Not my kind of read, so I won't rate it here. I had difficulty pushing through to make it through to the "good" parts - the scary stuff! For me, this Not my kind of read, so I won't rate it here. I had difficulty pushing through to make it through to the "good" parts - the scary stuff! For me, this book is so deeply culturally referential that I don't get a lot of the references and social commentary the author is making (which is usually my favorite part of any book) - and I understand this, because I prefer reading books about my own culture that are like that too, so I get why it would be in some ways counterproductive for the author to explain all of the references he inserts. It just doesn't work for me as a reader and really reminds me of a modern-day Native American version of an old Western, complete with bar fights and hunting through snow, etc., so not really my jam, but I can see how it would work for other readers! ...more
Steven Rowley’s The Editor is a jaunty, light read that attempts humor on every page. The opening of the novel, in many ways, reminded me of a duller,Steven Rowley’s The Editor is a jaunty, light read that attempts humor on every page. The opening of the novel, in many ways, reminded me of a duller, less funny version the wide-eyed Andrea Sachs of The Devil Wears Prada but from a male perspective. However, Rowley’s version read more in the vein of puerile than comical, and the jokes and moments of humor never really hit the mark for me. As I read this novel, the attempts at comedy only distracted from the reading experience, because they managed to take away from the book’s atmosphere rather than add to it. They fell flat and just came off as borderline YA, misplaced in The Editor’s setting. It’s possible that it was my own misunderstanding, but I was hoping for a more substantive read – something with a little more meat on the bones that I could really fall into. It’s possible that I would have responded better to this book if I’d known the type of humor that it was going for – borderline slapstick as the James Smale regales us with stumbling all over himself – and the fluffy way in which the story would be told.
Let’s start from the beginning: In 1992, James Smale is a writer living in New York City who hasn’t been published in years. What he has accomplished is a slew of soul-crushing temp assignments involving hours sitting in cubicle after cubicle; he’s witnessed the demise of his family unit on the subject of his homosexuality and he’s written a book about his mother. A cold woman he never really felt he knew, she is an accidental topic that spills out of James as a form of therapy while he tries to grapple with who she is and how they feel about each other. It is this book that lands him in the orbit of Jackie Kennedy Onassis. When James arrives at the publishing house to meet the editor who wants to buy his book, never in his wildest dreams did he imagine that it would be the Mrs. Onassis. He is dumbstruck and dumbfounded and worried how his mother, a devout Catholic and avid admirer of the Kennedy family, will feel about having her life read and edited by one of her idols. James and Jackie develop a friendship he never expected, and as they work together on his manuscript, she encourages him to go back home to confront his demons of the past so that he can write the perfect, authentic ending for the book. But when a long-held family secret is revealed, he realized his editor may have had a larger plan that goes beyond the page…
The Editor is a cozy read that pairs well with a mug of Earl Grey tea and warm footie socks. It leans into the territory of heartfelt, going for the heartstrings that for most of us are triggered by matters such as family, ailing elderly parents, apartheid within the ranks of a nuclear unit and the realization of finally meeting one’s goals. You’ll find all of that here, wrapped around a sincere writer still grappling with his past writer, his ice-cold mother, his now-estranged father and the Mrs. Jacqueline Kennedy Onassis in all her prim fineness and glamour. Jackie Kennedy Onassis, here, is painted as a real person – someone who waits in line at the copy machine and likes the occasional drink after work – and that portrayal of her I really appreciated. It was approachable and dynamic, as I’m sure Rowley intended for her to be. She quietly and demurely stole the show both as and in The Editor. However, the rest of the cast of characters would have interested me more if they’d been explored through a more profound lens, if the interactions between them had been conceived with more depth and less failed attempts at awkward humor. After a while, those attempts just make the read itself awkward for the reader, and that’s not the relationship I’d hoped for with this book. But alas, I don’t doubt that many readers will enjoy this novel. Just be prepared for what you’re in for – at times inane humor, a writer’s journey both personally and professionally and the effortlessly exotic bird that is the Jackie Kennedy we think of at its center. ***
*I received a physical copy of this novel from the publisher, G.P. Putnam's Sons in exchange for an honest review. Thanks so much to the publisher!
