strange and random happenstance

If you think about it, education, and in particular English classes, are, to an extent book clubs. Everyone is assigned a book to read and then participate in discussions moderated by a teacher. Which is probably why so many people don't like reading. They view it as homework. Which is why I personally think of book clubs as my own version of BOOK IT! Here we were rewarded for reading with stickers and personal pan pizzas. So what's the reward for book clubs? Getting to get together with your friends once a month to just talk and eat. Just being in the presence of those you care for who also happen to love reading as much as you, even if they didn't read the book, because true book clubs should encourage reading and not punish members if they didn't have time to read the book. I came late to books. I have a few precious volumes of books I read over and over when young, but it wasn't until after I was out of high school that I really started to read. And very shortly my desire to read with others became an obsession. I wanted a book club. I need a book club. And yes, I occasionally went to my mother's book club that consisted of all my grade school teachers because I needed one so bad. I was like Gomez Addams calling into the Sally Jessy Raphael show asking about where the voodoo witch doctors would meet. I even made a fake book club organization for a school project, Literary Linkup, and may have harassed a few of my classmates when they mentioned they were in book clubs. I had become Gomez Addams! But oddly something happened because of this. One of my classmates and I formed a book club, which was eventually dubbed, The Last Word. There were several classmates and friends that came and went over the years. We're now a small core, but through it all, disagreements, reading way more Philip K. Dick, Ursula K. Le Guin, and Neil Gaiman than I ever thought I would, we've now been together for twelve years this year. Things have changed a bit over the last four years, we're now virtual versus trawling around different cafes, houses, and apartments. But through it all it's about having one day a month where I make time for my friends and discuss what we've read, even if it isn't the book we were supposed to. The different tastes and opinions expands my mind and understanding. We rarely, if ever, agree on a book, and that makes it that much more interesting. So here's to celebrating my book club. Here's to celebrating all book clubs. Over the next few months I'll present just a sampling of what we've read over the years. But I hope you'll find it interesting, and maybe you'll share your own book club experiences.

Posted by Miss Eliza at 12:00 AM 0 comments  

Labels: Book Club, Book Clubs, Book It, For the Love of Book Clubs, Gomez Addams, Literary Linkup, Neil Gaiman, Philip K. Dick, Pizza, Pizza Hunt, Sally Jessy Raphael, The Addams Family, The Last Word, Ursula K. Le Guin

Earlier this year when I Am Not Okay With This debuted I admit I was suffering superhero fatigue. I mean, seriously, why do we need so many films and shows churning out the same story over and over again? So a story about a young girl, Sydney Novak, dealing with sudden powers did not feel like something I wanted to watch. Again. Enter my book club, and the fact that almost every single member started harassing me to watch this superhero origin story. I think they might have even threatened me, which I of course forgave as soon as I watched the show. I Am Not Okay With This reinvents the superhero origin story for those with superhero fatigue. It's a coming of age tale that just happens to have supernatural elements. I have since become a spokesperson for this show demanding everyone I know to watch it. The way I catch them is by saying it's as if John Hughes and David Lynch decided to make a show together. Because that is seriously the vibe. The teen angst, the music, the mysteries, the full out Carrie dance! What makes it even more special is that it's about not just Sydney struggling with her new powers, it's her struggling with who she is, and in particular her sexual orientation as she realizes she has feelings for her best friend Dina. This show is just unabashedly fun and inclusive and wonderful and Netflix I am still BEYOND pissed with you for cancelling this delightful series. Yes, I have the graphic novel to still read, but that isn't enough. I want more teen angst, I want to know who that stranger at the end offering to help Sydney was, and most importantly, I want more Stanley Barber. Stanley Barber has entered my pantheon of great geeky boys. He joins such luminaries as Duckie and Bill Haverchuck. Keep on being you Stanley. Keep on being you.   

Posted by Miss Eliza at 12:00 AM 0 comments  

Labels: And the Emmy Goes To, Bill Haverchuck, Book Clubs, Carrie, David Lynch, Duckie, Freaks and Geeks, I Am Not Okay With This, John Hughes, Netlfix, Stranger Things, Superhero, Superhero Fatigue, Syndey Novak

Star Wars: Doctor Aphra, Vol. 1: Aphra by Kieron Gillen
Published by: Marvels
Publication Date: July 3rd, 2017
Format: Paperback, 144 Pages
Rating: ★★★★★
To Buy

Doctor Aphra, thanks to her own ingenuity, was able to escape her servitude to Darth Vader by the handy expedient of faking her own death. But the galaxy is big and so long as she stays off his radar think of all she can do with this newfound lease on life? Think of all the artifacts waiting to be liberated. Think of how the sale of those artifacts using her archeological accreditation can get her out of debt to some rather unscrupulous characters. Think of all the humans waiting to be killed! Hang on... that's what her two murderbot droids pilfered from Vader, Triple Zero and BT-One, hope for on these adventures. But things never go to plan. Here she is with a relic ready for it's new owners and somehow all her bonafides have disappeared like Alderaan. Turns out her father is behind this newest wrinkle. He has an obsession with the Jedi and needs her help. Between family drama, an Imperial agent hot on her tail, and nothing ever being what is expected, Aphra will have a hell of a time surviving this new adventure. And she thought working for Vader was dangerous!

I have an enormous love of Star Wars but have been disappointed in recent years. The prequels? The retconning of the EU? So many missteps. The new trilogy is fine, but this isn't the path I viewed these characters I grew up with taking. Therefore my Star Wars is basically the original trilogy and Solo, because seriously, that movie rocks and I will cape fight anyone who disagrees with me. Also cape fighting is very similar to the walk off in Zoolander if you were wondering. Feeling many of the same feels as me a member of my book club handed me Doctor Aphra Vol. 1 and told me I MUST read it. When I received the book I was down and sick and was worried Star Wars would in some way let me down again. But THIS is what Star Wars should be! A glorious mashup of old school Star Wars and Indiana Jones, because, come on, who hasn't dreamt of that Harrison Ford mashup? Add in bloodthirsty droids, questionable motives, family issues, and more than a dollop of Firefly and Guardians of the Galaxy, and this is a near perfect comic. As my friend told me, Aphra is who Han Solo wishes he was and I couldn't agree more. I want to be Doctor Aphra. 

