last textbook review for now, but seriously - i love love love my readers' advisory textbooks!!
this one is focusing on genre fiction, rather than the last textbook review for now, but seriously - i love love love my readers' advisory textbooks!!
this one is focusing on genre fiction, rather than the process of readers' advisory, so for all you bookloving people who are not or are not planning to become librarians, this one might be even more fun for you than the other joyce saricks book i am in love with.
this one basically just identifies the different genres that exist, and then gives nice short essays about "why people like these books", or "appeal factors", if you are a librarian. so even if you; the librarian, the bookseller, the curious reader, do not personally like a particular genre, this book tells you why other people are drawn to them so you can identify other books with the same qualities, even in other genres which results in crossover appeal which will open even more doors to the book-seeker and if that doesn't make you hard, you are no booknerd, my friend.
in class, dr chelton was always talking about libraries that had special "readers' advisory corners" where the staff would collect all the books like this and things like genreflecting and detecting women and other awesome r/a tools, and people could just go and dork out at their leisure and learn about tons of new authors without having to ask for help. this sounds like a dream to me. in my head, i picture it like a windowseat with peach seat cushions and little like curtainy things that give the impression of seclusion. also, there would be lemonade. (when i was about 13, we moved into a house that we had built for us, and i was promised a windowseat, but either the builders forgot to build it or my parents forgot their promise to me. i was also promised a unicorn mural on the wall, but that may have been my brother's fault for not actually doing it. i am still bitter about the windowseat. even though my dad put this wooden chest thing in front of the window that had a padded cushion on it - it was not the same as a windowseat) but so that's what i imagine in these mythical libraries that are apparently all over long island. i also picture this song playing while i curl up with these textbooks in my imaginary windowseat.
"a collection is an accumulation of past decisions" *
if you don't see the beauty in that statement, you probably won't give a shit about this book.
peo"a collection is an accumulation of past decisions" *
if you don't see the beauty in that statement, you probably won't give a shit about this book.
people on goodreads.com don't seem to like this book very much. and i don't know if it is just because it is a textbook, and who but a total nerd would love a textbook, or if it is a genuine dislike for the information or layout or whatever. me, i like it, and i feel like i learned a lot from this class, and this is the first semester of grad school where i feel like both my classes have practical applications that make me excited about the book business again.
now, i have been running the fiction department at my store for about 10 years, and a lot of the material in here is stuff i have been doing already, without any guidance. but it is important stuff, if you are going to take book-matters seriously. the book takes the concept of a collection as a whole: building, protecting, managing, tracking usage, discarding; and goes into very clear detail about all of these aspects.if you do care about having a solid collection, there is some really useful information here. there is a bunch of basic shit, too, that you will probably pick up as you go along in the field, like i did, but having it all together in one book as a reference tool is helpful.
and of course, everything i know, i know from a bookstore perspective.libraries are completely different, so the parts about budgets and administration and bulk orders through vendors is all stuff i don't do now, but is stuff i will have to know about if i can ever bear to peel myself away from the job and the "collection" i have now. because i treat the section as though it is an living extension of me, and i always want it to look good and be healthy (i.e. - have more "good" books than "junk") but at the same time, it has to be "productive" as i recently had to learn.it is a tale i would call "triumph of the will", but that title has already been sullied.
if you have heard me bitching about this elsewhere, i apologize for repeating myself, but ima say it again here, because it is applicable and basically this book/class saved the day for books everywhere. or at least at my store.
and i will try to be brief.
basically, it comes down to the fact that i have had a pretty nice reign as fiction queen all these years. i am not the buyer, per se, but i have been able to get whatever i want into the store, because the buyer trusts me because i make a ton of money for the store - more than any fiction department in the country. so whether it is print on demand titles, or goodreads.com authors that no one is coming into the store specifically to find, or very small publishers or obscure world lit - i have been able to order it and trust that it will come in, and that i can make it sell through displays and whatnot. i also like to keep a stable of backlist higher-lit fiction that maybe doesn't move as quickly as some of the other stuff, but is important for the prestige of the section, and the strength of the "collection".(because i do view it as a collection - as an archive - as a representation of literature through the ages not as a place where people can come to buy books for the beach) so - i always have three copies of every robert coover book, 2 or 3 each of stanley elkin, john barth, harry mathews etc - even people i don't like or haven't read, but these "types" of post-moderny fiction writers that maybe aren't as popular as they once were, but goldangit they should still be there.
so but now with nook and economy and our store having been "overextended" for years, they finally came knocking. and they handed me a list that was 44 pages long. (i know, because i have it right here - and that is just general fiction, not poetry, mystery, romance, westerns, sci-fi - those were separate lists) and they wanted me to return all of it, claiming they were books that hadn't sold in a year - some of which we had been modeled for, but no longer were, and some (many) that were books i had brought in myself for the benefit of the book-buying world - like several of those coovers et.al. i like people to have options. people do not want options, they want twilight. so i tried to sweet talk, and got very practical, semi-sympathetic refusals. so there were tears and vomiting and general bad feelings. and i returned a lot of it - stuff i didn't care about, but that still left me with a bunch of titles i could not bear to send back: dalkey and nyrb titles, hesperus and melville house. and i despaired and despaired and found a couple of loopholes (some titles hadn't even been in the store for a year, so to me, they didn't count as "deadstock", and some had sold one or two copies which was enough to save them, technically.) but it was still bleak.
but then i got creative.
and i applied some tactics i learned in this class, and i was able to save many books just by displaying them with a "last chance" sign (and yes, i bought a bunch myself, as several of you goodreads.com book-recipients know, and other book-loving staff bought a bunch so there was some "cheating") but the important part is that now they are saying i can keep whatever is left (and since the ones that sold, sold, i am going to order in more copies and use sales as a justification and i would like to see them try and stop me!
