my life in books

seriously... i'm kidding by ellen DeGeneres

I honestly used to like ellen degeneres' humor. but this book is so full of celebrity names and outdated culture references that it's a slog to get through. now I wonder if I liked her other stuff because I got to it in a quicker window.

summer of my amazing luck by miriam towes

this was a surprising good read. I've gotten used to toews always writing the same themes but this felt fresh and was so much funnier than I remember her other stuff being. I think it's because she was much younger when she wrote it - the main character is young too, a teenager who falls pregnant and moves into subsidized housing with her baby and makes spectacularly bad decisions (like a teen would do) but just goes with it. it was innocent and naïve and impetuous and wildly charming. I loved it. 

the nine lives of charlotte taylor by sally Armstrong

a fascinating read if most details were true, but (as a work classified as fiction) it's difficult to know which parts were embellished with detail, or made up entirely. or perhaps records simply don't exist. case in point: charlotte has 10 children who all survive infancy and childhood - such a remarkable feat, and one that charlotte takes great pride in. but were there other children's whose records went missing?

she outlived 4 husbands (ok, 3 husbands and 1 lover), lived easily among the mik'mak, and had her name on the first property deeds of the miramichi. she must have been a force to be reckoned with... her stories being passed from generation to generation. remarkable? lucky? a witch? who knows how she truly got her fame. so her great, great, great granddaughter tried to pin down a story that she could be proud of. it's a story that it too tainted by today's politically correct values and knowledge of the future, but it's hard to escape the mindset of our current culture. 

our endless numbered days by claire fuller

it was not a spectacular book, but a good tale that pressed the reader to weave the 2 stories, past and present, back together.  a good enough, and immediate enough, tale that I read in 2 days and reminded me of the pleasure and escape that a good book can bring. one thread of the book is her survivalist father, stealing her away into the woods at the age 8 where she's repeatedly told the world has come to an end. the other thread is nine years later, back in her mother's house with an 8 year old brother that was born in her absence. lots of good stuff to work with, and although the 'big reveals' were obvious along, it doesn't detract from the truth that all traumas need to be deal with in their own way.

the high mountains of portugal by yann martel

this is the kind of book that makes you grateful for bookclub discussions. it's divided into 3 parts and the 2nd was so bizarre, and so off-putting with it's depiction of decaying bodies, that I almost didn't reach the 3rd section. but this is yann martel, and I trust where he's going to take me.

it was the discussion we had in bookclub that made me see each part was about a contrasting reaction to grief and loss - there's anger, denial, and acceptance. and I discovered that the humor I found in part 1 was all the more developed in the 2nd part (how could I have not seen the bits about his cucumber and her nest as levity the first time around?!) meanwhile the final story just encapsulated all the threads that came before. oh, and satisfied the animal themes everyone has come to expect from him, but added an entirely new branch with his thoughts about slavery. he really is a masterful story teller and peole who just don't get 'it' are not ready to see the allegory in all.

the bone clocks by david Mitchell

I loved cloud atlas, had high expectations for this book, and really enjoyed the start of it: holly sykes as a dense teenage girl divulging details that made the reader know her outcome month before she would. and the next narrator, hugo lam, was deliciously manipulative so that even the reader was in the dark halfway through his tale. then the 2 meet and romance and that's all good. and then - maybe it's time travellers, and that will be OK... but no - it's black and white, evil vs good, and the reader is dropped into a harry potteresque fantasy that the reader (ok - ME) felt tricked into. I can take the sci-fi parts and the dystopian stuff, but fantasy is not my thing.

still, i'll read his other stuff. I hear that his Japanese translation of 'the reason I jump' is amazing.

i'll take you there by wally lamb

an absolutely charming tale of a man revisiting his past thru a unique lens: canisters of film where he can enter the scene and feel those emotions as fresh and raw as the first time. and the best part? I had no idea that the narrator - already approachable and appealing - was a 60 year old Felix Funicello of Lamb's earlier work - Wishin' and Hopin'  (where he was a grade 5 student prepping for a Christmas concert, among other hilarious excapades) and Lamb nailed his voice - now 50 years later -perfectly. it was like seeing an old friend and catching up.

