Jeanne McWilliams Blasberg | new york journal of books

Jeanne McWIlliams Blasberg is an award-winning author and essayist. Daughter of a Promise (She Writes Press, April 2024) is her third novel. The Nine (SWP 2019) was honored with the 2019 Foreword Indies Gold Award in Thriller & Suspense, and the Gold Medal and Juror's Choice in the 2019 National Indie Excellence Awards. Her debut, Eden (SWP 2017), won the Benjamin Franklin Award for Best New Voice in Fiction and was a finalist for the Sarton Women's Book Award for Historical Fiction.

She co-chairs the board of the Boston Book Festival and serves on the Executive Committee of GrubStreet, one of the country's preeminent creative writing centers located in Boston.

When not in New England, she splits her time between Park City, UT, and growing organic vegetables in Verona, WI.

Books by Jeanne McWilliams Blasberg

The Nine: A Novel

Eden: A Novel

Daughter of a Promise: A Novel

Book Reviews by Jeanne McWilliams Blasberg

Author(s):

Weike Wang

Genre(s):

Asian American, Genre Fiction, Families, Relationships, Literary Fiction

Rental House: A Novel

November 18, 2024

Reviewed by:

Jeanne McWilliams Blasberg

“throws out traditional expectations and homogeneity and relies on determination and compassion to make random pieces of a puzzle crazily connect.”

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Image of Colored Television (A GMA Book Club Pick): A Novel

Author(s):

Danzy Senna

Genre(s):

Literary Fiction, Interracial/Multi-ethnic/Cultural Heritage, Dark Humor, Working Women

Colored Television: A Novel

July 29, 2024

Reviewed by:

Jeanne McWilliams Blasberg

“an important book by an important author who understands only too well that heavy topics are most accessible when delivered with a spoonful of sugar.”

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Author(s):

Alice Hoffman

Genre(s):

Literary Fiction, Historical, Occult, Mashups

The Invisible Hour: A Novel

August 14, 2023

Reviewed by:

Jeanne McWilliams Blasberg

With a truly imaginative structure, Alice Hoffman delves into what has become her trademark theme of magic.

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Author(s):

Jamel Brinkley

Genre(s):

Short Stories, Anthologies, Contemporary, Interracial/Multi-ethnic/Cultural Heritage, Social & Family Issues, Urban Life

Witness: Stories

July 31, 2023

Reviewed by:

Jeanne McWilliams Blasberg

A collection of ten short stories set in Brooklyn, NY, Witness: Stories is populated by characters navigating relationships with friends and family, both living and not.

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Author(s):

Adam Langer

Genre(s):

Literary Fiction, Coming of Age

Cyclorama

August 1, 2022

Reviewed by:

Jeanne McWilliams Blasberg

Cyclorama is a stunning novel that weaves together past and present while reflecting on and questioning Anne Frank’s timeless assertion, “In spite of everything, I still believe that peopl

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Author(s):

Bisi Adjapon

Genre(s):

Debut, Literary Fiction, Coming of Age

The Teller of Secrets: A Novel

November 15, 2021

Reviewed by:

Jeanne McWilliams Blasberg

The Teller of Secrets by Bisi Adjapon is a coming of age, character-based novel that follows Esi’s first-person recounting of her girlhood in newly independent Ghana in the 1960s.

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Author(s):

Gabriela Garcia

Genre(s):

Debut, Debut Fiction, Families, Hispanic

Of Women and Salt

May 10, 2021

Reviewed by:

Jeanne McWilliams Blasberg

“Of Women and Salt is a beautifully written novel that turns like a kaleidoscope in the light, illuminating the blurry delineation of who is an insider and who an outsider.”

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