Review: THE BURNING GIRL, by Claire Messud

The Burning Girl, by Claire Messud. Published 2017 by WW Norton. Literary Fiction

It's too bad that this book, a consummate literary beach book, is coming out now, as summer is coming to end.

The Burning Girl is a novel by Claire Messud, author of the much-lauded The Emperor's Children and somewhat controversial The Woman Upstairs; when the latter was released, Messud did an interview defending her choice of an angry, unlikable protagonist: "Well, I think women's anger is unacceptable. We live in a culture that wants to put a redemptive face on everything, so anger doesn't sit well with any of us. But I think women's anger sits less well than anything else. Women's anger is very scary to people, and to no one more than to other women, who think my goodness, if I let the lid off, where would we be?"


In The Burning Girl, the angry girl, Cassie, is held at a distance and we see her only through the eyes of her friend Julia. The two girls are both only children, though Cassie's family is fractured and Julia's more traditional; they have known each other since they were little and are inseparable as the book opens.
Cassie and Julia start the summer volunteering at an animal shelter; Cassie is bitten by a dog and the ER doctor who treats her, a taciturn loner, ends up in a relationship with Cassie's needy mother. Things go downhill from here. Anders Shute, the doctor, is a difficult step-parent, and Cassie's image of her long lost father may or may not be a fantasy. And the girls, as different as they are similar, drift apart as growing up does its inevitable work.

The Burning Girl reminds me of Margaret Atwood's Cat's Eye, another sharp novel about growing up and the delicate friendship of girls. It would also be a good follow-up for readers of Elena Ferrante. I think The Burning Girl will make a wonderful book club selection; largely character-driven, there's a lot to talk about. It's beautifully written and will appeal to readers looking to maybe recapture a piece of their girlhood, or just those looking for a thoughtful and moving exploration of the fragility of youth.

Rating: Backlist

FTC Disclosure: I received this book for review.

Review: THE MAKING OF JANE AUSTEN, by Devoney Looser

The Making of Jane Austen, by Devoney Looser. Published 2017 by Johns Hopkins UP. Nonfiction.

2017 marks the 200th anniversary of Jane Austen's death, and thus this year will see the publication of several books celebrating her life. Devoney Looser is professor of English at Arizona State and an Austen scholar, and she has produced an interesting and entertaining look at how we the reading public have come to understand and appreciate Austen's wonderful novels.

More academic in tone than Helena Kelly's Jane Austen: Secret Radical, Looser's book focuses on visual representations of Austen through the years, and how those representations have shaped the public's understanding of Austen and her works. She also touches on the ways, sometimes contradictory, that Austen's name and legacy have been appropriated for social or political ends. Kelly's book might actually serve as an example of someone interpreting Austen to serve a political agenda. But that is another discussion for another day.

Looser starts with a survey of early illustrations accompanying the novels, and tells us about the life of each artist who was important in establishing Austen's visual representations, as well as how the artwork itself served to create expectations in the public. She goes on to talk about theatrical productions and how they both defined Austen's works in their (the productions') own time and how those productions influenced the later adaptations that came to the silver screen. I wish she had spent more time on the cinematic adaptations of the modern day and how those continue to shape and direct the understanding of the general public of Austen and how they influence readers' understanding of the novels.

And she talks about how Austen was used by politicians and social activists, particularly during the suffragette movement of the late 19th and early 20th centuries.

Overall I thought the book was interesting and offered some worthwhile insights into the way we've read Austen over the years. I learned a lot about the weight the early illustrations carried, and how the theater was so important in both keeping Austen's books in circulation and shaping and evolving the understanding of womens' roles in the books. I will admit to finding it a little dry at times but Looser has written a book for the serious Austen fan rather than the casual one. But for that person, who is interested in digging deeper into the history of the novels and their popularity, The Making of Jane Austen is a great choice, and there is a lot to be learned from this volume.

Rating: BACKLIST

FTC Disclosure: I did not receive this book for review.