steve jobs: genius by design by Jason Quinn

this graphic novel tried to soften the blow for jobs by portraying a lot of inner thought/dialogue that 1) is unprovable and undocumented, and 2) is likely untrue. jobs was a narcistic bully that thought in unconventional ways and was a brilliant innovator (I don't think inventor applies to him since he often took existing technology and used it in better, and more beautiful ways)  But I guess being an asshole is not a palatable truth for kids today. we want to inspire and motivate and imply that good guys come in first. but the jeff bezos and sam waltons of the world prove otherwise. they are just still alive, and still being dicks. maybe when they are dead, they'll be eulogized, and humanized, in the same fashion

a little life by hanya yanagihara

so unbelievably bleak was this novel. it was a good thing I did it as a book-on-CD because I don't think I could have pushed thru all the terrible things, slowly revealed, that happened to the main character Jude. he is abandoned as a infant, taken in by monks who in turns physically or sexually abuse him. the one shining light that seems to care for him plans their escape but he turns out to be a manipulative, pimping pedophile. and when this despicable man is caught, Jude is confined to a foster home where more sexual abuse awaits him so he runs away - into the arms of a sexually depraved lunatic doctor who locks him in his basement, treats his various STDs, and ultimately runs him with down with a car after he's had his fill of him. how many terrible things can befall one person? ('more' is the answer when he takes up with an abusive partner that humiliates him, rapes him, and throws him down the stairwell)

and yet, in adult life, Jude is loved. by his college roomates, by a law professor that adopts him when he is almost 30, by a longtime friend that will forgo a sexual relationship in order to give Jude the peace and love he craves.  and this is where the book falls apart for me; why did they love him?

up and down by terry fallis

yuck. this guy wrote well when politics and parliament were his environment. but a PR firm and an endless succession of capable, successful women (to contrast the bumbling comic-relief men) about him made for a boring and contrived plot. fallis tries something new by adding a dying mother to the background, but the reader never feels invested in either her, or their relationship. a big: BOO.

the unlikely pilgrimage of harold fry by rachel joyce

man gets a letter from an old work colleague, writes her back, and leaves his home and wife to post it - walking past the local mailbox, to the more central one in town, to straight out of town. and he's off - ready to walk all the way to her bedside on the other side of England. seemed like another addition to the now popular 'old man rebels at the (near) end of his life to make some meaning' genre (the 100 year old man who... disappeared, a man called ove, major Pettigrew..., etc). it was rather funny in spots, but nothing better than meh.

the day I ate whatever I wanted and other small acts of liberation by elizabeth berg

I forgot who much I used to love elizabeth berg! this collection of short stories was an absolute delight. so funny, and so real. and the food stuff, well, you know how she must love her food because it made you hungry just to read those descriptions (AND made me want to put down the book and make an apple pie on the spot). I've got to read more of her

they do not mean to, but they do by cathleen schine

at first I liked this book about how a woman survives her husband's illness, and then his death, and her attempts to manage her children's expectations of her. but ultimately it lacked direction and depressed me that an old lady is truly at the mercy of her children - they'll put her in a home when it suits them.

a man called ove by fredrik backman

another 'old man nearing the end of his life and rejecting/reflecting' book, except he's trying to end it, and he's a curmudgeon. but a dutiful one, so he has to postpone his plans time and again to aid his pregnant neighbor or his old friend's wife or who ever until he has rebuilt a community and tah-dah: happy ending.  meh.

truly madly guilty by liane moriarty

this was a fabulous tale - both the story and how it was told. alternating between present day and the 'day of the BBQ' you can't begin to imagine there will be enough material in 24 hours to fill 200 pages, but there is. of course, there is the little dance you do, trying to figure out what actually happened at the BBQ. but even if you guess in advance, it's likely impossible that you had the whole thing figured out. with so many well drawn out, and memorable characters, it's a matrix of a puzzle. and the space the characters inhabit in the 'before' chapters vs the 'after' chapters is both incredibly different and totally believable. and that's the piece that was so well done for me - because we start the book with the present day - 3 months since the BBQ? - and it was nearly impossible to reconcile the behaviours of 'today' with the actions of 'before the BBQ" and I was ready to call the whole thing a sham until: Wham-mo, it all locked into place.  this is truly an author I need to read more of. (and a gift with the prose, did I mention? beautifully written!)

home safe by elizabeth berg

I confess I was disappointed in this one. her short stories were SO good but maybe she does better with character studies (even the best parts of this book were the side bits about the students in the protagonist's writing class). the plot was predictable to the point of trite, the convenient love stories were eye-rolling treacle. but the humor was still there. and there were quite a few beautiful sentences about grief, and motherhood, and getting older. i'll try her again, but choose from her good read reviews first to maximize the chance for success.

