Have you ever had regrets? What would've happened had you never given up that sport? Went on the date with the person at the coffee shop? What would've happened had you lived differently?
Saturday, October 12, 2024
The Midnight Library by Matt Haig
Monday, October 7, 2024
Motherthing by Ainslie Hogarth
The camptastic exterior of Motherthing I find both attractive and suspect:
Friday, September 20, 2024
Long Island by Colm Tóibín
There is much duplicity in this captivating novel! It seems as if every main - and most of the minor - characters are deceiving someone close to them. This is not consciously manipulative behavior; these are generally well meaning people.
Colm Toibin's brand new novel - Long Island - is a sequel to his 2009 novel Brooklyn, which was subsequently made into a movie. In this story that takes place in the 1970s, two fishbowl worlds and two cultures are depicted - one in an Irish village, the other a subdivision on Long Island, NY.
Eilis Lacey Fiorello, who in the original novel emigrated to New York City in the 1950s and married into a close, extended Italian family inhabits both of these entrapping worlds. It is her experience around which the larger story develops. A quiet and mostly responsible woman, she has a way of unleashing disruption within her two families, with little insight on the attendant emotional pain she tends to generate.
Tóibín's depiction of the lives in this story brings to mind novels of Edith Wharton in his focus on the dynamic nuances of private, unspoken thoughts that flit between and among people. Characters always seem to be second guessing each other and themselves. There is context to outline the story, while the pace of the novel often slows down. The reader may spend several pages examining the thoughts and suppositions of a character while only a couple of days - or even just a few hours - have passed, and it's riveting. That is one of the gifts of this writer.
All the drama happens at the beginning and the end of the story, leaving an ending I found satisfying even for its ostensible inconclusiveness. You come to see that all the interpersonal manipulation and deceit of this story is, collectively, people's responses to living in a world where everyone knows too much about each other and there is sometimes too little room to breathe or be true to the self. For these deeper themes I found it compelling reading.
Reviewed by Marianne W
Friday, September 13, 2024
The Sleeping Car Porter by Suzette Mayr
Wednesday, August 28, 2024
Katie by Michael McDowell
Prospects aren't exactly cheery for Philo Drax, the daughter of a small-town seamstress in 1871, until a letter arrives from her estranged grandfather. His farm and well-being are being (mis)managed by the villainous Slapes, and he fears for his life.
Friday, August 16, 2024
Blessings by Chukwuebuka Ibeh
The story revolves around Obiefuna and his journey of self discovery as he grows from a child into a young adult. His life is not without its obstacles, as he discovers quickly he is gay and that his mannerisms are seen as weak and feminine. In Nigeria, these qualities are frowned upon, the roots of their hate deeply ingrained in homophobia. Obiefuna does what any of us would do to survive: he hides these parts of himself.
But one can only hide for so long. His father eventually sends him to a (very rough) boarding school, and it is there where we see many of the books’ events take place. We see Obiefuna’s destruction and evolution, his death and rebirth. There is nothing else to do but adapt when you are thrown to the wolves.
While the story is primarily about Obiefuna, through alternating chapters, we also follow the perspective of his mother, Uzoamaka. We see her deepest inner thoughts as she watches her son change. It is through her that we start to see a different type of love, one that transcends what Obiefuna has always thought he understood.
Told in third person perspective, the book has an elegantly straightforward voice with a serious tone that still allows for laughs and smiles. It draws us into an attachment for the flawed Obiefuna as his understanding of love is consistently challenged. If you’re anything like me, it’ll also pull out some tears.
It's probably my favorite one so far out of the books I read in 2024, so please check out this book. It's a very beautiful example of how sometimes, the very places that challenge us the most can be the very same places that show us the truest possibilities of what love can be.
Thursday, August 1, 2024
Time Before Time by Declan Shalvey and Rory McConville
Tatsuo works for the time traveling smuggling business known as The Syndicate. He and Nadia, an FBI agent, are now on the run from the The Syndicate after stealing one of their time machines. Thus begins the graphic novel series Time Before Time (you can read the first issue here).
At first glance it looks like just another time travel book, but a couple of things set it apart:
In the usual time-travel thriller you will see one company or group in charge of all time travel but here they incorporate many different moving parts that make it feel real. In addition to the smuggling Syndicate there is the robot-fearing Arcola Institute and the hypocritical company the Union.
In most time travel, even with all the tech, they still annoyingly stay in the general same time period. In Time Before Time, they actually use this ability for more than just escaping from people or chasing them, and, even better, they aren't safe even when they do escape one spot because other people have time travel, too, and the writers emphasize that.
