New beginnings (oh, and a book too)

First, a beautiful explanation for why posts will be even fewer and farther between than they have been here lately: She was born on Wednesday, and she couldn't be more perfect. We are slowly figuring out this parenting thing, and I've been in too much of a fog to manage much reading. But I'm sure eventually we'll all get into sync!


I did manage to finish Eclipse. And I officially give up on Stephenie Meyer. I really dislike Bella's whining and weakness, Edward is still overly protective and stifling, and Jacob is just annoying. So that's enough of that for me.

Disappearing acts

My second venture on the Stephenie Meyer bandwagon: I finished New Moon last night. This one left me more perplexed as to why so many adult women are obsessed with these books. For teenagers, I get it completely, but for me, the teen angst is just a bit too much to take. I spent most of the book being annoyed with Bella's logic (lack thereof?), and quite a large chunk of plot toward the end seemed incredibly forced. I didn't dislike it, but I'm not becoming a devotee by any means. (Of course, I'll have to read the next two...) And the Edward love? He's just not my type. Assuming I got over the vampire problem, he's way too protective with a few too many moments of irrational behavior. I'll take old-school Angel and Buffy any day over whiny Bella and crazy Edward.


Maggie O'Farrell's The Vanishing Act of Esme Lennox was an enjoyable read, but not terribly memorable. The ending stayed with me but the characters have pretty much already escaped my (admittedly over-extended) mind. The story was intriguing and kept me reading, and I have no real complaints about the writing. It was pretty good. How's that for an underwhelming review?

Post-vacation roundup

How's that for an uninspired post title? I finished both of these last week and hadn't bothered to note anything about them until now.


Amy Bloom's Away is a book I had vaguely heard of but never looked into further until someone recommended it. I don't think I've ever disliked a book she gave me, and Away was no exception. Lillian's story draws the reader in and holds tight. I also loved the way Bloom finished the stories of the peripheral characters, even after they had drifted from Lillian's main story.


Girls in Trucks, on the other hand, was one of those books I finished only because it was a very quick read and I didn't have anything better immediately at hand. Katie Crouch's novel really ought to have been presented as connected short stories (in which case I would have avoided it, but at least I wouldn't have been expecting an actual novel). The episodes were just too disjointed, jumping back and forth in time and changing narrative techniques as well. It was readable, but not great.

Vacation roundup

A much busier vacation than usual, which meant less time for sitting and reading. Still a respectable book count, though:


1. Loving Frank by Nancy Horan. I expected to like this much more than I did. It wasn't bad, but after all the fabulous critical reviews, I thought there would be more to it. It was quite plot driven, without a lot of depth to the characters, and it often felt like she wasn't sure whether she was writing a novel or nonfiction -- it really would have been more effective had she been able to choose one or the other.


2. High Fidelity by Nick Hornby. Yet another where my expectations were a bit too high. I really like most of Hornby's fiction, but this one felt a little slow to me. I might have liked it better if I had read it closer to when it was originally published.


3. Revolutionary Road by Richard Yates. Best of the bunch. Yates examines the lives of a young, suburban married couple who realize their lives aren't as extraordinary as they had planned. All of the characters here, even minor ones, were so clearly developed and heartbreakingly real There's a movie version coming out in December, I've learned (which explains why this was on display at the library), with Kate Winslet and Leonardo DiCaprio as the main characters. I think Kate Winslet is just right for the part, but I'm not as sure about DiCaprio. The stills on imdb.com look good so far, though.


4. The Body in the Library by Agatha Christie. It's not vacation without an Agatha Christie in the mix. This wasn't one of the best, but still satisfying. (As usual, I can't find an cover image of the actual copy I read -- her books have had way too many covers! Perhaps I'll start taking my own pictures eventually.)


5. What I Was by Meg Rosoff. The best part about this book? It only took me an afternoon to read it. Dull, anticlimactic, just bleh.


6. The Summer of Naked Swim Parties by Jessica Anya Blau. A 1970s coming-of-age story, but it lacked any real insight into the main character. Cute, but not much more to it than that.

Greater than the sum

Weirdly, I didn't like this book all that much, but it made me want to read more of Kate Christensen's writing. In The Great Man, she looks at the women who surrounded and supported a famous New York artist, who (five years after his death) has two biographers trying to analyze his life and find his secrets. The meetings with the writers allow the women (the artist's wife, mistress, and sister) to explore their own feelings about the man. The characters and story were interesting, but it wasn't the sort of book that made me want to keep reading it. Christensen's writing style is rather nice, though, and the characters were certainly vivid and well-developed, if a bit stereotypical at times.

