I chose Breath because I needed to read Tim Winton after gr-friend, Justin’s, reviews.
The opening moved like a freight train in the first person presI chose Breath because I needed to read Tim Winton after gr-friend, Justin’s, reviews.
The opening moved like a freight train in the first person present tense —my favorite for its immediacy when done right. Winton did it right, but after that one chapter the rest was told in past tense, as the protagonist recounted his youth. I don’t think the opening was essential to the story, but it drew me in. And then I had a bit of a time trying to get back in, to be honest. I’ve never had this happen before, but I found myself editing the author’s sentences in my head to make a greater impact on me as I learned about this lost boy who started surfing.
But it slowly drew me in. The story turned into one of interior metaphor for needing the physical high of reaching intense pain, of living on the edge of death, until it became an addiction. And from that addiction a new community was formed, as they were unconsciously drawn to one another. And the more the main character learned about the people he was drawn to, the more he learned the myriad of ways this addiction could manifest. The characters felt real and fascinating, both relatable and new-to-me.
I will read this author again. Thank you, Justin....more
4.5. Chee’s prose has the same effect on me as Michael Cunningham’s, heading straight for the emotional center of pain until it expands, then releases4.5. Chee’s prose has the same effect on me as Michael Cunningham’s, heading straight for the emotional center of pain until it expands, then releases into a tender beauty. This coming-of-age journey of Fee continues into middle age, allowing the immediacy of what happened before to be viewed anew with wisdom, yet also still contain the still-living, twisted-taut emotions of his youth. There is sexual abuse and suicide and murder in these pages, yet they are either never seen or momentary, leaving Chee to explore and reveal the emotional trauma wresting inside his characters without sensationalism. Add to that the touch of Korean folklore that plays on the reader’s subconscious, and we have an exquisite debut.
If Cunningham’s, Flesh and Blood, asks us if we inherit the way we love, Chee here asks if who we love is forever shaped by our first. And he makes a good argument for a yes. Told with tremendous compassion for all characters without letting anyone off the hook, Chee also brought to mind, “There but for the grace of God, go I.” In a journey that is also about self-realization, he invites us to dance between impulse and choice, and how each contributes to composing a life....more
Perhaps, as my gr-friend, Mark, says, I’m in a stingy phase. Rose writes in deceptively simple language that goes down easy. This was a quiet book aboPerhaps, as my gr-friend, Mark, says, I’m in a stingy phase. Rose writes in deceptively simple language that goes down easy. This was a quiet book about a dying man and the family he made for himself, and in the end it was quite beautiful. I solidly liked it throughout, but for a story about a former Earl wanted for murder in London who changed his life and identity in Australia, it’s a little uneventful. I did like the way the past unfolds, how the protagonist isn’t the only one with deep-seeded secrets, and how the fear of self-exposure due to a brain tumor added to the tension. I also found the characters likable and interesting. But I often felt there was too much description, and it took a while to get hooked, although it never felt like a chore to read, and I always enjoyed the language.
If you haven’t read this author yet, I highly recommend The Museum of Modern Love. If you become a fan, this is worth the read....more
I picked this up to sample Van Booy for the first time, and I’m glad I did. He’s a gorgeous writer. This is a strange experiment where he merged his eI picked this up to sample Van Booy for the first time, and I’m glad I did. He’s a gorgeous writer. This is a strange experiment where he merged his efforts with those of another writer, and that in itself was worth reading about in the intro. I recommend this gem that can be read in a day without giving up any basking in language. I look forward to reading him again soon. Thanks to Lisa for putting him on my radar :)...more
Gorgeous, poetic writing that moved me as well as taught me, but written more like a series of vignettes moving back and forth through time that le3.5
Gorgeous, poetic writing that moved me as well as taught me, but written more like a series of vignettes moving back and forth through time that left me wanting more of each female character.
The story starts in 1866 in Camagüey, where María Isabel is the only woman working in a cigar factory, a factory and business of prestige in Cuba. There, the workers are read to as they roll cigars, until a regime change encapsulates the growing political unrest throughout the country. And yet, because of reading, María falls in love with her future husband, a kind man, and so we begin.
