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I rated this book four out of Five stars for ingenuity, and thinking about the plot when I wasn’t reading the book.One of my very best friends loaned me this book ages ago, but it has been lingering on my nightstand forever. I think having seen the film already, I felt less inclined to read the book. It became the perfect summer read for me. I took it with me on a long family road trip.
What I enjoyed about the book:
1) The characters. I didn’t encounter any character in the book that I did not find interesting or easy to like. They were all layered, complicated, endearing, and flawed.
2) The prose. It’s rare to encounter a modern book with well-balanced artistic prose that do not make the work come across as trying to hard or transform the work into self indulgent, poetic, silliness. The prose worked in this book. I loved the descriptions of Clare at work as an artist. I felt like I was sitting beside Clare watching her create. The author’s descriptions of winter were genuine. You are brought into each moment with the characters using descriptions of weather, food, and clothing.
3) The ingenuity. Sure time travel in a book is not new, but the authors take on it was different. The rules around how the characters could or could not control time travel, and how this impacted Henry’s outlook and his life, was fun and inventive.
What I did not like about the book:
1) Character voices. The book is written in first person point of view. The reader moves back and forth between Clare and Henry. There were times when I was not sure who the narrator was because Henry and Clare use the same voice. They describe things the same way. There were times I just could not imagine a man talking the way Henry did. Maybe I live a sheltered life, but I have never heard a woman refer to her own vagina as her cunt. Not a word I expected cute little catholic Clare to use.
2) Consistent use of prose. The author has the ability to eloquently describe things, however when it is time to get down and dirty she looses her flare. Talking about sex, a brutal death, or miscarriage-the language transforms into fifth grade fluency. Henry sounded like he took pleasure in telling Clare about his mother’s death. Like he was trying to shock her. He relates it in a brutal and grotesque way I found strange for someone talking about the death of someone dear to them. Clare’s descriptions of her miscarriages are not medically accurate. This surprised me considering the author consulted librarians and paper makers in her research for the book. Each and every sex scene (if and when sex is ever described) is anxiously mentioned. I found this strange considering Henry was supposed to be a cad before he meets Clare. Shouldn’t his point of view revel in sex with rich descriptions? Nope, Henry can describe the texture of a book better than his wifes skin, and he sounds like virgin catholic girl Clare whenever he talks about sex.
3) The author telling and not showing Henry’s former bad boy self. I kept wondering about Ingrid and her relevance in the book. I think her presence was intended to highlight Henry’s womanizing bad boy history. I never once believed Henry had this former persona, but the scenes with Ingrid do not achieve this. I wanted physical proof, but after awhile it becomes one of those, “because the author says so” kind of things.
The plot of the book is close to what you will or maybe have already seen in the film. For the most part the book is a relaxing and interesting read.
Book Review: Naked In Death, By: J.D. Robb
I gave this book three out of five stars. While I did not connect with this book, it still stands alone as a detective novel with interesting science fiction elements.
I had really high expectations given the length of the In Death series. I think my expectations are a big factor in my disappointment. I kept waiting to find the hook that has grabbed so many devoted fans. I never found it and that made me sad.
What I liked:
1) It’s set in the future. I loved all the futuristic and science fiction components. It made the settings fun and interesting.
2) The character of Lieutenant Dallas’s best friend. The scenes with Dallas and her best friend were some of the only times Dallas transformed into a character and not the detective caricature we see through most of the book.
3) The accurate depictions of police methods. It’s set in the future, so who knows if its real or not, but I like that Robb incorporated the mundane as well as the interesting aspects of police work.
What I didn’t like:
1) The romance. I didn’t feel the romance between Eve and Roarke at all. The set up was fun, but how they came together was a boring given, and the rest was just bad decisions and unrealistic. None of it meshes well with the strong character Robb has tried to present as Eve. The Roarke/Eve scenes are awkward and lumped together with strained dialog and forced action.
