Recent Reads

[firstroad]

The year started off well and then I read, like, NOTHING, throughout the entirety of February/March 😭 and then it picked up again! Happy to have made overall better choices in reading material than I did last year, I heartily rec the majority of these :)

A Lover's Discourse by Xiaolu Guo

Overall an easy, enjoyable read! A woman travels from China to the UK for her Ph.D. and gets together with a German-Australian man who works as a landscape architect. The title is very obviously copied from Barthes, who plays a pretty big role in the novel as well and whose words are used as the epigraph. It does this cool thing where every chapter begins with a small piece of dialogue between them which you get context for as you read the chapter itself.

Honestly, I'm mostly annoyed at how little this book trusted the reader and how... boring... the main character was. There are a ton of comparisons between China and the UK (which frankly got a little indulgent, there was honest to god effort put in trying to find differences) and this supremely boring thing that Elif Batuman does in The Idiot as well, where she goes round and round and round solipsistically and in Awareness Of Societal Pressures (in regards to her own life, of course) and then goes right ahead and chooses the most conventional choice possible. Ok. I sympathise I suppose, but I still think this trying to get away from looking like an idiot when making that choice because you Know makes her look like an even bigger idiot.

And there's this part of her dissertation:

‘. . . the argument of fake or real is a by-product of the copyright industry in the West. As long as the global market based on slavery – and on such a large quantity of Chinese labourers – continues to produce the products for world consumers, there will be no such thing as a “fake” or “genuine”. For example, all Mac computers are either made or assembled in China by the hands of cheap labourers. What is an original, and what is a copy? All fakes are real, as the so-called “quality control” and “intellectual property” are based on power and slavery, as Western democracy is also based on power and slavery . . .’

After which we get this conversation with her supervisor:

‘What I don’t understand is why the fact that products are manufactured in a system of wage slavery means we cannot talk of “genuine” as opposed to “fake”. After all, a genuine Mac is just a Mac produced under certain conditions, legal and physical, which involve wage slavery. The presence of slavery does not mean we can no longer talk of “fake” as opposed to “genuine”. The same holds for paintings. If slaves had been part of Modigliani’s or da Vinci’s atelier then would that mean there were no genuine Modiglianis or da Vincis? ’

I was suddenly flummoxed. Before I could respond, he continued:

‘But Benjamin suggested art is reproducible. So if that was the case, what is the difference between a perfect reproduction and an original?’ The professor from Manchester paused and glanced at me.

I thought I was having a panic attack. I could not continue this. My mind was a chaotic place, and there was no organisation to it. My body was not helping either, and my stomach cramped. I felt like vomiting. All I could remember was that I managed to say:

‘There is no intrinsic difference between the perfect reproduction and the original. The only difference is the exterior difference, and that is to do with its history.’

All of which very interesting on their own, even if it does come across a bit like the author is bending the narratological necessity of this scene in order to get a little more academic, but what gets ME is that right after this she gives birth. And it's all very obvious, right? Ha ha, copy or the original discussion, reproduction is about all of factory products/art/humans, ha ha, copy-or-original-both-are-genuine, cute decision. BUT THEN SHE HAS TO SPELL IT OUT FOR US. MULTIPLE TIMES. Like I promise we got it!!!! It wasn't subtle the first time!

All that aside, I did enjoy the writing and will probably be looking to read more from this author.

Some Shall Break by Ellie Marney

I actually only read this because I was in the mood for horror and it was one of the only things immediately available at the library. Shelved under horror. I read the first two paragraphs but not the back of it/synopsis and okay, lol, it's not the book's fault, but my thinking this was adult horror was soooooo wronggggg it's a YA thriller. It's the second book in a series about a young FBI consultant and this one has a copycat killer of the first one (I had not read the first one, LMAO).

