Reading 2017: Memorable Fiction Part 2
A previous post delineated a seven memorable novels I read in 2017, and here I present seven more books (not all novels) that somehow made their imprint.
One book, and now film, that's gotten plenty of attention is Fredrik Backman's A Man Called Ove. I'd already read his My Grandmother Sends her Regards and Apologies, and I'd heard enough about A Man Called Ove to not be put off by Ove. There was a lot of similar energy as in My Grandmother..., for instance the theme of human potential, that if you pay attention and listen, you'll learn why people are the way they are and perhaps discover hidden positive qualities. I especially enjoyed the driving and parking scenes, as I read this during the time that I did Czech driver's ed. Another work of Backman's that I read in 2017 was his novella And Every Morning the Way Home Gets Longer and Longer. Perhaps I appreciated this one even more, because I had no expectations about plot or content. The novella explores the relationship between a grandson and grandfather (and touches on the father and grandfather relationship) in the light of the grandfather's deteriorating memory/brain. The metaphors are keen, and in the short span of the novella, the unique relationships of all involved are portrayed in a touching, but not sentimental, way. I thought this was well-crafted.
An article in The New Yorker prompted me to find a copy of Jane Austen's unfinished work Sandition. It's not long, but there is all the evidence of it having potential to be another witty, intelligent novel. The absurd dialogue alone made it worth it. It made me have dreams where I thought that rather than breastfeeding Ella in the night I was actually reading Jane Austen aloud to her. If you're not into classics, read Sandition; you can say you've read Austen without investing much time. And if you happen to fall in love with Austen while reading it, well, is that such a bad thing?
Again I must give the What Should I Read Next Podcast the credit for my discovery of The Snow Child by Eowyn Ivey. I remember at some point reading a children's book of the same name, a translation of a Russian fairytale. This book takes that story, moves it to Alaska and expands it into a novel. The basis of the fairytale is that a childless elderly couple makes a little snowgirl in the winter that then comes to life and becomes like their own child. The ending of the fairytale is usually that the snow maiden melts somehow. In one version it was because she begged to feel love, but that the warmth of love melted her. In another version she melted jumping over a fire during a festival of spring. The versions are diverse, which makes the reader unsure how Eowyn Ivey will deal with it in her novel. She sets up the book with a middle-aged married couple has decided to build a new life in Alaska after years of infertility. A girl comes into her life in a mysterious way, and I appreciate how the book both does and doesn't follow the fairytale 100%. It retains anticipation as the reader wonders how the story will continue and end. One aspect that I particularly enjoyed was the Alaskan landscape, and how Ivey portrayed both nature and light.
Another good winter read is Snow Falling on Cedars by David Guterson. This was Anne Bogel's personal recommendation when I was on her podcast, and she chose rightly. This is set on a fictional island near the Puget Sound where many Japanese have settled, and a major aspect of the novel is prejudice against Japanese-Americans before, during, and after WWII. I loved how Guterson unfolded the histories of the people of the island. Details came out slowly, enlightening the reader bit by bit. The story jumps in time and place in a brilliant construction. He made me know and care about the characters to the point of causing me anxiety. As mentioned with The Snow Child, Guterson also portrays plants and the landscape with a detail I appreciate. (Don't worry, he doesn't get caught up with long descriptions; rather he calls plants what they are and writes of them knowledgeably.) There's a bit more sex than I like in a novel, but it's purposeful.
If I'm going to mention sex, I should probably mention two novels I read that were well-written and had interesting plot and character, yet which bothered me because of the amount and the nature of their sexual content. Those would be Simon Mauer's The Glass Room and Jonathan Safran Foer's Here I Am. The Glass Room is inspired by a villa in Brno (CZ), which was a landmark in modern architecture. Mauer's adroitly describes the villa and tramspprts the reader into the space. His portrayal of the build up to WWII is also thought-provoking as he shows how the characters react: denial, defiance, complaisance, etc. My issue with the novel was all of the unfaithfulness (and the sex therein). Yes, the unfaithfulness makes the drama of the novel and reveals a lot about the characters, but I just don't like reading about it. So chalk this one up as a well-written book that's not for me. I left my brand new copy in a neighborhood little library while in the USA. Safran Foer's Here I Am also had plenty of ingenuity in its structure, dialogue, character development, and plot-line, but there was the presence of fetish and sexting beyond my point of tolerance. I think Foer's a wonderful writer, but I just wish he could tame back the sexual content a bit.
So if you're looking or books that deal with relationships without much (if any) sexual content, I'd send you to Britain with any of the following three novels: The Guernsey Literary and Potato Peel Pie Society, Major Pettigrew's Last Stand, The Summer Before the War. The latter two were written by Helen Simonson and the former by Mary Ann Shaffer (with help from her niece Annie Barrows as she was too unwell to finish it alone). They had a bit of a similar feeling to me for various reasons including their humor, love stories that weren't too obnoxiously sweet, and leading ladies who were a bit rambunctious in their own ways. Guernsey... is probably the most serious of the three. I'd heard about this book and its cult-like following and it worked its magic on ms through the story and tone. It's a novel in letters, namely between Juliet Ashton, her publisher, her best friend, and various residents of the island of Guernsey. Set after WWII, the book explores the stories of the islanders and what they experienced during the war. It's delightful but not always light-hearted, as you get to know the tragic stories from the war. I read it in two days and would definitely read it again.
