Book 5: Slaughterhouse 5

I’m not really sure what I was expecting when it came to this book. I had no idea what the story was about, other than possibly time travel, but whatever it was, it wasn’t what I got.

The basic gist is: Billy Pilgrim is an American soldier captured by the Germans during World War II and taken to a prison in Dresden. But he is not just in the prison, as he has become unstuck in time and so wanders about his timeline, both on Earth and on the planet Tralfamadore where he has been put on display with a human female for the entertainment of the Tralfamadorians. They have no concept of time as a linear thing, they see everything that has happened and will happen, they cannot change it, and so choose to dwell on the good things, rather than the bad. We also see a little of Billy’s life after the war, his marriage and children, his career and his death.

I haven’t really got much to say about the book to be honest. I didn’t enjoy it and I didn’t hate it. It’s pretty short but it took me a fair while to get through it, mainly because I had no inclination to pick it up and continue. I didn’t care about Billy, I wasn’t all that interested in what was happening, there’s no real urgency to the story because you mostly know what’s going to happen anyway. It’s an easy read in regards to the writing style, though somewhat annoying with the repetition of ‘So it goes’. Wiki tells me it appears one hundred and sixteen times. That’s about one hundred and fifteen times too many.

I think I’ll give up on the so-called ‘classics’ for a while, they’re all so damn heavy-handed and don’t speak to me at all.

Book 4: The Time Traveler’s Wife

“It’s hard being left behind…It’s hard to be the one who stays.”

There’s probably not a lot to say about Audrey Niffenegger’s debut that hasn’t already been said a million times all over the internet. It’s one of those books that, if I find out you haven’t read it, I think ‘Where the hell have you been?’ And even if you haven’t, you’ll know of it, you’ll have some idea of the story, because for a while it was everywhere. When I first read it I assumed everyone would feel the same way I did, that they would end the book with a lump in their throat and tears running down their face. They would love it, because what’s not to love?

Just in case anyone has been under a rock for an age, here’s the basic gist. Henry has chrono-displacement, a rare genetic disorder which means his genetic clock resets itself and he moves throughout time, usually at times when he is stressed or anxious. He has no control about when or where he ends up, but certain events have a pull for him, and so he end up there more than others. At age 28 he meets Clare for the first time. But Clare has known him since she was 6. He has been a part of her life since childhood, but he has no memory of her as it hasn’t happened for him yet. And so their love affair begins, told from both their perspectives but staying mainly in Clare’s timeline.

It is a beautiful love story, and Niffenegger has found an interesting way of keeping her lovers apart, to give them something to fight for, and against. Here it’s not really each other, their love is strong, it’s just time really isn’t on their side. I love that we get to see the story from both of them, hear both their voices in our heads. It really gives you a better understanding of their lives, and their love.

When Henry is gone, it can be for minutes or hours, or even days, and Clare is left behind to wait, not knowing if he will return in one piece. On this reading, the waiting is one thing I had problems with. I love Henry and Clare, I would give anything for a happy ending, but of course there can’t be one, not really. In a letter Henry writes, he asks her to live her life to the full, to stop waiting for him. In the next sentence, he tells her she will see him again, years later. So how can she stop waiting? And we don’t get any idea of her life after Henry. I want to think that she did move on, that she was successful and happy, that Henry had added to her life, not taken away. Because she doesn’t have any choice, even if she says she wouldn’t change it. She can’t change it. It has happened and so it will happen, in a loop, forever. Her whole life has been mapped out for her from being 6 years old, how could she even see anything else?

I guess heartbreak makes for the best love stories though, doesn’t it? I still adore it. I still think it’s an amazing book, beautifully written, to the point it seems effortless. It could easily have dissolved into a book that hurt your brain, where you spent more time trying to figure out who is what age and where, and how it all fits together, but instead you go with the flow, it’s all right there. It still stays with me after I’ve finished. And even though I don’t think I love it quite as unconditionally as I did on that first read, it’s still one I’m going to revisit again and again. It doesn’t matter if I know what’s coming, knowing the end isn’t the important part, it’s the getting there that counts.