As it went on I thought, oh, maybe it's older YA? Because the characters are very much young adults in the literal sense of the word, and some of the subjects tackled seemed adult-adjacent. But the way it handled those was... very YA... in the middle of everything you just got sentences like, this is not a reminder of her trauma! No..! She has simply never got to forget it! You deserve Love and Compassion and Support after experiencing trauma! Law enforcement sometimes doesn't do their jobs... Monstrous people don't necessarily look monstrous, innocence doesn't have a look!!!

^ I do not wish to appear mocking, I genuinely thought it was pretty cute and good for teens to learn this, it was just written in a way that was so.... "And Here's Your Next Life Lesson, Teen!"

The killer and his twin sister, Kristin, had an absolutely hilarious dynamic and they were definitely the highlight of the book for me. There were one too many plot conveniences... the setting is a little too vague (took me way too long to realise this is the 80s). But it was cute!

I liked how short the chapters started getting towards the end, it was a nice structural choice.

The Houseguest and Other Stories by Amparo Dávila, translated byMatthew Gleeson and Audrey Harris

Deserved the hype!!!!! I genuinely do not know how to discuss collections of short stories... These were surrealist and weird and great. Not all of them worked for me, but it was hilarious how I kept starting a story, being like, well it's all just okay I do not get the adoration, then I kept going and it was all ohhhhhhhhh never mind I do get it, this rules.

Proust and the Squid: The Story and Science of the Reading Brain by Maryanne Wolf

There were some really good bits in there, especially about dyslexia IIRC, but I kept wanting it to have more science. The bits about history were so oversimplified and largely well-known enough that I wasn't sure what their purpose was. I'll happily revisit this, though, there were some things that didn't stick and I would want them to stick.

Maskerade by Terry Pratchett

I read this because a friend liked it and wanted me to read it so we could discuss it. I have no thoughts. It was... fine? It was okay. Phantom of the Opera-y. It was easy to read and I could discuss stuff with friend (who also gave me some context since this is a series, LOL) and make her happy :) That's all I needed from it.

The Lamb by Lucy Rose

A child and her mother live in the woods and lure in people to eat them. I really wanted to like this book! Unfortunately, it was bad! The attempts at making the writing fairytale-esque or folkloric fell flat, themes of consumption and cannibalism only got a surface-level interrogation, and did I mention the writing was bad?

It just shoved in ideas around child abuse, the bystander effect, the yearning for love and satiation and its relationship to hunger and other human beings and for the most part just... left them there? Like, okay, can we explore a little deeper? Please? For me?

There were attempts to make realism break through the otherwise faux-folkloric tone (in part to make all of the above themes obvious), but by that point the book has asked us to suspend our disbelief so much that it is hard to take them seriously. This is set in modern day England! People kept going missing around the same area and it took a long while for anyone to even notice! In modern day!

Into the Wild by Jon Krakauer

The story about how Chris McCandless lived and died. Mostly died. Travelling through the Alaskan wilderness.

Well, other people who met the same fate are also brought up, and MORE IMPORTANTLY an anecdote from Krakakuer's own life is brought up, and I just have to sayyyy someone please get this man into nature writing. His writing SHINES when talking about places he's seen with his own two eyes. Also someone needs to pay him for epigraph-picking for other books, which needs to be its own job, because he's scarily good at it (and some authors are bad at framing their work as something in conversation with what they did choose...)

That aside, it's a fairly straightforward recounting of events and discussion with people who McCandless met in the years before dying. It really really REALLY wants you to know that going off into the wild without adequate preparation is bad and foolhardy, but I thought a sweet level of sympathy for McCandless remained. Maybe a little too much of it, TBH, but I also understand the urge, so who am I to speak.

The Iliac Crest by Cristina Rivera Garza, translated by Sarah Booker

A doctor at a sanatorium gets visited by two women, who start living in "his" house, and slowly his fixed view of the world comes apart.

Ms Garza I love youuuu I love your brain. Borders (between north and south, between countries, between male and female, between identities, between sanity and madness) are a door, not a wall!!! This was magnificent. I have no idea how to talk about it without bringing up pretty significant things that happen and that would be spoiling the experience, which is an EXPERIENCE I can promise that. The narrator starts as a point of authority, dismissive, all sorts of -ist, and slowly becomes persecuted. What/who is real? The rigidity of subjective reality! The obsession with that pelvic bone that takes the entire novel to resolve.

