The Lastest Ann Patchett Novel 💦🍒 and I am Tricked into Starting Another Trilogy ☹️ and It's a Good One😠🧵🪡

elegiac--a story told with sorrow

 I am in awe of Ann Patchett for many reasons. She co-owns a bookstore, loves opera, and is a successful novelist. She's living the dream. I have read almost everything she's written and vibe with her style a great deal. 

   Tom Lake is her latest novel. I listened to it on audio read by Meryl Streep. It was sublime. I received it in my Libby App but waited to start it. I knew the book would wreck me, and I needed to fortify myself against the elegiac thread stitched into Ann Patchett's prose and plucked powerfully by Meryl Streep. A writing teacher once told me suffering is plot. These women are masters of suffering. The combination of Patchett's writing and Streep's interpretation is devastating, but in the best way. I've seen Tom Lake described as the story of young love versus mature love, and I agree. What resonated for me was the love between mothers and daughters as it changes over time. Small children are physically consuming, teenagers are emotionally exhausting, and adult children are untethered from your ability to protect them. 

   The plot reminds me of nesting dolls. There is plot within plot within plot. It is the beginning of COVID, and Lara's three daughters, in their twenties, have returned home to the cherry farm in Michigan where they grew up. The book is told from Lara's perspective. As they work to hand pick sweet cherries, the daughters want to hear again about their mother's early life as an actress and her summer love affair with a not-yet-famous actor, Duke--the gritty details they've been too young to be told before now. There are many precarious minefields to navigate as the narrative moves between young aspiring actress Lara and the mature woman of fifty-eight Lara. Will the cherry farm stay afloat, or will it be destroyed by climate change? What daughters will stay? What does the future hold for the daughters? What was Lara's relationship with Duke? Why did she stop acting? Who does Lara love the most--her husband or her young love? What can she tell her daughters about her past? What needs to remain secret?  

   Tom Lake vibrates with symbolism and meaning that I won't fully understand until my fourth or fifth reading. There is much to be said about this book because it is wonderfully dense, like a great carrot cake filled with juicy raisins, bitter walnut pieces, and tender shreds of carrot, then covered with cream cheese frosting. So delicious and complex!

    I predict this will be the best book I read this year. 

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    My daughter recommended the book, This Woven Kingdom by Tahereh Mafi, and I'm glad she did. It is a well-done fantasy book full of adventure, magic, and intrigue. As I approached the end of the book, I wondered how will Mafi, who'd been crushing it, end this fantastic book? There only so many pages left to do it justice . . . *gasp*. It's a trilogy. And the final one has yet to come out. 

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    This Woven Kingdom reminds me of Cinderella. I wonder if Mafi had that in mind as her framework. It works well, but this isn't a Cinderella waiting to be rescued by a prince. Alizeh kicks butt. The story is told between Alizeh and the crown Prince, Kamran. There might be a bit of Romeo and Juliet going on as well. All these elements are skillfully blended into a crisp, fast-paced book stocked with likable characters trying to solve big problems with adeptness and tenacity. 

      These Infinite Threads is a worthy sequel to Tahereh Mafi's first book of her newest series, This Woven Kingdom. The characters grow in complexity, and while some problems are solved, larger ones arise. It continues to be fast-paced and attention-grabbing. My biggest complaint is Mafi likes to end her book on a giant cliffhanger. My subsequent complaint is the next one will be out sometime in 2024. My life is so hard. My reading life, at least.

🥹

🔮🪄❤️🧵🪡🧽🧹🧞‍♀️

Maybe Aliens, more HP, and a Family Saga

 

    This quirky book, Where the Forest Meets the Stars by Glendy Vanderah, was superb. A biology graduate student doing field research encounters a lost child who claims to be an alien inhabiting a dead child's body. The characters in this book are wonderfully broken and complex. The book asks a big question: what do you do with death and pain? Move closer or move away? I like where it landed--risking to care is costly, but worth it.

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  I avoid spoilers, but if you haven't read or seen the Harry Potter series, you probably have chosen not to. There are spoilers ahead. Also, I'm revisiting the Harry Potter series, so expect to see more HP posts in the future. This week I read Harry Potter and the Chamber of Secrets. It is instructional to see seeds of future story plots being planted. The tight plot of the entire series, is a lesson to writers.

 Knowing that Harry and Ginny end up together makes Ginny's early reactions to Harry hilarious. He was her crush for a long time. I thought Hermione and Harry were better suited to each other than Harry and Ginny, but as I reread HP and the Chamber of Secrets, I wonder if I'm not as right as I believe. I will probably say this as I reread through each Harry Potter book.