Well, actually, the opening of the story begins, and ends, with Carmen. She is the protagonist and the frame for this work, although her treatment by the author was so egalitarian that I almost missed it. When the book ended with her it was obvious, and that made me return to the opening, which I remembered only for its lyrical quality and not its content.
So, we follow this line of mothers and daughters in bits and bobs from María Isabel down to Carmen’s daughter, Jeanette, in present day Florida. Each woman gets at least one chapter in her own voice, but not in chronological order. And there’s Jeanette’s neighbor and her daughter in Florida that show the struggles of other immigrants in the US, as well as offer another kind of mother-daughter bond.
The book is a lot about secrets, words and stories and how they shape us. It’s about how what’s unspoken can seep through the years and pass down what’s ugly until it festers and destroys, never to have been aired out and cleared.
This is a smart, sensitive, relatable story with lots of the trauma of being female (i.e. having little power) in the face of men who have little agency as immigrants and so compensate with the power they have over their wives. It is also a debut novel by a talented writer who sometimes lost me with what she chose to tell and made me hungry for what she left out. Not wholly satisfying, but with flavors good enough to read her again, Of Women and Salt was a quick read worth the investment. I will say that had I not read this with my buddy, Lisa, it may not have made as deep an impact. But I’m not sure. Lisa certainly made it more fun :) Here is her review: https://www.goodreads.com/review/show......more
When I heard this book was about the pandemic, I was hesitant to read it. I’m so glad I did. Enough time has gone by for the specifics of the lockd4.5
When I heard this book was about the pandemic, I was hesitant to read it. I’m so glad I did. Enough time has gone by for the specifics of the lockdown to give a sense of recognition and inclusion, rather than overwhelm. The novel begins as the lockdown unfolds and takes us through that strange and disorienting time from the specific point-of-view of Lucy Barton and her surrounding loved ones. The three previous novels (Anything is Possible, My Name is Lucy Barton, and Oh, William!) provide a foundation that supports and fills the story, but none are necessary; Strout ensures that this novel stands alone. Even Bob Burgess of The Burgess Boys plays a strong role here, and although reading that might have also added to my joy, Strout communicates what’s necessary without it. Even Olive Kitteridge shows up in conversation as one who impacted Lucy’s friend’s life (and I hear they will meet in Strout’s next book— how exciting). It’s fun to see characters from the outside and then read a book that lets us inhabit them. The reverse is also fun. Strout seems to do a bit of both in all she writes (I’m only unsure of Abide with Me). All that said, I do suggest reading Oh, William! first, as it’s almost a continuous story.
If you’ve only read Olive Kitteridge, I would say that is her most dense, and the writing here is most similar to Oh, William!. In this and in Oh, William!, Strout writes in deceptively simple sentences that left me breathless. The cumulative effect of those sentences felt profound....more
We’re all eager to stamp our names on our creations, even fight for credit in legal battles, and yet the unfolding of any work of art is way more s4.5
We’re all eager to stamp our names on our creations, even fight for credit in legal battles, and yet the unfolding of any work of art is way more shared than we’d like to think. Don’t we snatch a bit of this and that from others and mix it with ourselves before we put it out there in a new shape and form? Aren’t some people so influential to us that we unconsciously pick up their expressions, their habits, their hobbies, and adopt them as our own? When you’re really close to someone, what you claim as your own might have been theirs first, and what you think you got from them may have been yours from the start. The separateness of creation is an illusion.
Our creative works carry forth all of our experiences. We learn here that Lila lives in a world where this construct of separateness is something she has to will into being or she can’t sense boundaries at all. So, whose story is this, then? Elena’s or Lila’s? Is it an accident that their nicknames are Lena and Lina? Is it even possible to understand one without the other? And why, if this is a story of friendship, am I talking about creative work?