Having read Dávila’s work earlier, some references were reallyyyyyyy obvious, but I don't think it's a necessity... It was nice to see and recognise them, though! There were some historical references, notably this one (from the Translator's Note):

A final key reference should be noted to Mexico and its specific history. The North-South divide and the dynamics of border crossings are clear allusions in the novel, but another, perhaps more subtle, reference is to the historical figure Juan Escutia. Escutia was one of the six _Niños Héroes (boy heroes) who died defending Mexico against US military invasion at the Battle of Chapultepec in 1847. It is said that, attempting to keep the Mexican flag from falling into enemy hands, Escutia wrapped himself in the flag and jumped from the tower of Chapultepec Castle to his death.

Okay I leave with a quote from the book:

I stormed out the back door and headed straight for the ocean.

As I’ve said, you go there in order to cease knowing. To become intoxicated by the smell. To lose yourself. There, at the water’s edge, I concluded that, when all is said and done, if by some stroke of misfortune I actually was a woman, nothing would change. There was no reason for me to become sweeter or crueler. I continued walking down the beach, kicking stones, pausing to pick up seashells from time to time. Not any more serene or any more intimate. Not any more maternal or any more authoritarian. Nothing. Everything could continue to be the same. Everything was a rough mirror of the Self. And the words I had wanted to shout at the strangest visitor in the world began to accumulate in my ears. Their echoes blended with the noise of waves crashing against the cliffs. The squawking of the seagulls. So is this what it was all about? I asked myself suddenly, as if I could’ve come up with an appropriate response. In fact, I had no idea what I meant. Silence washed away my words and, with them, the feelings that had caused them to surface, the emotions that had validated them. My silence told me more about my new condition than any lecture my Emissary gave. And then, caught up in all that remained unsaid, I turned back.

And then I turned back.

Under the Banner of Heaven: A Story of Violent Faith by Jon Krakauer

Very informative for me, as I knew nothing about Mormonism before this. Also a very, very difficult read -- not in the way it's written, but the events detailed within.

Who Will Run the Frog Hospital? by Lorrie Moore

A woman reminisces about being fifteen with her at-the-time best friend, working at a park named Storyland. In the present, she's trying to not confront the fact that her marriage is failing, and while that is thematically important (as the author says, "There's that sense of being married, a bond that in heterosexual life is saved later for boys. It's not a conscious practicing of romantic love, but that is, in effect, what it turns out to be.") it is not given nearly as much weight as the story set during her teenage years.

One of the rare times I agree with the top-rated Goodreads review:

Frog Hospital -- which I love, love, love -- isn't a novel of great inventiveness, or scope, or wisdom. It is a book of breathtaking craft. Moore takes her stock-standard, ever-powerful themes -- innocence and its loss is the biggie -- and renders them in prose so perfect, so buffed and polished, that I want to pick up the sentences, quote them, put them under glass.

It's just SO insanely well-written! I have no other angle to rec this from, but I loved it.

The Lion Women of Tehran by Marjan Kamali

Now THIS book was awful. Lazy, badly written, under-researched, too impressed by itself.

In 1950s Tehran, the death of Ellie's father forces her and her mother to move downtown, losing their affluent bourgeois life. There, she meets Homa, they become very good friends despite her mother's disapproval (Homa is, gasp, a POOR!)

This book follows both their lives. I have ranted about it so much that my motivation to do so again has been taken out of me, although my general annoyance and anger haven't (& it'd be nice to have my thoughts written down somewhere). All the characters are one-note, the resolutions are lazy, Homa deserved a better friend, the book wanted to discuss politics but could not commit to that, so we get some wishy-washy statements in the middle of Ellie's preocuppations (which are all about rich people parties).

