Books Set in North America, California, USA

Porcupines, by Fran Fabriczki (2026)

Porcupines is a very funny novel about Sonia, young illegal immigrant from Hungary living in California, and her young daughter, Mila.  Sonia left Hungary as an 18-year-old to visit her sister and overstayed her visa.  In Hungary, her family led a very secular life, but her sister has become very Orthodox in the United States.  After she becomes pregnant, Sonia cuts herself off from her family.

New to America and new to motherhood, Sonia navigates live in California, while concealing her past.

This was a quick and funny novel.

Read: June 24, 2026

4 Stars

Books Set in Asia (Iran) and the North America (California)

The Good Daughter: A Memoir of My Mother's Hidden Life, by Jasmin Darznik (2011)

Read:  December 1, 2025

4 Stars

Books Set in North America, California, United States

One Amazing Thing, by Chitra Banerjee Divakaaruni (2009)

This novel takes place in the basement of a government building somewhere in California.  A group of random people trapped in the visa office hoping for a visa to visit India when a massive earthquake occurs.  To pass the time while they await a hoped rescue, each person shares something amazing that has happened in their lives.

Read:  August 4, 2025

5 Stars

Books Set in North America, California

Under the Influence, by Joyce Maynard (2016)

Read: January 2, 2025

5 Stars

Books Set in North America, California, United States

Milk Fed, by Melissa Broder (2021)

A novel about Jewish guilt, sex and food.

Read: August 25, 2023

3 Stars

Books Set in Asia and North America: Pakistan, Iraq, and San Francisco, California

The Bad Muslim Discount, by Syed M Masood (2021)

This novel follows two Muslim families who immigrated to the San Francisco from Islamic countries.  Anvar Faris’ family left Karachi, Pakistan in the mid-1990s when fundamentalism begins to take over their country.  Safwa, a young girl living in war-torn Baghdad, Iraq, illegally escapes with her father to the United States.

 

Anvar’s mother is a deeply devout Muslim, but his father is more laid-back.  Anvar’s mother and older brother easily settle into California and into its Muslim community.  His father, however, finds the community a bit more difficult.  All is well until 9-11.  Anvar’s brother is the “good” Muslim in the family.  He goes to mosque, prays five times a day, doesn’t smoke or drink and becomes engaged to a women chosen by his parents.  Anvar, however, it the “bad” Muslim.  He drinks, sleeps with women and goes to mosque only when his mother insists.

 

In college, Anvar meets and falls in love with Zuha Shah.  Although they part ways, Anvar never stops loving her.  He isn’t as religious as Zuha and settles for being a “bad” Muslim.

 

Meanwhile, Safwa is living with an abusive father and confined to her house in Baghdad.  Her father then was abducted by Americans during the Iraq War, and she was left along with her brother who was dying of a terminal illness.  As the war drew closer to her home, she was forced to flee to Basra.  Ultimately her father was released, and they were reunited.  His abuse, however, continued.  Enter Oais, an evil villager.  He offers Safwa and her father an opportunity to escape to the United States, but at a terrible price.

 

Safwa and her father begin a new life with new names in San Francisco.  Safwa is now known as Azza.  As it happens, they live in the same apartment building as Anvar.  The landlord has a tender heart and gives people in need what he calls a “good Muslim discount” on the rent.  Anvar and Azza begin a relationship, but from her perspective, it is a way to escape the violence inflicted upon her by her father.

 

This novel explores faith and geopolitical issues through the eyes of the lens of Muslim Americans.  The author points out that Muslims have been a part of American fabric throughout the history’s country.

 

I loved this novel.

 

Read: August 2, 2023

5 Stars

Books Set in North America; United States, Hollywood, California and New York, New York

The Seven Husbands of Evelyn Hugo, by Taylor Jenkins Reid (2017)

 

Seventy-nine-year-old Evelyn Hugo, a former Hollywood star, is determined to tell the world her life story only if young-and-coming writer Monique Grant writes the book.  Monique is a relatively unknown magazine writer and her boss reluctantly agrees to allow Monique to work with Hugo for an exclusive in the magazine.  Monique agrees to meet daily with Evelyn as Evelyn recounts her true life story.

 

Evelyn Hugo grew up as Evelyn Herrera in Hell’s Kitchen but was determined to become an actress.  Her first husband, Ernie Diaz, whom she married as a young teen, was her vehicle out of Hell’s Kitchen.  Ernie was a former neighbor with dreams of Hollywood, so Evelyn hitched a ride with him to realize her dreams.  The marriage was short-lived, but Evelyn quickly learned to trade her sexuality to climb the ladder into the movies.  Her life becomes a fabric of lies.  Her next husband is her co-star, Don Adler, who soon becomes physically abusive.  When he leaves her, he takes steps to ruin her career.  After a couple of years, Evelyn remakes herself making avant-garde films in Europe.  Her star rises again along with another marriage, and another, and another.