Posted by Miss Eliza at 12:00 AM 0 comments  

Labels: Book Clubs, Comics, Darth Vader, Doctor Aphra, Doctor Aphra Vol. 1: Aphra, Firefly, Graphic Novels, Guardians of the Galaxy, Han Solo, Harrison Ford, Indiana Jones, Prequels, Solo, Star Wars, Zoolander

Bookstore: Books and Company

Location: Oconomowoc, Wisconsin

Why I Love Them: Because of Books and Company's tendency to hold their bigger events offsite at the local High School I had attended many events before I actually entered their store. But you can actually tell a lot about a bookstore by how they manage an event and their sales when away from their brick and mortar. The most obvious observation was that they were willing to cater to my crazy. And here I'd like to give a special shout out to all stores who've catered to my crazy over the years, it hasn't gone unnoticed and I thank you greatly. I was at an event with two of my friends and I noticed my copy of the book wasn't a true first. I've had it happen when even on release day you're not going to get a true first with that number line intact. But one of my two friends DID have a true first, so I took my copy back to their little stall in front of the auditorium and not only did they understand, they helped me look through the books to find what I was looking for AND made sure that it was in good enough condition to live up to a true book collector's standard. Seriously, thank you for that. When I finally went to their store for a stop on the Fierce Reads tour (Marissa Meyer, Ann Aguirre, Lish McBride, and Elizabeth Fama if you must know and I hope your curiosity has made you jealous) I really liked the store. It's not that big, but Oconomowoc isn't that big a town. With the carpeted floors and big upholstered furniture it reminded me of the kind of bookstore you'd stumble on when on holiday up north and then go back to repeatedly just to be surrounded by books and get away from your family.    

Best Buy: Not only does my best buy qualify as a best buy, it qualifies as the cherry on top of one of those perfect days you hope to but never can recapture. Erin Morgenstern was on tour promoting her book The Night Circus. It was a beautiful day with a crisp early fall blue sky and the trees were just starting to change color. I picked my two friends (yes the two friends from above) up from their respective workplaces and we drove to Oconomowoc. We had dinner on the back deck of this restaurant that was right on the water. There was brie and honey and so much goodness. But then there was Erin Morgenstern. She read from the very beginning of The Night Circus, a daring second person narration, and I was instantly hooked. Sitting in the rehearsal space for the local high school all I wanted to do was have this day, this reading, go on forever. I was first in line for the signing and eagerly drove home through the night, waiting for the moment that I could sink into bed and begin the book. First there was much news that night, Steve Jobs had died, but the book transported me away. I went to a place where you could sit with your friends and enjoy the crisp fall beauty all year long. Now I will be the first to admit that The Night Circus is a polarizing book. You either love it or you loath it, a fact born out when I re-read it with my book club. But for me it will always be a perfect book, a perfect day, brought to me by a perfect bookstore. Thank you Books and Company for this memory, it totally makes me forgive you for the time I broke out in hives in your store (which had nothing to do with you.)  

Posted by Miss Eliza at 12:00 AM 0 comments  

Labels: Ann Aguirre, Book Clubs, Books and Company, Elizabeth Fama, Erin Morgenstern, Fall, Fierce Reads, Lish McBride, Marissa Meyer, Oconomowoc, Perfection, Support Your Brick and Mortar, The Night Circus

A Wizard of Earthsea by Ursula K. Le Guin
Published by: Houghton Mifflin
Publication Date: 1968
Format: Hardcover, 422 Pages
Rating: ★★★
To Buy (different edition than one reviewed)

On the island of Gont a young boy nicknamed Sparrowhawk is born with innate magical abilities. Motherless, his Aunt sees his potential and teaches him what she knows of magic and the words of power. When Kargish invaders threaten his small village of Ten Alders he is able to protect it by summoning a fog, concealing it from the enemy. The great mage Ogion who lives on the other side of Gont in Re Albi hears of the young boy's gift and journeys to Ten Alders to bestow the boys true name Ged on him and offer him an apprenticeship. Ged is grateful for all that Ogion does for him but is impatient. In his impatience he releases a shadow from one of Ogion's spell-books and Ogion realizes that he is not the teacher for Ged and he sends him to the island of the wise, Roke, to attend the school for wizardry there. On Roke Ged's power is apparent to all, but he is headstrong and aloof, making enemies easily. One enemy is Jasper who Ged challenges to a duel. The duel will release a shadow creature into the world and almost destroy Ged. Taking months to recover he is a far changed man. He is more circumspect and willingly takes a humble posting in the Ninety Islands once he earns his staff. There he does much good but is still hunted by the shadow. He knows now that it will chase him to the ends of the earth, so perhaps it's time he started chasing it. The battle will go one of two ways, but so it will be. As Ged sees it, this is his burden to bear.

As a kid I of course had heard of Ursula K. Le Guin, not so much because of her Earthsea books, but because of her Catwings series. They were released through Scholastic in the late eighties and seriously, it's about flying cats, there's no way I wouldn't have fallen for these books. They were basically marketed just for me, as evidenced when I laboriously filled out the Scholastic order forms to return to school. But as for delving into Earthsea? It's been something I've always meant to do for years but just never got around to. When the Sci-Fi channel adapted the first two books into a major television event I finally bought myself a copy of A Wizard of Earthsea. And like most books I buy, it just sat on my shelf all alone, until it was joined by the omnibus edition I bought from the Science Fiction Book Club containing the first three books, it was then eventually joined by The Lathe of Heaven for book club, but still the languishing continued. As I have mentioned before a joy of book club, with my group of friends all having similar tastes though vastly different opinions I've been getting around to a lot of these long neglected books. Ender's Game, Middlesex, We Have Always Lived in the Castle, The Island of Dr. Moreau, Misfortune, Catch-22, The Shadow of the Wind, American Psycho, The Family Fang, The Magicians, and finally, A Wizard of Earthsea, these are ALL books that have been sitting on my shelves for years unread until book club. And once I started A Wizard of Earthsea, it was the work of a moment until I knew I had to read the whole cycle as soon as I could.

What amazed me so much about this book is that you can see how Le Guin's writing influenced everyone from Terry Pratchett to Patrick Rothfuss. This book was written in 1968 and feels like the origin of all origin stories for modern science fiction and fantasy with the young boy's journey into manhood. This prototype is Ged! He can be seen in everyone from Keladry to Harry Potter to Kvothe to Kell. While many of you might be objecting and saying what about Tolkien? What about Lewis? What about White? What about her only choosing "K" protagonists? Yes, you do have a point, but they are the authors that broke the mold, they helped create this fledgling new genre and it was Le Guin who struck this new mold. She built on what they had created and made a blueprint for all the authors that came after. Yes, after accepting this you might start to shake your fist at her that she's the one who brought about the callow youth who needs a good smack down, a trope that sometimes can be too much, but at least here, well, Ged sure does get smacked down. But what happens to us readers who experience this smack down of Ged is that in his growing up we begin to like him. The truth is kids can be bastards. There's a reason none of us had the best of childhoods with bullying and regimented schooling, but we outgrew that. Perhaps that's why we hate Ged so much in the beginning? He reminds us too much of the untested swagger we all possessed about our beliefs. He is perhaps painfully relatable, and that's why he has become a trope. Because we get it. We get the journey because we've been through it ourselves.