Book 3: To Your Scattered Bodies Go

Since there’s some sort of mini-series or programme coming out based on the Riverworld novels by Philip Jose Farmer, and I had never heard of them, I thought I’d give them a go. I was amused when the book I got from the library had come out of storage somewhere and had been checked out from 1979, two years before I was born. And those are just the dates I could see. I suppose it did come out in 1971.

The first book introduces us to a world where everyone who has ever lived awakens on the banks of a seemingly neverending river. They are naked and hairless, some wondering if this is a version of heaven or hell.  Richard Francis Burton (not to be confused with the other Richard Burton who, frankly, might have been more interesting, since I had in fact heard of him) wakes up before the others, and before they arrive on the riverbank, suspended in air and able to see bodies around him. He later suspects there is something more to his afterlife, and that they are being used. Initially he forms a group with others who woke up nearby. Some are based on real-life people – one is Alice Liddell, the inspiration for Alice in Wonderland – and throughout the book Burton encounters many people we are familiar with from history. They establish how to get food and build shelter, alliances are formed and couples pair off, but some are more curious about why they are here. Burton decides to travel the river to find its end, and seek answers. Unfotunately the journey is perilous as it seems most of those who have been reborn want to do nothing more than enslave others and have power. It is established that if you die within the Riverworld you are again reborn, but not in the same place. Burton uses this knowledge to speed up his search for the river’s end.

I have to say, I didn’t like Burton all that much. I am assuming I am not meant to seeing as he’s from the 19th century and has very different ideas on things than I do, but he is fairly annoying as characters go. The rest of the characters aren’t given much to do, other than converse with him and fill in some blanks. There’s not a lot of characterisation going on and women especially are sidelined as sex objects for the most part, in need of protection. I’ll take it is a sign of the times in which this was written. It’s not all that well written really, although it has an interesting concept. There’s a lot of action but not much time to get to know anyone, so it’s hard to care. There are far too many fights scenes that go on and on, and I just wasn’t interested. Things that could have done with more description are jumped over with a ‘one year later’ leap. I think Farmer must have had an end in sight and was just giddy to get to it.

I was also a bit bored by its insistance on giving great emphasis to the maths of just how many people there must be per square mile, how long the river must be and how long it will take him to reach the end if you divide it by this and times it by that and blah blah I just don’t care about numbers. I get it, the river is big. There are a lot of people. Let me inside their heads, make me ask questions, make this whole thing have some sort of point.

It’s a harsh world, one I would in no way want to live in, eternal life or no. What would be the point, I mean, there’s no TV… Eternity as a concept kind of freaks me out in general. What would you do for all that time? Here they don’t have to do anything, or seem to want to do anything, except stay alive. Everyone is fighting to survive in a world where you can’t die. There’s war and slavery and seemingly not a whole lot of good people about. Are we really such a mess? It would be nice to be able to root for someone, have any kind of hero, flawed or no, but there’s no real depth to anyone, or to the story itself really.

Having said that, I did kind of enjoy it. It’s a really easy read and I am intrigued enough by the larger story to see where it’s going. I’ll definitely read the second volume, and Mark Twain turns up (that’s another thing, could we have some people who aren’t at all famous? I’m sure it’s fun to have the whole of history at your disposal and create new lives for these well known people, but in the grand scheme of things surely there are more unknowns? Also, enough with the Nazis.)

Book 2: Evermore

This was a desperation read, picked up as I was about to get on a train and I’d finished my other book. Yeah, I’m sure you believe me.

The story takes place in Laguna Beach, California, where people have names like Ever Bloom, Damen Auguste and Haven. All I know about Laguna Beach is from, well, watching Laguna Beach, so maybe they do all have crazy names. Also, if this book is anything to go by, they drink a shit tonne of VitaminWater. Alyson Noel should be sponsored by them for the amount of time it’s mentioned.