Review: THE GUN, by Fuminori Nakamura

The Gun, by Fuminori Nakamura. Published 2016 by Soho Crime. Translated from the Japanese by Allison Markin Powell.

The Gun is definitely not your usual crime novel. It's not a whodunit; it's barely a procedural, and the murder doesn't occur until the book is almost over. It reads more like an after-the-fact confession; the narrator, who is not named, recounts the slow burn of circumstance that leads to the killing. Out for a walk one night he finds a gun next to a body; he takes the gun and becomes obsessed with it. He's a student and when we meet him he's juggling two women, but nothing else in his life compares to the feelings he has for his new best friend.

Over time he begins to feel that he must fire the gun. Then he starts to plan a murder.

The Gun is Nakamura's first novel and the latest to be translated into English; first to come stateside was The Thief, which Soho published in 2002. Nakamura has a won several prizes for his writing including the 2002 Shincho Prize for New Writers for The Gun and the 2012 David Goodis Award, an American crime writing prize.

I can see why. Nakamura keeps the tone so even and so low-key even as the narrator descends more and more into madness and obsession. Even as he commits his crime, which comes and goes by so quickly I had to re-read the passage.

You have to be up for something a little different to get into The Gun, but I strongly recommend it for crime readers up for an adventure. I'll be reading more Nakamura sooner rather than later. (In fact I just entered a galley giveaway for his latest, The Boy in the Earth. I hope to win!)

Rating: BACKLIST

FTC Disclosure: I did not receive this book for review.

Review: SELECTION DAY, by Aravind Adiga

Selection Day, by Aravind Adiga. Published 2017 by Scribner. Literary Fiction.

As a big fan of Aravind Adiga's 2008 Booker Prize winning novel The White Tiger, I was really excited to get a hold of an early copy of his latest, Selection Day, and I didn't hesitate to read it. While I didn't think Selection Day has the same bite as Tiger, it's a worthy entry and well worth the time to read.

Set in contemporary India in the world, which I don't understand at all, of cricket, the book concerns two brothers and their ambitious father. Radha Kumar is the older brother, passionate for cricket and supremely gifted; Manju, the younger brother, is an up-and-comer who is good but not quite as good. And he idolizes his brother. Their father pushes them hard to become cricket stars and both boys resent him. Then Javed Ansari arrives on the scene- talented, Muslim, and handsome, he shakes Manju in ways he never expects and forces him to figure out who he wants to be, and who he is. As "selection day" nears, it becomes clear that only one brother will have the shot at stardom they are both told to want. The fallout from selection day will change the lives of not just the boys and their father, but the scouts, investors and friends who surround them.

I don't really know the first thing about cricket and I'm sure I missed a lot of fine points but I got the general gist of a sports-obsessed parent pushing his children, and ultimately pushing them away. For me certain swathes of the book moved slowly and while I'm glad I stuck with it, I almost didn't. That said, the book picks up momentum about 2/3 of the way through and from there until the end it doesn't let up. The action is all in the relationships between the three cricket players and how each one chooses a path.

Like I said for me it didn't have the kick of The White Tiger but I think Selection Day is a very strong novel, very well-written with great characters and a vivid setting which is immersive even if I didn't get every detail. I'd definitely recommend it to literary fiction readers and I think its emphasis on character growth would make it a great brainy book club pick. Check it out.

Rating: BACKLIST

FTC Disclosure: I did not receive this book for review.

Review: THE LONG ROOM, by Francesca Kay

The Long Room, by Francesca Kay. Published 2016 by Tin House Books. Literary Fiction.

Francesca Kay won the Orange Award for New Writers for her The Translation of the Bones; now she's back with a sad and suspenseful story of a empty man manipulated by his delusional love for a woman he doesn't know into the betrayal of a lifetime.

