Category: General Fiction/Literature Page 42 of 49

by Magnus Macintyre

Paperback, 301 pg.
Marble Arch Press, 2015
Read: October 13 – 14, 2015

This is the story of a self-centered, shallow, city-dwelling fat man who takes an opportunity to reinvent himself and travels to a small town in Scotland to be the voice of a proposed wind farm. Which, of course, he knows nothing about. So, our fat man, Claypole, spends the next week bouncing around from here to there in this community, finding himself in one embarrassing/catastrophic situation after another. I think this is where we’re supposed to find humor — it never struck me as funny. These all just seemed like a guy acting without thought and finding himself being taken care of like some sort of bumbling Candide.

As anyone who’s read this setup knows, once this particular Englishman went up this proverbial hill, he developed an understanding of this community, learned some important life lessons, and whatnot before he came down the proverbial mountain.

I couldn’t tell, really, how sincere we’re to take the “green” portions of this story — there are a couple of true believers, and a cartoonish doubter or two — but the rest, their interest in/commitment to the cause seems pretty shallow. Now, that’s the characters, not the author, I grant you. But when the central plot revolves around the establishment of an environmentally friendly source of power, I expect a bit more than that.

Those people that do actually end up liking Claypole — I don’t get it. Particularly those who take a seemingly instant liking to him. He’s such an offensive buffoon that it’s hard to understand. I guess I can understand those who grow to like him when they see the man behind the awkwardness.

The people of this small town are sketchy, outside of one family, they’re fairly generic stock characters. And that family? I can’t buy them either, a little more fleshing out and I probably could’ve believed them. But pretty much, they’re just a collection of characteristics, tics, and odd wardrobes.

Whirligig has very sweet ending, and it was not exactly the one a reader would expect, but pleasant, and – like “crap telly” (Claypole’s words) had taught him, one that tied everything up nicely.

Not funny enough, not “green” enough, and I couldn’t connect the way I wanted to with anyone. Near miss after near miss after near miss takes me to a 2 1/2 Star rating.

—–

2 1/2 Stars

How to Write a Novel by Melanie Sumner

By HCNewton

On October 7, 2015

In Fiction, General Fiction/Literature

How to Write a Novel

by Melanie Sumner
Paperback, 287 pg.
Vintage, 2015
Read: September 28, 2015

Aristotle — but you can call her Aris — Thibodeau is a 12 1/2 year-old would-be novelist. Under the guidance of her English teacher, school librarian and English-professor mother, she’s trying to write a novel in the next 30 days. Once it’s sold, she figures she’ll be able to make enough money so her mom can quit her job, still take care of her brother with his counseling/medication and find a husband. Aris does have a candidate in mind for her step-dad, but is open to someone else. We get to see precious little of her writing, but we do get to follow her on her journey through the novel writing process, and the family turmoil and drama surrounding it. Actually, as I write that, I have a hard time believing everything that happened outside of her novel took less than 30 days.

There’s a strong self-awareness to the narration — from Aris stopping the action to describe something she’s lacking in her novel, and then providing it in the narration to the sections of the book being labeled “Rising Action,” “Denouement,” etc. Typically, it works, but there were a couple of instances where it seemed forced or overdone.

There are two really strong points to this novel. Sumner can write a sentence that just sings I grabbed three examples from the opening pages — we get voice, humor, and a crystal-clear idea of the character she’s describing (and the one doing the describing):

Diane is forty-three now, short and either curvy or chubby, depending on her mood, with a button nose and blondish bangs that are always falling in her face.

Then he grinned. Papa was old before braces came out, so his teeth are slightly crooked, just enough to make him look like he can tell a good joke.

. . . ladies in the South don’t shake hands. Instead, they fold their cool fingers over yours and press ever so gently, leaning in close until you smell breath mints and the eau de toilette behind each ear. Then they say something awful. A few days after Joe [Aris’ father] died, Grandma and knelt beside Diane’s [Aris’ mother] bed and folded her fingers over her hand. After looking into her eyes for a moment, she whispered, “Why didn’t he ever have a better job?”

