On Beauty - Zadie Smith

on beauty
zadie smith
c. 2005
443 pages
completed 9/9/2010

read for: before i die challenge, 1001 books, EW new classics

*may contain spoilers*

One may as well begin with Jerome's emails to his father.

Howard, a white British art history professor, is trying to make things right with his African American wife Kiki after she catches him in an affair. Their three children, Levi who is still in high school and Jerome and Zora who are attending college, are all trying to make sense of the world around them and their place in it.

I'm finding it really difficult to give a decent synopsis of this book. There was a lot going on. Each of the five family members had their own personal story taking place. And sometimes there were other people's stories thrown into the mix just for good measure. So it could take me a long time to really describe the basic plot. Instead, I will just say, thematically I think this books centers around discovering how you identify yourself and how that identity may clash with family. For example, Levi, the youngest child, identifies very strongly as African American. To Levi, being black is equal to being urban, unintellectual, and "street." Despite being raised in the suburbs in a intellectual household, Levi uses what he describes as street language as a way to connect with his heritage. His older siblings, though African American through their mother, were both born in England and don't have this same pull to be "black" the way Levi does.

Severe differences within the family led to a very difficult family dynamic. They were each on such different ends of all kinds of spectrums: white vs. black, British vs. American, intellectual vs. plebeian, religious vs. secular, artistic vs. realistic, among others. At times it really seemed like these people didn't know each other at all. The relationship between Levi and Howard was especially awkward to witness. They had absolutely nothing to say to each other. This leads me away from describing the book into talking about what I thought of it...

While thematically it was interesting, I hated every single character. This was a family who claimed to love each other and yet I could not get passed the complete disrespect they all displayed toward each other. I couldn't get behind any of the choices any of them made especially Howard. I find it hard to like a book when I don't like any of the people.

I also had trouble with the gaps in the story. By that I mean, an episode of the story would be happening, conflict would arise, and just when it looks like we're getting to the climax of the action, the chapter would end kind of cliffhanger-like and the next chapter would start several weeks or months later already well into the aftermath. I would have liked to have seen how things actually played out. And sometimes the issues or debates just petered out instead of coming to any kind of conclusion. For example, there is a major debate throughout the college Howard teaches at regarding "discretionaries" (underprivileged people not enrolled at the school but who are found by professors to show extraordinary promise in their field and who are then allowed to take class). Howard is for discretionaries, his professional rival is not. A lot of time is spent setting up this issue, but then instead of addressing it and coming to any kind of conclusion, something happens to make Howard's rival's opinion moot and so the whole thing just blows over. Also from the tone of the book, I think I come down on the wrong side of the debate.

I was interested in the themes and the story, but it kind of fell short for me. I wish I could have cared about any of the characters.

3/5

Oscar and Lucinda - Peter Carey

oscar and lucinda
peter carey
c. 1988
432 pages
completed 8/24/2010

read for: before i die challenge, 100 greatest novels, 1001 books

*may contain spoilers*

If there was a bishop, my mother would have him to tea.

Oscar Hopkins, a nervous and fidgety clergyman, was born to an English Evangelical minister, but left him to study the Anglican faith. Lucinda Leplastrier, an overtly modern feminist, was an unwitting heiress to a large fortune after her beloved Australian farm was sold off piecemeal by an accountant following the death of her parents mere months before Lucinda came of age. These two oddballs, square pegs living in a world of round holes, were drawn together by a mutual obsession with gambling, a compulsion that would lead to the ultimate wager that, in 1865 Australia, would change the course of their lives forever.

It took me a really long time to get through this book. I have a really frustrating issue with reading. No matter how much I am enjoying the story, the act of reading always makes me sleepy. I have no idea why! Because of this I often have to read in fairly small increments, no more than like 20-25 pages in one sitting. This can really make for slow going. And then, the longer the book is taking, the more frustrated I get. I wish I could figure out some way to not get so sleepy when I read.

To be completely honest, this was kind of a bizarre love story. Every single character, especially Oscar and Lucinda, were complete oddities. I couldn't help but laugh at the situations they would get themselves into, but then it would immediately become clear that they often had no idea how odd they were so while I was still laughing my heart would be breaking. These people were all equal parts hilarious and depressing. Which I guess was mirrored in the whole book itself. Equal parts hilarious and depressing. The best way I can think of to describe the tone of this book is quirky. Like I said, all the characters were total weirdos. This made certain characters, like Ian Wardley-Fish, totally endearing, and at the same time made other characters, like Mr. Jefferies, completely detestable. But it wasn't just the characters that were quirky, but the tone of the writing itself, its descriptions of places and people. For example, my favorite description of anyone in the novel, "Theophilius Hopkins was a moderately famous man. You can look him up in the 1860 Britannica. There are three full columns about his corals and his corallines, his anemones and starfish. It does not have anything very useful about the man. It does not tell you what he was like. You can read it three times over and never guess that he had any particular attitude to Christmas pudding." It was this attitude towards Christmas pudding that led to the rift between Theophilius Hopkins and his son Oscar.

