Books

Book 227: The Year of the Flood (MaddAddam #2) – Margaret Atwood

What a great continuation of this series! And for a middle novel of a trilogy it definitely held its own which is not always the case. I also enjoyed reading Atwood from a different angle, although it was only a tiny bit different from her other books.

As I mentioned in my Oryx and Crake review every book I’ve read by Atwood has a single narrator who tells their story through a series of flashbacks. This book continues that theme, but rather than it being the same narrator there are two narrators, Ren and Toby, in this book telling their stories.

However, there were again SO many similarities. Each of the narrators, similar to Snowman/Jimmy, experiences the post-apocalyptic world in isolation until about midway through the novel. So looking back at all the characters of Atwood, they’re all isolated (physically, mentally and emotionally) and they all tell their stories from their own perspective. But this is not a bad thing! Atwood gets into each of her character’s minds and creates believable and unique characters which are amazing mirrors of humanity.

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Books

Book 226: Oryx and Crake (MaddAddam #1) – Margaret Atwood

I honestly cannot remember the last time I devoured a book this quickly or the last time I was this excited about a series. Let’s put it this way, I’m desperately trying to think of people to recommend this book to I enjoyed it that much. And I have no doubt I will devour the next two books in this trilogy as rapidly did this first installment.

Having only ever read The Handmaid’s Tale and The Blind Assassin, It has clearly been some time since I read anything by Atwood. When I found out recently that she would be visiting Harvard Book Store to give a talk and read from her new book I KNEW I had to go see her if only to get my copy of The Handmaid’s Tale signed. She will be reading from her newest book MaddAddam and as I haven’t read the first two books in the MaddAddam trilogy I thought I probably should, so I picked up copies of Oryx and Crake and The Year of the Flood from the library and I am SO glad I did.

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Books

Book 224: Seating Arrangements – Maggie Shipstead

For a book that has this much hype I expected it to have a lot more impact upon completion. Perhaps I just didn’t understand it and the impact’s subtlety was lost on me. I will say re-reading the last line again increased the impact, but I honestly thought the denouement would be much more dramatic and or conclusive rather than sort of wishy-washy-ing its way to a finale.

Don’t get me wrong, this was not a bad book, it was incredibly well written and the number of lines that made me laugh out loud or that I had to re-read because of how beautiful written they were far outnumbered the issues I had with the book. What got me though is how little action there was in the book. It felt almost like a set of actions stuck on repeat. and that just didn’t do it for me. Thankfully the writing was so great that it pushed the story forward, but I’m still not sure about most of the hype for the book.

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Books

Book 223: The Secret Diaries of Charlotte Brontë – Syrie James

After thoroughly enjoying The Missing Manuscript of Jane Austen and The Lost Memoirs of Jane Austen, it will come as no surprise that I enjoyed this book as well! It also doesn’t hurt that I always forget how much I love the Brontës when I’m not reading about them and then as soon as I start reading about them I quickly fall back in love with them. I’m super excited that I’ve got Wuthering Heights to re-read again this year!

The only other Brontë fan-fiction I’ve read was Becoming Jane Eyre in February of last year. I remember enjoying it and of course there were overlaps with this book, as this book covers a lot broader swath of time than the last. This book covers a long period of time and through flashbacks even includes a lot of the Brontës’ youth. It is noteworthy, although not shocking at all, that there are many similarities in writing style and stories in the two books. We know a lot more about the Brontë siblings than we know about say Austen or the more reclusive female writers.

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Books, Quotes

Book 222: The Lost Memoirs of Jane Austen – Syrie James

Although I enjoyed this book I didn’t enjoy it quite as much as James’ The Missing Manuscript of Jane Austen. I’m not sure if James’ skills as an author increased, but I’m actually reading them in reverse order of her publishing the novels culminating in The Secret Diaries of Charlotte Brontë which is next on my reading list.

However, as with Missing Manuscript, James’ has a distinct ability to write as and embody Jane Austen. Many Austen fan-fiction novelists are able to mimic Austen, but I don’t feel are able to get into her psyche as well as James’ has shown she is capable over the last two novels. James takes snippets of fact and builds amazingly detailed stories around them and as a reader I couldn’t help but appreciate her ability to spin a believable story around the most basic and minimal facts.

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