Bit of a mixed bag for March….fantasy meets reality and everything in between. By and large, I preferred the fantastical - the reality, true to form, was a bit much.
War and Peace - Leo Tolstoy
Yes, happy to report that I’m still carrying on with the slow-read of this. I’m actually a few chapters ahead of the official read-a-long as I got a bit carried away. I’m taking that as a good sign…very enjoyable. I’m almost at the point at which I abandoned it last year. The slow-read approach is definitely the way to go.
The Bear and the Nightingale - Katherine Arden
This was a carry-over from my February pile, as well as being a re-read. When I first read this, there was only this book - the two completing the Winternight Trilogy had yet to be written. I enjoyed it very much the first time around and even more so this second re-read. This series might well be one that I’d like to buy as I feel like on that I would regularly re-read.
I love any good foundation in traditional folklore and as these books are based around Russian folklore, of which I’m not the least bit familiar, it was a double delight. A bit of cultural history added in only strengthened the superb world-building; the setting itself became its own character and the whole thing is just so, so richly imagined. *chef’s kiss*.
This would be an excellent ‘seasonal’ read — the winter energy is strong in this one — though I think I’d read it at any time of the year. I found the themes around othering and superstition to be especially delicious…we love the wild woman of the woods trope! It’s just a really, really good book. (hold onto that statement, it’s important)
Moon of the Turning Leaves — Waubgeshig Rice
This is the follow-up to Moon of Crusted Snow, which I wrote about last month. Reading the introduction, I saw that this book was picked up by a Penguin Random House editor….which definitely made a difference. I’m sure it made a difference to the author’s paycheque (win!) but it also made a difference to the narrative style itself. (not necessarily a win). This one had less of the traditional storyteller vibe and more of the conventional narrative…not that it was bad, just different. Perhaps because this novel revolved around a journey, and so needed a more conventional style..or maybe it was an editorial decision, who can know? Either way, it was a fantastic read - very immersive and I read it over an afternoon/morning and was on tenterhooks the entire time. I really got invested in these characters and will be sad to say goodbye to them for good. The novel picks up the same family group from the first book, only twelve years later when they realize they need to move from the land that they’ve settled. It’s decided that a party will be sent to scout the land to the south, their traditional lands, to see if a return would be possible.
This one is going to stay with me for a while, just like the first one — these types of post-apocalyptic stories give us a chance to imagine how we could do things better, if we were give a clean slate, as it were…or how we might make the same mistakes twice and have history repeat itself. Both of those options were illustrated in this book. In this story, though, we’re shown how we might get it right.
A Court of Thorns and Roses - Sarah J. Maas
Right, well. Here we are then. 🥹
I can absolutely understand why people both love and hate this book with equal fervour and ferocity. Which means that, as far as the objective of writing a novel goes, it’s a hands-down success — it makes people feel something. So my hat goes off to Ms. Maas because she clearly knows how to stir people up.
I’m going to stay away from any kind of in-depth analysis - partly because that would be spoiler-y and partly because I’m sure there are many someones somewhere who have done that already, on both ends of the love-hate spectrum. But I will offer a few thoughts….in a hopefully neutral tone :)
As a fairy-tale retelling, its absymal (see above reference to a beautifully executed homage to folktales in The Bear and the Nightingale) I wasn’t even aware it was supposed to be based on Beauty and the Beast until about halfway through, and even then it was with a snort of derision. So off-the-mark. Ahem. Sorry, that wasn’t very neutral.
The story starts off with great promise. The world-building has much potential.
There are some truly fascinating characters — and some truly one-dimensional ones….
…actually, I’m going to stop there. This is the kind of book that the more you think about it, the less appealing it gets.
I wanted to like it, I really, really did. I feel like it could’ve been so much better.
Incidentally, if you want to read a series that has complementary elements (mortal girl-faery prince, court intrigue etc), the Folk of the Air series by Holly Black is fantastic. Which is to say, way better.
If you can maintain the necessary suspension-of-disbelief, it will be entertaining. I managed to do that for the first third or so of the story, but something happened between putting it down and picking it up again. It’s like my rose-coloured glasses had been yanked off my head. That said, I finished the book…the story was compelling enough to carry me along so that’s saying something. Were there lip-curls and eye-rolls? Perhaps a few. Do I have the second book on hold at the library? Yes, I do. I can’t explain it…could be morbid fascination. I’m hoping for a better second book?