Though it's the success of the magic system that for me makes this book not only so readable by so relatable. Let's look to Harry Potter. I adore Harry Potter but the magic isn't exactly logical. I mean, they just magic food together? Why? And yes, I was just rewatching Fantastic Beasts and Where to Find them so this is obviously the first example to pop into my head. I mean, can you make bad food as a wizard? I seriously want to know. They can mend that which is broken, they can kill with the swish and flick of a wrist, but what are the consequences? Where is the balance? Here magic is balanced. As Ogion shows, it is sometimes easier to just let the rain fall on your head than to magic the weather away. For every action there is an equal and opposite reaction, hence dark magic summoning a dark force. Magic is never just used for it's own ends, it's used only when needed for the betterment of life, for helping to control goats, or making a ship sail true, or maintaining the balance of the universe. Everything is about equilibrium. Nothing should be attempted without knowing the full consequences of those actions. If you think about this the way magic is approached should be the way we approach all things in life. The whole do onto others but with a magical backlash. A Wizard of Earthsea through magic shows us how to properly live with the world around us, and that is indeed magic.

There's one thing I want to talk about though that is a little controversial, and that's the color question. My first real image of Ged was the marketing for the miniseries staring Shawn Ashmore, a whiter white boy you could not get. So imagine my surprise when I realized that everyone in Earthsea is dark skinned. So yes, the miniseries was whitewashed. And the thing is, I just don't get why. Maybe I was just raised right, believing everyone is equal no matter what gender, skin color, or sexual orientation. Therefore changing this makes no sense to me. Especially when this miniseries was made so recently. I applaud this book for making a strong fantasy series outside the trope of the skinny white boy who will pull some magical feat and become king therefore subverting the genre. In fact, I think I would have read this series earlier had I know that it was so progressive. On many levels. But I'm also writing this from a place of privilege. Seriously think about how you picture the characters of a book when you read it. If you're white your just going to assume they are like you because they usually are written as such. But if you're colored, it's rare that you're actually going to see an accurate depiction of those who people your life. Therefore I think this book needs to be talked about more. Look what it did and when it did it. Seriously, admire it.

If this book has a flaw, moving beyond the color question, because that's the reader forcing the issue, also going past Ged being so callow because over the course of the book he does move beyond that, it's that the ending is rather abrupt. We've grown up with Ged, on Gont, on Roke, when he took a lowly possession but did real good, when he negotiated with a dragon and chose the people he cared for over his own chance of survival, so many adventures, and yet the ending is bam, done. For the hundreds of pages leading up to him confronting the shadow and giving it a name we journey the width and breadth of Earthsea, we are on his little boat Lookfar, we have travelled to the very end of the world, and then he just stands there, gives the nameless a name, and bam, over. And yes, I'm sorry for repeatedly saying bam, but the ending is just so abrupt that it felt like a door was slammed in my face. I kept re-reading that section thinking to myself that that couldn't be all. Ged couldn't just solve all that plagued him in an instant. The resolution is too fast to be satisfying, and perhaps that is why I so quickly picked up The Tombs of Atuan. I thought that this story had to go on somehow. But it didn't. That was the end. And while it was the ending that was always in sight, could we perhaps have admired the view before being thrown overboard?

Posted by Miss Eliza at 12:00 AM 0 comments  

Labels: A Wizard of Earthsea, Book Clubs, Catwings, Fantastic Beasts and Where to Find Them, It's a Kind of Magic, Patrick Rothfuss, Terry Pratchett, The Earthsea Trilogy, The Lathe of Heaven, Ursula K. Le Guin

The Pirates! In an Adventure with Ahab by Gideon Defoe
Published by: Pantheon
Publication Date: October 4th, 2005
Format: Hardcover, 160 Pages
Rating: ★★★★★
To Buy (different edition than one reviewed)

After the main-mast falls over for the third time in a week the pirate with a scarf reluctantly and cautiously approaches the Pirate Captain about perhaps getting a new boat. After admitting to his number two that perhaps covering the holes in his quarters with dashing pictures of himself isn't the best way to keep a boat afloat, seeing as a stiff breeze could conceivably kill off half the pirate crew and the Pirate Captain himself has never bothered to learn to swim he agrees that they go to Nantucket and Cutlass Liz's boatyard. There they run into two interesting people. One is Ahab, a dour whaler who is searching the world for the great white whale who took his leg off with a big chomp, the other is the Pirate Captain's Nemesis, Black Bellamy. Black Bellamy eggs the Pirate Captain on to buying a boat, The Lovely Emma, which the crew can in no way afford. Desperate to quickly get the cash for fear of Cutlass Liz and her ways of dealing with those who don't pay the pirates go in search of treasure! When that fails they try gambling. When that fails they try putting on a Vegas show. When that fails the pirate in red suggests perhaps they try some piracy? When that fails they just might take up Ahab's quest, they keep running into him and he's now offering a reward equal to the cost of their new boat. But can the Pirate Captain and his crew really succeed where Ahab has failed? And if they do can they succeed before Cutlass Liz gets violent?

What seems like years ago now, probably because it was, I remember seeing a few of Gideon Defoe's Pirates! books at Half Price Books and thinking they looked rather fun. I promptly forgot about them because do you realize the number of books I look at on a daily basis? It's seriously staggering. But shortly thereafter Lauren Willig mentioned them in passing as being hilarious so this confluence of events led me to order the first two books, handily sold as one volume, and I put it on my bookshelf and promptly forgot about them again. Fast forward to 2012 and Aardman Animation has adapted the first book for the screen. David Tennant, Hugh Grant, Russell Tovey, no wait, not Russell Tovey in the US, grumble, grumble, but once again I thought of the books and again promptly forgot. For some reason all my encounters with Gideon Defoe's work was promptly forgotten until his third book, The Pirates! In an Adventure with Communists, was picked out of the hat for book club in 2016. Not being one to start in the middle of a series I picked up my copy of the first two books, promptly fell in love, ordered the next three books and plundered my way through them all.

The thing is, I've always had a soft spot for pirates. This started quite young with my parents reading Irene Haas's The Maggie B. to me. A young girl wishes for a boat to travel the world in with her little brother. I wanted a boat just like it for myself. A pirate ship in miniature with flora and fauna and the coziest rooms you could ever imagine that weathered all storms. As I grew up there were Lego pirate ships and Playmobil pirate ships that actually floated helmed by my Star Wars figures. There were hideouts down by the railway tracks and in my back yard with hammocks, just like on a real pirate ship. There were other books too like Peter Pan and The Princess Bride, and tons of movies from The Goonies to Muppet Treasure Island to Hook. Finally there was Pirates of the Caribbean, opening night at Point Cinema on the UltraScreen with my girlfriends. Some were there to see Johnny Depp, some to see Orlando Bloom, and some to see an anvil three stories tall. I was there for the pirates!

