many extraneous tangents. I was not interested in that much discussion of Florida Man. I also preferred when Orlean narrated her work and the narrator here was only okay. I still look forward to her other essay compilations and her recently released memoir.

Nov 24-26, 2025.

A Minor Chorus by Billy-Ray Belcourt

I read this for an Indigenous Voices challenge on GR. It was a nice and short story. It’s auto fiction which I did not mind. It leaned more into a memoir and had no plot which was fine with me. It was more an exploration of the author as the character and state of mind. It was similar to some of Ocean Vuong’s work and the author referenced their work in this book too. I am glad I read this since it was from a perspective I do not usually read.

November 29, 2025 on Kobo Libra 2.