I had really high hopes for this book going in, because who doesn't love a good adult fairy tale, right? But, ultimately, I found that the wrDNF @ 15%
I had really high hopes for this book going in, because who doesn't love a good adult fairy tale, right? But, ultimately, I found that the writing just didn't interest me. (view spoiler)[The big happening, upon which the entire novel is based, happens fairly early on in the novel, and it failed to wow me or even approach tickling my imagination. (hide spoiler)] There's nothing specific that I would critique about Diane Setterfield's writing; it just wasn't for me. I think it was a little too plain for me. This novel had the air of sitting at the knee of a 19th century British grandmother's knee as she she knits a scarf and tells the kiddies a story. While I'm sure many will love that style of writing and storytelling--that simple life, folksy feel--for me, it could barely keep my attention. For that reason, I will not rate this book.
The description of this novella only vaguely resembles how it actually reads. What really seems to be happening here is a narration style similar to sThe description of this novella only vaguely resembles how it actually reads. What really seems to be happening here is a narration style similar to stream of consciousness, where this budding teenage narrator learns first-hand about sex the summer that Barbra, an Ethiopian Jewish girl of 18, comes to stay with his family for the summer.
There is a lot of crude language, which wouldn't have bothered me if it come from a more mature mind (the narrator, not the author) and had a meaningful purpose to the narrative. This wasn't a narrative vehicle I would have driven to deliver the message it intended, but I'm sure that that will be the appeal for some. However, for me, the dialogue seemed stilted and unnatural and the plot was smothered in descriptions. For such a short literary narrative, this book would have been better served with plot than with the often meaningless descriptions that take up, ultimately, pages and pages of space. If you're looking to jump inside the mind of a Jewish teenage boy (who uses words like tits and cock and "seriously?!" for over 100 pages, you've come to the right place. Other than that, I never really got into it and was grateful that Queen Solomon read so quickly. I wouldn't say that it was a bad book, just not one that's for me. Definitely more of a "niche" read. The cover art, though, is eye-catching and very striking; that I thought was well-done.**
I received an advance-read copy of this book from the publisher, Coach House Books, via Netgalley in exchange for an honest review.
This entire novel, especially the prologue, reminded me of the ramblings of someone’s old grandpa rocking on the front porch of his clapboard home.DNF
This entire novel, especially the prologue, reminded me of the ramblings of someone’s old grandpa rocking on the front porch of his clapboard home. I can only assume this is exactly what Beatty was going for, by the direction the novel ended up taking, but I felt like I was reading—no, sifting through—a bunch of nonsense I just wanted to be done with. And a lot of this read like an ultra-liberal excuse to spout out the n-word (hard er, mind you) as both a starting point, comma and full stop to every paragraph. It was absolutely exhausting.
I was looking forward to a good satire, but I don’t think I ever laughed once, because I was too distracted by trying to figure out what the hell he was even rambling about and how it fit into any possible plot line, ironic device, literary direction--hell, even a Katt Williams-like satirical skit--anything! I wanted to like this one – the first time non-Commonwealthers are allowed to be considered for the Man Booker Prize and an American—I’d be lying if I didn’t go ahead and point out—and African American wins it. I HAVE to read it; I’m so excited…I’m so confused…I’m so let down.
I don’t want to take away from the win at all. Have it; keep it, Paul Beatty. But I’m not on the bandwagon. Not even a little bit. DNF.
Carmen Maria Machado's Her Body and Other Parties is a collection I was so excited to read I dragged a friend in to read it with me. We hande2.5 stars
Carmen Maria Machado's Her Body and Other Parties is a collection I was so excited to read I dragged a friend in to read it with me. We handed off back and forth who got to pick the next story, never going in order, and found ourselves surprisingly disappointed by each one.
In all honesty, I was drawn to what Machado was trying to do here, to what she was trying to say. But, she didn't say it with enough force. Some of her stories, such as "Real Women Have Bodies" and "Eight Bites" seemed to not amount to much more than a harsh whisper, if that, never fully realizing themselves. I wanted more--MORE from a voice that dared to tackle such bold topics as the female experience and psyche. And by "more" I don't mean argumentative or domineering in tone; some of my favorite short stories ever crept up on me with a gentle breeze at my neck only to bowl me over in the end with words just as gentle. Machado and Her Body didn't do that for me. In fact, what I remember most about this collection is my buddy reader's and my disappointed-mounting-to-annoyed reaction as each story was read and discussed. For such a topic that spoke to us, we both wanted to learn something, to feel something--something. This collection just fell flat in so many ways.