Apples Never Fall - Liane Moriarty
I read this one on a recommendation from Kate at Five Books For under the theme of ‘families’. This isn’t one I’d ordinarily pick up — it’s about a tennis family and I have zero interest in tennis - but it was a happy surprise. There’s a bit of mystery, a bit of family drama and a bit of thriller/suspense, all against the backdrop of a family who are deeply involved with the Australian tennis scene.
The parents ran a tennis school (recently sold) and their four adult children were tennis stars in their youth. When the wife goes missing, the story dips back and forth between past and present, including the strange appearance of a young woman who stays with the parents for a while. It’s brilliantly plotted and paced - I really couldn’t ever settle on ‘did he or didn’t he’, I was kept guessing all the way. It’s an excellent observation of family and relationship dynamics, how our past informs our future, the way seemingly innocuous decisions and exchanges can have a ripple effect. The author’s observations on marriage and generational trauma are so on point as to be flinch-worthy. The commentary on sports and children-in-sports, especially those deemed as particularly talented is also very well articulated. All in all, an excellent read.
The Girl in the Tower - Katherine Arden
Back to medieval Russia for the second book of the Winternight Trilogy. It’s just as wonderful as the first book…maybe even more so. Our plucky heroine, Vasilisa, once again shows herself to be superior in every way to the patriarchal society in which she lives — which is constantly proven to be narrow-minded and misogynistic. I particularly loved her relationship with Solovey (her horse) and the supernatural world. My horsey-self noticed and appreciated that the author, having spent time working on a horse farm, makes a point of making sure that the horses in the story are well-treated and cared for properly. I’m also loving the romance arc in these stories — a very slow-burn (so much classier than….others 🤓 ). Morozko ( a frost demon) remains a sympathetic character - he’s exasperating and appealing all at once so of course I’m rooting for him. Obviously, I’ll be reading the third book just as soon as I can get my grubby little mitts on it.
My Own Country - Abraham Verghese
This was my (accidental) non-fiction book of the month. I say accidental because I hadn’t really intended on reading it. When I took Covenant of Water back to the library, the librarian at the desk (actually my nemesis, but that’s a story for another day) asked me how I liked it — naturally, I gushed. She then asked if I’d read his other book, Cutting For Stone, which I hadn’t, though said I was intending to. She immediately offered to put it on hold for me. Thinking myself redeemed and returned to favour (again, another story), I readily accepted her generous offer. Little did I know, she’d also put this book on hold for me as well. Considering my precarious position, I dared not refuse to accept it when it became available (in case she quizzed me later).
Anyway — this is a memoir of the author’s time living in a small town in Tennessee as an infectious disease specialist at the time of the AIDS crisis in the 1980s. By virtue of being the only infectious disease specialist in the area at the time, he then became the only HIV/AIDS doctor. It was a fascinating - and, at times, difficult to read — account of what that was like, both in terms of how it affected him personally, and for the people he was serving. Interesting - and encouraging - so see how far we’ve come in the treatment of HIV/AIDS since those early days, though not without the blatantly obvious comparisons in the difference in timely responses between the AIDS epidemic and the COVID-19 pandemic, both in terms of government and scientific efforts. Nothing new under the sun, there.
The Most Fun We Ever Had - Claire Lombardo
Another one from Kate’s stories-about-families recommendations.
Was this a “good” book? Probably. Did I enjoy it? I’m not sure. I don’t know that ‘enjoy’ is the right word to describe my experience with this at all. I didn’t hate it, so that’s something. I feel like it’s the kind of book I should like — which I would, if I had high-brow, sophisticated literary tastes but alas, it seems I don’t. I’m strictly a middle-brow girl, I guesss. It’s the kind of book I can see one having to read for a book club…
For me, it ranks among the Olive Ketteridge’s of the literary world, that genre where it’s common for many, if not all, of the characters to be profoundly unlikeable. Happily, none of these characters were so unlikeable as to be unbearable, but I couldn’t get too invested in them, I couldn’t really bring myself to care all that much.