It's 1981 and we're in London; IRA bombings and the Cold War are what's for dinner in British intelligence and Stephen Donaldson is in his late 20s, a "listener" whose job it is to monitor and transcribe surveillance recordings of subjects of various kinds. Stephen lives alone and is the only surviving child of a controlling single mother. His workplace, the "long room" of the title, is the center of his life when a woman named Helen comes across the wires, wife of a subject known only as "Phoenix." Stephen is besotted with this woman and her voice, and constructs a fantasy life which takes root gradually and ultimately leads to his downfall.

I was hoping for a white-hot thriller when I picked up The Long Room but what Kay delivers is more on the order of a slow-burn tragedy. It is impossible to put down but not in a heart-racing way. It's just that once you get enmeshed in Stephen's growing delusions you'll want to see it through and into what lies beyond.

He starts breaking little rules, like visiting an out-of-bounds pub, and not so little rules, like finding out who "Phoenix" really is. Then things escalate before he even knows it. A man named Alberic befriends Stephen and the association seems harmless enough- just a guy to talk to at the pub. Is there something more? Christmas is coming and with it parties and of course his mother depends on him. His infatuation effects how Stephen handles all of his obligations, and profoundly distorts his judgement until little by little there is no going back.

I enjoyed The Long Room and I'd recommend it for literary fiction readers who maybe want to dip a toe in the spy genre. Not having read a lot of spy thrillers I don't know how it compares to others but I like it as a character study of a sad, lonely man and the bad choices he makes even though he knows better. It's a sharp study of what happens in the grips of a delusion.

Rating: BACKLIST

FTC Disclosure: I received this book for review from Tin House Books as part of their Galley Club program.

Review: SWEET LAMB OF HEAVEN, by Lydia Millet

Sweet Lamb of Heaven, by Lydia Millet. Published 2016 by WW Norton. Literary Fiction.

A young mother with a secret and her toddler daughter escape a controlling husband for a dingy Maine motel in the latest novel by acclaimed author Lydia Millet.

I've been a fan of Lydia Millet's for a while now, starting when I read her wonderful novel Magnificence. That was the third in a trilogy, and reading the first two novels in that series really locked her in for me as a new favorite writer. Here was someone who reminded me of a pre-dystopia Margaret Atwood, who wrote about peoples' lives with devastating insight and clarity and mixed the political into her very personal stories about growing up, marriage and everyday life, pushing past the domestic and into the sublime.

In her latest novel, she tells the story of a married woman named Anna who has taken her young daughter Lena and run away from her husband, a budding and controlling politician. They are hiding out at a motel in Maine as Anna tells their story through journal entries and flashbacks.  But Anna and Lena have a secret; when Lena was a baby, Anna (and maybe her husband too) heard voices. These weren't voices in their head; these were like radio broadcasts or transmissions and included music, recognizable passages from literature, and more. The voices always seemed tied to whatever Lena was doing and once she started to talk the voices stopped. But in a way they have continued to haunt Anna in their new life at the motel.

What starts as a quiet narrative picks up steam when Anna's husband catches up with them and kidnaps Lena. From here the book takes a turn into thriller territory but we never quite leave the supernatural behind.

I welcomed the change of pace since the book did start off slow for me. I hung in because I trust Millet to deliver, and she did. That said, Sweet Lamb of Heaven isn't going to be for every reader. It reminds me a lot of Curtis Sittenfeld's 2013 novel Sisterland (read my review here), about two sisters, adultery, sibling rivalry and psychic phenomena. That one was a rewarding read that was also a tough sell and I'd save recommending Sweet Lamb for the reader who isn't afraid of domestic fiction with an edge. I liked it a lot; I always admire Millet's work for the way she portrays the quiet of everyday life as well as the undercurrent of our inner lives.

Rating: Backlist

FTC Disclosure: I did not receive this book for review.

Review: FATES AND FURIES, by Lauren Groff

Fates and Furies, by Lauren Groff. Published 2015 by Riverhead Books. Literary Fiction.

Fates and Furies, the latest book from celebrated author Lauren Groff, has been all the rage since its release last fall. It's been likened to Gone Girl with its his-and-hers story of the marriage Lotto, a wealthy bottled-water scion, and Mathilde, a young woman of murky background. They meet at Vassar and go on to live a charmed life, first in genteel West-Village poverty and later as Lotto becomes a lauded playwright and Mathilde his loyal and devoted helpmeet.