But these Pirates! by Gideon Defoe, they are a breed apart. They are the love children of Blackadder and the briny deep, with historical cameos thrown in just as much as historical accuracy is thrown out. With this lovability that makes you just want to take them home give them a big feast predominately of ham and tell them a good bedtime story before tucking them in for the night. Gideon Defoe's writing combines the wit and love of footnotes of Terry Pratchett with the absurdity of Monty Python. Yet it's so uniquely his own that while I can draw comparisons all day it will never do justice to a series of books that need to be read for their hats and their love of ham. And I'm not joking that once you start you won't be able to stop until you've read them all. From Darwin and Bobo, the "man-panzee," to Ahab and what hunting the great white whale does to the Pirate Captain's sanity, to Wagner trying to blacken the name of Communism, to beekeeping on St. Helena where Napoleon causes quite a ruckus, to Byron and the Pirate Captain forming a true bromance while the Pirate Captain tries to woo Mary Godwin away from Shelley, you will just pillage your way through Defoe's prose.

Yet what makes this series really unique is that, aside from them being kind of hopeless as pirates, is that the characters names aren't really names, instead being character descriptions. There's the Pirate Captain and his faithful number two, the pirate with a scarf, there's the pirate in green, the pirate with rickets, the albino pirate, Jennifer, and every one's least favorite pirate, the pirate in red. While this could be viewed as just a humorous joke at the readers expense, I mean, think how many times we as readers when faced with a new story with oodles of characters has picked up on a character trait to remember them all by? Instead I don't think it's about readers and the inability to remember names, instead I think it's a clever conceit. While yes, there is a bit of poking fun at stereotypes, I think it actually goes beyond this and is making the character archetypes. The Pirate Captain is THE DEFINITIVE pirate captain. He's the only one that matters, suck it Black Bellamy! Just like the pirate with a scarf is the perfect number two, and the pirate in red is the perfect red shirt for us to hate on. These are the lovable essence of all the pirates we wanted to sail the high seas with as a kid and therefore we gleefully go with them wherever that may be. Even if there might be ghosts. And we all know how scared pirates are of ghosts!

In fact I think that the film by Aardman Animation, The Pirates! Band of Misfits, is doing a disservice to the books. While these pirates are true characters by making them cartoonishly animated it has turned them into caricatures. This movie has lessened them. In the books they are larger than life fiendish friends, on the screen they are a kind of boring movie. Which is really odd when you consider that Gideon Defoe wrote the screenplay. When I think back to when I first saw the movie, it in no way made me want to rush out and read the books, which is such a shame. Think of all those people out in the world who are judging these books based on that movie? The movie has far more "presence" and it's overshadowing these lovely, sweet, and comical adventures. When reading the books I thought how much they reminded me of the TV series Galavant. There's an absurdity and a gallantry and a sense of humor that makes it similar to The Pirates! Plus done as live action, there's a basis in reality with having actors like the brilliant Timothy Omundson bring the characters to life. This humor works best with the dichotomy of the absurd versus the real. Which leads me into my next point, when is there going to be a live action movie with Timothy Omundson as the Pirate Captain?

As for why I chose to pick their adventure with Ahab as my favorite? Partly it's because I had yet to read them hanging out with the Romantics last year, but also it has to do with this balance of fantasy and reality that elevates the humor in these books. In taking The Pirates! and placing them in their natural setting you get to see how atrocious they actually are as pirates. The fact that when they desperately need money to pay for their new boat that actual piracy is their second to last resort shows where their priorities lie. They'd rather look at clouds and have feasts with ham. Again and again it's brought home how not at home they are on the sea. They know nothing about whales! As for mermaids... well, the Pirate Captain did date a rather attractive halibut for three months thinking the rather normal fish was something more... While Black Bellamy may be a successful pirate, he isn't that enjoyable a pirate to be around. He's too suave, too together. I actually like my pirates a little on the lost side. Perhaps that is the one thing that the movie got right? They are a band of misfits, and I love them so much for not conforming to any stereotype. They are archetypes and I love them!

Posted by Miss Eliza at 12:00 AM 0 comments  

Labels: Ahab, Archetypes, Blackadder, Book Clubs, Galavant, Gideon Defoe, Irene Haas, Johnny Depp, Lauren Willig, Monty Python, Peter Pan, Pirates, The Maggie B., The Pirate Captain, The Pirates!, Timothy Omundson

As summer drew to a close in 2015 my book club took advantage of the fine weather for our meeting and sat in cafe chairs sharing a Caprese salad while the last warm breeze teased the air. It was a day where you could feel the shift of the seasons, summer was ephemeral, much as the impression left by The Ocean at the End of the Lane. Ironically the member of my book club who put Neil's book into the hat was unaware of the unofficial book club outing two years previously, but somehow, the book getting picked, despite the attempted rigging to get The Martian selected, seemed right. The Ocean at the End of the Lane was coming full circle. We got to talk about our previous adventure but having now read the book there was a deeper meaning to that journey. What struck me, and the rest of book club, was that while we all rated it highly we agreed that it was a hard book to discuss, because much like summer, the book was slipping away from our collective conscious.

Much like the unknown narrator's continual memory loss as to what exactly happened in those days with the Hempstocks, this is a book that you enjoy while reading yet somehow when you finish you don't quite remember what happened. Oddly enough I don't think that this is a deterrent for the book. I think often of A Wrinkle in Time and how many endless occasions have led to me re-reading that book since it was first read aloud to me in forth grade, and yet I can not for the life of me tell you what exactly happens in that book. Yet both these books leave behind this feeling of childhood and hopes and dreams and endless possibilities that are just there for the taking. They are both classics in that they capture something true. Something crucial to hope and life. Now The Ocean at the End of the Lane might not be my favorite book by Gaiman, but I connect it to hope, and these wonderful experiences I have had with my friends, and that is pure magic.

Posted by Miss Eliza at 12:00 AM 0 comments  

Labels: A Wrinkle in Time, Book Clubs, Fall, Gaiman Gala, Gaiman Reminiscence, Hempstocks, Memory, Neil Gaiman, Summer, The Martian, The Ocean at the End of the Lane

"Neil Gaiman is such a cultural badass that an entire race on Babylon 5 was named after him. The Gaim Intelligence* was the collective name for the monarchy made up of the six Gaim Queens, each of which control their own specific territories on their homeworld of N'chak'fah. I think we can all read between the lines on that one! Well played, Neil." - Aaron

*The masks of The Gaim Intelligence were designed to strongly resemble the mask of Dream, the titular character in Gaiman's graphic novel The Sandman. 

