April 2015 mini reviews

Mini Reviews April 2015

Dear Reader, Maybe it seems as if I haven't been reading much lately. That is decidedly NOT TRUE, but I have felt a little less eager to write long reviews (maybe it's the languorous summer days?), and I apologize for that! Amber gave me the great idea to write a single post about a few books that I've read but haven't reviewed this year. Please, no psychoanalyzing me! - I didn't choose to not review these for any specific or consistent reason. Sometimes it was because I was lazy. Sometimes it was because I was eager to crack the next book, and then I got so into it that I didn't recall what I had to say about the previous book. Sometimes? I just didn't have much to say about something I'd read, for whatever reason. So, apparently April was a BAD review month for me. Perhaps that had to do with my travel to Minneapolis for work and the planning of Candy Picnic (Amber's and my annual joint birthday party extravaganza! - I can't even begin to explain the amazingness). Perhaps it was other reasons (anxiety, busy with work, etc.?). Whatever the case, here are a few I finished that month but missed mentioning! The Wind-Up Bird Chronicle Haruki Murakami 4 / 5 I just could not bring myself to write a review of this book. There was so much to take in! I didn't love some of the magical realism (that is not really my jam), but I did love some of the characters and will not soon forget many of the stories which the book encompasses - especially those of the soldier in Mongolia. Ms. Marvel, Vol. 1 G. Willow Wilson (Author), Adrian Alphona (Artist) 5 / 5 I'd been meaning to pick this graphic novel up for ages, particularly since I have the poster of Ms. Marvel in my office (it's actually a poster for ACRL 2015, but I loved it so much I had to put it up). It could only go unread so long when I was flying the Ms. Marvel flag! So of course once I picked it up, I flew through it. I loved the humor, the amazing female lead, and the cast of side characters. The story felt real, and feminist, and, well, super. I definitely plan to continue with this series. Remains of the Day Kazuo Ishiguro 4.5 / 5 I really loved this book. I actually started writing a review of it several times. It had so much to say - about regret, about time, even about the disappearance of the British gentry following WWII. I really enjoyed the feel of the book - it reminded me of a more serious version of a Wodehouse novel - and the strong characters. I have to say I might have rated it 5 stars except for the ending, but that is kind of unfair, and I might have to revise that. Gorgeous and heartbreaking prose. Paper Towns John Green 2 / 5 I read this in my hotel room in Minneapolis. I don't know why I keep trying to read John Green - apparently he just doesn't do it for me. Even though I like him as a person (his YouTube channel is pretty great) and even do like the premises of his book! But his characters seriously grate on me. They are too pretentious and FAR too full of themselves. I will die happy if I never hear the name "Margo Roth Speigelman" again, and boy did I want to punch that incredibly selfish girl in the face at the end of the book. However, I did really like the concept of "paper towns" and the ideals behind the story itself - the main character was very sympathetic, and sounds like someone I would have wanted to be friends with in high school. And I understand very much dying to make a huge and life-altering change in high school! The world seems terribly narrow and impossibly huge at the same time. There was certainly a lot of beautiful sentiment in the book. It just didn't balance out enough for me, I suppose. Off to Be the Wizard Scott Meyer 4 / 5 Troy & I audiobooked this during several car rides. We loved it and laughed our heads off constantly! The narrator was also priceless. We still quote from or reference it from time to time, two months later. A totally worthwhile geek read. A very ecclectic collection, huh? I am actually fascinated by what stuck with me from those books, even months later. Ah, I love books. (Could you tell?) Yours, Arianna

Never Let Me Go

Never Let Me Go Kazuo Ishiguro 4 / 5	Published 2005 First Sentence "My name is Kathy H."
Publisher's Description: As children, Kathy, Ruth, and Tommy were students at Hailsham, an exclusive boarding school secluded in the English countryside. It was a place of mercurial cliques and mysterious rules where teachers were constantly reminding their charges of how special they were. Now, years later, Kathy is a young woman. Ruth and Tommy have reentered her life, and for the first time she is beginning to look back at their shared past and understand just what it is that makes them special--and how that gift will shape the rest of their time together.
Dear Reader, Well, this was my first Ishiguro (I have Remains of the Day lined up as well; I had difficulty deciding which audiobook to start with!) and I feel like there was definitely a lot of hype for it to live up to. Well-deserved hype, but...would I have loved this book just a little bit more had I stumbled across it, and not expected so much from it? Probably, yes. Because I think I DID love the book. It was charming and sentimental and I adored the conversational tone that Ishiguro wrote from Kathy H’s point of view - and I was quite impressed by the author’s ability to write young women! But. There was the expectation built in. Which really upsets me, because I enjoy reading books that people have already read & loved. It makes me feel certain that I will find something worthwhile in between the covers. (I defer often to the “wisdom of the crowd” on Goodreads!) And it does work out well that way - I don’t think I’ve ever read a book that I ended up hating that others adored. But, I have fallen into this situation several times, where too much hype makes me want more from a book than the book can give me. Le sigh! However. That is not to say I didn’t love this book! It had such a great concept (I feel as if I can’t spoil it, though! - so talking about this book will be mighty difficult). I give Ishiguro a lot of credit for taking a current trend and imagining a truly possible (and somewhat horrifying) future. I just wish I had come up with it, myself! He did a wonderful job with character development; I enjoyed how the reader grew up with the students at their private school. I wanted to befriend Kathy and I wanted to kick Ruth in the teeth for her manipulative ways. Tommy just always seemed rather...slow to me. Perhaps that was just how the reader portrayed him, but I really got the impression he was somewhat dimwitted. Maybe Ishiguro just meant to convey a feeling of innocence around that character, who knows.  And they were all so innocent of their actual futures. It was tragic, and certainly moving when they finally realized what was going on. You want desperately to believe that we, humanity, would never do such a horrific thing, but...it’s frighteningly easy to see that as one possible future for us. Man oh man.  Great slow reveal, and while the climax wasn’t terribly startling, it was a strong resolution to a long-running puzzle. I enjoyed this book and certainly look forward to more Ishiguro! Yours,  Arianna P.S. This isn’t related to the review, but wanna know one thing that really bothered me? The fake cassette tape that they sent out to promote the film adaptation looked NOTHING like Kathy H had described it. Why would they not recreate the image that the author had described, since it was his invention?!? So weird.

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