Review

Review – American Gods

/ justbookreading / 4 Comments

Shadow is doing his time in prison but the end is in sight. A few days before his release, he finds out his wife has died in a car accident, and due to her death, he’s being released early. In shock, he heads home to the funeral only to find out his wife died in a precarious situation involving another man. He feels little remorse and decides it’s time for change. He takes a job offer from a man named Mr. Wednesday who needs someone to drive him around and protect him every once in a while. Shadow is a man trying to find himself or just forget everything around him depending on how you want to see it. His employment with Wednesday sets him up to meet a lineup of interesting people challenging Shadow’s beliefs in who and what he is.

The idea that gods were brought to the US, essentially immigrated here with the people that worshiped them, is an interesting one. Once those beliefs, prayers, adoration, whatever you want to call it, are replaced by other things in society — think celebrity — the gods begin to diminish. This imagines what would happen to those gods if everyone stopped believing in them. And, yes, it comes to war, but not the kind of war you’re probably thinking.

Shadow is an interesting character. He’s quiet, thoughtful (at times), and even though he’s done things in his life to land him jail, he’s not a bad person and really does his best to do what he thinks is right. He’s slow on the uptake when it comes to understanding the gods but gets it when necessary. He sort of lumbers through the story but that’s what I liked about him. There was no pressure with him. Everything took place around him and he just accepted and moved on — think blind faith if you will. He never professes to any belief system but he’s able to take them all on individually when he has to. I can see how for some people he’s not a captivating character but that’s what I liked about him. He was the grounding force for all the gods around him.

Now the gods, and they weren’t the only ones to make appearances here, several folk heroes get a bit of honor as well. Gaiman’s portrayal of the gods is interesting and I liked that they had human qualities even if those qualities, and vices, wouldn’t hurt them in the end. I wasn’t able to place every god, some were obscure, but each added something to the story and I didn’t feel any were dropped in for entertainment purposes. That’s something I always appreciate about an author; not everything has to be wrapped up nice and tidy but I want characters to have a purpose.

I read American Gods while taking a writing class and it was the perfect time to read it for me. The elements of storytelling were on full display here and I felt each time I turned a page I learned something new, in addition to being fully entertained. It’s a great piece of storytelling.

American Gods

By Neil Gaiman

HarperCollins Publishers

ISBN: 9780062059888

4.5 stars

Review – Blood, Bones & Butter

/ justbookreading / Leave a comment

This book has been on my radar for a while but I never quite got around to it for no other reason than I just didn’t. This happens to me sometimes. So, when it arrived in the mail it was fate, I guess.

Gabrielle Hamilton is a chef but not one that’s been classically trained; in fact, you can probably argue that she hasn’t really been trained at all. Her mother, a woman of French decent, instilled in her a love of all food and the ability to cook it. Up until the age of 12, she had an ideal life growing up in a rural area of Pennsylvania punctuated by summer blowout parties and family memories. When her parents decide to divorce, she ends up taking care of herself and finding it not so easy a project. She’s smart but barely finishes high school. She is able to work but can’t seem to hold down a job without getting in trouble. And even though she manages to get into college, she can’t manage to stay there. She takes on catering jobs in all the places she lands, and along the way, realizes this is what she knows, what she can do, and what she wants to do. She wants to feed people and share her food experiences with them.

I was skeptical at first — really the first chapter of this book is setup so sweet that you’re pretty sure she was walking around with rainbows streaming out of her ass. That might sound harsh, but I put this one down a few times only a few pages in wondering exactly what was going on. No one’s life is like that and then it all came to a crashing halt, and not that I felt better, but it felt like a better book. Hamilton is a trained writer, MFA in fiction from the University of Michigan, so she knows the tricks and she used them in that first chapter. My favorite parts were the rougher ones though. When she moves to New York for college she takes a job as a waitress and then gets on the night shift where she finds she can make a ton of money. When she ends up in trouble, legal this time, her brother pulls in a few favors to get her out and you see where all of this might go.

