Tag Archives: historical fiction

Rules of Civility by Amor Towles

By Lu Posted in Books, review Tagged , , , , 8 Replies

Rules of Civility

I have this problem with historical fiction. No matter what, I can’t help but think, “Is this authentic? Would this have really happened? Was this word common?” I question and question every single bit until I’m completely taken out of the story. It’s why my Orange Prize Project ended up with more DNFs than not. A majority of the books were historical fiction and I just rarely enjoy historical fiction. So when I do find one I enjoy, it’s always a bit of a surprise.

So, you’ve probably guessed that I really did enjoy Rules of Civility, by Amor Towles. This story of a young woman in New York during the thirties painted such a complete picture of life during this time, I rarely found myself questioning it. There were certain moments throughout the book that I didn’t quite believe, but overall this is the kind of historical fiction I can get behind.

Towles completely embodies his narrator Katey and she is the books biggest strength. This is the kind of book that seems to be made up of quotes, especially about New York City and that certain city magic that exists. I recommend this book for the beauty of it alone, but the pacing and plotting leave something to desire. The first half of the book is much more interesting and engaging than the second half. I devoured the first 200 pages in two days, unable to put the book down to do other things, but I found I liked Katey less and believed her story less toward the end.

Like I said, in a lot of ways, this is a book of quotes. It is a novel of beautiful sentences that come together to form a story and even if I didn’t love the story for every page, I loved every word. This was probably my favorite part, or at least the one that has truly stuck with me:

Presumably, one factor is that each city has its own romantic season. Once a year, a city’s architectural, cultural, and horticultural variables come into alignment with the solar course in such a way that men and women passing each other on the thoroughfares feel an unusual sense sense of romantic promise. Like Christmastime in Vienna, or April in Paris.

That’s the way we New Yorkers feel about fall. Come September, despite the waning hours, despite the leaves succumbing to the weight of gray autumnal rains, there is a certain relief to having the long days of summer behind us; and there’s a paradoxical sense of rejuvenation in the air. [...] Somehow, despite the coming winter, autumn in New York promises an effervescent romance which makes one look to the Manhattan skyline with fresh eyes and feel: It’s good to live it again

Unfortunately, I don’t have a page number anymore, but that pretty much sums up the insightful and lovely writing found throughout this novel. I think Towles is the kind of writer that even when he writes an imperfect book it’s still an excellent book. I can’t wait to see what he comes up with next.

I am a Powell’s affiliate. If you click a link to Powell’s from my site and purchase something, I will receive a very small commission.

A Good Hard Look by Ann Napolitano

By Lu Posted in Books, review Tagged , , , 10 Replies

This is a different kind of book love story. A couple weeks ago, we were promoting A Good Hard Look for FridayReads and I got to spend a lot of time with Ann Napolitano’s website. I love her website. It’s beautiful, it’s helpful, it has unique and original content, not just links to the places you can buy her novels. It also has an excerpt of A Good Hard Look. Trying to come up with some clever tweets, I tweeted about one line in the first few pages, “The peacocks were not out to make friends.” I knew in that instant that I had to read this book.

A Good Hard Look completely lived up to every single expectation I had. In fact, it might have exceeded them. I am always wary of historical fiction novels that feature real-life people. In the case of A Good Hard Look, that person is Flannery O’Connor. I’ve never read anything by O’Connor, except for a story here and there, but I’ve been intrigued by her for a while now. A Good Hard Look just made me more interested in O’Connor and her fiction. But back to this story.

On the eve of Cookie Himmel and Melvin Whitestone’s wedding, Cookie’s cousin Flannery’s peacocks just won’t shut up. Restless because of the noise, Cookie gets up and and trips over a stool, giving herself a black eye. The next morning, she walks down the aisle, picture perfect, except for her eye. That bruise foreshadows everything that will take place in Millidgeville, the small town where Flannery O’Connor grew up and where she returns when she is diagnosed with lupus, like her father. Later in the book, Flannery and Melvin form an unlikely friendship, while Cookie refuses to have anything to do with the cousin she despises. Meanwhile, Lorna designs the curtains for the wealthy Whitestones, while employing Flannery’s next door neighbor, the teenage Joe.