now they are saying, "yeah don't return these, i guess you know best"
duh.
don't tell me how to raise my child.
and that story was not intended to be just me patting myself on the back and saying how heroic i am, (although feel free to create a mythology - a lore- around me) it's just illustrating that this shit matters. if you want to move books, in a library or a bookstore, people have to see them. i thought that names like barry unsworth and penelope fitzgerald would be enough for them to sell on their own, but i am learning that is no longer the case. frequently people get their book information from subway ads or what their friends are reading (and you goodreaders are of course major exceptions, because you mostly are aware of a range of books) but the public - they need to know their options and you can do that by highlighting the collection however you can.
if you are going to be in this business, this is important shit. it is not always going to be fun shit, but you gotta learn it. collection development policies, censorship issues, tailoring the collection to the community, deselection (shudder) - it's all part of the world of books, and it does matter.
i kind of regret that i only rented this book from chegg. i knew i was going to want to keep my r/a textbooks, but i rented the ones for this class, and now i kind of want this one back. (i do not want the digital licensing book back, though)
oh, and sorry for all the ranting/rambling. i have this passion for books, see...
*that is not a quote from the book, that is from my professor, dr. chelton.
gather round chilluns - it is that time of year, where i get to review textbooks!! i will only do one today, because i do not want to overstimulate yogather round chilluns - it is that time of year, where i get to review textbooks!! i will only do one today, because i do not want to overstimulate your excitement-panels, but seriously - this book is so much fun, i can hardly stand it!! it's probably not much fun if you don't love books, but for me, it is a total curl-up-on-the-body-pillow funtime read. it should be required reading for anyone who wants to talk about books on this website or amongst friends or to strangers on the subway - or wherever you do your best book-talking.
it has everything: the r/a interview, articulating appeal factors, promoting the collection, highlighting unknown titles, book talks and book lists, topics like "differentiating between hard and soft-edged suspense"; all the shit i nerdily love!
readers' advisory is by far the most fun thing in all of library school; it is like being a book detective or a book matchmaker - setting people up on blind dates with books and hoping they find a life together (well, in a library setting, i suppose i would hope they find a two-week period of happiness together and then - a painful severance). and it is the hardest class to get into because the demand is so great, and it is not offered every semester, and it ends up being like a book club, but with papers, and rarely any wine. and although i complained about a lot of the books i had to read for the class, i still feel like i learned a lot about genre fiction (which is the other textbook - stay tuned!)
but so my professor, the reigning queen of all readers' advisory says this book is flawed because it does not go into enough about indirect readers' advisory through merchandising and effective displays, but shhhh!! that is my ace in the hole, the gladiola in my back pocket - displays are the only thing in this world i am truly good at, and someday when i myself am the queen of all readers' advisory, it will be because of this advantage i have from my years of retail servitude. and the book does go into that enough, i think. shit like that is more intuitive - you either know what you are doing, or you don't. but i know how to move books. i can make really good displays to attract the peepul with colors and covers and proximity and subliminal connections (and as ariel would tell me - bears)
and i don't want joyce g. saricks giving away the secrets. yet. when my unauthorized biography comes out, then you will all know the secrets. until then - this book should suffice.
many people did not want me to read this book.they tried to save me. but this was myi have said it before and i will say it again: junkies are boring.
many people did not want me to read this book.they tried to save me. but this was my very last book for my reader's advisory class: the memoir,and i was so hoping to go out on a good note, me in my post-winter's bone rut. so i took a turn through the memoir section, and they seemed to fall into a couple of broad categories:
i'm drunk:
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i can't keep my legs together:
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i'm drunk and i can't keep my legs together:
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i have overcome some awful illness: [image][image][image]
i have lived in an area of current geographical trendiness:
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the above topics are kind of tedious, to me. and russell brand came to the store for a reading for this book,and he was funny and energetic and freakishly tall, and he blazed through the store like some sequined crazy-storm, grabbing and kissing every lady in his path.
but this? i was so bored with it that i spend much of mother's day morning discovering and mockingly voting for greg's early fossilized reviews. do join me!
while i am not as militantly anti-sex as others i have encountered, reading about other people's sex lives is, ultimately, boring. and i am so desensitized to exploits, that nothing is shocking anymore. when i was in high school,i confess, i read both the led zeppelin book and the doors book. after you read about robert plant sticking a fish in some groupie's...regions.. russell brand's dropping trou atop a van is almost pedestrian as a "sexual" act. oh no, he got locked outside his apartment naked??after spitting on a girl and forcing her out of his place?? i am barely awake at how hilarious that is...
allow me to relate a personal anecdote. many years ago, i was hanging out at the apartment of a straight but platonic male friend. we had hung out maybe twice before, but this night, he went into the bathroom and when he emerged, it was in full drag - wig, fishnets, corset, heels, and he said, "would you mind tying me up?" and i didn't even pause - i processed it immediately as "okay, this is his thing". so i did it and we just chatted the rest of the night, but he was trussed on his stomach on the floor. in less-platonic situations i have always amicably responded to requests that will go here unnamed, but i'm a pretty easygoing lady overall; i just don't care enough to be shocked by people's kinks.russell brand's kink is that he likes girls with big boobs, which i don't think is uncommon among men ,if the magazine rack at "porn deli" tells me anything.