The quick and the mysterious

It's a mystery in which sheep are the detectives. It's got to be good. Indeed, Three Bags Full lives up to its whimsical promise, without every being silly. Leonie Swann's novel is plenty amusing (I even laughed out loud twice), but she's also quite serious and respectful toward her sheepy characters. And characters they are -- each with a distinct personalities that I can actually imagine sheep having. I highly recommend this one, especially if you've ever enjoyed an Agatha Christie mystery.


Alison Larkin's The English American is quite a bit sillier, but without any sheep. It's a very quick read and probably fits the chick lit category. This is an enjoyable book, but it doesn't have a lot of depth to it -- quite predictable, with rather stereotypical characters. Certainly not an unpleasant way to pass an afternoon, but nothing exceptional.

In short

I've finished two books I really enjoyed, and yet I have very little to say about either. I think it's the heat -- I'd rather sit still and read than sit at the computer and type. But here goes...


The Girl With No Shadow was published originally as The Lollipop Shoes, and I don't actually think either title works all that well. But Joanne Harris' continuation of the story from Chocolat does work very well. In this novel, she gives voices to three characters who alternate telling the story. It's a classic battle of good and evil, but with magical and fairy tale elements added in -- and, of course, plenty of chocolate.


In The Lady Elizabeth, Alison Weir takes her impressive historical knowledge and research to breathe life into Elizabeth I's coming of age. The story takes Elizabeth from the death of her mother to her becoming queen. It relies on the facts, as Weir did in Innocent Traitor, but it also adds plenty of fictional elements and intrigue. Weir's historical fiction feels so much more intelligent than many of the others out there, thanks to her background as a historian.

Finally!

After an annoyingly long series of abandoned books, I finally managed to get through a couple of quick and enjoyable reads. Most recent was Jacqueline Sheehan's Lost and Found, which I had been eyeing on my mother's bookshelf for a while primarily because of the very cute dog on the cover. It's hard to go wrong with cute dogs. I think this qualifies as chick lit, and certainly it was quite predictable, but it was a sweet book and hey, a dog is a major character. Really, hard to go wrong.


Before that I breezed through The Kindness of Strangers, by Katrina Kittle, though it's not a breezy book by any stretch of the imagination. The subject matter was quite disturbing -- a woman finds out her best friends have been running a pornography ring with their children as the focus. Kittle handles it well, though, much in the style Jodi Picoult. Kittle uses similar shifts in characters' perspectives to narrate the story, which makes it move at a good pace. A good read, but one I was glad didn't stick in my memory for very long.

Modern love

Camille DeAngelis is an ambitious woman to tackle cloning in a realistic fiction setting. I found Mary Modern fascinating and strange (though, as far as cloning fiction goes, I preferred Kazuo Ishiguro's Never Let Me Go). The characters in DeAngelis' book were a little too unsympathetic for me -- I didn't really feel sorry for any of them except Mary, and I thought Gray was way too much of a doormat. The political aspect seemed not quite developed enough; there were random snippets from a book that strongly criticized various aspects of the 2000s, and while I don't disagree, it seemed odd to have that disconnected soapbox in there. The story itself, however, and the writing, were entirely compelling and readable; the book is well-paced and the plot suspenseful in the right places. I'm glad the author is putting these ethical and political issues out there for readers to ponder and analyze, but I wish she had given them more context in the fiction.

Deliciously old fashioned

In the author blurbs on the back of Matrimony, Brian Morton, whose fiction I've enjoyed in the past, is quoted as saying: "Joshua Henkin's Matrimony is a deliciously old-fashioned novel. With no gimmicks, no tricks, Henkin gives us a cast of complex, flawed, utterly real characters, exploring their inner lives with an astonishing sureness of touch." I think this is a beautifully stated summation of the novel, which is filled with the quiet lyricism of everyday life. The story traces a couple's life beginning with their meeting in college, while also incorporating such challenges to friendships as time, class, and just plain life. I read several reviews complaining that the novel was too quiet, too focused on inner lives, but this (along with Henkin's elegant writing style) is what I found most appealing about it.

Woof.

I've never read Dean Koontz before, but I wanted to read The Darkest Evening of the Year when I heard the main character worked in dog rescue. Unfortunately, the book annoyed me from the very first overwritten sentence: "Behind the wheel of the Ford Expedition, Amy Redwing drove as if she were immortal and therefore safe at any speed." (Yes, I would have figured out she was speeding if you'd quit before the conjunction. Do Koontz's readers really require things to be spelled out so much?) I continued with the book -- despite its not-so-wonderful writing, misused semicolons, and bizarrely short paragraphs -- because of the dogs, and I really only enjoyed the parts with the dogs. Those sections were lovely and descriptive, with excellent detail of the dogs' behavior (indeed, the dogs were better characterized than many of the humans). The rest of the book I pretty much skimmed, and I still got the whole story, which left me entirely underwhelmed.