Here's what I will say: Carmen Maria Machado clearly has something to say, though I, myself, didn't hear it loudly enough. I thoroughly enjoyed her use of Gothic elements--vaguely supernatural devices used to convey her thoughts, to tinge her messages in wonder. Yet, some of her works were too referential without adding enough to the conversation to warrant the blatant references (to "The Girl with the Ribbon Around her Neck" and Law & Order: SVU in particular). "The Husband Stitch" was my favorite story, because of the unique and haunting asides inserted into the narrative, but the ending failed to shock or move me, so even that story did not live up to the hype around this collection. Every story I read left me wishing there was more--not length but meat and substance, not words but voice and resonance. As we all know, fabulously original ideas must, too, be supported by the execution of them, and that I did not see impressively done here. 2.5*
Pure Hollywood proved to be a collection plagued by a wide spectrum of dullness. There were moments, mostly at the start of the collection, where overPure Hollywood proved to be a collection plagued by a wide spectrum of dullness. There were moments, mostly at the start of the collection, where overwrought prose ran rampant in a way that made no sense whatsoever. It was as if the author, Christine Schutt, had her trusty Word thesaurus immediately on hand, ready to whip out at any moment to form absurd sentences instead of creating readable literature—as if her way of being “creative” was to write so evasively and nonsensically as to confuse the reader into thinking, “Damn, this MUST be the newest form of erudite art; I’ve got to HAVE it!” purely (sure, why not?—pun intended) because they don’t get it at all.
As many readers and writers know, Ernest Hemingway is famously quoted as saying: “If a writer knows enough about what he is writing, he may omit things that he knows, and the reader … will feel those things as strongly as though the writer had stated them. The dignity of movement of an iceberg is due to only one-eighth of it being above water.” I’m confident that this is not what you’ll find in Schutt’s Pure Hollywood. All of the stories seemed incomplete and covered in a blanket of gray soot. They were all a bit dreary in atmosphere (I found that to be fine if that's the mood she was going for) and very unfinished. There was very little shock factor in this collection at all, and what little there was wasn’t followed-up on, so the few moments of revelation turned out to be aimless, pointless, near-powerless punches that slipped off the skin like water, non-scathing and unmemorable.
The first story in the collection took up one-third of the space of the entire anthology and had literally only one moment of pure interest. You’ll know that moment when you get to it. I left “Pure Hollywood” behind feeling that moments of my life had been squandered in reading it. But, I pressed on.
The second story in this collection, “The Hedges,” begins as such:
The woman who had just been identified as attached to Dick Hedge looked pained by the clotted, green sound of her little boy’s breathing, an unwell honk that did not blend in with the sashaying plants and beachy-wet breeze of the island.
*raising hand* Umm, did you just try to say that a woman’s son was sick on the beach? I had to read that line at least three times just to extract some meaning from that sludge of words, almost senseless when mixed in that formula. That opening line alone was enough to make me say “Pass” on that story. BUT I pressed forward again. I ended up liking “The Hedges”—the story of a strangely unhappy young couple on vacation with their fussy toddler and the events on that vacation that led to an unfortunate event—far more than I liked any of the other stories. Still, it read like an adult version of Fun with Dick and Jane (and the husband is even named Dick). If that was Schutt’s intent, it fell just short of being clever because it was somehow never fully realized. It read like an outline of a story with none of the goods filled in, and because of that I didn’t especially care about the family, particularly that toddler.
“The Duchess of Albany” was the absolute epitome of the word WASP(y) and held no interest for me whatsoever. It read easily, sometimes even jauntily, but in the end left absolutely no impact.
“Family Man” was a dull flash fiction about a dull man. Literally. That is all.
“Where You Live, When You Need Me” warranted only an annoyed side-eye glance and a curt flipping of the page. As far as I can tell, it said nothing about anything but still managed to be rather snobbishly WASPy. Are these people seriously hiring a homeless woman, whose full name they don’t even care to know, to help them out around the homes they’re renting in “the Berkshires,” then contemplating their belief in God (ironic, sure, I see it. But too haughty for me to even care)? The nerve. Nothing else to be said about this one.
“The Dot Sisters”—what for??
“Oh, the Obvious” drew me in because of the potential for irony implied in the title. There was some irony in the end that was tolerably well done.
In the end, Christine Schutt’s Pure Hollywood is a collection I’m sure most people can live without. This compilation of stories added nothing to the dialogue about anything, unless you are the kind of reader who enjoys a dry read of literary content the likes of which is sure to make future readers inexperienced with the genre cringe away from it. I get the feeling that Schutt may have been going for dry, witty, ironic and possibly socially commentating fiction, but I do feel that I very well might be stretching for benefit of the doubt because it just never got there. For me, it was mostly fiction without a soul, which, I’ve noticed, is almost always what you get from Grove Atlantic/Grove Press. (This is an unfortunate, but accurate observation, in my personal opinion.) To give the best and most accurate analogy I can think of, this entire collection was written for and about extremely uptight Protestant-esque people of coin (probably family money) who would wear cardigans buttoned at the neck and drone on and on about the troubles with “the help.” Picture that person and you’ve got a pretty good idea of the audience for this short story collection. I struggled with what rating to give Pure Hollywood. In the end, 2 stars seemed fair enough, and I’ll move on with my life thinking no more about it. **
*I received an advance-read copy of the book from the publisher, Grove Atlantic, via Netgalley in exchange for an honest review.