"yeah, but karen, he reeeeally likes girls with big boobs". yeah, no, i get it, but that's hardly shocking, innit? this book is basically "then i did some heroin and shagged a load of birds". with about that much detail. not that i want a lot of detail of his techniques, but that is one of the big failings of this book - no closure, just gloss. there is a story in here about him having these two big african snails that he kept as pets until he got bored and left them in a hotel room. then he gets a call from the rspca. and then... that's it. no end of story. he mentions having a mouse living in his hair for a time, but then just more about his naked ambition to be famous and some glossing over of "and then i took drugs and went to a prostitute. or ten."
let me sum it up: russell brand wants attention - he wants to be famous, he lacks impulse control and behaves like a toddler most of the time, giving in to every temptation and throwing tantrums like refusing to put his feet down from the seat in front of him on an airplane, sex, drugs, "rebellion" that you would expect from any teenaged white frat boy from connecticut, except he's grown and thinks he is being funny enough to warrant fame, heroin, wank wank, pot, sex, boobs, MTV, wank, entitlement, exploitation, the end.
sorry, darling, not this time.
edit: right, reading other reviews of this i was reminded of something else i wanted to bitch about. another big, subversive thing he did?? he introduced his drug dealer to kylie minogue (on september 12, 2001, while dressed as osama bin laden and on crack, so he gets points for overkill, sure)and DO YOU KNOW WHAT HAPPENED?? THE BIG EXPLOSIVE THING THAT HAPPENED WHEN AUSTRALIA'S BRIGHTEST STAR WAS INTRODUCED TO A DRUG DEALER??
they had some awkward conversation. read all about it.
i mean, what else am i supposed to say? it's not like he went out on a limb here and wrote a space opera or a bothis is a book by david sedaris. shrug.
i mean, what else am i supposed to say? it's not like he went out on a limb here and wrote a space opera or a bodice ripper. it's david sedaris. if you like him, you will probably like this one. if you don't, you probably won't.
this is not my favorite of his collections, but i laughed out loud three times, which i think is pretty good. i like laughter.
**one time, connor made david sedaris laugh. he has yet to write a story about this incident, but we are all holding our breaths and waiting....more
so i figured this, which i read for the christian/gentle segment of R/A class, would be the beigest of the beige: dentist office carpeting, hotel roomso i figured this, which i read for the christian/gentle segment of R/A class, would be the beigest of the beige: dentist office carpeting, hotel room art, supermarket music (although my supermarket plays a lot of corey hart and toad the wet sprocket, so - awesome) but what i didn't count on from "gentle reading" was quite so much attempted rape, whipping, and use of the word "nigger" by white people. sure, it takes place in mississippi, whose racial tolerance has come a long way, baby (oh, but i still do think he is dreamy...) but i thought the point of gentle fiction was to excise all the uncomfortable realities and serve up some pap for the grannies. guess not. the reality of this world is one where a man gets an unsigned notecard in the mail from his hometown (40 years after leaving it) that says "come home" and nothing more. and he goes, receiving cryptic phone messages and other notes throughout and DOES NOT GET DISMEMBERED at the end. this is a gentle world, indeed, full of obedience and no consequences for foolishness:
"Who is ______??" (i have kindly avoided spoilers.)
"I have no idea, except he's the one who wrote me in Mitford. I talked to him on the phone this morning, He wants me to meet this afternoon at one o'clock."
"Where? And what for?"
"We'll meet at Frank's place, he says someone wants to see me, insists the whole thing is covered by prayer. We'll drive out to the country about fifteen miles."
She pondered this. "How do you feel about going off with a total stranger who lacks the courtesy to sign what he writes, much less tell you what he's up to?"
"He sounds like an agreeable fellow. There's nothing to worry about. I promise" ...............................................................................
famous last words, in the real world. teenaged girls - take heed: THIS IS A BAD IDEA.
but be that as it may, i was going to give this three stars because i didn't hate the dickens out of it. but it's not great, and i will never read another of her books, and i can't see giving this the same number of stars as i gave borges, even to prove some anti-elitist point, for which i do not have the strength.
my favorite quote, which does kind of serve as a commentary of the genre:
"You want your lip balm in cherry, lemon, or chocolate?"
"Can't it just be plain??" Nothing was plain anymore. ................................................................................
when i learned i would have to read christian fiction for this readers' advisory class, i thought, "booo" expecting it would be preachy and didactic awhen i learned i would have to read christian fiction for this readers' advisory class, i thought, "booo" expecting it would be preachy and didactic and like my old CCD classes where we were talked down to and bored the whole time. but when i looked at the list of christy award winners/nominees, i realized i already owned this one (yayyy) because b/n just classifies it as general sci-fi/fantasy and i had no idea it was christian and i bought it because i liked the cover (here is where i am glad david is on sabbatical so i don't have to hear a litany of Why I Am Wrong. but this shade of blue... she soothes me.) so but i didn't know it was christian. and after reading it, i am still unsure. have i strayed too far from my flock to recognize christian values and themes?? i am genuinely puzzled. this just strikes me more as basic fantasy that a y/a audience would be perfectly comfortable reading, but i don't feel particularly christianized after reading it.
in fact, it seems to have a decidedly un-christian message. a quick breakdown:
so the people in this realm are asked to make sacrifices for the good and the glory of their king (but really more the materialistic queen, naturally). they are denied color, and must donate all they have that is colorful and beautiful to the castle. they are told that after a certain period of time, all will be restored to them... and more. why is this so?? doesn't matter, don't ask questions - the specifics don't matter. but so far so good, right??this seems fairly biblical. and after a period of toil and deprivation the reward will come in the form of color and joy and freedom and all will have been worth it.. but so one little girl (our heroine) manages to thwart this by finding all these colors in nature and making a cloak that is so beautiful and magical and wowing them all and making everyone doubt their subservience to rules that seem, and indeed are, arbitrary. so by being a wild flaunter she wins and gets to be the one everyone loves. is this what god is up to these days?? from what i remember, rules were not meant to be questioned, it is called "faith,"right?, and trust and obedience are kind of big deals in the gentile worldview.
