Sometimes, something can be masterfully done and still be pointless.
McDonald's franchises can be inside beautiful buildings. Abstract art can be...in Sometimes, something can be masterfully done and still be pointless.
McDonald's franchises can be inside beautiful buildings. Abstract art can be...in existence. And a story like this one, the millionth book about a male unreliable narrator doing horrible things, can be excellent.
But why does it matter?
The fries will still taste the same (good for a few minutes and then not even food after that), I will still not understand art, and this story will still have nothing to add.
Since there has BEEN a canon to literary about, there have been books about men who are unreliable and bad. The writing style can differ, the evils that the men commit can vary, but fundamentally they are saying and doing the same thing.
So even this great author adding to that population still doesn't actually add anything. Because they're all the same.
Does that make sense?
Bottom line: I'm not angry, I'm disappointed.
Also, the abstract art part was a joke. That one's on me.
I mean it about the fries, though.
----------------- pre-review
this is a very brilliant book that i did not care for much at all.
review to come / 3ish stars
----------------- currently-reading updates
let's try this again
-----------------
i have to put this on hold, because i am currently about as likely to finish a 500 page book as i am to scale mount everest.
do you know how hard it is to finish a book this long without enjoying it for even a second?
i do.
it is roughly as hard as the following things: - havindo you know how hard it is to finish a book this long without enjoying it for even a second?
i do.
it is roughly as hard as the following things: - having just one cookie - pretending to listen to people who are telling you in detail about their dreams - engaging in something called "exercise" - writing a review under 478239478923 words.
and yet here we are. i did it.
AND FOR WHAT.
i'm kind of uninterested, as a rule, in engaging with what authors deem to be The Purpose of their books. i don't believe in separating the art from the artist (it's altogether impossible), but i am a firm disciple of the concept that your average reader's opinion on the meaning of a work is not only as valuable as its creator's, but in fact both more significant and typically more interesting.
that's a long-winded way of saying that all of hanya's bullsh*t-spewing about why she keeps writing about gay men and doesn't believe in therapy and generally sounds like every globally minded mindfulness expert's specific nemesis has nothing to do with her work to me.
so in a sense, i forgive her for it, because it doesn't matter in my reading experience.
what i can't forgive her for is being long-winded, self-indulgent, pointless and meandering, and above all, DULL.
i wanted to believe that the people in the trees, in all its thoroughly-tread exploration of cliché, was the outlier, but it appears that a little life, which, for all its issues and red flags, is a stunning achievement, was a total one off for our dear ms yanagihara.
this is as different from that as an oatmeal creme pie is from a twinkie. both are disturbing crimes against humanity, but one is addictive and impressive and the other is just unholy.
i read this in the midst of a truly insane reading month, one in which i was typically reading half a dozen books at a time and alternating chapters because i physically could not stop reading.
i did not care about a single character in the first section, and in fact hated them so much i prayed on their respective downfalls, a phenomenon that continued into the second story and only relented a bit in the third because i was so relieved at the unexpected treat of a female character that i almost had to be grateful by default.
that didn't last long, either.
it was almost comical how snooze-worthy this was, and in fact i would have had a good laugh if it didn't take me a week and an undue amount of suffering to finish. maybe if i had a moment's relief, but this book had no plot, no memorable characters, no striking writing, nothing new to add to the idea of the pandemic novel, no real backbone to hold up its experimental structure or playfulness with perspective, and ultimately, it felt to me, no meaning.
that's a lot of nothing.
bottom line: if you don't have anything nice to say, you're not supposed to say anything at all...but i already wrote this whole review, so i'll just drop this to one star instead.
I love to have an unpopular opinion. Nothing brings me more joy than the anger and fear of others in my comment sectiI am, as everyone knows, a hater.
I love to have an unpopular opinion. Nothing brings me more joy than the anger and fear of others in my comment section. My sole purpose in this life is to upset the people around me via literary takedowns and nothing else.
However.
I will never, ever, ever, EVER!!! DNF.
And this book is why.
I started out this book residing in Snooze City. I took a train to Sleepville with a one-way ticket, making stops in Boring Town, Dry Island, and Dull Junction. But I kept reading, because I'm stubborn.
And GUESS WHAT. It worked!
While this started out as a retelling that somehow managed to feel both too true to the original and not true enough, it turned into a crazy demonfest of magic and evil and Daisy and beautiful writing and more importantly, Daisy.
Another win for team refusing to learn from mistakes.
Bottom line: And another win for team Gatsby!
As in, team the book. Not team that bozo character.
------------------ pre-review
i've read many books that started out as a 4 star read and slowly became a 2 star, but this is my first time experiencing the inverse.
feels weird.
review to come / 4ish stars
------------------ tbr review
i am a person who is made up of 75% water, 25% strong opinions, and some of my very strongest are on the great gatsby. let's see how reading a retelling goes...more
I don't know about you, but I read middle grade in order to be jealous of children.
I wish my library had books like this one growing up, instead of 80I don't know about you, but I read middle grade in order to be jealous of children.
I wish my library had books like this one growing up, instead of 800 musty books from the 1980s nobody's ever heard of with the plasticky jackets all scratched up and falling off.
That's like. A slight exaggeration. But still.
I am no longer the target audience of books like this one (obviously), but I still like reading them and yearning for what could have been.
I mean, I do not want to actually be 10 years old right now. In this climate. But I do love to complain.
This was kind of meh at some points for me, but that is obvious, is what I'm saying. I'm 23 years old. But telling stories like this one is rad as hell.
Sorry I swore in a review of a kids' book. But that's the bottom line.
