LOVED THIS! It’s out in 2022 and I’ll write more then. It was everything I want in a memoir: relatable, honest, interesting, complicated, revealing. JLOVED THIS! It’s out in 2022 and I’ll write more then. It was everything I want in a memoir: relatable, honest, interesting, complicated, revealing. Jami Attenberg is one of my favorite authors and I appreciated learning more about her writing career and personal life. She’s lived in so many cool places and done lots of traveling; basically she’s done all the things I thought I’d do by my age. Thank you to @eccobooks for sending me a review copy. ...more
Loved this and found it very relatable. I’m so happy to read novels with main characters over 40! Jhumpa Lahiri is one of my favorite authors. Lahiri Loved this and found it very relatable. I’m so happy to read novels with main characters over 40! Jhumpa Lahiri is one of my favorite authors. Lahiri wrote this in Italian and then translated it into English. The central character is single and lives alone. She teaches but remains unmotivated. She wanders-she swims, goes to a coffee shop, goes to a bookstore, goes to a museum and gets a manicure. She does things alone but has interactions and connections. Lahiri writes with an obvious appreciation for solitude. ...more
I wanted to like this novel much more than I did. Norah is writing about her mother, Irish theatre legend Katherine O'Dell, who shot another actor in I wanted to like this novel much more than I did. Norah is writing about her mother, Irish theatre legend Katherine O'Dell, who shot another actor in the foot and was institutionalized afterward. Katherine O’Dell seemed rather glamorous and eccentric. She hung out with IRA men in New York and Boston in the 1970s, had a gay following and various lovers (as one might expect). Norah reconciles her relationship with her mother and with her mother's art and fame. A delicate balance to be sure. ‘Katherine O’Dell was forty-five years old. She wasn’t forty-five the way people do forty-five these days. She smoked thrity a day and she drank from 6 to whenever. My mother never ate a vegetable unless she was on a diet; she did not, I think, possess a pair of shoes without heels. She talked all day, and got bitter in the evening, when the wine made her face swell and her eyes very green.” Norah didn’t know her father-- “My teenage energies were spent running away from my mother or back to her, and there was, between us, enough love and trouble to keep us busy, with no need for any ‘father’ to distract or intervene.”...more
Okay so two things: I have been a vegan for 15 years and was vegetarian for at least a decade prior to that; I am a fan of Jonathan Safran Foer. EatinOkay so two things: I have been a vegan for 15 years and was vegetarian for at least a decade prior to that; I am a fan of Jonathan Safran Foer. Eating Animals and Here I Am are favorites of mine. I always recommend Eating Animals to people. And it’s not that I wouldn’t recommend We Are the Weather but I just didn’t like it that much. I wasn’t impressed. It’s a self-exploration of why Foer isn’t doing more or caring more. This is the book someone writes to appease guilt. It’s an existential search for why he cannot sustain a vegan diet and lifestyle. It’s well-written and researched–the book provides plenty of facts to back up the thesis that factory farming affects climate change. Foer writes: “Climate change is the greatest crisis humankind has ever faced, and it is a crisis that will always be simultaneously addressed together and faced alone. We cannot keep the kinds of meals we have known and also keep the planet we have known. We must either let some eating habits go or let the planet go. It is that straightforward, that fraught.” This book didn’t move me as much as Eating Animals moved me.
Utilizing family history, notable the Holocaust and WWII, Foer states the importance of decreasing meat consumption for the common good. Foer notes: “Ninety-six percent of American families gather for a Thanksgiving meal. That is higher than the percentage of Americans who brush their teeth every day, have read a book in the last year, or have ever left the state in which they were born. It is almost certainly the broadest collective action—the largest wave—in which Americans partake.”
