2013 book 310

Donna Tartt's The Goldfinch
I enjoyed Tartt's previous two books, but wouldn't call myself a die-hard fan or anything, and I wasn't in a rush to pick up this almost-800-page books, despite its appearance on most best-of-the-year lists. And it took me a couple of chapters to get into it--because, frankly, the plot is completely preposterous. But it was just so RIVETING! And an amazingly quick read for such a long book. Then, a little more than halfway through, it kind of turned into a novel about weak-willed rich New York assholes. Do people like that exist outside of novels? Frankly, I wish they wouldn't exist in novels either, because they're VERY tiresome.  And the protagonist . . . at first, he's impossibly sympathetic, but as he makes one horrible decision after another, you just want to shake him and scream, "GET YOUR LIFE TOGETHER, MAN!" Tartt does love her complicated and ineffectual protagonists! Despite the stellar writing, I honestly wasn't sure how Tartt was going to conclude this in a satisfying way--but she manages somehow. It is really annoying for a really long stretch, though. B+/A-.

2013 book 309

Sergei Lukyanenko's Night Watch
This is the first book in an internationally bestselling series making its way to America for the first time--it looks like the whole series will be released in the next few months, which on the one hand, YAY for not having to wait long to find out what happens next, and on the other--well, the translation is a bit awkward at times. (Also, I didn't realize this was first written in 1998, and couldn't figure out why the main character kept listening to a Discman, but now am mostly amused by that.)

Anyway, this is the story of Anton, a young guy who works for the Night Watch--an organization of various supernaturally gifted people dedicated to maintaining balance in the world between light and dark (the Night Watch are the Light ones, who keep an eye on their dark counterparts of the Day Watch). The worldbuilding here is fascinating, even though the plot is kind of all over the place--there's a young boy with strong powers, and a pretty doctor with a curse, and a talking owl, and some fairly convoluted machinations. The last third is also a lot weaker than the first two. But I really liked seeing a strongly Russian fantasy world, and loved all the concepts and most of the characters (more Tiger Cub and Yulia, please!). I'll definitely be reading the next one. B+.

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A review copy was provided by the publisher. This book will be released on December 31st.

2013 book 308

Suzanne Collins' Mockingjay
Ahhhh this book still makes me cry! I like how Collins allows a little bit of hope into her otherwise extremely grim finale. And we finally get to know a few more of the side characters, particularly Prim, who is SMART.  Also, Gale is a terrorist several times over, stop being on Team Gale. I honestly can't wait to see Jena Malone in this movie. She's amazing as Johanna (side note for book nerds: apparently she's also playing Carson McCullers in a biographical movie!). Anyway. I still think this is a fitting end to the series, and don't really know what disappointed readers expected after reading the first two.

2013 book 307

Suzanne Collins' Catching Fire
What I really admire about Collins with this series is how she is willing to really up the ante--and insanity--with every volume. The end of this book still makes my heart jump into my throat--and that's knowing everything that comes after! Really masterful plotting, I have to say, though obviously very heavy-handed. Still, it's rare to read a book about someone with PTSD--especially a YA book--and I was very relieved that the movie didn't shy away from showing Katniss' trauma. Though I /do/ wish they'd included a little training montage of Peeta and Katniss! And don't even get me started on Gale.

2013 book 306

Suzanne Collins' The Hunger Games
I made a concerted effort not to reread these before the Catching Fire movie came out, but seeing it (twice) made me want to! I'd forgotten how the narrative voice is kind of choppy and awkward--at least until the story gets completely insane and sucks you in. I wonder how this works as an audiobook--maybe the first-person narration is better that way? Anyway. I love this book, despite its flaws.

2013 book 305

Louise Penny's A Rule Against Murder
Much to my relief, the fourth Inspector Gamache book doesn't take place in the small town of Three Pines (though a few of its denizens show up eventually)--I just can't believe that one town would have so many murders! Instead, the action is set at a remote resort where Gamache and his wife are celebrating their anniversary; a large, rich, horribly dysfunctional family is also vacationing there and one of them is MURDERED! It's one of the more unusual murders I've ever read, too. There's also a lot revealed about Gamache's past, to good effect. I liked this one a lot. A-.

2013 book 304

Louise Penny's The Cruelest Month
I liked the third Inspector Gamache series a little bit less, mainly b/c there's a fair bit of malicious lying and lots of double-crossing going on. The central mystery is interesting enough--who scared a woman to death, and why?--though I am starting to wonder how one small idyllic town can have so many murders! Is it like the flu and murder is contagious? The whole police force vs Gamache thing came to a head in this one, which was a relief, too. B.