2) The protagonist. I really wanted to like Lieutenant Eve Dallas. I wanted to see a smart, respectable detective, who makes good decisions, and has an even grasp on life. You know the kind of character I mean, like most male protagonists in detective novels. I was disappointed again because I can’t relate to Dallas. She is a closed off, unstable, non-relatable, job-aholic. When she is doing her job she is a female detective caricature. A beautiful, brilliant, and oh-so-smart she is able to connect the dots before anyone else. She’s the best so she gets the hard cases, and she knows this about herself. However she “can’t remember” or better said-won’t deal with the first eight years of her life. She has to take drugs to sleep through the night, and she has nothing else in her life outside of her job. But she’s “strong” because she can ignore these things and press on for the greater good.
3) The crime plot. You can deduce the killer within the first interviews Dallas conducts (first 100 pages). Going forward it became really obvious because these are some of the only interviews we read, making the ending easy to deduce. Knowing the ending made the book boring, as I had to get through another 200 pages to find the ending. Are those 200 pages interesting? Not so much.
If I had found the romance more compelling, maybe the book would have been more interesting, and maybe I would have finished it faster. I had no enthusiasm whenever I picked this book up. It became a chore, something I had to finish, and not a book I found pleasure reading.
Book Review: City of Dragons (Book #3 of the Rain Wilds Chronicles) by: Robin Hobb
I gave this book three out of five stars.
If you expect the third book to flow seamlessly into the first two books of the series, you will be disappointed. Older characters from other series are revived and the first one hundred pages are spent introducing new-old characters. Madness, utter madness, but then really there were only a few plot climaxes left to the original story.
What I liked:
1) The city of Kelsingra. I enjoyed learning about the city and seeing it come to life. I think that was undoubtedly the best part of the book.
2) The continuing changes for Thymara. Did Thymara actually pick a partner? Way to go Hobb, upping the drama. This might be the one plot line that gets me to read book 4.
3) There is some really fun action in this book. Without giving away any spoilers let me just say, a character gets shanked in a brothel, dragons may or may not learn to fly, Thymara may or may not mate, and a dying Duke may or may not get healed.
What I didn’t like:
1) The redundancy. Did I mention before how redundant Hobb can be in her characterizations and narratives? In case you missed it, or missed it in my last review, Hobb writes a lot of redundant things. The repetition is annoying.
2) There were several monologues of narrative, which the author tried to hide as character dialogue. There are at least three scenes where characters monologue back and forth with stagey information. These are just contrite and silly, not only do people not talk to one another like this, these character have no need to tell each other this information. I wish Hobb would just write a narrative. Write a quick narrative, and while you write it, imagine your reader is smart and stop bringing up the same details over and over again.
3) Why is the evil Duke still alive? If he is such a bad guy, hated by everyone, weak, defenseless, and dying he should be dead. Should be easy for even his servants to just kill. It doesn’t make sense to me why he has the ability to wield the power he does when he should be easy to kill and overthrow.
I plan on reading the next book. I don’t know if book four is the end, but I would like to see this series end. I’m hoping Hobb has something sinister in store for Hest. I hated that he was a key character in this book. Kill that man off already. I also look forward to reading about what happens with Sintara and Thymara.
Book Review Dragon Haven (Volume two in the Rain Wild Chronicles) by: Robin Hobb
I gave the book three out of five stars
The action in the second of the Rain Wild Chronicles picks up, and some of the various sub plots from book one are resolved.
What I enjoyed about the book:
1) The character conflicts. Hobb does an excellent job of depicting the tight ebb and flow of relationships in an on going stressful situation. The younger characters are developing into adults. They are learning about relationships, leadership, and some of life’s harder lessons. Sedric’s character arch was my favorite. I adored how funny and endearing his relationship with Repelda was as it developed.
2) The journey was wonderful. The danger depicted was intense. It plays out in tandem with the real up’s and downs of traveling so far into the unknown. It was a long journey, but Hobb’s kept the action moving.
3) The resolutions begin. This book heals many of the pain and buried secrets we learn about in book one. Finally Sedric confesses his biggest secret to Alise. The shock, tension, and long term after effects from their conflict were real and constructed beautifully.