Don’t ya just luuuuv Grandma?

The other strong point (maybe half of a point) is her characters — Aris, Diane, her brother Max — are great. Diane’s student, Charles and his mother are pretty well-drawn. The librarian Ms. Chu wasn’t that fleshed out, but she didn’t need to be, and she was well drawn enough that you want to see more. These are real people, you could build a book around any of them alone. But the rest — and I’m only talking about characters that should be well-drawn — just aren’t. Aris’ grandparents don’t become much more than they were described above. The worst is Aris’s choice for her future step-dad, their current volunteer nanny: Penn MacGuffin^*. He’s an accumulation of ticks, quirks, and clichés, but there’s not a person in the middle of that.

The more I think about it, the less I’m sure I like How to Write a Novel as a novel, however frequently clever it is. There are some great scenes, dazzling sentences, charming characters here; it was a pleasure to read. But I’m just not sure there’s much there beyond that.

—
^* I’m not going to mention how long it took me to realize what his name meant — let’s just say it was before this moment, and I felt really, really stupid

—–

3 Stars

Reread Project: The Van by Roddy Doyle

By HCNewton

On September 2, 2015

In Authors, Blog Series, Fiction, General Fiction/Literature, Reread Project, Roddy Doyle

The Van

by Roddy Doyle
Series: The Barrytown Trilogy, #3

Trade Paperback, 311 pg.
Minerva, 1991
Read: August 25 – , 2015
Jimmy Rabbitte, Sr. started off as a supporting character in The Commitments, moved up to co-star in The Snapper, and finally moves to the forefront in The Van, which is more about him than the other two were about any one person. Which isn’t to say that Jimmy, Jr., Sharon, Veronica, Darren and the twins aren’t here, they’re just in the background — as are most of Jimmy, Sr.’s friends (actually, I think Jr.’s in this far more than he was The Snapper).

Not only is the focus more narrow, the final installment in the trilogy is different in other ways — it’s almost 100 pages longer (depending on the printing) than The Snapper which was about 50 pages longer than The Commitments. Which gives Doyle more space to do things he hadn’t really before. It’s still primarily told through heavily stylized In the first 90 pages, I estimated I’d read more (significantly more) narration than I did in the first two volumes of the trilogy.

It’s not been clear before what Jimmy did for a living, but whatever it was, it was pretty clear the bills were barely paid. They stretched what they had pretty far, but they seemed to manage. Somewhere along the line, pretty sure it was post-Snapper, but I’m not sure, Jimmy lost his job. Unemployment isn’t setting well with him — he can’t support his family, he’s bored, he can’t even go down to the pub to have a few pints with his friends.

Jimmy’s trying to grow — he’s reading the classics. Thinking of taking some classes. But it’s not enough. At some point his friend, Bimbo, also gets laid off. The two spend a lot of time together — having a companion in his unemployment makes the whole thing tolerable for Jimmy — almost like summer vacation from school. Bimbo isn’t quite as accepting of this new reality — he almost applies to work at McDonald’s, but is shamed out of it by Jimmy. Bimbo’s wife is even less satisfied with his job status. Which leads to a reckless move on Bimbo’s part — reckless, yet maybe inspired — he uses some of his last dollars on a Chip Van (minus an engine). In the midst of the U.S.’ current Food Truck craze, this might not seem so risky, but in the early 90s? (then again, what do I know of early 90’s Dublin, other than what I’ve picked up from Doyle’s novels and the movies based on them?)

They’ve just a few weeks until the World Cup games start when they hope they can cash in on the post-game crowds. So Jimmy and Bimbo rush to clean the, learn to cook, design a menu, etc. And now you’ve got yourself a plot — can these two make a go of this? Can they remain friends and co-workers? Will they start a grease fire that destroys the whole of Barrytown?