Peter Carey has a very unique voice, though certain aspects of it kept reminding me of a wide variety of specific authors. For example, the quirky names and descriptions of people often made me think of Charles Dickens, whereas the matter-of-fact descriptions of certain body parts, functions, and ailments brought to mind Gabriel Garcia Marquez. Carey also uses a lot of words. I know that's a weird thing to say, but I mean...maybe I'm not sure exactly what I mean. The sentences were complex and the writing was often quite dense. But not in a bad way where it's hard to get past the language and into the story. If anything, I felt the density of the language only contributed to the story. Putting these different elements together lead to, as I said, a very unique voice.

Despite its humor and quirkiness, there are a lot of subjects addressed in this novel, such as 19th century feminism and the loneliness and ostricization (yes, I may have just made up that word) that came with such modern ideas. Lucinda was very much ahead of her time and was constantly thwarted and frustrated in her endeavors because of the limitations of her sex. The novel also focuses a great deal on religion, exploring different denominations of Christianity and the emergence of Darwinism. At least five prominent characters are vicars or ministers of some kind, all with differing views on their faith. Last month I posted a review of The Queen's Lady where I complained a lot about the way the author dealt with the complications of Christianity in Tudor England. I am happy to report that there will be no repetition of those complaints. Instead, I found Carey's examination of Victorian Christianity to be complex, intriguing, ambiguous and respectful. At no point did he try to say that any one idea was totally right or that any one idea was totally wrong. Everything was a valid idea.

Lastly, I should let my sister the librarian know that I will finally admit defeat and agree that "gewgaw" is a real word...albeit a stupid one.

5/5

Belong to Me - Marisa de los Santos

belong to me
marisa de los santos
c. 2008
388 pages
completed 5/23/2010

read for: before i die challenge

*may contain spoilers*

My fall from suburban grace, or, more accurately, my failure to achieve the merest molehill of suburban grace from which to fall, began with a dinner party and a perfectly innocent, modestly clever, and only faintly quirky remark about Armand Assante.

Belong to Me follows the story of three completely different individuals, Cornelia, Piper, and Dev. Cornelia is newly moved to the suburbs with her husband, but is an outcast due to her city ways. Piper, the queen bee of the suburban ladies, is dealing with her best friend's cancer and growing problems within her marriage. And Dev has just been dragged across the country by his mother, skipped two grades, and is beginning to question the whereabouts of his absent father. All three cross paths in a small suburb in Philadelphia, and while there may be nothing to initially bond them together their lives soon begin to intertwine.

I keep getting books that I put on my TBR list years ago and cannot for the life of me remember what would have induced me to want to read them. This book is no exception. I don't read a lot of "women's fiction" or anything set in a contemporary America. And (just like my last review, I might be a little bit crass here) I'm really not into "cancer books." Cancer really sucks, I know, but I don't want to read a whole book about how much it sucks. So I was extremely wary going in and was convinced that this book was going to be consumed by its cancer plot. Thankfully it was not. Yes, Piper's best friend Elizabeth had cancer, but her's was not the story being told. Instead Elizabeth's problems were just another part of Piper's life.

Each chapter in this book is told from the point of view of one of the three main characters. Cornelia is the only one who actually narrates which I thought was a little odd, but the other two are just as insightful into their respective characters. I was really surprised by how much I liked this book. It was funny and heartfelt, and I really enjoyed most of the characters. I never could quite get behind Lake. I was pretty put off by her even before the secret came out. I absolutely LOVED her son Dev, however. It was the third chapter when he was introduced, and it was this chapter where I began to be sure that I would enjoy this book. Really, I think it was just Dev's mention of Green Day. How could I not like a book where the main kid is introduced listening to Green Day as he is dragged across the country?

