It's Monday again...what are you reading?

What happened this week? Nothing too exciting. There was work and school for David and life as usual. I am feeling in a bit of a reading slump, but perhaps not in the usual way. It's not that nothing is appealing - it's more like I feel that my reading pace is slower than usual. Does that ever happen to anyone? Any thoughts on a way to fix it?


Read This Week:

Swing Low: A Life
By Miriam Toews


Gone Missing
By Linda Castillo


Posts from this Past Week:
It's Monday
Reviews of Troubling A Star, Finishing the Hat, and Oryx and Crake

Still Reading:

Brick Lane
By Monica Ali

Up Next:

Outcasts United: A Refugee Team, An American Town
By Warren St. John


What are you reading this week?

Review: Oryx and Crake

Oryx and Crake

By Margaret Atwood

Anchor Books 2004

374 pages

From my shelves

Snowman is the last human on earth. Well, the last human of our kind. He is the guardian to a group of modified humans known as Crake's children. Snowman must set out on a journey to supplement his rapidly dwindling supplies. As he travels back to the place where the world changed forever, he thinks about his past and his love for a beautiful girl named Oryx and a brilliant and dangerous boy named Crake. 

We know from the beginning of the novel that the world has forever changed, but it takes a long time for us to understand exactly what those events were and how they came to pass. As Snowman goes back to his memories, he goes all the way back to his life as a small boy named Jimmy. He recalls living with a father married to his job as a scientist while his mother spirals into depression. He lives in a world divided, where the brilliant live tucked away in compounds where they can create new species and new medication. The rest of society lives in squalor controlled by the decisions of the elite. Although Jimmy does not excel in science, he becomes friends with a young man who goes by the name Crake. After college, Crake is drafted into the highest echelons of science and takes Jimmy with him. 

Oryx and Crake is, at times, not as compelling as some of Atwood's other stories. It lacks urgency, since we know what the end result will be from the first pages of the novel. But that doesn't mean it's not interesting. In the present, we see Snowman grapple with his humanity. What does it mean to be human in a world where you are the only one?  Can Snowman hold on to his sanity as he is haunted by the mocking whispers of those he loved best? In the past, Jimmy's world seems so distant but still eerily similar to our own. As scientific discovery increases, human interaction seems to be less of a priority for their society. 

I think what makes this story most gripping and terrifying is that it seems completely plausible. I could see how things could spiral out of control just as they do in this story. It gives its readers a lot to think about with regards to the ways in which power is held by a select few and the ways they can use that power to affect everyone. Can the same science meant for good also be used for evil? Who makes that distinction? Oryx and Crake may not be a novel you will speed through, but it is a story that will leave you thinking for a long time after you close its covers. 

P.S. If they are reading this, I'm wishing a very happy birthday to my best friend Becca and my sister Ashley! 

               

Review: Finishing the Hat

Finishing The Hat: Collected Lyrics, 1954 - 1981, With Attendant Comments, Principles, Heresies, Grudges, Whines, and Anecdotes 

By Stephen Sondheim

Alfred A. Knopf 2010

421 pages

From my shelves

Here are some things you should know about me before we get into the review part of this post. I was the star of our first grade play in school. I was the president of the drama club at my high school. I majored in theatre arts, along with English literature in college. So...theatre is sort of a thing for me. I am also slightly frustrated that blogger doesn't realize that theatre is the art form and the theater is the building. But I digress...

Stephen Sondheim is recognized as one of the greatest lyricists to work on Broadway. He has written lyrics, and in some cases the music as well, for shows as diverse as West Side Story, Sweeney Todd, Company, and Into the Woods (which you may recall I saw just a few weeks ago). In Finishing The Hat, a lyric from his musical Sunday in the Park with George, Sondheim looks back at each show he has worked on professionally. He meticulously analyzes what he did well and what he wishes in retrospect he could change. He also, as theatre people are wont to do, gives his readers the inside scoop on the difficulties of working with a group of temperamental artists. 

This is not a book you want to sit down and read through in a few days. This is a book to be savored, especially if you are familiar with many of Sondheim's musicals. Each chapter deals with one show and he includes all of the lyrics, including those that were eventually cut from the show. One of his greatest strengths in writing this book is his honesty. He is humble enough to admit the lines that still make him cringe to this day or the moments in which he took the easy way out as a writer. But he will also glory in what he views as his great successes, the turns of phrase that still make him smile. 

