October Recap

I have a really big problem this month – I read too many good books so I find it impossible to pick the one best…My reviews are also slow to go up but Cross Country Season ended for the boys last week (Girls compete at State this Saturday and I wish them well – they have worked hard and overcome incredible difficulties to earn a berth at State).  Now I just have to wade through literally thousands of pictures for the slide show.

• What is Left The Daughter – Howard Norman
• The Language of Trees – Ilie Ruby
• Faithful Place – Tana French
• The Good Daughters – Joyce Maynard
• Last Night In Montreal – Emily St. John Mandel
• DNF – The Piano Teacher – Janice Lee
• The Tricking of Freya – Christina Sunley
• The Singer’s Gun – Emily St. John Mandel
• Old School – Tobias Wolff
• Strength in What Remains – Tracy Kidder
• The Last Song – Andrea Levy
• Room – Emma Donaghue
• Small Room – May Sarton
• Dangerous Neighbors – Beth Kephart

With this list it is really difficult to pick one best read so I have to settle for two: Last Night in Montreal and Room.  With Last Night it is hard to compete against language like this: “Lilia was suppose to be the navigator, but the map had been folded on the dashboard of the car for nine years now; and it was fading under a barrage of lights. Entire states were dissolving into pinkish sepia, the lines of the highway fading to gray. The names  certain cities were indistinct now, and all the borders were vanishing.” As for Room, I hope to review it this week – I was very impressed with the level of detail that Donoghue was able to put into this slim work while handling a potentially difficult subject with deftness and grace.

What was amazing was that as good as these two books are, there were also some other strong contenders:

• Best Academic Novel: Again, two choices – do I pick the one that came from the student perspective (Old School) or the one from the teacher’s perspective – May Sarton’s Small Room. I really liked what Old School said about writing and reading but I think I will give the nod to Small Room simply because I love how Sarton paints an incredibly complex picture using such simple small strokes. Sarton knows how to pack a lot of punch in just a few words.
• Best Travel Book – I have to pick The Tricking of Freya not only because you sink into the story but also because of the beautiful descriptions of Iceland – its landscape, history, and lore.
• Best Book Group Book – The Language of Trees for its writing, its themes, and its sense of place.  Lots of good discussion to have. I am sure some people would pick The Good Daughters in this category and there is certainly lots to discuss about family and relationships and sense of self but I found it to be a bit too predictable as well as a little outrageous in certain aspects.
• Best Second Book: The Singer’s Gun by Mandel – same great writing, similar themes to Last Night but told in a very different story.

Not Bad

• Best Historical – The Long Song. It is the only historical book I read and if you like the genre I would recommend it.
• Best Mystery – Faithful Place. This was my first book by Tana French and it wasn’t bad.  Her main character was complex (I enjoyed his relationship with his daughter) and is is well written, somewhat predictable but she does build the psychology quite well.  I was very interested in a secondary character and I wonder if he will appear in a future novel.

The So-So list contains two disappointments, one young-adult fiction, and a did not finish:

• What is Left the Daughter has gotten some very good reviews and is the memoirs of a loner writing about his life for his daughter.  I just didn’t find the story compelling.
• Strength in What Remains: I really like Kidder’s Mountain Beyond Mountains and this one follows a young man from Burundi who came to America to escape from the genocide in his country.  The young man’s story is heart rending; I just didn’t think this was Kidder’s best work.  I did come away with an even more profound respect for Dr. Paul Farmer and the work Partners in Health does in the world.
• I don’t often read young-adult fiction but Dangerous Neighbors was raved about on a few blogs I look at so I ordered it and was disappointed.  It is well written but just seemed so lightweight – what was the point? It has caused me to reflect on the genre as a whole and I loved the cover.
• The did not finish was The Piano Teacher – just couldn’t get into it at all.

Lots in the reading pile but the first priority is dealing with all those pictures and getting the youngest to complete his college applications which theoritically should be easier now that cross is officially over but he has already shifted focus to Track and the 800 – winter training has begun.

Happy Reading.

 

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