To be honest, I was least interested in Piper's storyline. I'm torn though because, while I could have done without her story, I loved HER. She starts out as just this horrible person that I would love to hate, but ended up being pretty okay. But her inner monologue was just hysterical, thinking about how short people try too hard or how she likened dealing with a friend who'd joined the world of runners with living with a friend who'd joined a cult or gained a recreational drug habit. Probably her best rant was against all things New Age "a heading under which she corralled crystals, chiropractors, ESP, yoga, Dr. Andrew Weil/Deepak Chopra, aromatic candles - excepting cinnamon and vanilla holiday candles - echinacea, singer/songwriter music, and the entire country of India." She kind of reminded me of myself in some ways. Not the way she acted or her specific likes and dislikes, but just the way her inner monologue sometimes went. I don't know...I don't think I can explain it. Anyway, surprisingly enough, I liked this book quite a bit.

4/5

The Adventures of David Simple - Sarah Fielding

the adventures of david simple
sarah fielding
c. 1744
282 pages (102 read)
stopped reading 4/26/2010

read for: before i die challenge, penguin classics

*may contain spoilers*

Mr. David Simple was the eldest son of Mr. Daniel Simple, who kept a Mercer's Shop on Ludgate Hill.

After the discovery of a major betrayal at the hands of his previously beloved brother, David Simple takes to the streets of London to try to find someone who could be completely worthy of the title "friend." Written as a commentary on social groupings of the day, David flits from group to group experiencing the myriad social trappings and failings.

Seeing as I didn't finish this book, I don't know if David ever found somebody worthy enough to be called a friend. To be totally honest, I hope he didn't. As he continued to judge and find fault with one person after another, all I could think was maybe David should have tried to bestow that title on himself. Not once in the 100 pages I read did he look in on himself and recognize his own similar shortcomings and vices. Maybe if he did he would be more likely to look past the foibles of others and appreciate what they had to offer. True friends accept you unconditionally. Though again, I didn't finish so maybe he did by the end. I doubt it, but you never know.

It's difficult for me to read early novels like these. I think there were still a lot of things that were being figured out about what the novel was supposed to be, so plot and character development were often a little thin. In their place was some major social commentary and satire. And for me, while that can be enjoyable and interesting, I can only deal with so much before something in the plot has to move forward. As nothing ever did, I decided to quit. Though that does make me feel like a failure.

1/5

The Road - Cormac McCarthy

the road
cormac mccarthy
c. 2006
256 pages (15 read)
stopped reading 3/29/2010

read for: before i die challenge, ew new classics

*may contain spoilers*

So normally my book policy is that I have to read 100 pages before I abandon a book. I feel that that gives me quite a bit of time to decide I really do hate something. Also, if it's a short book that I hate it's easy to convince myself to finish if I've already read 100 pages. I can't do that with this book. I just can't. It's amazing I got to page fifteen. Even with the fact that it took five days to read fifteen pages, normally I would push myself to keep going, but I can not tell you with any certainty a single thing that happened in those fifteen pages. I think there's a father and son and they have a shopping cart and maybe a tarp...but those details could have come from seeing the movie trailer not from reading the book. And surprise, surprise...I don't think it's the story's fault for me abandoning this so early. Even though I know that this is a post-apocalyptic story (which is something I normally avoid) I haven't gotten to enough story for that to possibly be the cause. Instead, I can't get past the author's writing choices. I'm sorry, but the English language has writing grammar and punctuation rules for a reason. I don't find it stylistic or in any way appealing when those things are so blatantly abandoned. I suppose there are exceptions (such as dialogue), but for an entire novel to be written without quotation marks for instance is too much for me to deal with. And so I choose not to put myself through the irritation of trying to read this book. Maybe I'll watch the movie in order to get to experience the story. Or maybe not.

1/5

Never Let Me Go - Kazuo Ishiguro

never let me go
kazuo ishiguro
c. 2005
288 pages
completed 2/14/2010

read for: before i die challenge, 1001 books

*may contain spoilers*

My name is Kathy H.

Set in England in the 1990s, Kathy H is now in her thirties. She has recently been reintroduced to two old friends from her childhood and adolescence, Ruth and Tommy, and she begins to look back over their time together and the way they grew up. On the surface, her memories consist of growing up in an idyllic boarding school, but there's something a little darker underneath, and it takes a while for Kathy and her friends to understand just exactly who they are.

I was extremely surprised I like this book. I went into it preparing myself to give it up after my required 100 pages, but by the end it was bordering on un-putdownable. Perhaps that is because the science fiction element of it was very much in the background. Just by reading the book jacket (and likewise my brief synopsis) you would have no idea this book is about clones. Unless, like me, you went to check the Answerer of all Life's Questions (also known as Wikipedia) to find the correct publication date and glanced at the book description. I don't think the word was mentioned until after the first 100 pages of the books and even then it was used extremely sparingly. Instead, the author created a vocabulary of euphemisms that society used to describe them, as a way for them to gloss over some of the unease. They weren't clones, they were "students" and later on "donors." They didn't die, they "completed." I assumed this was supposed to mean they completed their purpose in life.