Ever Bloom is the sole survivor of a car accident that kills her whole family. She goes to live with her mostly absent aunt who showers her with cash rather than time, but that can’t buy Ever happiness, or cred at her new school. Yep, Ever has gone from being a superficial blonde cheerleader with stacks of friends, to a ‘freak’. Since the accident she has become psychic, able to see auras and talk to dead people. Or one dead person rather, her little sister Riley. Ever spends her life in hoodies with her ipod earphones in, trying to drown out the world. She does have two friends though, of course also freaks, and all is so-so until Damen shows up and she has a niggling feeling they’ve met before. Haven calls dibs on the new hottie and gets pissed when he obviously only has eyes for Ever. So Haven joins a new crowd of wannabe vampires, putting her life in danger…what in the hell have I been reading here?

I’m probably going to unfairly compare this to Twilight, seeing as they’re both teen books that deal with folks who live forever. Here though it’s Ever who has psychic abilities that are switched off only in the presence of Damen (think Sookie Stackhouse’s fondness for hanging around vampires). I’d say Evermore is more tightly written, (less vomit-inducing descriptions of her lover’s marble-like abs) and the author has a better grasp of English so it’s a less painful read (for the most part, although someone should explain to her the difference between envelops and envelopes), but Twilight definitely has a more interesting story, and (remarkably) characters. Ever is boring. Damen is boring. The ‘chemistry’ between them is non-existent. There’s a lot of lazy writing techniques, and I was amused by her use of name-dropping to establish Damen’s immortality. You can tell he’s been around a while since he has Shakespeare’s autograph and has been painted by Picasso. Way to keep a low profile. And the story plods along until the end where there’s so much exposition I needed Giles to show up and sing his song. (Yeah, Buffy reference.) Much of it doesn’t make much sense or is explained thoroughly, but seeing as this is the first of six I guess she’ll get back to the important questions later.

I can imagine much of its intended audience will love it and have a new ‘meant to be’ couple to adore and obsess over, but I don’t think I’ll be rushing out to get the next book.

And now I need to go throw myself under a bus for being nice about Twilight.

Book 1: American Wife

All I did is marry him. You are the ones who gave him power.

Curtis Sittenfeld’s latest novel is a fictional account of a first lady, closely mirroring the life of Laura Bush. I possibly wouldn’t have picked this up had I realised, not being the greatest fan of old George, but it is an interesting read, following Alice Lindgren from childhood through to her life in the White House.

I don’t know much about Laura Bush, it must be said. I’m assuming that though she has been taken as Sittenfeld’s model, the majority of it is fictional. Of course, as Sittenfeld herself has said, she can’t know what conversations the couple have had throughout the years. Certain things are fact though, and are used as the basis of Alice’s life; that during her teens Laura Bush was responsible for the death of a classmate; that her husband had a problem with drugs and alcohol, and then found God; that he went on to be one of the most reviled presidents there has been.

It is the death of her classmate, and here her crush, that is the focus of the beginning of the book, and seen as the defining moment of her life. It leads to a relationship with the dead boy’s brother, an unwanted pregnancy and an abortion. Later, as a librarian, Alice meets Charlie Blackwell, the feckless son of good stock, meandering around his life and in search of his destiny. There are issues from the beginning, Charlie is a Republican, Alice a Democrat. His family appears disapproving of Alice, especially the mother, and they have very different personalities. But the attraction between the two is clear, and though Alice often has misgivings about his character and behaviour, she stays silent.

It is this silence that is the crux of the novel. How responsible is she for her husband’s behaviour, and his later presidency, as a wife, and a first lady? How much influence can she be expected to have? How much should she try to have, when she was not elected, and when they have such differing views?

Alice is very sympathetic, she’s intelligent and kind and you do wonder sometimes how she ended up with Charlie. Although it is a testament to Sittenfeld’s writing and character development that it never seems unbelievable. That Alice loves her husband dearly is never in doubt. But I am not sure I like her all that much. She goes through a lot, and does so with grace, but I wished quite often while reading that she would grow a spine, that she would speak up, stand up to her husband, put forward her views, tell him off, give him some guidance, anything, instead of staying quiet. She says more than once that she doesn’t have to explain herself to the media, or to the general public, that they don’t own her and knowing the truth herself is enough. And then she goes on to explain, and explain, why she has done the things she has. I lost some respect for her at this point.

