The Sparrow: A Novel, Mary Doria Russell

Good read. I started reading this simultaneously with Gilead, and this won out. The premise is interesting, the storytelling is vivid and the characters are so likable. In fact, I don’t know why I kept reading, since you learn early on that only one of the group of eight survives. I guess that’s a sign of how likable the characters are -- I couldn’t let them go even though I could see I was going to lose them one by one to gruesome deaths. I enjoyed this book, but I’ve had my fill of torture and gruesome death for a while. I will not be reading the sequel to this.

-- Ferdinand Hodler, Night