Trees at Leisure by Anna Botsford Comstock is a very unusual little book! At first I thought it was a chapbook. Then, perhaps a small book of poetry. I was a few pages in before I decided to Google it and find that this is actually an instructional book, intended and funded to inspire understanding and appreciation for trees–and originally published in 1916 no less! The illustrations are gorgeous. The text is strange and insightful. It’s worth the quick read through.
The pacing of Small Things Like These by Claire Keegan is more like that of a short story than a novel. This is nothing against the story–I love shorter works! I would classify this piece as a novella.
This book was a pleasant Christmas read, which was perfect because I finished it on Christmas Eve this year! This is a plot driven book with decent writing. It won the Orwell Prize for fiction that tackles a social issue, and it does that, and does a fine job of it.
I’ve admitted before that I love Gilmore Girls, and I’ll admit it again here, which is why I decided to read Talking as Fast as I Can: From Gilmore Girls to Gilmore Girls (and Everything in Between) by Lauren Graham, which she wrote ahead of the Gilmore Girls “A Year in the Life.”
First, I want to clarify my feelings about Gilmore Girls. In so many ways, the plot (and yes, even some of the beloved dialogue) is predictable, formulaic. Sometimes it feels like the creators just had an idea and went with it before thinking for even one second about deeper meaning or complexity, and that’s okay. I just often find myself wanting more from the show, even as much as I am a fan.
I am a fan because I absolutely LOVE the premise. The premise is perfection. It is interesting, sometimes feminist, and idyllic. It is an always beautiful, quaint little New England town inhabited by colorful women who are living life joyfully and on their own terms. The men are mostly cool too–there’s very little of the sexist strife that pervades much of popular media today (and, unfortunately, real life too). The premise makes me love the show and all of the possibility it holds.
While women also have power in many popular shows, it is often a very masculine definition of power, with what feels like to me very masculine pursuits. Of course, my understanding of what is “masculine” is completely biased, but to me, many of the pursuits of Stars Hollow feel distinctly not masculine. It’s also just lovely to watch.
As for the book, I enjoyed it as Gilmore Girls fans will. Graham provides detailed insights into the films of the Gilmore Girls, both the original and the reboot. Graham is also a writer, and the book reads more like a collection of short stories and definitely ventures far beyond the world of Stars Hollow and into Graham’s career and life. Fans will like that too.
I continue to be impressed by the work of the ghostwriters behind some of the memoirs produced by key famous people recently. These writers effectively capture the famous figure’s voice, add genuine insight to their lives, and seemingly work under impossible deadlines, and that was the case with Britney Spears’ book The Woman in Me. The first half of the book is really interesting and insightful. Readers will likely learn things about Spears’ childhood that were previously unknown. The context helps add insight to the performer’s experiences later on.
What I appreciate about some of these ghostwritten books written about famous people is insight into the individual’s character and experiences, and what that says about humanity and culture. In the case of Britney, it’s really tragic just how she was used by everyone and what that says about our culture. The book lends some insight into that dynamic in ways that just don’t get captured in popular media (try as they may).
If the first half of the book is good, the last half or third of the book drags on a bit. The conservatorship seems like a thirteen-year fog, and that’s what readers feel too. There were relationships, but they lacked much depth and development (both in the book and perhaps in real life).
I wanted the conclusion to really sing with mind blowing insights into the human spirit, but that’s not real, I suppose. Instead, readers get the sense that Britney is still just surviving in many ways. Adding the context of her recent divorce, which is not mentioned in the book, readers can see that Britney is still figuring it out. It’s not perfect, or pretty, but she is alive, and that is worth celebrating.
(It is also true what they say about Michelle Williams–she really did a phenomenal job with the audio book.)
Over the Thanksgiving break, I read Hernan Diaz’s incredible book In the Distance. This is such a unique book, and as I read it, I marveled that folks at Coffee House Press were able to recognize it and publish it. (It then went on to be a finalist for the Pulitzer Prize in fiction!) I really do think it can be difficult to recognize books like these when they are submitted to publishers. The writing is obviously excellent from the beginning, so that helps it become recognizable, but there’s a surprising element of plot that goes on to drive this novel–and that’s requires a close read through to the end. As someone who reads a lot, I know just how big of an ask this is. Normally, a piece of writing needs to show itself off and say what it is immediately. This book shows itself off, but, in my opinion, is slow to reveal what it is.
