Book Challenge, starting over

Apr 30, 2009 13:07

Who says the calendar year has to be the be-all-and-end-all? My goal is to read 50 books in a year, and dammit, I'll do it.

Beginning in April. Fine.

ahem. new reads are marked with a dash and rated out of five stars.

- 1. Promise Not to Tell, Jennifer McMahon. A local author (very local-- her daughter and my daughter are in Montessori school together) weaves a chilling story of murder and lies that spans two generations. ****

- 2. Island of the Lost Girls, Jennifer McMahon. A separate story from Promise, McMahon's second novel is superior to the first, and on it's own I think is better. I'd read this one first. It follows a very similar style to Promise, which makes it seem less original and more predictable-- a couple characters feel recycled, it alternates chapters past and present, and a couple twists are less surprising. It's like how Angels and Demons would have been better if I'd never read DaVinci Code. My advice is to read this book first, and only read Promise of you want more of the same style. ***** unless you read it second, and then ****

- 3. Twilight, Stephanie Myer. Really? Really? That was it, huh? (see longer review, below). *

4. Zero at the Bone, Jane Seville. I read it online, but what a trip to hold it in my hands! Congrats, Lori, and well done. It's still *****

- 5. New Moon, Stephanie Myers. I'll withhold the total review for when I finish the other two. I'm reading them for research, of course (much as I read the *entire* Left Behind series, and I assure you, those were far worse!), so that I can interface with teens and their parents and stuff. Yeah. And because it's a little like a train wreck and I have to see what happens next with Bella and her monster boys. But honestly, I have never encountered a more uninteresting narrator, a more drab and helpless damsel in distress 'heroine.' There was a moment in this second book where I thought Myers might have been better than I gave her credit for-- Bella admits to Edward that she bought the whole I'm-breaking-up-with-you-for-your-own-good thing because she never actually believed he loved her to begin with. She comes so close to saying it, just a little tweak, and she could have admitted "I don't think I deserve *anyone* to love me!" She could have voiced what about 75% of teenage girls feel (let alone teenage daughters of divorce), and given a great moment for reflection. The author might have hinted then that Bella is an unreliable narrator, and we shouldn't trust her description of herself. She isn't actually drab and helpless and uncoordinated and without talent or ambition or intelligence, she just *sees herself* that way. And she, in that moment, might begin to break through and see herself through another's eyes, to love and appreciate herself with a mere portion of the love others have for her. What a modern-day parable! What an inspiration for young women! But no. The conversation carries on and they kiss, leaving me to wonder along with Bella what the hell Edward does in fact see in her, and making me think that if there is someone who is drab and unimaginative and without talent, it's probably Myer.*

book lists, books, goal- track books, x goal- 50 books per calendar year, reviews

Previous post Next post
Up
[]