a whole pile of book recs

[causeways]

I was just reading lyra_wing's post where she mentioned Little Women and WHY did Jo and Laurie not get together? And then I was reading wendy's post mentioning Unwind, which I have not read but sounds all kinds of intriguing (YA sci-fi -- excerpt on Amazon is here). And suddenly all kinds of things are pinging in my head, about YA and love stories and books, and

Comments

[macbyrne]

Totally agree with you on Wizard and Glass; I remember when SK was struck by that van b/n W&G and WotC, and I was FREAKING OUT that he wouldn't live to finish the series; I followed that series for twenty years; LITERALLY. SK was one of the first authors I started reading voraciously, and I continue to read his works to this day, but The Dark Tower is definitely his masterpiece; I loved W&G, b/c I loved the peeks we got into a young Roland in the first three books, and to see this much of him was like expecting to get a peanut butter sandwich for supper and instead getting a four course meal!!! I don't think I ever cried as hard as I did at the end of that book!

[causeways]

Yeah, there are some books of his that I love, and some that I'm like, "Really? You wrote that?" I liked WotC a whole lot (although I was pretty eh on Father Callahan's Big Gay Love, hilariously enough, since by then I was all for the Big Gay Love in general) but Wizard and Glass, maaan. There's a reason Roland's so fucked up, and not all of it is because of what happened with Susan, but YIKES nonetheless.

[slob_child]

I loved The Giver! We read it when I was tiny, in one of my elementary classes, and it stuck with me. I have heard it said that the Logan series (Logan's Run, etc) sort of deals with similar themes, only with grown ups. I'm not sure on this by any means, but it's what I've heard, so. For YA apocalyptic-ness, I like Garth Nix's Shade's Children and Isobelle Carmody's Obernewtyn series. Both are intensely creepy and amazing.

Re. Margaret Atwood - I actually dislike her quite a bit. I've read a lot of her older books (Handmaid, Surfacing, Robber Bride, Cat's Eye, etc), and poetry, and even picked up Oryx and Crake but couldn't finish it. I never quite knew why I had this aversion to her, but I recently found out that in the Canadian literary circles she's known to be a bit racist, so maybe that was part of it? *shrug*

I'm going to keep my eye open for The Rapture of Canaan; thanks so much for the rec!

[subterrain]

Sorry for eavesdropping, but WHAT? MADGE IS A RACIST NOW? Seriously, you have to tell me where you read that, because you are blowing my mind. O.O

[slob_child]

Hahaha, uh, actually it's kind of well known in Canadian literary circles. Uh, if you read her text Survival, which is admittedly dated now, she denies the problem of the Japanese concentration camps, 'the plight of the Japanese'. She also told Nourbese Philip that Philip's audience "doesn't know how to read" - like, not that they were illiterate, but that they didn't know how to understand what they were reading. She and Philip have an antagonistic relationship, or so I've heard from some Canadian scholars. The criticism against Atwood is basically that, like, she's the token female author in the CanLit canon and that a lot of her attitudes are the same as the overall patriarchal literary dominating force.

Don't take anything I say as gospel, though! She might not be racist? I just find it telling that writing as an author of a country renown for multiculturalism, her characters are predominantly white - or at least of the texts of hers I've read. Compellingly written, but yeah.

[subterrain]

Honestly, I'm just astounded that I've never heard that criticism of her. Of course, all my canlit profs were way too postcolonial to assign her books, so I was only reading her in like, my gothic seminar. Perhaps that's telling in itself, though.

As for the whiteness of her characters, there was that huge academic flamewar about appropriation of voice a few years back, and I can guess which side of the divide she was on with that. But all the women from her era - Laurence, Munro, Engel, Galloway - were pretty much sticking with the white and female pov. From what I've read anyway, which isn't comprehensive in any way. Feminism was hard enough to champion, it seems like.

Ugh, I'm totally being the apologist here! I just love her for her reputation of dismantling writers' egos with offhand phrases, and for being the kind of woman dumb people call a man-hating bitch. It's heartbreaking for me that she'd say that about Philip's audience, but I can believe it. :/

[gretazreta]

I have read Oryx and Crake and I almost have never agreed with anything MORE than how much I agree that Margaret Atwood's real enjoyment comes in thinking about it afterward. I guess because she's so thinky and complex, and I mostly like reading when I'm swept away and finish in a sitting: with O&C I had to keep putting it down and going away and thinking thinking thinking. I adore that book, and sometimes I pick it up and read small bits of it and think and think again.

I've also read The Rapture of Canaan and man, I have NOT thought about it in years. I stumbled on it randomly, I think because it was like, two bucks in a bargain bin. I REALLY LIKED IT A LOT. And yes, the main love story in it was so, so, so moving. But the whole world view again was very captivating. I'm quite fascinated by fundamentalism as a way of life and I thought she captured it both with appreciation for its community and horror at its oppression. And the narrator was so, so, believable. YESSSSS

[causeways]

I mostly like reading when I'm swept away and finish in a sitting

Yes yes yes! That is just what I love! One of my favorite things in the world is getting caught up in a book to the point that I am thoroughly unwilling to put it down -- like, I get GROWLY at people when they try to interrupt my reading -- and where I am so involved that people will be talking to me and I literally do not hear what they are saying.

Oryx and Crake was awesome, but was definitely not that kind of book.

Ninah was indeed incredibly believable, and she was trying so hard! In all ways! I need to go back and reread that one for sure.

Poor Amy. She was supposed to be super hot, but WHATEVER, her man was still in love with her sister.

[causeways]

Definitely give it a try!

And yeah, it really, really is. That's happened to me with books before, too. I read The Catcher in the Rye when I was fourteen, for school, and I was too young for it; I hated that shit! And then I picked it back up at eighteen and was like HOLY FUCK, SALINGER IS RIGHT ABOUT ALL THINGS.

[subterrain]

THE GIVER, YES. That book changed my life when I was a kid. They need to canonize Lois Lowry or something. I still think about that book, and I've reread it probably a dozen times. HIGH FIVE.

And I've read way too much Margaret Atwood, even for a canlit devotee, but I've never read Oryx and Crake because that's the one where academia says she jumped the shark. Or so I've heard! Probably I haven't read it because I've always been afraid to mix my feminism and my scifi. However, if you recommend it, I will give it a try, yo.

[causeways]

I still think about that book, and I've reread it probably a dozen times.

Oh yeah, me too. EASILY. My roommate D and I recently had a long conversation about how she wanted to find books that will change her life (which is kind of backwards, since usually you don't know the books that will change your life until . . . after they've changed your life), and The Giver is definitely one of those books for me, too.

Interesting! I need to read more Atwood, though.

[subterrain]

I think it's easier to find books that will fuck up your worldview when said worldview is still half-formed. Case in point: the 23529350283490234 young men walking around university campuses across the continent with On the Road in their back pockets. Fuckers. Also, A Clockwork Orange, which is the less pretentious, more sociopathic option. What can I say, I definitely went through those phases, too. :(