I do highly commend Koontz for all of the information in the book about dog rescue and puppy mills. He clearly loves dogs and is doing a great service to the rescue world by getting the message out this way. It's not at all preachy, but he makes sure his readers see how important it is to choose rescue and shelter dogs, or at least to go with reputable breeders rather than the backyard breeders or puppy-mill sellers. For that alone, I wish great success for this book.

Brighten my northern skies

I didn't really know anything about Vendela Vida's newest novel before I picked it up. I was wandering around the bookstore (I'm a library girl, so this is not a usual pastime for me), looking for another paperback with which to travel, and the pretty blue and white cover caught my eye. (The sale price helped too.) Let the Northern Lights Erase Your Name, in addition to having a lovely and fitting title, was an excellent purchase. The story is told in very short chapters, which made me think of those indie movies where the scenes fade to black frequently and pick up a few seconds later. It gave the book a quietness that melded nicely with the snow-covered Lapland setting. I enjoyed the plot, and Clarissa's story definitely kept me reading, but the writing style was what most appealed to me about this book.

Parting is such sweet sorrow

Ah, Harry Potter. In truth, I love the series as it is too much to mourn its ending. Sure, there are flaws, but nothing that popular can please all its fans. Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows is a perfect conclusion, and I appreciated it more the second time through. At some point this year, I want to reread the whole series in order, just because I can. If you've not read the books (seriously, how would that be possible?), pretend you don't know all the hype and give them a chance.

In the middle

I absolutely loved Ursula Hegi's Stones from the River, but her latest book, The Worst Thing I've Done, was disappointing. It lacked the humanity of Stones and replaced it instead with unlikeable characters. The story alternates viewpoints among five characters, three of whom had been tangled in a triangle of friendship and jealousy since childhood. The three seem to feed off of and enable the worst qualities of the others' personalities, which made them more annoying than interesting. Hegi also intertwined political rantings with the plot, and while I'm in agreement with her views, they didn't seem to have much relevance to the book. I did like the descriptions of Annie's art -- she would work through her emotions and let the creation of the collages bring out buried memories and feelings -- but those weren't quite enough to redeem an otherwise dull narrative.

In dreams begin responsibilities

The Sweet Far Thing is the final book in Libba Bray's trilogy, following A Great and Terrible Beauty and Rebel Angels. Bray brings the story to a satisfying conclusion, with plenty of the elements that made the first two books so enjoyable. As in the first two, Bray balances fast-paced adventure with Gothic-inspired teenage drama, with the characters remaining intrinsically real while they journey into fantastic lands and situations. Bray also handles all of her details beautifully -- she has an excellent handle on the rule of Chekhov's gun. The end seemed a little drawn out to me; the last few chapters felt like they were wrapping up loose ends that had already been wrapped. But throughout, the reader is thoroughly drawn in to Gemma's unfolding battle for the realms and for herself.

Mixed grill

I didn't dislike Last Night at the Lobster, but I was expecting more. Stewart O'Nan's little novel (only 160 pages) is almost too realistic. The main character is the manager at a Red Lobster that corporate is closing after this snowy Saturday night. He's feeling guilty and nostalgic and pragmatic all at once. I felt a weird combination of sympathy for and boredom with the characters' lives -- similar maybe to seeing a minor car accident on my way to work. Unfortunate, and I'm glad it's not me. I wanted to care more, but that empathy just wasn't there.

A very slow year

The Year of Fog started off well -- heavily plot driven and fast paced, so that I breezed through the first half in one sitting. After that, Michelle Richmond's narrative drifted into a mediocre and occasionally tedious middle, with a slight recovery toward the (entirely too far-fetched) end. Abby's wallowing, however justified, was just not enjoyable reading; the novel needed more of the energy of the beginning, even if the story itself was focused on an emotionally draining search. I found Jake's character to be rather weakly drawn, and most of the other characters seemed repetitive and unnecessary, especially as more and more incidental players were introduced. Overall, it left me bored.

Finding home

The jacket copy for Haven Kimmel's The Used World ends by saying that it's a book that "charts the many meanings of the place we call home." But for me, it is really more about the many meanings of love and friendship, which I suppose ends up in the same place. I loved Kimmel's characters -- perfectly real, flawed and complicated -- and the intertwining stories that slowly but surely revealed their connections. This is a book I wouldn't mind rereading, just to make sure I caught all of the links and to savor the writing.

One of my favorite characters had only a peripheral role, but he does have his own book: The Solace of Leaving Early. That's definitely going on the reading lists.