The best parts of this book have to do with her time in Italy. Hamilton marries an Italian professor in need of wife to stay in the country, and for whatever reason, she marries him (there is talk of several girlfriends in this book but her sexuality is not explicitly talked about and I don’t feel the need to address it here either other than note this for the sake of non-confusion) and accompanies him back home to Italy every year. She doesn’t speak the language, doesn’t know his family at all, but manages to find a place in the kitchen and share her love of food with people she doesn’t know but very much wants to. I didn’t necessarily relate to the family issues though; for me it was the food. We went to Italy on our honeymoon and there are still dishes that I remember so fondly, and yes, I’m sure my recollection is cloudy with wine and love but I wanted to go to those places all over again.

Hamilton is a good writer and she’s able to capture something that we all have memories of, in one way or another, and elevate them to something you want to know more about. Yes, I looked up her restaurant in New York to see what was on the menu because I wondered what a writer talking about food was actually cooking.

I don’t read memoirs, generally, but when I do I tend to prefer ones dealing with food because I think I can relate. I’ve never had aspirations of being a chef, and frankly after watching too many food shows, know I would never be able to even think about it. But this book did make think about food differently and the way it’s intertwined with our lives. This book is not always about cooking and food. In some ways, that comes later to this author, but it’s an interesting look in on a life definitely lived.

Blood, Bones & Butter: The Inadvertent Education of a Reluctant Chef

By Gabrielle Hamilton

Random House
ISBN: 9780812980882

3.5 stars

 

Review – The Secret Diary of a Princess: A Novel of Marie Antoinette

/ justbookreading / 2 Comments

You’ve heard me say it before so don’t act surprised to hear it now — I have a thing about France and particularly Marie Antoinette.  I have no idea why, I just do. Now, since I’m in the confession mood, I read Melanie Clegg’s blog, Madame Guillotine, and have for a while. I’m a good lurker like that and she’s interesting and funny so I keep going back. Anyway, I saw the book there and then one day I saw it come up on my Nook and I bought it. I’m so happy I did too.

The Secret Diary of a Princess is told through the diary entries of the young Marie Antoinette starting as a child in the Viennese Court, her early education (and antics), family turmoil, and her eventual marriage. She leads a privileged life, and because she’s considered unimportant in terms of being marriageable material, she gets away with a lot. When it’s decided by her Empress mother that she will become the Dauphine of France, her life is forever changed. Gone are the jsilly games she would play, gone are the teachers who let her education lag, and in their place are new manners and etiquette to be learned and new people to impress.

This book delighted me in the way it was told. It’s a young girl writing and relaying her antics and daily problems such as not being able to enjoy some of the things her older sibling are allowed to do. When her mother’s plans are announced for her future, Marie Antoinette is no longer the least important of the daughters but is now the daughter the Empress is placing a huge burden on. She begins to feel the weight of what her mother wants of her but you also see a very young, and very scared, girl. I liked that. While Marie Antoinette doesn’t change dramatically — she still has the worries of and understanding of a young girl who doesn’t see the political ramifications of her actions — you see a glimpse of the woman she’s about to become.

There’s so much written about Marie Antoinette, her early life included, and while no one would say it was easy, it was certainly interesting. She is the youngest child of 15, lives a quiet and sheltered life at the Viennese court, and is then elevated to being the Queen of France. It’s an amazing story in some ways even more fascinating than anything fiction writers can imagine. I think that’s why I keep going back to books about her and this time frame. It all fascinates me so much.

Anyway, back to the book. I enjoyed it and when I came to the end, I was actually sad to see there was no more. It ends in a necessary place but I wanted it to go on. The dairy of a princess must stop when she stops being a child. My only quibble, and it’s a small one, is that I never thought of Marie Antoinette as being a writer so it took me a minute to take my early thoughts out it and get lost in the story. It didn’t take long. I was too entranced by the story to care at that point.

Finally, I did see that Clegg is writing a sequel to this one and I’m planning to read that one as well. I’m interested to see how she handles the next stage in this character’s life.

A Secret Diary of a Princess: A Novel of Marie Antoinette

By Melanie Clegg

BN ID: 2940011400735

Smashwords Self-published

4 stars

Review – Enchantments

/ justbookreading / Leave a comment

Masha Rasputin, and her younger sister Varya, became the wards of deposed Tsar Nickolay Romanov in 1917 shortly after her father’s mutilated body is pulled from the river. The daughter of Grigory Yefimovich Rasputin, known better as the Mad Monk Rasputin, she understands the only safe place for them is with the tsar and his family even though she would rather leave St. Petersburg to be with her mother back in Siberia. Masha and Varya leave for the imperial palace and soon find themselves under arrest with the royal family.