someone set me straight on this. {jen fisher, light of my life, does a very good job of this in her comments on the thread}
this is exactly what happened when i read lewis' till we have faces, which i love like candy. i never understood why it was shelved in the christian inspiration section at b/n - this is a retelling of the psyche/cupid myth (or eros, depending on where you're calling from) but it at least offers up a recognizable christian theme: do not disobey. if your god/husband says "don't look at me, i'm hideous" and you do, and he catches you, there will be consequences. so, exactly the opposite of auralia.
there is one line that struck a religious chord: "If you allow Abascar freedom, some people will choose what they shouldn't...but take away that freedom and no one has the opportunity to choose what they should." so fine - yes - free will and all. but still - the impetus that led to this thought was still auralia's revolt. anyone read paradise lost? revolution is supposed to lead to banishment, not freedom and praise.
all "where's the christianity" aside, this book is probably fine, but it is most decidedly not for me. i don't read fantasy precisely for the things that are all over this book. too many "names" for creatures, people, lands... i just get lost in the unfamiliar. the prose seems overwrought and the story underwrought. for me, it's like the guy you try to avoid at work who means well, but if you get sucked into a conversation with them, you just let your mind wander a little until he has spent himself. kind, but dull.
this book was very frustrating. i feel like i should love it, but it's like there is a barrier - a chastity belt between us preventing our love, and athis book was very frustrating. i feel like i should love it, but it's like there is a barrier - a chastity belt between us preventing our love, and as much as i want it, it isn't going to happen for us. there is a quality to her writing that reminded me of What I Loved or Housekeeping, books i am also told i am supposed to love, but just can't feel anything for, like distant relations. she is a less antiseptic writer than hustvedt, though. i respect her prose - there are lines in here of amazing beauty and melancholy that make me say - "yes, there you are - come out where i can see you," but the nothing-new-here feel to the plot means these moments are not enough.
and for some reason, i always thought i liked the booker award-winners more than, say, the pulitzers or other prestigious awards. in my mind, i had decided, "no, the bookers are the "good" awards - i usually like those." this idea, deeply rooted as it was, turns out to be like so many of my firmly-held ideas, and based on zero facts. i checked out the former booker winners and i have only actually read 10 of them, and only really liked 4. there are a lot of authors i like on there, but in a lot of cases, the winning book is one i haven't read. so - i give up my idea of the booker as my gold standard and one more ideal topples.
one odd thing of note about her ("her" being author/narrator)- she is endlessly preoccupied with casually describing the genitals of characters: her own, her husband's, the imagined genitals of her grandparents, etc. and they are usually compared to food - poultry etc. it is jarring, at first, then it becomes an accepted quirk, and by the end you can sort of see a psychological reason for it (for the narrator - enright's choice to grossly describe is still a mystery), but still - enough with the genitals.
having finished it, i shrug and i move on, not really feeling i have read anything that will stick with me, but while i was reading it, i did make little bookmark pages that have examples of a beautiful turn of phrase, or a nice original observation, and i would type them out here, but if they are the reason to read the book,in my opinion, i don't want to ruin the experience for any other future reader because they are like the jewels in the quiet night of her story.
i didn't say she inspired glorious prose from other people
i am floating this because i just cannot WAIT for monica!s review, and i am hoping everyone will email her with similar anxieties.
this is not the booki am floating this because i just cannot WAIT for monica!s review, and i am hoping everyone will email her with similar anxieties.
this is not the book that is going to redeem the novel-as-concept for buck mulligan.
there is nothing "necessary" about this novel.
however, there aren't many books that can boast a political rant about bush's treatment of the katrina situation, anal masturbation, voodoo spirits, and an adult bed-wetting, all within the first fifteen pages.
and i gently mock, but it's true i didn't read the first two installments of this trilogy, so i may be missing key elements in the narrative. i only bought this as an extra book to read for the urban fiction segment of my class because i have kept it in the store for two years now, hoping someone would fall in love with it based on its awesome title/cover, and now it is out of print, and i felt bad, so i said,"well, if no one else will buy it, i will!!". which i do a lot, and it gets me into all sorts of trouble. if i worked in a pound, i am sure it would be much, much worse.
however - if i had read the first two books in this trilogy, i would have been very pissed off at the ending of this one. had i invested all sorts of time into reading this series, the ending would have been a serious letdown. as it happens, it was just comical and puzzling to me, with minimal damage to my peace of mind.
but i had a lot of fun with this book. most of the fun involved me toddling along behind naressa and reading aloud portions to her in the very whitest of voices. this caused her to revoke the "honorary black" status she bestowed upon me only weeks earlier. easy come, easy go!!
she hates me now, but i will win her back.
i dunno - this book just could have used some editing. it is wildly inconsistent. on the one hand, there is a lot of final-g dropping, which is fine, but then that is juxtaposed with what i call robot-writing, which is where contractions are avoided at all costs, making it completely awkward-sounding:
"Tell me how you are feeling."
and
"Baby, what's wrong? You look like you have seen a ghost."
and
"It seems that I have something to prove to you that does not need witnesses."
and
"Where are you? I have walked a hole in my carpet."
and
"I will holla at you"
contrast with:
"Hell to the fucking no!! He blew his chance. I wouldn't go out with his ass again if I was wearing gasoline drawers and he had the only water hose in the state."
you see what i mean about contrast? it's all over the map.
some wonderful lines, though:
I am going to order up some tall dick or two with a side of latex as my first meal of the day when i get to my hotel.