Sondheim sees no problem with analyzing the work of composers and lyricists who have come before him with the same brutal honesty that he dissects his own. That being said, he remains a classy and intelligent gentlemen and only contemplates the work of those who have already passed. He praises Oscar Hammerstein II, a man who he saw as mentor, but also points out his tendency to write flowery imagery that didn't quite make sense. While his insight can be laser sharp, it is never malicious. Through his critique of himself and other artists, this book becomes a sort of master class in the art of writing for the musical theatre. 

This book is a true gift to anyone who loves musicals and admires the work of Mr. Sondheim. Hearing his own thoughts about his work, accompanied by photographs and photocopies of Sondheim's original notes, gives the reader great insight into Sondheim's process as a writer and his passion for his work. Finishing the Hat is an invitation into the life and work of one of theatre's greatest. If you play the prologue from Into the Woods on repeat or love the dark genius of Sweeney Todd, this book will enhance your admiration of this talented musician/lyricist and his songs. 

Review: Troubling A Star

Troubling A Star

By Madeleine L'Engle

Bantam Doubleday 1994

296 pages

From my to-read shelf

Vicky Austin is feeling restless after returning to Connecticut from New York City. She wishes she could spend time with her friend Adam in the hopes that something more will develop, but Adam is on his way to a once in a lifetime internship. Instead, Vicky becomes close to Adam's Aunt Serena who makes her feel like one of the family. When Aunt Serena offers to send Vicky to Antarctica to have an amazing experience and meet up with Adam, she can't refuse. As Vicky prepares to leave, she receives threatening notes in her locker at school and becomes increasingly uncomfortable about how Serena's son died on a similar expedition. Vicky's trip will put her in danger beyond her imagination and show her amazing marvels that she will never forget.

Madeleine L'Engle is one of my favorite writers ever. Excuse me while I gush about her and her writing for a bit. Troubling A Star is what would be called YA literature today. Our protagonist, Vicky, is a high school student with normal problems but very unusual circumstances. She is a sister who feels intimidated by her younger sibling, who seems to have more ease with math, science, and social events. She is a girl hoping that a boy will see her as more than a friend. She is a student as interested in biology as she is Shakespeare and poetry. Vicky is a great everygirl protagonist.

There is so much happening in this small novel. It's a love story, a coming of age story, a mystery, and a thriller about the intersection of politics and science. Every time I read L'Engle, I appreciate the way she respects her readers. She is writing for teens and believes that they, like Vicky, will care about the effect that politics have on the Antarctic and its inhabitants. L'Engle writes characters who are smart and care about their families and friends. Best of all, she writes characters who are not defined by their romances. 

I love Madeleine L'Engle and while this is not my favorite of her novels, I enjoyed reading every page. This is the way I wish authors would write YA fiction today. The mystery is tense and surprising and there are interesting characters on every page. This is not a story about a romance, it is Vicky's story about the ways that she grows and changes because of her experiences. If you've never read L'Engle, pick up one of her books today. She is a writer you don't want to miss. 

It's Monday...how did that happen?

Hey there, friends! How are things going? This past week has been good. My sister was home this weekend for her birthday and it was wonderful to have the whole family together. We also went to back to school night at David's preschool this week. It was great to have the chance to really talk with his teacher and find out about all of the things he will be doing this semester. I did, however, have one of those obnoxious parenting moment when his teacher said that this class would prepare them to read but they wouldn't necessarily be reading by the end of the year. I may have given my husband a smirky sort of smile because our little guy already can. (End of obnoxious parent routine) 

Anyway, about the books...

Read This Week:

Finishing the Hat
By Stephen Sondheim


Troubling A Star
By Madeleine L'Engle



Oryx and Crake
By Margaret Atwood

Posts from this Past Week:
It's Monday
Wednesdays with David: Superhero School
Reviews of Madame Tussaud, The Great Good Thing, and Dune Road

Reading Now:

Swing Low: A Life
By Miriam Toews

Up Next:

Brick Lane
By Monica Ali

What are you reading this week?

