belligerent opinions on books

"The Truth About Delilah Blue" - Tish Cohen

2012-02-06T02:58:00.000-08:00

Summary:

Struggling art student is reunited with her long lost mother, deals with her dad’s dementia,

and becomes a nude model.

Thoughts:

This one wasn’t too bad. Easy enough to read, adequate flow to the story, etc. It was okay.

The writing was a bit girlier than I like. Whimsical mixed with girl-power. Definitely a chick book. A few of the metaphors were show-stopping (meaning I had to stop, re-read and think “wtf?” because they were stupid). Example: “the kitchen was small as a cookie.”
Seriously, wtf?

The big reveal wasn’t all that big, and it wasn’t plausible that the protagonist hadn’t thought of it before. Think about it: Your parents are divorcing and fighting over you.
Then Dad takes you on a spur of the moment “trip” that turns into a move to a different country. Then he cuts your hair, changes your name, and tells you that Mom doesn’t want you anymore. Any alarm bells? Red flags, maybe?

There were a few other reveals, but they were hinted at so much that by the time you actually read them you don’t really react.

The characters often did things that didn’t fit with their personalities. So I’d be surprised by something that happened, but not in an “oh wow” kind of way, but more of a “what the hell, did I miss a page?” way (e.g.: “since when does she feel suffocated by human contact??”)

The ending with the father character was good. The ending with the rest of them was a bit depressing. Nothing gets resolved, really. The protagonist is pretty much where she was at the beginning of the book, with the addition of a bit more baggage and responsibility.

I don’t feel like I wasted my time reading this, but I think I could have fixed it up and made it better. Maybe I should become an editor.

"Singing With The Top Down" - Debrah Williamson

2012-02-01T21:36:00.000-08:00

Summary:

2 kids go on a road trip with aunt after their parents die. They bond while having adventures.

Thoughts:

Meh. It was okay.

The inner turmoil of the teenage protagonist dealing with bitterness and guilt about her family kind of felt like a hamster going around in his little wheel. It was a bit different in that her parents were dead, but really she was like any other teen girl, and there’s only so much of that that I want to listen to.

The protagonist is like a light switch in that she’s either FOR something or AGAINST it, but it’s also easy enough to cause her to flip from one extreme to the other. I guess because she’s young and passionate, and impulsive…? But I don’t remember being that way when I was young. If I hated something or someone, it would take more than one or two instances to change my mind, and then it was a gradual thing. The character is also constantly getting angry/sad about things that should make her happy. Like the clichéd unpredictable woman. Ugh. Way to keep that stereotype going.

I got kind of mixed up about the protagonist’s parents because she paints them in this really negative, uncaring light, and then turns around and says that they loved her so much and would have done anything for her. What? Didn’t you just finish saying that you practically had to raise your brother yourself because your mom wanted nothing to do with you, but now you think she’s the best and most caring parent ever? There are other examples of this in the book, but I’m too tired to look for them.

Weird random shit happens to the characters, which I guess is logical for a book about a road trip. But other than one negative outcome, their crazy, spur-of-the-moment schemes pay off in positive ways, no matter how convoluted they start off.

Lastly, it’s frustrating to read a book in which a woman narrowly escapes sexual assault and then refuses to report the attack. I fucking HATE that shit. Chrissakes…

Everything ends up perfectly peachy at the end of the book. ALL problems have been solved, EVERYONE is happy. Just like real life, right?

You could easily skip this book and not feel like you were missing anything.

"Drowning Ruth" - Christina Schwarz

2012-02-01T12:15:00.000-08:00

Summary:

Woman drowns mysteriously in lake. Family tries to get over it while thinking back about it.

Thoughts:

I read this because it was recommended by my mother. NOT because it was on the Oprah book club list. In fact, I didn’t want to read it because Oprah liked it. It seems that any book Oprah likes turns out to have child abuse, murder, horrible family secrets, or some combination of the three. Apparently she likes to be horrified and brought to tears every time she reads a book.

So I went into this book with a bit of a chip on my shoulder. (“Peh! Oprah likes it. So it’s going to be depressing! Fun!”) I found the plot to be thin/skeletal. The chick drowns, details are murky, and the only witnesses are a 3-year-old child and a woman who ends up in a nuthouse. You’re given three or four little pieces of evidence and then slowly, very slowly, the author explains one… and then 50 pages later she explains another… then another, etc. until she explains the last clue on the second-to-last page. But I didn’t really find it suspenseful, just annoying. (Just bloody well tell me what happened, stop changing the fucking subject!) There were also too many coincidences in this book, but without them the story would have fallen apart.

The writing is fine. Poetic in that way that some women write. The author has a knack for creepily describing everyday events or conversation to give them a sinister tone. It was also interesting to see how someone can take misinformation and twist it around until they come up with ‘evidence’ to support a made-up history.

The beginning of the book introduces too many characters too quickly (or maybe I was just tired). In less than a page we are told about Ruth, Mathilda (sometimes called Mattie), Amanda (last name Starkey, sometimes called Aunt Amanda), and Dr. Nichols. Since the back of the book mentioned the drowning death of a woman named Mathilda, but the book is called “Drowning Ruth” this didn’t really help with my confusion. (oh, pardon me, I guess I was supposed to feel ‘intrigued’).

The back and forth with the time was also confusing to me. Example: At the start of the chapter the character is 14 and arguing with her aunt. In the next paragraph she’s 3 years old and remembering something vague about her mother’s death. And then she’s 14 again, but it’s a few months after the argument and she’s at a party. It would have been easier if there’d been some kind of time stamp on each paragraph. Some of them are titled with a name so that you know Amanda or whoever is speaking. But you still don’t know WHEN she’s speaking, so you have to read the first few lines oblivious to what she’s talking about until you figure out if you are at a point before the drowning, after the drowning, during the drowning, or years later. After you’ve determined this, you have to go back and skim over the start of the paragraph to put it into context.

The plot itself was alright. I don’t think it needed to be padded up into a 300+ page book. The story could easily have been told in 100 pages – a chilling little novella – but wouldn’t have made much cash for Schwarz.

"Orange Car With Stripes" - Tom Lichtenberg

2012-01-27T09:50:00.000-08:00

Summary:

Guy attempts to discover a personal secret about a complete stranger.

Thoughts:

I downloaded this onto my Kindle for 3 crappy reasons: 1.) it was free. 2.) it had the word “orange” in the title (my favourite colour). 3.) it was described as an “atheist classic” (my husband is an atheist). I started reading the book with the idea that it was supposed to have some revolutionary ideas that would blow my mind, etc. And maybe that was unfair of me because, well, it didn’t.

The protagonist is arrogant and otherwise unlikeable. He loathes spending time with his wife and kids, and thinks most people are idiots. He’s an atheist, and thinks anyone who isn’t should be argued with. His gay priest friend (his sexual orientation is mentioned ONCE and then never again, so why mention it at all?) likes to come over and discuss various topics, and one night he dares the guy to find out the secret of a stranger. Sadly enough, I couldn’t remember why he was supposed to do this, and just had to flip back to that part: they were arguing about whether people are the same at their core, if we all have the same secrets, etc.

So then the guy randomly picks someone because he always sees his car on the way to work. And then he gets kind of obsessed about finding the guy and talking to him (because, of course, this guy is randomly going to tell some stranger the most hidden and personal stuff about himself). The rest of the book is the guy going to work, coming home, and having these long discussions about fate, dreams, coincidence, and other topics he thinks are horseshit.

I say ‘discussions’, but they’re more just him telling the other person why s/he’s wrong.

The book finally gets interesting about 82% of the way through (I love my Kindle). And by “interesting” I mean that random shit just starts happening that doesn’t get explained,

and then other shit happens, and then more weird shit, and then the book’s over. At the time,

I thought there was something wrong with my e-book, but nope. Random stuff happens and then the book is over. The end.

At least this book was short. Apparently I was talented enough to miss the entire point of it.

Don’t read it.

"Blue World" - Robert McCammon

2012-01-26T10:44:00.000-08:00

Summary:

First half: Short stories: Various weird/fucked up/macabre stuff.

A few of the plots:

-Kid rules a small town because he can control swarms of wasps.

-Vietnam vet’s nightmares come to life and kill people, so he has to stay awake.

-A guy talking to himself while purposely inserting a sewing needle into his eye.

-Retired TV superhero tracks down a murderer.

Second half: Novella: Love story between a priest and a porn star.

Thoughts:

I found this one on my husband’s shelf and picked it up because the cover looked so cheesy:

A gargoyle with wings and red glowing eyes, snarling and clawing at you from a foggy cemetery... Rawr… Lame.

Then I read the introduction, and – seriously – I almost put the book back. Total cheese.

The phrase “fabric of wonder” has now become a standard joke in my household. We usually say it while wiggling our fingers and cocking our heads to one side.

Well, I guess it’s really just me who does that.

I am actually glad that I read this book. The ideas in the stories were all pretty unique, and the writing isn’t really that bad. There are a few eye-rolling phrases, but most of these stories were written in the 80’s, so you have to cut the guy some slack. Some of the stories are quite fucked up, with disturbing imagery and events, but they all have a human element to them as well. Other stories aren’t really horrific or macabre, but just kind of odd.

The author has an annoying habit of spelling it out for you, after you’ve already figured out what’s going on. I find stories that are more ambiguous (and make you realize the horrible truth on your own) are always better. Having said that, he has a playfulness to his writing that is entertaining. For example, in one story the protagonist is an ex-cliffhanger TV actor, so each chapter is short and ends with a campy cliffhanger (…and he goes through the door and a guy starts shooting at him!!! Could this be the end of our hero?!? Tune in next week!).

In another story, every street mentioned is the last name of a friend the author lists in the introduction.

I was surprised that I enjoyed “Blue World”, the novella that takes up half the book.

The plot just sounds so stupid: a priest falls for a porn star. Really? Can you get any lamer? But it was actually pretty good. The main characters are written as multi-sided individuals, and although the story is written in the third person, it drifts into different characters’ heads

so we can better understand everyone’s inner turmoil. It kind of reads a bit like a movie, or maybe it would just make a good movie, I can’t tell.

Bottom line: this book isn’t “THE BEST EVER”, but it’s worth reading. It won’t take you long and if you’re a writer it’ll probably give you some ideas.

"Jurassic Park" - Michael Crichton

2012-01-18T23:29:00.000-08:00

Summary:

Scientists clone dinosaurs and create a zoo for children. Things, obviously, go horribly wrong.

Thoughts:

This book just could not keep my interest. I never got more than a few pages in before I got distracted by something more interesting (e.g.: “oh, I forgot to empty the dishwasher.”

Or “oh, my toenails are getting a bit long.”) Seriously, right in the middle of the T-Rex attacking the car, I put the book down and wandered off. I also fell asleep a handful of times in the middle of the day while trying to read it.

I had trouble sorting out the characters. I think it was partly to do with all the

two-syllable ‘white guy’ names (i.e.: Muldoon, Malcolm, Harding, Hammond, Arnold). A few of the characters seemed unnecessary, and could easily have been combined into one character.

There was very much a “movie script” feel to the writing. All the main characters that we like survived, despite however many extremely close-calls they had. Any character that was a dick died slowly and gruesomely, and any characters that we were pretty much indifferent to died quickly. Crichton also used this annoying technique of dropping down to the next line to

Tell you something.

And then he’d tell you something else.

and it really got on my nerves after a while.

The references to “famous” people were lost on me because I hadn’t heard of any of them. Yes, I’m fairly ignorant, it’s true. But there are plenty of stupider people in the world. And when you say “This man is the Jimmy Spooperbooper of cloning!!” it really takes away from it when your reader is sitting there thinking “Jimmy who?”

The diagrams of the screen menus and computer code were a waste of space.

Just bloody well write about what happens, and tell me that the computer system was daunting/confusing. Don’t show me a bunch of little boxes and make me guess which one is the right one for fixing the computer.

I was surprised at the lack of vocabulary. In a book that was so full of chaos theory and other scientific information, I was expecting an impressive use of obscure and interesting words, and was very disappointed. The word “foliage” must have appeared on nearly every page. The dinosaurs were hiding in it. The people were looking at it. The view was blocked by it.

It swayed. It was pretty.

Another example that comes to mind is the use of “crazily” THREE TIMES IN THE SAME PARAGRAPH, ferfuckssake. The world tilted crazily. Then the car tilted crazily. Then everything swung crazily. Then I put the book down to gouge my eyes out.

Crazily, of course.

Now let’s briefly touch on the pompous, long-winded, condescending speeches constantly being made by the character named Malcolm. He was a bit like listening to an arrogant prick read a textbook to a slow-witted toddler. (However, you get the distinct impression that it’s Crichton dumbing everything down for you, the retarded reader.) Most of these speeches have little to no bearing on what is happening in the story. It’s as if he’s working on a paper on various mathematical theories and every once in a while he slips a page into the dinosaur novel he’s also writing. These long rants also don’t sound like dialogue, but rather like someone reading from a prepared text. One example is the chapter at the end entitled “Destroying the World.” This thankfully short chapter is completely useless and should have been left out. NOTHING happens. Basically, they move Malcolm to a new bed, and then he starts droning on about life on earth, evolution, etc. Droning in perfect, coherent, long and technical sentences, despite being horribly injured, doped up on meds, and hours away from slipping into a coma from which he never recovers.

Lastly, I was surprised by the amount of shit writing in the book. Crichton is a best-selling author, and he’s also very smart, so his writing should be good, right? Umm, sadly, no.

Example of awkward shit writing:

Gennaro flipped up his watch. “I knew this thing would come in handy one day.” Beneath the watch face was a compass.

Grant said, “You have much use for that in court?”

“No.” Gennaro shook his head. “My wife gave it to me,” he explained, “for my birthday.”

Firstly, we are told in this passage 4 times that he doesn’t use the compass. 1.) When he says he knew it would come in handy some day (as in, he never uses it). 2.) From Grant’s comment we can glean that it’s (obviously) not very likely that a lawyer would need a compass.

3.) Gennaro answers “No.” to a question that was clearly sarcastic. 4.) He shakes his head while answering the question.

Secondly, Gennaro’s entire response from Grant’s question is all useless filler.

Proof: 1.) We know it’s an explanation, so there’s no need to say “he explained”. 2.) We know it’s Gennaro talking, since they were having a back-and-forth conversation and Gennaro had just been asked a direct question, so having Gennaro’s name in there at all is a waste of space. 3.) Seeing as the watch has a feature that he doesn’t use, it was probably something he didn’t pick out himself, hence a present. 4.) It doesn’t matter that it was a birthday present or a Christmas present or whatever the fuck, so that line is just filler. 5.) Since a watch is a rather personal item, it’s probably from a close friend or family member, such as his wife, but regardless of that, who the fuck cares who gave him the fucking watch?

I read the book because it was famous and because my husband owned it, so it was already in the house. It wasn’t worth my time, since I’d already seen the movie, and it wasn’t a far cry from a movie script to begin with. You probably loved this book and think I’m an ignorant idiot who has missed the entire point. Fuck you, I just didn’t like it.

"The Water Babies" - Charles Kingsley

2012-01-04T21:48:00.000-08:00

Summary:

Young, ill-used chimneysweep becomes a water baby. Has trials/adventures in order to become a better person. Moral story for children.

Thoughts:

Yes, it’s a kids’ book. I’ve gone over this before – just because it’s a children’s book doesn’t mean that it’s not worth reading. I should have read it as a kid, and I’m just a bit late. Fuck off.

This was the first book I read on my Kindle, so some of the “magic” of reading a whimsical old fairy tale, resplendent with drawings of fantastic places and people was lost on me (the Kindle version had no pictures, despite having a picture index. Figure that one out). Well whatever,

I was free to use my imagination.

The book is definitely for little boys. In fact, the author addresses the reader as “little man” or “dear boy”, throughout the story, but it’s kind of endearing. And although it was described as a religious fiction, I really didn’t find the guy all that preachy. It was all about doing right by other people, and bad people getting their comeuppance, etc.