I like to read other people's comments on books I've just read and I noticed a lot of the people who didn't like this book complained about the lack of science, and I think maybe those people missed the point of the book. I don't say that to be mean. I often feel like I am missing the point of the books I read. But while it had sci-fi undertones, I think the book was really about life and friendship and humanity. The book didn't go into the development of the clone technology, or how their "donated" organs cured cancer, or anything like that. There was no clone uprising at the end to show that science and technology will one day take over the world. Instead, the book focused on the mundane daily lives of these three people, on their humanity. The important thing to learn about these people isn't how they were created and for what purpose, but to understand them as people. They had hopes and dreams and fears and foibles like any other person, even though they were maybe created in a test tube. The book was not explosive and excitable the way someone might assume a sci-fi clone book would be. Instead, it was quietly melancholy, a bit bleak, and ended not with revolution but with a resigned outlook to a way of life.

4/5

The Book of Laughter and Forgetting - Milan Kundera

the book of laughter and forgetting
milan kundera
c. 1979
228 pages
completed 1/21/2010

read for: before i die challenge, 100 greatest novels, 1001 books

*may contain spoilers*

In February 1948, Communist leader Klement Gottwald stepped out on the balcony of a Baroque palace in Prague to address the hundreds of thousands of his fellow citizens packed into Old Town Square.

A series of short narratives, mostly set in and around Prague during the 1970s, united by the common themes of laughter and forgetting.

I have to be honest and say that I was a little bored with this book. There were some compelling elements, such as the authors conversation-like writing style. Oftentimes, the author explained some of his thought process, why he wrote a scene a certain way, and sometimes he would stop the fictional narrative completely and tell a personal anecdote to more fully complete a thought. Unfortunately, while I found this writing style extremely unique and engaging, the stories themselves were somewhat bland for me. The narratives were both extremely politically and sexually charged, but instead of being engaged in any of the stories I think I just found most of it odd. I will be the first to admit that I probably did not get everything out of this book that I was supposed to. I'm sure (partly from reading the review quotes on the back of the book) that a lot of this was supposed to be a commentary on the nature of forgetting, both politically and in our own lives, how we rewrite the past as how we want to see it. But I think some of that went over my head.

That being said, there were a few things that stood out to me and made me think a bit. There were a lot of discrepancies between how one person remembered events and how another person did. Each person had there own perspective of the past. In one story there was a woman who was desperate to get some old diaries back because she realized she was beginning to forget her life with her dead husband. There was a particular line I liked, about how she wanted to remember everything, both the good and the bad, "She has no desire to turn the past into poetry, she wants to give the past back its lost body. She is not compelled by a desire for beauty, she is compelled by a desire for life." I think maybe too often when things are gone we remember them in a different light than how we thought of them at the time. We turn memories from reality to "poetry" if you will.

I mostly get frustrated with books like this. I feel like I should have some profound opinions when I'm finished, but more often than not I don't. Instead I'm left thinking that the story (stories, in this case) weren't compelling enough to keep me entertained and that I'm not intellectually inclined enough to be stimulated by the true meanings of the book. But I keep trying.

3/5

Read the best books first...

Like I said, I've decided to quit all my challenges for the rest of 2009 and put all my focus on television school. However, I am having fun gearing up for the challenges of 2010, so much so that I have decided to sign up for my first one. So. FIRST CHALLENGE OF 2010 IS...(drum roll please)... BIBLIOPHILE BY THE SEA'S BOOKS TO READ BEFORE I DIE CHALLENGE! WOO WOO!! During 2010, choose between 10-20 books you have just always wanted to read but haven't gotten around to it yet. And then read them! For more rules, click the link above. I am choosing 12 books. One for each month of the year. I don't know why I like to do that. My 12 books are...

1. The Book of Laughter and Forgetting - Milan Kundera
2. Never Let Me Go - Kazuo Ishiguro
3. The Road - Cormac McCarthy
4. The Adventures of David Simple - Sarah Fielding
5. Belong to Me - Marisa de los Santos
6. Possession - AS Byatt
7. Oscar and Lucinda - Peter Carey
8. On Beauty - Zadie Smith
9. Beloved - Toni Morrison
10. Against Nature - Jori-Karl Huysmans
11. Moose: A Memoir of Fat Camp - Stephanie Klein
12. When Christ and His Saints Slept - Sharon Kay Penman

Let's hope 2010 goes better than 2009.