Two of a Kind Part One: Romance is Camel Colored

Maybe you don't see it. But we had these two books next to each other on Boswell's Best this week and to me, they look like two volumes of the same series. Major Pettigrew's Last Stand is a modern twist on the English village novel--the English gentleman is in love with a Pakistani shopkeeper. The book's been selling well at lots of bookstores; at Boswell, Bev's been leading the charge.

The Lotus Eaters has little in common, except that there is a romance at its heart. A female combat photographer in the Vietnam War is torn between two admirers. I don't know too much about it, except that the advance reviews from Kirkus, Library Journal, and Publishers Weekly were all very good.

Here's just a snippet from LJ: "Like Marianne Wiggins's Eveless Eden and Tim O'Brien's The Things They Carried before it, Soli's poignant work will grab the attention of most readers. A powerful new writer to watch."