I was not a fan of this writing at all. From the very first page, I was turned off. The narrative jumps around in a disjointed manner that nearly gaveI was not a fan of this writing at all. From the very first page, I was turned off. The narrative jumps around in a disjointed manner that nearly gave me a headache, and the punchlines usually fell flat at best. There are several attempts at wit here that never hit the mark (raccoon/coon, for one), and this novel didn't really seem to delve any deeper than the surface of stereotypes (model on cocaine, trust fund kid still spoiled and under his mother's thumb). There were literally moments when I sighed with disgust (Don't worry; you're too rich to go to prison) and knew there was no way I'd get through this one. I'm sure that there's a market for this sort of novel. There are readers who would absolutely relish the scandal here. However, I am definitely not that reader.
The Only Child started out as improbably as to mock the tradition of true Gothic fiction. The tension and “horror” seemed contrived from the very starThe Only Child started out as improbably as to mock the tradition of true Gothic fiction. The tension and “horror” seemed contrived from the very start, placed into our minds by the forced narration of the author, not by circumstance, not by the skilled hand that every reader searches for to guide them on their path.
This novel was a dabbling adaptation of so many classic stories of the Gothic tradition—Frankenstein, Strange Case of Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde, and Dracula…my foot. To sample their tradition is one thing, to recreate it, another, more awe-inspiring thing. Yet this, The Only Child, was neither. It sampled their names, their ideas, but never breathed any life into them. In fact, it read as a lifeless shell of them, if that even, that writhed with too much telling me and not enough showing me. I felt nothing while reading this, not even when Pyper tried to tell me what to feel, and was bored from the start of the first chapter.
In short, The Only Child turned out to be a “fast-paced” adventure story with no soul, a play on the classic horror traditions we all love for their originality, though this novel displayed little originality of its own. I recommend it to no one, least of all lovers of classic horror or the Gothic tradition. In fact, the only surprise I found in these pages, before skipping to the end and finally putting it down, was that the renowned Simon and Schuster, whose lists I tend to love, would publish this thing in the first place. 1 star *
*I received an advance-read copy of this book from the publisher, Simon Schuster, via Netgalley in exchange for an honest review.
Short stories hold a power that longer works of fiction do not have the advantage of: they can pack a hard punch that'll knock your socks off in mere Short stories hold a power that longer works of fiction do not have the advantage of: they can pack a hard punch that'll knock your socks off in mere minutes, spilling uplifting joy, heart-wrenching pain or newly provoked thought from readers all in one fell swoop. This, of course, is because they are so much more concentrated than their longer counterparts, doing away with excess prose and condensing the narrative arc into a matter of pages rather than chapters. For this reason, some of my favorite reads—the most thought-provoking and resonating reads—of all time have been short stories, and I sought this out here, within this collection, to continue that tradition for me. However, In Sunlight or in Shadow seemed prepared to offer up nothing but the latter, with the few glimmers of entertainment here so weak and sporadic that it was like the sun never quite pushed through the blinds.
Story after story were mind-numbingly dull and unmemorable. In reading through this anthology centered around the paintings of Edward Hopper (also featured within these pages before the start of each story written around them), I often felt like I was trudging through thick mud in search of that jewel that would glimmer brightly from beneath the sludge. It took me longer to finish this than it should have—than it could have—because I didn’t really want to pick it back up. But, alas, that is the magic with short story collections, isn’t it? You always feel that just around the next corner, with the next turn of the page, the next story might be the one. The next story might be enough to carry the entire collection—and so, you read on. But I never found anything magical in this compilation.
To be fair, Stephen King and Nicholas Christopher lightly touched on a literary nerve, and had this collection been filled with stories such as those, In Sunlight or in Shadow would’ve earned itself a far stronger rating from me indeed. But nothing truly moved or inspired me here. In truth, most of these stories took themselves far too seriously, as if the author’s identity or the mere fact that they’d proffered literary prose (rather than commercial plot lines) would alone carry the read, make me love it, make me keep turning pages. Well, Block, it wasn’t enough! Not by a long shot. I found most of these stories to be tedious and stuffy at best. No doubt, some teacher will find this collection and force it upon her high school English students, because it seems to exude the literary seriousness—gravitas, shall we say—requisite to be considered great. And no doubt the students will likely feel as I did.
