The Enchanted Booklog
Thanks to everyone who commented previously: I did acquire a copy of The Queen of Attolia, and I do plan to read it!
81. Bloodroot, Amy Greene - Recently, as I was scrolling back up through my list of 2010 books, I came across this title, and it took me several long seconds to produce any recollection of what it was. Good sign, eh?-for both the book and my failing brain. Anyway, I have since managed to dredge up the memory that this is a book about several generations living in the hills of Appalachia, and the generally poor life decisions they make. Yes, one of those. I vaguely recall some pretty, sun-dappled imagery-although I might be lifting that wholesale from the cover image, like when you convince yourself you remember something that happened when you were two that you’ve really only ever seen in a photograph. But in general: several generations, poor life decisions. If you like that sort of thing, you will probably like this, but clearly it’s not a trope that does a whole lot for me.
82. The Good Son, Michael Gruber - I read this thriller because Laura Miller recommended it on her Twitter; it was entertaining, and even makes some overtures toward deeper political meaning, but reading it, I was never able to forget that I was, in fact, reading a silly thriller. It’s an airport book that failed to let me forget that it’s an airport book. So much Action! and so many Twists!-I kept wanting to reach for the popcorn, or keep my eye out for Bruce Willis and Alan Rickman, in case they should choose to wander on. Not that there’s anything wrong with that-I like a good thriller-but I was never able to lose myself in this book, and that’s less good.
Interesting to compare this with another violently yellow book, The Girl With the Dragon Tattoo. The latter certainly has its silly thriller moments, but unlike The Good Son, its world utterly convinced me, its politics seemed less pasted on, and it completely swept me away. This may be a character thing: Gruber’s people are all very, very clever and very, very cold. And maybe that’s why I was never able to shake that cold, anonymous airport feeling.
83. Tokyo Fiancée, Amélie Nothomb - I liked this a lot more than the last Nothomb book I read: it didn’t make me squirm-in-my-seat uncomfortable, for one thing. Fear and Trembling is all about humiliation and degradation and having to work a shitty job for a living; Tokyo Fiancée is about travel and wonder and love-the dark sides of all the above, too, but still, it’s no contest, is it? Nothomb would roll her eyes at me (for a number of reasons), but this book just increased my desire to go to Japan.
84. Expiration Date, Duane Swierczynski - Hey, dummy! You weren’t impressed by the last book you read by this guy, so why the heck would you try another of his titles? What were you thinking?
But...but this one’s got time travel! The blurbs all said it was kind of like Life on Mars! I love Life on Mars!
Since when do blurbs ever tell the truth?
Yeah, okay, that one turned out to be totally bogus. But...time travel?
There really aren’t any interesting time travel ideas in this book. It’s boring and pointlessly violent, just like Swierczynski’s last book. And he ends it with another bullshit attempt at a twist ending, more idiotic than even the equally hard to spell Shyamalan’s usual crap. It’s the literary equivalent of a B-movie that would close with a card that says, “The End...Or Is It?!”
Admittedly that kind of made me want to stab myself.
So are you going to learn your lesson finally? Please?
Yeah, if I could, I’d go back in time...and not read this book!
I am so, so ashamed that we are actually the same person.
85. Tongues of Serpents, Naomi Novik - Yay Temeraire!
I’ve definitely reached the point with this series where I enjoy it so much and love all the characters that I have a hard time being analytical about it. Yeah, there’s a bit too much wandering the desert in this one, but... Temeraire! Laurence! EVERYONE.
Next book, please!
86. The Possessed, Elif Batuman - “Adventures With Russian Books and the People Who Read Them,” as the mostly-accurate subtitle explains. The parts it was accurate to were by far my favorites: heeee, academics. The sections about Uzbekistan, however, mostly just taught me that I don’t want to go to Uzbekistan, and the final chapter on the original The Possessed (by Dostoevsky, a book also known as Demons) made me think that Batuman’s editor might have told her she needed another chapter, so Batuman stuck one of her old papers in. So: fun, if uneven.
Side note: Roz Chast should do more book covers; it always makes me want to read whatever they grace.
87. The Enchanted April, Elizabeth von Arnim - The very definition of charming-or should I say enchanting? Four women escape rainy England for the sun-soaked Mediterranean, where they (re)discover love. My mom and I watched the film based on this novel a few times when we were living in Vermont, which was perhaps a rather sigh-inducing endeavor; forget the Mediterranean, I think we would have been thrilled to escape to rainy England. Actually, I live in sun-soaked Los Angeles now, and I’d still be thrilled to escape to rainy England. Which makes me wonder where people who live on the Mediterranean long to escape to. Antarctica? The moon?