------------ pre-review
pretty sure if i don't like this book i'll be excommunicated.
fortunately i like it fine.
review to come / 3 stars
------------
taking lily's idea and reading only books by asian authors this month!
i'm not going to review this beyond saying that everyone should read about this time in history. we should all reckon with this.i'm not going to review this beyond saying that everyone should read about this time in history. we should all reckon with this....more
seems like we as a society should probably talk more about the fact that we imprisoned everyone of a certain race not even a century ago.
this book migseems like we as a society should probably talk more about the fact that we imprisoned everyone of a certain race not even a century ago.
this book might be a good place to start.
i have a hard time enjoying books like this, where there are about 92 main characters, because i can only generously like 1 character per book (and that's on a good day) plus i get confused, but...
i see the purpose of doing that here. because jesus christ we took away the innocence of thousands of children and the livelihoods of thousands of adults and somehow both for thousands of adolescents. so how could you spend a book just telling one story like that, when there are so many?
bottom line: important reading. i wish i had this at 15.
3.5
------------
taking lily's idea and reading only books by asian authors this month!
One, this concept - a set of four siblings who go to a psychic who tells them when they will die, and thenI have two sets of feelings about this book.
One, this concept - a set of four siblings who go to a psychic who tells them when they will die, and then following them one by one through the decades as the predictions come true - is the best book idea I have read in recent memory.
Two, HOW DARE CHLOE BENJAMIN MURDER MY FAMILY.
I cannot read a good book about a family - especially about siblings - without coming out the other side thinking they are really related to me, in real life.
Finishing a book that fits this description is a heartbreak in and of itself, because you're saying goodbye to your loved ones, if you're the same kind of insane that I am.
But this is even more heartbreaking than usual.
Not a perfect book, and a very painful one, but beautifully written and filled with characters I truly love.
I'm going to go cry quietly now.
Bottom line: NEVER AGAIN.
Just kidding. If you hear about a well written literary fiction book about siblings hit me up immediately.
------------------- pre-review
aaaaaaaaand now i'm tearing up.
god damn. i hate when books ruin my steely reputation.
review to come / 4 stars
------------------- tbr review
whenever i hear about someone reading on a bus or a train or in a park or whatever i picture them reading this book, which i have not read, and which i know nothing about.
not sure what that says about me, but it's true.
clear ur sh*t book 50 quest 23: opulent cover...more
I am a book nerd in a way that is all-encompassing, not limited to any genre or niche but instead poisoning every cI try to read basically everything.
I am a book nerd in a way that is all-encompassing, not limited to any genre or niche but instead poisoning every category of literature (as well as books that could never be called literature even if you were being nice) in order to be absolutely as annoying as possible to both everyone I know in real life and everyone on this website.
That being said: 1) I have read less young adult stuff this year than ever in my life, and 2) recently I have decided to all but give up on historical fiction.
I can explain both, as I'm sure you are relieved to know. YES! you shout in the privacy of your own home. Another review from emma with an unnecessarily high word count!
I know. I'm excited too.
I read less and less YA because I am both legally and technically (and in no other ways) an adult now. I pay an electric bill sometimes, when my roommate Venmo charges me. I pay rent all the time. I am 23 years old physically, even as I vary between 12 and 74 emotionally.
Because I am a grumpy elderly person I get mad at teens. So when I read books about teens I get mad at the books. So it seems better for us all if I just stick to my General Fiction section where I am welcome in my curmudgeonliness.
The historical fiction part is because I cannot f*cking stand when modern writes write old-timey. I mentioned this in a wildly ranty review recently. I can't remember which. But if you're feeling like I'm repeating myself, a) you're right and b) get used to it because I am REALLY running out of review ideas.
Anyway.
All of this is to say that this is YA historical fiction and therefore everything in me advised against reading it and yet I liked it so much.
Very lovable characters. Very sweet romance. Very interesting and believable setting. It was good stuff.
I can't believe I read a million-page-long young adult historical and liked it to this extent. Thank you as always for knowing me and my reading taste better than I know myself, s.penkevich.
Bottom line: What a pleasant surprise, for once!
------------------- pre-review
hm okay so this is everything.
review to come / 4 stars
---------
upon further reflection, i'm stealing lily's idea and reading only books by asian authors this month!
to anyone who calls me cynical or pessimistic: what could be more hopeful than adding super long books to my tbr when i'm probably never going to readto anyone who calls me cynical or pessimistic: what could be more hopeful than adding super long books to my tbr when i'm probably never going to read them?...more
This is a very short book, and yet it took me 4 days to read it.
I'm the level of book nerd where I try to finish a book per day every day that I can. This is a very short book, and yet it took me 4 days to read it.
I'm the level of book nerd where I try to finish a book per day every day that I can. It's the first item on every to-do list I've ever made. It is the biggest factor in my priorities being as screwed up and weird as they are.
And yet this teeny tiny book took me down.
This is due to the fact that it made me so viscerally uncomfortable I had to read it in approximately 42 separate sittings. I spent several days chugging glasses of water so I could grab a new one, suddenly being overcome by the urge to make cookies, reading different books - and so on and so forth. Just so I could get up and get away from this book.
That's pretty cool, in a lot of ways. It's what Ottessa Moshfegh is known for, certainly.
But it didn't make up for how unpleasant of a reading experience it was. No aspect of this was enough to make up for how much I disliked reading it.
If you believe that people are fundamentally somewhat selfish and unkind, this is the book for you.
Bonus points for book representation.
I don't reallyIf you believe that people are fundamentally somewhat selfish and unkind, this is the book for you.
Bonus points for book representation.
I don't really think that, because if I did I would be forced to give into a lifetime of sorrow and cynicism and suffering and other alliterative negativity, but I do think a lot of people are.
