Ungrid Coleman writes letters to her husband, Gil and leaves them in books in the library. When she finishes her final letter, she disappears. Her daughter, Flora comes home twelve years later to care for her ailing father. She has been searching for her mother ever since, never believing that she has died. The story goes back and forth between the letters and Flora struggling to put the past behind her. A great, suspensful read.

Flan Parker sells stuff from abandoned storage lockers trying to make ends meet while her husband “finishes” his PhD. She finds a piece of paper in a box that says “yes” and so begins her search for the person who wrote the word and why she wrote it. Flan is funny and smart. What I liked best is the ending was unpredictable.

I wasn’t sure whether I would like this coming of age story about two young boys (Nathan and Robert). I loved it. It is a suspensful, tender novel about tragedy and redemption with two boys who will make you laugh and cry and laugh again.

A story set in Renaissance Italy – my FAVOURITE – revolving around Pope Rodrigo Borgia and his daughter Lucrezia. It is a work of historical fiction filled with intrigue, politics and nasty characters. The best!

A real departure for Vassanji I think. This story is set in the future and follows the life of a doctor whose job it is to create entire new lives for people who would like to shed their present one. He is in popular demand and is highly respected but he begins to question whether it is really possible to shed a life without regrets. A very interesting, well written, suspensful read.

Orhan heads back to his backwater Turkish hometown to sort out his grandfather’s will. The family estate has been left to a stranger who resides in the US. The story shifts back and forth through time – telling the story of two young people caught in the Armenian holocaust. Orhan decides to find out who this mysterious person is and how she fits into his family. Great historical fiction.

A story about Virginia Woolf and her sister, Vanessa – told from Vanessa’s perspective. If you are a lover of art in all its forms read this book!

After a car crash that leaves her best friend on life support, Shelby loses her “self”. She begins receiving two word messages from an unknown stranger – messages that bolster her – and they follow her all the way to New York where she feels she can truly get lost. This is a story of how Shelby finds her self – the book is tender, funny, wise – again, all the things I love in a novel.

Sharon is a novelist who is reeling when her husband leaves her for his grad student. A few months later Sharon is diagnosed with breast cancer. She is asked by the editor of a dying newspaper to write a serial to commemorate the anniversary of Dickens’ death. She says yes in the hopes that the work will sustain her. Every other chapter is one of the serials – from the perspective of Dickens’ mistress. The chapters in between are a story to her twin daughters about her life. Am I making sense? It is a great book – full of wisdom and heartbreak – a page turner in its own way. I loved it.

This is a novel about a dysfunctional family that you cannot help but love. Each character gets his/her own chapter that gives you some insights into that particular (dysfunctional) individual. Funny, Wise and tender – my kind of book!