There was, it seemed to me, a maturing of Jimmy that started back in The Snapper. Not that he wasn’t a good father before, but he kicked it into a higher gear with Sharon during her pregnancy. Here, that seems to manifest itself in a paternal pride — Junior’s having some sort of success out there, is getting married; his other son, Darren, is doing very well in school (better than anyone else in the family, that’s sure). Part of Jimmy’s reaction to it is finding pleasure in someone else’s success for what it means to them. I’m not convinced that the Jimmy of The Commitments or the first part of The Snapper could do that.

That’s not to say that he’s Man of the Year material or anything. There are some real (human) flaws to him. He’s petty, he’s jealous, he’s proud — there’s some sort of mid-life crisis that he’s got a half-hearted interest in involving Other Women. As in all good fiction, these just make him someone you can like, someone you can relate to, someone you can get annoyed with — even pity.

There’s some great, great stuff about sports fans here — national pride around The World Cup, the joy in sports, the very real camaraderie that can exist for a few moments around a shared experience. That’s not my typical milieu, but I’ve tasted it a time or two — and I can’t imagine many capture it better than Doyle did here. Even if I didn’t like the rest of the book, I think that part would’ve been worth it.

In the end, this is Doyle’s best work (to date), not the most enjoyable, but the best. It’s impossible after reading this, to ignore Jimmy, Sr.’s brief appearances in The Commitments, to not pull for him earlier than you should in The Snapper, and really to forget him. Just a great character in a world you really don’t want to leave.

—–

4 Stars

Go Set a Watchman by Harper Lee

By HCNewton

On August 17, 2015

In Fiction, General Fiction/Literature

Go Set a Watchman

by Harper Lee
Hardcover, 278 pg.

HarperCollins, 2015

Read: August 14 – 15, 2015

Maycomb did not have a paved street until 1935, courtesy of F. D. Roosevelt, and even then it was not exactly a street that was paved. For some reason the President decided that a clearing from the front door of the Maycomb Grammar School to the connecting two ruts adjoining the school property was in need of improvement, it was improved accordingly, resulting in skinned knees and cracked crania for the children and a proclamation from the principal that nobody was to play Pop-the-Whip on the pavement. Thus the seeds of states’ rights were sown in the hearts of Jean Louise’s generation.

I don’t know what to think. I just do not. It’s that simple. I probably shouldn’t even be blogging about this one, but I feel compelled to.^*

There are so many things that’d help me know what to think about this; for example: 1. if there wasn’t the cloud of controversy over the publication — did Lee really want it published? Is she of sound enough mind to make that choice now? and so on. 2. If there’d been a third book of hers published, it’d be easier to know which is the aberration — Mockingbird or Watchman (because there is a clear qualitative distinction) — it’d be easier to cut her some slack if we knew this wasn’t her typical work.

Am I glad I read this? I think so. There are phrases, sentences, paragraphs, vignettes, scenes, that I relished. I do think I like the story of Jean Louise here. I think I appreciate Atticus as father, not necessarily Atticus as a man making certain choices. I’m pretty sure I like Jean Louise’s Uncle Jack.

But there’s bits about this novel that just confound me. Some of the speechifying seems so out of place (and I won’t get into what I think of the points of them). A lot of the speechifying makes it seem like an unfinished draft — where Lee could’ve come back, fleshed it out, edited it and made the same points through dialogue, not monologues.

Maybe in time, after weeks/months of thought, a few re-reads, some distance, I’ll have an opinion about the book that I can stand behind. Right now, best I can manage is a shrug.

—–

^* And because I’m really close to having blogged about every novel this year, haven’t missed one since February — and I don’t want to break my streak.

—–

? ? ? ? ?

The Most Useless Page Ever?

By HCNewton

On August 15, 2015

In Currently Reading, Fiction, General Fiction/Literature

Is there anyone holding this book in their hands that needs to be given this information? Why waste the ink?
Also by Harper Lee
“Oh, To Kill a Mockingbird, huh? Never heard of it. Wonder if it’s any good.”