And I do hate capitalism.
And I do like books.
So this wasn't bad.
Add to it the fact that I've had exercise routines longer than this book (which may not sound insane, but consider that working out is, for me, an undertaking I embark on approximately once every three years and get sick of nearly immediately and you'll get it), and there's a lot to like.
Not enough to make this a truly pleasurable reading experience. But a good amount.
Bottom line: Apparently not every book about a bookstore is destined to be my favorite thing ever! Who knew.
------------------
give me all the books about books
clear ur shit prompt 5: your shortest book follow my progress here...more
As Jia Tolentino once said, "Ottessa Moshfegh is easily the most interesting contemporary American writer on the subject of being alive when being aliAs Jia Tolentino once said, "Ottessa Moshfegh is easily the most interesting contemporary American writer on the subject of being alive when being alive feels terrible."
Anyway. This book is so goddamn disgusting.
I won't lie to you - historic times in general are gross to me. The idea of living in a time where I am walking in a gross street on a daily basis and have literally never taken a shower in my life? It sucks. I feel icky just abstractly considering it.
But this book...it's so gross.
It's not bad. It's confusing and yucky but those are intended.
Is it for me? No. Is it my least favorite Ottessa Moshfegh book even as it is only equally gross objectively to every other one, just because it hit me harder? Yes.
That's all I have to say.
Bottom line: YUCK!
------------- currently-reading updates
this is set 200 years too late to be about the salem witch trials.
i would like to formally apologize for being a dumbass.
This cover is so pretty and happy and wonderful, and then the contents are the darkest, most painful thing you have ever experienced in your life.
LiteThis cover is so pretty and happy and wonderful, and then the contents are the darkest, most painful thing you have ever experienced in your life.
Literally every bad thing that exists under the sun happens in this book. Death. Sexual assault. Devastating illness. War. Genocide. Betrayal. Deceit. Abandonment. Death again. Suicide. Racism. Hate crimes. Poverty. More violence. Family trauma AND family drama.
Probably more I'm forgetting because presumably my brain filed this under "to repress."
Honestly, I really wanted to like this book, but the horrific-ness was gratuitous. I didn't feel like I came to know the characters so much as I came to know the horrible unrelenting stream of things they'd been through.
And that's not my ideal reading experience!
Bottom line: Too much for me!
-------------- pre-review
very, very cool that i just accidentally read the most suffering-filled, sadness-inducing, heartbreaking book of all time.
review to come / 3ish
-------------- tbr review
can't stop / won't stop buying literally everything i see at used bookstores...more
I have to do the most dreaded thing I ever do...figure out how I "feel" about something.
EvenAll right. I've procrastinated all I can.
The time is come.
I have to do the most dreaded thing I ever do...figure out how I "feel" about something.
Even though I am someone who reviews every book she reads, and even though I read hundreds of books a year, I try to think about feelings as infrequently as possible. I go with a gut rating, I often change it when I actually write the review, and that's it.
But then...once in a while...Nightmare. Chaos. Destruction. A book like this comes along, with an intense and confusing reading experience, and I am unable to rate it.
And then I wait days and weeks and a month if I can swing it so I do not have to do any sort of emotional reflection of any kind. But I've put this off all I can.
This book is weird.
It has some of the dark-academia vibes of books I love, but way more violent and twisty and confusing. The writing is pretty, if sometimes a bit purple for my taste (okay fine you got me I just like using the word "purple" to describe prose too much).
I just kind of like...don't know how I feel about it? But it's a vaguely positive kind of not knowing. So I think...3.5.
The rating of indecisive nice people everywhere. (I'm rebranding to nice.)
These characters are unlikable, but that's the point. The plot, if it exists, winds in fits and starts, but that's the point. It kind of walks the line between literary fiction and thriller, but that's the point. Everything that could take away from it feels intentional, which makes deducting anything seem willfully basic.
What else to say? I'll add this: When I'm reading physical books, I never eat, because I only have two hands and I don't understand the energy distribution that would take. Am I turning pages with one hand and holding my ice cream sandwich in the other? Am I taking bites of salad without turning my eyes to it for optimal forkfuls? How does this work? But on the other hand (buh dum ch), all I do while eating (because I can't be alone with my thoughts) is read on my laptop. And I had a library ebook copy of this book, so boom. Laptop.
But it's such an oddly consuming story, such a disruptively disturbing and gripping and occasionally shockingly violent narrative, that I was often unable to eat. And I lost my appetite if I tried.
Do with that what you will.
Bottom line: Weird! But good? But mostly weird.
---------------- pre-review
what the hell?
review and rating to come
---------------- tbr review
put the word "dark" next to the word "academia" and i am IN...more
this book is a calm cool and collected 880 pages long, so elle and i will be tackling three chapters a day...every daywelcome to...MIDDLEMARCH MARCH.
this book is a calm cool and collected 880 pages long, so elle and i will be tackling three chapters a day...every day for this whole month.
join us as we melt our minds. i love a project!
DAY 1: CHAPTERS 1-3 immediately i am having fun. approx 30 pages per day for 31 days currently seems like the perfect way to read a book, i am walking on sunshine, i am breathing rainbows or whatever. this is beautifully written and a whole blast. i'm gonna live forever.
DAY 2: CHAPTERS 4-6 somehow i have been cursed with reading not one, but two books about the devil's work on earth (beautiful twenty-something women marrying random dudes in their 40s) at the same time. gotta give it up, though: i'm not even at the 10% mark and i'm invested enough to do all but scream NOOOO at the pages.