I think there’s a reason this book is called The Story of the Lost Child, and not just The Lost Child. Elena-our-narrator is an author talking to us about shaping this very story as a blend of the lives she puts before us; and Elena-the-author (penned creator of this series), is also a fictional figure, playing with her readers as the entire series takes on a meta feel. (If you haven’t read about the hunt to unveil Ferrante’s true identity, here’s an example: https://lithub.com/have-italian-schol...). So this work belongs to nobody and no one, and at the same time is all of ours to share.
As for the friendship, Elena and Lila possess each other and infect one another so completely that they don’t seem to know where one ends and the other begins. And in a way, the whole journey through each book is Elena trying to sort that out.
“Now that I’m close to the most painful part of our story, I want to seek on the page a balance between her and me that in life I couldn’t find even between myself and me.”
“What she really thought of my behavior…I don’t know. Only she can say if, in fact, she has managed to insert herself into this extremely long chain of words to modify my text, to purposely supply the missing links, to unhook others without letting it show, to say of me more than I want, more than I’m able to say. I wish for this intrusion, I’ve hoped for it ever since I began to write our story, but I have to get to the end in order to check all the pages.... It’s more and more difficult to keep the thread of the story taut within the chaos of the years…. So either I tend to pass over my own affairs to recapture Lila and all the complications she brings with her or, worse, I let myself be carried away by the events of my life, only because it’s easier to write them. I mustn’t take the first path, on which, if I set myself aside, I would end up finding even fewer traces of Lila—since the very nature of our relationship dictates that I can reach her only by passing through myself.”
It seems Elena continues to compete with Lila long after she’s already won. Tragedy can be the great equalizer when it comes to the balance of power in friendships, and events can turn life on its head. But even in book two, before tragedy strikes, Elena writes of Lila: “she was explaining to me that I had won nothing, that in the world there is nothing to win, that her life was full of varied and foolish adventures as much as mine, and that time simply slipped away without any meaning, and it was good just to see each other every so often to hear the mad sound of the brain of one echo in the mad sound of the brain of the other.”
Another thing this book did right was bring the series to a head. The author followed many of the characters to their ends. The quartet takes a specific slice of our world and shows us how the people from three generations unfold from this origin. They are the characters that make up a neighborhood, the ones you know your whole life, the families who knew yours before you were born. The writing is warm; it’s smart without being cerebral, authentic without being alienating, both familiar and otherworldly. It’s also not often we see a female protagonist in literature who is both pretty and bookish, popular and respected for her hard work in a neighborhood with working class values and habits.
This is the story of childhood fantasies that become real with determination. It’s also the story of childhood aspirations squelched by lack of opportunities. Ultimately, it’s a search for identity by one woman whose girlhood friend and home marked her so deeply that she must learn how to integrate them before making her specific mark on the world.
I didn’t like this one as much as the others at first — until I loved it. A lot of politics. I’m not crazy about politics when seen from the peripheryI didn’t like this one as much as the others at first — until I loved it. A lot of politics. I’m not crazy about politics when seen from the periphery of a character’s life: I need it to work closely on the personal. This book did both, showing how the unrest of the 1970s channeled violence between communist and fascist ideologies in working-class Italy. It did not pull back from sexual harassment in the workplace, unionizing, failed marriage and the woman’s right to exit, nor even the violent deaths of those in close community. But Elena, our narrator, tells many of these Naples’ moments from afar, in Florence. [Update: I just started book 4, and the narrator confesses that she hates politics. I can’t help wondering if the reason those parts kept me at a distance in an otherwise immersive work was because of the narrator’s own discomfort with politics, and therefore an inability to integrate them into the book]. Her own story lacked luster without the push-pull of Lila, and became more one of the drudgeries of early motherhood and marriage. In this context, I suddenly found Elena unlikeable. But once she’s pulled back into the neighborhood and its original cast of characters, the story regained its vibrancy and flow. Then it ended on a cliffhanger.