Obviously, there are people who haven’t heard of the Mockingbird — but none of them are going to be tempted to pick up Go Set a Watchman.

Now, the question is, once the initial furor/money-grab over this new book has died down, are there going to be future printings of Mockingbird printed with an “Also by Harper Lee” page? And if so, will the font size be legible?

At this point, I’ve got a little less than a hundred pages to go in the book, and I have no idea what I think of it. Individual sentences or paragraphs? I have very strong opinions about some of them.

But the novel?

I just don’t know.

Long Black Curl by Alex Bledsoe

By HCNewton

On August 7, 2015

In Alex Bledsoe, Authors, Fantasy, Fiction, General Fiction/Literature, Tufa

Long Black Curl

by Alex Bledsoe
Series: Tufa, #3

Hardcover, 377 pg.

Tor Books, 2015

Read: June 11 – 13, 2015

5 Stars
This book was practically un-put-downable. Not because I was driven to find out what happens next — like a Finder, or Child etc. This is one of those kind of books you don’t want to put down because you don’t want to leave that world, not for a minute, to step back into this one, as nice as it is — filled with your stuff, and your great wife and frequently tolerable children. But this book’s little corner of Appalachia that touches another world (in more ways than one) is a place you just want to exist in. Granted, I’d rather be in one of the earlier books than this one (not a reflection of the quality of the book, just the events portrayed).

Not all that long ago, especially by Tufa standards, Bo-Kate Wisby and her beau, Jefferson Powell wreaked all sorts of havoc. They were so terrible that they were banished from the community, unable to return — or, worst of all, make music. WHen you think of some of the despicable things that have happened or have been described in the previous two novels by citizens in good standing, you get an idea just how bad this was. Both have spent decades yearning to return, to play music — but have had to settle for incredibly successful careers in the music business. Which would be a special kind of torture and pleasure — being that close but not able to partake, still being able to appreciate it though. Somehow, however, this curse was lifted without anyone realizing it.

Well, anyone but Bo-Kate. She returns to get revenge and bow the Tufa to her will, destroying their heritage, their way of life and instituting her own. Her approach is not subtle, she clearly learned a little bit from the “Shock and Awe” tactics of a recent war. My jaw almost dropped when i saw the first step that was taken by Bo-Kate. I — like most of the Tufa — didn’t think that was possible, or at least likely. Although there was something to appreciate about that action, there wasn’t in the rest of what she did to the community — I can’t think of any fictional character I’ve had such a visceral reaction to (especially this quickly) this side of Joffrey ~~Lannister~~ Baratheon, first of his name.

It should go without saying with this world, the way the rest of the Tufa respond and defend themselves isn’t how you’d expect. Which goes double for how things play out.

Thankfully, I did really enjoy the rest of the Wisbys — especially Bo-Kate’s sister. I hope to spend more time with them. Actually, I liked getting to know all the new characters — including Bo-Kate’s allies (or those characters who weren’t new, but we hadn’t really spent time with). The characters in this community are so well drawn, so real that you almost don’t need a plot to enjoy a book about them.

As always, I’m jealous of the relationship between these people and music. I don’t have it — a couple of my kids do, at least. I think the way the two banished Tufa react to their returning musical ability tells you almost everything you need to know about them. These are books that need to come with their own score, their own soundtrack. Sadly, I don’t think humans are capable of putting out anything worthy of the books. As good as some of the music inspired by this series has been, it’s not good enough to live up to Tufa standards.

Two things that detracted from the book for me. First is the sex. Not that Bledsoe’s a model of Victorian attitudes toward sex before this, but Long Black Curl is pretty sexually explicit — moreso and more often than before (I’m reasonably sure, but am not interested enough to go back and check). I don’t think it was necessary, but don’t think it hurt things. It was just one of those things that seemed to stick out to me.