Posted by Miss Eliza at 12:00 AM 0 comments  

Labels: A Clockwork Iris, Babylon 5, Book Clubs, Dream, Gaim Intelligence, Gaiman Gala, Gaiman Toast, George Mann, MKUltra, Neil Gaiman, Obverse Books, Paul Magrs, Sandman, The Last Word, The Woman Who Sold the Moon

"I never really liked sunny days.
When the skies were gloomy with heavy dark clouds... that's when I felt the happiest.
Mom never allowed me to dress in black, and I knew that that was the protection I needed.
Father always yelled at me to put down the volume, but I needed loud rock and roll.
I was sheltered for most of my life.

But then, The Sandman came.

My cousin, who I really admired (still do), would draw these very goth and interesting looking characters and I loved them! She then handed me DEATH: THE HIGH COST OF LIVING, and it changed everything. I was 13. I didn't know someone could write like that. I didn't know there was someone out there who thought like I did.

It sounds melodic and over the top, but I was a very sheltered child, 13 years old, living in a 3rd world country, in a city that did not have a single library. It was very hard, but one by one, I started reading all of his works that I could find throughout the years. But definitely, The Sandman series are special to me.

Neil Gaiman's writing touches that delicate line in between life and death with such gracefulness that the reader barely notices how fragile existence is. That is what I enjoy the most in his works. There's no death for the mind - that's what his work taught me.

I briefly "met" him once and got my books signed. He looked into my eyes and smiled. Little he knew how far I traveled to be there that day and smile back at him.

My "estranged" friend... soul as gloomy as mine, mind as endless as the sky.

Cheers!" - Flávia

Flávia and I met at MATC. For many semesters I'd seen this amazing work credited to a "Fly" and then one semester there was this girl in the back of my two classes named Flávia, easy to remember because I'd just read The Sweetness at the Bottom of the Pie for the first time, and I realized she was the "Fly" I'd been admiring for so long. Since then we've remained friends, getting to meet Neil Gaiman together, talking over books once a month a book club. I'm forever in awe of her talent as an artist and a mother, and after this toast, as a writer too.

Posted by Miss Eliza at 12:00 AM 0 comments  

Labels: Book Clubs, Death: The High Cost of Living, Flavia, Fly, Gaiman Gala, Gaiman Toast, Library, Neil Gaiman, Sandman, School, The Sweetness at the Bottom of the Pie

The Stranger by Albert Camus
Published by: Vintage International
Publication Date: 1942
Format: Paperback, 123 Pages
Rating: ★★
To Buy

Meursault's mother has died. He makes the long trek to her funeral, it was cost prohibitive to keep her with him and they had nothing more to say to each other. He feels that he should feel something, but there is nothing but the heat of the day and the inconvenience to his daily routine. The day after his mother's funeral he begins a long desired affair with Marie, a co-worker, going to a silly movie and having sex. Things are going along swimmingly with Marie, though she presses for marriage. Meursault says if she wants to get married they should get married, it makes no difference to him. He is passivity personified. He even helps his neighbor Raymond pen a missive to his mistress, seeing that there's no harm in it. Meursault's naivety as to his situation with Raymond will be his undoing. One day at the beach Meursault shoots and kills the brother of Raymond's mistress. The day was hot and the gang of men were following Raymond and Meursault and Marie to the beach. They had an altercation but everything seemed to be over. Then Meursault wandered back to the cool little cove where they first encountered the men, hoping to rest. The Arab was there and then he was dead. Killed by the gun Raymond gave to Meursault. Meursault confesses to his crime. He puts up no protest. The trial is tiring, but he is sure that he will get off. The sentence passed down is a shock to him.

If you read for pleasure versus reading for a class you quickly realize that just because a book is defined as a classic doesn't mean it actually has to be good. In fact some of the most lauded and praised classics might be the most deathly and dull books you'll ever read. While I wouldn't classify The Stranger as the "worst" classic I've ever read, I will say that of all the members of my book club I liked it the least. Though my ambivalence to the book and how it influenced existentialism doesn't preclude it from being a good book to discuss. So while the book might not have met my expectations the discussion that arose from it was engaging, and I think that's why this book has stuck around. It's not perfect but it is perfect to get people talking. As to why The Stranger didn't blow me away, I've read similar books that are better written. D'entre les Mortes by Boileau and Narcejac, which was the basis for the movie Vertigo, captures existentialism and fatalism far better than The Stranger ever does. And it also has that very French vibe as well. But seeing as this book is written later, it was probably influenced by Camus. Therefore I suggest looking to a contemporary of Camus, mainly Daphne Du Maurier. Her short stories succinctly capture the feeling of The Stranger but with better writing. Just because she has been erroneously labelled as a "romance writer" it has lead to her being overlooked. Camus might be a good discussion topic, but for true existentialism go to Du Maurier.

Despite preferring Du Maurier, I am not going to argue the "classic" status of The Stranger. The truth is it is a classic. The reason this is is there is a timelessness to the book. Aside from the method of Meursault's execution and one mention of a movie star, I challenge you to pinpoint the time period of this piece. Not only could it have been set anytime during the past century, it could easily happen now. As my friend Mike pointed out, Meursault could just as easily have been going to a movie by Adam Sandler. Think of that. Could a man be condemned for enjoying an Adam Sandler movie? Now that would add an interesting modern take to the book without changing any of the underlying themes that Camus is trying to get across. Camus was all about the absurdity of life, that a man could be condemned for not showing what society thought as proper grief at his mother's death. If Camus were still alive I think the absurdity of being condemned for laughing at one of the worst comedians of all time would appeal to him. Plus, can you imagine the stir this modern take would create? It almost makes me want to make it into a film myself.

What is odd about The Stranger is despite having a first person narrator it almost feels like it was written in the third person. The reason for this is the passivity of Meursault. He outwardly has no emotions, no desires, he doesn't even really have a personality so to speak. He just follows the ebb and flow of life never really questioning anything until he is faced with his imminent death. One of my friends pointed out that this leads to a refreshing narrator because he does not have any ego. I personally would disagree. Yes he is passive, but being passive doesn't mean that at the bottom of all that there isn't an ego. The truth is he has a very well defined id. An id that is more animal than human. He only goes with the flow if it isn't an inconvenience to him. But look at his train of thought, it's all about food and sex and swimming. He only thinks about stuff that provides gratification to himself. He has an ego, but an animalistic ego that is all about his comfort. Sure he'll marry his girlfriend, what difference does it make to him, all he cares about is having someone around for sex. If marriage will secure this, then why not? The only incident in his entire life that isn't about his own pleasure was the murder he is accused of. He just did it because. Though you could argue that it was because of that nice cool cove.