Review: Dune Road

Dune Road

By Jane Green

Viking 2009

341 pages

From my shelves

Kit Hargrove is starting life over. She has divorced her distant Wall Street husband and found a beach side bungalow in Connecticut where she plans to put her life back together with her two kids. Kit finds a job through her neighbor as the assistant to the famous but reclusive writer Robert McClore. But just when Kit starts to find a rhythm, things start to fall apart. A mysterious woman shows up claiming a connection to Kit, something is wrong with a close friend, and Kit finds herself increasingly happy to see her ex in spite of the gorgeous man she has started dating. Dune Road is a look at the things that can break our relationships and the bonds that last through the hardest moments of life.

I started reading this book expecting something light but interesting. Ultimately, this one fell really flat for me. There were several moments where I wondered if this book had ever seen an editor before publication. The ways in which the characters spoke were so inconsistent - sometimes stilted and formal, but other times sounding like teenagers. What middle aged, divorced woman thinks "A date! A date! I have a date! And he's cute! Soooo cute! My ship may be coming in after all!"?

I also felt like Ms. Green began with a lot of really interesting ideas and then proceeded to give each and every one of her characters a really easy way out. Kit was a woman starting life over, but at the end of the book her life looks an awful lot like it did before the events of this book. Her friend Tracey has a secret past and the stakes could be so high for her character (and eventually for them all), but instead we get a tidy resolution without any real danger. Instead of creating an interesting relationship with the mysterious connection who shows up from Kit's past, she is exactly what they fear from the beginning.

This is not a terrible book. It's entertaining and it's a fast read. I was just disappointed because I could easily see the ways in which this book could be more. I have read some of her books before and as I started reading this one, I wondered if this was one of her first novels.  But Dune Road was published only a few years ago. While this would be an ok choice for a quick read, it's not Jane Green's best book. 

Review: The Great Good Thing

The Great Good Thing

By Roderick Townley

Turtleback Books 2001
216 pages

Borrowed from my sister

Sylvie is the princess of a beautiful kingdom. But she's a little different from most princesses. Sylvie is the princess in a storybook. When the covers open, Sylvie, her parents, and the other characters scramble to their places so they can act out their story yet again. When the book is closed, they go about the rest of their lives. But Sylvie is increasingly disinterested in their tale because it's always wonderful in the exact same way. But things are not as simple as they seem -  what if Sylvie can get out of the book and the reader can get in? 

This is a wonderful book. The plot is so imaginative and, while it is mainly targeted at children, I think it has a lot to say about the endurance of stories and how we bring a story to life as readers. It's a story that I could imagine reading aloud to young children, giving to them to read by themselves when they get older, and returning to again as an adult.

Sylvie is a great character. She does have a prince, but he is hardly mentioned in this story. In the original tale, Sylvie is promised to be married but refuses to do so until she achieves a great good thing. When the story goes as it should, she sets off on a series of adventures helping various animals and people in her kingdom. Even after her story changes and Sylvie is unsure of what she should do, her courage and determination to help others guide her choices. She's a great heroine and one you can feel good about sharing with your kids. 

The Great Good Thing was really reminiscent of Peter Pan for me. The reader in this story is named Claire. She loves Sylvie and her tale as a young girl, but as she gets older needs Sylvie's help to remember it. What happens to a story when no one reads it anymore? Sylvie comes out of the story so she can help Claire and her daughter remember. There are moments between Claire, her daughter, and the characters in this novel that remind you of Peter Pan when Wendy grows up and Peter comes back for her daughter.

The Great Good Thing is a story about our shared love for characters who inspire us and stories that stay with us for a lifetime. Roderick Townley should be commended for taking the fairy tale and giving it new life and new heart. While it is aimed at older children, this is one of those wonderful tales that will resonate with people of all ages who love to hear the words "once upon a time." 

Wednesdays with David: Superhero School

Superhero School

By Aaron Reynolds

Illustrated by Andy Rash

Bloomsbury 2009

From the library

The story: Leonard has always been an unusual kid. He has some special abilities, like super strength. When his mom enrolls him in superhero school, Leonard is ready to learn how to be a real hero. But his teacher, Mr. Tornado, seems to care more about multiplication and fractions than teaching his students to stop out of control trains or battle super villains. One day, Leonard and his classmates show up to school to find that Mr. Tornado and the other teachers have been kidnapped by the evil ice zombies! Can Leonard and his friends use their math skills and superhero abilities to save the day?