The author has a playful quality to his writing that comes across well. He also does a good job describing fantastical places and creatures. Some of his ideas were actually new to me (before you jump down my throat, notice I said they were “new to me”). I was surprised at the amount of death in the story, and how it doesn’t really ever get you down. He lets several children and even a dog die, and he just presents it in such a way that you’re okay with it.

It’s weird.

I’m going to have my son read this. You should read it to your kids, too. It’s relatively short, and you can get it for free off any number of websites, so there’s really no excuse.

"Crime and Punishment" - Fyodor Dostoyevsky

2011-12-29T00:50:00.000-08:00

Summary:

Russian guy kills/robs old woman because he’s poor and conflicted. Becomes increasingly more mentally unstable as the story goes on.

Thoughts:

I am doomed. I can’t possibly write anything about this novel that would explain how good it is. Leave this blog now. There are literally thousands of proper reviews of this book that will do a much better job that I will, and will explain all the characters and their motivations, as well as the major themes of the story. I, on the other hand, suck.

Dostoyevsky is a treasure. He’s fricking amazing. I can’t really explain why his writing is so good, and I’m reading an English translation, so I’m sure he is even more mind-blowing in Russian. I was just reading his Wiki entry – he was condemned to death for being part of some underground political group when he was in his 20’s, but got his sentence commuted at the last second. What a waste his death would have been.

In this book, the protagonist is all over the map with his actions and emotions. He kills someone without remorse. He gives someone else all his money out of compassion for their poverty and loss. He’s in love with but also kind of despises a different person. Sometimes he’s so upset he starts to cry, and then seconds later he’s laughing, and then he’s moody and reserved. And sometimes he can't leave his apartment for days. But he’s not crazy. At least I don’t think he is. He aggravates you, but you start to feel a kind of affection for him.

The reason behind his crime is really quite intriguing. I haven’t done any reading one the subject, so it was all new and fascinating to me. And even though you obviously can’t condone what he’s done, he makes a few interesting points.

The one problem I had with the book was the names of the characters. Throughout the story, everyone addressed everyone else by their full name. And then there were shortened versions of some of the names, and other names, or sometimes there were three names. For example, Arkady Ivanovich Svidrigailov might be addressed by a character by his full name, or by Svidrigailov, or by Arkady Ivanovich, or by Arkady. There are also a lot of similar-sounding names (e.g.: Zametov and Zosimov) and people with the same name (e.g.: three people in the story have names that include ‘Petrovich’, and none of them are related). After the first few chapters I pretty much had everyone figured out, but I will admit to occasionally Googling characters to remind myself of who they were.

I think I missed out on a lot of the story because I am not well read, and because it was a translation. The book is engaging, incredibly well-written, and it makes you think. But it’s long, so you jackasses probably aren’t going to read it, are you?

"Kiss Kiss" - Roald Dahl

2011-12-28T03:14:00.000-08:00

Summary:

Eleven weird short stories set in the 1950’s. Topics: deception, insanity, reincarnation, taxidermy, cannibalism, experimental medicine…

Thoughts:

I read part of this book as a child. I had (and still have) almost all of Dahl’s children’s books and was too young to realize that although it was the same author, this book was not appropriate for a kid. My mother must have taken it away before I finished it. However, I vividly remembered 4 of these stories, and they stuck with me for decades until I stumbled onto the book again.

I have to admit that I am biased toward Roald Dahl. He is fucking brilliant. Everything he touches turns into shiny gold sparkly awesomeness. He was one of my first influences for writing, poetry, and humour.

Dahl has this awesome subtlety to his adult writing. Despite the fact that these stories have abattoirs, sci-fi medical operations and other grizzly stuff, they don’t smack you in the face like a Stephen King novel. This is more of a gentleman’s book of the macabre. I also noted a definite vein of misandry running throughout many of the stories. Kind of weird for a book written by a man, but kind of cool, too (Misandry, hatred of men, is - of course - not ‘cool’.

I meant it was cool that a guy in the 50’s would write about women sticking it to their overbearing husbands). Excellent imagery, too. You can actually see events as they happen. And he does it all so effortlessly in these short little stories. The guy’s a genius.

I’m not sure which story I liked the best. They are all pretty different, all strange or disconcerting in their own way. I used to tell the stories of Parson’s Pleasure and Mrs. Bixby and the Colonel’s Coat to people sometimes. (i.e.: “I read this story one time…”) There was also a story about Hitler that I didn’t understand the point of until I thought it over for a while.

Read this book. You’ll be surprised how the stories stay with you.

The imagery, the smart yet subtle wit, the quiet but horrid conclusions…

Angela's Ashes - Frank McCourt

2011-12-19T19:02:00.003-08:00

Summary:

Memoir of impoverished Irish Catholic kid in the 1930’s.

Thoughts:

Bought this from the local library’s discard section (wtf? there was nothing wrong with the book). I’d always meant to read it, but whenever Oprah makes a big deal about a book, I tend to make a point of NOT reading it, so I’d dragged my feet on this one.

Also, for some reason I’d gotten the impression that it was about Nazi concentration camps, which is, of course, off-putting. It’s not about that at all, though. I don’t know where I got that from.

The first thing I did when I finished this book, was probably what everyone else does when they finish this book. I typed “why is angela’s” and then Google auto-completed it for me: “…ashes called angela’s ashes”. Okay, so that figures. Next I Wiki’d Frank McCourt, and I was disappointed to read that he died two years ago. He came across as such a nice, honest guy.

This book was good. Obviously. It won a Pulitzer, and they made it into a movie.

This guy’s writing is heartfelt and honest. He can describe things in such a way as to make you smile, or make you feel a bit weepy. I think he did a good job of not puffing himself up that much. (I hate reading memoirs where you can practically hear the author patting himself on the back. Fuck off already!). His upbringing was also completely foreign to me, what with the supreme poverty and excessive Catholicism, but he explained everything very well and I never felt lost.

While reading this book, I was constantly telling my children how lucky they were to have food and shelter, clean clothes and a father who came home every night. It really amazes me that the author survived past infancy living in such harsh conditions. And although he had a shit life and a father who drank, he was still able to appreciate the beauty in nature, to be grateful for whatever little there was to eat, and to see the good sides of his father. Lastly, all of the main characters in the book were fully-realized, complicated, and three-dimensional. They were so well-written! It’s just not that common in novels anymore.

I am planning on reading the sequel, “’Tis”, and watching the movie as well.

Read this? Yes.

"How to Get Things Done (Without Trying Too Hard)" - Richard Templar

2011-12-01T10:36:00.001-08:00

Summary:

Self-help book about how to organize your life.

Thoughts:

This book probably would have done me a lot of good. If I had read it.

I’ve had this book on my kitchen counter for two years. It still has the bookmark in it from when I put it down the day that I bought it, after reading the introduction and the first page of chapter one.

Perhaps if I’d made it to such inspiring chapters as “Get into Good Habits”, “Have a Place For It”, “Be Decisive About Mess”, or “Learn to Tidy” I would have cleaned my kitchen counter and not lost this book for months at a time. Oh the irony.

If you have read this book and succeeded in accomplishing your goals and streamlining your life, you probably didn’t need to read it in the first place. But good for you.

"You Don't Love Me Yet" - Jonathan Lethem

2011-11-25T23:43:00.001-08:00

Summary

Member of a struggling band uses a stranger’s musings for song lyrics.

Thoughts

Yeah, I dunno about this one.

It starts off all right. Weird, off-beat, different. I felt interesting and chic for reading it. The writing is okay; Not profound, but not annoying or boring. However, not that much really happens in the story, and the ending is kind of meh. It just sort of peters out.

The characters are all weird broody artist types who drift around for no apparent reason and are never happy. A few odd, unrelated things happen, and there are a few odd little anecdotes, but it’s not really a cohesive story.

There are some parts that have the potential for entertainment or conflict, but they all come to nothing. For example, one character steals a kangaroo from the zoo where he works because he thinks it’s being mistreated. He keeps it in the bathtub of his apartment. No police come to the door, no articles in the newspaper report it. It’s barely mentioned again until he decides to bring it back a few weeks later, upon which time he doesn’t get caught, doesn’t get arrested, doesn’t even lose his job although everyone knows it was him. And the kangaroo doesn’t end up any happier.

So what the fuck was the point? What am I missing here?

Maybe I’m not deep enough to have ‘got’ this book.

I don’t even get the title, it never gets explained or even mentioned as far as I could tell. Whatever, I probably completely missed the point on this one.

"Rendezvous with Rama" - Arthur C. Clarke

2011-11-22T17:04:00.001-08:00

Summary:

Futuristic spacemen investigate alien ship that enters the solar system.

Thoughts:

This one took me months to finish. I just kept putting it down. I’d read a page, or half a page, then get distracted, put it down, and not go back to it. I usually read 4 or 5 books at a time, and this one just kept losing out to others that were better at holding my interest.

I read it because my husband likes Arthur C. Clarke and recommended it as a “science fiction classic”. And I am a stickler for finishing books, even if I don’t like them.

If I was normal, I probably would have put it down and left it at that.

The book isn’t terrible. It’s got some action… kind of. And it’s interesting… in theory… Fuck, I don’t know, I didn’t like it. It was boring. The author kept describing the inside of the alien ship and I had no idea what he was talking about. I am awful with distance, time, geography and 3-D descriptions of things. So when he describes how big the ship is, it rolls right off me. When he gives detailed layouts of the inside of the ship, where the ladders or mountains are, the shape of the horizon, how far they have to travel, how many gees of gravity they are feeling…. yeah, it has no effect on me at all. I couldn’t visualize much of what was described. Maybe I can blame it on my lack of a penis.

The ending was okay. Kind of anti-climactic but cute. But all I really felt at the end of the book was relief that I was finished and could read something else.

"Couch" - Benjamin Parzybok

2011-11-19T15:17:00.001-08:00

Summary:

Three guys pick up a couch. Then they can’t put it down.

Thoughts:

Got this one out of the bargain bin at Chapters. Picked it up due to the title, and the basic premise (you’ve got to admit, the summary is intriguing). Unfortunately it doesn’t fare that well as a 280-page story.

Early on, the 5 possible theories on what the couch could symbolize are laid out in detail in the form of a long email to the protagonist from a friend. So there goes all the guesswork for the reader. The rest of the story is just picking out which of the 5 theories is the correct one.

The characters are depressingly average. Three out-of-work roommates who don’t know each other very well. YAAWWWWWN. The main character (the hero? really??) is fat, insecure, and friendless. And he suffers from a gluten intolerance. So he has a lot of bowel problems. That we get to read about. Frequently.

The story stumbles along as they meet different people while carrying the couch. It gets a bit convoluted when they keep bumping into family members just by chance while in the middle of nowhere. Here and there we have boring bits discussing ancient Inca clans, etc., and there are a few interesting bits that don’t really get any attention (e.g.: The protagonist is an infamous, convicted computer hacker? Cool! Let’s talk about that! ...Really? No? ...Umm okay…) And it never really gets explained why people are trying to steal the couch, and why these guys are ready to die to protect it when they have no idea where they’re going or why. Lastly, I didn’t know enough Spanish to understand some of the dialogue, so I think I missed out on some jokes. I suppose I could’ve kept jumping up and using the Google translator, but that would’ve cut into the flow of the story.

At the end of the story, I got the impression that the author ran out of paper and had to wrap everything up on the last page. I literally did that check-both-sides-of-the-page-to-see-if-there’s-more thing that people do.

I think this book works best as an idea. As a one-sentence summary of a story. I had fun describing the premise when someone would ask what I was reading. In that way it was kind of like “Winkie” by Clifford Chase or “Pride and Prejudice and Zombies” by Seth Grahame-Smith; A conversation-starter, but not actually all that entertaining to read.

"Southern Vampire Mysteries" aka "Sookie Stackhouse Books" aka "True Blood Series" - Charlaine Harris (Part 2/2)

2011-10-15T01:29:00.001-07:00

Part 2:

Seeing as I’ve said these books remind me of Harry Twilight Hunger, I’m now going to use the same 4 criteria to complain about this series as I did in my triple-combo review of those series. Enjoy!

Shitty Plot Device #1: The Ordinary Becomes Extraordinary:

When the book opens, Sookie is a sad little “crazy” barmaid with no education, no friends and she’s never had a boyfriend. And then suddenly she is transformed into a quick-witted, highly perceptive and irresistible sex kitten with the “gift” of telepathy (Gee! She’d just never thought of mind-reading in a positive way before, she’d always thought it was a disability! Gosh!)

And let’s not forget the second part of SPD#1 – the ‘world on her shoulders’/take care of herself aspect. Harry Potter is an orphan with no money. Bella Twilight is the child of divorce and a ditzy mother. Katniss HungerGame’s dad died and her mom went nuts, and they have no money. Not to be outdone, Sookie is an orphan with a ‘disability’ and no money. Aww.

Shitty Plot Device #2: The MEMEME Syndrome:

Everyone is talking about Sookie. Everyone is in love with Sookie. Everyone is trying to kill Sookie. Everyone is fighting over Sookie. Everyone find Sookie fascinating. Everything that happens in the story happens to Sookie, or in the presence of Sookie. The ground-breaking idea no one has ever thought of before always comes from Sookie. The mystery is always solved by Sookie.

This might work for Sherlock Holmes, but it doesn’t work here. It’s a cop out.

We’re going to add to this the bewilderment the protagonist (repeatedly) feels when she (repeatedly) finds herself in the spotlight. She claims that she doesn’t want attention and that it makes her nervous, but she is then constantly doing things that make her stand out. e.g.: blurting out that someone is lying while in the middle of a room of people and then acting embarrassed when everyone stares; wearing a brand new skimpy outfit and then acting shy and surprised when people stare and/or compliment her.

Shitty Plot Device #3: The Clumsy Reveal

Most of the reveals in this book occur because either the protagonist just has this “feeling” that something is wrong (i.e.: “Hmm… I dunno why, but I think that pop can is a BOMB!”) or because Harris invents some vampire/werewolf/fairy reason why someone has to flat out tell her something. (i.e.: “Fairies can’t lie!”) We also have the recurring theme of new characters ending up being the bad guy at the end. The cook and the bartender get replaced repeatedly, often because the previous person was a traitor at the end of the previous book. I kept waiting for the Defense Against the Dark Arts teacher to show up.

Shitty Plot Device #4: The Fantastical Easy-Out

Wow, these are absolutely non-stop in this series. Randomly making shit up, slipping stuff in and acting like it’s common knowledge. It’s impossible to paint your plot into a corner because you can just whip out some fantastical element and be all like “yeah bitch, didn’t I mention that before?”

How do you kill a vampire? Sunlight and silver!

A werewolf? Silver and (fuck, I can’t remember)!!

How ‘bout a fairy?? Lemon and iron!!!!

How do you break a spell on a fairy? Kiss him!!

Oh no, I’m mortally wounded! Don’t worry, vampire blood will heal you lickitysplit!

Who killed this woman? I’ll just cast an ectoplasmic reconstruction spell!

Oh no, we’re done for! Don’t worry, I have a wish-granting thingy in my purse!

Okay so now we can move on to the nails-on-a-blackboard feeling I get from being inside the protagonist’s head. I understand that she is written to be tongue-in-cheek annoying, but I’m not usually demonstrative enough that I’m throwing my hands up and rolling my eyes as I read a book. Harris just takes it a bit too far so that instead of being endearingly neurotic or quirky, the character is fucking aggravating. I believe that a large number of readers would enjoy the prospect of slapping the shit out of Sookie Stackhouse. (not Anna Paquin, but the actual literary character -- Ugh ugh ugh, it is SO WRONG to use the term “literary” to describe any part of the Sookie Bookies! Bah! Unclean! Must wash now!)