the newest hallmark card:
Tarcia could suck a mint out my mouth and through my dick, that's how talented she is. she knows how to please a man with her mouth and her pussy. If someone can just get past her other quirky habits, she's a good catch.
but ow, though.
and:
He washes my butt like it's fine china.
can you believe no one would buy this for TWO YEARS???
this book and i almost never met. and that would have been tragic. the fault is mostly mine - i mean, the book made no secret of its exienthusiasm!!!
this book and i almost never met. and that would have been tragic. the fault is mostly mine - i mean, the book made no secret of its existence - a billion weeks on the best seller list, every third customer asking for it at work, displays and reviews and people on here praising it to the heavens. it practically spread its legs for me, but i just kept walking. i figured it was something for the ladies, like sex and the city, which i don't have to have ever seen an episode of to know that it's not something i would enjoy. i figured that this book was on the ladder one rung above chick lit. so i am to blame for my snobbish dismissiveness, but have you seen this cover?? what is with that sickroom color scheme? and i hate those stupid little birds. what is chip kidd so busy doing that he can't just pop over here and lend a hand?? it is not my fault for thinking it was a crappy book when that cover wanted me to think it is a crappy book.
but this book is good. really, really good. again, i thank you, readers' advisory class, for fixing me up with this book. it has been a long time since i have read such a frankly entertaining book. (if a book about the emotionally-charged early days of the civil rights movement can be called entertaining.) this is just an effortlessly told story, split between three different women, whose voices and perspectives never run together - the secondary characters are also completely believable and are all different brands of repellent, with some token sympathetic characters tossed in for the halibut. i don't even know what to say, i just feel all "aw, shucks, i loved this book" about it - there were several times i would catch myself grinning at a turn of phrase or a situation, and every time i would start to doubt myself, that maybe i would like sex and the city. or buffy the vampire slayer or all these things i have formerly judged without having read/seen/eaten. maybe i am like these white women in the book, taking their help for granted and assuming they have nothing to say to each other because of their unwillingness to talk to them and know them as human beings. maybe buffy and i have so much to learn from one another...
then i would snap out of it and remember that my gut opinions are 99.99% foolproof.
so for you other people, who need to be swayed by hype - i give you hype. this book's hype is merited - it would be a perfect book to read this summer when you are melting from the sun and need a good story.. this is a very tender and loving book, about hope and sisterhood and opportunity, but also about beatings and terror and shame.
donald harington recommended this book to me and now that he's gone, i can't even talk about it with him, and that is what i was thinking the whole tidonald harington recommended this book to me and now that he's gone, i can't even talk about it with him, and that is what i was thinking the whole time i was reading this book. if i hadn't had to read it for school, i would have waited until the other two books in the trilogy were published, so i could have had at them all at once, but again, school screws up my plans. it's an amazingly quick read - i was under the impression that i was supposed to have read it for yesterday's class so i zipped through it in a day and a half, which is way quicker than i read the known world, a less fun, and much shorter, book also for class. this book is just more vibrant - it, too, is a sprawling narrative with a huge list of characters, but this one has pirates, and drugs and a man growing boobs, so it's more familiar territory than slave-owning, for me. (shortest "review" ever, i know [you're welcome, dana:]) but i have to get back to my stupid paper about collection development and somehow write at least 5 more pages on a topic i feel i have already exhausted.
cliffs notes for this review: it is fun and good. read it.
there is that old adage that a good book will tell you how to read it. and i have no idea to whom that should be attributed, only that my undergrad prthere is that old adage that a good book will tell you how to read it. and i have no idea to whom that should be attributed, only that my undergrad professors seemed to have been born to quote that thought endlessly: in my gothic lit class, my enlightenment class, my victorian lit class... the african and irish lit professors mostly kept their mouths shut on the subject. but the rest - hoo boy - did they love to drag that old chestnut out...
and it makes sense, to a certain degree. but this book doesn't tell you how to read it so much as it presents itself to the reader, like a fat man in a speedo lolling around on an undersized towel saying, "look at me ladies, you like it?? this is what you get!!" it almost demands that you read it and like it.
but i was disobedient.
every sentence, every paragraph, seemed to be trying to contain multitudes. and i am a fan of "thick" writing, but the manner in which this book presented itself quickly soured on me. there were too many stories or episodes ending with, "years from now, when celia was on her deathbed, she would think back to her third year of marriage",in a scene where she has yet to even be married, or right after two characters are introduced to each other, "this would be the last time they would meet until the hailstorm of aught-six" - and i am making up all the names and situations here, but you get an idea of the shape of my complaints. it's constant foreshadowing and some of the foreshadowing is just teasing, as the events never come to pass in the novel itself. it's like sitting down to tea with a god in his dotage, rambling and making connections only he can understand; seeing the past and future simultaneously.
"hey, karen, didn't you really like that kjaerstaad trilogy, where he basically did what you are complaining about here??"
yeah, what? so? shut up - isn't it past your bedtime??
yeah, but sure, that's true. but for some reason, it bothered me here. all i wanted was a straightforward linear narrative about a fascinating subject matter: free black men and women who owned slaves. when i read roll of thunder, hear my cry last summer, the whole transition period between slavery and freedom really excited my brainparts. i dunno. and mister jones was a real sweetheart when he came for the new yorker festival and i waited in line to get a book signed for a friend and i really wanted to like it because it seems like a nice fat sprawling sweeping story the way i like, but i just got lost in the names and the timeline and my confusion turned into apathy.
it's like this guy you date who seems really perfect - he is smart and looks like gabriel byrne and he dotes on you and everything is fun and on paper it all looks great and you know you should really like him, but he just doesn't make you laugh so you run off and leave him for a rockstar. you know?
because i feel like i should like this one because it is award-winning, and my experience with the african-american novel is middling (although i love the african novel, the west indian novel and the afro-canadian novel - go figure) so i feel like as someone who appreciates literature in general, i should totally love this. but it wasn't there for me.
oh, chris wilson, i am sorry. now you are going to want full custody because your baby is being raised among heathens.
years from now, when my and chris wilson's book-baby became the mayor of littleton, he would read this review and a tear of sorrow would come to his eye at my short-sightedness.