2013 book 303

Louise Penny's A Fatal Grace
The second book in the Inspector Gamache series is even better than the first (despite the presence of the annoying rookie from the last book, who does not work for me as a character at all). I really like the small town of Three Pines and its motley assortment of denizens, as well as Gamache and his team. There's just a palpable feeling of niceness about most of it--I mean, besides the murder of an aspiring lifestyle guru. But she's awful, so it's ok? There's also an interesting through-line about faith that I found really compelling. Maybe there are a few too many coincidences, and an apparently ongoing police power struggle is introduced here and left unresolved, but that just makes me more eager to read the next one! A-.

2013 book 302

Brigid Pasulka's The Sun and Other Stars
This book was beautiful. I say that as someone who knows next to nothing about soccer (and has even less interest in it), and as someone who has only the vaguest memories of Dante's Inferno from a college lit class. But somehow it's still just beautiful. It's the story of a young man, the son of a butcher in a small Italian village, whose brother died in an accident and whose mother committed suicide a year later. Then he meets a girl--the sister of a famous soccer player. Don't worry, this is not a book where a sad boy is rescued by a manic pixie dream girl--it is a book about a small town, and loss, and family, and friendship, and love. And soccer. Really well done. A.


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A review copy was provided by the publisher. This book will be released in February.

2013 book 301

Charles Finch's The September Society
The second Charles Lenox mystery finds Lenox investigating the mysterious disappearance of two Oxford students--which quickly turns out to be something more complicated. One plot point was obvious to the reader but annoyingly hard for Lenox to figure out, and the solution was honestly kind of silly. But the characters and setting were still enjoyable--I look forward to seeing Lenox train up an apprentice in subsequent books, and to more dinners with Thomas and Toto. B.

2013 book 300

Liane Moriarty's The Husband's Secret
For the past couple of years, my sister and I have had what we call Thanksgiving Sister Book Club, where we read a book we might not normally read and then chat about it over fro-yo (it's GREAT!). My sister had expressed some interest in reading this one, and though initially I was turned off by the title, the cover, and the premise, I realized Moriarty wrote a book I enjoyed and figured, what the heck. Butttttttt I really didn't like this book. It has three plotlines involving a bunch of intersecting characters--one involving the titular husband's secret, as revealed in a secret letter; another, involving a woman whose husband and cousin/best friend have fallen in love, and a third, involving a woman whose daughter was murdered almost 30 years earlier. But almost all the characters are somewhere between unbearable and reprehensible.  And I absolutely hated the end. The last line is soooo dumb. This book was written for the book groups that drink a lot of wine and shriek about crazy decisions made by the characters and their dysfunctional relationships. Which is fine, it's just not really my thing. C.

2013 book 299

Charles Finch's A Beautiful Blue Death
This is a perfectly serviceable historical mystery involving a gentleman in Victorian London who is am amateur detective, mainly b/c he's good at it and finds it interesting. Sure, why not! Anyway, his dear friend, the young widow next door (who seems like she'll become a love interest eventually), asks him to investigate the murder of her former housemaid, who now works in a house with a series of suspicious characters. Good characters here, and I like that Finch refers to past cases--it helps flesh out the world a little. I think these books will help me nicely kill time till a new CS Harris book comes out. B+.

2013 book 298

Louise Penny's Still Life
I've been hearing a lot of good things about the Inspector Gamache series--the latest one has made a bunch of year-end lists--and this first one was better than I expected. It involves the murder of an elderly woman in a small Canadian town and Penny really kept me guessing the whole time. Really good pacing and characters, barring the extremely annoying and grating rookie trying to prove herself. Otherwise, very solid mystery and I'll definitely be reading more in this series. A-/B+.

2013 book 297

Carrie Vaughn's Kitty Goes to Washington
The second Kitty Norville book finds Kitty in DC to testify at some Senate hearings about paranormal research. There's also some followup on the weird cult from the first book that claims to cure paranormal people, some interesting new characters (including an actual psychic, a kindly vampire queen, and a hot were-jaguar), and the usually muddled motivations from the bad guys. But that's ok--these are quick and fun reads and don't really need to be analyzed that much. B/B+.