 

As Evelyn marries and divorces, it is apparent that her marriages are all shams.  She marries because the studio wants her to, she marries to cover-up her true feelings and sexuality, she marries for show.  Early in her career, Evelyn met a young starlet, Celia St. James, whom she mentors, then falls in love with.  As I read this novel, I couldn’t help thinking of some of the movie stars from this era who had multiple marriages and wonder how much of this novel rings true to the causes behind their marriages.

 

We know very little about Monique other than she is of mixed race – her father, who died when she was 7, was black and her mother is white.  Spoiler: near the end of the book, we learn just why Evelyn selected Monique to write her life story.  Monique’s father was the love of one of Evelyn’s husband.

This novel portrays a very jaundiced view of Hollywood in the 1950s and ‘60s.  It kept my interest, however.

 

Read: November 9, 2021

 

4 Stars

Books Set in Asia and North America: Sri Lanka and California

What Lies Between Us, by Nayomi Munaweera (2016)

 

This novel is narrated by a young woman who was born in Sri Lanka during a tumultuous political period of war.  Her father was the son of a wealthy family and her mother was of a poor family.  Her father was light-skinned, but her mother was dark.  Although her father’s family had little to do with her, she grew up in a loving family, surrounded by servants.  One of the servants, Samson, who worked as a gardener, was one of her childhood’s closest friends.

 

As a young teen, however, her life is transformed by events that she dares not speak of.  She has memories of being molested that are closely associated with Samson.  One night, during a monsoon, her father goes to confront Samson.  That same night, her father mysteriously disappears.  His body is found several days later, ostensibly having been drowned in the monsoon.  Samson soon disappears also.  After her father death, she and her mother immigrate to America to live with her mother’s sister and her family.

 

Although our narrator was light-skinned in Sri Lanka, in California, she suddenly finds herself dark-skinned.  This is just one of her adjustments living in her new country.  She adjusts, attends college and becomes a nurse.  She is still a bit of a loner and has dispensed with all thoughts of finding love due to her foreign status.  Then she meets Daniel and falls deeply in love.  

 

They marry and, although, they had not planned to have children, but when she discovers she realized that she wants a child.  Daniel initially says that he doesn’t want a child and she agrees to an abortion.  At the last minute, Daniel changes his mind, and they have a beautiful daughter.  The secrets she has suppressed since childhood, however, bubble to the surface.  As Daniel grows close to the baby, our narrator has traumatic nightmares of her childhood.  She fears for her daughter and makes the ultimate sacrifice.

 

 

In addition to an intriguing tale, this novel provides a beautiful view of Sri Lanka.

 

Read:  January 29, 2021

 

4 Stars

Books Set in the United States: Oklahoma and California

Mary Coin, by Marisa Silver (2013)

The cover photograph is the famous photograph by Dorothea Lange entitled Migrant Mother ~ the mother and baby taken during the Depression in 1936.  At the time, Dorothea Lange was working for the United States’ Farm Security Administration and taking pictures as part of the work program.

Mary Coin is a novel based on this photograph. In the novel, Vera Dare is the photographer, and Mary Coin is the mother.  Mary was of a poor family living in Oklahoma in the 1920s, shortly before the Dust Bowl.  She falls in love with Toby Coin, and at age 17, marries him and begins her family.  Toby was of poor health and quickly dies, leaving Mary with a growing family.  She moves from place to place finding work in farms so to feed her family, ultimately finding her way to California.

The novel spans nearly 100 years, from Mary’s early life to the present day.  The novel opens in present day with Walker Dodge emptying his father’s house after his father died.  Walker is a history professor with little knowledge of his own family’s history.  He meticulously goes through his late father’s possessions in hopes of learning more of his mysterious grandfather.

Then we switch to Mary and her life.  The book describes the life of the migrant worker. One day, Vera comes across Mary as she is holding her new born, pondering how to get her broken down car started.  Vera asks to take her photograph.  Mary agrees, but doesn’t really know what she is agreeing to.

Soon the photograph is plastered in all the papers. Years later, Mary locates the photographer and, thinking Vera made money off the picture, makes a plea for funds. This briefly touches upon ownership issues of work done at the behest of a governmental entity.  It would have been interesting to have explored this issue in more detail.

The novel does, however, explore how lives touch and become intertwined.  It was interesting, but not one of my favorite books.