The story seemed to be mostly a dissection of family dynamics and the effects of parenting on four adult women, where the general perception was that the parents loved each other more than they loved their children — except when they didn’t. We see how each girl, now grown into adulthood, responds to that as they each try to grasp the thing they feel they were denied. It’s very well-written, very thoroughly observant with definitive psychological insights…but it just wasn’t really my cup of tea.
I think that I don’t often enjoy this type of modern literary fiction - especially those books which examine in minute and abrasive detail, the lives of women. I guess I just don’t need to know the intricate details of how profoundly messed up people are. It’s just a bit too depressing.
The Growing Summer - Noel Streatfeild
And now for something completely different…..or is it?
I was in between books and needed a bit of a palate cleanser after that last one and so pulled this off my shelves. I’d bought it after a seasonal reads recommendation by Miranda Mills. The way Miranda described the story — a family of children are sent to live with an eccentric aunt in Ireland for the summer — struck me as very Enid Blyton-esque and I did so love that sort of thing as child. And while she also offered a laughing disclaimer that it perhaps wasn’t an example of good parenting (the children are literally left to fend for themselves), I didn’t think that would bother me.
And it didn’t. Not in the way that I felt the children were being badly used — food arrived with regularity but they were in charge of cooking and cleaning for themselves — but what I didn’t like was the bald-faced morality lessons on the perils of being spoiled, ‘dependent’ children. It lacked the cozy camaraderie of an Enid Blyton book, and perhaps that was the point, I don’t know. I know I felt a bit disappointed with the whole thing.
The Heroine’s Journey - Gail Carriger
This is a writing craft book that I finished in March, though I’ve been dipping in and out of it since January. It’s a really excellent look at the structural differences and implications of stories built on the Heroine’s Journey structure as opposed to the more conventional Hero’s Journey, which tends to dominate much of mainstream media, and has done so for a very long time.
While I found it useful (and affirming, as this is the story framework that I use — though I didn’t know it until I read the book!) to read about the story beats what I found most fascinating was the look at why the Heroine’s Journey is, by and large, devalued, and to learn that it has it’s roots in 18th century Gothic literature.
The disenfranchised nature of all genre fiction today is rooted in the Victorian critical attitude toward Gothic literature in England in the 1800s. 1
It seems that a story framework that highlights co-operation, networking, compromise, hope, love and comfort is somehow inferior to one that portrays individualism, isolation, violence and tragic self-sacrifice.
I know.
Another interesting thing to note is the way the romance genre (very much based in Heroine’s Journeys) has long been the red-headed stepchild of highbrow opinion, despite being the largest earnerof all genres in terms of sales.
Apparently that’s been going on a long time: a female author by the name of Marie Corelli (starting in 1886), writing a mixture of romance, occultism, mystery and Christian morality, exceeded the combined sales of her male counterparts, namely HG Wells, Arthur Conan Doyle and Rudyard Kipling. And yet, she was consistently abused by critics as being melodramatic and plebian.
You can bet all those critics were men.
I know!
If I can summon the brain cells (editing friends, the editing!), I’ll write more on the subject of the Heroine’s Journey and the patriarchal fu*kwittery that’s so deeply entrenched even in our entertainment choices, often without us being consciously aware.
So there we are - some winners and some losers, as I said, a bit of a mixed bag.
I’m slowing down on the reading in April as I come to the final stretch with Hazel’s book…but I’m already in the middle of a good ‘un.
How about you? Read anything good lately?
~m. xo
Learning of this has me wanting to read ALL OF THE GOTHIC THINGS….source material as well as modern versions. Recommendations on a postcard. I’ve already got my mitts on some of the classics, including The Mysteries of Udolpho. I know!
What a fun list -- I love seeing what people read. I just posted my March list. You had quite a few. While working on my basement refix, I found my mom's copy of "War and Peace." I'm thinking I may approach it like the readalong (though that's long over) and give it a try!
Oh yes please!! Definitely tell us more about the heroine’s journey. This resonates so deeply and it feels like the piece that has been missing for too long. From books. From film. From all shows. Well, from everything. Framework is so important. At least that’s how I feel. And? Lovely book list! Thanks for sharing your thoughts. I have more recently learned to embrace my local library. Now just have to get their inter library loan system figured out. They seemed to have made it as convoluted as possible. 🤪