Oh wait wait wait!! I have to quote this absolutely retarded line from Book 11. On first hearing it (audio-book, remember) I had to pull over and copy it down because it was so ridiculously retarded! Check it out!:

“He was the golden brown of a chocolate chip cookie. When he removed his sunglasses, I saw that his dark eyes would have been the chips. This was the only sweet thing about him.”

Hooooooooooooly fuck what a terrible piece of writing!! This is why you shouldn’t listen to audio-books while driving. I am lucky there were no brick walls around at the time, because I would’ve been sorely tempted.

More examples of shit writing! Woo!:

- “Something about putting on my underwear makes me feel more capable.” (WTF???)

- “That’ll put frost on your pumpkin.” (Seriously, WTF?)

- “His nipples were the size of pencil erasers.” (This was a redeeming quality for her!)

- “In the romance novels I’d read, that would be called his…”

- Pretty much everything that comes out of Vampire Eric’s mouth (e.g. “Hello, my lover!”)

- “That word was from my Word-A-Day Calendar!!” (It became pretty apparent that someone disgusted with the lack of adjectives in the first 2 books had sent the author a W-A-D Calendar. And she made a point of mentioning it at least twice in every book after that)

- Adverbs adverbs ADVERBS!!!! E.g.: “He grinned fangily” (!!!!!!) “She asked questioningly” (!!!auuuugh!!!!) I’m a fan of adverbs, but you can’t let them take over the storytelling for you! Fuck!!

The author is also very self-deprecating, which can be cute for a while, (e.g.: “Seriously? ANOTHER person is trying to kill me??”) but instead of poking fun at your writing, why not fix the problems?

I do appreciate that Harris tries to tie different things together (something from book 1 is explained in book 6, or a creature introduced in book 2 comes back again in book 5, or whatever) which is something that the Harry Potter series failed miserably at. So good for you on that. There are a few times when we’re introduced to random crap that is never mentioned again (e.g.: the Maenad; sino AIDS) but that’s still preferable to her usual tactic of rehashing everything over and over. And although she’s too wussy to kill off anyone major, she at least allows each of the main characters to take turns getting very badly hurt.

One potential benefit of this series has been that since reading it I have asked two separate people who’ve stopped by my house if they’d like a coffee, something that would never have occurred to me before. Both people said no. But still.

Yeah so these books are shit. They won’t make you smarter, they won’t make you think. But they’re mindless and fun and they go down easy, like Cheetos, or whipped cream from a spray-can. Make sure your hands are free as you read so you can gesture appropriately whenever Sookie opens her mouth.

"Southern Vampire Mysteries" aka "Sookie Stackhouse Books" aka "True Blood Series" - Charlaine Harris (Part 1/2)

2011-10-15T01:26:00.000-07:00

This is going to be a two-part review because it's really fucking long.

Summaries:

Book 1: Telepathic waitress fucks a vampire, meets a shape-shifter, gets attacked a few times, and solves some murders.

Book 2: Telepathic waitress sabotages an anti-vampire cult, goes to a sex party, gets attacked a few times, and solves a murder.

Book 3: Telepathic waitress meets a werewolf, sabotages an anti-vampire cult, rescues a tortured vampire, gets attacked a few times, and disposes of a body.

Book 4: Telepathic waitress fucks a different vampire, sabotages an anti-vampire cult, rescues her tortured brother, gets attacked a few times, commits murder, and disposes of a body.

Book 5: Telepathic waitress exposes a betrayal, rescues a tortured friend, gets attacked a few times, and solves a murder.

Book 6: Telepathic waitress discovers a betrayal, saves a vampire from political ruin, gets attacked a few times, and solves a murder.

Book 7: Telepathic waitress fucks a were-tiger, rescues some people, gets attacked a few times, and solves a murder.

Book 8: Telepathic waitress observes a political takeover, exposes adultery, rescues some people, and solves some murders.

Book 9: Telepathic waitress marries a vampire, evades crucifixion, gets tortured, and solves a murder.

Book 10: Telepathic waitress deals with vampire-family dichotomies, evades murder attempts, rescues a fairy, solves some murders, and disposes of a body.

Book 11: Telepathic waitress plots murder, gets in a few fights, kills some people, and disposes of a body.

Book 12 hasn’t come out yet, but let’s take a wild guess:

Telepathic waitress fucks a leprechaun, sabotages an anti-vampire cult, rescues a tortured unicorn, gets attacked a few times, kills some people, solves some murders and disposes of a body.

Sounds about right, don’t you think?

Thoughts:

These books remind me a lot of the Harry Potter, Twilight, and Hunger Games series in that they are entertaining and famous, but the writing is complete shit. This review is going to be rather long, but it covers 11 books, so I have a lot of built up aggression to get out.

I would like to start off by saying that I was roped into the Sookie Bookies while on a week-long cross-country road trip where they were the only audio-books we had with us. I have since damned my sister to hell for introducing me to this series.

Okay, let’s get this over with.

The absolute, number one worst part about the Southern Vampire Series is the repetition. For fuckssake, woman, by the time you get to Book 3 you’re not getting any band-wagon jumpers. We’ve all read the whole series, so it is completely insulting and ridiculous that in fucking Book 11 you find it necessary to once again tell us that the protagonist is telepathic, or discuss Bubba’s history, or describe the colour of her brother’s truck, or tell us what the protagonist is wearing to go to work (It’s fucking burned onto my memory now, for fuckssake: A white boat-neck t-shirt with “Merlotte’s Bar” printed on the left breast. Black pants, white socks, and black Reeboks. Fuck!) Part of the problem I had with this book was that I was “reading” it as an audio-book. If I had been actually reading it, I could have skimmed over the boring descriptions of eye colour, height, and shirt size, or the re-re-re-re-rehashing of the “coming out” of the vampires. Maybe you think that you’re helping your readers to remember things in case it’s been a while in between the release of each book. But really, these repeated parts are just painful for everyone, and I think forgetful people could just skim over the previous book again before starting the new one. Seriously, if I have to read about the colour of her boss’ hair one more fucking time… it’s fucking wavy and red-gold! Two-thirds of the way through the books it turns strawberry blonde, but regardless, we KNOW what colour his hair is, so fuck off.

Speaking of, let’s move on to the second most annoying part of this series of books: the attention to the mundane. I have always detested writers who insist on telling you what a character is wearing and what shape eyes they have. Harris takes this idiocy to a whole new extreme, so much so that I found myself talking back to her as I was “reading” this audio-book.

Example: (not real quotes from the books, but they might as well be.)

“Suddenly there was a knock at the door. I put down my coffee and my bagel, stood up, made sure my robe was closed, and padded over to the door in my slippers. “Get on with it.” I took a deep breath, unlocked the deadbolt, and opened the door.” “<muttering>” “The man who at the door had dark blue eyes and neat, sandy brown hair.” “I don’t care.” “He wasn’t a tall man, maybe about 5ft7, but he carried himself well and he had beautiful long eyelashes” “I don’t CARE” “He was wearing a white long-sleeved shirt with a collar and light green Dockers.” “I don’t fucking CARE” “On his feet he had sensible brown business shoes from JC Penny over thin grey socks.” “Oh my god, get on with it already!” “The man carried a clipboard and a pen in his left hand, and was sipping a cup of 7-11 coffee from his right. The cup was a size large, with a pattern of orange swirls down the side.” “Jesus Christ, get on with the story!” “The man’s companion was a small woman with thick chestnut hair…” “Auuugh! Fuck off and get on with it!”

I wonder if she’s trying to create suspense, e.g.: “Oh my goodness, who’s that at the door?? What do they want from her?? The suspense is killing me!!!!” I didn’t find it suspenseful, just annoying, but maybe I’m alone on this one.

She does this with every character in the book. Even if the guy gets killed in the next sentence, he dies only after we’ve found out that he was wearing brown cords, a black wife-beater t-shirt and dirty brown work boots, and that he had full lips and a beautiful chocolate complexion.

This cataloguing of every detail of the protagonist’s life is all encompassing. We find out exactly what she does at work, right down to making more lemonade and filling the salt shakers. We get to help her clean her house top-to-bottom in jaw-aching detail (she found $1.05 in the couch cushions! Woo!). And when it’s time for bed, we know that she’s brushed her teeth and washed her face, and that she’s wearing her favourite nightgown. And guess what, Charlaine? We don’t fucking care.

Continued in Part 2

"Swallowing Grandma" - Kate Long

2011-10-14T22:50:00.000-07:00

Summary:

Fat girl is awkward and lives with her pushy grandma.

Back-story: Fat girl’s mom explains why she ditched her as a baby.

Thoughts:

Not bad. I missed a bit due to the overuse of UK language. I guessed two out of the four reveals before I got to them, but I didn’t really mind. The parts about arguing with her grandma and the creepy friend who keeps coming around with stuff he’s stolen were kind of hit or miss (mostly miss). But the parts about the girl meeting the distant relative, and the back-story written by her mother were quite good. There was a part in the middle that was one of those “oh no! how unfair!” kind of things. It was awkward and good. I saw it coming, but still. The self-deprecation due to her weight got old fast, but I guess a lot of fat people (and thin people, too, for fucks sake) make jokes about how fat they are.

I finished the book in a day or two. I’m not sorry I read it. Just kind of ‘meh’.

"Lost in Place" - Mark Salzman

2011-10-13T12:28:00.000-07:00

Summary:

Memoir of a white kid obsessed with kung fu.

Thoughts:

I wonder what it says about me that after reading this book, I looked up Mark Salzman on Google and Wikipedia to figure out who he is. I.e.: Is he famous? Why do I care about his childhood?

The real question should be why would his being famous make me care more about him?

If he’s had an interesting life, it should be interesting regardless of who he’s married to or how many times he’s been on TV. What the fuck, right?

At the moment I feel like a People-magazine-reading McIdiot. I am full of self-loathing.

The book was good. Well written, funny, insightful, etc. He went over his feelings and inner turmoil a few more times than necessary, and the topics of oneness and peace got a little tired by the end. But then I bore easily.

The different influences on his teenage brain (mild soft-spoken Dad vs. wise but elusive Chinese texts vs. abusive alcoholic kung fu teacher vs. neat and orderly Mom vs. confused but awe-inspiring psychedelic drugs) all impressed various characteristics on him as he grew up. It was also intriguing to see how an interest in something weird or unconventional could lead the guy into a job or friendship that may otherwise not have happened.

I found the opportunities he came across (such as teachers openly willing to allow him to learn outside the regular curricula) a little hard to believe (but then it was the 70’s and educators hadn’t yet lost all hope). It was also frustrating to read about someone whose been given several awesome opportunities and was, in some circumstances, pissing them away. But then it’s easy to sit back as an observer and throw shit at people.

That’s why we all love to do it.

This “review” had more in it about myself than about the book. And I'm a fucking nobody.

Talk about hypocrisy. Read the book, it’ll take you a day.

"The Withdrawal Method" - Pasha Malla

2011-10-08T00:33:00.000-07:00

Summary: Short Story Collection

I don’t really know how to summarize the stories, they were all fairly different and disconnected. Weird, random snapshots of peoples’ lives and relationships.

Yeah, that sounds good.

Thoughts:

It took me a few stories before I got into this book. And even then I wasn’t really sure what the point of the book was or even whether or not I liked the writing. And then of course since the author is Canadian I feel like I have to like him or else I’m being unpatriotic. Fuck.

Buzzwords to describe various parts of the different stories:

Disconcerting. Forlorn. Heavy. Fucked up. Haunting. Awkward. Familiar.

There, done.

At times it seemed like an event drawn out on the page could have been written by me. Something I’d experienced or thought about, or could imagine happening but wouldn’t necessarily have thought about writing down. At other times I found myself wrinkling my nose, thinking “why the fuck did he write that?” or “it must be profound, but I have no idea what that part meant.” It’s also kind of cool that in one story he’s a middle-aged writer,

in another he’s an awkward young boy, in another he’s a pre-teen girl. It shows versatility, and everyone loves that. Shit, that could have been another buzzword: Versatile.

None of the stories ended the way I thought they would. In fact, none of them really seemed to end. Or begin, for that matter. Each story felt like I’d opened up a novel somewhere in the middle, read for a while, and then closed it again without finishing.

This was refreshingly different, but also kind of annoying and unsatisfying, like a stranger in a night club whisking up, enveloping you in a long, gut-aching, leg-numbing kiss, and then dancing away again, leaving you stumbling and confused. Most of the stories also had some version of a sex scene, and each was awkward and off-putting in its own way.

I would not be at all surprised if Malla retools some of these stories in a few years into full novels. He seems to have a shitload of ideas. Maybe the stories will make more sense if they’re longer. But then I suppose the artistic beauty of their brevity would be lost. Whatever, the guy’s gotta eat.

"The Importance of Being Earnest" - Oscar Wilde

2011-07-31T01:33:00.000-07:00

Summary:

Two friends who are less than truthful on a good day get engaged to women under false pretenses.

Thoughts:

So yeah, I guess this kind of play is called “witty”. But I hate that word, so I’m not going to use it. Anyways, it’s a tongue-in-cheek, satire kind of thing. The subject matter was a little grating on my nerves, since I am pathologically honest and abhor lies of any kind. But still, when I got past that it was a nice little book.

The dialogue is flippant, as it’s supposed to be, and I had to re-read a few things when I was reading-to-fall-asleep because I was missing some of the little jokes. Some of the references were lost on me, but I attributed that to the play being written 116 years ago. Having said that, I think it’s stood up remarkably well over time. I still thought it was clever and funny, I still got what was going on, etc. It actually surprised me how the arbitrary and lackadaisical nature of the character’s attitudes was a lot like certain people today.

It’s a cute little book that you’ll finish in less than a day.

"The Old Man and the Sea" - Ernest Hemmingway

2011-07-31T01:07:00.000-07:00

Summary:

Old fisherman from a poor village catches a huge fish far out at sea and then has to make it back home.

Thoughts:

First Hemmingway book I ever read, and it’s a good thing it was. I’ve hated every other one since, so if I hadn’t started with this one I might never have picked it up. Hemmingway is usually – well, no. Hemmingway is ALWAYS depressing, but this book is a bit different. There was a defined beginning, middle and end to the story, and the plot makes an impression on you. It was like the author had a point in mind, instead of just rambling on about some random depressing crap that had happened.

There is a beautiful sadness to this book, as well as a deliberateness to the fisherman’s actions and a quiet dignity around his entire person. It’s very close to poetry.

Although it’s Hemmingway, so I knew it was going to end badly, I was still rooting for the old guy. The ending was fitting, and not clichéd.

This book is good. It might depress you a bit, but it will make you think.

The Scarlet Pimpernel - Baroness Orczy

2011-07-31T00:41:00.000-07:00

Summary:

Cocky Englishman’s daring rescues of French aristocrats doomed to the guillotine during the French Revolution in 1792. Plot focuses on a Frenchman working for the Revolution whose one mission is to catch the hero.

Thoughts:

I read this without knowing what it was about. Without seeing the movie or anything first. And it was very good – right from the first page it was a pleasure to read. Orczy can fucking write.

The one snag I had reading this was that my husband let slip the true identity of the Scarlet Pimpernel when I was maybe a quarter of the way through the book. So the one and only surprise was revealed early. But, despite my bitching and swearing at this, the story was still very good, kept me interested, etc.

The love story was of the Bittersweet Misunderstanding type, and very well done. Not sappy or formulaic, just good. The adventure/chase parts were also well written – I have a tendency to get lost and confused when reading a book where people are travelling from place to place, strategizing their attacks, etc. but I didn’t get mixed up at all in this story.

Based on the subject matter, I really didn’t think I’d even be able to finish this one before I'd started it. It’s a classic, it looked kind of dry, and I don’t care at all about history or politics. But yeah, no, I was completely wrong. This was a great novel. I highly recommend it, but you’re probably going to just watch the stupid movie instead, aren’t you?

"Peter Pan" - James Barrie

2011-07-31T00:27:00.000-07:00

Summary:

Children are taken to an imaginary world with pirates, fairies, etc. by a boy who never grows up.