But really, why kill this man? This is an action completely out of character. Meursault derived no apparent pleasure from it, and that was how he lived his entire life, so why do it? My theory is that there is something seriously wrong with him. Yes, you could look at the entire book as an emotionless man fighting against the inevitability of death and finally finding fire within, but I think that it is a study of a man who was seriously ill. I think that Meursault had a brain tumor. The book oddly backs this up. Firstly, people who have brain tumors often seem off, they don't understand how society works and are therefore often detached. Like people with aspergers they don't get social cues. They also don't understand dangerous situations, often having a childlike naivete. Therefore not crying at his mother's funeral doesn't seem odd to Meursault, while it's a "hanging" offense to the jury. His single-mindedness with devotion only to his own pleasure would also indicate that he has a tumor. But what I think is most significant is his reaction to the sun and heat. The sun is always too bright and overwhelms him. His brain can't process the light streaming through his eyes and he often complains of the sun and his head, much like someone with a migraine would. Only I don't think this is any migraine. I think that Meursault is a sick man because of something inside. This something doesn't see anything wrong with shooting a guy full of holes because it has no mechanism for censure of right and wrong. It lends an entirely different spin to the story but oddly backs up the futility of life. He is inevitably going to die so why fight? In fact he might not have had long to live even if he wasn't executed.

Obviously talking about life and death and this book being the epitome of existentialism, God will enter into it. The first half of the book leading to the murder followed by the second half of trial and condemnation, don't quite fit together. It's like Camus was trying to just show us this man's personality in part one but part two was where all the moral and philosophical reasoning reside. Which makes the second half far heavier. We only see Meursault lose his temper once and that is to the priest who visits him. Obviously this is the important part highlighted by English teachers the world over as the crux of the book. But by the time I reached this point I just didn't care. I didn't care if our antihero did or didn't accept Christ into his life. I didn't care if he was executed. I didn't care if he lived or died. That is the fault at the very center of this book. Yes we can discuss it, yes it might be a fascinating discussion, but a book comes down to the readers investment in the hero or antihero. I could not care less what happened to Meursault! But maybe that's the point? Maybe Camus is playing a double game? For those actually invested there's Meursault's struggle to come to terms with his death, and for the reader there's the struggle to actually care about the book. Or maybe I'm seriously just reading too much into things and applying meaning where there is none because so many people I know liked it and I thought it was just meh. Yep. Still meh.

Posted by Miss Eliza at 12:00 AM 0 comments  

Labels: Adam Sandler, Albert Camus, Aspergers, Boileau and Narcejac, Book Clubs, Brain Tumor, D'entre les Mortes, Daphne Du Maurier, Execution, Existentialism, French, Id, The Stranger, Trial, Vertigo

I've never been a big one for biographies. In fact, non-fiction in general has never been a big draw for me. There's just something that rubs me the wrong way, and occasionally makes me see that I could write better than a particular author given the drive. Yes, I've read my fair share of celebrity biographies over the years, but in truth I've always been turned off by learning the less glamorous side of things. As I've gotten older this has changed to an extent. Perhaps it's the rise of authors like David Sedaris and Jenny Lawson who bring humor to their writing but are also relatable in that damaged way that calls out to me. Or perhaps I'm now more willing to peak behind the curtain and see the great and powerful Oz for what he really is. Though despite this change I rarely pick up a biography unless it's for a book club. Therefore perhaps that's what's really changed, I'm willing to let my fellow book club members and fate decide what I should read. I think that is actually the best thing about my book club, not how awesome everyone is, though they are, it's that I'm reading books I would never pick up on my own and reading outside my comfort zone. So here's to something different! Here's to the biography!

Posted by Miss Eliza at 12:00 AM 0 comments  

Labels: Autobiography, Backlog Bonanza, Beverly Cleary, Biography, Book Clubs, Celebrities, David Sedaris, Gerald Durrell, Helene Hanff, Jenny Lawson, Non-Fiction, Oz, Victoria Laurie

How To Be a Good Wife by Emma J. Chapman
Published by: St. Martin's Press
Publication Date: October 15th, 2013
Format: Kindle, 288 Pages
Rating: ★
To Buy

Marta has lived her married life to her older husband Hector quite literally by the book. She has learned How To Be a Good Wife. Though the book doesn't tell you want to do when your son goes off to college and your life becomes meaningless. Marta starts to unravel. She drinks, she cleans, she takes her meds, she doesn't take her meds, she starts to remember, but are her memories real? She remembers a room under the house and being held captive and brainwashed till she was the wife Hector wanted. She tries to tell her son, Kylan, but he has his own life now. She is unhinged, she is a danger to herself. She is not the Marta that they remember, but did that Marta ever truly exist?  

If you have a book with an unreliable narrator there has to be some kind of revelation, an inside or outside force that is able to give some kind of resolution to the unfolding drama, even if it is a dissatisfying resolution, re Agatha Christie's Endless Night. To be left without any closure makes for a disgruntled reading experience. But then again, being in Marta's brain for even the short amount of time it took to read this book had already alienated me against her and her antics, so what's one more nail in the book's coffin eh? Marta is scatterbrained, obsessive about the weirdest things, her dinner party for her son is such a disaster it makes the Christmas dinner in The Ref look like the best party in the world. She's unstable, unlikable, and, well, selfish. Why did I read this book again? Oh yeah, book club.

The question though remains, did or didn't Hector create this wife? My mind thinks no. Because it's just too outlandish. If he had done it his own mother would have been complicit, something I don't think she'd ever have done. Plus, let's look at it this way. If Hector was making the perfect wife, after all these years of brainwashing why would she crack? Yes, empty nest syndrome, but this is a major psychotic break. And her meds wouldn't make her more compliant, after all this time she'd totally be in the thrall of Stockholm Syndrome, so drugs wouldn't be needed. Whereas if she's just crazy, going off her meds would do something. They'd make her go back to her natural crazy state. But in the end I don't care. No, seriously, I hated each character so much there was no sympathy and well, fuck the lot of them.

With Marta we are given a woman who is neurotic and self-destructive as well as more then a little dumb. Instead of doing anything logical she runs around like a chicken with her head cut off. If she had just sat down and laid out her thoughts and provided proof of her delusion, perhaps someone would have believed her. Instead of making it seem like her illness was responsible for her inability to tell her suspicions Chapman made Marta's failings feel like an idiotic character flaw of the greatest order, total dumb blond syndrome. Perhaps her decision making is completely impaired, but for some reason I just don't think so. I have this feeling that Marta has a very fixed view of the world and her place in it and when things don't go her way she acts out. This seems to be supported by how everyone treats and coddles her. She's a selfish woman who may have issues, but in the end it's her selfishness that defines her. How else would you categorize the fact that she kills herself on the day of her son's wedding? She's making the happiest day of his life all about her.