Secondly, this is absolutely the most straight-forward of the series, which is both a strength and a weakness. It’s more accessible. There’s almost no doubt whatsoever whats going on. The previous two books haven’t been exactly subtle about the magic and how it works out in the lives of the Tufa — but (and I’m struggling to express this the way I want to) they mostly just let us see what happened and say “hey, that’s magic.” There’s some winking and nudging, but primarily the reader has to do the heavy lifting. To switch metaphors, Bledsoe gave us all the numbers and equations, but we had solve for x on our own. But here? It’s all spelled out. It’s somewhat refreshing, but a little disappointing, too.

But that’s just a little tarnish to the series. It’s still one of the best out there. This book changes the world, but not so much that you won’t recognize it — this is all about growth, development. It does my heart good to know that Bledoe is writing #5 at the moment, so we’ve got at least a few hundred more pages of this world to come.

You can absolutely start here, but I think you’d be better off starting with the first, The Hum and the Shiver to you can catch all the nuance and atmosphere and all that. What it means that character X shows up and does Y. That kind of thing. Either way, dive into this world.

—–

4 1/2 Stars

Thank You, Goodnight by Andy Abramowitz

By HCNewton

On August 6, 2015

In Fiction, General Fiction/Literature

Thank You, Goodnight”

by Andy Abramowitz
Hardcover, 338 pg.
Touchstone, 2015
Read: June 30 – July 3, 2015

In most instances, space between people grows like mold, neglected just long enough to be noticed. You intended to wipe it clean, but the more of it there is, the more daunting a task it becomes to erase it. Not so with me and the band. I’d discontinued those people as if they were a premium cable channel that I’d finally realized was broadcasting nothing I wanted to watch.

From passages like that, a nice mix of thoughtful, sentimental, with a bit of a grin; to the out-and-out funny, like the funniest suicide attempt I’ve read in a long time, possibly ever (something worthy Save Steve Holland’s Lane Myer, but longer); this book covers the spectrum. Not only covers it, but does so with assurance and panache. It’s one of those first novels that makes you wonder what could possibly be done as a follow up.

Teddy Tremble is a successful enough lawyer for someone who’s heart isn’t really in it, while still being good at it. He’s sort of coasting through life — being good enough at his job, good enough with his girlfriend of forever, good enough for his social circle, but not good enough for his father (but after meeting him, you understand that’s just a given). He’s forty-ish and realizes that life is going to pretty much stay this way. On the whole, he seems okay with that — but in the back of his mind he knows he’s not. He won an Academy Award. His band was huge for a little while in the 1990’s, before his hubris ruined things. Sure, things are good enough now, but once upon a time they were great.

Then through a truly humbling and bewildering set of circumstances, Teddy comes across a group of huge Tremble fans. Seriously, die-hard doesn’t begin to describe these people. Think something akin to the kind of people that organized the first Star Trek convention back when it wasn’t a cultural phenomenon, just a short-lived and then canceled show. This changes everything. The adulation, the attention, the satisfaction of performing gets under his skin and he starts writing music for the first time in a long time.

Pretty soon, he’s (forgive the cliché) trying to get the band back together — his agent and producer are on board, convinced that what he’s written exceeds his former quality. Incidentally, both of these characters are the kind that we readers hope to come across — supporting characters that threaten to steal the entire novel, but when used properly just make the whole thing better.

Anyway, with these two on board — Teddy just has to convince the rest of the band to give it a shot, to trust him. Maybe even to forgive him for what he did to them so long ago. Then he has to convince music fans to take them seriously. Neither of these tasks is going to be easy. Both are practically impossible, really.

The book starts out as pretty entertaining, definitely amusing. But it doesn’t stop there — it gets better, deeper, emotionally richer all the while. By the time I got to (and through) Chapter 20, I tweeted that, “Not sure I need to read another word (am going to), but that was as close to perfect as it gets.” I’m still thinking about it a month later.