These plots weave together beautifully to a tragic climax that affects everyone in Millidgeville. I think the best novels are the ones that, when a tragedy occurs, you just can’t believe it yourself. You want to go back to that time in the novel when everyone was happy, or when everything is “good”, as the first part of the novel is titled. What happened hit me hard and, honestly, was so unexpected. Ann Napolitano has written a book that truly just made me feel. I felt Flannery’s loneliness and the joy she felt when she was with Melvin. I felt Melvin’s helplessness in front of his own life. He’s a wealthy man, but he never seems to do much with it or do much at all, until he meets Flannery. I understood Cookie’s resentment of her famous cousin. And when it all fell apart, I fell apart too. These characters were just so real.

In a recent article, Ann Napolitano says that she thinks Flannery O’Connor would have hated this book. I have to agree with her, but only because I think the Flannery that Napolitano created is so vivid and real. And while she is the “backbone” of this novel, as Napolitano describes her, she’s not necessarily what this book is about. This book is about the complexity of love and all of its manifestations and it is done beautifully.

So go read this!: now | tomorrow | next week | next month | next year | when you’ve read everything else

Thanks to TLC Book Tours for sending me a copy of this book to review. You can read more about the tour, including links to other tour stops, here. 

Sky Coyote by Kage Baker

By Lu Posted in Books, review Tagged , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , 8 Replies

Dear Kage Baker,

Yes, I am writing you a letter.  You know that I only write letters to really special authors, right?  I wrote one to Elizabeth Strout after she blew me away with Olive Kitteridge and I wrote one to Sarah Waters after she frustrated me and wowed me with The Little Stranger.  I’m really sorry I didn’t get a chance to write you this letter before, I think I would have actually sent it to you.  I had to let you know though, I’m in love with your Company novels.

For folks who don’t know, the Company novels are science fiction books about a group of immortals (cyborgs who were once human and trained by the Company since they were young) who are employed by the Company Dr. Zeus to live through history in real time and save historical items.  Don’t worry, you can’t change the past.  Well, at least you can’t change recorded history.   Dr. Zeus is somewhat dubious, but for the most, their employees are genuinely trying to do good things, while hiding the reality of what they are.  In Sky Coyote, Joseph is a facilitator who is on a mission to save the Chumash, a Native American tribe in what will be Southern California.

I read In the Garden of Iden and I liked it, but I didn’t love it.  What I did love was what it promised me — a series that has an awesome premise and plenty of time to grow into something amazing.  You didn’t let me down, Kage.  I loved Sky Coyote.  It was charming and mysterious and funny. It has a hugely diverse cast of characters and breaks every possible stereotype that you could possibly think of.  It’s inventive and an absolute joy to read.

Like this quote.  It made me laugh out loud:

“Hey, Sky Coyote, You should have been here this morning!  We had quite a shaker!”

“Hell of a quake,” agreed Nutku, beating his best bearskin robe until the dust flew. [...]

“I know.  Khutash is very angry.  She found out about Sun’s white men last night,” I told them.  They looked surprised.

“Khutash is angry?  Is that what makes earthquakes?” Sepawit blinked.  ”Well, I guess You’d know, but we always thought it was a natural phenomenon.”

“What?” Oh, boy, I wasn’t at my quick-witted best today.

“We always thought it was the World Snakes down there under the crust of the earth, the ones who hold everything up?  We thought they got tired every now and then and bump into one another,” Nutku explained.  ”The astrologer-priest says they push the mountains up a little higher every year.”

“Oh,” I said. (229)

So thank you, Kage Baker.  For having such an original idea, for writing so many books for me to read.  Thank you for making science fiction approachable for all readers, but incorporating historical and literary elements to make any literature junkie like myself smile.  I cannot wait to read all of these books and I will be devastated when I have read them all.  I wanted to let you know all of this, even if it’s too late for me to actually tell you.  You will be greatly missed, but your voice lives on, in all its delightful humor and wit, all its tenderness.