Hoping that Masha has inherited some of her father’s mythical healing powers, Tsarina Alexandra asks Masha to attend her son Alyosha, the tsarevich and next in line to carry on the Romanov dynasty. Sick since birth — his hemophilia is unspoken of and he is never seen in public unless healthy — Alyosha suffers from extreme loneliness and is burdened with the knowledge that he will die earlier than expected. Terrified of the slightest bump causing unseen, and unstoppable bleeding, the tsarina prays constantly for his health and will do anything she can to keep him safe, including bringing in Rasputin to heal him when necessary. While she never directly says it, she wants the same thing from Masha, who knows she cannot provide the same reassurance, or healing powers, the tsarina is looking for.

What Masha can do is tell stories and she spends her days with Alyosha telling him about her family, every detail of her father’s life, their home in Siberia, her love of horses, and they discuss what they would do if they were to escape. Alyosha knows their lives will end but doesn’t speak of this to anyone but Masha who fears he may be correct but doesn’t want to believe too strongly in his convictions. Their stories and time together become an escape, not only the loneliness they both suffer from, but from daily reminders of what little life holds for them at the moment.

If you know anything about the Romonovs, it’s a sad time for this once powerful family. The tsar no longer holds any power and the tsarina has lost herself in her religion spending her days praying for the safety of her son almost oblivious to the fact there is nothing left of their former life. The four Romanov daughters are not spoken of much but are mostly just background players filling out the tableau of characters. It’s all about Masha and Alyosha and the stories she’s telling him — her own form of healing therapy. While she doesn’t have the healing powers of her father, she can distract Alyosha and take him away from the horror that has become their lives.

Each chapter in this book is a small story tied together by the people involved. You can’t really think of this book as traditional with a beginning, middle, and end but if you take each chapter as a story of its own, it’s an intriguing book. No, things won’t tie up nice and neat but you will get the thread of story as if someone were telling you about their time with a dear friend and what they spoke about and did during their time together. It’s also a very sweet love story of two teenagers who know they have no future together but spend each day trying to forget what they can’t change. They’re in an untenable situation but they manage to seek out the only the joy they can find.

This book is aptly named. The story, while in no way linear, is a tale of love and hardship that spans years. Harrison doesn’t ignore the ghost of death hanging over everyone but manages to make the situation one of hope and a life dreamed of outside of palace walls.

In addition to this blog, I also do reviews for The Book Reporter website. The above review was done for the Book Reporter which can be found here. The book was provided to me by the publisher.

Enchantments

Kathryn Harrison

Random House

ISBN: 9781400063475

4 stars

Review – The Technologists

/ justbookreading / 2 Comments

Boston, 1868, and the Massachusetts Institute of Technology is about to graduate its first class. Founded four years before, the school has endured the mocking of its neighboring and well-known school, Harvard University, but is coming into its own.

On a foggy night at the harbor, a terrible accident takes place resulting in the wreckage of several ships. The accident is blamed on faulty compasses, which were reported to spin wildly at the time several of the ships were pulling into port causing the catastrophe. Some individuals believe it might be the work of some strange phenomenon and others a madman. The police aren’t sure who to turn to for answers — Harvard with its gravitas or the new upstart school with the means for experimentation. When a second odd event, glass melting spontaneously in an area in downtown Boston, causes the death of a popular actress, the police turn to an esteemed Harvard professor to find the answer. However, students from the Institute of Technology also decide to investigate knowing their means of experimentation will result in a faster answer and hopefully bring calm to the city.

Marcus Mansfield, and several of his colleagues including the first female student of the Institute, re-form The Technologists, a defunct club at the school, and begin their investigation in a secret basement laboratory experimenting with every known compound to find the answers they need. Racing to put an end to the madness now griping the city, they search for a madman using technology to prey on the fears of everyone.