Thoughts:

Yes fine, it’s a kid’s book. But I hadn’t read it, and I’m all about the classics. Plus I felt stupid that I’d seen the movie but hadn’t read the book. And that my 6-year-old had read it and I hadn’t.

Excellent book, as most classics are. Well-written, insightful and fun. The movie took away a lot of the more serious ideas about love, belonging, and compassion that I thought the book handled beautifully. The characters also have a lot more depth. e.g.: Yes, Peter is fun and exciting, but he’s also ignorant and selfish. The author also has a playful way of writing that made it a lot of fun to read.

Peter is more than just a kid who’s forever young. He lives completely inside his own fantasy, and his companions have no choice but to join him. If he doesn’t know something, then that thing doesn’t exist. He never makes mistakes, and is easily distracted. He’s the epitome of the “Harry Potter Everything Is About ME” character, but he’s supposed to be, and the author readily admits this. Neverland literally shuts down when he leaves it, and adventure follows him everywhere. It was also interesting to think that Neverland is the place that regular children visit when they are sleeping, etc. whereas Peter just flat out lives there full-on all the time.

Also, being a mom, all the parts about how important mothers are struck home with me.

My favourite two passages in the book:

1.) “Proud and insolent youth,” said Hook, “prepare to meet thy doom.”

“Dark and sinister man,” Peter answered, “have at thee.”

2.) “...and thus it will go on, so long as children are gay and innocent and heartless.”

Better than the movie (duh) and a fun, quick read. Read it to your kids if you’re embarrassed to read a children’s book. It’s still ten times better than Harry Potter.

The Godfather - Mario Puzo

2011-07-20T00:16:00.000-07:00

Summary:

Leader of a powerful Mafia family is succeeded by his son. Describes the inner workings of the Italian Mafia (favours, hierarchies, ‘friends’, business dealings, shootings, etc.)

Thoughts:

Great book, surprisingly. It’s totally not my style at all. I haven’t seen the movie. Going into it, all I knew was it was about the mafia and at some point a horse was going to get its head cut off. I read it because it was famous, and because my husband owned it, so the book was just sitting there waiting for me to pick it up. And other than accidentally misplacing it once or twice (my house is a rats’ nest) I never put the damn thing down.

It was one of those books that went everywhere with me. Ever tried eating noodle soup while holding a novel? It can be a bit precarious.

I don’t know if the writing was “brilliant” or “excellent” or anything like that, but it didn’t suck, and the story itself was very engaging. Puzo had a way of describing a completely foreign situation succinctly, and without making you feel like he’s talking down to you.

I really wasn’t familiar with any of the subject matter (I don’t run any illegal businesses,

I’ve never intimidated or killed anyone, etc.) but the author had me effortlessly understanding what was going on. He also does a good job of setting up background stories so that each character has a bit more depth, and his descriptions of places, etc. are interesting and informative rather than boring.

There was a side-story or two that were out of place and less interesting than the main Mafia story, namely the failed-singer story and the part about the woman with a deformity, but whatever, it was still a good book overall. I don’t even have the urge to see the movie now -- I feel like I don’t need to.

You’ve probably already seen the movies, but the book is definitely worth your time. Read!

"Battle Hymn of the Tiger Mother" - Amy Chua

2011-06-13T02:33:00.000-07:00

Summary:

Biography of Chinese woman who pushes her children to succeed in everything through high standards and excessive drilling and practice.

Thoughts:

I first heard about this book when my dad showed me a Time magazine article about it. Then I had to wait for FORTY-TWO slow fuckwads to finish with it before I could get it from the library. I should have just bought it, I think I’m going to buy it now, now that I’ve read it. I really really liked it.

This book goes against everything that we North American parents say about our kids. We’re always talking about “natural gifts” and protecting their self-esteem and not pressuring them and accepting them for who they are. Fucking pandering bullcrap.

The other North American thing we always hear about is the romantic idea of the person who tries hard and never gives up, making it to the top through hours of grueling practice and determination. People love that shit, too.

But if it’s a story about a parent who pushes their kid into succeeding, through vigilance, practice and determination, well that’s not okay, that’s the parent interfering and living out their dreams through the kid. What the fuck? That’s not fair. You could have a really gifted kid, but if she never opens a math book, she’ll do worse than the kid whose mom studies with him every night. I think our society has gone too far away from encouraging kids to strive for success.

The mother in this book is by no means perfect, and she crosses the line a few times (which she readily admits). However, you can’t argue with the results: her daughters are talented, successful and happy, with an ingrained determination to stick with something until they are the best at it. And, despite the fighting and complaining, they still love their mom. People have this worry that if we push our kids, they might resent or hate us. But guess what - they might resent or hate us, anyway! Lots of kids hate their parents no matter what they do.

The writing is interesting and funny. I burned through the book in a day or two, and as soon as I finished it I wanted to open it up and start it again. And I am determined to have my husband read it.

This book is inspiring – it makes me want to go out and buy a violin and stand over my son and make him practice for hours and hours every day. This book also makes me feel like my elementary-aged kids are too old to save; they’re washed up, done! Lastly, this book makes me feel like a negligent parent. And it's probably right.

"The Island of Doctor Moreau" - H. G. Wells

2011-06-12T11:41:00.000-07:00

Summary:

Man gets shipwrecked on an island of Beast People where vivisection is being performed.

Thoughts:

So I’m pretty sure this is a classic, but when I mentioned it to a few friends they’d never heard of it and thought I was sick for reading it. But then they also hadn’t heard of H. G. Wells, so maybe I’m still okay. I downloaded it (for free!) onto my phone and read it in bits and pieces in my spare time.

Like the other H. G. Wells books that I’ve read, the plot is no secret: The doctor is a nut and he makes Frankenpeople on an island in the middle of nowhere because he has been ostracized by his peers. The medicine behind his experiments and procedures is a bit far-fetched, but it is a fictional story, and it was written over 100 years ago, so you have to give the guy a fair bit of artistic license.

The protagonist is very honest and straightforward, admitting when he gets scared or makes mistakes, so that it’s very easy to sympathize with him, and you find yourself to be inside the story instead of just observing from the sidelines. e.g.: When he runs through the forest with the Beast People chasing him, so do you.

The descriptions of the Beast People are so scant and fleeting that it ends up making them even more creepy. No pictures, either. I had to make these hideous creatures in my mind, and it just made them all that much worse.

I don’t think there’s a real moral to the story, except something like “making scientific abominations is a bad idea”. But I don’t know if Wells usually puts a definite moral in his writing. It’s more escapism than anything.

The Guinea Pig Diaries" - A.J. Jacobs

2011-06-12T04:10:00.000-07:00

Summary:

Series of unrelated experiments the author puts himself through month by month.

Topics include: Outsourcing, Being Beautiful, Brutal Honesty, Public Nudity.

Thoughts:

I picked this one up from the cheapo bin at the supermarket of all places. I thought it was Jacobs’ other book about following the bible to the letter (I’d seen a video review of it, it looked good). When I realized it was the wrong book, it still looked good enough to try.

Funny, easy to read, good writing style. The author doesn’t take himself too seriously and is able to step back from a situation in order to see it from all sides. I smiled a lot when reading this book, and I also found Jacobs and his family easy to relate to.

He lost me a bit in the middle with two kind of boring/stupid experiments: a WWGWD piece (What Would George Washington Do?) and one on rational thinking that brought up so many theories and ‘effects’ that I began to lose interest. Some of the other experiments were a bit sparse, so he’d stretched them out, paddng them with little facts or sometimes just dumb extremes (outsourcing your kid’s bedtime story to a guy in Bombay on speakerphone was lame and stupid). He also plugs his two previous books a lot, and okay fine, they’re on my list, but I still hate being sold something while I’m trying to read.

All in all, the book was entertaining and thought-provoking. It inspires you to come up with your own random and weird experiments (e.g.: Tether yourself to your dog for a month. Eat nothing but foods that start with the letter “C”. Spend as much time as possible upside down to see if brain function increases). And by allowing us to live vicariously through the author we can learn a bit more about ourselves and our surroundings. Case in point: I want my husband to read the one about Jacobs’ wife, but he won’t.

"I'd Know You Anywhere" - Laura Lippman

2011-06-09T12:30:00.000-07:00

Summary:

Woman is contacted by guy on Death Row who abducted her as a teenager.

Thoughts:

This one was okay. I guess.

Recommended by my mom. Sorry, Mom. I dunno, it was just kind of lackluster (despite the iridescent cover). The premise was thin to begin with: Killer slated for execution wants to talk to his only victim that got away. Interesting idea (hence why I started reading it) but they drew it out for almost 400 pages.

I found the book had a lot of unneeded padding and repetition.

Padding: what colleges various people went to, problems her kids’re having at school, her husband’s job, UKisms vs Americanisms, waxing philosophical about child-rearing.

Maybe it was all supposed to create atmosphere and round out the story, and maybe I’m impatient and cold-hearted, but whatever, I didn’t care what the name of her high school was, or that her family liked going to a specific pudding shack for a treat.

Repetition: Of course the murders were important, but I didn’t need to hear over and over again that the girl’s names were Holly and Maude, that he’d killed them, that they were young and pretty and innocent, and that the protagonist didn’t know why she’d been spared. Again and again and again.

I’m also not a fan of putting current events into stories, such as names of famous actors or singers, brand names, recent news stories, etc. It dates the work, and in ten years (or less) no one will understand the reference. Lastly, the side stories about the failed reporter and the teacher-turned-inmate-advocate were, well, boring and depressing.

While I was interested enough to keep reading, I didn’t particularly enjoy it. And then, after holding this huge tease in front of the reader for the entire book (“oooh, what’s the abductor guy going to say to her two decades after the kidnapping?? His last words to her before he dies!!”) it was pretty anti-climactic.

"My Father's Fighter" - Ronald K. Fried

2011-05-30T16:24:00.000-07:00

Summary:

School teacher inherits an unsuccessful heavyweight boxer from his estranged dad.

Dealing with the boxing community, which is all new to him, kind of fucks up his life.

Thoughts:

Picked at random from the public library. I know nothing of boxing, in fact it’s probably my most hated sport (it seems pointless and mean) so the idea of a mild-mannered professional having a fighter dumped on him seemed like an interesting idea. An “oh crap, what would I do if that happened to me?” kind of thing.

The writing was passable, but unnecessarily crass. I don’t think there was a single page in this 175p book that didn’t have either “Jew”, “nigger”, “fuck”, or all three of these words prominently displayed. I kind of expected it from the boxers, since they’re portrayed as uneducated and nasty, but from the school teacher protagonist, too? And he lusts after his students, and gets distracted by his wife’s breasts all the time? What kind of middle-aged English teacher is so horned up like this? Maybe this was a way to show that he related to the boxing people more than he realized.

There were a handful of funny parts, and a few parts that were kind of poetic and sad.

So the guy can write when he wants to, but the book just had a harsh vein to it for the majority of the story. Like I said, I know nothing of boxing, so maybe he was just trying to create a mood or relate to the characters.

Umm, not really sure if this book had a moral or universal truth or anything at the end. Stuff was awkward, then got worse, then even worse, then really really bad, then it was over. Moral of the story: boxing is harsh? Sure, let’s go with that.

"Dockside" - Susan Wiggs

2011-05-28T15:33:00.000-07:00

Summary:

Woman has her small business bought out from under her. And it just so happens that the guy who buys it is rich and gorgeous. And they’ve both secretly lusted after each other for decades. Dot, dot, dot.

Thoughts:

Nope sorry, this one didn’t do it for me. It was too coincidental, in that lame chick-flick kind of way. There were also a lot of parts where I had to stop myself from rolling my eyes and remember that this is just a romance novel, and it’s not going to be realistic. And of course everything worked out perfectly at the end. Of course.

Although a lot of parts of the book had the potential to go wrong (including three, count ‘em, three unplanned teen pregnancies) everything always worked out, and even better than expected. Example: Not only did a girl get pregnant on her first time (like ohmigod, what’re the odds of that?!?!1!?) but the guy left the next day for a military school that he would be thrown out of if she tattled on him (get out! what a tragic coincidence!!) and when she finally sent word that he had a daughter, he was just weeks away from his wedding to someone else (oh no, that’s amazing!!!!). And then, although she’s 15 and struggling to raise a kid on her own, she ends up mayor of her town (wow!!! awesome!!!! good for her!!!!!!!!!) and her daughter becomes valedictorian of her high school (WOW ohmigod!!! I think I’m having chest pains!!!!!!!1!!!1!!). Total bull crap. Couldn’t she just have been someone who made a mistake, and then her life turned out to be fairly average? Not an interesting enough story, I guess.

There was also a lot of upselling for the rest of the books in the series (The Lakeshore Chronicles). It wasn’t just “then she went to meet her friend Jenny to talk about it”,

it was “then she went to meet Jenny, who would understand about emotional upheaval and life changes, what with just being reunited with her father after 20 years and then her house burning down and then getting married.” (I’m not exaggerating, Jenny has her own book in the series.)

The writing wasn’t as bad as some romance novels I’ve read. She didn’t use the same adjective ad nauseum, although the word “Adirondack” did come up 6 or 8 times. However, the writing was still fluffy romantic garbage. The guy would look at the girl, and just magically KNOW what she was thinking. And of course the protagonist had to valiantly fight against something, because they always do, so she fought against the guy she’s loved for years giving her her dream job and begging her to be with him. Because, yeah, that would really suck...

And was it supposed to be a surprise that the pregnant girl was going to go into labour at the big wedding at the end of the book? I wasn’t supposed to see this coming?

The female characters all had traditional romance-novelesque jobs, such as Photographer, Baker, Flowershop Owner, Bed & Breakfast Manager, etc. The topics of abortion or adoption were barely even mentioned with any of the teen pregnancies. And the women were all lost and unhappy until they found a man, and then they were all glowing, smiling all the time, feeling ‘complete’, etc. You know, just like in real life. Right?

I think Wiggs has the potential to write something important, something to make a difference or make people think. Something where things get messy and don’t turn out story-book-perfect at the end. I don’t think she’s ever going to do it, though. She’s carved a comfy little nest for herself as a romance writer. Whatever. I’m not reading any of the other books in the series.

"Invisible Monsters" - Chuck Palahniuk

2011-05-18T14:03:00.000-07:00

Summary:

Accident leaves beautiful model permanently scarred. She deals with her new identity, (people staring at her or afraid to look) as well as the loss of her old identity, (no friends,

no modeling jobs, no fiancée) and her troubled past (inattentive parents, dead brother).

Thoughts:

A good book. Follows the Palahniuk formula of freakishly gross I’d-never-thought-of-that kind of stuff, meets scamming people for money and/or drugs, meets graphic but interesting facts, meets startling and meaningful insights on the human condition.

I got a little tired of the story structure being jump-to-this-point-in-time, now jump here, now here, now here now herenowherenowherenowhere. I got kind of turned around and bored in the middle for a while, waiting to see when the author would get back to the plot. But he brought it home well at the end, so I can’t complain too much. There were also a big handful of plot twists that I didn’t see coming, and was pleasantly surprised by them, as well as by the complexity of several of the characters.

Palahniuk always gets to me a little. His writing bugs me. The innermost feelings and motivations behind his characters are usually pretty profound, when you push away the drugs and the sex and the other bullshit. I think that people who don’t like Palahniuk books have probably never made it through one. Either that, or they scanned the book looking for yucky words and missed the entire point of the story.

This book is pretty powerful, and it will make you think. Unless you just see the word 'felching', shriek “Eww! Gross!!” and slam the book shut.

"The Other Boleyn Girl" - Philippa Gregory

2011-05-18T13:22:00.000-07:00

Summary:

Anne Boleyn’s marriage to Henry VIII as told through the eyes of her older sister,

a mistress of Henry VIII.

