December Reading
61. Three Junes
by Julia Glass
Genre: Fiction
Pages: 353
62. A Death in the Family
by James Agee
Genre: Fiction
Pages: 310
63. Chocolat
by Joanne Harris
Genre: Fiction
Pages: 242
64. The Optimist's Daughter
by Eudora Welty
Genre: Fiction
Pages: 180
65. Love Junkie
by Rachel Resnick
Genre: Memoir
Pages: 245
66. Queen of the Turtle Derby and Other Southern Phenomena
by Julia Reed
Genre: Non-fiction
Pages: 180
Possible Spoilers ahead: The main story of Three Junes is a beautiful and sad story of a gay man, David, who is coping with the fact that his neighbor, Mal, is dying of AIDS. David is terrified of the disease and even more terrified of love. This story is interlaced with David's return to his home country of Scotland following his father's death. David eventually comes to the realization that the difficult and demanding Mal was his best friend and the love of his life.
The main story is wonderful, but it is flanked by two novellas that felt extraneous to me. The first is about David's father traveling in Greece after the death of his mother. I was firmly in the point of view of the father and it took a while to realize that he wasn't coming back as a narrator. The third section, about a friend of David's ex-lover who is trying to decide how to tell her boyfriend that she's pregnant, seemed even more tacked on and unnecessary.
A Death in the Family, originally published in the 1950s and written even earlier, holds up well to the test of time. The scene in which the wife awaits the news of her husband's fate after a car accident was gut-wrenching and powerful. I felt like I was there, waiting for terrible news about a loved one. However, the writing was dense in places and I didn't connect with the book on an emotional level like I thought that I would.
Chocolat was good for the sort of fluffy, non-literary sort of book that it is. Vianne, who is a witch of sorts, arrives with her young daughter in a small French town and opens a chocolate shop. Her sensual, outsider ways began to change the lives of the townspeople and invokes the ire of the local priest. This is an enjoyable, light read, but one thing that confused me was when the novel was taking place. I remember reading a part about someone watching videos, but the idea of a priest being upset over people eating chocolate seems so bizarrely anachronistic that I assumed it couldn't be set anywhere near modern times. I suppose they couldn't have made a film if Vianne had come to town to open up a porno shop.
The Optimist's Daughter is a spare but perfect novel. Laurel McKelva Hand returns to New Orleans where her father, Judge McKelva, is dying. She must cope with her gold-digging, trashy, young stepmother, Fay, and with the past as she returns to her hometown in Mississippi. The details of small-town Southern culture are just right and I often found myself wanting to leap into the book and throttle Fay. I wanted the book to be longer and more detailed, but I wondered if that would have spoiled the "everything is exactly right" feeling that I had.
I had to edit this when I realized that I forgot Love Junkie, which is never a ringing endorsement. While I pitied the author for her terrible childhood, writing a memoir about your addiction to sex/unhealthy relationships is inherently sordid and probably not a good idea.
Queen of the Turtle Derby and Other Southern Phenomena is a fun book of essays about Southern culture that I had read before.
by Julia Glass
Genre: Fiction
Pages: 353
62. A Death in the Family
by James Agee
Genre: Fiction
Pages: 310
63. Chocolat
by Joanne Harris
Genre: Fiction
Pages: 242
64. The Optimist's Daughter
by Eudora Welty
Genre: Fiction
Pages: 180
65. Love Junkie
by Rachel Resnick
Genre: Memoir
Pages: 245
66. Queen of the Turtle Derby and Other Southern Phenomena
by Julia Reed
Genre: Non-fiction
Pages: 180
Possible Spoilers ahead: The main story of Three Junes is a beautiful and sad story of a gay man, David, who is coping with the fact that his neighbor, Mal, is dying of AIDS. David is terrified of the disease and even more terrified of love. This story is interlaced with David's return to his home country of Scotland following his father's death. David eventually comes to the realization that the difficult and demanding Mal was his best friend and the love of his life.
The main story is wonderful, but it is flanked by two novellas that felt extraneous to me. The first is about David's father traveling in Greece after the death of his mother. I was firmly in the point of view of the father and it took a while to realize that he wasn't coming back as a narrator. The third section, about a friend of David's ex-lover who is trying to decide how to tell her boyfriend that she's pregnant, seemed even more tacked on and unnecessary.
A Death in the Family, originally published in the 1950s and written even earlier, holds up well to the test of time. The scene in which the wife awaits the news of her husband's fate after a car accident was gut-wrenching and powerful. I felt like I was there, waiting for terrible news about a loved one. However, the writing was dense in places and I didn't connect with the book on an emotional level like I thought that I would.
Chocolat was good for the sort of fluffy, non-literary sort of book that it is. Vianne, who is a witch of sorts, arrives with her young daughter in a small French town and opens a chocolate shop. Her sensual, outsider ways began to change the lives of the townspeople and invokes the ire of the local priest. This is an enjoyable, light read, but one thing that confused me was when the novel was taking place. I remember reading a part about someone watching videos, but the idea of a priest being upset over people eating chocolate seems so bizarrely anachronistic that I assumed it couldn't be set anywhere near modern times. I suppose they couldn't have made a film if Vianne had come to town to open up a porno shop.
The Optimist's Daughter is a spare but perfect novel. Laurel McKelva Hand returns to New Orleans where her father, Judge McKelva, is dying. She must cope with her gold-digging, trashy, young stepmother, Fay, and with the past as she returns to her hometown in Mississippi. The details of small-town Southern culture are just right and I often found myself wanting to leap into the book and throttle Fay. I wanted the book to be longer and more detailed, but I wondered if that would have spoiled the "everything is exactly right" feeling that I had.
I had to edit this when I realized that I forgot Love Junkie, which is never a ringing endorsement. While I pitied the author for her terrible childhood, writing a memoir about your addiction to sex/unhealthy relationships is inherently sordid and probably not a good idea.
Queen of the Turtle Derby and Other Southern Phenomena is a fun book of essays about Southern culture that I had read before.