...I’ve lost my train of thought. I really do need a vacation.
88. Elliot Allagash, Simon Rich - Rich’s books of humorous sketches-especially Free-Range Chickens-totally cracked me up. However this, his debut novel, disappointed me. The plot sounded promising: Seymour, an unpopular nonentity at his New York private school, is befriended/falls into the clutches of rich, deeply fucked up con artist Elliot Allagash. Sounds sort of like The Great Gatsby if Gatsby were evil, or The Catcher in the Rye if Holden had the emotional energy to scheme. (Note: I said sort of.) I usually love that type of thing. But this book is just...airless. It’s predictable and not that funny-certainly nowhere near as amusing as anything in Free-Range Chickens. Rich propels the narrative along pretty well, and the book is a fast read, but when I finished I realized that he had never made me care about the eponymous character at all. I think that’s a problem: if Elliot managed to charm Seymour enough to suck him in, he should be able to do the same for the reader. Otherwise Seymour is just a chump, and Elliot Allagash isn’t worth having a novel named after him.
89. Waiter Rant, Steve Dublanica - Right book, right time. Dublanica struggles with a service job, rude customers, and the desire to accomplish something creatively. Gosh, why does that sound familiar? Sometimes reading something close to your current experience makes you feel better about it, and sometimes it makes you feel worse, but for whatever reason, this turned out to definitely be a case of better. It was a nice alternative to constantly refreshing notalwaysright.com, anyway.
90. Bill’s New Frock, Anne Fine - Quite good children’s novel about a young boy who wakes up one morning to discover everyone thinks he is (and has always been) a girl. Cue lessons about how society is pretty rubbish to girls! As is often the case with these things, I wish it had gone further with its ideas (actually, I wish I could read the same story but with characters who are teenagers...or perhaps I should simply write it?), but it’s nevertheless nicely thoughtful, especially considering its target age group and date of publication (1989).
A quick Google revealed that it was made into a TV movie which, despite its acid trip of an opener-and generally cracktastic wardrobe choices-is likewise quite good. Damn, though-“He’s Got the Whole World in His Hands”? There’s a ’90s elementary school reminder that I didn’t need!
Total Reviews: 90/229
81. Bloodroot, Amy Greene - Recently, as I was scrolling back up through my list of 2010 books, I came across this title, and it took me several long seconds to produce any recollection of what it was. Good sign, eh?-for both the book and my failing brain. Anyway, I have since managed to dredge up the memory that this is a book about several generations living in the hills of Appalachia, and the generally poor life decisions they make. Yes, one of those. I vaguely recall some pretty, sun-dappled imagery-although I might be lifting that wholesale from the cover image, like when you convince yourself you remember something that happened when you were two that you’ve really only ever seen in a photograph. But in general: several generations, poor life decisions. If you like that sort of thing, you will probably like this, but clearly it’s not a trope that does a whole lot for me.
82. The Good Son, Michael Gruber - I read this thriller because Laura Miller recommended it on her Twitter; it was entertaining, and even makes some overtures toward deeper political meaning, but reading it, I was never able to forget that I was, in fact, reading a silly thriller. It’s an airport book that failed to let me forget that it’s an airport book. So much Action! and so many Twists!-I kept wanting to reach for the popcorn, or keep my eye out for Bruce Willis and Alan Rickman, in case they should choose to wander on. Not that there’s anything wrong with that-I like a good thriller-but I was never able to lose myself in this book, and that’s less good.
Interesting to compare this with another violently yellow book, The Girl With the Dragon Tattoo. The latter certainly has its silly thriller moments, but unlike The Good Son, its world utterly convinced me, its politics seemed less pasted on, and it completely swept me away. This may be a character thing: Gruber’s people are all very, very clever and very, very cold. And maybe that’s why I was never able to shake that cold, anonymous airport feeling.
83. Tokyo Fiancée, Amélie Nothomb - I liked this a lot more than the last Nothomb book I read: it didn’t make me squirm-in-my-seat uncomfortable, for one thing. Fear and Trembling is all about humiliation and degradation and having to work a shitty job for a living; Tokyo Fiancée is about travel and wonder and love-the dark sides of all the above, too, but still, it’s no contest, is it? Nothomb would roll her eyes at me (for a number of reasons), but this book just increased my desire to go to Japan.