How flat everything was aside, a minor detail that bothered me was how Homa, self-proclaimed communist activist, hater of the Shah, just kept mentioning human rights, using that exact phrasing. Look, I'm no historian, I am open to being extremely wrong about this, but it felt really odd! The concept of human rights did not fall from the sky, and Ashraf Pahlavi, the Shah's TWIN SISTER, has been chairman of the United Nations Human Rights Commission. I looked up leaflets etc to the best of my ability and found a list of the Tudeh Party's (which is at least closer to the soc-dem-y side and I could see them using that phrasing more than other orgs of the era) pamphlets and none of them were talking about human rights.

A rare case of a book having zero redeeming qualities, for me. Amazing concept. Beyond piss-poor execution.

The Girl Who Trod on a Loaf by Kathryn Davis

MANY MANY thanks to aquietjune for the rec, because I would've likely never come across this otherwise, and it's hands down one of the best books I've read in my entire life.

Helle Ten Brix, a Danish composer who has moved to the US, wants to turn the fairytale of the same name as the title of the book into her last opera, but dies before finishing it. She leaves her estate to Frances' (the narrator's) twin girls, and to Frances herself (who now works as a waitress after her wealthy parents cast her out (after she fell victim to rape)) she leaves the unfinished opera. We follow along, trying to piece together Helle's life in the process.

I cannot even begin to describe how good this is. I really do not think you need to know anything about opera or music to enjoy this -- I didn't! -- but looking at other reviews, maybe the amount of detail is off-putting? But NOT TO MEEEEE, I loved it! Yes, sure, this is about art, but it is much more about WOMEN. No man could create Helle's operas!

A queer and pessimistic composition, it seemed to me, characteristically perverse in its view of the created world: God engages in endless replication of His form, the sextet suggests, but whatever diversity He appears to promote is limited by His overwhelming desire to see Himself wherever He looks, to be everything—this is the world “analogous to man’s imagining,” as Inger sings, and clearly we’re meant to understand that she’s making a crucial distinction, that the world as imagined by a woman might be completely different.

And the love between them! Not romantic (on Frances' side), but so, so present. Despite the amount of differences, their similarities win. The ending is insane. Or, well, an event near the ending, but also the ending itself. The human voice as an instrument. The richness of the language! The use of Scandinavian fairytales and other fairytale elements that exist within the narrative without being fairytale-esque. I could write an entire book about this book.

John Leonard, in his review, says:

All art, we are told, is about captivity and escape, and no art has ever saved anybody's life, and all artists are monsters. A grim message, maybe, but a brilliant orchestration.

Which I agree with! But also I disagree with, because I really do not think it's grim. This book is a treatise on the effects of art, on top of all the other things it is, so we can clearly see all the other results it has. It's just that being life-saving is not one of them.

The Dragonfly Sea by Yvonne Adhiambo Owuor

Oh, wow, what a book. This is both a positive and a negative statement, but the positive is very, very positive, so it outweighs everything else. This is mostly -- but not only -- Ayaana's story, a girl raised by a single mother on Pate Island, off the coast of Kenya. Her mother and the father she chose, Muhidin, also play a rather big role. We get to witness: ISIS recruitment in East Africa, American troops' involvement and their "war on terror", Chinese infrastructure (/the belt and road initiative) in full action, on top of rape, not-called-rape-but-it's-rape, human trafficking, refugee death, and honestly a bunch of other stuff that I either forget or do not really know how to warn for.

In the interest of Sino-African relations, at about the 20% mark Ayaana is declared a descendant of Zheng He and taken to Xiamen for her university studies. At that point and for about 150 whole ass pages the book is largely one cliche after another, which REALLYYYY brought my enjoyment down, and I went on reading based solely on the strength of the prose (which, to be fair, is pretty damn strong), and then it thankfully does improve again! In that it has its own identity again. While the author overall tries to treat everything sensitively, and I would say she largely succeeds, there were many sections where things go Exactly as you'd expect with the exact attitudes you'd expect and not nearly as much vibrancy as the parts of the book set in Pate. Tied to this, if the author wants you to know something about the morality of a character, she Will Let You Know.