The good writing is still there, as well as the naturalness, but whereas Books 1 and 2 both stand alone, this one is nothing without the others. There were chunks of this that felt impersonal enough to skim, but by the end, I’d follow Elena wherever she wanted me to go....more
Reading Elena Ferrante’s second book in her Neapolitan series felt like a return to a time when working-class teens married young and were forced to pReading Elena Ferrante’s second book in her Neapolitan series felt like a return to a time when working-class teens married young and were forced to play the role of adults. How well Ferrante captured this mix of adult responsibility and adolescent urge in each character, as well as in the overall tone! I felt immersed in the delicious excitement of girlhood friendship and first times, and how all decisions must be navigated within the loyalty of the one friendship that matters most.
Lately, I feel like everything matters more than it used to. The problems we’re all dealing with seem now to be of the highest stakes. But perhaps life is really a series of crossing thresholds? I believe one of the hardest is the transition to adulthood: going from that place where your stomach is in knots from all that happens to you, to being faced with the choices that will shape the rest of your life.
This book is wonderful at capturing what it’s like to rise above your community of origin, and what it’s like to abandon it even if it means you fall. Here, the experiences are of ambitious, intelligent, female teens marked by a working class neighborhood where violence is the primary language. The friendship between the two women is symbiotic: They live without each other for long stretches, but the threads of one another are permanently interwoven, forcing a constant seesaw of success and sacrifice. Of course, this leads to betrayals.
Ferrante also wonderfully captures the fate of a smart, gorgeous, hard-working girl whose only choice for her future lies in which man she will attach to, and how she will use other influential males in the community. We see how she tries to let academic learning fall away because there’s no use for it in her every day, and yet her drive to devour ideas is not easily thwarted. To change would mean to no longer be compatible with the world she grew up in. So, one half of this pair makes the decision to go, one to stay; both decisions can be lonely, both exciting, both incomplete.
Ferrante is good. I like her more than I thought I would. Her first two novels in this series are relatable and immersive, and of the first three, this was my favorite. I liked book-one more than I thought I would, too. This one goes deeper, and I think a reader can start here, and later read the first for background. Be warned, however: this one ends on a cliffhanger.
What a lovely experience this was, listening to the incomparable Meryl Streep bring to life a book of Ann Patchett’s. As much as I have my go-to narraWhat a lovely experience this was, listening to the incomparable Meryl Streep bring to life a book of Ann Patchett’s. As much as I have my go-to narrators, Meryl Streep brought a whole new level of humanity, humor, and kindness to each character and to the story as a whole. I could just feel her nuanced, multi-faceted intelligence through her craft. If other narrators give 5-star readings, Meryl Streep is off the charts.
I really enjoyed the story, too. In a way, it was a story about the power of story. A woman, her husband, and their three grown daughters are living together during the pandemic on a farm in Michigan. The family gathers around and listens to the mother tell stories of her past, when she fell into acting and dated a movie star before he was one. There is power in the simple act of sharing stories, and there was something idyllic about this close family gathered together for it on a cherry orchard.
I loved the Meryl-Streep-embodied main character most of all, Lara, the mother, when she recounted what lead to acting in a summer stock theater nearby the farm. I knew what she meant when she said that a summer stock day was packed with the normal intensity of a week, and so on from there. It brought me back to times of sleep away camp when couples and best friends were determined by the first night. The heightened sense of being away from home, and thrown into newness and possibility, was well captured. It’s no accident that colleges and universities by tradition house people of the same age together for a particular kind of learning and transition into adulthood. Patchett’s summer stock brought me back.
The reason Lara tells this story is because all of her grown daughters want to hear about the famous movie star she dated. It’s a strong, believable reason, made more interesting by the sheer joy of youth and first love. As the story unfolds, it reveals the personalities and relationships between them in the here and now. It also deals with the fear that the world is ending. And while the mother is pretty straight with her daughters, she shares only with us what she’s kept to herself, highlighting how stories are made by what she chose to tell, and revealing the paths not taken.
Lara also admits her guilty pleasure of enjoying her daughters at home, despite it being because of the global pandemic. The knowledge that this is temporary makes it all the more precious—just like summer stock. Just like a life. Maybe just like our world.