David has insinuated that this novel is in some way comparable to Hitler or Mariah Carey, which I think is unfair. This book has been responsible neitDavid has insinuated that this novel is in some way comparable to Hitler or Mariah Carey, which I think is unfair. This book has been responsible neither for the attempted extinction of a race of people, nor for Glitter and dog-whistle mimicry. It is not a book that is going to stay in my heart for a long period of time, but one does care about the characters, and she writes vividly and is never boring. And that is enough for three stars, considering this was not a book I chose to read myself, so I had no real expectations. If you are a fan of The Wire, (and why wouldn't you be, since it is the best non-Bluth television show to have been put on the air since Manimal) this will mostly be old hat to you. But if you are wicked sheltered and don't know that drugs are bad and destroy communities, check this out, because like The Wire, it shows all aspects: the users, the dealers, the way communities are divided as people die, are jailed, and betray each other. I don't think there is (still) a lot of literature about women caught up in all of this, so even though it is chock full of early nineties slang, it is still a relevant book, but probably more appropriate for teen girls than David. (How are my capitals so far, do you approve??)
I loved that Sister Souljah was a character in her own book, as the voice of reason and the angel of the projects, saving lives and making a difference and showing the alternative path to a life of crime... And I know that she really is an activist and does do a lot of work for urban communities, but it just comes across as arrogant, doesn't it?? That the author is also in the book, with all the answers while the characters around her flounder if they do not heed her advice. I kind of want other celebrities to write novels in which they give practical advice like this. Like if Keith Richards wrote a novel, dispensing advice about how to pickle your insides so you live forever, or Britney Spears cautioned her characters, "Hey, maybe wear some panties before you go outside, it's windy". Sage advice from celebrity pens.
All in all, it was in no way as painful as reading those romance novels, and the scene in the abortion clinic waiting room was effective and depressing.
this was my thought process on choosing this book for my western RA selection: "pumpkin rollers" sounds funny. cormac mccarthy writes westerns. suttrethis was my thought process on choosing this book for my western RA selection: "pumpkin rollers" sounds funny. cormac mccarthy writes westerns. suttree has some pumpkin scenes that illustrate the love a man can find with a gourd. maybe this one is similar.
it is not.
it's not a bad book, but honestly, until this point, my exposure to westerns had been clint eastwood, deadwood, and mccarthy. the lone man exacting justice, the occasional rape, lawlessness and some shakespearian dialogue. somehow, between this and the god of animals, i ended up with two coming-of-age stories neither of which felt the way i thought a western would/should feel, the main character such a pillar of moral behavior and unwritten codes. it's an idealized vision of the cowboy, his honor system and chivalry. yawn city.
there is of course the counterpoint of the outlaw, the rustler, the vigilante, but their stories get pushed out into the margins in favor of the young man's triumph over those who would swindle him and his unwavering devotion to proper behavior.
despite its bold, college-sports-team cover colors, i would probably never have picked this book up if i hadn't needed to read a recent spur-award-windespite its bold, college-sports-team cover colors, i would probably never have picked this book up if i hadn't needed to read a recent spur-award-winner for my beloved readers' advisory class. but, dammit, if it wasn't the most enjoyable thing i have read in a while. and i know that lately i have been slapping a ton of reviews up here, and y'all are sick of my stupid opinions, but heed me one more time: this book is crazy-good. greg, fonso, mfso - feel free to ignore me here, but ladies, come a little closer. it's not a girlie book, but it really captures something about that teetery place between (see, greg: "tween") child- and womanhood. i have no idea how something like this wins a spur award and cormac mccarthy doesn't - to me he is the embodiment of tough men, stinky boots, and scalping violence. but it does take place in colorado, which is west of where i am, so who am i to argue?
this is a book that remembers how to tell a story, without complicating the process. its depth is in its simplicity, if you follow. the story is not revolutionary,(girl, horses, death, lies, fantasy world, teacher crush, economic disparity, eloped sister, first kiss, depressed mother, adultery, secrets secrets secrets, and life's disappointments including the ways a marriage can come apart) but it is told very well. the clear voice of the narrator and her eventual disillusionment and realizations is uncanny and a perfect crystallization of how it feels to be a girl on the cusp of puberty, with all of its aggression and violent impulses and unsure footing, cruelty and tenderness, the conflict, the decisions one makes to become the woman you become; particularly here, where the traditional role models are damaged, absent, or financially impossible. and the foal-weaning passages were heartbreaking and unexpected. oh, man.
i loved this character. i loved her in all of her moods: confessional, spiteful, hopeful, lonely, guilty, triumphant. i loved the pacing, as her fantasy safety net crumbles and the truth comes out in tiny pieces and life's tarnish is revealed. it would also be acceptable for a YA audience, one that had also enjoyed to kill a mockingbird. and it makes me want to tell you to read what's eating gilbert grape, because the book is so so good.
all in all, a perfect story, perfectly told. now, go. i will try to hold off reviewing for a while.