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   Family Lore by Elizabeth Acevedo was recommended to me as a family drama, and it does that exceptionally well. Acevedo weaves the stories of four magical sisters and two of their daughters into a gripping, wrenching, loving, heart-expanding tale that is hard to put down. Halfway through, I did put it down because of the graphic sex. It was too much for me, but I returned and finished it because the story was compelling, and I wanted to know what happened. It is a great book I'm not 100% happy I read.😐

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Baltimore, Hogwarts, and London 💔🧪🇬🇧🧙‍♂️

 

  R. Eric Thomas's book Kings of B'more--great double entendre of a title--takes place in and around Baltimore (B'more). The narration ping-pongs between two sixteen-year-old gay friends, Linus and Harrison. Linus is moving out of state in a few days and has yet to tell Harrison. An anxious soul, Harrison wants to give his friend, Linus, a final fantastic day together. I moved a lot growing up because my dad was in the military, and this book captures the poignancy of losing your best friend when you need each other most. Navigating growing up is better when you have someone who gets you, what you're going through, and is striving to "be more."  

🩳🌞☀️😎🚗🏳️‍🌈

 J. K. Rowling has become a controversial figure of late. Is that why Audible is offering her book Harry Potter and the Philosopher's Stone for free, if you're a member, through August 10th? https://www.audible.com/about/newsroom/stream-the-first-harry-potter-audiobook-free-on-audible-stories

  Jim Dale does an award-winning narration of a complex, many-character book. This book is always delightful. The characters are multilayered, with several storylines, and they are humorous and clever. I admire how the three friends work together, shoring up each other's weaknesses and celebrating each other's strengths. The despised child becoming the hero never gets old for me, and this is probably why I love A Wrinkle in Time, The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe, and Inkheart. 

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    The Lost Apothecary by Sarah Penner is her first novel. It is interesting and well researched--it is historical fiction, but it is too closely following a formula for its multiple plot lines. I found the main character too flawless. It also gets off to a slow start, but gains momentum. I think her subsequent novels will improve as she ventures out a little more into her own style. It is a worthwhile read, especially if you are an Anglophile. 

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Murder Mystery with Edgar Allan Poe 🐦‍⬛ and a Blah Romance 💔

 

    This week I read another excellent recommendation from a daughter, The Pale Blue Eye by Louis Bayard. It is a historical murder mystery centering around West Point in 1831. Retired New York constable Gus Landor has relocated to the Highlands for his failing health. He is called upon to solve a gruesome murder at West Point Academy, but he needs help from an insider. One presents himself--Cadet Poe, that would be Edgar Allen Poe. I gave this book five stars on  Goodreads because it is a masterful mystery. It captures the language and metaphors of the time. When Poe speaks or writes, it is with florid expressions and exactingly careful word choices that feel like his writing. I haven't read anything else by Bayard, but I'm curious if this is his imitation of Poe's voice or an extension of his own. Did he say to chatGPT, create a mystery in the voice of Edgar Allen Poe narrated by a grizzled former police officer set in 1831? I don't think so because it has an original voice and plot. It is dark, suspenseful, and gothically creepy. I admire what Bayard has crafted. I'm not alone. This novel won the Edgar Award in 2007. 

I think the book revolves around themes of death, revenge, poetry, and melodrama. It can be weighted down by its own words at times, but it has a rousing finish. 

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    Emily Hendry's newest story Happy Place sounded appealing. I had read one of her previous books, Book Lovers (https://barbpruittwrites.blogspot.com/search?q=Book+Lovers), and enjoyed it. Happy Place was disappointing. I found the characters uninspired. It starts with three college roommates, Harriet, Sidney, and Samatha, who bonded over their childhood hurts. From this inner circle, it grows to include their significant others who vacation yearly at a beach house in Maine. The house is being sold. They have spent a decade vacationing together, but this is their final summer. Everyone has secrets they're not telling, especially Harriet and her ex-financé, Wyn. They haven't told their best friends they've broken up. To make this final week perfect for everyone--but them--they decide to keep their split a secret and "act" like they're still together. Henry works hard on the atmosphere of Knott's Harbor, Maine, but the characters never animate, and the premise falls flat. There are some steamy encounters between Harriet and Wyn, but it feels gratuitous without the connection to back it up. 