As I read, new insights slowly emerged, making the experience at once both intellectual, but also emotional. That said, this book is also dogged and difficult and inconceivable at times, especially in the last half as plot and meaning start to cohere (congeal?) I found myself thinking the book was too extraordinary at times, but then reminded myself that books should tell the story of the extraordinary! Diaz integrates a kind of fanaticism in the great tradition of magical realism and is also both contemporary and traditional in its approach. This is a book worth reading and might make a great film too.
Where the Crawdads Sing by Delia Owens was (is!) a bestseller, very popular, and was made into a movie. It is also not the kind of book I typically read. However, more than one person recommended I read it based on a project I’ve been working on, and so I did. While I used to listen to books on CD (and even tape!) when I had long commutes, this is the first book I’ve listened to via an app, and, for the most part, I really liked the experience. Unfortunately, much of what I read is not available on audio, and I usually need to mark stuff up for my own writing and scholarship. So, I’m not sure how much literature I’ll actually be able to consume in this way, but it feels good to have the option. Sometimes.
As for this book, the first quarter is really quite good, gripping, some lovely imagery, and some complicated ideas that go beyond what’s portrayed in a lot of popular fiction. Usually by the first line or two, I get a sense of plot-based genre fiction, but this one kept up to muster well beyond the first few lines. In fact, some of the insights were truly profound and beautifully written (as far as I could tell via audio).
However, near the end, there is a lengthy trial, and, let me just say that I find trials to be about as interesting as football games, which is to say: usually, not very. Using the lawyers and police people to work through the ideas and the drama of the crime was just not my cup of tea. Of course I still listened through to the end and with interest.
There’s a lot of plot and tension built around who will sleep with the beautiful “marsh girl” and then later, whodunit, and I found myself wishing that the book could go beyond these relatively common tension points. In some ways it does, but it also doesn’t break with plot form. If it had in the last quarter of the book, like if Owens had really done the unexpected, I think it could have elevated this book to capital “g” great literature. As it stands, the author made something that would be a bestseller and would make a lot of money, and with writing that she could be proud of, and that’s very nice too. And entertaining!
If you’re looking for a book that’s going to make you go “wtf” at the end, in a way that is neither particularly good, nor bad, well then The Old Ballerina by Ellen Cooney is the book for you.
I picked this book up for its compelling title, and the book does live up to the title. The book is compelling. It is experimental in form; it deals with plot in ways that are both typical and unusual, which is why I had a certain expectation for the denouement that were not met, which led to the muttering of “wft” as I closed the book.
I’m glad I read it because it is informative on what’s possible, on something to aspire toward, and, yes, this book does seem possible, and, also, necessary.
I recently read the short and delightful Coffee House Press book, Horse, Flower, Bird, by Kate Bernheimer. This is a delightful book of poetic prose pieces that are connected through haunting, sometimes confused, but always strangely familiar imagery of childhood, girlhood.
While reading this, I felt reconnected with the strangeness of being young and not yet fully understanding the world around me and the social expectations and information that would eventually become themes. Bernheimer is able to capture that world for me, which was stranger and more magical.
Reading it, I just found myself grateful that this quirky little book exists. Sometimes the world, and the literary world, starts to feel very similar to me, and this wasn’t that.
I followed up Maggie Nelson with more Maggie Nelson. This time it was her 2016 book, Jane: A Murder, which explores the 1969 murder of Nelson’s aunt Jane. Obviously, I’ve just been mesmerized by everything Nelson touches lately. This book is thoughtful, creative, but also frightening in the true crime kind of way. I don’t have much more to say about this piece–just that I think Nelson’s work is so novel and important and a way forward for us literary types.
The Argonauts by Maggie Nelson wasn’t on my reading list, but I dropped everything when I remembered I hadn’t read it. What a great book! First, it should be taught in graduate-level theory courses. (It probably is, but nothing like this was taught in mine.) We need more feminist theory like this that truly integrates the (deeply) personal with the philosophical. I can’t be the only one who gobbled this up, and I suppose I can do my part by quoting it and integrating it into my scholarship myself.
The blurbs about this book say it’s about art and philosophy, but, I don’t know, somehow those descriptions fail to capture what Nelson is doing, which is, admittedly, unparalleled and difficult to describe.
The book helped me understand some philosophy and culture more deeply through her insights and critique. Unsurprisingly, I clung to her thoughts on motherhood, joy, femininity, womanhood, and culture. Perhaps especially as a mother, I appreciated the spare, yet complex prose. What can I say–The Argonauts is yet another important book by Nelson.
SHEREWIN 