DAY 3: CHAPTERS 7-9 listen to this roast: "He has got no good red blood in his body [...] Somebody put a drop under a magnifying-glass, and it was all semicolons and parentheses." insanely good. i like this will ladislaw character!
DAY 4: CHAPTERS 10-12 there's like a full page of dialogue in this about how dumb men look playing the flute and in other words i think i am in love with this book.
DAY 5: CHAPTERS 13-15 i could read about rosy for 100 years. i could read about dodo for 50 years. i could read about will for 25 years. i am reaching the end of my patience with mr. old man husband and dr. boring guy.
DAY 6: CHAPTERS 16-18 for the first time thus far, i almost missed a day. you may be tempted to say "emma, it hasn't even been a week, how are you already almost missing days" and to that i would respond a) i'm doing a WHOLE OTHER PROJECT right now and b) i'm lazy. technically it's 1:19 a.m. and thereby i did miss a day, but i ascribe to my own calendar, which is whenever i'm awake it's one day and then when i go to bed and wake up it becomes the next. this was very trying (three in a row of the more town politics-y chapters) but i did it in spite of dawning sleepiness.
DAY 7: CHAPTERS 19-21 AND WE'RE BACK TO DODO AND LADISLAW! that sounds like a truly unlistenable indie band. anyway, after all those chapters about chaplaincies and town doctors, it's a treat beyond words to read about these two again. speaking of treat beyond words, i just remembered i have Trader Joe's Dark Chocolate-Covered Cherries™️...hang on, middlemarch. let me get my priorities in order. oh man i'm having so much fun. 1,000 pages of dodo and ladislaw dialogue, please and thanks.
DAY 8: CHAPTERS 22-24 i've straight up been looking forward to this since i put it down yesterday. i don't want to jinx anything buuuuut...if this level of fun keeps up we may just have a 5 star on our hands. we have now entered Book 3, which has the cheery and promising title "Waiting for Death." i'm in heaven.
DAY 9: CHAPTERS 25-27 27 is my favorite number. just a fun fact. this fred vincy character sure is a ding-dong, and a bit of a jerkoff to boot. chapter 26 uses the phrase "to be caught tripping," a moment which i imagine is what people mean when they say a timeless classic.
DAY 10: CHAPTERS 28-30 wow. can you believe it! almost a third done already. time flies when you're assigning books to yourself like homework. relatedly: best homework ever. this rules.
DAY 11: CHAPTERS 31-33 anyone else as stunned as i am that i haven't yet missed a day? if you aren't you should be. do not believe in me. a cliffhanger!!!!!!!!
DAY 12: CHAPTERS 34-36 we are now entering book 4: three love problems. my guesses for the three titular issues in question: 1) Dodo's Old Man Husband Is The Worst And His Young Artist Cousin Rules 2) Mary Garth Deserves Better Than Fred Vincy But Will Probably End Up With Him 3) Somehow Middlemarch's Hottest Single Is Engaged To Some Poor Guy. No Thanks, As A Reader next book is called "THE DEAD HAND," very ominously, and we're getting some foreshadowing as to what that means here on the day of featherstone's funeral. technically that's a spoiler but i don't think "oldest character dying in a sprawling 1000 page novel" is much of a twist. already today is so long and i'm not even halfway through the first of the three chapters but!!! "There would be a satisfaction in being buried by Mr. Cadwallader, whose very name offered a fine opportunity for pronouncing wrongly if you liked." this is so funny. and i haven't even mentioned yet that there's an oft-referenced place called Freshitt. okay and: “I dare say Dodo likes it: she is fond of melancholy things and ugly people.” me using dating apps.
DAY 13: CHAPTERS 37-39 okay. i am suddenly multiple days behind. in my defense: on sunday i took medical leave of reading (so scared of slumping again) and yesterday i was equal parts busy and anxious, and thereby effectively illiterate. but the good news is: today is a 9 chapter day!!! (it is really a reflection of how much fun i'm having that this is good news, instead of the sickening impact of procrastination.) "Each looked at the other as if they had been two flowers which had opened then and there." golly. this is a very witty and smart and beautifully written book, and the nicest thing i can say about it is that there are approx 100,000 characters and i'm not having that much trouble remembering them. huge praise.
DAY 14: CHAPTERS 40-42 haha. chapter xl. “The lad is of age and must get his bread.” was this published YESTERDAY? i'm losing my damn mind current character ranking: 1) dodo 2) will 3) rosamond 4) mary 5) fred 6) celia any of these guys as the focus: good with me. when we open up a chapter and i see the dreaded word "lydgate"...a different story!
DAY 15: CHAPTERS 43-45 as very witty people in the comments pointed out: IT'S THE MIDDLE OF MIDDLEMARCH MARCH. the ides, even. it is also now BOOK V: THE DEAD HAND, a badass title that only grows more badass because of the aforementioned foreshadowing. nothing is more badass than foreshadowing. I CAN'T BELIEVE THIS. ROSAMOND IS SUDDENLY LIVING WITH AND MARRIED TO AND ACQUAINTED WITH THE FAMILY OF LYDGATE. WHAT THE HELL KIND OF PACING IS THIS. NARY A SINGLE WEDDING SCENE IN THIS DAMN BOOK IN WHICH 3 WEDDINGS HAVE TAKEN PLACE AMONG MAJOR CHARACTERS. casaubon and lydgate can be exiled from this book, as far as i'm concerned, for their respective crimes of being a butthole and being boring.
DAY 16: CHAPTERS 46-48 it's the best time of the day! will ladislaw, a pro-union pro-democracy king. also the first recorded instance of a floor person. this is also such a perfect example of the Every Good Heterosexual Romance Involves The Man Liking The Woman Way More. i'm once again having a blast. I JUST GASPED AT THE END OF THIS CHAPTER. OH LA VACHE.