For such a large book it is a very quick and easy read, and generally enjoyable and engaging. It does feel rather light and fluffy in parts of its portrayal, before becoming a little over long and tedious in others, and although I wouldn’t say Sittenfeld is an amazing writer, she does a decent enough job to make it worthwhile. It’s not a work that will sit with you afterwards, nor will it really give you any great insight into the Bush’s marriage or his presidency, but it might make you ask questions and look elsewhere for the answers.

The Best and the Rest

So here’s a run down of the 10 books I liked the most out of my 60, and a few others I thought weren’t that great. They’re not in any particular order, and I cheat a little by including series not just individual books.

Ones I recommend

Last Night in Twisted River – John Irving

The Southern Vampire Mysteries – Charlaine Harris

The Girl in Times Square – Paullina Simons

The Handmaid’s Tale – Margaret Atwood

The Suspicions of Mr Whicher - Kate Summerscale

Cage of Stars – Jacquelyn Mitchard

Mudbound – Hillary Jordan

The Harper Connelly Mysteries – Charlaine Harris

Garden Spells – Sarah Addison Allen

Eleanor Rigby – Douglas Coupland

 

Ones I’d avoid

Her Fearful Symmetry – Audrey Niffenegger

The Secret Scripture – Sebastian Barry

The Thirteenth Tale – Diane Setterfield

The Other Hand – Chris Cleave

Blackberry Wine – Joanne Harris

Change of Heart – Jodi Picoult

Never Stop Looking – Sarah Jackman

 

Cannonball Read II

The first Cannonball Read has come to an end. And I have failed. That’s the challenge to read 100 books in a year for those who don’t know. I have made it to 60, and though technically I have until the end of December, a) I’m so not going to make it and b) I want to take part in Cannonball Read II. So I am calling it. I will do better next year. The goal with this one is 52 books, which I think I’ll have no problem with. I’m still going to aim for 100 though.

If anyone is interested, the list of books is here, starting with the latest. I kind of like having a list of what I’ve read, even if the review part of it did become a bit of a pain in the arse (and led to me being called stupid more than once. I stand by my opinion of Catch-22. So there). I shall continue on. I may do a top/bottom ten list at some point.

Book 60: Last Night in Twisted River

Ah John Irving. At one point if you’d asked me my favourite author, I would have said John Irving with no hesitation. There was a time during my early twenties when I just thought he was the best thing ever. I read his books and was moved and amazed and depressed all at the same time. I would never write like this man. But I thought I’d grown out of it, after reading his last book, Until I Find You, and finding it lacking. I thought maybe I was done.

It seems not, since Last Night in Twisted River reminded me of all the things I loved. Sure, there’s a lot of the Irving staples — bears, sudden death, wrestling, writers, a father’s fears and its own version of the Under Toad — but that’s part of its charm. It’s familiar and new at the same time, and filled with characters you fall in love with, all so delightfully described. The book begins with a death, in a remote logging town in 1950s New Hampshire. We are introduced to Dominic and his son, Daniel. Dominic works as cook and is raising Daniel alone after the death of his wife in a freak accident ten years before. His best friend is Ketchum, a curmudgeonly logger who tells it like it is, and sports various scars, most from his dangerous work, but some from other encounters. It is the early part of the book, with its descriptions of Twisted River and their lives there, that is easily the best, but after Danny accidentally kills the girlfriend of the local policeman, he and his father flee, leaving Ketchum behind.

The rest of the novel is split into sections, each covering a certain time period. After leaving Twisted River they go to Boston, with stints in Iowa and Toronto. Each time they make a life for themselves, but worry about the ‘cowboy’ catching up with them. The story soon focuses on Danny and his struggles as a writer and young father, spanning over fifty years of his life.