At various places through the novel, Teddy observes: “One day I’ll die, and this will be one of the things I did with my time.” I’m not sure if I’ve ever seen one sentence used so many different ways with so many different meanings depending on the context. Sometimes he’s says it wryly, sometimes caustically, sometimes wistfully, sometimes with pride. It’s one of those writerly things that when you see it in action, you wonder why more people don’t try it.

Each of these characters — the agent, the producer, the bandmates, their (sometimes very odd) families, Teddy’s girlfriend, associates in the law firm, and others — are well-drawn. Occasionally familiar, without being stock characters or cliché, each character ends up being strong enough that you want to spend at least a little more time with them. But Abramowtitz is too capable of steward of his resources and gives us just enough to leave us wanting more.

I’ve seen a lot of comparisons of Thank You to Hornby’s High Fidelity and Tropper’s This is Where I Leave You. I don’t get that. Maybe it’s just because these people haven’t read anything else by these authors — they should be comparing this to Hornby’s Juliet, Naked and Tropper’s One Last Thing Before I Go (to be fair, I have seen a little of this comparison, but no one else that I’ve seen has tagged Juliet). These three cover some of the same territory, and Abramowitz comes out looking really good in that company. Don’t get me wrong, I really liked Juliet, I know I liked it more than most people I know. But I don’t think it was as good as it wanted to be or as it thought it was. Thank You seems to do the things that Juliet was wanting to do but didn’t get done. I’m not necessarily saying it’s a better book (I might lean that way), but this is more successful in the areas they overlap. Similarly, while I wouldn’t say that One Last Thing is a bad book, it can’t hold a candle to this one. I’m not trying to make this a competition, but for this first-time novelist to get things better than old pros like Hornby and Tropper says so much about him.

One day I’ll die, and reading this will be one of the things I did with my time. I’m so glad it was.

—–

4 1/2 Stars

Luckiest Girl Alive by Jessica Knoll

By HCNewton

On August 4, 2015

In Fiction, General Fiction/Literature, Mystery/Detective Fiction/Crime Fiction/Thriller

Luckiest Girl Alive

by Jessica Knoll

Hardcover, 338 pg.

Simon & Schuster, 2015

Read: July 27 – 31, 2015
There has been so much buzz about this book the last couple of months, it might as well be inhabited by bees. There’s been a couple of times this summer that half of my Twitter feed seems obsessed with it — it’s really only one or two people, but they really like posting reviews about it. I get the love for it — I don’t share it (at least to the extent that so many seem to) — but I can see where some would go ga-ga over it.

For me, not since Mark Watney from last year’s The Martian has a book depended so much on a narrator’s voice for me. This thing rises and falls with what you think of Ani FaNelli. If she doesn’t turn you off in the first 10 pages (odds are, I know the exact line), you’ll enjoy the ride.

The book opens on Ani and her fiancé working on their wedding gift registry, but it’s pretty much unlike every such trip you’ve seen/read. I’m pretty sure I emitted an audible chuckle or two. The fiancé is not really a cad, not really a bore, more of a guy who would be a jerk, or a really good guy if he just put a little effort into things in either direction, but can’t seem to bother to care. Ani is driven, emotionally-complex, with a dark sense of humor, there’s a subtext straight from the start that says some nasty stuff has happened to her, and it’s shaped the way she relates to life — it should be said that this subtext isn’t all that “sub.”

As we march towards the wedding day, we start to look back at how Ani’s (then TifAni’s) high school life made her into who she is today — her trials, her trauma, her friends, and everything else. As we get further along in each story, we gain more understanding of why she does what she does. I’m not all that certain I liked Ani as a person, but as a character? Oh, yeah. She’s a damaged mess of various disorders, doing her best to keep things together and progressing (it’s clear that she’s earned every one of those disorders). In the end, Ani just wants acceptance, love (for who she is, not what someone wants her to be), and a little public vindication. It’s just harder for her to find that because of who she is.