Mama opines: David got such a kick out of this book. There's a lot of action here for the kids and a wry sense of humor for mom or dad. I really liked that there were male and female students and teachers at the superhero school. As someone who is still a bit intimidated by math to this day, I'm glad to find books that remind David from an early age that math can be fun. 

Thoughts from David: Well, I like it because the superheroes used their heat vision to blast through the ice. And then I like it because they had no freezer burn…almost.

Favorite part: My favorite part is when they save the day. That’s what I like. The end. 

Happy Reading!

Review: Madame Tussaud

Madame Tussuad

By Michelle Moran

Crown Publishing December 2011

440 pages

Won from Lorren of The Story Girl

Marie Grosholtz works in the family business, creating wax figures and scenes that depict the most famous and infamous people in France. They are focused on keeping the family afloat and staying ahead of the news so that they can portray it within their museum, The Salon de Circe. When it is requested that Marie teach the art of wax sculpture to King Louis' sister, she sees it as an opportunity to find out what is going on with the royal family. As the people start to rise up against the monarchy, Marie has the unique position of straddling two worlds - the pomp and beauty of the royal palaces and the whispering and anger that take place among the revolutionaries plotting in her own home.

Michelle Moran does an excellent job of showing her readers an incredible amount of history without getting bogged down in facts. Because Marie is one of the few people who is incredibly present in the world of both the royal family and the revolutionaries, we get to know people on both sides. Everyone in this novel feels authentic and like a fully realized character, from Marie's brothers to the royal family to the revolutionaries Marie encounters as the unrest grows. 

This novel makes you really feel the peril of this time period. No one is safe. Through Marie's eyes, we can see how the folly of the king leads to the downfall of his family and how the court prevented the royal family from realizing what was really going on in their country. The revolutionaries themselves quickly spiral out of control and innocent people are being killed in the chaos that follows. There is constant fear of being named as a loyalist to the crown and hauled off to prison or to the guillotine. Marie finds herself on perilous footing as she tries to placate whoever is in power at that moment. Even if you know what happens to Marie, the feeling of danger is heightened throughout the novel for every character. 

Marie is a really interesting character. Her love for her family and her dedication to them is apparent on every page. She knows that they are in a precarious situation and will do anything to keep them safe. She also is proud of her successes in her field and looking for success and recognition. This puts her at odds with her desire for love with her neighbor Henri, a prominent scientist. While it is certainly a unique time period, the pull between success in work and happiness in personal life with a family is something that feels familiar to so many of us today.

Reading Madame Tussaud reminded me of why I love historical fiction. I loved learning about new people and times in history. Michelle Moran is a gifted writer and I stayed up much too late to finish this excellent novel. This is a book you don't want to miss. I look forward to reading the rest of Ms. Moran's novels very soon.

It's Monday, so what are you reading?

Hey everyone, how was your week? We're doing well around here. I'm working through my to-be-read shelf and keeping myself on a strict library ban. So far I've read five books from my shelf, but it doesn't look like I'm making too much progress. It might have something to do with the book loot I got last week or the giveaway I won this week...Oh well. What's a bibliophile to do? 

Read This Week:

Madame Tussaud

By Michelle Moran


The Great Good Thing
By Roderick Townley


Dune Road
By Jane Green

Posts From This Week:

It's Monday

Wednesdays with David: The Magic Tree House Series

Reviews of Gone to Ground, The Unlikely Pilgrimage of Harold Fry,
and The Discovery of Jeanne Baret 

Still Reading:

Finishing the Hat
By Stephen Sondheim

Up Next:

Troubling a Star
By Madeleine L'Engle

What did you read this week? 

Review: The Unlikely Pilgrimage of Harold Fry

The Unlikely Pilgrimage of Harold Fry

By Rachel Joyce

Random House July 2012

336 pages

From the library

My review is up at the Atlantic Highlands Herald. See you there?