I thoroughly enjoyed the book. It’s easy to get lost in its pages and the story being told. I love Irving’s writing style, even if he is a little too fond of repetition (why write one sentence when you can write seven?) and semicolons (man, does the dude love semicolons). At times things seem a bit hammered home, but I’ll take it for the overall feel of his words. The man writes beautfiul descriptions. One problem I had was the motivation behind their flight. I never totally bought the cowboy’s desire to find them and do them harm, it just seemed like a convenient way to keep them moving. Plus, he’s not particularly fearsome, so any tension that should be there when they’re about to be discovered is lost.

It also loses its way a bit towards the end. The focus becomes Danny’s writing, the how and the why of it, and its very autobiographical for Irving. Danny’s style is Irving’s style, his career is Irving’s career. Sure it’s fun if you know this stuff about him, but it becomes a sort of display of metafiction. Who is writing the book, is it Danny or John? Are they one and the same? It doesn’t really add anything to the story, other than a few dozen pages.

If anything, the reason to read this book is Ketchum. He is by no means the main character, but every time he came back I was happy to see him. He adores Danny and sees himself as his protector. He’s a large, gruff man who cannot be felled by anyone other than himself: ‘Only Ketchum could kill Ketchum’, and yet he still has a vulnerability to him. It is his story that moved me, the only one I felt choked up over.

Looking at it now, I feel there’s a lot I could pick apart, but while I was in it, it was almost perfect.

Book 59: Her Fearful Symmetry

I was one of those people who loved, nay, adored The Time Traveler’s Wife. I was absorbed by it, moved by it, and left thinking about it for days after I finished. I couldn’t put it away. So I’ve been waiting rather impatiently for Audrey Niffenegger’s new book. Anyone who could write so beautifully would surely have a great followup.

Hmm.

American twins Julia and Valentina Poole are left a flat in London in their aunt Elspeth’s will. They have never met their aunt, as she and their mother (also identical twins) have been estranged since before Julia and Valentina were born. The girls have a very close, almost suffocating relationship, at least for one of them, and have dropped out of several schools. Having nothing to do, they move to London, as the terms of the will state they must live there for a year before selling. Along with the flat, they inherit Elspeth’s neighbours: Robert, Elspeth’s lover, and Martin, who suffers from OCD so badly he can hardly leave the house. And they have inherited Elspeth who, as a ghost, lingers in her flat watching the girls and missing Robert. Through some plot contrivances, the girls become aware of Elspeth’s presence, leading to a rather ridiculous set of events. Sorry, I was trying to give a rundown of the plot without my opinions, but I failed miserably.

Her Fearful Symmetry is disappointing on so many levels. It’s about so many things that it becomes about nothing at all. The characters seem to have been stuck in the same story without belonging to it, and they are so badly developed it is difficult, if not impossible, to care about them. And so you have several people wandering through a novel, not holding your attention, and a plot that meanders trying to find a point. I found it maddening, and sad, that someone I felt to be such a good writer would come out with something like this.

The story itself is filled with elements we have seen many times before – identical twins, cemeteries, ghosts, mistaken identities – and not used here to any original effect. It’s not haunting, or sad, it doesn’t make you think, and it’s often frustrating. I find it amazing that she could so easily make me believe in a man going back and forth in time, yet make it so difficult for me to accept the reality of a ghost. It’s not so much that there is a ghost, it’s what she, and those around her, do. They behave in ways I couldn’t get behind. No one with any ounce of intelligence would act this way, and so it cheapens everything that goes on.

Story aside, the writing itself is also not as good as I expected it to be. I think she had trouble going from the first person of The Time Traveler’s Wife to the third person here. We don’t really get inside any of the characters’ heads, and the intermittent italicised lines that show their actual thoughts add nothing to the narrative, instead bogging it down. The language is also very clunky. Having just started reading John Irving’s latest, I can tell you that that’s how the third person should be written. It should be effortless. It shouldn’t cause you to trip up at the end of every sentence because it ends so abruptly.