It’s hard to argue with desires like that — particularly from someone who’s gone through what she’s gone through. I’ve seen more than one review who talked about not being able to connect to Ani, and while I enjoyed her voice, I’m not sure I could either. What I could connect with was her goals, her desires. So my emotional investment came from wondering what kind of success she’d find.

Ani had a plan — one overarching plan since high school — she developed it, let it evolve, but by and large her plan was everything to her, a religion. I don’t think you could say it was a great plan, but it seems plausible. More than that, it was Ani’s and she liked it. But — somewhere in these pages, a little of that character growth thing happens — plus a handy accident occurs — that necessitates change in her plan. It’s impossible to say if that growth would’ve without the accident, or without the growth if she’d been able to take advantage of the accident. Either way, it’s how you handle a change in your circumstance and plans that reveals the most about you, right? The payoff here was satisfying.

The book promises a lot of twists — and there are several — but most of them I could see coming. That didn’t matter, Knoll teases them just long enough, and then brings them to light just at the right time for them to be fully effective. The ones I didn’t see coming, on the other hand? They were just as effective, and oh, so wonderful.

Thanks to the cover copy and promotions, this is being compared to Gone Girl — some people like the comparison, some don’t. I’m not going to make that comparison (mostly because I haven’t read the other). But for cryin’ out loud — don’t base you opinion of this book on that comparison. That’s not Knoll’s comparison, it belongs to someone at Simon & Schuster’s marketing department (and valid or not, that bit of cover copy paid off for the company).

Give this 10-30 pages. If you’re curious about what happened to Ani, if you like her voice, if you want to if she succeeds in her goals, keep going. If you don’t? Drop it and grab something else.

—–

4 Stars

Re Jane by Patricia Park

By HCNewton

On July 23, 2015

In Fiction, General Fiction/Literature

This is frustrating…I’ve been working on this post for a couple of weeks now, and have spent a lot of time re-writing, re-writing and throwing out material. I finally decided what to keep and how to organize it, I think. I’m tempted to just put this cover image next to a big .gif of a thumbs up and call it a day.

—-

Re Jane

by Patricia Park
Hardcover, 338 pg.
Pamela Dorman Books, 2015

Read: July 6 – 8, 2015

There are two ways to look at this book — as a retelling of Jane Eyre and as a novel on its own terms. It’s clearly indebted to Jane Eyre — frequently, the allusions are subtle; sometimes, she might as well be jumping up and down waving a flag. Still, Park’s her own writer — this is its own story, with its own characters — and a heroine who’s not just Brontë’s best-known character thinly disguised.

If you haven’t read Jane Eyre, first of all — shame on you. Secondly, yes, you can read this and appreciate it — you’ll just miss some of Park’s cleverness. Instead, what you’ll get is a straight-forward story about the trials and travails (and travels) of a young Korean-American woman.

Jane Re’s a half-Korean college graduate who becomes a nanny for the daughter of a couple of silly (white) New Yorkers — she’s a stereotypical college professor in Women’s Studies, he’s a henpecked high-school English teacher. Their daughter was adopted from China, and is now old enough that she doesn’t need a nanny — which makes the whole thing a greater challenge. Still, it’s better than the alternative — returning to live with her uncle and aunt, who were forced to take her in after the death of her mother in Korea (and her family there being unwilling to keep her).

Then through a series of events you can read about yourself, she finds herself living for a bit in South Korea. This is as fascinating as you’d think it’d be. It’s not just about a young South Korean woman, it’s about a young half-South Korean woman, raised in the States (by people who left Korea decades before), trying to acclimate to Korea. A stranger in the U.S. to many because of culture and appearance, finds herself a greater stranger there for the same reasons.