84. Expiration Date, Duane Swierczynski - Hey, dummy! You weren’t impressed by the last book you read by this guy, so why the heck would you try another of his titles? What were you thinking?
But...but this one’s got time travel! The blurbs all said it was kind of like Life on Mars! I love Life on Mars!
Since when do blurbs ever tell the truth?
Yeah, okay, that one turned out to be totally bogus. But...time travel?
There really aren’t any interesting time travel ideas in this book. It’s boring and pointlessly violent, just like Swierczynski’s last book. And he ends it with another bullshit attempt at a twist ending, more idiotic than even the equally hard to spell Shyamalan’s usual crap. It’s the literary equivalent of a B-movie that would close with a card that says, “The End...Or Is It?!”
Admittedly that kind of made me want to stab myself.
So are you going to learn your lesson finally? Please?
Yeah, if I could, I’d go back in time...and not read this book!
I am so, so ashamed that we are actually the same person.
85. Tongues of Serpents, Naomi Novik - Yay Temeraire!
I’ve definitely reached the point with this series where I enjoy it so much and love all the characters that I have a hard time being analytical about it. Yeah, there’s a bit too much wandering the desert in this one, but... Temeraire! Laurence! EVERYONE.
Next book, please!
86. The Possessed, Elif Batuman - “Adventures With Russian Books and the People Who Read Them,” as the mostly-accurate subtitle explains. The parts it was accurate to were by far my favorites: heeee, academics. The sections about Uzbekistan, however, mostly just taught me that I don’t want to go to Uzbekistan, and the final chapter on the original The Possessed (by Dostoevsky, a book also known as Demons) made me think that Batuman’s editor might have told her she needed another chapter, so Batuman stuck one of her old papers in. So: fun, if uneven.
Side note: Roz Chast should do more book covers; it always makes me want to read whatever they grace.
87. The Enchanted April, Elizabeth von Arnim - The very definition of charming-or should I say enchanting? Four women escape rainy England for the sun-soaked Mediterranean, where they (re)discover love. My mom and I watched the film based on this novel a few times when we were living in Vermont, which was perhaps a rather sigh-inducing endeavor; forget the Mediterranean, I think we would have been thrilled to escape to rainy England. Actually, I live in sun-soaked Los Angeles now, and I’d still be thrilled to escape to rainy England. Which makes me wonder where people who live on the Mediterranean long to escape to. Antarctica? The moon?
...I’ve lost my train of thought. I really do need a vacation.
88. Elliot Allagash, Simon Rich - Rich’s books of humorous sketches-especially Free-Range Chickens-totally cracked me up. However this, his debut novel, disappointed me. The plot sounded promising: Seymour, an unpopular nonentity at his New York private school, is befriended/falls into the clutches of rich, deeply fucked up con artist Elliot Allagash. Sounds sort of like The Great Gatsby if Gatsby were evil, or The Catcher in the Rye if Holden had the emotional energy to scheme. (Note: I said sort of.) I usually love that type of thing. But this book is just...airless. It’s predictable and not that funny-certainly nowhere near as amusing as anything in Free-Range Chickens. Rich propels the narrative along pretty well, and the book is a fast read, but when I finished I realized that he had never made me care about the eponymous character at all. I think that’s a problem: if Elliot managed to charm Seymour enough to suck him in, he should be able to do the same for the reader. Otherwise Seymour is just a chump, and Elliot Allagash isn’t worth having a novel named after him.
89. Waiter Rant, Steve Dublanica - Right book, right time. Dublanica struggles with a service job, rude customers, and the desire to accomplish something creatively. Gosh, why does that sound familiar? Sometimes reading something close to your current experience makes you feel better about it, and sometimes it makes you feel worse, but for whatever reason, this turned out to definitely be a case of better. It was a nice alternative to constantly refreshing notalwaysright.com, anyway.
90. Bill’s New Frock, Anne Fine - Quite good children’s novel about a young boy who wakes up one morning to discover everyone thinks he is (and has always been) a girl. Cue lessons about how society is pretty rubbish to girls! As is often the case with these things, I wish it had gone further with its ideas (actually, I wish I could read the same story but with characters who are teenagers...or perhaps I should simply write it?), but it’s nevertheless nicely thoughtful, especially considering its target age group and date of publication (1989).
A quick Google revealed that it was made into a TV movie which, despite its acid trip of an opener-and generally cracktastic wardrobe choices-is likewise quite good. Damn, though-“He’s Got the Whole World in His Hands”? There’s a ’90s elementary school reminder that I didn’t need!
Total Reviews: 90/229