Thoughts:

I’m prefacing this review by saying that I got this as an audiobook. Unfortunately, the voice on the recording sounded remarkably similar to the voice from the “Confessions of a Shopaholic” audiobook. I did my best to ignore it, but I kept imagining that when the main characters were done draping themselves in silk and jewels and having sumptuous feasts in front of an adoring court, that they would be off to the nearest shop for a new Hermes scarf or pair of Monolo Blahnik’s. And well, maybe they would have. Actually no, I guess a queen would order from the catalogue, perhaps having MB himself come to the castle to deliver her new strappy sandals.

I don’t watch TV, and I’ve said before that I’m not one for history. So while I’d heard of the movie, I didn’t realize that the “Tudor” TV series was related to this book as well. That really puts a lot of pressure on the book to be good, don’t you think? Especially when we all know the basic story (i.e.: we all know that Anne Boleyn is executed by the king).

Bottom line: I didn’t think much of the book. Apparently there’s a whole series (the Tudor series). I won’t be reading them.

The main character was not from the 16^th century like everyone else. She had the morals and values of someone from the 21^st century. So while the 21^st-century-reader might identify with her love of a poor man or her horror at having her children sent away to be raised by a nurse, it was completely unrealistic for a high-bred woman in the 1500’s to be upset by these things. This woman was supposedly born and raised with royalty, so she knew how everything worked. Before the story starts, she'd married someone she didn’t love at a young age, had zero relationship with her parents or other family, and she dutifully became the king’s mistress. And then out of nowhere she jumps 500 years into the future and starts moaning about love, happiness and family. Where did this come from? This to me was the equivalent of being disgusted that someone was going to marry a cousin, or complaining about the lack of indoor plumbing. And seriously, the brother was gay and his sisters were totally fine with it? In 1536 ?? Really? (and no, I’m not anti-gay or anything, I’m just saying that in the 16^th century people were a lot less open-minded).

The writing was nothing special, and had a bit of a whiny vein to it.

One good thing about this book was it caused me to do a little Wikireading on Anne and Mary Boleyn, since the book is apparently grossly inaccurate when it comes to the facts.

I didn’t think the author was that inaccurate. She just added a lot of her own ideas about the characters’ feelings and motivations.

And education, regardless of what it is or why you do it, is always a good thing.

"Lucky Leonardo" - Jonathan Canter

2011-05-17T16:38:00.000-07:00

Summary:

Psychiatrist’s personal life messed up after divorce, paranoia, stalkers, and a lawsuit complicate things.

Thoughts:

Picked this one up randomly at the library, and decided to read it because some from

‘The Simpsons’ (writer? producer?) said that he liked it. I know, how lame is that?

I found the story to be pretty rambling. Stuff happened, and then other stuff happened. And while that stuff was happening, this other stuff was happening over here. And we forgot to mention this other stuff that happened before that stuff started happening…

It didn’t really all come together as a congruent story. When I got to the end, I didn’t really see why it was the end, and why the end couldn’t have been 50 pages before or 50 pages after where it was.

It was kind of funny in a few places. There were a few parts I considered reading out loud to my husband, but then realized I’d have to explain a bunch of other stuff or he wouldn’t get the joke. None of it made me laugh out loud, though I may have smiled slightly a handful of times.

So yeah, it was kind of funny, and random stuff happened, and then it was over. Meh.

"Man Missing" - Mignon Eberhart

2011-05-13T13:32:00.000-07:00

Summary:

Intuitive nurse investigates murder on Navy base.

Thoughts:

Recommended to me by my mother, as an “American Agatha Christie”.

Would probably help if I’d already read some Agatha Christie to compare it to (she’s on my list). Short little book, under 200 pages, quick read.

Although I wasn’t gripping the edge of my seat while I read, it was a complex enough plot that I didn’t know what was going to happen next. There were also a few times where

I arrogantly told myself that I knew who’d done it and then a few pages later found that

I was changing my mind.

The protagonist is likeable, in that she can be self-deprecating but also knows she’s smart and isn’t easily swayed from giving her opinion. One writing flaw with the plot was that the main character kept being given all this evidence from everyone around her. The idea was she was kind and matronly so people opened up to her, yeah, I get it, but it was still a bit convenient how everyone kept telling her stuff. She also had a knack for walking by and seeing/hearing something vital to the case.

So basically it’s a nice little mystery that I didn’t figure out until the end. It’s a bit dated (written in the 1950’s) but not annoyingly so. Mysteries aren’t my favourite genre, but if you’re into them you should give Mignon a try.

P.S. I looked it up, it means delicate and pretty. It’s also a chocolate egg, a dance,

an opera, a punk rocker, a painter…

"Grotesque" Natsuo Kirino

2011-05-09T14:18:00.000-07:00

Summary:

Murder trial of two prostitutes causes relatives and childhood friends to reevaluate the victims as well as themselves, and how everyone ended up where they did.

Thoughts:

This was an interesting one. It made me think.

Kirino does a good job of examining self-worth and self-image in young women.

The characters in this book come from similar backgrounds, but end completely differently: hookers, business women, criminals, family caretakers... All of them are looking for something more, namely love and meaning in their lives, which brings several of them back together again. They all become bitter unsatisfied, socially inept and unhappy.

Caricatures of real people. In a word, monsters.

The writing was a bit wordy, kind of like a Stephen King novel where he goes on for 100 pages about the background story of some bit character and you’re wondering why you care. But this of course gives us a more thorough picture of each character and it’s all interesting to read, even if it doesn’t have much to do with the plot. And the ending leaves a few things up in the air, which I always love (no sarcasm, I actually do love open endings). There were also a lot of times where I found myself wondering what I would (or wouldn’t) do if put in the same situation as one of the characters.

Okay so here comes the negativity:

There were two problems with this book. First off, the protagonist kept being given diaries, personal letters, and police reports of the other characters. It was good because we got to see the story from different angles, and we got background on each character. However, all these items were written in long-winded heartfelt prose – which is perfect for a novel, but not for a diary, letter, or confession. Kirino should have just changed the POV and timeline of the book (e.g.: Chapter 5, Kazuo, 1985), like authors do all the time, instead of unearthing yet another hidden journal.

The second problem I had with the book was that it was translated to English from Japanese. I’m guessing that this is why the book is saturated with American idioms

(approx. 4-6 per page). Phrases like “flat broke”, “get down to business”, “spice of life”, “piece of cake”, “he chewed me out”, “top-notch”, and “southpaw” are all through the book, it was distracting. I’m pretty sure the original Japanese version wouldn’t be full of Americanisms, but maybe it is.

Regardless, the story itself was different and intriguing. It challenged the roles of

“women surviving in a man’s world” and the idea that anyone (even the beautiful, rich, and/or successful) can be unhappy.

"Pig Island" - Mo Hayder

2011-05-02T13:14:00.000-07:00

Summary:

Journalist visiting religious colony to debunk Satanism hoax gets stalked by crazy guy.

Thoughts:

I wanted to like this one. It looked good, I was really hoping to write a kick-ass positive review for it. Now that I’ve read it, I’m on the fence. I didn’t like it that much, but it wasn’t terrible.

First off, the back cover proclaimed that it would be “so disturbing that [I wouldn’t] have nightmares because [I wouldn’t] be able to sleep.” That’s a pretty hefty promise.

Contrary to this, I had trouble reading the book because at the beginning I, literally, kept falling asleep. Seriously. Near the middle of the book I had to keep re-reading passages because my mind would wander. And by the end, yes I was paying attention, but when the Big Reveal came out I just kind of thought “Huh. Okay, well that makes sense.”

It was just something about the writing style. They probably could have cut 100 pages or so without much difference to the story.

Everything happened in a lazy, roundabout way, where we all know what's going to happen but have to wait for the author to write it down. For example, think about it:

You’re on Pig Island. You’re surrounded by creepy religious nuts. People from the mainland have already told you that pig guts wash up on shore all the time. There’s been talk of Satanism and various creepiness. You’ve seen a bunch of butchered pigs on the island, their heads on stakes. Someone takes you to a shed in the woods where “something” was done on a regular basis that involved butchering pigs, but not for meat. And… and… and… AND… three pages later they tell you that (oh my god!!!) pigs were being (no way!!!) sacrificed!!!

I’m not saying it’s not creepy, I’m just saying it wasn’t shocking.

The parts written from the woman’s point of view seemed whiney (on purpose I suppose, but it’s still annoying) and also pointless. Why did we need a second point of view? Why did we need that character in the story at all? The little twist in the middle regarding the hoax was kind of neat. All of that part was more interesting than the killing and stalking and freak-o stuff. And although I wasn’t shocked and amazed by the ending, it was still a pretty good ending.

Perhaps if you’re deeply religious you’ll find this book to be bone-chilling. But then if you’re deeply religious you wouldn’t be caught within thirty feet of such an abomination, right?

So there’s the rub.

"The Adultery Diet" - Eva Cassady

2011-04-29T22:43:00.000-07:00

Summary:

Fat lady gets thin to fuck ex she hasn’t seen in 20 years.

Thoughts:

So apparently this is known as “chick lit”. I understand where the “chick” comes from,

but not the “lit”. In my mind, ‘literature’ implies some sort of quality or refinement.

There was nothing original in this book. Everything is black and white. The women are either fat, bitter and sad, or skinny, bitchy and alone. The protagonist has to choose between being fat and gorging herself on pastries, or being thin and never eating pizza again. The husband is boring and clueless, while the lover is gorgeous and understanding.

And, most importantly, while she refuses to communicate with her husband, the protagonist pours her heart out in emails to the lover. For example, she leaves her husband “an obvious hint” by not putting the empty box of Chinese take-out in the garbage. This is not obvious, this is woman-shit. Don’t leave “hints”, COMMUNICATE!

Just plain SAY to him “Hey, I don’t like it that you didn’t put the box in the garbage,

it makes me feel like you think I’m your maid. Please put it in the garbage next time.”

It’s no wonder that the lover “understands” her and she feels “distant” from her husband – she doesn’t give the poor old guy a chance.

The tone of the book is also a bit off. It’s a random, mindless bit of book-club fluff about clothes, interior design and denying yourself dessert, and then in the middle of it they drop a few F-bombs and talk about blow jobs. WTF? That’s a little much. I’m not prudish, I’m just saying it felt out of place in this little book. Also, the emails back and forth between her and the lover were tedious because the main character stopped after every sentence to analyze what the guy had said, or to delete and rewrite what she said.

Lastly, I disliked the protagonist’s obligatory view of her role with men. Her boss wants her to exploit an old friend for an article, and although it makes her very uncomfortable, she does it. Her husband wants to have sex with her, and although it'll make her late for an important business dinner, she does it. An old lover wants to meet her, and although she’s 40 lbs heavier and married, she drops the weight and resigns herself to the adultery, dealing with the regret afterwards. This is not an empowering feminist “take control of your body and your life” kind of book. She loses the weight in order to avoid changing someone’s decade-old image of her.

If you like the “Shopaholic” series, you’ll think this book is “fabulous!!” (ugh, women suck).

Since this book was about dieting and food, maybe I finished it because my parents raised me to clean my plate, even if I don’t like it.

"Lullaby" - Chuck Palahniuk

2011-04-28T13:33:00.000-07:00

Summary:

Children’s lullaby that kills you when you hear it. Various people using it for their own purposes.

Thoughts:

So, it’s a Palahniuk book, so obviously it’s disturbing and nasty. Ok fine. But it’s also

heart-breaking and sad in some parts, and almost beautiful. It’s a weird, disconcerting combination.

I’ve read a handful of Palahniuk books and this one is by far my favourite (I’ve found some of the others to be a bit formulaic). I would suggest that they make it into a movie, but I don’t really know how they could possibly film the ending.

The writing is good. Raw, creepy, but real. There were also a few twists I didn’t see coming, which seems to be a rarity lately. The protagonist was also rather refreshing. In a lot of stories, the guy who gets the super power or the magic wand is a Good Guy or a Bad Guy. But in this story, he’s Just A Guy. So he doesn’t really do anything with his secret weapon to help mankind or create world peace. He does eventually help stop the Bad Guy, but it’s not his primary goal.

I borrowed the book from my sister, but it’s worth keeping, so I’m going to buy a copy for myself. And I’m really cheap, so that’s saying a lot.

Read it, however – as with any Palahniuk book – if you’re easily offended, don’t.

"Bound" - Sally Gunning

2011-04-28T13:12:00.000-07:00

Summary:

Servant in 1700’s runs away from abusive master, is arrested for murder.

Thoughts:

Okay so this was a definite chick book.

Immense hardship threatening to crush her, but she presses on, with a new and even more horrible plot twist waiting at every turn. And, of course, she stays silent during all this abuse and hardship, feeling desperate and alone. I don’t mean to belittle slavery and abuse, but the girl is written in such a way that she really starts to piss me off. If you’re being abused by someone, you leave, you tell someone, you fight back (frying pan to the head when he’s not looking would do nicely). You don’t just quietly take it, hoping he’ll stop. This kind of behaviour causes readers to think that degradation and rape are okay, that although they’re unpleasant they’re also commonplace. This is wrong!

The writing itself is okay, despite the profuse inner dialogue, (worrying, working things out in her head) but she does have a bit of an excuse in that the protagonist is young and has few people to turn to for guidance. My biggest beef with this book was the hammering home of tired points. For example,

[Discussing Alice’s indenture papers with Mr. Freeman]

“Musn’t the widow sign it, sir?”

…“[The papers] passed to me at our marriage, in accordance with the law.”

Alice didn’t understand. She didn’t understand at all. And then, of course, she understood it very well.

The widow and Freeman were married.

So she didn’t understand… and then she didn’t understand… and then she did. UGH! Okay so I get it that she’s trying to create suspense or build-up, but it just sounds so dumb. There are other ways to convey this without making the passage plodding.

The murder trial and subsequent fall-out was interesting and unsettling. In other words, it was well done. The protagonist’s chaste little love story on the side was quite good, I enjoyed those parts. To think that someone could be brutalized and treated as though she was invisible, and then be able find someone who was nice to her. It was a hopeful little side plot. There was also a bunch of political stuff in there about taxes and importation. Kind of boring. Sorry I'm not one for history, politics, or the history of politics.

I think the book was, overall, worth reading. It’s not going on my favourites list, but I’m also not sorry that I read it.

"Which Brings Me to You" - Steve Almond & Julianna Baggott

2011-04-28T01:06:00.000-07:00

Summary:

Two people make out at a wedding, then write letters back and forth confessing sins from previous relationships.

Thoughts:

Different, interesting, honest.

I took a 24-hour reading-break after finishing the book to fully digest it before starting another. And then I recommended it to a friend.

I very much enjoyed the tone of this novel. The easy back-and-forth between the two strangers, the shared sense of humour, the raw honesty, the innate attraction... It was like they truly were meant for more than just a one-off at a party.

The various love affairs they write to each other about were all different, which was kind of odd when you think about it. I think people are usually drawn to a certain type of person; their looks, and their job or hobbies. But I guess the book is more interesting than if the girl had only had relationships with moody metal guitarists. I also thought the selected exes were more than a bit clichéd (the chef, the swingers, the camp counselor, the tough guy) but not enough so that it put me off the story.

By the end of the book the two strangers really do feel like intimate friends, although they’ve only met once and had barely spoke at the time. They are brutally honest with each other (which I am a huge champion for in relationships, as well as life in general) and since they understand each other so well, neither one will let the other squirm away from any uncomfortable truths.

The story ends with a very hazy future for our heroes. It’s strangely unsatisfying. It’s nice.

"A Spot of Bother" - Mark Haddon

2011-04-28T00:43:00.000-07:00

Summary:

Family members deal with various relationship problems (e.g.: break ups, adultery, marriage) while the patriarch goes nuts because he thinks he has cancer.

Thoughts:

Not nearly as good as Haddon’s last book, “The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Nighttime”. That book was fucking brilliant. There was no way this book was going to hold a candle to that one.

The story was a little slow-going at first. I lost track of who people were a few times, the names running together a bit (George, Jean, Jamie, Jacob…). And for quite a few chapters in the middle of the book I felt like I was walking through heavy snow, just slogging through it, plodding along. However, by the end I was pretty into it, interested and semi-eager to find out how it would all turn out.