If the words penis, pussy, dick, cunt and cock bother you in print, don’t read this. If you were disappointed by Sarah Waters,’ Tipping the Velvet,4.5
If the words penis, pussy, dick, cunt and cock bother you in print, don’t read this. If you were disappointed by Sarah Waters,’ Tipping the Velvet, and still want an urban coming-of-age story about performers in a historical setting, but without the sentiment, this may hit the spot. And if you did love Tipping the Velvet, you may love this, too, although this one is about heterosexual love.
There’s an element of fairytale in this story about a boy and a girl who fall in love while living at an orphanage together in 1914-Montreal. O’Neill is unafraid to show a population seeped in sex, as sex is a free power for the poor. It also shows the power of creative minds to express and spread what buoys us in life, and how possession of these gifts separates you from your fellow man, whether they revere or dismiss you.
In a believable reversal of the norm, the boy is molested by a nun, and the author is unafraid to show how pleasure mixes with disgust, how the effect can be passed from person to person, and become a way of life for those without options. The boy and girl age out of the orphanage, and begin separate lives, taking us through the depression era in New York City and Montreal. They’ve never forgotten one another, and it feels like the story is leading up to the two meeting again.
This is the kind of unwholesome tale I like, one that isn’t gratuitous, just showing a way of life unafraid of judgment and not needing to prove a thing. And the whole orientation of the story feels directed towards hope, with the characters using their gifts of kindness, intelligence, and creativity to make the best of the cards dealt, letting the reader laugh and love with them....more
My mom urged me to read this years ago, this first edition debut of Elizabeth Hay. People say she’s slow, but she’s not Snow Child slow. Her words areMy mom urged me to read this years ago, this first edition debut of Elizabeth Hay. People say she’s slow, but she’s not Snow Child slow. Her words are clean, clever, accessible, and often profound. She’s preoccupied by her relationships, this narrator in close third, particularly one she cannot let go. This may turn some people away, this obsession, this drive, as redundancy. Her characters are great, especially the one we travel with, Norma Joyce. Norma Joyce starts out as an 8-year-old living a small life on a Saskatchewan farm, as the black sheep of her broken family. They move from there to Ottawa, already familiar with their neighbors. This increases the tensions that built up on the farm between Norma Joyce and her older sister, Lucinda. Norma Joyce then moves away to NYC - but don’t be fooled: she manages to live a small life there too. In all three places, however, and at every age, she breaks the boundaries for acceptable female behavior. It’s fun to watch, as well as meaningful.
This was intimate and insightful, about a uniquely spirited and bright young woman I routed for the whole way. I don’t say this lightly, since she hurts others and herself. Only a full character in rich surroundings could inspire such commitment.
This is not your typical romance, but if you don’t like coming-of-age stories immersed in nature and focused on relationships, you will grow bored. Because this was so well done, and also because of its flaws, I’m highly curious to read another novel by Elizabeth Hay. ...more
I’ve decided I love Bernardine Evaristo. I feel like a couple of books into an author’s oeuvre is too early to declare such a thing, but the two novelI’ve decided I love Bernardine Evaristo. I feel like a couple of books into an author’s oeuvre is too early to declare such a thing, but the two novels of hers I’ve read were so different from one another, yet both great reading experiences.
Mr. Loverman has a more traditional structure than Girl, Woman, Other, but it’s still a work of art. Ultimately a poignant portrait of what it’s like for a gay man to be raised in the Caribbean culture that rejects him, and how this wreaks havoc on the people he loves as well as on himself. Mr. Barrington J. Walker, Esq., our guide, is offensive in his assessment of others, yet clever and funny enough to get us to laugh with him. What’s remarkable about what Evaristo does here is that, as we laugh with Barry, we find more sympathy for the people he’s criticizing rather than less. And we can’t help sympathizing with him, too. It doesn’t hurt that some of the peripheral characters get their own chapters to round out our perspective. I can’t imagine any other composition of this story being as effective as this one. And, Evaristo writes with such a love for all her characters, that I can’t help but love them, too. That’s why I can say I love this author after only reading two of her works.
I listened to the audio for this one, and enjoyed hearing it come to life. I think this worked especially well for the humor, but I do wonder if reading the words at my own pace might have heightened my emotional experience....more
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