Love, Lu

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So go read this!: now | tomorrow | next week | next month | next year | when you’ve exhausted your TBR
Also reviewed by: bookshelves of doom, Mervi’s Book Reviews.

Call me Zits in Sherman Alexie’s Flight

By Lu Posted in Books, review Tagged , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , 8 Replies

Sherman Alexie is one of those authors that everyone loves and for good reason.  He’s ambitious, witty, fearless and unbelievably creative.  I’ve been interested in picking up more of his books recently, especially after reading and loving The Absolutely True Diary of a Part-Time Indian, Ten Little  Indians and some of Alexie’s poetry last year.  I’ve also been listening to Nancy Pearl’s podcasts on my commute and one of her older archived interviews was with Sherman Alexie right after he published Flight, which is, as far as I can tell, one of his least popular books to date.  It did not sell well and has received very mixed reviews.  Something about the way Alexie talked about his narrator Zits really made me want to read it and I suggest everyone go watch the video!  If that doesn’t make you want to read Flight, I’m not sure what will.

“Call me Zits,” the novel begins, introducing us to one of the most original narrators I’ve read in a long time.  He’s a half-white-half-indian teenager who has been wronged by life, a not uncommon tale, of an absent father and a loving mother who dies when Zits  is young, forcing him into an uncertain life going from foster care family to foster care family.  After one particular incident with a new foster care family, Zits is arrested and while in jail he meets Justice.  Justice convinces him that he can bring his mother back, but only if he kills someone in a revenge murder.  So Zits shoots up a bank and is killed by a police officer, dying immediately.

But that’s not where Zits’s story ends, that’s only where it begins.  As Alexie explains in the video, he becomes “unstuck in time” like Billy Pilgrim in Slaughterhouse Five, going from one moment in American history to the next.  At each moment, he experiences a revenge killing of sorts, making him relive the moment when he made the decision to shoot the bank.  Zits inhabits the body of all sorts of men and boys throughout history – men who betray their wives, soldiers who betray their army, even a little boy who is asked to do an unspeakable thing.  Each time he feels the guilt multiplied until he cannot understand making that decision over and over and over again.

One thing I think is clear from reading Flight is that we are all capable of revenge.  It can be a small thing, it does not have to be as big as murder, but that is a human feeling.  It does not matter what race you are or what gender you are or what age you are.  It is a powerful human emotion that can make anyone do something they will regret.  Zits’s story ends well, at least he tells us it does.  We are left at the end, unsure of what to believe or knowing what was real.  In the end, though, it does not matter if it was real or all in Zits’s head.  It does not matter if he killed in 2007 or the 1970s or the 1700s, or if he killed at all.  What is important is what he learned along the way – the danger of exacting revenge for something that no one could stop and the ability to forgive.  At least we hope he learned something.

Alexie, through Zits, provides so many insights that make Zits completely believable as a character, such as:

And then it’s the white kid and me.

He sits on the floor at one end of the cell.  I sit on the floor at t he other end.  He stares at me for a long time. He’s studying me.

“What are you looking at?”  I ask.

“Your face,” he says.

“What about my face?”

“It doesn’t have to be like that,” he says.  ”They got all sorts of medicine now.  I see it on TV.  They got miracle zit stuff.  Clear your face right up.”

I’ve seen those commercials too.  The ones where famous people like P. Diddy and Jessica Simpson and Brooke Shields talk about their zits and how they got cured by this miracle face cream made from sacred Mexican mud and the sweet spit of a prom queen.  And, yeah, I’d love to buy that stuff, but it costs fifty bucks a jar.  These days, you see a kid with bad acne, and you know he’s poor.  Rich kids don’t get acne anymore.  Not really.  They just get a few spots now and again. (21)

This novel is so unique, drawing on influences from literature and popular culture, but making it into a completely original story that encompasses many aspects of our culture in one short novel.

So go read this!: now | tomorrow | next week | next month | next year | when you’ve exhausted your TBR

Other reviews: Bibliofreak.

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