Five books that deliver life – with the boring parts edited out.

I mean, that is what most of us are living, isn’t it? And so it seems fitting to corral a handful of books, all fiction, which draw their sense of tension, suspense, emotional depth, structure, and cultural relevance from the very plot points that make up our lives.

Now, don’t get all wonky on me; these books are not boring or trite or vacuous. And, no, you couldn’t have written them yourself. These books are fierce, terse, heart-breaking, hilarious, witty, acerbic, and smart as heck. They are what life would be like if you took out all the boring parts (roughly 67 percent), amped up the intensity, and always let conflict boil over. They are books that have the power to remind you just how beautiful and terrible life can be.

"The Feast of Love," by Charles Baxter

Charles Baxter has a book called "The Art of Subtext" that is referenced in writing classes from Harvard to Hong Kong, and when you read his novel, "The Feast of Love," you will understand why. Baxter summons up a cast of narrators, throws them each in turn onto center stage, and bids them to show us their world. From Bradley, the middle-aged owner of an espresso bar with his two ex-wives (who make appearances of their own), to Chloe and Oscar, the fiercely in love 20-something punksters. A retired philosophy professor and his wife pine for their estranged son while an author sneaks into a football stadium in the middle of the night in an attempt to combat his insomnia. "The Feast of Love" is truly an achievement of form, with characters’ lives being drawn together into a luminous tangle that you won’t soon forget.

"Motherless Brooklyn," by Jonathan Lethem

There’s nothing I can say about this book that hasn’t already been said. But I’m going to make you listen to it all over again, because for those of you who haven’t read it, you are really missing out. "Motherless Brooklyn" is what you get when you cross "A Separate Peace" with "The Big Sleep" (and by my accounting Mark Haddon, author of "A Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night Time" owes Lethem more than just the tip of a hat). Lionel, the narrator, is an orphan diagnosed with Tourette's Syndrome who falls in with a small time mobster, Frank Minna, after he matriculates from St. Vincent’s Home for Boys. But when Frank is murdered, Lionel’s world is thrown upside-down and he sets out to solve Frank’s murder and reestablish order for himself. Lionel’s is a compulsive and caustic burst of a voice and Lethem’s prose is a veritable high-wire act of linguistic precision.

"How to Breathe Underwater," by Julie Orringer

1 | 2

Next