I understand something is better than nothing and I’d like everyone to reduce meat, dairy, poultry and fish consumption. As someone who is first and foremost vegan for the animals, I can’t relate to the sentiment that it’s okay to sometimes eat fish or meat or sometimes have dairy ice cream if someone says they’re vegan. It isn’t a “cheat” diet. There are dire consequences. Foer writes: “According to Project Drawdown, four of the most effective strategies for mitigating global warming are reducing food waste, educating girls, providing family planning and reproductive healthcare, and collectively shifting to a plant-rich diet.”
Most people remain ignorant to the impact of their diets. They’re not morally opposed to consuming animal products. They also don’t think that an individual’s choices will affect the greater good. They’re wrong. He states: “When I first chose to become vegetarian, as a nine-year-old, my motivation was simple: do not hurt animals. Over the years, my motivations changed—because the available information changed, but more importantly, because my life changed. As I imagine the case for most people, aging has proliferated my identities. Time softens ethical binaries and fosters a greater appreciation of what might be called the messiness of life.” He makes these types of statements but by the end of the book I still don’t understand these other motivations and why it’s so hard for Foer not to be 100% vegan. If you want to be vegetarian or omnivore then that’s your choice. It’s not, however, difficult to commit to being vegan if you’re in it for the right reasons. And if you’re committed to helping the environment, then it’s critical that you make changes in your diet.
"Gender Studies"-- Henry leaves Nell for his 23-year-old grad student Bridget. Nell and Henry had been together for 11 years. --"Simultaneously, notes
"Gender Studies"-- Henry leaves Nell for his 23-year-old grad student Bridget. Nell and Henry had been together for 11 years. --"Simultaneously, she is furious at him--she feels the standard humiliation and betrayal-- and she also feels an unexpected sympathy, which she has been careful not to express to him or to her friends. Their deliberately childless life, their cat, Converse (named not for the shoe but for the political scientist), their free-range beef and nights and weekends of reading and grading and high-quality television series. It was fine and a little horrible. She gets it."
oops. reading this much slower than anticipated. because i don't like reading on the Kindle.
"You Think It, I'll Say It"-- a woman becomes friends with her husband's colleague. they play a "game" that i don't fully understand. saying mean/critical things about other people? when he leaves his wife, she thinks it's because he wants them to be together. i really like this line: "Although her internal organs had begun to liquefy and collapse, it seemed important to conceal this from him."
"Vox Clamantis in Deserto"-- "At that time, the thing i wished for was a Dartmouth boyfriend, but it seemed even more romantic to have one somewhere else-- it implied yearning and passionate reunions. I was nineteen and a virgin, and hadn't so much as kissed anyone since arriving on campus five months ago." same. VERY familiar situation in this story.
Writer Claire Messud adroitly explores themes such as friendship, what it means to be a woman, opportunity, choices, class, perception and artistic peWriter Claire Messud adroitly explores themes such as friendship, what it means to be a woman, opportunity, choices, class, perception and artistic personalities with thoughtfulness and precision. The Emperor’s Children stunned me with its near perfection and it remains one of my favorite novels. I tore through her brilliant novel The Woman Upstairs. I realize now I need to read Messud’s back catalog. Messud’s known for writing what many consider unlikable characters. She excels at it. It’s the strength of a talented writer to write unlikable characters in a readable, magnificent and emotive manner. We may all possess unlikable qualities. Sometimes likeable characters are just too perfect, just too likeable to make for a satisfying read.
In this compelling novel with a realistic portrayal of female friendship in all its infatuation, moodiness and competitiveness, childhood friends Julia and Cassie fall out in high school, not surprisingly as we often change and need different things at different stages of our lives. Something terrible happens to Cassie. How much can one remember about our childhood friendships and what drew us to that person and what pushed us apart? Julia, the narrator of this novel, acknowledges that her memories might be murky way back when she and Cassie first met and “became friends in the second week of nursery school when we were four years old.” Julia recalls what drew the girls together and ultimately pushed them apart. It’s rare the childhood friendship that carries into adulthood. Most of us evolve so much that those relationships fall to the side. This novel will make you reminisce about your childhood friendships. I've seen some childhood friends at high school reunions, while others I've lost forever, some for no reason then that we grew apart, we went in different directions as we developed into adults. Messud divided the novel into three sections. In the first section, the girls are children. This section's influenced by fairy tales, Messud explains. In the second section, time passes and events have wider consequences as Julie and Cassie move into adulthood. In the third section, Julia and Cassie are "nominally into adulthood" and are both making up stories.