☀️🌊⛱️ 💔❤️‍🩹❤️

A Week of Sci-Fi! 🛸👽🌵🤖🫖

 

    This week I got to read some of my favorite sci-fi authors. First was Connie Willis's newest book, The Road to Roswell. What I like about Willis is she writes stories that good-heartedly poke fun at things that people either disdain or are highly invested in, like time travel and clairvoyance. This one addresses alien conspiracy theories. Willis weaves several tropes together--road trip, romantic comedy, and The Code of the West --and creates a cohesive story stocked with zany characters. She must have spent COVID lockdown watching Alien and Cowboy movies because both are an intricate part of communicating with the tumbleweed alien that abducted her. It is a bit kitsch, but it's well-done kitsch.

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    A Prayer for the Crown-Shy by Becky Chambers is the second in her Monk and Robot series. It is short, but it doesn't feel brief, I think because the main characters Sibling Dex, a tea monk, and Mosscap, a robot on a quest, change and grow throughout the book. In the past, robots awakened (which I take to mean gained sentience) leading to a split with humans They haven't interacted for many years until Dex and Mosscap met in the forest. In this book, the two of them travel together and become deeper friends. I didn't understand the title until almost the end of the book, but it is a lovely metaphor. Even though I would characterize this as a gentle book, it wrestles with thorny themes like identity, family, purpose, and change.  I don't know if other Robot and Monk books are planned, but I hope so. Here is my review of the first book:  https://barbpruittwrites.blogspot.com/search?q=Becky+Chambers

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Tom Hanks, Bears, and Two Mysteries 🎞️ 🐻🔎🔍

 

 I like Tom Hanks because I'm not a monster. His novel The Making of Another Major Motion Picture Masterpiece is fun and informative. My involvement in movies is I've watched many from my couch. Tom Hanks's novel is a worthwhile read, but I find myself asking, would this have gotten published if the author wasn't Tom Hanks? Maybe not. The writing can be clunky; lots of description that doesn't further the plot, many simplistically rendered characters to keep track of. Though Hanks does try, his characters are either good guys or bad guys without much nuance or development. The book could have benefitted from multiple storylines and more tension. However, it was heartwarming. The good guys triumph, and the bad guys get their just desserts.

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  My daughter asked me to read Mama Bear Apologetics: Empowering Your Kids to Challenge Cultural Lies by Hillary Morgan Ferrer, General Editor. It was written by seven Christian women to address what our culture teaches about spirituality and thought trends. Something I've seen depicted is wealthy people are evil, and that is discussed in a chapter on Marxism. The book is well-researched, and the women are passionate about defending Christianity and safeguarding their children. The format is designed for a study or class with questions and action points. The book proposes teaching a "spit and chew" method of evaluating cultural messages--keep the pearls, spit out the swine. Talking with our kids about world views of the things they consume is a great idea. 

  I found the book's voice somewhat uneven as it jumped from author to author. The writing of one would be playful and jokey, and another would be deadly serious. Mama Bear would be a great book to read and discuss with others, but reading it on my own was a bit of a slog.

    One of the contributors is Alisa Childers. I reviewed her book, Another Gospel, here: https://barbpruittwrites.blogspot.com/search?q=Alisa+Childers  

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Sophomore effort, good continuation,

  Robert Thorogood's book Death Comes to Marlow is a good follow-up to his first effort. His characters are fleshed out with interesting backstories and problems. He keeps the tension throughout the book and even folds a crossword plotline. If you liked the first, you'll enjoy the second. 

Here is my review of the first book: https://barbpruittwrites.blogspot.com/search?q=Robert+

🦆😵🕵️‍♀️

Third in the series, madcap fun, 

  My murder mystery book club is reading the first in the series by Elle Cosimano, Finlay Donovan is Killing It (review here: https://barbpruittwrites.blogspot.com/search?q=Finlay+Donovan) for July, but I've been reading her latest book, Finlay Donovan Jumps the Gun. Cosimano's writing reminds me of Janet Evanovich, with crazy characters and madcap adventures. Finlay is a reluctant mystery solver propelled by circumstances, which adds to the insanity. 

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A Typical Week of Mystery and Fantasy 🧩🧞‍♂️

 

    The River of Silver by S. A. Chakraborty is related to The Daevabad Trilogy. This book contains chapters that didn't make it into the orignal and contains more back story or further adventures. I found the Daevabad Trilogy books  a sumptuous feast and The River of Silver to be a leftover crumbs. It less satisfying than the trilogy, but it you love the characters, and I do, some is better than none. 