DAY 17: CHAPTERS 49-51 i love this book so much (reading it earlier in the day than usual for i can't wait reasons) but it is SO FRUSTRATING SOMETIMES. when a once-major character has a baby I DON'T WANT TO FIND OUT THROUGH A PASSING LINE OF DIALOGUE. jeez. tangled webs here in middlemarch.
DAY 18: CHAPTERS 52-54 ugh! i like the vicar better for mary than dumb old fred vincy. sure, he's 5th in my character rankings, but i rank, like, the mad hatter pretty highly too. doesn't mean i'd wanna marry the guy. was just thinking "ah, don't know if i have a long bulstrode section in me..." and then after two paragraphs this book straight up says "enough." i'm in love aaaaand onto book 6: THE WIDOW AND THE WIFE. ok. three months have suddenly just passed without will and dodo even glimpsing each other, meanwhile if i go like 10 days without seeing someone i'm dating i assume we're ghosting each other. how times have changed. goddamn i am yearning! this book is so f*ckin' good.
DAY 19: CHAPTERS 55-57 okay. so i missed a day. in my defense i was drunk for like 90% of the friday to saturday block of this week, for reasons of "It Was 70 Degrees And St Patrick's Day Weekend And I Am Young And Hot." aaaand i missed another day. i read one chapter but i was very hungover and had also drunkenly bought basketball tickets so time was limited. 8 chapter day it is!!! some fun mary and fred action happening. maybe i will have time to turn Team Fred before the end of this.
DAY 20: CHAPTERS 58-60 immediately this set started out by saying lydgate hates his cousin because his haircut is lame. maybe i'll do a 180 on lydgate, too, because that f*ckin rules. oh my god and it says the same cousin isn't actually hot but girls think he is because of his mustache. i love that this million year old book has the same opinions as the average tiktoker. oh my god and: “If he got his head broken, I might look at it with interest, not before.” PLEASE this project is really testing my roman numeral reading ability.
DAY 21: CHAPTERS 61-63 oh man. drama alert. oh god. chapter 61: drama. chapter 62: yearning. onto BOOK 7: TWO TEMPTATIONS. ugh. i was trying so hard to like lydgate but him being an asshole immediately on the heels of a perfect dodo / will chapter is too much to bear.
DAY 22: CHAPTERS 64-66 read over 100 pages of this yesterday. now i feel invincible going in for what will surely be, like, 22. rosamond is a complete and utter b*tch and i love it.
DAY 23: CHAPTERS 67-69 hehe. this was like...all bulstrode. rude.
DAY 24: CHAPTERS 70-72 ugh. more bulstrode. at least he's doing crimes. and i guess we have to kill the time somehow until will and dodo can see each other again. onto book eight: SUNSET AND SUNRISE. it's giving ethan hawke. “And, of course, men know best about everything, except what women know better.” so true bestie
DAY 25: CHAPTERS 73-75 oh thank god, will ladislaw is coming back. i can't deal with all this bulstrode and lydgate action, even if i do keep getting the opportunity to see rosy be an absolutely divine asshole because of it.
DAY 26: CHAPTERS 76-78 this set of chapters is so dramatic that i just explained the entire plot of this 900 page book to my sister just to try to indicate the massive yearning angsty payoff of dodo and will seeing each other again under unintended circumstances. i am having so much fun it's hard to stop!!!
DAY 27: CHAPTERS 79-81 I AM GOING THROUGH IT, EMOTIONALLY SPEAKING.
DAY 28: CHAPTERS 82-84 AAAAAAAAAHHHH!!!! honestly in my heart of hearts i find this kinda anticlimactic but still. AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAHHHHHHHHHH!!!! actually i take it back. it's nice just the way it is.
DAY 29: CHAPTERS 85-87 folks, we are nearing the end and i have to say...I DON'T WANNA. don't cry because it's over, smile because it happened, or whatever, i guess, ugh. also now realizing it's been about a hundred years since we last heard from fred and mary. we're down to the last seconds, george eliot! thereeee they are. all the star crossed dodo-and-will stuff is lovely, but this is so good too: "I don’t think either of us could spare the other, or like any one else better, however much we might admire them. It would make too great a difference to us—like seeing all the old places altered, and changing the name for everything." and it's over. i didn't know it was finishing today!!! i'm going to cry.
OVERALL this is a funny, wry, smart, witty, political, historically significant, educating, romantic, beautifully written, basically perfect book. it is worth each and every one of its 880 pages and i would have kept reading far more! rating: 5
------------------- tbr review
am very into pretending i want to read super-long books lately...more
i'm going to read a chapter (or whatever the this-book equivalent of a chapter is — 100 pages? a normal size book?welcome to...sigh...LES MAYSERABLES.
i'm going to read a chapter (or whatever the this-book equivalent of a chapter is — 100 pages? a normal size book? undue suffering?) of this a day until i'm done, a process which will begin in may but end way after that.
i've been thinking about reading this book as a way to get into weightlifting, so. it's beach body season or whatever.
let's do this. i'm so scared right now.
BOOK ONE: A GOOD MAN oh, great. this is divided into 48 books. that's awesome. a book a day of this book alone. no worries, no problem. i'm not troubled. i have no regrets. it's fine that this bit is a million pages long and all of my above jokes are thus true.
sometimes i think i would never join a cult, but i feel like i just got radicalized by the hermit weirdo living in a hut 45 minutes away from society in this book, so. too close to call.