My life has not been changed in reading this. Neither has my mind been stretched nor my imagination tested, my joy for reading stoked or my heart rate even quickened. In fact, the only thing that changed in reading this collection was my willingness to ever pick up anything else that Lawrence Block has ever laid a finger on. Will I dare? We shall see.
This collection has managed to earn the first 1.5 star review I’ve ever given—I could barely finish it, but somehow Stephen King’s “The Music Room” and Nicholas Christopher’s “Rooms by the Sea” saved it from complete engulfment by the yawning abyss. I have nothing else to even say about this collection, except that I need a good palette cleanser to start anew on something else. *
* I received an advance-read copy of this book from the publisher, Pegasus Books, via Netgalley in exchange for an honest review.
So sorry, I couldn't even finish this one before putting it down, which is extremely extremely rare for me!, because the word that kept popping into mSo sorry, I couldn't even finish this one before putting it down, which is extremely extremely rare for me!, because the word that kept popping into my head was overwrought, Overwrought, OVERWROUGHT! It seemed like NDiaye was trying way too hard to be deep or profound, and I just couldn't get into her writing style. It seemed...melodramatic, but not in a way that I could appreciate. Just couldn't do it, so, sadly, this will be the first novel EVER to make it onto my "Could Not Even Finish" shelf. But, to be fair, I'll refrain from rating this one since I couldn't even get halfway.
HOWEVER, I'd be interested to read this one without translation to see if it ends up being better, so perhaps I'll review that one instead and let you all know how it goes!
I’m sorry to say that this one nearly bored me to tears (yes, literal and actual tears), which is a far cry from what I’d expected—and what Miss SchifI’m sorry to say that this one nearly bored me to tears (yes, literal and actual tears), which is a far cry from what I’d expected—and what Miss Schiff’s previous prize-winner, Cleopatra, invoked in me during the reading of it. I was ever so excited to start this one because I’d SO enjoyed Cleopatra—that one had me turning pages faster than any fiction thriller ever has and literally brought me to tears in the end—definitely the kind of roller coaster read that we all yearn for but wouldn’t dream of finding in a biography! However, I found The Witches to be a muddled let-down from the very first page! A tremendous bore whose tendency towards superfluous purple prose didn’t have nearly the moving effect as it offered before. This one proved to be as laborious a task in reading as it must have been in writing, which is never the effect that an author wishes to achieve, I’d imagine. It skipped around from progressing through the timeline of events in its narration to delving into the most minute details of the backgrounds of even the most minor individuals—an enterprise to be applauded that her research yielded such the treasure trove of information, but a fact that severely slowed the progression of the narrative and made the following of it more difficult than necessary. I felt like I was constantly juggling the backstory of each minister, shop keeper, servant and—Lord help me, each family line. Now, who refused to bring firewood to the new minister, and who first accused who of witchcraft because what (and whose cousin/sister/brother/niece/neighbor was that again)? That’s what it sounded like in my head with every page I turned! Ordinarily, such a deep understanding of the characters would be enriching to say the least, but this made me feel leaden down and burdened with the reading of the minutiae, like I was trudging through never-ending quicksand! This actually made it hard to get back into the timeline of events because I sometimes couldn’t remember where I’d even left off in the recounting before the meandering path of anecdotes about all of the interweaving families had knocked me off my reading compass. It was a lot like trying to follow a path already overridden with weeds (over-wrought in its attempts at setting the setting) only to be led off the path and back onto it again over and over by trails you thought you were following to stay on course. Honestly, the reading of this would have been much easier and more enjoyable if Schiff had organized the information differently—shorter chapters would have been an immensely helpful start—so that the reader could more easily remember, categorize and process all of the moving parts of the story in a way that worked more like a novel, as her previous work did. Sure, there was a Shakespearean-like list and description of characters at the start, but even the use of that pulls the reader away from the flow of the work. The Witches would function wonderfully as a reference for an academic paper or the like, but not as a read for any sort of personal enjoyment, whether it had been based on fact or fiction. And this from someone who thoroughly enjoyed one of her other works. After all, as they say, nonfiction writing requires the finesse for story-telling of fiction authoring. Here, the finesse that I previously knew her for was missing. I would give five stars for the sheer amount of information presented here and for just how deeply her research went, but only one star for the way that it read. *
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