Here are my reviews of the The City of Brass, The Kingdom of Copper, and The Empire of Gold: https://barbpruittwrites.blogspot.com/search?q=Daevabad 

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    Robert Thorogood's cozy murder mystery The Marlow Murder Club feels like a cousin of The Thursday Murder Club in that it is British and exceedingly entertaining. It features four women, each from a different generation, coming together to solve a series of murders in their town of Marlow. Thorogood combines the women's skills and speciality knowledge to catch the murderer. One is a dog walker who knows where everyone lives and is connected socially. Another is a young vicar's wife who is internet savvy and highly organized. A young female detective challenged to "figure it out" on a shrinking budget gives access to the forensic and background information. The ringleader is a 70-year-old eccentric who has a job setting crossword puzzles and has a masterful mind for mystery and odd clues. It is the first book of the series, and I'm looking forward to reading more. It is pleasantly diverting.

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Books about Home🏠🛖

 

    I suspect Gretchen Rubin isn't for everyone, but I like her. This week I read her book, Happier at Home: Kiss More, Jump More, Abandon a Project, Read Samuel Johnson, and My Other Experiments in the Practice of Everyday Life, and I liked it. This is a sequel to her book Happier which I reviewed here: theology-nihilism-and-self-help-or-im.html. She takes a large concept and breaks it down into pieces, and then explores each piece. She examines parenting, romance, interior design, and other things relating to the home. These are things that I am experiencing, and her book addresses my life right now.

"The pleasure of doing the same thing, in the same way, every day, shouldn't be overlooked. The things I do every day take on a certain beauty and provide a kind of invisible architecture to my life." 
― Gretchen Rubin, Happier at Home: Kiss More, Jump More, Abandon Self-Control, and My Other Experiments in Everyday Life

    Both books revolve around her Eight Splendid Truths (link here: https://gretchenrubin.com/articles/the-eight-splendid-truths-of-happiness/). What she has to say encourages me to thoughtfully consider this life of mine. 

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    Binti, Binti: Home, and Binti: The Night Masquerade, written by Nnedi Okarafor, are award-winning science fiction. The three books are more novellas than novels, but the story is rich and deep. With space science fiction, it is difficult to deviate from the formula of there's a war; how will the good guys win? Then a chosen one arises to bring order out of the chaos. The main character, Binti, a master harmonizer becomes more than she imagines or wants. Okarafor creates innovative characters that are fully orbed--they have desires and drives that are sometimes misunderstood, leading to unforeseen conflicts and consequences. I found the books absorbing and was so glad all three were available because it would have been hard to wait! 

    The central theme of her books is home--leaving, returning, and finding. Binti wants more than home can give her and her family wants her to stay. 

    Nnedi Okarafor's parents are from Nigeria, and she draws upon African culture to inspire her work. She coined the phrase African Futurism. Her work reminds me of Haruki Murakami, a Japanese science fiction writer, in its not-what-I-anticipated plots and characters. These will likely be the best science fiction books I read this year.

    The cover art on the three books is evocative of what happens on the pages, a great pairing of story and picture. 

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In🐙Celebration🐙of🐙Octopuses🐙

    This has been Octopus Week at my house. I read two books where octopuses (Not octopi because octopus is an English word rising from Greek, so it doesn't take a Latin plural. plural-octopus) were the main characters.

     Many years ago, when I was in Germany, I ordered seafood spaghetti. It came with several small, intact purple octopuses that were so unexpected and unusual my husband and I started laughing, causing a waiter to come over and check on us.  I remember them being delicious, but Sy Montgomery's book The Soul of an Octopus: A Surprising Exploration into the Wonder of Consciousness makes me sad to have eaten such an intelligent creature.  I enjoyed listening to Sy Montgomery narrate her book. During her research, she interacted with four Pacific octopuses at the New England Aquarium and visited octopuses in the wild. As a naturalist and a writer, her big question was, does an octopus have a soul or consciousness? The book displays a depth of research and also sincere contemplation. She conveys the different personalities of the octopuses she has befriended and moves them from scary monsters to fascinating specimens to intelligent companions.

   Octopuses are also amazing escape artists. Check out this video: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IveCcHnNGwo

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    It took a long time to read Remarkably Bright Creatures by Shelby Van Pelt even though it had been recommended by several significant people: my daughter, my sister, Anne Bogel, and finally, my writing mentor, and I wished I'd read it sooner. The writing is beautiful. The untraditional robust characters are endearing, wounded, and brave. The plot is unlike any other--it makes you long for a happy ending and lives outside the conventional formula enough to create the tension of uncertainty. It resembles A Man Called Ove, with an octopus playing the grumpy old man with a broken heart. As a child, some of my favorite books were about a connection between lonely humans and wise creatures, like Charlotte's Web and A Cricket in Times Square. Shelby Van Pelt has captured that element of magical realism those books contain. This might be one of the best books I've read this year.