Review: The Discovery of Jeanne Baret

The Discovery of Jeanne Baret: A Story of Science, the High Seas,

 and the First Woman to Circumnavigate the Globe

By Glynis Ridley 

Crown December 2010

252 pages

Won from Constance Reader

Jeanne Baret is a woman who accomplished incredible things in her time, but you didn’t learn about her in school. She left behind no written records of her thoughts, but her actions were integral to the fields of botany, medicine, and zoology. She was a woman of poor upbringing who is only represented in history with a birth certificate, marriage license, and death certificate. But Jeanne Baret was the first woman to brave the perils of the open sea (and its sailors) on a long expedition. She was the first woman to circumnavigate the world.

Baret was a poor woman who had something invaluable to the eminent botanist Philibert Commerson. She was a local herb woman and knew things about plants that Commerson would not find in any book. As they worked together, she became his mistress. Their lives and work became so intertwined that when Commerson was commissioned to collect samples during a voyage around the world, Baret disguised herself as a boy and accompanied him as his assistant. Their journey through new waters to encounter new plants, peoples, and lands is set down in careful detail in The Discovery of Jeanne Baret.

This book is one where the author makes a lot of assumptions. Because we have nothing directly from Baret and very little about her, Ridley has to pull a lot of loose details together. While this can be frustrating, I wonder what alternative we have in constructing historical narratives. Certainly it is important for us to learn about important historical figures, even if they fail to leave us their own versions of their stories. So perhaps this is the only way we can learn. Writers who use this technique assume that their readers are intelligent and willing to work for answers. While Ridley comes to many conclusions that seem tentative, she has to make decisions about what she thinks happened. And she assumes that you can likewise make your own decisions and will do the work to support your conclusions if they do not match hers.

At times, this book seems to lack some heart. Despite the evidence and the assertions that Ridley makes, it is difficult to feel that we really know our heroine. The men in her life who did leave personal records behind are not exactly shining stars themselves, so it is difficult to connect with them. But I have to conclude that reading books like this one is important. We need the ability to celebrate the men and women who achieved remarkable things in their lifetimes, even if they have been largely ignored in the annals of history. Jeanne Baret should be known, and remembered, for her courage, for her excellence in her field, and for the commitment she had to the people and subjects that mattered most to her. Even if we don’t know the details with certainty, it matters that we know that this one remarkable woman was the first to defy the social conventions of her time and sail around the world. 

Wednesdays with David: The Magic Tree House Series

The Magic Tree House Series

By Mary Pope Osborne

Mostly from our collection; some from the library

                                


The story: Jack and Annie are a brother and sister living in Pennsylvania. One day, they discover a mysterious tree house in the woods behind their house. The tree house is full of books and takes them to any place they point to. They soon discover that the tree house belongs to the magician Morgan Le Fay and she needs their help. Jack and Annie soon set off on adventures to the time of the dinosaurs, the time of pirates, and even to the moon!

Mama opines: I like that these books give a little bit of history in a way that the small people still find entertaining. David chose several books in this series as prizes during the summer reading contest at our library. They are short enough to read in one sitting, but have enough information that I feel as if he is really learning something about dinosaurs or knights.

Thoughts from David: I like it because there are tornadoes in it and I like the pirate one because the pirates want them to find the treasure because pirates like treasure. I like them because they are funny. My favorite one so far is Sunset of the Sabertooth. 

Do you have a favorite Magic Tree House book? 

Review: Gone to Ground

Gone to Ground

By Brandilyn Collins

B and H Books March 2012

321 pages

From my shelves

The small southern town of Amaryllis has been rocked by a series of murders. Older women living by themselves are stabbed once and left in their closets. No one is able to figure out who the murderer is, or the connection between the victims, even with the publicity of a Pulitzer prize winning series of articles that focus on the murders. Three very different women come across evidence that makes them suspect the murderer is someone they know. But which one is right?

Brandilyn Collins is the author of many thrillers and her pacing is excellent. The mystery moves quickly, with lots of uncertainty. There are three possible killers and each woman uncovers something that makes her believe that her husband, her boss, or her brother is the murderer. Collins switches perspective from one woman to the other and each time you are convinced that you know who the killer is, you realize that it must be someone else instead. 

That being said, I was disappointed in the characters. Our heroines are Cherrie Mae, an older black maid; Tully, a young wife who is very pregnant with her first child; and Deena, a hairdresser who cares for her handicapped brother. Honestly, I wanted more original characters. Must every novel set in the South deal with a sassy black maid and a poor white pregnant girl in an abusive relationship? That is not to say that these are not well-developed characters. They are fully realized by the author; I just wished they didn't feel like characters I had encountered a hundred times before.