Which leads to . . . spoiler stuff. Which is even more interesting. Along the way there’s a whole mess of family issues, stranger-in-a-strange-land issues, self-acceptance issues, romance issues, and other things I can’t pair with the word “issues.” Jane goes through a lot, I’ve got to say — maybe a wider-range of challenges than Eyre. I frequently found myself wanting a bit more spunk, a bit more chutzpah from Jane throughout. But, like her namesake, when she needed it, she found it within — and it was great to see.

Park makes a pivotal choice in her selection of chronological setting — and one that worried me. It’d have been so easy to go wrong with this, and I’m used to seeing it go badly — but Park pulls it off, and actually makes it work for her.

In the end, I liked Jane. I rooted for her. I liked (some of) her family and friends. I was invested in the story. It’s not going to go down as good as, or as important as, its inspiration — but it’s a well-written, warm, look at a woman learning how to take charge of her life.

—–

4 Stars

How to Start a Fire by Lisa Lutz

By HCNewton

On June 19, 2015

In Authors, Fiction, General Fiction/Literature, K-O, Lisa Lutz

How to Start a Fire

by Lisa Lutz

Hardcover, 337 pg.
Houghton Mifflin Harcourt, 2015
Read: June 5 – 6, 2015
I really enjoyed Lisa Lutz’s latest, best, and most mature novel and want to encourage you to give it a read. That said, I’m not really sure how to start this post — or how to finish it, now that I think about it. It’s not really a plot-driven book, it’s more about the relationships between the three main characters, and others in their lives. But, it’s really difficult to talk about the book without talking about the two (maybe three) plot points that drive the whole thing.

Early on, I jotted down the note, “I’m either going to love or hate this book,” and while I stayed in the former camp, I could easily see where some wouldn’t (a quick skim of goodreads today, suggests I was right). This book plays with chronology, skipping around throughout the 20+ year history of the characters (plus some in-chapter flashbacks), with no easily noticeable pattern. So, in the first few chapters (most of Part One), once I started a new chapter, I’d have to flip back to the first page of the 3-4 previous chapters to make sure I was placing the current one in the right spot on my mental timeline. Eventually, I didn’t have to physically turn the pages, and was able to re-arrange things without much thought — and I know two other readers that experienced the same

At its core, How to Start a Fire is about the relationships of three women over time, from meeting in college through everything that happens over the next twenty plus years — ups, downs, fights, make-ups, forgiveness, betrayal, estrangement, personal growth, self-destruction, and the ability of friendship to forget all of that and just care in the moment. To boil it down to its essence: real friendship.

I had to repeatedly remind myself that this was a Lisa Lutz novel, it didn’t feel like one. Not any of The Spellman Files or Heads you Lose, this was a totally different creature (not being a mystery novel plays into that, obviously). Of course, like with my fixation on chronology eventually I got into the book and stopped caring about that. Most of the humor is different, most of the heart is different — the types of people are different, too. Still, the humor is solid, the heart is genuine, and the people are, y’know, people.

Yet . . . there’s no denying the Lutz DNA here. The three main characters were aggressively quirky like Izzy or Rae, Anna ‘s brother could’ve been David), and Malcom has a very Henry-esque quality. There’s so much more about the novel to think about than the parallels to the Spellman books. I don’t want to focus on it, but I did make those notes at one point. I think if I hadn’t written it down, I’d have forgotten about it by the time I reached the end.

This is Chick Lit that can be appreciated by the non-Chick reader^* — there’s a little bit of something for just about everything in these pages, laughs, chuckles, an “Aww” or three, and maybe a something to make your eyes misty. It’s a bit too fresh for me to confirm this, but I’m betting this is one of those novels that rewards re-reads (especially when you’re not trying to figure out what’s going on in the opening chapters). Not my favorite Lutz book, but probably her best — and it demonstrates what many of her readers have suspected: she can write whatever she sets her mind to. Frankly, I want something back in the comedy/crime area again, but I’ll line up for whatever.

—–

^* Which is the mark of the best of Chick-Lit — or any genre — even those outside the target demographic can appreciate it.

—–

4 Stars