hilary mantel is such a tease. she calls her book wolf hall because she knows i have a crush on jane seymour, and then she just blah blah blahs about hilary mantel is such a tease. she calls her book wolf hall because she knows i have a crush on jane seymour, and then she just blah blah blahs about thomas cromwell for 500 pages, feeding me only tiny bites of jane. sigh. me and hil have always had a rocky history.i have read four of her books now, and have only really liked one; beyond black. but i keep trying. this one was for class, but i probably would have read it anyway, because this summer i read a nice fat bio of henry VIII and really enjoyed a lot of "characters" in his court. but it is so frustrating, reading historical fiction or biographies. this is only my third tudor book (because, yes, i totally read the other boleyn girl), and the malleability of history and the filters through which authors present these people is terribly inconsistent, depending on their own prejudices. i loved chupuys in the weir book, but here he is so foppish and weird - like a less fuckable david bowie in labyrinth. sometimes mary boleyn is a victim, sometimes she is cold and calculating, sometimes she is just a party girl depending on who is telling me the story. damn apologists. there were sections of writing i loved here, but most of it was flat, to me.i thought the opening was great, and the last 60 pages or so were fairly rollicking, but for some reason much of the middle seemed arid, but peppered with episodes i loved. i am glad that i read it, and a lot of my resistance may have just been my poor fever-riddled brain's inability to concentrate for any reasonable period of time, but i'm not swayed to mantelmania just yet. try try again.
addition: can someone help me with this, because i am getting conflicting opinions from people i trust equally. please tell me how to pronounce "chupuys". one smart person said it was pronounced "cha-pwah", and another smart person made it rhyme with "pepys". fix this rift for me please.
i am glad i am such a grad-school overachiever. for both the horror/sci-fi and mystery portions of my readers' advisory class, i have read one extra title from the selection list, and both times, i have liked the extra title best. (i did not choose to read an extra romance title, so we will never know how that would have turned out, alas)
this book is a rare combination of to the lighthouse, and the thing, with hardy-esque occurrences of misunderstanding and some cannibalism thrown in for the kiddies. plus boats and ice and monster.
like the descent, it is the supernatural elements of the story that end up being the least scary. nature is scary enough. cave-exploration, even for feisty extreme-sport doing, athletic-looking girls, becomes terrifying, even before any monsters show up. monsters are icing. for this book, scurvy, madness, murder, temperatures of 78 degrees below zero, starvation, frostbite, gangrene, botulism, did i mention scurvy??- i mean, isn't that enough without a giant monster stalking and eating your seamen?
but i am,to my great dismay, not easily scared.this, to me, was the most promising trailer in the world: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2lm2hZ... but the movie was not scary, and in fact made me cross because of the ways in which it was not scary. i thought i had finally met my match, but i wound up being utterly disappointed. being scared is not too much to hope for, is it?? this book, while it is not going to keep me up tonight, has several really good "oh shit" moments. (and i hope that answers lori's question)
i love the cold, but this book made me pray for global warming to hurry up and save these poor men. (this feeling will last until one of you jokers sends me a picture of a sad polar bear - awwww) but seriously, shit is COLD!!
and i got so into the book that i took the wrong bus on monday and traveled a half hour in the wrong direction before looking up from the book to realize my mistake, and also skipped work (ostensibly because of residual bad-feeling from hellish customers yesterday and faulty alarm clock [both true:], but also because i wanted to finish this book before the ending could get ruined for me in class tonight)
it is an amazingly well-researched book, which may ruin it as horror genre-fiction for people who want their horror fast, cheap, and hard. there are tons of details about rigging and naval protocol and ice conditions and many repetitions of the survivor's names - there are echoes of moby dick here, in its dullish bits about whale anatomy that might be a staple of maritime fiction for all i know, but make the progress a little slower than the monstrous stephen king i read as the other horror title for this class. i think all the details add too much weight to the story to let it retain its status as genre fiction. for myself i would consider it historical fiction with some supernatural zazz.
but it remains totally absorbing, totally gripping, and despite all the questions i raised about the pacing, it is ultimately scarier than the king, whose characters remain cartoonish and too one-dimensional to be scary. except for large marge, cartoons are not scary. here, the danger seems imminent - there are incredible moments of tension and so many beloved characters having unfortunate things happen to them. do not become attached to any of them, because in the end, many seamen are swallowed, and several are spit out.
do you know how long it takes to listen to audio books?? this one is eleven hours and thirty-nine minutes! and i am not one of you cyborg kids who havdo you know how long it takes to listen to audio books?? this one is eleven hours and thirty-nine minutes! and i am not one of you cyborg kids who have all manner of machines strapped to you and dangling off of your tool belts like a williamsburg batman. i can only listen to this in my house, doing the dishes or cooking etc. but - jesus - eleven hours!! of this guy's voice!! as he raises the pitch to make lady-voices or baby-talks through a five-year-old character or slaps this comical minnesotan accent on for one cop, or gets gruff, or creepy, or MAKES THUNDER NOISES as the narrative requires. it's like listening to a grown man play with dolls (and i have used that expression privately, to one of you goodreaders, and if you are reading this review, the association is intentional)
this is only my second audio book.* i have dfw reading "brief interviews", which is wonderful because it is his voice, and he knows how to read his own stuff, but i have great difficulty paying attention to the aural. in class, i pretty much write down everything teacher says because otherwise i will drift off and not remember anything but when i read my notes, i can remember it. hearing shit? i tune out, i daydream, it is not ideal for me. (i actually watch all my netflix with the subtitles on, because i find it helps me remember what happened) i had to start several chapters over because i had been having little dreamthoughts in my head that were entirely separate from the cd. audio must be great for you commuters who have to pay attention to the road and all. because i am chauffeured daily by the mta, i can read guaranteed a couple of hours a day, and not have to resort to this medium which limits my involvement by telling me where the inflections are. maybe as a reaction to the imaginative limitations, i misheard several lines and conjured up mental pictures different than intended:
"He let his gaze wander around the room" "I've got a unit on the house" "You're a target" "bucking wildly" "see Kyle" "She could feel his gaze on her" "Headlights washed over them"
it is important to enunciate.
as for the book itself -what can i say? it is a perfectly serviceable thriller; it's got a dead lady with flowers stuffed in a slit down her chest, some red herrings, an oddly schoolmarmish attitude towards pornography, and a bunch of dead bodies. it would have taken me far less time to read it than it did to listen to it, but the syllabus wants what the syllabus wants. sieg heil, indeed.
i think an appreciation of science-fiction literature is, like a second language, a skill best acquired in youth, when the thirstSPACE SLOTH!!