Or that's the story you could glean from the first half of the story, told from Lotto's perspective. And even in that first half the reader can see how self-centered he is and how many things might look different from Mathilde's point of view. In the second half some of those gaps get filled in.

I have a lot of thoughts about Fates and Furies. I would join a book club just to talk about it, because I feel like I need to talk about it with someone. There were things I loved about the book, like Groff's insight into Mathilde's character, the writing itself, so descriptive and lush, and the skill with which she both draws and skewers Lotto, a decent if myopic man. But I had some problems with it too, mostly to do with the amount of melodrama larded over situations that don't need it. I think there is a trend in the literary world right now towards overwrought emotional and sexual melodramas (hello A Little Life) and if you loved Hanya Yanagihara's blockbuster you will probably like this one too (although I admit I haven't read Yanagihara's book and probably won't, the talk about it is roughly similar to what Fates has to offer).

I was a big fan of Groff's last book, Arcadia, which also centered around a young woman shaped by abuse; I thought that book was excellent and very insightful, and I admire Fates but I think too often she just went to far in investing her characters with uber-angst. Mathilde's childhood as Groff shapes it is the stuff of nightmares; it's hard to believe she would walk away from that. I think a young woman who's been neglected the way she is, and who has had the lack of parenting she's had, would be drawn to bad relationships and have the attitude towards childrearing she does, but it's all so overwrought. And that's assuming she just physically survived it, which I don't think is a given. I don't know what to say without big spoilers- this is why I need people who've read it.

And the comparisons to Gone Girl are off the mark too. Mathilde isn't evil or a schemer or a murderer, and if anything the revelations about her role in the marriage seem overcooked. Her emotional detachment is both extreme and uneven; Groff tells us Mathilde loves Lotto, is devoted to him, but she lies to him in shocking ways, driven by more than just fear of not being loved for who she is. Again I don't buy that this person would be able to do what she does, given what she's been through. I think toning down or reshaping the melodrama of her childhood and early adulthood would have helped to make her more  believable overall.  I don't know that I'd recommend it to Gone Girl fans just based on the two-sides-of-a-marriage premise. I think that Fates might be a little overwritten for die-hard crime fans too and there is no real element of horror here, telenovela-worthy sexual melodrama aside.

So yeah, ambivalence from me. I get why people like it; I get why they don't. Just before I finished the book I glanced through GoodReads reviews to see what folks were saying, if it fit with how I was feeling about the book and I found that I agreed more or less with the good reviews and the bad. Should you read it? I have no idea. I'm glad I satisfied my curiosity about it though.

Rating: BACKLIST

FTC Disclosure: I did not receive this book for review.

Review: CITIES OF SALT, by Abdelrahman Munif

Cities of Salt, by Abdelrahman Munif. Published 1989 by Vintage. Literary Fiction. Translated from the Arabic by Peter Theroux.

Cities of Salt takes place in the 1930s, in a nameless Persian Gulf state, and examines the impact of the discovery of oil on a small town, its inhabitants and its diaspora. Wadi Al-Uyoun is a backwater, a stopover for caravans and a place where it seems like life has changed little in a long time. Then oil is discovered, but nobody tells the locals what's going on. People go on the move, form a new community based on the priorities of the foreigners, an Arab one and an American one, separate and different and each mysterious to the other.

The novel seemed to me to be written as a series of episodes moving forward in time, with different sets of characters spotlighted as different conflicts erupt and subside. A mother who has been keening for her lost son who left Wadi Al-Uyoun a long time ago becomes further distraught as the chaos sets in and her plight becomes emblematic. Another man becomes a ghost haunting the wadi. Further in, as the new town is set up and divided between the Americans and the Arabs, more conflicts come up. A man working for the company dies in an accident and the consequences will ripple for years to come. The Americans are a faceless horde, aliens and regarded with suspicion, derision, humor and indifference by the Arab characters who are just trying to adapt and stay afloat.