The book has a very slow start, and if you removed the first hundred or so pages you really wouldn’t miss all that much. It is only when we finally get to Julia and Valentina’s arrival that it really gets going, and by that time I’d almost lost the will to continue. If this had been any other author I am not sure I would have. I wasn’t overly interested in the lives of these people, with the possible exception of Martin, who seems like he belongs elsewhere, they were all a mystery to me. I didn’t understand their motivations or their actions, and I couldn’t help but find most of what they did to be immensely stupid. And then there’s Highgate Cemetery, another character in its own right. While I am sure she has outdone herself with her research, does it all need to be in the book? If she had wanted to write a guidebook, she should have written one. And the same goes for her descriptions of London in general. Lots of it is spot on, to the point where it becomes boring (perhaps because I live here and know all this), but there are also things she gets wrong, and that really rubbed me the wrong way.

The problem with the book is all the things it is not. It is not a book I will read again. It is not a book I will treasure. It’s not a book filled with real characters, ones I was sad to leave behind. I think it’s fine to say you can’t expect it to be annother Time Traveler’s Wife. That’s true. But I don’t think it’s wrong to expect another strong work from an author with so much obvious talent, or to expect it to be original, well written, moving, a page turner. And overall, this isn’t.

Book 58: The Handmaid’s Tale

This was the first book by Margaret Atwood I ever read. It was assigned reading during my degree, back when reading had become a complete chore and if I had to even look at another book I was going to hurl. And then I started reading, and I was hooked. I didn’t want to put it down, I was totally absorbed in this nightmare world, this twisted version of a not too distant future. I’ve read it a few times since then, and although I think each re-read has lessened the impact some, it’s still an amazing book, and one I always want people to read.

Set in the Republic of Gilead, a totalitarian regime runs things through their skewed idea of religion. The government of the United States has been overthrown, and in its place is a military dictatorship, whose purpose includes trying to overcome the high infertility rates brought about by war and radiation poisoning. There’s no more Constitution, there’s no more Congress, there’s just their word, their law, and if you don’t follow it you are shipped to the Colonies to face a slow, lingering death, or strung up on the Wall as an example.

Higher up personnel, all male of course, are given Handmaids. These women have one purpose: get pregnant, or die. They have three chances, and then they’re out. One of these women is Offred (all Handmaids are of-someone, losing their names and identities from post to post), and it is through her eyes we see Gilead, and what came before it.

From the very beginning you are in Offred’s world, you feel her fear, her lack of hope. You worry whether she should trust someone, as the wrong word to anyone could mean death. I remember feeling so outraged the first time I read this, and terrified for Offred. The idea that freedom could be taken away so easily, and without a fight, it’s one of my worst nightmares. One of the first ways they limit a woman’s power is to take away their money, putting it in the hands of their husbands or male relatives. One of my biggest fears is of having no access to cash, of being dependent on other people. It’s easy to lose yourself that way, and it’s one of the reasons there’s so little resistance.

But even in a society with so many hard rules, Offred, and the reader, slowly learn that the system is being twisted for the gains of the few, just as it always has been. Luxury items can be bought on the black market, sex is still bought and sold. These people may claim to be morally superior, to be doing their best for society, and keeping women safe from men’s eyes, from their touch, but it’s all just a lie to justify the power they have.

Part of what is so hard hitting about The Handmaid’s Tale is the section that comes after the main book, the Historical Notes. It’s such a mundane, dry account of Offred’s story. They’re not looking at her struggle with any compassion or feeling, it is so far removed from them it’s just events, not people, a lecture to be read in between announcements about fishing trips and nature walks. But we do this everyday, don’t we? That’s what history is. We can only hope we learn something from it.

This book creeps under my skin and sits there for days afterwards. What people will do with a little bit of power is frightening. But more frightening is that it feels so real. I could see this, or something similar, happening. Hell, similar things happen to women throughout the world everyday. I know how lucky I am to have my own bank account, my own name, my own identity, and the thought of losing it is what makes this book so scary.

In the end, we’re given no real resolution for Offred. We know she left a record of her time in Gilead, but whether she found true freedom and happiness, well that’s up to us to decide. Do we see this story as hopeful, that you can put back together a life that was torn apart? Or is it merely a terrifying vision of our future, one without a happy ending, a tale reduced to the footnotes of history? Me, I swing between the two, but right now, I’m going with hope.