the nest by cynthia d'aprix sweeney

a jumble of characters that get hap hazardly introduced toward the end of one chapter, and then have the next chapter devoted to them (with a mention of a new character towards the end, with their chapters on their heels, and so on) means it was hard to keep track of who was who. it was also hard because they were all whiny, white, (mostly) privileged new Yorkers. the main characters -  brothers and sisters of a wealthy family who are waiting on the release of their inheritance - were the least sympathetic of all and I couldn't care less that the money they were all pinning their hopes and dreams on, disappeared when their reckless and drunk brother almost kills a 20 year old.

and the birds rained down by jocelyn saucier

the best and most surprising thing about this slim book is finding out about the massive fires that swept thru northern Ontario back in the 1920s.  and it's ironic that a French author (the book is a translation) was the first to write about them.

it starts with a chapter narrated by an aging photographer stumbling upon a group of men living in the forest. the next chapter picks up from one of the men's perspectives and so on. I liked that. but, as death was an ever present element in the story, it was a bleak read for me

breakfast of champions by kurt vonnegut

at first I loved this book and wondered why I hadn't read more vonnegut as a 20 year old - this guy has a razor sharp eye for satire. but slowly it became TOO exaggerated, TOO satire for the sake of satire. it reminded me of Douglas Adams and the Hitcher's Guide to the Galaxy. and then, then it used a penis measurement jokes so any times (and even in relation to his own member, ugg) that I started to hate it. I didn't like when jenny Lawson went on and on about her vagina, so at least i'm consistent ...

adult onset by anne-marie macdonald

I chose to read this a second time, this time with my book club. the group's opinion was meh (as was mine the first time around) but this time - knowing where it was going - it just hung together so much better. for instance, in my first reading I felt the action dragged over a long period of time, but this read I saw it was over the course of 5 days and most of the expository was in her head as memories or run-on thoughts. and I had so much more room for forgiveness for her mother this time around (but even more anger for her father) which I think is what the author intended. I still wish the character would have been more direct in challenging her parent's earlier nasty attitude (and consequent re-writing of history) of her coming out as a lesbian, but I do understand the overarching desire to not upset a hard won balance in your family.

the butterfly effect by jon ronson

this was my first 'audible' book and the chapters were like individual podcasts. I wonder if this is the future of books... anyhow, it was about the porn industry - specifically the rippling effect of free porn sites like pornhub: a huge increase in erectile dysfunction in the under 40s set, a consequent reduction in teen pregnancy, the production of weirder and wilder bespoke porn, a generation of girls that have grown up seeing porn and 1) choose it as a viable career 2) get lots of work in the first month of two 3) then the work dries up because a new slew of girls arrive in town but they are forever marked by the 20-40 movies they made in that 6 week period. basically, it was very depressing.

everything everything by nicola yoon

it mystified me from the get-go that this girl-in-a-bubble had not googled her own condition and that, although written as a 17 yo acts very much like a 14 yo. I assumed, YA book and all, it was for sex - the main character would have sex and the publisher didn't want a sh*t storm. anyhow - the entire plot was unrealistic so I felt cheated to fins out that of ourse: this is a made-up condition ad the mother is holding her hostage. SO stupid. but enjoyable to dissect the stupidity. oh, and now it's a movie

commonwealth by anne patchett

did I read this book too quickly? because anne patchett is an amazing author and I simply couldn't find one character to care about in this multi-sibling / step sibling / blended family saga that goes on long enough that everyone gets their share of disappointment. and maybe that's my 2 pronged problem with the book: too many characters (who I really need to hear about the two sons and two daughter-in-laws of a sibling's husband's first marriage? and this sibling is one of 6) and too much sadness (betrayal, cancer, addiction...)

best kind of people by zoe whitall

this book had to have been inspired by the Toronto highschool teacher accused of sexually abusing his students and the reaction that his wife MUST have known. we get to hear the wife's thoughts as we searches for her own culpability (mostly believing his innocence until the end), and the daughter as she contemplates how to go forward (mostly believing his guilt until the end). and we're lucky because we get to know it's true. he did it. that extra layer is doubt is removed. which makes it all the more shocking that he simply gets his life back.