Chapman is obviously trying to explore the themes of PTSD and what it does to us knowingly or unknowingly, after all if you didn't get it she talks all about it in her afterword. But the problem is we don't know if Marta is suffering from PTSD or is just run of the mill crazy. Either way Marta is not a sympathetic character so whether she was always crazy or became crazy signifies very little to the book itself. But I think if I was a sufferer of PTSD that this would signify very much to me if I was reading this book, which I wouldn't recommend anyone to do. Because How To Be a Good Wife doesn't exactly portray PTSD in a flattering light. In fact the book kind of makes sufferers of PTSD get lumped in with people with severe mental illnesses. Now, while PTSD is a mental illness, well, it's a different kind and to have it lumped in with the psychotics, this is doing the sufferers of this disease an injustice. In fact everything about this book should offend anyone with any kind of mental instability, because Chapman obviously doesn't get it and doesn't have the compassion to render their fight with compassion and honesty.

Posted by Miss Eliza at 12:00 AM 0 comments  

Labels: Agatha Christie, Book Clubs, Christmas, Emma Chapman, Endless Night, How To Be a Good Wife, Kindle, PTSD, The Ref

Cartwheel by Jennifer DuBois
Published by: Random House Trade Paperbacks
Publication Date: September 24th, 2013
Format: Paperback, 416 Pages
Rating: ★
To Buy

Lily Hayes didn't know that deciding to do a semester abroad in Argentina would be the end of the life she knew. Lily thought it would take her out of her comfort zone, give her a greater view of the world. Instead she's in a prison cell accused of murdering her roommate Katy. As her family comes to her aid, the life Lily really lead in Buenos Aires starts to take shape. The drugs, the men, the conflicts with her host family and her roommate. Everything starts to take shape proving Lily's guilt, which the media devours like a hungry animal. DNA, timelines, secrets, lies, can Lily actually return to the life she had or will her life ever be tainted by what happened to Katy and that cartwheel she did while being interrogated?

When this book was drawn out of the hat at book club (yes, we do trust the caprice of fate for our next reading selection) I was actually intrigued. Despite being another book fictionalizing actual events, the second in a row for book club, I thought that this book could give me something I've been craving, closure. Cartwheel is based on the Amanda Knox trial. Loosely based. Though it should be noted, hitting all the important details of the case from bar owners to feces. Oddly in my family the Amanda Knox trial is a source of contention. Why would this be? Well, my father and I both strongly believe in Amanda's guilt. Everything I've heard and seen makes me certain of this fact. It doesn't mean this is true, this is what I believe to be true. My mother strongly disagrees with my father and I having such a blanket statement of her guilt. So anytime the subject comes up my mother gets exasperated with us for condemning this innocent young girl (innocent my ass is what I usually reply with.) Therefore, subject on contention.

I was hoping that Cartwheel would give me some kind of closure so that I could move on and get to a stage where I didn't feel the need to bring up the Knox case and keep the strife alive. Because dammit, she's guilty and if this book could give me this proof, even ersatz proof, then I could quite literally close the book on all this. But this is just what made me seethe with rage at Jennifer duBois. Life doesn't give us clear cut answers, that's why we turn to books. Life is easier in books. You have a question, you get an answer. Straight forward and easy, hence why many people would rather live in books. She had the chance to write a what-if answer, an ending. An ending that we will probably never get in real life and she blew it. There was no ending, there was no conclusion. To you, Jennifer duBois, I say fuck you.

Yet the ending, or lack thereof, isn't the only gripe I have with this book, not by a long shot. Having a book with multiple narrators is tricky. There has to be balance and variety to keep the book's forward momentum. A bad narrator is the kiss of death, the reader will just check right out of the book. Cartwheel suffers because the book is hard to get into because the narration of Lily's father is mind numbingly dull. Logistics about being there for Lily, money worries, lawyers blah blah blah. I don't care about police policies or the legal system, get to the murder, get to the juicy bits, don't drag the opening to breaking point so that the average reader will just toss the book aside. If I didn't have the hard and fast rule that I finish what I start, and I definitely finish what's for book club, well, this book would have been flung out a window shortly into starting it.

The only bearable narrator was Lily herself. She gave you the first person, though unreliable, narration that was needed. Seeing things through her eyes made the story temporarily work. Where the book really failed is that once the arrest happens we abandon Lily and her thoughts. She's just a person in a box. We get no insight, no revelations. The "ending" sneaks up on us and it's muddled and ill conceived and what really happened!?! We lose Lily's voice and then everything falls apart and there's no more pages. WTF!?! Really, just give us the whatever ending? It's like Jennifer duBois got to the end and threw up her hands and just gave up. Could she really not make up an ending? Isn't that what writers do? I invested time and energy in this book, I deserve closure!

In fact, here's how the book should have ended. Tie everything together and make it interesting. Eduardo the lawyer and his weird wife, make them no longer peripheral, make his crazy wife's return a ploy to distract him from his work because she's being paid to help the case for Lily. Just an idea, because, really, what other purpose do these two characters have otherwise? But what I think would have solved all my issues with wasted opportunities would have been if we had one final narrator at the end, and that narrator was Katy. To get the truth from her point of view, to have her speak from "beyond the grave" and tell us what really happened. Why can't writers just get it right sometimes? Because getting it wrong, well, it hurts us all.

Posted by Miss Eliza at 12:00 AM 0 comments  

Labels: Amanda Knox, Argentina, Book Clubs, Buenos Aires, Cartwheel, Closure, Jennifer DuBois, Murder

The Bride That Time Forgot (Brenda and Effie Book 5) by Paul Magrs
Book Provided by Headline Publishing
Published by: Headline Publishing
Publication Date: 2010
Format: Paperback, 352 Pages
Rating: ★★★
To Buy
Even in Whitby Brenda's life might be going to the bad. Sure there have been dangers before, but they've always found a way to have a punch up and be victorious. The return of Effie's fancy man Alucard might be the turning point. Because Brenda may be in denial about what this once and possibly still evil vampire has done to her best friend. She doesn't want to go accusing Alucard of turning Effie unless she is certain, and she sure doesn't want to be certain. Yet, there is no way of denying that the vampire population in Whitby is on the rise... which brings Henry Cleavis back into Brenda's life. Brenda sure does have her trouble with men, either they're monsters, like her MIA husband, or monster hunters, like Henry.

If vampirism wasn't enough, there is a new bookshop in town, The Spooky Finger, run by an odd lady, Marjorie Staynes, who doesn't quite get that a book club should have a broad range of reading material, and instead focuses on the works of Mrs. Beatrice Mapp, an Edwardian writer, who placed the majority of her work in the fictional land of Qab, where men are subservient to women, which is the main draw for the book club. But the name Beatrice Mapp sparks something in Brenda's mind... what is her personal connection to Beatrice, and, on a side note, Marjorie's assistant and Robert's new plaything, Gila, looks suspicious like the subservient lizard race of Qab. Could Qab be real? Before long there are vampire attacks and portals to other places with tears in the very fabric of time, yet the strangest thing that happens is that Brenda willingly, if begrudgingly, takes the help of Mrs. Claus. Maybe that is the first sign that it's the end of days?