It doesn’t bode well for Cassie that she lives with only her mom Bev, a hospice nurse struggling to make ends meet. Messud writes: “It wasn’t hard for Cassie, who never confided in her mother. Bev Burnes wasn’t reliable; she was moody and weird in spite of her perma-smiles, and even if she seemed cool about something, it didn’t mean she’d stay cool with it, and weeks or even months later she would throw it back in Cassie’s face, or blab like it was nothing. Cassie had learned the hard way not to trust her mother.” Julia lives comfortably with two parents who earn enough money to allow Julia the comfort to not worry about daily necessities. Both work from home which means Julia always has her parents around for guidance, security, etc. Julia's father is a dentist with an office in the (no longer used) stables on their property ["When he goes to work, he walks a hundred feet out the back door."] and her mother "is a freelance journalist, a vagueness that seems to mean she can be a journalist when it suits her. She writes restaurant and movie reviews for the Essex County Gazette, and for the past few years she's written a literary blog that has a following, including an adult English class in Tokyo that writes very polite comments."
It seems clear that something will happen even if we aren’t already expecting it from the book jacket because these two girls are from such different family situations. When you’re young you can ignore those differences and how they may shape your future and your development. There’s this astute observation: “With someone you’ve always known and have loved without thinking, there’s the strangeness of knowing everything and nothing about them at the same time.” Julia's the "good girl" and Cassie's the "bad girl." At least as literary characters. Cassie lives on the edge. She's delving into everything and anything she can without hesitation and without considering any consequences for her action and behavior. Developing brains and all. It's hard to be a teenage girl. Some girls want to grow up quickly. Some girls want to be more adult than they are. Some girls are more adult than their age. It happens. I had lots of friends who got fake IDs so they could drink before they turned 21, both in high school and in college. My brother got my friends the fake IDs. I had no desire to do so.
Messud, at a recent book reading, explained that as teenagers we have "a choice to opt out of the sexual economy." Such a brilliant way to describe that phase when we hit puberty or start liking boys (or girls). Julia isn't hurrying into sexuality as much as Cassie and that definitely separates them in junior high and high school.In high school, I had a group of friends who didn't date or hook up with boys. Of course, this was a while ago, in the 80s. There were others who always seems to have boyfriends. Teens become sexually active even earlier these days. Julia focuses on her future outside of the town while Cassie focuses on her future outside her house and apart from her mom. This friendship won’t last once these girls become independent young women.
David Vann writes dark and introspective in an appealing, engrossing manner. He’s one of my favorite authors. I interviewed him for his last novel GoaDavid Vann writes dark and introspective in an appealing, engrossing manner. He’s one of my favorite authors. I interviewed him for his last novel Goat Mountain. His characters struggle with complex yet simple issues involving families and quiet brutality. There’s a brutal hunting accident in Goat Mountain, suicide in Caribou Island, unimaginable family tragedy and matricide in Dirt (my favorite of his works) or getting into the psyche of a school shooter in Last Day on Earth. His collection of stories Legend of a Suicide introduced readers to his darker themes and potent writing style. Dark beautiful writing isn’t for everyone. I tend to gravitate toward dark music and prefer darker themed, well-written novels and memoirs.
This is Vann’s first novel centered on a female protagonist. Twelve-year-old Caitlin lives in Seattle with her dockworker single mother. Older now, Caitlin looks back on this time with the wisdom one gains through age and experience. There’s a lighter tone than previous works until events draw to a boiling point for Caitlin and her mother. Every day after school Caitlin visits the aquarium to study the fish while waiting for her mom to finish work and retrieve her. She finds the various fish and sea life fascinating and allows herself contemplation and solitude.