But!!! Ayaana herself and her relationship to Muhidin and the things Muhidin taught her and the things they shared -- like a love for Rabi’a al-Adawiyya -- and her journey is so, so heartwarming, and then heartrending. I also loved how the book let the languages stand for themselves and didn't translate every single tiny thing (even if it had the beloathed italics for 'foreign' words) and just how much weight the sea carried. This truly is a novel about the sea!!! Ayaana is exactly as unconquerable as it is, and I loved seeing her journey. Definitely a rec!

Also, it can be hilarious, in a sad way:

Shu Ruolan was implementing a curriculum to prepare Ayaana for her “auspicious arrival.” In forty days, the Descendant should have knowledge of at least fifty characters. That first morning, Teacher Ruolan smiled at Ayaana, her neat teeth showing. “Now I show you.”

The ideogram: 非洲.

Sound: Fei zhou.

Teacher Ruolan formed 非洲. She broke it down for Ayaana: Fei: nothing, wrong, lacking, ugly, not. Zhou: being, state, country. Put together: Not Existing. A teensy giggle bubbled forth. “Oh dear.” A pause. “We continue.” A bold sequence of strokes produced 中国. Zhōngguó. “China!” she exclaimed. “Middle Kingdom. True. Beautiful.”

Ayaana watched. Ayaana listened. She imaged “Teacher” in Kipate: Ujinamizi. Nightmare. Noun.

Rangikura by Tayi Tibble

I'm trying to remember where I saw this recced so I can go up to that person and thank them.... Until I manage to do so, this is a vivid collection that makes a hobby out of suckerpunching you. Despite me reading the poems days and sometimes weeks apart I cried real tears from my real actual IRL eyes. Multiple times! The middle part is a short story.

On more minor notes: I knew exactly two Māori words before opening this, so there was a lottttt of googling to be done, but honestly, even without it, I don't think the feelings they evoke are at all diminished. It's more like unlocking yet another layer? And, at risk of sounding like a broken record across all my "reviews", I think some poems should've been shorter. Some other poems work great within the context of the collection, especially if you read more than one within the same day, but don't stand as strong on their own. (Which, hey, the poet is only turning 30 this year! She's very young! I'm very excited to see what else she comes out with.)

Copying the CWs from storygraph (although I'd argue that the minor ones are NOT minor):

Graphic: Eating disorder, Infidelity, Racism

Moderate: Domestic abuse, Drug use, Emotional abuse

Minor: Bullying, Pedophilia, Cultural appropriation

It Lasts Forever and Then It's Over by Anne de Marcken

This is a post-apocalyptic book from the POV of the zombie. Banger premise, right? Well, the book is mostly good, too! Yay!

There are lots of things I think it does well: the slow deterioration of self, for one. The descriptions of the environment are always a thousand times clearer than those of people, whether people in front of the main character or those in her memories. Said descriptions are also plentiful! The fragmentary nature of its structure complements this loss.

I also think the idea around it, of exploring grief and the cyclicality of time through someone undead, is very solid. It's just that... it went on for too long? This is an 130 page novella, it is really rather short already, but it should've been shorter. There are many, many paragraphs that introduce a concise, sharp idea in their first two sentences, and then they essentially rephrase that with zero additions four more times. It reads a bit like it doesn't trust the reader, unfortunately.

It's just so jarring! It was so close to being unbelievably good, it just needed to be cut down by about 40 pages.

I saw someone on Goodreads say that the crow was speaking in What3Words and I was unable to get it out of my head since, lol. Take a shot every time the words 'hunger' and 'grief' are mentioned. Actually, don't, because you'll die of alcohol poisoning.

I feel almost peaceful.

Blanketed in snow, its grime concealed, its makeshiftness smoothed, the gyre’s order and form are plain. Concentric rings of shelters and paths radiate out from the central clearing. A miniature medieval city state surrounded by perfectly white fields surrounded by the leafless filigree of lowland alders and maples surrounded by the darker, flocked forest of firs and pines and cedars rising to the hill’s crenelated ridge surrounded by clouds so low they catch in the ragged tops of trees.