The parts of the story involving the gay son were excellent. Whenever a new chapter or paragraph started (and with it the jump from one character’s problems to another’s) I searched for Gay Guy’s name, hoping there would be more about him, and I felt happy/sad when good/bad things happened to him. A lot of the other characters were just boring or depressing. I wish he’d had a bigger part in the book.

Haddon’s a good writer. Insightful, clever, funny, <insert a fourth buzzword here>.

He’s capable of intriguing plots and can write a character so that you care about him/her. However, I felt he was off his game for a fair bit of this book. On the upside, I love learning, and I was able to pick up a few pieces of British slang (e.g.: throwing a wobbly).

I probably wouldn’t recommend this one.

"Happy Endings" - Katherine Stone

2011-04-28T00:13:00.000-07:00

Summary:

Three interconnected romances:

1 – Unloved, hurt-before business woman meets rich, hurt-before family man.

2 – Unloved, wimpy victim meets rich famous guy.
3 – Unloved divorcee meets famous broken-hearted man.

And guess what – all three have Happy Endings. Aren’t you surprised?

Summary:

I’m sorry, I’m trying to be open-minded here, but I’m failing miserably. What can I do?

Can anyone help me? Anyone…? Hmm. Maybe if I had someone who was strong… but gentle… someone with brilliant, forest green (or dark blue) eyes and (err sorry, or they may be molten steel eyes)… err ahh, ahem, where was I? oh yes, and long fingers that he would use to softly caress the tendrils of my silky auburn hair, causing my snow-white limbs to tremble and my dazzling emerald (or sapphire) eyes to flutter (oh wait, no, it’s my heart that’s supposed to flutter). And when he looks at me, he can read the pain in my eyes, because no one has ever loved me before, and he makes a solemn vow to never hurt me, and to love me forever, even though up until this point he’s never loved anyone (or he loved one person, once…<sniff!>). And even though we have literally just met 5 minute ago,

he just knows and I know and he’s going to propose by the end of the week, and there will be a baby (even though I’m menopausal, or barren) and it will be a be a baby of love and yes… YES! I DO BELIEVE IN FAIRIES!! CLAP YOUR HANDS!! FASTER! CLAP YOUR HANDS!!! OH, I DO BELIEVE, I DO!!!!

Total horseshit.

The idea that this is being pawned off as writing that goes “deep into the hearts and mind of contemporary men and women” (quoted from back cover) is insulting to the reader’s intelligence. As is the glaring lack of a thesaurus on the author’s bookshelf.

This is why men and women say they don’t understand each other. There is not a man alive that thinks like the men in this book. But there are women out there pining away for some guy to come along who will understand, just by the look in her eyes, some specifically precise truth about her, and will then be able to convey – with only his eyes, mind you –

the exact thing that she wants him to. This is total crap! Men are not mind-readers! Nobody is! If you want a guy to know something about you, you have to TELL HIM, not flutter your fucking emerald eyes at him!

By the way, why the fuck was it necessary to hear about three different character’s menstrual cycles?? Was this really important to the plot? Really?

And, I’m sorry, now we have to talk about the pathetic vocab. It was suggested to me by my sister to read a romance novel while making a checklist of words that popped up repeatedly. She once read a 350-page romance in which the word “gently” appeared 192 times. None of my results were quite that dramatic, but in the 375 pages of “Happy Endings” I had about 50 words that came up, ad nauseum. The winners were soft/softly/softness at 143 times, and gentle/gently/gentleness at 157 times. Every word spoken was soft, gentle, or quiet. Every touch was soft, gentle, or caressing. Every look was soft, gentle or tender. Fucking hell, man, you’re killing me!

Gentle: affable, compassionate, considerate, docile, cool, peaceful, kind, tame, sweet-tempered, temperate, warm-hearted, moderate, genial, mellow, pleasant, loving, agreeable, mild, delicate, sensitive, serene, low-key, smooth, melodious, toned down, soothing, subdued, tranquil.

Soft: comfortable, pliable, smooth, yielding, muted, supple, faint, velvety, malleable, moldable, flexible, delicate, flowing, wan, cozy, restful, diffuse, dulcet, sweet, mild.

A five-second internet search for synonyms. See? Was that hard?

Also surprising was the 15 TIMES that the term acid baby found its way into the book, along with snow white (35 times), brilliant (26), ice/icy (49), tremble (33), as well as a bunch of random, stupid words that shouldn’t have appeared at all, but strangely enough were found more than once, namely beribboned (2), segue (3), ingénue (3), love-tangled (3), and patrician (3).

One or two of the plots had a slight possibility of being interesting. Unfortunately the

mind-reading, the love-at-first-sight, the insecurity, and the lack of variety in the vocabulary made this romance novel just like any other: Contrite, unrealistic, and embarrassing if you’re caught reading it.

"The Haunting of James Hastings" - Christopher Ransom

2011-04-14T13:31:00.000-07:00

Summary:

Guy’s wife murdered. New neighbour seems a lot like her. Things get fucked up.

Thoughts:

Given to me by a friend who’d bought the book at the airport right before a long flight. She didn’t think enough of it to pack it home, was going to turf it if I didn’t want it. I’d heard of his other book (“The Birthing House”) so I thought sure why not. As soon as I’d finished it,

it went in the Good Will box.

The story is kind of weird, and I suppose I would call it interesting. I didn’t know what was going to happen next, so it kept me reading. By the end of it I still wasn’t exactly sure what had happened. But instead of thinking “Wow, cool, what a weird/fascinating/creepy story!”, it was more of a “Umm, okay, sure, what the hell was that?”

I did not enjoy the writing style. Choppy back-and-forth timeline, unnecessary crudeness, awkward metaphors (e.g.: “the couch was the colour of insanity”; someone’s penis looked like “a Snickers bar”), detailed descriptions of the streets and geography around the protagonist’s house (who gives a fuck?), and references to brands/stores/other American culture that I wasn’t familiar with and so was left out of the joke.

I dunno, it was okay, but not worth re-reading, lending to a friend, or discussing with anyone.

"Two to Tango" - Peter Guttridge

2011-04-11T11:10:00.000-07:00

Summary:

Reporter travels with a rock tour around South America, while someone on the tour receives death threats.

Thoughts:

My husband did not enjoy this book. My husband has not read this book.

However, he did have to endure my constant vociferous objections while I read it.

The book is basically Rambling-First-Draft meets Travel-Guidebook. At some points the story reads like a rough draft or a new author’s first effort – someone stumbling over their own words, dropping a weak story in chunks behind them as they go. At other times the entire plot is halted so that we can, for example, go on a page-long history of the Inca people in bizarrely detailed drudgery. I get the impression that Guttridge wrote this while on vacation in South America, jotting down little paragraphs about what he did that day, what bar he went to that night, then stopping to read his travel book to learn about some piece of geography or local history. Don’t get me wrong – I love learning. I drive my family and friends nuts with my delightfully inquisitive nature. But when I’m reading a fictional novel about someone tracking down a murder in the 20^th century, I don’t care that such-and-such a battle was fought on “8 November 1533.”

The main character is a jokester, and fine, that’s great. Although it got a bit tiresome, it was actually the only redeeming quality in this ‘satire’, i.e.: at least he was trying (albeit lamely) to crack off a few clever jokes. However, it annoyed me to no end that the protagonist would use an idiom (e.g.: ‘flying off the handle’) and then make a flippant remark about how he didn’t understand it (e.g.: “Why should you be on a handle in the first place?”). This is an extreme pet peeve of mine. If you don’t know something, look it up. There is no excuse for this nowadays, with Google and Wikipedia around.

The murder/attempted murder/mystery part of the story was choppy, inconsistent and not particularly interesting. The protagonist goes from a bumbling coward who no one takes seriously to a clumsy heroic detective that everyone seeks out for advice on how to catch the bad guy. He also gets kidnapped by ruthless guerillas, gets away easily, and then continues on with his vacation. Lastly, I figured out the ‘big reveal’ about twenty pages early, which is always a downer.

When I finished this book I re-read the praise plastered on the back cover and was astonished. “The funniest crime novel of the year” ? Really?? The plot “engages and amuses to the end” ? Seriously, what book was I reading?

I would definitely not recommend this book. There are so many far superior satires, crime novels, and travel guides out there, why would you waste your time with this one?

P. S.: ‘Flying off the handle’ refers to older tools coming apart during use, due to wood shrinkage. Think of someone swinging an axe and having the steel head come ‘flying off’. This would be violent and dangerous. Just like someone losing their temper.

"Gone With the Wind" - Margaret Mitchell

2011-04-05T11:10:00.000-07:00

Summary:

Young woman living in Southern US during American Civil War (1860’s).

Marriage, death, hardship, etc.

Thoughts:

I liked this one. It was honest and complex. This book would never be written nowadays. For starters, instead of being one 1000-page book, it would be a trilogy (not that would be a bad thing, the book was getting a bit heavy). Secondly, they would either wimp out and make everything work out in the end, or they would make a never-ending series of follow-up books (think V.C. Andrews). Lastly, this book had complex characters, and that is a rarity.

The characters are very well written – not just the main characters, either. A lot of books have blank boring protagonists who aren’t as complex as more than half a dozen of the side-characters in GWTW. There aren’t just “good” and “bad” people in the book. Each and every character is selfish, petty, proud, loving, strong, helpless and brutal – it changes based on the situation and what is motivating them. (i.e.: just like REAL people) And the third person narrative leaves the author free to go into every person’s head and show us ten or more points of view on the same subject.

I loved Scarlett’s character, she’s great. Nasty and selfish, beautiful, strong and

self-assured, always thinking about how she can get what she wants and hurt people, but also lonely and scared. And infruriating! I’m reading it, thinking “Jesus Christ, if she would just (tell the truth/shut up/etc.) everything will work out!” I just wanted to reach into the book and smack some sense into her. Rhett’s character is also awesome, but this review is getting too long.

Being Canadian, I am blissfully ignorant when it comes to US history, so I actually did learn a few things reading this book. For example, I’m familiar with the names “General Sherman” and “Stonewall Jackson” but had no idea who they were. I also found the description of slavery and emancipation to be completely different from other things I’ve read (such as “Uncle Tom’s Cabin”) and it was intriguing to see slavery, the KKK, and freedom from a different angle. (No, I’m not a racist, fuck off)

I’ve never seen the movie, and other than knowing that Rhett doesn’t give a damn, Scarlett doesn’t want to be hungry, and tomorrow is another day, I knew zip about the story.

I enjoyed reading it because I didn’t know for sure what was going to happen next. I found I was thinking about the book when I wasn’t reading it, and staying up later to read more (much to my husband’s annoyance). And although I knew the protagonist got dumped at the end, I was still hoping that I was wrong and everything would turn out. (“maybe the movie completely changed the ending! umm yeah! that’s it!”)

Read this book. Don’t be lazy and just watch the movie instead. Read it, damn you!

"I Never Promised You A Rose Garden" - Hannah Green

2011-03-19T13:40:00.000-07:00

Summary:

Teenager gets committed to psychiatric hospital. In depth look at her illness and treatment.

Thoughts:

Overall, it was an interesting book. I found it a bit hard to follow until I got into the groove of flashbacks, fantasy world, and real life. The descriptions of the mental hospital and other patients are excellent. The explanations of why someone does something were helpful, and the actions made sense after they’d been interpreted. Also, the idea that the protagonist has to get worse before she can get better made a lot of sense. As a detached reader I totally understood it, but as a parent in the story it would be difficult to swallow.

The author gives us fascinating little glimpses into the extremely detailed fantasy world that the girl develops in her head and escapes to whenever her real life gets too hard. All these different characters, various levels and hierarchies, an entire made-up language – it’s all very cool.

It was a bit of a stretch here and there as to why she goes nuts. I mean, everyone’s childhood has a few bad spots. The realities of lapses in sanity and ‘making it on the outside’ were also brought forward well. It would be really hard to survive as an ex-mental-patient in a small town.

It had a bit of an “okay, book’s almost done, let’s wrap it up” feel at the end. Like she suddenly decided to change her ways and be normal, but there wasn’t any real concrete reason behind this. Unless I missed it, which is entirely possible.

It was an intriguing book, not really sure why I’ve heard of it, though. Maybe it was a movie or something.

"Call of the Wild" - Jack London

2011-03-19T12:18:00.000-07:00

Summary:

Farm dog sold into gold rush dog sledding in Yukon.

Thoughts:

I Wikipedia’d this book because I was surprised to find it was a “Children’s Classic.”

It’s pretty brutal, with all the in-fighting, beatings and starvation. It looks like some twit decided that because the main character is a dog, then it MUST be a book for kids. Whatever, it was a classic I hadn’t read. Laugh if you want.

I read it because it’s famous. Took me less than a day, and it was a day well spent. I was completely ignorant to the fact that dogs were used during the gold rush (‘used’ being the operative word). It’s one of those books that makes you loathe people in general.

I found the writing to be powerful, though a little simplistic, similar to the writing of “Uncle Tom’s Cabin” and I think it’s just because it was written over a hundred years ago, also similar to “UTC.” So the good guy was uber-good, and the bad guys were completely horrid. It’s also a little hard to believe that the farm dog who’s spent a lot of his life in the house lying by the fire is doing so well in such a harsh and demanding climate. Dogs on either side of him, from far less cushy backgrounds, are dropping dead from exhaustion and starvation, but he just keeps going.

It’s a good book if you’re in for some self-loathing and you have a dog to hug and apologize to after you read it. I don’t know if I’d hand this book over to my kid just yet. Maybe in a few more years.

"Confessions of a Shopaholic" - Sophie Kinsella

2011-03-19T11:42:00.000-07:00

Summary:

Young woman’s credit card debt catches up with her.

Thoughts:

I read it because I see the stupid books with the pink swirly writing and the skinny high-heeled legs everywhere. I knew there was a series of them, they have to be half-decent, right? Umm, no actually.

Really, it turned out to be a complete disappointment. I tried reading it as black humour, as kitsch, as tongue-in-cheek, as living vicariously…. Nope, nothing worked. This book is shit.

The protagonist is lazy, shallow, a liar, a compulsive spender, and prone to obsessing/panicking/day-dreaming about every aspect of her life. Someone asks her on a date, and she’s suddenly imagining their wedding day. She buys a lotto ticket, and spends the rest of the day laying out (in jaw-aching detail) how she will spend the money, and is then shocked when she doesn’t win.

The plot itself is nothing clever or new. Over and over again I guessed what was going to happen next. What do I mean “guessed”, there was no brain power involved at all. It was totally fucking obvious what was going to happen next. And despite the fact that the main character has ZERO redeeming qualities, and spends the majority of the book fucking up her life, in the last 10% of the book she gets everything she wants and all her troubles are taken care of. Total bullshit. Total cop-out. You teach your readers nothing, there is no moral to the story, no come-uppance for your completely irresponsible protagonist, who deserves to fall flat on her face.

There’s also a lot of that “thinking over every detail” crap that a lot of female writers seem to think is necessary. E.g.: “He said that. What did he mean by that? Why did he say that?? Did he mean this? Or this? Or this???!?!?!” AUUUGH!!! I have discussed this before in earlier reviews of chick-books. There is NO NEED to dissect every little comment that a character makes! We (the readers) do that already!! We don’t need our hands held along the way.

Why the fuck is this book popular? Is it because millions of women in the world are hopelessly in debt with low-paying jobs and cling to the idea that maybe one day they’ll marry a millionaire or get discovered by a modeling agency and all their money woes will go away? Their problems won’t go away. If they have a $5,000 overdraft before they win the lotto, after they win they’ll simply get a $50,000 overdraft and eat that up, too. Money does not solve problems.

Read this book if you are a brainless idiot who loves clothes and you want some new ideas for lying to people to get what you want.