2013 book 296

Carrie Vaughn's Kitty and the Midnight Hour
I really like what I've read of Vaughn's work--particularly After the Golden Age, which has a sequel coming out in January!!--so figured it was high time to check in with her long-running urban fantasy series, which seems to center on a werewolf with a late-night radio show. How did I wait so long to read it?! Anyway, it's not like exceptional or anything, and the bad guy's motivations are kind of all over the place, but it is really fun and I like the premise a lot. Plus, it's $1.99 for Kindle right now! B+.

2013 book 295

Kate Atkinson's Case Histories
Case Histories is one of those books that is always satisfying and always good, no matter how many times you read it. Even remembering all the details of the various cases, the way the story is structured makes it a great story. Not to mention Jackson Brodie and all the other characters. Remember what a revelation this book was when it came out? A literary mystery! And then Atkinson wrote three more! I am deeply grateful these books exist, because they always hit the spot.

2013 book 294

Benedict and Nancy Freedman's Mrs Mike
I think my life is complete now that Mrs Mike is available for Kindle, b/c my old childhood copy is falling apart. I read this SO many times when I was a kid--it was one of the many books that my mom loved and gave me to read. I thought it was SO romantic (both in terms of romantic love and romanticizing the wilderness lifestyle), though it is really, really grim at times (it's also very funny at times). It's about 16 year old Kathy, an Irish Bostonian, who travels up to Canada in 1907 for her health and immediately meets and marries a hot Mountie. Then they go deep into the wilds of Canada to start a life. It's (in theory) based on a true story! But, because it was written in 1947, it's amazingly racist/paternalistic about the indigenous population. So that's kind of a downer. Apparently a couple of sequels were written in the early 2000s, and they look terrible, so I'll just keep rereading this one over and over. Way better than the Little House books.

2013 book 293

Joshilyn Jackson's Someone Else's Love Story
The author's note at the beginning of this book signs off with "Shalom, y'all" and so right away I was like, two thumbs up! Trying to summarize the plot won't do it justice or make it sound appealing, so I'll just say a few things--it involves a young single mother, Shandi, who was a virgin when she got pregnant, and a man who's doing a poor job of recovering from a tragedy, and the unlikely way they meet. But like the title says, it's someone else's love story. I really like Jackson's books, and this may actually be my favorite of hers--not just for the Jewish content (Shandi is from an interfaith marriage that didn't last). Really, really compelling reading, amazing characters, and it all wraps up in a satisfying way. I accidentally took a long lunch today because I was so caught up in the story. A/A-.


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A review copy was provided by the publisher. This book is available now.

2013 book 292

Annabel Pitcher's Ketchup Clouds
Pitcher's latest (after My Sister Lives on the Mantelpiece) requires so much suspension of disbelief that I never really got past it. It's about a teenage girl in England involved in a love triangle with a pair of brothers--and look, teenage girls do a LOT of stupid things in the name of hormones, but I really can't believe that a girl who had an /amazing connection/ with one boy would keep hooking up with his brother once she realized who they were. Just, no. And also, this whole thing is told in letters to an American killer on death row (because apparently she killed one of the boys and got away with it), which, also, no. I mean, I like epistolary novels, but what teenage girl would spin her story in such a literary way--because you don't know which boy died. A teenage girl would not write letters in a way as to build suspense, right? It just kept throwing me out of things. It may have worked better as a diary kind of book. And then when the reveal finally comes, it's the most melodramatic reveal it could possibly be. Weirdly, the ending is then kind of nice, but in general, this book was not for me. I bet teenagers will eat it up though. B/B-.

2013 book 291

Brandon Sanderson's Steelheart
At Comic Book Book Club last month, the conversation turned to novels about superheroes (b/c dang, I love novels about superheroes) and one of the group members recommended this book to me. Of course, it's not really about superHEROES, but about superpowered individuals who have taken over--particularly one Steelheart, who rules over what I think is near-future Baltimore with an iron fist. Well, actually, more like a steel fist. Anyway--it's a superpowered dystopia! The protagonist is teenage David, whose father was killed by Steelheart a decade ago, and David's been planning his revenge ever since. He's determined to join up with a group of non-powered rebels to bring the powered villains down! I did like this a lot, but wish that David's crush on hot Megan (hotness is her main personality trait, unfortunately) had been a little more downplayed. Nothing is more annoying than a teenager pining over someone when he should be fighting bad guys with superpowers! Sanderson does bring a couple of interesting twists, though, and though there is a nice conclusion, there's room for a sequel that I'd definitely read. B+.