The art is stylized, yet still gritty. Character drawings are lanky and action-oriented. They are wildly different from almost every other comic or graphic novel out there.
This, with all the other reasons (which I will not get into detail about due to them being spoilers), make Time Before Time a must-read for all sci-fi fans out there.
Tuesday, July 16, 2024
Nightblood by T. Chris Martindale
If you're in the mood for an action-packed vampire story that is darkly funny, wildly violent, at points crude, and non-stop fun, have I got a recommendation for you!
Chris Stiles is (cue gravelly voiceover) "a Vietnam veteran they couldn't kill" whose dead brother's ghost leads him to a small Indiana town to hunt down some unknown evil.
Bart and Del are stepbrothers dared to spend the night at the old Danner house, abandoned for almost a century after rumors of a gruesome double homicide.
They don't find any ghosts, though. They find a walled up vampire! And he's thirsty! And EVIL.
The book pretty much explodes from there, Stiles unloading bullets from his impressive arsenal and the boys wielding nunchaku and Molotov cocktails while they gather a militia of townsfolk. Martindale writes with gusto and glee and his descriptions are cinematic. See here this vision:
"There was a demon in the road. It stood backlit by hellspawned flame, its wings folding and unfolding restlessly, its impossibly long arms drooped at its sides and reaching all the way to the ankles." The light shifts, and it is revealed to be Chris with billowing overcoat tails and two shotguns. Look out vampires!
Speaking of which, this is not the book to read if you want sensitive, moody vampires struggling with the ethical dilemma of blood-sucking. These are monsters of insatiable hunger and that's it. Once your friend, girlfriend, or neighbor is turned, the only thing they need is to be staked, beheaded, shot up with silver, or burned. Or all of the above. Often, all of the above.
I wasn't sure how I'd like Nightblood, to be honest. It's very macho. But it's also a complete blast and well-written and I loved it. I'm thrilled that indie publisher Valancourt Books is re-publishing horror gems from the 70s-90s with their Paperbacks from Hell line and I'm excited to add a few to the library's collection.
-Michael G.
Monday, July 8, 2024
Change by Edouard Louis
"What I'm writing shouldn't be seen as a story of the birth of a writer but as the birth of freedom, of being uprooted at all costs from a hated past." - Edouard Louis
Wednesday, July 3, 2024
The Husbands by Holly Gramazio
After coming home to her London flat from her best friend's bachelorette party, still a little drunk, she discovers that she has a husband. Except he definitely wasn't there when she left for the evening, and she definitely doesn't remember marrying him, despite what the wedding photos on her mantel and saved in her phone might suggest. Then, just as suddenly, this husband goes up into the attic to change a lightbulb, and a new husband appears on his way back down.
And so begins one of the strangest years of Lauren's life.
Equipped with a seemingly magic attic and a never ending supply of husbands, Lauren cycles through different versions of herself, based on the husband that emerges from her attic. Sometimes they barely have time to settle in before she sends them back up to try another. Sometimes she sticks with them for a little, trying them on to see if they fit (if you're getting dating app vibes from this, you're not wrong). Each new husband resets her life - oftentimes, it's cosmetic, like different paint colors and decorations in her flat, but sometimes it results in more seismic changes, like her sister suddenly single with no children, or a different job that she has no idea how to do. While her life resets with each new husband, time continues to move forward and Lauren begins to wrestle with some hard questions. Chief among them is this - how do you know you're making the right decision when the possibility of something better is just a short trip into the attic away?
I thoroughly enjoyed this book! The author, Holly Gramazio, is a game designer, and I think her skills in writing games lent themselves well in how this story plays out (pun absolutely intended). Like a game, we're dropped into the action right away, as we meet Lauren just minutes before she meets her first husband. As the story continues, more information is teased out. Sometimes it's small things, like Lauren figuring out that switching husbands wipes out any bad decision-making (which she absolutely takes advantage of), and sometimes it's big things, like when she figures out that her attic isn't just creating husbands. One of things that struck me about this story has to do with the fact that Lauren always gains a husband, and never just a long-term relationship, or fiancé (though once, the husband is someone she is about to divorce). There's something interesting about the idea of skipping out on all of those early relationship struggles, but now having to suddenly deal with the struggles of being married, and Lauren realizes that too, to a certain extent. In true magical realism form, not everything is explained - the magic attic just is, and there isn't an explanation as to why this is happening to Lauren. That didn't bother me, but I know that could be a turnoff for others. Lauren also has to sometimes go to extremes to get the husband back into the attic, and some of the decisions she makes in those moments will either be funny or shocking, depending on how you feel. I did find Lauren to be relatable and sympathetic, but we also don't get a full sense of who she is outside of this particular moment in time. Ultimately, I thought this was a fun read, and it has stuck with me since I finished it a few weeks ago, so I highly recommend it!