"Sharp Teeth" - Toby Barlow

2011-03-16T00:32:00.000-07:00

Summary:

Werewolf gangs struggling for dominance. Sub-plot of weregirl-dogcatcher romance. Written in free verse poetry.

Thoughts:

Fuck, I couldn’t write a decent summary for the plot of this book. I made it sound like some shitty Twilighty pukefest. It’s not! This book was really well done, very sincere and original, and nothing like that horrid tween romance. And yes, it’s poetry, but it’s free verse (that means it doesn’t rhyme, lamewad) and it doesn’t get annoying or anything, in fact I think it helps to capture the emotions of the characters and the intensity of all the action.

Barlow does an excellent job on this book; I was pulled into the story right away. The different chunks of the story (e.g. the feuding werewolf gangs, the love story, the investigating cop, the dog fighting ring, the mysterious girl, the missing dog catchers) are mixed together very well. The ambushes are calculated, the fights are brutal, and the alliances are shaky at best. Barlow puts some new ideas into the tired old theme of ‘werewolf lore’ and makes it his own, he adds some excellent imagery and, yes, some poetic turns of phrase. There’s also a very well put together and touching love story thrown in, but it’s not anything sappy, it’s just genuine and well done.

Side note: I am noticing a trend here with authors kicking major ass with their first book. It’s like everything they’ve ever thought or felt gets worked on and sweated over for years, and it’s all poured into their initial literary debut, and it’s awesome. And then they either run out of ideas or sell out but still manage to spew forth a dozen more (comparatively sub-par) novels in quick succession. No offence meant to Barlow, I haven’t read any of his other books, I don’t even know if he has any others.

My one beef with this book is, unfortunately, a pretty major part of the plot. Throughout the whole story, werewolves are having these battles and ripping each other apart mercilessly. Once they’re in a fight and all ramped up, it’s even harder to get them to calm down. Okay fine. Then at the end, during the major (MAJOR) battle-to-end-all-battles, one wolf runs off (okay fine, I understand why that happens) and another, very ruthless wolf (from the OTHER GANG, the gang that is in MORTAL BATTLE with the other) chases after the deserter but doesn’t kill him. It’s so out of character. Seriously, WTF?

Conclusion: I like this book, other than the little fuck up at the end. The poetry keeps it from being just a mindless action book for guys, and the quality of the writing and the lack of suckage keeps it from being just a lame-ass vampire/werewolf-pop-sensation romance novel for girls. Read the damn book.

"Chew - Vol. One: Taster's Choice" - John Layman

2011-03-15T23:23:00.000-07:00

Summary:

Cop who gets psychic readings from everything he eats. Solves cases, uncovers conspiracies, has adventures, etc.

Thoughts:

I found this while randomly browsing my local library’s website. And I am infinitely impressed that my local library carries this graphic novel. It was so cool!

I’ve never been one for comics, but I liked this one a lot. Despite being dead tired today,

I wolfed down this little book (NPI) in less than an hour (that’s actually pretty good – I can barely string a sentence together today). I was also happy to find out there are two more books after this one.

Excellent, innovative idea for a story. The guy is fighting crime, chewing on nasty stuff, and falling for a girl with a similarly weird talent. Then you add in the cool graphics, snappy dialogue and fast-moving plot with multiple weird twists, and you’ve got a kick ass comic. Fuck, that whole last sentence sounded so cheesy. I apologize. Whatever, I’m tired.

Even if you’re totally not into comics/graphic novels (what’s the difference? I have no idea) I would really recommend you read this book. It was an intriguing idea that followed through with an awesome story. Read it! Unless you’re easily grossed out by blood, vomit, cannibalism or other harmless fun.

"No Country For Old Men" - Cormack McCarthy

2011-03-13T16:04:00.000-07:00

Summary:

Guy finds drug money. Bad guys send a professional to get it back.

Thoughts:

Recommended to me by my husband, and for once he was right. I think it’s the kind of novel that would be called “gripping” by a professional reviewer, but since I’m not one,

I won’t call it that.

I ‘read’ it as an audio book, so unfortunately I couldn’t listen to it when the kids were home, what with all the swearing and people getting their heads blown off every few pages.

I had to listen to it in bits and pieces over a number of days, and I got impatient because

I was enjoying it a lot and was eager to see how it would all turn out.

I’d been warned against Cormack McCarthy by friends, under the accusation of his writing being harsh and disturbing. And yeah fine, it is, but it’s still damn good writing. The one criticism I will give is that at times the story is a bit monotonous with the details, and I understand that he’s doing it on purpose, but it’s still monotonous (e.g.: “He picked up the bag and put in on the table and unzipped it, and then he took out the gun and he zipped the bag closed and he picked it up and put it back on the floor” - NOT a direct quote, but you get the idea).

This book bugged me, left me feeling hollow. I don’t really know if it had a moral or anything. But I would definitely recommend it. It’s a pretty short book, you can blast through it in a day or two.

"Zombie" - Joyce Carol Oates

2011-03-13T00:29:00.000-08:00

Summary:

Diary-type POV of serial killer on quest to make a zombie.

Thoughts:

This book is fucked up.

I’m kind of regretting reading it at the moment because I finished it a day or two ago and I’m still getting creepy flashbacks (to parts of the book, not parts of my life, stupid). I am really really surprised that they had this book at my quaint little small-town local library.

I think the creepiest part of the book is that it is completely plausible. It’s realistic.

There are probably thousands of nasty messed up little creeps like the main character out in the world, doing similar fucked up nasty stuff and getting away with it. The author doesn’t go over the top with unnecessarily complicated plans, and she doesn’t cop out and have him get caught or even stop by the end of the book. The guy’s plan is straight forward, and he’s careful and methodical. He’s just not a doctor, so he keeps fucking up his attempts.

Oates also does an excellent job of using the main character’s voice. Short little sentences, repetition, ALL CAPS, tons of swearing, quick scratchy drawings, random little paranoid statements, etc.

This book makes me afraid to leave my house. Or let my kids leave the house. Or let my husband leave the house. It makes me worry. It makes me scrutinize and second-guess every strange car and pedestrian I see. I am thoroughly freaked out.

I don’t know if you should read this book or not.

"The Postman Always Rings Twice" - James Cain

2011-03-01T14:24:00.000-08:00

Summary:

Drifter has affair with a married woman and then they plot her husband’s murder.

Thoughts:

I read it because it was famous. It was okay. I researched it a bit afterwards and it’s one of those pioneering novels that was banned in a few places and had a style or subject that was new at the time (1930’s). Unfortunately, reading it from the standpoint of someone born 50 years after it was published, it wasn’t shocking or new.

I was a little annoyed at the complexity behind the murder plots. Why do they always have to make it so convoluted? I admit, I’ve never tried to kill anyone, but I just don’t see why you need an elaborate plan. Multiple steps, and if even one goes wrong then you’re screwed. Simple and ‘to the point’ seems better to me.

I had a bit of trouble making sense of what was going on sometimes due to the old-fashioned slang and the way the main character would just randomly decide to do something for no reason. I also found the protagonist’s love interest annoying and flakey.

It’s kind of cool to see that the title of the book really has nothing to do with the story. I had to Google that, too, and got a few different answers, but in almost all of them the title was a separate idea the author just tacked on to the novel.

The ending seemed a little dumb, almost like a P.S.A. about how “crime doesn’t pay”.

"Birds of a Feather" - Lynda Johns

2011-02-26T18:32:00.000-08:00

Summary:

Memoirs of a wild bird rehabber.

Thoughts:

After reading this book, you will need to wash your hands because they will be dripping with syrup. Oh my fucking god what an insipid, self-congratulating, sappy book. I actually had to take a break from reading it for a few days because I couldn’t take it anymore. I did eventually finish it, but it was like eating an overly sweet cake, coated with icing and sprinkles and chocolate sauce, and then washing it down with a tall glass of honey.

I must explain that it was not the content of the book that I disliked. I have worked at wildlife shelters. I have spent countless hours feeding baby birds and mammals, and cleaning/medicating various injured wildlife, and I loved it, and I think it’s a very worthy cause. My problem with this book is the delivery and style of writing. Some people help animals (or people, for that matter) because it’s the right thing to do. Other people do it because they want a big pat on the back from everyone around them.

This book is written so that it puts a big spotlight on the author as being this heroic saint who tirelessly gives all her energy over to her cause. For example, she doesn’t just find a hurt mouse and rehab it for a day. No, no! She leaps from her car, catches it up in her hands and hugs it to her chest, where it immediately snuggles into the warmth of her palm, its eyes shining with love and relief. When a bird in her house chirps for food, she drops everything and races to refill its bowl, because God forbid the bird should have to wait 5 minutes while she finishes her lunch. She even puts excerpts of fan mail throughout the book, of people congratulating her on how great she is. Fuck off and get off your self-made pedestal, lady, before you fall and break your fucking neck!

She also gives a dangerous amount of information to her readers. She tells you where she found the bird, how she caught it, how she transported it, what kind of enclosure she kept it in, what and how she fed it, etc. She basically writes a How-To for rehabbing, which sounds like a good idea, but it’s dangerous. This is why we get people phoning the shelters I’ve worked at saying that they’ve had the pigeon for a week and they’ve been feeding it peanut butter and popcorn twice a day, but it’s getting weaker, and can they bring it in now?

The writing itself is decent; she is good at describing the beauty in nature. She does this a bit more than I would like, so I skimmed over a few parts. Her descriptions of the birds’ personalities were entertaining, but she always takes it a few steps too far, assuming she knows exactly what each bird is thinking.

Due to the sheer amount of fan mail she included in the book, I have to conclude that there are a large number of people who think she’s great, so maybe you’re one of them and you are offended by my review and think I’m heartless and cruel. Whatever. Think what you want. I think the majority of her fans are laypeople who have either never worked at a wildlife shelter, or think that they deserve a medal because once when their cat mauled a robin, they kept it in a bird cage and fed it worms for 2 days before it died. (“I’m a rehabber, too! I love animals! And when I grow up I want to be a vet!! Teehee!”)

"These is My Words" - Nancy Turner

2011-02-26T17:38:00.000-08:00

Summary:

Diary POV of woman in late 1800’s Arizona. Youth, marriage, kids, hardship, etc.

Thoughts:

I picked this one up at the library because the title grated on my nerves. I am anal-retentive to the extreme when it comes to spelling, grammar and punctuation (and hypocritical, too, since I’m sure there are a lot of mistakes in this blog). I picked it up in disgust, thinking “ugh! What an awful title!” and I don’t even know why I decided to take it home. It was the last one out of the pile I got that day that I read, I think because I was sure I would dislike it.

I haven’t cried at a book since I read “The Pigman” in Grade 7. This book made me cry.

The writing is very endearing and honest without being sappy or formulaic, and the story is interesting and (to use a cliché) ‘action-packed’. There are a lot of very touching, poetic moments, as well as some raw, harsh, emotional bits, but it all fits together very well.

The only real fuck up with the story is that the summary on the back of the book tells you it’s a love story between the protagonist and this one guy. I had read through a good chunk of the book before I re-read the summary, and then I kind of went “oh shit, she ends up with him??” and it kind of took some of the fun out of it for me, because it’s not completely obvious she would end up with him right away and I was having fun wondering about it.

The diary style lends to the story nicely because you can read short little chunks here and there (good for reading at work or when you’re otherwise going to get called away to do something) and it also allows for a personal aspect, where the main character can describe her thoughts and it doesn’t come across as boring crap. I could identify with her feelings, for example, when she writes one day that she loves her husband more than anything, and then a day later she’s writing that she hates him and wishes she never married him. Basically, she describes the highs and lows of her emotions without boring us to death like so many other chick books do. And then she’ll throw in a gun fight or a fire to punch up the energy level again.

The main character does have a bit of the low-self-esteem pitfall that a lot of female characters are written with, but she doesn’t let it dominate her thoughts, and she readily mentions other strengths she’s aware she has. The author also successfully introduces us to a shitload of characters without tripping us up with trying to remember who’s who.

I thought this book was great. Touching, exciting, and heart-breaking all at once.

I’m usually not into that kind of stuff, but this book is good.

"The Bell Jar" - Sylvia Plath

2011-02-15T14:31:00.000-08:00

Summary:

Young woman doesn’t fit in at school or at home, can’t decide on a career, feels trapped, etc. Gets committed to a mental hospital after a few suicide attempts.

Thoughts:

So I read this for the same reason that everyone reads it: because she committed suicide about a month after it was published. It’s also her only novel, and a lot of it is based on/mirrors her life.

You can definitely tell that Plath is a poet. The writing is fluid and full of imagery. The bit about the fig tree of her potential futures shriveling up and dying was excellent. It’s also a bit hard to follow where the author’s going sometimes, it’s like she’s floating across the ocean with no particular destination in mind. (I get the same problem with Michael Ondaajte, another poet). I suppose it’s hard to get the beautiful, descriptive poetic side without also getting the dreamy, wandering poetic side, too.

The book is rather alarming when you figure out that the protagonist is a young female writer who tries to kill herself. It’s upsetting, you’re reading it thinking “why the hell didn’t her editor call her a doctor or something?” But then, obviously, the majority of writers don’t do what they are writing about. If editors took all manuscripts as the gospel truth, a lot of authors would be in prison for murder attempts and the like. But still, hindsight is 20/20, and this book stands out as a flashing *CRY FOR HELP* beacon.

The plot kind of meanders along. She goes here, she’s unhappy. She goes there, she meets these people she doesn’t really like, she’s unhappy. She goes with some other people somewhere else, she’s still unhappy, then she goes home, where she’s unhappy. Then she tries to kill herself a few times, so she gets some therapy, then she sits around at home. She’s still unhappy so then she tries to kill herself again, then she gets some more therapy. This lackadaisical quality to the plot also goes with the idea that it parallels the author’s own life. Like she’s describing things that have happened to her (I looked it up, she did use a lot of her own experiences in the book) but she’s describing them as they happened, literally, instead of looking at what would make a more complete and comprehensive story.

Whatever, I’m making out like I didn’t like this book, but I actually did. It was like drinking a large, warm mug of heavy cream (as opposed to shit writers, where it’s like drinking toilet water out of a sippy cup). It’s really too bad that she only wrote the one novel.
I’ll have to look up some more of her poetry.

"Cyrano de Bergerac" - Edmond Rostand

2011-02-15T11:06:00.000-08:00

Summary: (it’s a Play)

Guy in the 1600’s is in love, but won’t act on it because he’s self-conscious about his big nose. He gets the opportunity to express how he feels by writing the girl love letters that she thinks are from someone else.

Thoughts:

Yes, it’s where the Steve Martin movie “Roxanne” got its material. Ok, shut up.

The idea that this book has a ColesNotes is a little pathetic, but I guess there are a lot of stupid people in the world. Other than the ‘language barrier’ in place due to the fact that this was written in the 1800’s and set in the 1600’s, this book is very engaging. I kind of had to hiccup along, looking up old-fashioned words at the back of the book as I went, but that can’t be helped.

The main character is instantly likeable for his quick wit and skill with a sword. It’s kind of a neat idea that although he can kick ass quite easily, he would rather try to joke his way out of a violent situation if possible. The unrequited love aspect was well put together, you really find yourself hurting for this poor guy. However, since it didn’t interest me, I have to admit I kind of let the political/battle aspects of the story fly over my head.

The ending is very well done, heart-breaking and beautiful. The woman is written in such a positive light that you can’t even hate her for how everything turns out.

Although your friends will give you a hard time for reading this (I know mine did) and although you’ve already seen the 80’s movie-version (or perhaps a better version – it is a play, after all) you should still read it. You can blast through it in a couple of days and then go back to reading “Twilight” for the forty-second time.

"The Gargoyle" - Andrew Davidson

2011-02-15T09:57:00.000-08:00

Summary:

Guy in Burn Ward is visited by a mental patient who insists they were lovers in several previous lives. She tells him stories as he recovers.