I wonder what direction I am facing, if beyond those hills is the ocean, the dunes, the memory of you.

Not so bad to stay here forever, or for as long as passes for forever, until perhaps I die.

Kairos by Jenny Erpenbeck, translated by Michael Hofmann

Katrin comes for Katharina on her motorbike. The sight of beggars outside the cathedral is less surprising to Katharina today. Does one so quickly get used to being more fortunate than others?

A 19-year-old girl and a married 53-year-old man begin an affair in East Berlin 1986... Honestly, that sentence tells you all you need to know about the book. The relationship goes exactly as you'd expect and the political backdrop is exactly what you'd expect. I read a few interviews with the author and she says she wants to show a different side of the GDR, which I respect! And I think for the most part she succeeded! But, well... Actually first of all let me say that unlike many reviews I looked at, I found reading this to be wonderfully enjoyable. It's a very smooth book. Saw some people call the prose dense or convoluted and IMO IMHO for meeeeeee the reverse is true: the prose is TOO straightforward for its subject matter.

THAT SAID. 45% of the book takes place during that first year Hans and Katharina know each other, which I find baffling. The interesting part of the book is the setting! We can all tell how this relationship is going to go, there's no need to hit the cynical litfic romantic relationship beats! There's no need to drag us through the honeymoon period & very first red flags for so long -- they're obvious! And this isn't even a case where the reader might want to debate the merits of them being together vs the drawbacks etc etc, because Hans is a genuinely shitty person in so many ways. He's a serial cheater (bad but mild when compared to his worse 'sin':) and WAS IN THE HITLER YOUTH.

I think I sound like I'm dragging it but I genuinely found it super fun. Katharina was SOOO CUTEEEEE she's the first character I've been so taken by in so long... Look at her!!!

Usually, when they’re in the Arkade together and they get up to go, he fetches her coat for her, and helps her into it. And then she always puts it on frontwise to give him a little hug, before putting it on the right way around.

OHHH MY GOD SHE'S SO CUTE. She made getting through the 'nice' parts of this horrible relationship bearable and then once it takes a turn for the worse (gasp and shock) you just want to shake her... Girl, get up... Free yourself... I admit during the second half of the book there were passages I was skimming like crazy. I do NOT want to read about this terrible man! He's not even fun! He's well-educated and there are tons of references in the book (which didn't bother me. I read this as an ebook so googling was easy even though I knew only enough about music to see the difference in the kind of music namedropped in Hans scenes vs. scenes with her friends) and I can see the heart-eyes Katharina sent his way... but ehhh. (Also did I mention Katharina was super cute? Like she was so cute. My baby. If this was the kind of book to get a fandom she'd be my blorbo.)

Ok on more serious matters and SPOILERS like spoilery spoilers, epilogue spoilers (only in this paragraph): supposing I agree that this is an attempt to, ah, humanise the GDR & its population, I do not get the decision to make Hans a Stasi informant. It opens the book wide for an interpretation in which Katharina is the young, the breath of fresh air, the all-new experience (unification) and Hans is the old, suspicious, ~totalitarian~ state of the GDR. It validates the idea that East Germany was 100% bad. I obviously do not think that's the intent here, given [gesture at author interviews], I just... don't see what I'm missing?

The last 15% of the book is where it REALLY really picks up. The writing there is astonishing. I truly wish the entire book was like that, instead of confining itself to litfic cliches.

Fave part:

Aged eighteen, he had wanted to prove to himself and to mankind that he would have behaved differently. But would he have? Or was a human being just a container to be filled by time with whatever it happens to have handy? Did you have any control over what you saw in the mirror? Or was one helplessness merely succeeded by another? Any confession of guilt meant saying I, and not “human beings” or “one.” And there was no shopping street in the Western world where you could purchase such an I.