Read:  June 15, 2019

3 Stars

Books Set in the United States: California: Silicon Valley

Bad Blood: Secrets and Lies in a Silicon Valley Startup, by John Carreyrou (2018)

In 2003, Elizabeth Holmes, a college dropout, founded Theranos, a biotech company that was revolutionize the way blood tests would be analyzed.  Elizabeth had a phobia of needles, thus devised a novel idea for blood testing using only a drop or two of blood ~ a finger prick instead of a venous draw.

Elizabeth Holmes came from a wealthy and connected family.  While still a student at Stanford, she took a class on controlled drug-delivery devices from Channing Robertson, a leader in the chemical engineering department at the school.  She convinced him that she had a new idea for a method testing blood.  She further convinced him, and many other prominent people, to serve on the Board of Trustees of a new company she would create. Over the years, her board would include such dignitaries as former Secretaries of State George Shultz and Henry Kissinger.

Using her connections, Elizabeth was quickly able to raise more than $700M from investors for her start-up company.  She also convinced Walgreens drugstore and the Safeway grocery chain to invest, with the promise that they would have exclusive rights to utilize her device as a part of their wellness programs.  Unfortunately, a few drops of blood were not sufficient to run the range of routine blood diagnostics.  Blood tests using her devices routinely gave false results, seriously putting peoples lives in danger.

Elizabeth hired Ramesh “Sunny” Balwani, to be her number one executive at the company. He was a hot tempered manager.  Together, the two created a very toxic work environment. Elizabeth and Sunny demanded complete loyalty.  Anyone questioning methodology would be either marginalized or fired.

Elizabeth was obsessed with Steve Jobs, and soon began to dress all in black, in imitation of Jobs.  She lured away several of Apple employees to work at Theranos.  While initially excited about working in a biotech company, the former Apple employees soon became disillusioned and left.

The book describes how Elizabeth and Sunny deceived potential investors as to the efficacy of the technology.

In 2015, the author, an investigative reporter for the Wall Street Journal, got a tip about the goings-on at Theranos. He quickly began asking questions. When he seemed to get too close to the truth, Elizabeth turned her legal team on him and his paper.  She was able to hire one of the most prestigious lawfirm that threatened to destroy both the author and the paper.  This tactic had worked on employees deemed to be disloyal. The paper, however, refused to back down.

Tyler Schultz, grandson of George Schultz, briefly worked at Theranos.  When he became disillusioned by the company, he was threatened by the company's legal team.  They tried to strong-arm him into signing various disclosures after he left the company's employment.  They even used his famous grandfather as leverage.  Unfortunately, this caused a riff between George and Tyler that appears not to have been repaired.

Theranos was exposed, and as of the publication of the book, Elizabeth and Sunny have been indicted on criminal charges.  In addition, both have been involved in civil suits.

This book reads like a crime story.

Read: January 30, 2019

5 Stars

Books Set in North America: San Francisco

Frog Music, by Emma Donoghue (2014)

It’s 1876 in San Francisco.  The city is plagued by a small pox epidemic and a heat wave.  Prostitution is legal, as is the farming out of unwanted babies.

Blanche Beunon is a French immigrant, burlesque dancer and “soiled dove”.  She lives with her lover and his protégé.  One day in the middle of August, Jenny, riding a high-wheeled bicycle literally runs into Blanche.  Jenny has a mysterious past.  She has, however, been arrested numerous times because of her habit of wearing pants and men’s clothing.  It is illegal in Victorian San Francisco for a woman to wear such clothing.

Blanche and Jenny form a curious friendship.  Within a month, however, Jenny has been shot and killed.  [This is not a spoiler, as the murder occurs in the first few pages of the novel.]  Blanche spends the next few days trying to bring the murderer to justice.

The novel goes back and forth in time, slowly peeling back the layers of Blanche’s life and her relationships with those around her.

The novel is based on actual historical events of the real-life murder of Jenny Bonnet who wore men’s clothing and caught frogs for a living, and Blanche Beunon.

Read:  January 14, 2018

3.5 Stars

Books Set in the United States: San Francisco, California

Special Circumstances, by Sheldon Siegel (2000)

Mike Daley recently left a high-powered law firm and started his own criminal law practice.  His first case is Joel Friedman, a former colleague and friend from his old law firm.  Joel has been charged with the murder of a key partner and associate at the law firm.  Although at first blush, it appeared to be a murder suicide, Joel seemed to have a motive ~ he had just been denied a partnership.

This was a fun and easy read.  The book was written in 2000, so some of the references to the OJ Simpson trial, and references to pay phones seems a bit dated.

Read:  November 23, 2017

4 Stars