Books books books...
I should really get a dog and books icon now that we have dogs, not a cat...
I've occasionally tried really hard to read, like, and finish a book, and sometimes I've failed (most notably, with Kinky Friedman, when I actually returned the book to the store). Last night I finished a book that I'd really looked forward to, based on the title, and then by halfway through thought "Why am I bothering?" I have a feeling I missed some deep philosophical message, or some amazing literary breakthrough, as the author's been hailed as something along the lines of "this generation's Jane Austen." I liked Jane Austen.
I wanted to like Allegra Goodman, but I just couldn't, and I was glad I hadn't paid full price for the book. The Cookbook Collector sounded like a promising title, except that we don't get to the point of the title until a third of the way into the book, and then it's not about collecting cookbooks, it's about deciphering the collection of a guy who collected cookbooks. Nobody in the book ends up happy; Emily's boyfriend steals her idea for a software program, but she doesn't find out until he's been killed on American flight 11 on 9/11, and she can't handle the betrayal; she ends up starting another computer company that's going to get beaten by Facebook (which is SO brutally obvious in the story that it's pathetic); she just doesn't know it yet. There's a late, blatant, and clumsy attempt to say "isn't it nice how we're all connected" by making the two main characters, Emily and Jess, related to the Jewish families they keep meeting. Jess goes to work for George at a bookstore and after much strife, ends up married to him. There were so many threads in the story that I frequently got lost or couldn't figure out where one thread ended and another began. I read a lot. I read a lot of predictable fluff (thinking about Lilian Jackson Braun and other cozy mysteries) but I also read material with substance and complexity (thinking about GRRM), so I don't think it's a failure on my part to appreciate complexity and substance. I just thought the book fell flat.
On a lighter and more fun note, I read The Tainted Relic, by The Medieval Murderers (not kidding!) and enjoyed it enough to decide to read more collections (the authors who make up TMM are British mystery writers, some of whom I've already read and enjoyed, such as Susannah Gregory). The Bad Beat by Tod Goldberg would make another good script for a Burn Notice episode (and that's still a good thing). The Darling Dahlias and the Naked Ladies is another delightful entry in Susan Wittig Albert's newest series, although I will always and forever love China Bayles first of her characters. :) And Leann Sweeney, who writes the Yellow Rose mysteries, has a second series about Cats in Trouble; The Cat, the Quilt, and the Corpse; The Cat, the Professor, and the Poison; The Cat, the Lady, and the Liar are all very fun books. They made me miss having a cat, and having just finished a quilt I appreciated the descriptions of the character's quilting. :)
I've occasionally tried really hard to read, like, and finish a book, and sometimes I've failed (most notably, with Kinky Friedman, when I actually returned the book to the store). Last night I finished a book that I'd really looked forward to, based on the title, and then by halfway through thought "Why am I bothering?" I have a feeling I missed some deep philosophical message, or some amazing literary breakthrough, as the author's been hailed as something along the lines of "this generation's Jane Austen." I liked Jane Austen.
I wanted to like Allegra Goodman, but I just couldn't, and I was glad I hadn't paid full price for the book. The Cookbook Collector sounded like a promising title, except that we don't get to the point of the title until a third of the way into the book, and then it's not about collecting cookbooks, it's about deciphering the collection of a guy who collected cookbooks. Nobody in the book ends up happy; Emily's boyfriend steals her idea for a software program, but she doesn't find out until he's been killed on American flight 11 on 9/11, and she can't handle the betrayal; she ends up starting another computer company that's going to get beaten by Facebook (which is SO brutally obvious in the story that it's pathetic); she just doesn't know it yet. There's a late, blatant, and clumsy attempt to say "isn't it nice how we're all connected" by making the two main characters, Emily and Jess, related to the Jewish families they keep meeting. Jess goes to work for George at a bookstore and after much strife, ends up married to him. There were so many threads in the story that I frequently got lost or couldn't figure out where one thread ended and another began. I read a lot. I read a lot of predictable fluff (thinking about Lilian Jackson Braun and other cozy mysteries) but I also read material with substance and complexity (thinking about GRRM), so I don't think it's a failure on my part to appreciate complexity and substance. I just thought the book fell flat.
On a lighter and more fun note, I read The Tainted Relic, by The Medieval Murderers (not kidding!) and enjoyed it enough to decide to read more collections (the authors who make up TMM are British mystery writers, some of whom I've already read and enjoyed, such as Susannah Gregory). The Bad Beat by Tod Goldberg would make another good script for a Burn Notice episode (and that's still a good thing). The Darling Dahlias and the Naked Ladies is another delightful entry in Susan Wittig Albert's newest series, although I will always and forever love China Bayles first of her characters. :) And Leann Sweeney, who writes the Yellow Rose mysteries, has a second series about Cats in Trouble; The Cat, the Quilt, and the Corpse; The Cat, the Professor, and the Poison; The Cat, the Lady, and the Liar are all very fun books. They made me miss having a cat, and having just finished a quilt I appreciated the descriptions of the character's quilting. :)