I was also put off by Ms. Collins' attempt at replicating a Southern accent. She writes the women's speech as non-regionalized with the exception of a few chosen words. She is fond of having Cherrie Mae talk about "closing the doh" and "calling the police." It would have made more sense to fully commit to Southern accents for all of the women throughout their speech or to have no accent at all.

I enjoyed the main theme of this book, which was women working together. Although Cherrie Mae, Tully, and Deena hardly knew each other before the murders, they form an instant bond when it becomes apparent that they each suspect something or someone. It's refreshing to find female characters who are able to stand up for themselves and each other in times of crisis instead of being saved by a dashing male hero.

Gone to Ground is a taut mystery story that will leave you changing your mind about the killer from chapter to chapter. While the characters would benefit from some originality, you will find yourself rooting for them as you race through the pages to find out who is terrorizing their small town. 

It's Monday and Fall is in the air!

Hello, bookish friends! How are you? We had a good week around here. David had his first full week of Pre-K (three half days). I visited my best friend this weekend. In between multiple rounds of Dutch Blitz and many movies, we took a trip to Ukazoo Books in Towson. I got a great bunch of books for $15. They mostly sell used books, but they are all in great condition. If you live in the area, definitely check it out. It's a wonderful place. Here's my literary loot (not including the three books for David that have already been put on the little man's shelves).

Read This Week:

The Discovery of Jeanne Baret
By Glynis Ridley


Gone To Ground
By Brandilyn Collins

Posts from this Past Week:
It's Monday
August Wrapup
Reviews of  Tender Is the Night and The Red House

Reading Now:

Finishing The Hat
By Stephen Sondheim


Madame Tussaud
By Michelle Moran


What did you read this week?

Review: The Red House

The Red House

By Mark Haddon

Doubleday June 2012

264 pages

From the library

Angela is invited to spend a week at a country house with her brother Richard. The siblings are not close, and hope that the week together will be a way for their families (and the siblings themselves) to strengthen relationships and healing old wounds. Angela brings her husband Dominic, teenagers Alex and Daisy, and their young son Benjy. Richard is accompanied by his new wife Louisa and her teenage daughter Melissa. Author Mark Haddon sets the stage for grand family drama, new discoveries and the pain of old secrets.

This is my first time reading a novel by Mark Haddon. I have had The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Nightime on my to-read list for a long time. Someone wrote an intriguing review of Haddon’s new novel and I hopped into the queue at the library. I found Haddon’s style confusing and awkward. There are a lot of characters in the two families and each one gets some time. This means that by the time you are really interested in one, the perspective has changed. It often has multiple people's perspectives on the same page. Then Haddon is fond of throwing in excerpts from books, dreams, the past, and seemingly random ruminations. It can be confusing at times to figure out who the narrator is or what the stream of consciousness or book selection has to do with the story at large. The novel opens like this:

“Cooling towers and sewage farms. Frinstock, Charlbury, Ascott-under-Wychwood. Seventy miles per hour, the train unzips the fields. Two gun-gray lines beside the river’s meander. Flashes of sun on the hammered metal. Something of stream about it, even now. Hogwarts and Adlestrop. The night mail crossing the border. Cheyenne sweeping down from the right. Delta blues from the boxcar. Somewhere, those secret points that might just switch and send you curving into a world of uniformed porters and great-aunts and summers at the lake.”

Ultimately, I found this novel to be disappointing. I don’t mind working to understand a book, but I was working hard and finding myself underwhelmed anyway. I found myself ambivalent about characters who seemed to take one step forward and two steps back. Each time I thought that they were making progress towards strengthening a bond or overcoming a personal flaw, they run right back to where they started. Nothing really seems to change for these people – the same ghosts they experienced before (sometimes literally) are the same ones leaving the red vacation house with them.

It often feels as if Haddon is just throwing literary tricks at the wall to see what sticks. There is so much going on here that it is difficult to figure out where to begin or what parts of the novel really matter. I wish that Haddon had used his pages to take his characters through growth and change instead of filling the pages with too many literary tricks. 