BOOK TWO: THE FALL yesterday i read an ebook of this because i couldn't run out to buy a copy, and today i am reading it physically. it is so goddamn heavy it's insane.
this jean valjean guy is kind of a bad vibe thus far. #blessed that the bishop was successfully able to be like..."get your act together my guy."
BOOK THREE: IN THE YEAR 1817 this one has a huge time jump, is half the length of the first two, and begins with a 6 page "here's what you missed on glee" style recap of pop culture since we last saw jean valjean. in other words it rocks.
only truer because it follows 8 really fun characters.
BOOK FOUR: ENTRUSTING SOMETIMES MEANS GIVING AWAY this book was as short as it was depressing. for being little more than the first part of cinderella it sure feels novel in how upsetting it is.
BOOK FIVE: THE DESCENT well, that doesn't sound good. i thought the place we were in was pretty low already.
so things did get much worse, and now they appear to be getting better, but this book has given me trust issues and i don't believe it's going anywhere good from here.
BOOK SIX: JAVERT get a load of this guy (derogatory). i don't know much of the story of les mis, in spite of its cultural prowess and the fact that i technically attended my sister's high school production of the musical (physically if not in spirit), but even i know this loser.
BOOK SEVEN: THE CHAMPMATHIEU AFFAIR i mean. i don't even know what to say about this chapter. the emotional range here...i have no choice but to stan.
i'm using humor as a crutch because this made me really sad lol.
BOOK EIGHT: AFTER-EFFECT this is the nicest possible way of saying "in which sh*t hits the fan."
ok. even with that expectation i was not prepared for the extent to which sh*t would hit the fan.
BOOK ONE: WATERLOO we have completed part one: fantine, and we move on to part two: cosette. i don't know why i feel like i have to avoid spoilers for this million year old classic but here we are.
okay so this was literally a 50 page recounting of the battle of waterloo. i guess in hindsight i don't know what i expected.
BOOK TWO: THE SHIP ORION it's kind of reassuring that even in the 19th century they were dealing with tabloids and fake news. but leave my boy valjean out of it...
is there anything more jean valjean than risking his own life to save a stranger's, and then also using that peril as a means of escaping prison? one thing about jean is my guy is going to escape.
BOOK THREE: A DEATHBED PROMISE IS HONORED okay, fine. i took multiple days off this project. in my defense reading this book is not conducive to busy days. i can't exactly haul a 1400-page tome around with me just in case i have a minute between social obligations.
hard to convey the extent to which i root for things to go well in this book, even though i know they're building me up just to break me back down again.
BOOK FOUR: THE GORBEAU TENEMENT i can't stress enough how much i live in fear at every moment. oh, the beggar that valjean has been generously giving money might be javert? can't surprise me. i was prepared for the worst from minute one.
BOOK FIVE: SILENT STALKERS IN THE DARK well, that doesn't sound good.
javert is operating on kendrick lamar levels of hatred...just picking up newspapers on a daily basis hunting for clues about a guy he straight up thinks is dead. another level of living in his mind rent-free.
BOOK SIX: PETIT-PICPUS you know things are getting crazy when even victor hugo is like "what i'm about to say has nothing to do with this actual story." this from the guy who spent the whole first 100 pages of the book on somebody who once had a sleepover with our protagonist.
BOOK SEVEN: PARENTHESIS oh my gosh. now this part is like "well, since i just spent 40 pages on one specific nunnery that isn't at all relevant, surely y'all won't mind if i write a quick 12 page essay about monasticism."
to be honest, my sir...i mind. get back to the good stuff.
BOOK EIGHT: CEMETERIES TAKE WHAT THEY ARE GIVEN [record scratch] [freeze frame on jean valjean inside of a coffin] you're probably wondering how i ended up in this situation
BOOK ONE: PARIS THROUGH THE STUDY OF ONE OF ITS ATOMS we have concluded part two: cosette, and begin part three: marius. and i have to say, this chapter is looking like a classic case of one of hugo's lengthy sociopolitical asides.
BOOK TWO: THE CONSUMMATE BOURGEOIS marked safe from back to back lengthy sociopolitical asides.
instead, this was another classic: a character study of a guy whose role we do not know yet and may never know.
BOOK THREE: GRANDFATHER AND GRANDSON today i am feeling: can you believe i'm not even halfway done this book. i know the goodreads review character limit can't.
kind of funny to be radicalized because you've become just completely obsessed with your dad.
BOOK FOUR: FRIENDS OF THE ABC throughout time, college students have always thought they are funnier and smarter and more revolutionary than they are.
but i still love them anyway.
BOOK FIVE: VIRTUE IN ADVERSITY all this talk of parisian revolutionary teens hanging around in cafes talking about politics was sounding familiar, and i was so proud of myself for actually paying attention during my sister's play, but then i realized i was thinking of that wes anderson movie the french dispatch.
BOOK SIX: THE CONJUNCTION OF TWO STARS in my mind this is going to be the marius x valjean meetup: two stars to me. let's see.
i didn't even consider this would be a meet cute between marius and cosette. i might be too much of a jean stan. if that's even possible.
BOOK SEVEN: PATRON-MINETTE quick sidenote for some inferno fanfiction and an intro to a crew of villains. i'd say "our villains," but that would be a crazy assumption for an author who just loves to introduce us to guys.
BOOK EIGHT: THE VILLAINOUS PAUPER to be totally honest with you, this 80 page section of a book written 150 years ago is one of the most exciting and unpredictable and satisfying scenes i've ever read.
jean valjean fan till i die.
BOOK ONE: A FEW PAGES OF HISTORY we have concluded part three: marius, and have broken out of our character titles and entered a little something called "part four: the rue plumet idyll and the rue st-denis epic." this part title and book title are not pairing up for what sound like an adventurous romp.
interesting to find out that victor hugo defines "a few pages" as 34.