Rivaling investigations take place between the two schools — old Harvard with an eminent scholar at the helm ready to explain how man has brought about the accidents and the Institute of Technology ready with chemicals and formulas to counter the out of date arguments of the old university. The police aren’t sure who to turn to and finally decide on the tried and true Harvard University but find the arguments put forth aren’t stopping the bizarre occurrences. When Marcus and his friends are able to find explanations for the events, the police aren’t willing to listen. When they finally begin to understand, it may be too late to save everyone and the city from total destruction.

The geek in me loved the science in this book. The Technologists is true to its name in that regard. Marcus Mansfield, a former soldier and factory man, is an example of the old world meeting the new. He understands technology and the fears of the men who work in the shops. The idea that man has brought down the wrath of God on himself with his experimentation adds some nice tension but unfortunately, isn’t explored in much detail as the real culprit starts to come into focus.

One of the more interesting characters in the book, Ellen Swallow the first female student at the school, adds to the outdated thoughts that man with his new experiments is testing the limits of his creator by allowing a woman to study, not only among men, but science. Her steadfast mind proves she can more than hold her own among her peers though. She might take a minute to grow on you as a character but she’s definitely one of the more notable ones.

I became a fan of Pearl’s with The Dante Club. I enjoyed the way he married technology and fear in this book and think fans of his earlier works will find The Technologists an enjoyable read as well.

In addition to this blog, I also do reviews for The Book Reporter website. The above review was done for the Book Reporter which can be found here. The book was provided to me by the publisher.

The Technologists

By Matthew Pearl

Random House

ISBN: 978140006657-5

3.5 stars

Review – Lady Susan

/ justbookreading / Leave a comment

Lady Susan is told through letters, and through those letters, oh does Lady Susan ever get a dousing.

Lady Susan is a woman in need of a place to stay after deciding it was time for her to quit her current residence which of course was some else’s home. She finds herself a place with her in-laws, the Vernons. A recent widow looking for a new husband, she is willing and able to manipulate to get what she wants. She also needs a husband for her daughter, Fredericka, whom she describes as stubborn and unruly and who she talks badly about at every opportunity. She wants to marry off her daughter and be done with her and find herself a handsome, rich man to take care of her without the worry of an unwanted, and uncared for, daughter.

There are essentially seven characters in this book and in some way these people are all related or know each other intimately which makes the barbs being thrown all the more sharp. Yes, Lady Susan deserves every snide remark and sideways evil eye thrown her way but that, for me, is what is so fun about this book. Lady Susan goes around flirting with men, while keeping a married one on the hook, hoping to snag a good one along the way. She’s able to convince people of her virtues, and more than enough people describe her willingly as beautiful and smart. I think all the backbiting and hastily sent letters is wonderful though. Yes, you can say it’s slightly preachy on the morals side but the letters flying between family members is really entertaining.

This was an early unpublished work of Austen’s. I think I may have known that at some point but forgot it. It does have an unfinished feel about it and maybe an unedited feel as well. If you’ve read a lot of Austin, it’s easy to pick up on some of that but it was still good for me. It was included in my The Complete Works of Jane Austen which I’ve had on my Nook forever and love because when I’m feeling the need for Austen, it’s right there.

I have one book left to go and I will have officially read all of Austen’s books. It’s taken me longer than anticipated to complete this little challenge. As the number on the list of not read gets smaller, I get slower and now I’m down to one — Emma. I’ve tried to read Emma before and have never made it all the way through as she’s a character I really find annoying. After Lady Susan, I’m hoping I look at Emma as more the silly matchmaker and not the annoying, coddled child I think of her as. We shall see. We shall see.

Lady Susan from The Complete Works of Jane Austen

By Jane Austen

Douglas Editions

BN ID: 2940000816981

4 stars

Review – Unfamiliar Fishes

/ justbookreading / 4 Comments

In September 2011, I went to hear Sarah Vowell speak at the National Book Festival in Washington, DC. I stood in the back and laughed as she read her snarky take on the history of Hawaii. I bought the book that night at one of my two favorite bookstores. Yes, I have two favorites.