What I did not like:
1) This had to be the longest series “introduction to book 2” I have ever read. I was skipping over paragraphs of unnecessary character introductions. Then right when I thought the book was taking off there was more. Entire paragraphs of backstory information, which I could swear, were copy and pasted right out of book one.
2) I don’t like the conflict between Sintara and Thymara. I don’t believe it. People don’t go on day after day, confined with routine intimate contact, and continue on with this unresolved tension. All of the other characters seemed to evolve in book two, why have these two not? Sintara effected a physical change, but really nothing else moved between the two of them. Why would Sintara hide the changes she was implementing on Thymara? She’s never been above bragging before? I just don’t believe these two could have so much continuous conflict, in tight quarters, needing one another to survive, but still go on without a solution.
3) Part of the plot felt preachy to me. It was like the author had constructed a whole sub plot to illustrate why pre-marital sex is bad. The timing of Billad’s lecture to the girls was inappropriate. I could not believe her character would be so insensitive since she herself was the most intimately familiar with the tragedy-taking place. I also thought the character reactions were out of character for everyone else in the scene. Was it a good idea for an older woman to school the younger girls? Certainly. Was that scene the right time and place? Never. If anything this lecture to the girls should have taken place in book one, if at all.
Book Review of Gone Girl by: Gillian Flynn
I gave this book three out of five stars.
This book is disturbing, well written, and grotesque on many levels. The first mystery thriller I was not able to predict the ending to in a long time. I think the “Who’s Afraid if Virginia Woolf” reference was the best example of where the book was headed. Like the play, this book imposed a similar disorienting disgust and wonder on me. Reading the end of the book I immediately thought of the end of the play. For some reason the equivalences made the unresolved conflict palatable for me. I’m not sure I would have been happy with the ending otherwise.
What I liked:
1) The parallels drawn to the real life Scott Peterson case. It was the perfect case to reference since it captured the nations attention so completely and for such a long period of time. I also smiled at all of the crime television references made.
2) The writing is good. The prose fit well into the heads of a book staring two self absorbed snarky writers. My favorite internal dialogue was Nick’s when he explained where his life was before Amy. How he was bored or blanketed in malaise because “the second hand experience is always better”. It was like reading a prettied up personality outline of a generation X attitude.
3) I like how Flynn keeps the reader guessing by adding details you may or may not need to know. I thought the Nick’s father was a brilliant embellishment.
What I didn’t like:
1) The characters. I was fascinated really, to read a book where so many of the characters were offensive and not endearing. Character attachment had nothing to do with why I finished the book. I kept cautioning myself to not infer the author shared the character opinions, but it was difficult with so many characters espousing similar haughty views. The character Rand sums up every narrative description or observation made of the Midwest when he say’s: “I have to tell you, it’s really quite ugly here.”
2) Inconsistent Characterization. I was disappointed when Amy lost her smart sociopath edge. I liked hating her and seeing her as a calculating, OCD, list making nut case. What happened at the roadside inn, and her reaction was not smart. If she is so cunning and forward thinking that never should have happened. Did it make her more human, sure. Do I really believe she cooked up what eventually happened with Desi while she was curled up in the fetal position at a rest stop for forty-five minutes? No way.
3) The plot. Since when do sociopaths include their own demise as part of their revenge plan? She’s a narcissist not depressed. You could see where Flynn may have said, “I don’t know what to do now” when Amy’s at the roadside motel. Why wasn’t milk-spitting Amy executing some clever plan against these two “redneck” offenders? Once Amy meets up with Desi, her character really falls apart. She let’s Desi pen her up for how many days? Seems like her ultimate solution for him could have been carried out within the same week she’s brought to his lake lodge. It was a little too convenient for Desi to be who he was originally rumored to be. At the end I don’t believe the police or FBI would just shrug their shoulders and go home. Not really how a situation like this would play out in real life, but this is a fiction book. If the ending mirrored real life then there would be too much light in what is meant to be a dark book.
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