BOOK TWO: EPONINE praying for the streets since this girl appears to be in them.
marius is giving me the same secondhand stress i got when harry potter wouldn't do his homework. please get a job and do it.
BOOK THREE: THE HOUSE IN RUE PLUMET you guys all know how i feel about jean valjean but even i can admit the man has to take a chill pill. descending into a deep depression because your adopted daughter has an un-acted-upon crush is crazy.
BOOK FOUR: HELP FROM BELOW MAY BE FROM ON HIGH if i saw an old man get attacked at night and then beat the hell out of his attacker, i'd clap too. i can't say that i would then steal the attacker's purse and give it robin hood-style to another conveniently located old man, but that's more for lack of skill than desire.
BOOK FIVE: WHICH DOES NOT END THE WAY IT BEGAN you know that thing of how if someone writes you a love letter, they love you, but if they write you a hundred love letters, they love writing love letters?
i feel like that automatically applies if the love letter in question is 15 pages long.
BOOK SIX: YOUNG GAVROCHE well, everyone...welcome to june. i've spent a full month with this book, and i've gotten just over halfway into it for my efforts.
if i were a little child criminal who was known for climbing anything, and i'd been asked to rescue my deadbeat dad at my own peril for no reward, i don't know if i'd be interested. but i guess that's why i'm me and not little gavroche.
BOOK SEVEN: SLANG something tells me we're in for another one of hugo's tangentially related 40 page essays.
BOOK EIGHT: ENCHANTMENT AND DESPAIR love that marius flirts by being like "i almost killed a veteran for you" and then refusing to elaborate when cosette asks him what the hell that means.
ok. i didn't feel enchanted but of course the despair hits.
BOOK NINE: WHERE ARE THEY GOING? victor, where are WE going. people are moving, riots are occurring, new characters are being introduced, and we have 500 pages left to go. which is of course 2 normal books worth, and about a third of this. we should be WINDING DOWN by now.
BOOK TEN: THE FIFTH OF JUNE 1832 at one point in this victor says "one last word before we rejoin the story," and then what follows is—and i'm not joking—11 more pages without rejoining the story.
BOOK ELEVEN: THE ATOM EMBRACES THE STORM "come along with me to take down the parisian government at the barricades" -courfeyrac if he was a vlogger
BOOK TWELVE: CORINTHE i did not expect to see the word "nark" in this book. but i am loving seeing it applied to javert as he is tied to a pole.
BOOK THIRTEEN: MARIUS ENTERS INTO DARKNESS we've crossed the thousand page mark. marius better not enter into anything he's not planning on leaving soon.
well. i fear he's on his romeo and juliet sh*t, and therefore may actually be leaving sans his mortal coil.
BOOK FOURTEEN: THE GRANDEURS OF DESPAIR the chapters with titles like this one are always pretty okay. it's the ones with titles like "let me tell you about 1842 paris" that casually include the most devastating sentence you've ever read.
not marius' sentimental ass entering the barricade like an action hero...
BOOK FIFTEEN: RUE DE L'HOMME ARME it's been roughly 200 pages since the last time we encountered jean valjean. what a sight for sore eyes (literally) (my eyes are sore from having read 1,031 pages of 19th century french tragedy with 400+ to go).
even if this is my least favorite version of jean: Weird Dad.
BOOK ONE: THE WAR WITHIN FOUR WALLS we are beginning part five: jean valjean. now i understand the title: the fact that i would have been thrilled to spend our remaining hundreds of pages with jean at any other time except this creepy overprotective obsessed father one is making me miserable.
jean and javert are truly having a serendipity-style series of rom-com coincidences and meet-cutes. how do these two keep finding each other.
BOOK TWO: THE BOWELS OF LEVIATHAN i think i've developed a pretty healthy sense of victor's priorities, but even i could not have expected that this chapter, which follows a climactic scene that killed off a dozen named characters, would be a lengthy diatribe about poop.
BOOK THREE: THE MIRE, YET THE SOUL possibly the most well-constructed joke of all time: 16 pages about parisian waste management followed by "Jean Valjean, it turned out, was in the sewers of Paris."
BOOK FOUR: JAVERT DERAILED oh my god. what the hell.
i should have expected that this evil goddamn book would make me feel sadness over even JAVERT!!!
BOOK FIVE: GRANDFATHER AND GRANDSON we've got a couple hundred pages to go and it seems like marius has his happily ever after. this isn't my first rodeo. 4 more chapters is plenty of time for victor to f*ck his sh*t up.
if you'll pardon the french.
BOOK SIX: THE SLEEPLESS NIGHT i did not expect this book to contain a closed-door sex scene.
then again 1400 pages is a lot to fill up.
BOOK SEVEN: THE LAST DROP IN THE CHALICE remember how jean valjean was originally stealing for a brood of interchangeable nieces and nephews we never saw again? this guy is just obsessed with forming familial bonds.
this one is pissing me off for so many reasons...how is it saintly for jean valjean to tell marius the truth but force marius to lie? how is marius' reaction of disgust and rejection supposed to be all good with me? why doesn't cosette get to know or be involved with anything besides repeatedly being described as a beautiful angel??? this is the first time where i'm like damn. this is old timey as hell.
BOOK EIGHT: THE WANING TWILIGHT if marius has a hundred haters i'm one of them. if marius has one hater it's me. if marius has no haters i'm dead.