In the 1800s, missionaries began arriving in Hawaii with plans to educate the good people of the islands on what it meant to be a good Christian. Upon arrival, they take on the task of reforming a society with some strange customs (royal incest was normal and encouraged) and impose on them some strange new customs of their own, forgetting the entire time they were no longer in New England but Hawaii.

History can be, and is, strange. I’m always fascinated when I come across something so out of the ordinary, especially when it concerns something I feel I should know more about.  Hawaii is a state I don’t know much about. I’ve never been there, not for lack of trying to convince my husband, but a place I do hope to one day visit and not for the beaches alone although that would be cool too. What I want to now see is the original Hawaii. What it was before America decided it needed to have it. And no, I’m in no way trying to start any kind of argument about statehood here. This book made me think about the complications that statehood certainly entailed, but also about what we all lose as days go by and we see things though a camera or screen without actually seeing what’s there.

This isn’t my first Vowell book (The Wordy Shipmates was) and it won’t be my last. I enjoy the witty way she looks at a slice of history and imposes her own past on it which might annoy some people but I think it’s absolutely necessary to do that because not only are we trying to understand others but ourselves through that process of learning. I’m looking forward to reading Assassination Vacation which she takes a look at places made famous by, yes, assignations.

Unfamiliar Fishes

By Sarah Vowell

Riverhead Books

ISBN: 9781594487873

4 stars

Review – Frankenstein, or The Modern Prometheus

/ justbookreading / 4 Comments

There are books that make me feel very sad; Frankenstein is one of those books. It was a strangely profound sadness that for whatever reason, made me wish the book wouldn’t end because I wanted to find a morsel of light in this dark, lonely tale. It was not to happen.

Having been encouraged early on by loving, generous parents, Victor Frankenstein grows up in a happy household in Geneva surrounded by the comforts of home and family. While as a child he was mildly obsessed with old scientific theories, his father encourages him to broaden his thoughts. Right before he is to leave for school in Germany, the first of his life’s tragedies happen — his mother, a beloved figure to him, passes away after nursing his much loved adopted sister, Elizabeth, back to health. He leaves for Germany with a heavy heart. While there, he throws himself into the sciences, exceeds all his expectation with his interest in chemistry and like sciences. It’s this interest though that causes his second tragedy — the creation of a monster with parts culled from places unmentioned. When the monster escapes, his fears all become real and death follows wherever he goes. He falls into a deep depression knowing that whatever he has to do to stop the monster of his creation, he will never be happy and there will never be any solace.

This is not my first time reading this book but parts felt completely new to me. I love when this happens to me while re-reading. It’s like discovering something that you want to share with everyone. That said, Frankenstein is not an easy read. The words flow easily enough but it’s the emotional toll that got me this time. I really, truly, felt so sad while reading that at one point I burst out crying for no reason. To be affected like this by a book I’ve experienced before surprised me.

There is so much to this book but for the sake of those that don’t like spoilers, I won’t mention all that happens. There are moments when reading though that you wonder how much one person can take and if it’s fair for Frankenstein to heap all the blame on himself. While, yes, he created a monster that has crossed the line and taken life, and has held over him another life if he didn’t comply with his wishes, sometimes things in life are not meant to be. The monster is a physical manifestation for everything that has gone wrong for him. The loneliness that comes with the realization for Frankenstein made me want to put the book down. I couldn’t though because I was waiting for some kind of resolution. When it happens, it’s not satisfying at all. There is remorse, for Frankenstein, and in some way for the monster as well, but it didn’t make me feel any better. It only brings on more grief.

Now that I’ve sufficiently depressed you, let’s talk about something else. The monster has no name; he is simply the monster. Frankenstein is the scientist. Why did I need a reminder of that? Huh, the things we forget. I didn’t remember much from the first reading of this (it may well have been shortly after high school) and my memory faded. I was happy to renew it though. Of course, now each time I see a movie based on the book I’m going to be looking for mistakes.

I read this book for the Gender in SFF challenge. Glad I finally found an excuse to pick this one up again. If you like horror, fantasy, and science fiction, read this one. If you shy away from this one because you think I might be gruesome, it’s not. It’s worth a read.

Frankenstein, or The Modern Prometheus

By Mary Shelley

Signet Classic

ISBN: 0451527712

4.5 stars