You know those books where the character you’re rooting for makes a bad decision and you just want to jump into the book and shake them by the shoulders and point out their folly? This book was kind of like that, except I wanted to jump into the book and hug the main character and tell her: it’s okay, you’re not the only person who feels that way and it will get better, I promise.
Category Archives: Reviews
Jump at the Sun, by Kim McLarin
Two short reviews
Only Human: A Divine Comedy, by Jenny Diski
I mooched this book from April Boland after reading about it on her Sunday Salon post. It’s a retelling of the story of Abraham and Sarah, with a twist: the story is narrated alternately in the third person from Sarah’s point of view, and in the (omniscient?) first person, by God.
On reading short stories
So, not to keep you in suspense, the second faerie book I read was The Ladies of Grace Adieu, by Susanna Clarke, which I first heard about from Ella. Susanna Clarke is also the author of Jonathan Strange & Mr. Norrell, a book that I am very fond of not only because it was a terrifically entertaining good read but also because it was the subject of my very first blog post. Awwww!
Faerie tales
Quite by coincidence I happened to read two books in a row about the sidhe. You know: the Little Folk; the “people of the hills”; the fey creatures whose name you don’t want to say out loud or your milk will go sour; who are afraid of iron; who if you wander into their kingdom you’ll be there for three hundred years but it’ll only feel like three days
Matrimony, by Joshua Henkin
For the first time, and probably for the last time, I accepted a book for review. In general, I’m not keen on the idea of ARCs and so forth, for the same reason I don’t do challenges. I simply don’t want someone telling me what to read. As soon as I promise to read something, it feels like a school assignment. No longer pleasure, but obligation.
The Position, by Meg Wolitzer
I’ve known quite a few people who felt that their parents’ professions placed an unfair burden on them, like the son of a Methodist minister I dated in college. In fact, with a professor of clinical psychology for a dad and a piano teacher for a mom, I may even have complained about it myself on one or two occasions. ;-)
Finding Nouf
I was a little surprised when I got the email from the library saying this book I’d requested, Finding Nouf by Zoë Ferraris, had finally come in. I didn’t remember requesting it, and it didn’t sound like the kind of book I’d normally seek out. First, it has one of those two-word titles where the first is a transitive verb ending in ing and the second is a proper noun: I have an irrational prejudice against those. And second, it’s a murder mystery, not my favorite genre. I’m just not that interested in figuring out who dun it. I used to love mysteries, but now… meh. So, two strikes against this book. Whatever review I read on someone’s blog somewhere that led me to put this on hold must have been a really good one.