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    Freebie: One of my favorite Sci-Fi writers, Adrian Tchaikovsky, has a space book featuring octopuses as astronauts. It is called Children of Ruin, and it's stunning.

    We Are the Brennans by Tracey Lange was on a list of juicy family dramas, a genre I didn't know I liked. I enjoy observing family's struggles and wondering how, or if they will resolve them. I think juicy family dramas make me wonder what a happy ending would look like? There is a saying that our secrets make us sick, meaning the power of the things we hide and conceal poison our relationships. I was not surprised to discover Tracey Lange has a degree in psychology. Many of her characters have shameful secrets that, as they're revealed, lead to good endings. We Are the Brennans isn't moralistic about therapy, but optimistic about the difficulties of living and loving others wrapped up in a well-told, entertaining story. 

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Familiar Authors, Newer Works

 

crass, funny, insightful, strange, cringe

    I have mixed feelings about reading David Sedaris and Carnival of Snackery: Diaries 2003-2020. Sedaris is masterful at comedic writing. He makes me laugh out loud. Part of his humor springs from observing how mean people can be to each other. He can gross me out talking about a seatmate who eats his boogers, tell crass jokes that offend me, and rail against George Bush continually, but he records his father's decline and his sister's death in its painful awfulness and brings tears to my eyes. We are very different and not so very different. 

    Here is a link to another Sedaris book I reviewed: https://barbpruittwrites.blogspot.com/2022/11/looking-for-humor-finding-something.html

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    I was fortunate to read the latest Louise Penny Inspector Armand Gamache novel, A World of Curiosities. If her writing is like her personality, I wouldn't mind meeting Louise Penny in real life. To sit at the Bistro in Three Pines and eat some of their delicious food while chatting would be amazing. As usual, Inspector Gamache ruminates deeply about his inner life, his monsters, and his motives. A hidden room is discovered in Three Pines containing odd, sinister artifacts. I liked this suspenseful book and was glad to revisit Three Pines, but it stretched my credulity at points--another mystery room? 

Here is a link to a previous Louise Penny review: https://barbpruittwrites.blogspot.com/search?q=Louise+Penny&max-results=20&by-date=true

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I Visit Ancient Rome and Communist China--Via Books

 

  If forced to say my favorite historical mystery writer, I'd give in easily. It's Lindsey Davis. I've been reading her excellent novels for over thirty years. In the Flavia Albia series, her eponymous protagonist is witty and intelligent, and the supporting cast is nutty. While Davis solves a mystery in each book, she also gives the next installment of Albia's life. In a previous book, on her wedding day, her new husband, Tiberius, was struck by lightning. Albia is a newlywed with a sick husband, moving into an unfurnished home while unexpectedly becoming the primary wage earner. She is relatable. Pandora's Boy is sixth in the Flavia Albia series. A fifteen-year-old girl mysteriously dies in her bed. The girl's father suspects poison and hires Albia to discover the truth. I've read a lot of mystery books, and I didn't anticipate the solution. The book is witty, clever, and a little naughty. There are many jokes about a statue of the Egyptian God of fertility Min. 

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  Dreams of Joy, by Lisa See, is the follow-on of Shanghai Girls. See writes vividly of life in China in the late 1950s. Her book feels authentic with sensory descriptions of the food, clothing, surroundings, and daily life. Nineteen-year-old Joy runs away to Communist China after learning her birth father lives there. Her mother, Pearl, follows to find Joy and bring her back. Mother and daughter become tangled in the political and economic turmoil of the time. I don't know much about Chinese history, but I remember a terrible famine. There are gruesome details of the horrendous things people do when starving. The women claim to be communists but still face persecution for being Imperialist Americans. Shanghai Girls describes the burden of American hostility and ill-treatment despite seeking to live as loyal Americans. Spoiler alert: Joy's adopted father kills himself, overwhelmed by being hounded by the FBI to confess to being a communist sympathizer. Dreams of Joy illustrate life under a totalitarian communist regime. As American Chinese, neither country entirely accepted them. See's characters fight for a good life free from fear and want in both nations. 

    To keep the grain crops from being eaten, Mao ordered farmers to bang pots continuously to scare away the sparrows until the birds died of exhaustion, leading to insects ravaging the crops. Pearl and Joy remind me of sparrows seeking rest, but being driven from place to place.

    I gave this book five stars on GoodReads.

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