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i think an appreciation of science-fiction literature is, like a second language, a skill best acquired in youth, when the thirsty adaptable mind is able to come to terms with unfamiliar worlds, languages, names, descriptions of political sects and painstakingly detailed family trees and planetary formations with a casual shrugged grace.
i myself am old.
and this book is by no means the best or most complicated example of that type of science fiction, but my brain still had a great deal of difficulty conceiving of upside-down town and gravity and AI hoverscreens etc. i am truly unable to "get" science fiction. one time, i tried to read a book by robert sawyer and my head nearly exploded. pwoosh!
there are many things about this book that i did like: (and forgive me for not learning from my mistakes and venturing into the relevant) the main character was well-crafted, and i felt drawn to her in a way that i thought i would have been drawn to dear lisbeth salander but was not - she is emotionally removed but still badass and clever and not averse to a little dirty fighting, plus hates being touched, and also killed a man at the age of eight. bonus. the resolution was as satisfying as any courtroom drama, all pieces tied up, with enough layers to not feel cheated by some necessarily expected turns.
also - giant sloth-creatures. and dragons. i don't know what more you nerds want.
this is the best romance novel i have ever read. which really only means it is better than this.(now that i have learned how to do that,retard ranch!!
this is the best romance novel i have ever read. which really only means it is better than this.(now that i have learned how to do that, i am going to link to every part of the internet, given time...) and sarah palin will probably hate this review. but the fact of the matter is, i love the word "retard". i think it is a funny-sounding word, along with "renal", "swizzle" and "filbert". but i don't want any angry facebook letters (because i am not even on facebook, so it will do you no good) asking for my resignation from my position of absolutely nothing. my relative anonymity is very freeing, as i can use the word "retard" with impunity as long as you recognize words are different from intent.
because this book totally takes place on retard ranch, which alliteration pleases me, so it is my shorthand, because "gentle rain" sounds like a euphemism for douche.(another word i think sounds funny)
as a romance, it is way overly complicated - billionaire environmentalist heiress' parents die in a plane crash while they are living in brazil, she learns she was actually adopted, and that her parents are both mentally-challenged (one of whom is also stinking rich, but not really allowed access to the dough) and living on a ranch staffed exclusively by the mentally-challenged, except for the handsome quarter-indian leading man who was a mexican wrestler in another life, of whose fan club (the brazilian branch)she was once the president.so she goes to the ranch to meet her birth parents, but does not reveal her identity (natch) and ingratiates herself into their lives, becoming a champion barrel racer, and getting steven spielberg to finance a movie based on former mermaid performers and there is some samba and soy cheese and ummm heart transplants?? is anyone still reading this review, or have you all gone out to buy a copy of this book? it's pretty amazingly detailed. with a lot of quotes from jane austen. and does every romance novel feature a million/billionaire with a heart of gold? it's almost startling.
because this is a romance novel, i will have to give you writing samples, also to amuse me.
a lot of it actually sounds as if sarah palin herself may have written it. it is full of apostrophes and folksy-isms:
"karen was hunched over estrela's neck like a hungry panther ridin' a wild pig"
(estrela is a horse, by the way)
"some mornings, gettin' possum out of his box was like pryin' a turtle out of a storm drain"
(possum is an autistic man, by the way)
"now, if a bodacious blonde like her walked up to me in a bar, and smiled, i'd sure buy her a martini and enjoy the view. but this blonde had walked up to me with a chip on her shoulder and her tongue wrapped in barbed wire.
("bodacious" is used on at least two other occasions)
now, onto some "ew".
"She was soft and snuggly, and i knew just how to stroke the sensitive spot on her caesarian section".
"i liked the way the shirt fit. she had some good muffins."
(because she was baking muffins at the time - get it?)
"the kiss after the mermaid show had been on my mind a lot. on my mind and wrapped in the sweaty palm of my hand, if you know what i'm sayin'"
(i do. and ew)
"their heads may not work right", she liked to say,"but their other parts operate just fine".
(from the mouth of a sixty-year-old women who has regular sexual relations with two different mentally challenged men on the ranch. i think it's the phrase "she liked to say" that gets me into "ew" mode.)
and as a finale, isolated lines that made me quizzical:
"see there? when you actively open your heart and mind to new ideas and the possibility of friendship, the hostility and distrust all fade away"
(spoken in portuguese. to a horse.)
"ben thocco was a metrosexual cracker cowboy. i meant that in a good way"
"his legs, inside those thin cotton joggers, were a fiesta of interesting muscle"
"worn with just the right amount of style and swagger, a large belt buckle draws the eye directly to the territory beneath it. i found myself helplessly drawn to ben's horse head"
"i loved her then. right then. that's when i fell in love"
so it is 2 stars, but it's a fun two stars,and if you like romance novels, you might like it. it is much better than the nora roberts - i can't understand my own star system, i just click 'em.
oh - i forgot!! this book also has recipes. at the end!! for fried gator, etc!!! if you asked for more out of a book, you would just be a greedy gus....more
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