- Amy R.
P.S. Holly Gramazio designed her very own husbands generator and published it online, in case anyone wants their own taste of the magic attic: https://www.hollygramazio.com/husbandsgenerator/row.html#96113. I think I'll stick with this one for awhile:
Tuesday, June 25, 2024
Icarus by Kayla Ancrum
- Kayla Ancrum
Tuesday, June 18, 2024
The Love Hypothesis by Ali Hazelwood
Olive Smith is a Ph.D. candidate in biology, studying at Stanford. After a few tepid dates with fellow grad student Jeremy (and after seeing how well he hit it off with her best friend, Anh), Olive breaks things off, and lies to Anh about dating someone new, just so Anh will take a chance with Jeremy. So when Olive spots Anh at the lab late one night when she is supposedly on a date, Olive does the only logical thing - she kisses the first guy she sees. Except she realizes that she kissed Dr. Adam Carlsen, who is not only a professor, but also a well-regarded scientist and researcher, and the reason why half of her fellow grad students either have nightmares or drop out before graduation. When Olive apologizes and explains the whole lying-about-dating thing to Dr. Carlsen, he shocks her by suggesting that they keep the ruse going. As time progresses, Olive begins to realize that Adam isn't as horrendous as he seems. Even worse, she catches feelings, feelings that threaten to explode the more they get to know each other...
This one hits some of my favorite romance novel tropes, like fake dating and forced proximity, with a secret softie of a male main character who would do literally anything if it meant Olive would be happy, though she obviously doesn't realize it right away. Even though I pretty much knew how the story would end, I was more than happy to go along for the ride. I wouldn't have minded a little more spice, but the amount we got was fitting to the story. It does have a third-act breakup, which is becoming one of my least favorite romance novel tropes, but I can forgive it since I loved everything else. There is a good reason why Ali Hazelwood's books have become instant bestsellers, and I look forward to reading more by her!
Thursday, June 13, 2024
Hemingway's Widow: The Life and Legacy of Mary Welsh Hemingway
Confession: this may be considered sacrilege in literary circles, but I've always liked books about Ernest Hemingway and his orbit more than books by him. Yet I suspect I'm not the only one. His life was so huge and colorful compared to that of most of us. At times his personal adventures seem larger than his literary creations. Fun fact: three of Hemingway's four wives were from St Louis (Hadley Richardson, war correspondent and novelist Martha Gellhorn, and Vogue fashion writer Pauline Pfeiffer.) His fourth and last wife was the exception; she was from Minnesota. Mary Welsh Hemingway - also a war correspondent - was as complex as he was - talented and highly accomplished, courageous, likeable and unlikeable, magnanimous and petty, enjoying the world's favorable spotlight throughout her life, and ruined in the end by alcohol. This book is an incredible accomplishment by a retired Canadian civil attorney and law school Dean who spent many years tracking down and reading thousands of letters and documents and interviewing as many friends, family members and publishing world associates of Mary and Ernest Hemingway as he could locate. His voluminous findings have been integrated into a sensitively rendered interpretation of the last years of Hemingway's storied life and what it cost his wife Mary to spend these years with him as his mental health deteriorated. It wasn't only the writer that charmed the world who ultimately lost his mind. Though not the specific focus of this book, intergenerational, multigenerational mental and emotional health issues in this family are tragically evident in its pages. Depression, substance abuse, and suicide - all are expressed in various ways and patterns up and down at least four Hemingway generations and likely more. Gender bending was another multigenerational issue in the author's family. Hemingway was curious but also ambivalent about gender fluidity and sexual identity. In childhood his mother frequently dressed him in girls' clothing - perhaps planting a seed that bedeviled him into adulthood. He experimented with themes of gender switching in his writing as well as in his marital relations. Yet once his sons were grown, he angrily rejected the transsexual identity of one of them. Maybe that was a latent manifestation of how he felt about the clothes he wore as a little boy. Even if in close up you don't entirely like these people - Ernest and Mary - and you are especially repelled by their thoughtless destruction of animals and magnificent sea life, your heart is broken by the time you finish the book. Broken simply by the overall sadness of it. The Hemingways lived large, yet despite the richness of opportunity and life experience and the worldly glamour and respect they enjoyed, so many members of this family - including Hemingway's widow - came to sad and lonely ends. Reviewed by Marianne W |