“At twelve, I had only the sense of pressure, some premonition, riding each surge and waiting for the counterpull, believing, perhaps, that all would release at some point. Each day was longer than the days now, and my own end not yet possible. It was a simpler mind, more direct and responsive. We live through evolution ourselves, each of us, progressing through different apprehensions of the world, at each age forgetting the last age, every previous mind erased. We no longer see the same world at all.”
The aquarium becomes synonymous to real life. What Caitlin sees in the tanks she can directly relate to her emotions, her relationships and the girl she is now. At home Caitlin finds herself as stuck as the aquatic life in the aquarium. Vann writes: “Back in our aquarium, as territorial and easily found as any fish. We had only four places to hide in this tank: the couch, the bed, the table, and the bathroom.” When you’re young you might have some hopes for the future but you also remain tempered in your reality. Particularly if your reality is subsidized housing, ramen noodles, single parent no siblings bleak. When Caitlin wants something new or wants to go somewhere, her mother reminds her that she’s working so that Caitlin can survive. She’ll say: “It doesn’t make any sense. Welcome to the adult world, coming soon. I work so I can work more. I try not to want anything so maybe I’ll get something. I starve so I can be less and more. I try to be free so I can be alone. There’s no point to any of it. They left out that part.” She gets a real guilt trip. That’s a lot to endure. The mom also has a boyfriend and when he’s around Caitlin’s often quickly consigned to the background.
An old man befriends Caitlin at the aquarium. Her extensive knowledge and interest impresses him and they chat about everything. Then one day he wants to take her to introduce him to her mother. This involves an unraveling to an already precarious lifestyle. Turns out he’s her grandfather who took off on her mom over 15 years ago and left her to care for her dying mother alone. Her mom had to drop out of school. She tells Caitlin: “And now I have the worst jobs a person can have, with no money and no future. We’ll be okay, and you don’t need to worry, but I won’t be able to become anything.” Caitlin quickly learns that childhood isn’t always easy. But she’s not grown-up enough to realize that in time memories fade. Past traumas heal. Or there’s that possibility. In one alarming scene, Caitlin’s mother wants Caitlin to suffer the same indignity and hard work she did when she cared for her mother. She’s fed up that her father wants a relationship with his granddaughter. So vivid and disturbing. What is the end game? Why? There’s a resolution but the most important message might be: “The worst part of childhood is not knowing that bad things pass, that time passes. A terrible moment in childhood hovers with a kind of eternity, unbearable.”
Currently a professor at the University of Warwick in England and honorary professor at University of Franche-Comte in France, Ivy-educated Vann lives the ex-pat life and might be more popular abroad than in the states. For one thing, many readers only want to read likeable characters and one finds many awful characters in Vann’s work. His dark, meditative writing likely won’t be discussed with a bottle of wine at a book club. Everything he writes compels me to keep reading because he’s such an impressive writer. His ability to fabricate stories about the most unimaginable events and catastrophes with grace and clarity impresses me.
May Sarton is a favorite author and prolific writer of novels, poetry, short stories and memoir. I'm working my way through her writing. I want to incMay Sarton is a favorite author and prolific writer of novels, poetry, short stories and memoir. I'm working my way through her writing. I want to include more poetry in my reading. This is a short, solid collection that provides a glimpse into Sarton's appreciation for nature, solitude and friendships....more
3.5 stars exquisite setting and place. intriguing WWII historical fiction but too confusing in the back and forth telling. I also kept getting some of3.5 stars exquisite setting and place. intriguing WWII historical fiction but too confusing in the back and forth telling. I also kept getting some of the characters mixed up and that shouldn't happen if they're created and well-developed. Never truly grew to know ANY of the characters just that unimaginable atrocities occur during war....more
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