Thoughts:

Beautifully written book. It switches around, sometimes charming and poetic, at other times jarring and almost raunchy. It’s easy to ‘lose yourself’ in this book, getting wrapped up in the different stories the girl tells the protagonist, and watching their relationship grow. The relationship doesn’t just grow ‘up and out’, like the leaves of a tree, as they get to know each other in the hospital, but also ‘down’, like the roots of a tree, as she fills in their background and history.

Davidson does a good job of moving us around between ‘before the accident’, ‘in the hospital’, and all the different stories the woman tells the main character. A lot of authors end up confusing their readers when they jump around to different times and places with flashbacks, etc. but this guy did a good job. Each vingette of a past love between the two main characters could stand alone as its own story, and they’re also all different from each other so it doesn’t feel redundant. Davidson also weaves all the various stories together, putting little pieces from one into another, it’s very cool. The descriptions of the guy’s burn treatments were (sorry) fascinating. Gross, too, obviously.

The protagonist goes through some good character development as the novel progresses, going from conceited prick to hesitant and insecure lonely guy. It felt a lot more real that the character was flawed. Just because he was badly injured and survived doesn’t mean that he became some kind of saint or born-again. He was a bastard before the accident, and he was a bastard after it. But the woman’s love and friendship helped to change that (gah, that sounds really corny).

So, it’s a great book, I think you’ll like it, I think you should read it. I don’t know you, but still.

"Breakfast of Champions" - Kurt Vonnegut Jr.

2011-02-14T16:13:00.000-08:00

Summary:

2 interwoven stories:

Story 1: Author travels to an art convention to give the keynote address.

Story 2: Car salesman thinks book by author from Story 1 (told from POV of God) is true. Goes nuts.

Thoughts:

I really didn’t know what was going on through most of this book, but it was fun to read. The author was constantly going off on little tangents about the lives of people in the story, or ideas the main characters have, or drawing us pictures, or discussing other things we might need to know. Some of my favourite passages involved descriptions of (weird, interesting, thought-provoking) sci-fi books that the main character has written.

I smiled through a lot of the book. As a whole, though, as a book, I don’t know if it all really works. When it came time to write the plot summary for this review, I had to Wikipedia the book because I couldn’t really remember what it was about, exactly. I remember that it was weird and entertaining, but the plot? Hmm… yeah… umm…

I think you have to be just the right kind of person to enjoy a book like this. My sister loves Vonnegut, but she’s more than a little eccentric. My dad, on the other hand, would probably hate it.

"Wicked" - Gregory Maguire

2011-02-14T15:52:00.000-08:00

Summary:

Autobiography of the Wicked Witch of the West from “The Wizard of Oz”.

Thoughts:

The idea of seeing “The Wizard of Oz” from the bad guy’s POV had never occurred to me before. And although the Wicked Witch is totally evil, etc., I’d never stopped to wonder why she’s so mean. In this book we follow the witch from birth all the way through school and adolescence, until her death at the hands of Dorothy. We get to know her, and even to like and understand her.

Maguire weaves an interesting story, showing us that the witch is really just different and misunderstood, an unpopular outcast. He explains a lot of things from “The Wizard of Oz” in a completely different light, as well as adding a lot of extra stuff, fleshing out the Land of Oz more completely. It’s really quite cool. Maguire also had a thought-provoking sub-plot about animal rights (real rights, like voting and stuff) and caste systems.

By the end of the story, I disliked Dorothy and her friends, and wanted the Witch to win.

I liked this book very much and eagerly read a few of the others by the same author. They were ‘okay’ but disappointing in comparison. “Wicked” is definitely his best.

"The Lovely Bones" - Alice Sebold

2011-02-14T15:42:00.000-08:00

Summary:

Search for a child-killer told from the POV of the dead kid.

Thoughts:

Ugh ugh ugh. This book gave me the creeps. I got half-way through it and I put it down because, as a parent, it was too upsetting to read. Then I had to go watch TV because I couldn’t sleep. I wasn’t planning on finishing it, but then I read the back of the book, where it basically says “You’re going to get half-way through this book and feel awful. But keep reading, it gets better and ends really well.” How can I argue with that, right? So I finished it. I wouldn’t really say it ended well, it didn’t give me much closure. It kind of went off in a few different, weird directions.

Not sure why this book is so famous. The writing is okay, nothing amazing. And obviously it’s an interesting idea to do the book from the dead girl’s POV. But as a whole it’s really quite depressing (yes, I know, ‘duh’) to see how this one incident has transformed not only her family, but the whole town. People who didn’t even really know her are affected by her death. It’s a bit of a cop out at the end when the killer kind of ‘gets what he deserves’. It would have been more realistic (and gone with the rest of the story better) if the guy had gotten away completely.

"The Wedding" - Nicholas Sparks

2011-02-11T22:04:00.000-08:00

Summary:

Man tries to make up for neglecting his wife for decades by planning his daughter’s wedding.

Thoughts:

What a load of shite. I seriously kept looking at the cover and checking that the author’s name was Nicholas and not Nicole or Nicola. Then I’d recheck the photo on the back flap and, yep okay, definitely looks like a guy. Well, regardless of the gender of the author, this was a horrid book.

Not only was it sappy and formulaic like a lot of romantic novels, not only did we spend entirely too much time in the main character’s wimpy, doubting head, not only all that, but we also had the unfortunate job of visiting an old man at an old folk’s home so he could give the protagonist marital advice and remind him (repeatedly) of his own love story. (You know? The best-seller? “The Notebook”? Remember??)

The opener of the book, and instigator for the entire plot, was completely unrealistic and annoying. What kind of wife lets her husband get away with not being romantic at all for YEARS AND YEARS AND YEARS, and then cries herself to sleep, leaves town, and consults with her children about leaving him because he forgot their anniversary? It’s ridiculous!

Whatever. I suppose that if you loved “The Notebook” and re-read it fifty times, (always in tears) you might like to read another book by the same guy, in which he repeatedly mentions characters, locations and whole scenes from “The Notebook”. And I mean that literally: They are constantly talking about Noah and Allie and their undying love, etc.
Ugh, it's embarrassing that Sparks is trying to get away with this. It's like when famous people do cameos in shitty movies to boost sales. I know he's called it a 'sequel', but it's really not. It's just a half-assed story that keeps flashing back to his more successful book.

"The Mermaid Chair" - Sue Monk Kid

2011-02-11T16:11:00.000-08:00

Summary:

Old lady cuts off her finger. Middle-aged daughter comes to look after her and find out why. During her stay she has an affair with a priest, deals with the death of her father, and restarts her art hobby.

Thoughts:

Yeah. Not sure why I read this one. Or to be more specific, I’m not sure why I bothered to finish it. I’d read “The Secret Life of Bees” which is pretty good. The library had “Mermaid Chair” as an audio-book, so I thought it was worth a try. Ugh. Yuck. No. Did not enjoy it at all. I think I only finished it because it was an audio-book, so I could ‘read’ it passively while I did other things. If it had been a book in my hands, I probably would have put it down.

Why would I want to read about a woman in her 40’s who feels trapped by her husband and kids, and randomly decides to start screwing around with a priest and painting pictures when she’s supposed to be looking after her mentally-unstable mother? She obviously does a pretty piss-poor job looking after her, considering that her mom has the opportunity to cut off another finger half-way through the novel.

The fact that the title of the book refers to some bit part about her father’s death seemed kind of stupid. It wasn’t the pinnacle of the story, but I didn’t know that, so whenever they mentioned the chair, my ears would prick up, like “oh, this must be important”. In the end it turned out not to be that essential to the main character’s story. I think the author chose it as the title as a cheap ploy to catch people's interest.

These mid-life-coming-of-age women stories seem to be gaining in popularity, no doubt due to aging Baby Boomers and the high divorce rate in North America. It’s understandable, since Boomers are raising their daughters to think they can do anything and be anything, that the Boomers themselves are now stopping and saying “hey, wait a minute…” and then trying to make up for years of being bored housewives. Maybe some middle-aged women will be able to live vicariously through this book, and then not fuck off and leave their families. Maybe they will rebel by insisting that their husbands do the laundry or some other ‘female’ chore, and command respect without committing adultery.

If you’re over 40 and have grown kids and a loving husband, but feel ‘trapped’ by them all, like you haven’t had a chance to live your life, you will probably enjoy this book. I didn’t.

"Memoirs of a Geisha" - Arthur Golden

2011-02-09T21:29:00.000-08:00

Summary:

Life and times of a young Japanese girl in the 1940’s who becomes a geisha.

Thoughts:

I’ve been told by a number of people that they couldn’t believe this book was written by a man. Why, exactly, I’m not sure. The guy obviously did a lot of research and interviewed a bunch of geishas. Why wouldn’t he be able to accurately describe what it was like and how a woman might feel?

Golden is a pretty decent writer. He moves the story along nicely, explaining various old customs without sounding like a textbook, but he uses a few too many metaphors and similes. I understand that the main character is Japanese and that they are seen as quite poetic by Western standards, but I felt like I was drowning in metaphors by the end of the book. I actually started counting them – 2 to 3 per page. Don’t get me wrong, they were beautiful. The girl comparing her fragile future to a twig in the breeze or a pebble in a stream or whatever, yes they were very nice. They were just so numerous that they kind of started to run together like….. hmm lets think of a good simile here… like rain on a sidewalk chalk drawing. Hmm nope, that one sucked. Ahh well.

The story of girls being sold by their parents into prostitution and geisha..hood was pretty harsh, but it happened so we should know about it. I was pretty ignorant about what is involved in becoming a geisha and also how she makes her living. Interesting stuff. And although the whole thing seems foreign, it’s not that different from the way some Western women arrange their lives - it’s just a bit more structured.

i.e.: The protagonist describes meeting an American woman at a party who has come with a wealthy man who is several decades older than her. The American is shocked with the geisha, seeing her as a prostitute, not realizing that she herself is also a ‘kept woman’.

I was more than a little miffed about the pedestal that all the male characters were thrust upon. The main character’s love interest is a guy she met for less than five minutes who is a good 30 years older than her, but her entire life is focused on becoming a geisha so that she can become his lover. Apparently her life is shit unless she can be with this specific guy, the clichéd “I am nothing without my boyfriend” routine. (Yes, I understand that in the 1940’s in Japan a geisha really did need a man to pay for everything in order to keep her future comfortable. I can still hate it, though.)

The protagonist also has a little bit of the low self-esteem issue that was so rampant in the Twilight and Hunger Games books. She is constantly being told that she is beautiful and remarkable, but she won’t believe it. It’s grating on the nerves.

All in all, the book is good. The movie (obviously) left a lot of stuff out. The author is able to let us into the main character’s head without boring us to death, and the plot moves along at a good pace.

"Drop Dead Beautiful" - Jackie Collins

2011-02-09T20:47:00.000-08:00

Summary: Multiple (MULTIPLE) plots and subplots, such as:

Someone opens a casino resort while flashing back to the deaths of family members.

Someone else goes to meet an internet date and ends up tied up in a cabin in the woods.

Someone else has an affair with the hired help because her husband is a control freak.

Someone else is still fantasizing over a one-night-stand from several years before.

Someone else is going to rob a store but then chickens out.

Someone else has a big birthday dinner.

Someone else catches an STD from a groupie.

Thoughts:

So, this was like a crass version of a Danielle Steele novel. It’s like Danielle Steele in that the author has pumped out a few zillion books, all of them on the same subject, and she is a best-seller, for no conceivable reason. While Steele writes sappy love stories, Collins goes more for racy sex’n’gangsters soap operas.

Big things are happening everywhere in this book, and the main character (who I’m guessing I’m supposed to admire because she’s ‘gutsy’) is strutting about kickin’ ass and git’n’er done. Guuuuh. Fucking kill me now. Please. This is not literature, this is barely even writing. I doubt Collins even needs to do a second draft. There is no art or poetry to her writing. It’s like listening to a gangster’s wife at the nail salon as she drones on about the latest gossip while cracking her gum: “And then Vinnie came in and caught Denise with Vito, so he shot him and fucked her, and then Tony heard about it, and he…”

Although this book didn’t say anything about being ‘Part 5’ of a series of books, I felt like I was walking in on the middle of a story. The characters are constantly thinking or talking about past events, using veiled comments that barely make sense unless you’ve read the previous 10 books Collins has written. It felt like an ever-expanding web of characters (and therefore book series) was being laid out before me, like they were trying to sell me her other novels. I have no intention of reading the rest of her books, but maybe other people fall for this.

"The Book of Flying" - Keith Miller

2011-02-09T17:58:00.000-08:00

Summary:

Librarian who is in love with an (actual) angel goes on a quest to earn a set of wings so he can be with her. Has various adventures along the way.

Thoughts:

I loved this book. Loved it! And I usually hate sci-fi/fantasy books. I tried to get my husband and a few of my friends to read it and no one would even open it. I don’t know what that is about, I thought the book was great fun.

The main character meets all sorts of interesting individuals on his journey, and each one pushes him out of his comfort zone and teaches him something new. He learns to steal, to argue, to make alliances, to fuck, and to fight for what he wants. So as the story progresses, he becomes more and more capable, adding each of his new experiences to his character. Most of the situations he finds himself in are vaguely familiar to the reader, but with intriguing twists. I truly didn’t see where most of the plots were headed. The writing itself is excellent. Lots of nice big words and turns of phrase. A good writer.

I found this book on the $1 discount table at Chapters. I thought it was excellent. So much so that I tried to contact the author to let him know (especially since it was his first book, and it had ended up in the $1 bin, poor guy). Unfortunately I was unable to reach him, either through a website of his or through his publisher.

So here we are: Keith Miller, I think you’ve written a damn good book.

"Somebody Else's Daughter" - Elizabeth Brundage

2011-02-09T16:59:00.000-08:00

Summary:

Baby given up by crackhead parents to rich couple. Years later biological father becomes a teacher in daughter’s highschool. Everyone in the nice rich neighbourhood has a secret. These various secrets start becoming common knowledge as the story progresses.

Thoughts:

I liked this book. Lots of stuff happens, a lot of it unexpected. It also has a lot of messy ‘what would I do in that situation?’ kind of moments. There’s a little too much coincidence, but I suppose in a small town everyone’s pasts could be intermingled. It’s also, unfortunately, one of those books where everyone is having an affair with another person from the community. Maybe I’m naive, but I just don’t think that many people are out there having affairs with their neighbours.

About three-quarters through the book, the action ramps up and doesn’t stop until the story ends. It actually ramps up a little too much. Like as if the author was given a maximum page limit, and she kind of said “aww fuck, I’m going to run out of room!” and just started blasting each page with 2 or 3 major plot developments. She does a good job of mixing all the stories and secrets together, but as I said before, a few parts are too coincidental to be believable.

The opening ten pages of this book are completely flawless and awesome. I’m pretty sure it was a short stand-alone piece that Brundage wrote, and then years later she fleshed out the rest of the book around it. Even if you don’t want to read the rest of the book (and it’s highly readable, I would recommend it) at least read the opener.

"Winkie" - Clifford Chase

2011-02-09T16:31:00.000-08:00

Summary:

Story told from the POV of a stuffed teddy bear charged with murder.

Thoughts:

Really awesome idea for a book. A teddy bear found at a crime scene is handcuffed, taken into custody and put on trial for murder. Unfortunately, the idea was not well executed

(no pun intended).

This book DRAGGED. Big time. It was a chore to finish. Although there were some interesting parts, such as when Winkie became conscious, how he moved around, and how he ‘played along’ for the police, there were also a lot of parts that were really fucking boring. It also made me feel guilty about growing up and not playing with my dolls anymore (I get a similar feeling when I watch “Toy Story 3”). All the parts about Winkie and his daughter, Baby Winkie, were quite neat. Chase should have concentrated more on that story, which was relatively brief.

It was a little weird (and pointless) that the author showed up in the book. Winkie had been his bear, so he put himself in the story as a young child, and then as an adult to testify for him at this trial. I didn’t see the point of it.

I’ve kept this book because I like the cover and it makes a good conversation piece.

You couldn’t pay me to read it again.