BOOK NINE: ULTIMATE DARKNESS, ULTIMATE DAWN hi mtv and welcome to the final chapter of les mis.
i can't believe we made it. it's been 51 days, 1,275 pages, and 3-7 mental breakdowns, but we're here. and i have to say i couldn't have done it without you all, because quite literally if i didn't have your nice compliments and jokes in the comments i would have given up on this 41 days ago. anyway. enough kindness, it's off-brand for me. let's finish this.
OVERALL this book is: long. ridiculous. full of lengthy asides about sewage and waterloo and parisian geography, it is also full of unforgettable characters. it's almost unrelentingly sad, and yet the emotional impact of it is so heavy and real. it's beautifully written. it's one of a kind.
this is crazy to say about a book that will take nearly two months to read even if you're dedicating a significant amount of time to it every single day, but. i recommend it. rating: 4...more
Real fans already know: I'm heartless. I'm soulless. My resting temperature is 35 degrees Fahrenheit and I have a deep abyss where my cardiac system iReal fans already know: I'm heartless. I'm soulless. My resting temperature is 35 degrees Fahrenheit and I have a deep abyss where my cardiac system is supposed to be.
So it shouldn't be surprising to anyone who is familiar with me that this book didn't make me feel much of anything.
I didn't read the Percy Jackson books in elementary school (I was too busy sneaking into the teen section at the library and reading books that would cause me to ask my mom what a bl*wj*b is at 9 years old). I don't read much historical fiction now. Mythology generally is like a worse version of fairytales in my mind.
Anyway this was a recipe for disaster, is what I'm saying, and instead it was just. Kind of boring? To me.
There is not much to say about this book, except that if you have a few hours of very boring work ahead of you, listening to Neil Gaiman tell you his There is not much to say about this book, except that if you have a few hours of very boring work ahead of you, listening to Neil Gaiman tell you his versions of fairytales ancient myths at 2x speed is a fairly ideal way to accompany it.
Doesn't need too much attention. Won't distract you very much. This should be consumed, in my opinion, exactly as pleasant background noise.
Sorry that that's kind of a frenemy-ish thing to say.
Bottom line: Fine!
---------------- pre-review
what's the level of possibility on neil gaiman narrating every audiobook?
asking for a friend or whatever.
review to come / 3 stars
---------------- tbr review
on a quest to find pure joy. pretty sure i'm on the right track with "mythology rewritten and read aloud by neil gaiman"...more
I love a good prank as much as the next person, which is to say: kind of, sometimes, hypothetically, and not when it happens to me.
So the fact that I I love a good prank as much as the next person, which is to say: kind of, sometimes, hypothetically, and not when it happens to me.
So the fact that I am forced to assume that this book represents the culmination of a years-long trick you all have been playing on me is NOT good news.
I have read everything Taylor Jenkins Reid has ever written, from when she wrote exclusively in the tiny micro-genre of Chick Lit About Bad Things Happening To Kind Boring Women And The Aftermath, to now, when she writes exclusively in the tiny micro-genre of Historical Fiction Set In The Back Half Of The Twentieth Century About Good Women Doing Bad Or Neutral Things In The Name Of Generic Feminism.
I have never given any of it below a 2.5 rounded up, and even that was of the "this is trash but fun trash" variety.
SO I ANTICIPATED THIS WITH GREAT EAGERNESS. An eagerness that was only FUELED by the ENDLESS loving reviews and GLORIFYING hype and UNDYING high average rating!
But you guys!
This book isn't good!
It's been so goddamn long since I've been in this position. I got tired of being the unpopular opinion girl. I got sick of yucking your collective yum, but more importantly, I was not super into dreading checking my own comments on a regular basis.
So I worked on myself. I was in the brain equivalent of a superhero workout montage. (I'm realizing now - why would a superhero really need to work out? They're magic. I think I'm making this up. I don't watch superhero movies, because again, I GOT TIRED OF BEING THE UNPOPULAR OPINION GIRL.)
(It all comes full circle.)
I actually tried to pick up only books I really thought I would like. And it worked! Kinda. My average rating hit ever so slightly above 3 stars for the first time in years. Huge for me, depressing for anyone else - which is my wheelhouse, generally.
And then this book came along. WHICH I SHOULD HAVE LIKED.
And it ruined...everything.
I'm just going to say it: This book is poorly written. It tells without showing. The descriptions are insane. The chapter endings are continually bizarre, alternating between saccharine and nonsensical and a combination of both. Compared to TJR's other books, I feel like somehow an early draft was published by mistake and everyone just has to run with it to avoid embarrassment.
It is, top to bottom, overly sweet.
And, while I typically do care about the often-boring sometimes-not characters that popular Reid's books, and I feel for the nightmarish scenarios that nonstop befall them almost too much, that wasn't so true here. In essence, I felt bad for these people without caring about them.
Does that make sense? In other words it was all the downsides of empathy with none of the ups.
AND I LOVE BOOKS ABOUT SIBLINGS. I am someone with three of them, and I downright adore those bozos. There's nothing I love reading about more than found families and real families. But the goddamn Rivas didn't even feel like siblings, to me. More like weird friends, each with half of a personality, so on the 2 pages they're together you can pretend there are only two and they're real people.
I am so upset.
Bottom line: Ms Jenkins Reid, please go back to the chick lit. Just for one book. Then we can talk about this later.
I need a break.
------------------ pre-review
okay. honesty hour. everyone knows this isn't good and is just pranking me, right?
...i can't be the unpopular opinion girl again. i won't do it.
either way, review to come / 1.5 stars
------------------ currently-reading updates
brought this on a train because i thought it'd be a pleasure to binge read. instead i had to force myself through the first 100 pages.
send thoughts and prayers.
------------------ tbr review
look at me. look me in the eyes. anything taylor jenkins reid writes. ANYTHING. i will read it....more
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