Review: Tender Is the Night

Tender Is The Night

By F. Scott Fitzgerald

Charles Scribner and Sons 1934

313 pages

From the library

Dick Diver is a young psychiatrist who falls in love with a patient. Nicole is beautiful, brilliant, and a very broken young lady. This novel follows their marriage as Nicole goes through treatments, Dick gains notoriety in his field, and they travel to all of the most extravagant European vacation spots. When Nicole is feeling well and Dick isn't drinking, the couple draws people to their youth and beauty. One of those admirers is the young actress Rosemary Hoyt. Her presence in Dick and Nicole's lives is the beginning of the end of a very fragile marriage.

Tender Is the Night begins from Rosemary's point of view. We get to see Dick and Nicole in all their glory as they go from party to party among the wealthy and privileged people vacationing in Europe. Rosemary admires the beautiful and captivating Nicole, but falls in love with Dick. As she travels with them, she discovers that their perfection is only a cover for the trouble churning underneath. The perspective then changes to Dick in the beginning of his career, as he first meets Nicole. This change is tough to get into, and still somehow leaves the reader wanting more. I was curious about why we don't get a lot from Nicole's point of view. Despite ultimately being the story of their marriage, it's a rather one sided account. I suppose this makes sense since this novel, as usual with Fitzgerald, is heavily autobiographical. Fitzgerald is drawing on his own experiences partying through Europe with his family and his reaction to his own wife's mental illness.

This book could certainly be classified as a tragedy. You are watching a marriage dissolve before your eyes, slowly and painfully. The characters go through a complete reverse. When we get their earliest history, Nicole is a fragile shell of a woman, desperately needing Dick first as a doctor and then as her husband. As the story progresses, she starts to come into her own and it appears that there is not room in the relationship for two healthy individuals. Dick starts his own descent into alcoholism, ultimately ruining his career and his reputation. The couple find themselves slipping further away from each other with each passing day.

"There was little they dared talk about in these days; seldom did they find the right word when it counted, it arrived always a moment too late when one could not reach the other any more."

I had a hard time getting through this one this time around.This novel is about trying to escape unhappiness - through money, through travel, through affairs. I think the air of inevitability was really heavy and I found it difficult to read too much at a time. That doesn't mean that this isn't a beautiful novel. Out of all of Fitzgerald's novels, this one does the best job of showing the glitz and glamour of the rich and fabulous in juxtaposition to the pain it cannot alleviate and the problems it can cause. This is not a happy story, but it is a powerful story about the ways we scar each other and how we cannot save each other. 

August Wrap-Up

Summer is over? Can I please have some more? Actually, I am feeling ready for the cooler temperatures, some cozy sweaters and blankets, a nice cup of coffee with a piece of pumpkin pie....You get the idea.

How was your summer reading? Do you find you read more in the summer or in the cooler weather?

Books Reviewed in August: 11
Pages Read: 4093
Fiction/Non-fiction: 10/1
Female authors/male authors: 6/5
My books/library books: 2/9
Lindsey's favorite book in August: Angelmaker (honorable mentions go to The Fault in Our Stars and The Song of Achilles)

Books reviewed by David: 3
David's favorite book in August: The Fantastic Flying Books of Mr. Morris Lessmore

In honor of the fact that my little guy is having his first day of preschool today, I thought we would enjoy a little blast from the past...

What was the best book that you read in August?

It's Monday...Hi September!

Hey everyone! Happy September and Happy Labor Day! This has been another crazy hectic week here at the literary household. We went to the Franklin Institute on Monday with my sister and her boyfriend. David had a blast, especially in the train room and the outer space section. We had a busy week at work, David had a doctor's appointment on Thursday, and then he had a try out day at a local preschool. He starts on Tuesday! I am really excited for him and sad at the same time that our baby is so big...

We slowed down a bit this weekend, but I still only managed to finish one book this week. Oh well. 

Read This Week:

Tender Is The Night
By F. Scott Fitzgerald

Posts from this Past Week:
It's Monday
Wednesdays with David: Animals 1, Books 0
Reviews of The Siren of Paris, A Soft Place to Land, and The Song of Achilles

Reading Now:

The Discovery of Jeanne Baret
By Glynis Ridley

Up Next:

Gone To Ground
Brandilyn Collins


What are you reading this week?