The Summer Before the War is set before and then during WWI in Sussex. I found myself intrigued by the examination of the civilian experience of the war. The attitudes of townspeople and the effects of the war on the community were experiences I hadn't given much time to thinking about before. I liked the diverse cast of characters and the dialogue (including its veiled insults). The dialogue was an aspect that I also enjoyed in Major Pettigrew's Last Stand (Though I will say that I enjoyed The Summer... more.) I'd heard the title and picked it up in a library book sale in the USA. The book begins with an unlikely friendship between two very different people who both happen to be late middle aged and widowed. Despite their different backgrounds, you discover commonality in their values and the pressures of familial expectation. It was the perfect travel read: interesting but not too heavy, written well enough, and easy to jump into.
Again I must give the What Should I Read Next Podcast the credit for my discovery of The Snow Child by Eowyn Ivey. I remember at some point reading a children's book of the same name, a translation of a Russian fairytale. This book takes that story, moves it to Alaska and expands it into a novel. The basis of the fairytale is that a childless elderly couple makes a little snowgirl in the winter that then comes to life and becomes like their own child. The ending of the fairytale is usually that the snow maiden melts somehow. In one version it was because she begged to feel love, but that the warmth of love melted her. In another version she melted jumping over a fire during a festival of spring. The versions are diverse, which makes the reader unsure how Eowyn Ivey will deal with it in her novel. She sets up the book with a middle-aged married couple has decided to build a new life in Alaska after years of infertility. A girl comes into her life in a mysterious way, and I appreciate how the book both does and doesn't follow the fairytale 100%. It retains anticipation as the reader wonders how the story will continue and end. One aspect that I particularly enjoyed was the Alaskan landscape, and how Ivey portrayed both nature and light.
Another good winter read is Snow Falling on Cedars by David Guterson. This was Anne Bogel's personal recommendation when I was on her podcast, and she chose rightly. This is set on a fictional island near the Puget Sound where many Japanese have settled, and a major aspect of the novel is prejudice against Japanese-Americans before, during, and after WWII. I loved how Guterson unfolded the histories of the people of the island. Details came out slowly, enlightening the reader bit by bit. The story jumps in time and place in a brilliant construction. He made me know and care about the characters to the point of causing me anxiety. As mentioned with The Snow Child, Guterson also portrays plants and the landscape with a detail I appreciate. (Don't worry, he doesn't get caught up with long descriptions; rather he calls plants what they are and writes of them knowledgeably.) There's a bit more sex than I like in a novel, but it's purposeful.
If I'm going to mention sex, I should probably mention two novels I read that were well-written and had interesting plot and character, yet which bothered me because of the amount and the nature of their sexual content. Those would be Simon Mauer's The Glass Room and Jonathan Safran Foer's Here I Am. The Glass Room is inspired by a villa in Brno (CZ), which was a landmark in modern architecture. Mauer's adroitly describes the villa and tramspprts the reader into the space. His portrayal of the build up to WWII is also thought-provoking as he shows how the characters react: denial, defiance, complaisance, etc. My issue with the novel was all of the unfaithfulness (and the sex therein). Yes, the unfaithfulness makes the drama of the novel and reveals a lot about the characters, but I just don't like reading about it. So chalk this one up as a well-written book that's not for me. I left my brand new copy in a neighborhood little library while in the USA. Safran Foer's Here I Am also had plenty of ingenuity in its structure, dialogue, character development, and plot-line, but there was the presence of fetish and sexting beyond my point of tolerance. I think Foer's a wonderful writer, but I just wish he could tame back the sexual content a bit.
So if you're looking or books that deal with relationships without much (if any) sexual content, I'd send you to Britain with any of the following three novels: The Guernsey Literary and Potato Peel Pie Society, Major Pettigrew's Last Stand, The Summer Before the War. The latter two were written by Helen Simonson and the former by Mary Ann Shaffer (with help from her niece Annie Barrows as she was too unwell to finish it alone). They had a bit of a similar feeling to me for various reasons including their humor, love stories that weren't too obnoxiously sweet, and leading ladies who were a bit rambunctious in their own ways. Guernsey... is probably the most serious of the three. I'd heard about this book and its cult-like following and it worked its magic on ms through the story and tone. It's a novel in letters, namely between Juliet Ashton, her publisher, her best friend, and various residents of the island of Guernsey. Set after WWII, the book explores the stories of the islanders and what they experienced during the war. It's delightful but not always light-hearted, as you get to know the tragic stories from the war. I read it in two days and would definitely read it again.
The Summer Before the War is set before and then during WWI in Sussex. I found myself intrigued by the examination of the civilian experience of the war. The attitudes of townspeople and the effects of the war on the community were experiences I hadn't given much time to thinking about before. I liked the diverse cast of characters and the dialogue (including its veiled insults). The dialogue was an aspect that I also enjoyed in Major Pettigrew's Last Stand (Though I will say that I enjoyed The Summer... more.) I'd heard the title and picked it up in a library book sale in the USA. The book begins with an unlikely friendship between two very different people who both happen to be late middle aged and widowed. Despite their different backgrounds, you discover commonality in their values and the pressures of familial expectation. It was the perfect travel read: interesting but not too heavy, written well enough, and easy to jump into.
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