People from all walks of life come in and out of the story- doctors, travelers, workers, hapless bystanders. Munif portrays them with compassion, except for emir and his handler, who are portrayed as a bumbling idiot and a conniver respectively. The emir, a fool enamored with anything shiny and new, leaves everything up to the Americans and his handlers are too busy currying his favor to step in. I get the sense that this might be a bigger problem in the sequels (Cities of Salt is first in a quintet). Here it feels like a counterpoint to the stress and tension building among the rest of the characters.

Did I like it? I liked it enough to keep reading, but I'm probably not going to read the sequels. It was honestly hard for me to keep track of everything that was going on, and none of the narratives seemed really compelling or powerful enough to hold my interest for too long. I get the point about the culture clash, the alienness of the Americans, the mix of fascination and fear with which the Arab characters viewed them, especially the women. Cities of Salt is a very immersive book and will find admirers among fans of historical fiction but the drama is low-key and quiet.

This is book #2 for the #ReadMyOwnDamnBooks challenge.

Rating: BACKLIST

FTC Disclosure: I did not receive this book for review.

Review: THE MOUNTAIN AND THE WALL, by Alisa Ganieva

The Mountain and The Wall, by Alisa Ganieva. Published 2015 by Deep Vellum. Literary Fiction. Translated from Russian by Carol Apollonio.

Alisa Ganieva's first book is also the first book to come to us in English from Dagestan, an ex-Soviet republic in the Caucasus Mountains with a diverse population representing many languages and ethnic groups. The reader gets a strong sense of this diversity in The Mountain and The Wall, a novel about the rise of Islamic fundamentalism in the capital of Makhachkala once a rumor spreads that the Russians are building a wall to separate itself frog Dagestan.

Ganieva tells the story mostly through the eyes of Shamil, a young man with a lot of time on his hands and some personal issues to muddle through. There's the state of his love life now that his fiancee has taken up with a would-be mujaheddin, and what's going on with his friends, and more. Then there are the other misfits in town- Asya, a young woman whose family is convinced will never marry, and who may not even want to marry. And there's the writer who's finally finished his book. What's going to become of these people, and others, now that "the beards" are taking things over?

There's a lively wedding, which may be the last for a while, and more rumors flying around on all sides, and very little is known for sure. Ganieva weaves stories and more stories into her tale- Soviet propaganda, religious texts, poems, excerpts from novels, folk tales and more- which help create a sense of depth and richness, a sense of shared traditions and also of traditions that are very different from each other and struggling to coexist. Whether they'll be able to is the thing we're waiting to find out.

I hope we see more writing from the Caucasus and I liked this book but I can't say I loved it. It was kind of slow and drawn-out, a matter of taste more than judgement since I like plot-driven books and the pacing was a little jittery for me. Ganieva does a wonderful job bringing this community to life particularly at the beginning with a town meeting that is both hilarious and dark and foreboding. She eviscerates just about everyone at one time or another, except the star-crossed lovers at the center of her story, who are just trying to find their way through the chaos.

Rating: BACKLIST

Read My Own Damn Books Challenge: 1

FTC Disclosure: I did not receive my copy for review.

Review: GHOST LIGHTS, by Lydia Millet

Ghost Lights, by Lydia Millet. Published 2012 by W.W. Norton & Company. Literary Fiction.

Ghost Lights is the second volume of Lydia Millet's "Extinction" trilogy and like many second volumes it serves as a transition from the first to the third. The first book, How the Dead Dream, tells the story of T., a man who goes from capitalist to conservationist and then gets lost in the jungles of Belize after a storm destroys a resort he's trying to build. The second book picks up the action after T.'s disappearance but is told from the point of view of Hal, the husband of T.'s assistant Susan, and Hal is a ghost light of a kind, a transient figure who is seen and then disappears.

