Home to Harlem

Claude McKay's novel of post-World War I Harlem is striking to a later reader because of its use of dialect and its characters' emphasis on the importance of skin tones. The book might be called a Manhattan Transfer of black people, as it creates a vivid portrait of a community with all its hopes and flaws.

Across the River and Into the Trees

Hemingway's last big novel, published in 1950, tells of a middle-aged American colonel's love for a young Venetian countess. The food and wine and hunting are there, as well as the mannered dialogue. A cold book about a doomed love.

The Torrents of Spring

I came across a 1930 issue of The American Mercury in which Sherwood Anderson wrote an affectionate piece about Hemingway and Faulkner, which shows his big-hearted nature given that both of those authors had mercilessly satirized him in print. Torrents, Hemingway's effort, is very funny for anyone who has read Anderson and a curiosity for those who haven't. I like the idea of an online reviewer who wrote that this book is not just pure cruelty; it is Hemingway's farewell to a way of writing as he struck out for new territories.

The Sun Also Rises

Hemingway grants one quick peek beneath the surface near the end of this novel when he has Lady Brett Ashley say, "You know it makes one feel rather good deciding not to be a bitch. ... It's sort of what we have instead of God." Otherwise it's bars, restaurants, taxis, hotels, bulls, and some snappy and occasionally very funny dialogue.

The Garrick Year

Margaret Drabble's second novel displays her subtle and perceptive understanding of human behavior, in this case that of a couple with two young children who spend a summer in the countryside where the husband is a stage actor.