Qab. That land before time of garish colors where Jane Fonda from Barbarella wouldn't be incongruous. Qab was interesting, as was the Professor Challenger "Lost World" vibe. Yet, it felt wrong somehow. Spending so much time and energy on a place that's not the Whitby I know and love. This really pushed the series, not in a different way, but in a direction that, while logical, I wasn't that keen on embracing. My brother was always the "Land of the Lost" person in the family. He had the bad eighties posters of dinosaurs with mauve skies that would make your eyes water. I was never into this prehistoric or postapocalyptic man-eating Eden. Also, not to mention my nightmares of dinosaur dioramas from the Milwaukee County Museum, this volume just didn't grab me. We had just another creative medium that creates a vortex, like the previous installment and the film, Get They Inside Me, Satan. Personally, if I had to chose, a film would be a better vortex of evil than a book any day...

Don't get me wrong, I still enjoyed the book and there where aspects that I loved. Effie finally going to the bad after all the hints and intimations, a book club that is really a cult. Because truly, if you think about it, I spent years trying to find a book club, and they're hard to break into, so, really, they are very much like a cult. I give Penny big props for getting on the inside, even if sometimes she started to believe the retoric. Mrs. Mapp and Bloomsbury! Adored this! I love that how Brenda describes Mrs. Mapp's writing, or more truthfully, her channeling of Qab. I knew something was up with her writing style, it was too much like Automatic Writing, where the writing is "produced from a subconscious, and/or external and/or spiritual source without conscious awareness of the content." I have always found Automatic Writing fascinating, and to have it in this book made me a little giddy, if truth be told. There where a few things that where left open ended, which I hope will be handled in the next book, mainly, the Limbosine and what happened to Leena.

Finally onto the nit picky. The switch back to first-person narrative was a bit jarring. It's not like this series hasn't utilized it, but since the third book we've been in third-person narration which made sense considering the expanding cast of characters and certain events that made Brenda unable to continue the narration herself. Here it seems to be occasionally forcing the narrative back on Brenda or Effie in her letters to Alucard, so that all news and events must filter through them and it's kind of awkward. Even more awkward is the fact that the book doesn't stay in first-person, but jumps back to third-person or vice versa, sometimes in the same chapter. The really really long chapters. I like third-person, it works for these books, even if we lose Brenda's voice, her voice is so strong now it can survive the change over from first-person.

Posted by Miss Eliza at 12:00 AM 0 comments  

Labels: Automatic Writing, Barbarella, Book Clubs, Brenda and Effie, Dracula, First-Person, Mrs. Mapp, Paul Magrs, Qab, The Bride that Time Forgot, The Lost World, Thrid-Person, Vampires, Whitby

The Leftovers by Tom Perrotta
Published by: St. Martin's Press
Publication Date: August 30th, 2011
Format: Paperback, 355 Pages
Rating: ★
To Buy

The Rapture has happened. Or at least an event that looks so much like the rapture that it makes no difference, except to those who are offended by the choices made as to those taken. How could they take the idolaters and not the true believers? Yet one thing is certain, with so many people now gone, everyones life has changed. Kevin Garvey's wife has left him to go and be a part of the new cult The Guilty Remnant, where she keeps silent and smokes all day while accusing her fellow citizens with her mere presence. Their daughter Jill has sunk into sex and drugs with her sexy new friend Aimee who walks around the Garvey house in almost nothing. Their son has joined another cult, the Healing Hug Movement, that seems to put a lot of stock into their holy leader, Wayne. Yet Nora Durst is the one suffering most, as she lost her husband and her children. While the town gathers to mourn those who have left, each of these people will continue on their own painful journey while the world seems to be in limbo, allowing grief to rule the day years later. Yet their journeys will cross, and in those brief moments, maybe they can try to move on.

The concept of this book is genius, the execution is another thing. Instead of finding the humor in his topic, Perrotta seems to have thought the book was an excuse to wallow in a midlife crisis and dwell overly long on grief. Add to that characters that are so shallow they verge on being less then one dimensional, especially the women, whose only way to deal with grief or their emotional traumas is to do something to their hair. Because obviously, all women are superficial and only skin deep. Whereas the male lead, Kevin Garvey, is living, in my opinion, Perrotta's dream life. His family has all deserted him, he has his daughter's hot friend living in the house, obviously every woman wants him because he has power as the mayor, and therefore his life is good. If Perrotta had been skewering this perception of male wish fulfilment, that might have been something, but it appears to be in earnest.

That's the whole problem in the book. It's earnest. Instead of lampooning weird end of days cults and the new mentality of the human race, we get people who have been given an excuse to wallow in their grief. Hundreds of pages of shallow wallowing. Because nothing is ever analysed, it just is. Nora Durst lost her family, so here's a hundred pages of her riding a bike and not thinking about the tragedy. Jill ditches school and does some tame drugs, oh, now that's a totally revolutionary way for a teenager to revolt now isn't it? This book is so shallow that if I were to throw it into the deep end of a pool it would come out without even moisture on it.

The Guilty Remnant and Holy Wayne with his Healing Hug Movement seemed to have potential, but instead it's basically Jim Jones and his "Kool-Aid" at work. Though there is no analysis of the parallels, no plugging into the zeitgeist that makes such organizations form. Everything is just surface. If you actually want humor and Jim Jones, go read Armistead Maupin's third Tales of the City book, Further Tales of the City. In fact, thinking of Maupin has now made me sadder, because there is a true comedic American writer and I'm sure given the same basic plot of this book he could have written a satire that pierced the American way of life while also tackling grief.

Needless to say this will be the first and last book by Perrotta that I ever read. He is mostly known for the book the classic Reese Witherspoon movie Election is based on, a fact that he himself is mighty proud of in his Q&A at the end of the book. Well Mr. Perrotta, you shouldn't be that full of yourself. You wrote a superficial little novel that reads as a pathetic roman a clef of yourself. I've seen into you and you are a trifling writer of meagre and bland talents and you have wasted my time with a book that was unable to deliver on it's premise. Also, just as a final note, if you only "rapture" up a small number of the population of the earth, there really can't be that many people missing from one small town in New Jersey now can there? Just saying, basic math!

Posted by Miss Eliza at 12:00 AM 0 comments  

Labels: Armistead Maupin, Book Clubs, Cults, Election, Further Tales of the City, Jim Jones, Jonestown, Kool-Aid, Tales of the City, The Last Word, The Rapture, Tom Perrotta