Hal has never had a high opinion of T., but he volunteers to go to Belize to find T. after Hal finds out that Susan has been having an affair with a younger coworker and that their daughter is working as a phone sex operator. Confused and feeling like a ghost in his own life, he makes the trip thinking it will just be a chance to get away and that he won't find T. at all. He feels like an invisible presence in the life of his family, whom he doesn't recognize anymore.

Millet is an excellent writer, kind of like a mid-career Margaret Atwood before speculative fiction took over her canon. Ghost Lights isn't as flashy as How the Dead Dream, or the splendid final volume of the series, Magnificence, which I read when it came out and plan to re-read. Those two were unforgettable for me, and I can't say I loved Ghost Lights though I think it plays an important role in the series. It is a crucial pass-through point, not just answering questions asked in the first book and setting up the third, but spotlighting a man who feels unobserved in his own life, a shadow of what he imagined he would be. Hal is a man who's been passed through, passed by.  It is a quiet and quietly profound study of family, mid-life crisis and what happens when you realize the people you love aren't what you assumed they were, and find out they are the people they have always been after all.  If that makes sense, I strongly recommend the whole series.

Rating: BACKLIST

FTC Disclosure: I did not receive this book for review.

Review: CECILIA, by Linda Ferri

Cecilia, by Linda Ferri. Published 2010 by Europa Editions. Literary Fiction. Translated from the Italian by Ann Goldstein.

The story of a Roman woman who becomes a Christian martyr, Cecilia is absorbing historical fiction about rebellion and finding yourself. Set in the second century A.D., Cecilia starts when its title character is about 15 and still living with her parents, noble Romans involved in public life. Her mother is bereft following a series of miscarriages and early deaths of her children; her father is distracted and Cecilia is left to her tutors, her friends and mostly to herself. She dreads marriage and soon finds herself questioning her society's values and looking elsewhere for fulfillment.

The book is immersing but really takes flight once Cecilia becomes involved with a local group of Christians and starts to navigate this new world and her place in it. They become like a new family for her, after her marriage has faltered and her relationship with her parents strained. But like any family they are fractious and fight among themselves as they all try to figure out what it actually means to be a part of this fledgling religion. I liked that these people don't have it all figured out yet, that they struggle and experience doubts and conflicts. Cecilia finds her calling in service to the poor, and she tries to set aside the internal politics of the new church and focus on this central mission to give her life meaning. Watching a woman of her class living the word of Christ, Cecilia reflects "...I understood that if prayer is words, the word is not a dead letter but life and love. She was a rich matron, and now she has callouses on her hands from so much work and blisters on her feet from all the miles she walks to visit the needy."

But what she's doing is illegal in Rome, and she is soon called upon to denounce the faith or risk
execution. Her family tries to intervene, but what will be her ultimate fate? That's not really a mystery but watching her approach it is fascinating and moving, and it makes me want to visit the church in the Trastevere neighborhood of Rome, which was the real-life Saint Cecilia's home and is dedicated to her. Through the twists of history she is the patron saint of musicians but this book a rumination  of her life rather than her legend. I recommend it to readers of literary and historical fiction and for adults who read YA for the way it examines the life and mind of an adolescent.

This is my 16th book for the 2015 Europa Challenge. You can visit the blog at EuropaChallenge.blogspot.com.


Rating: BACKLIST

FTC Disclosure: I did not receive this book for review.

Review: THE POPE'S DAUGHTER by Dario Fò

The Pope's Daughter, by Dario Fò. Published 2015 by Europa Editions. Literary Fiction. Translated from the Italian by Anthony Shugaar.

Of all of Europa's summer offerings, this was the book that attracted me the most, being about Lucrezia Borgia, one of the most (in)famous members of that very famous and powerful family. Her father, Rodrigo, served as Pope Alexander VI, at a time when the Pope headed an army and the Papacy was as much about the Earthly as the spiritual- maybe more so. Lucrezia herself was a pawn in her father's political maneuvering, married several times to various members of the European nobility as it suited either Rodrigo or her brother Cesare, also politically ambitious but not as inclined towards the Church. She was also the subject of another recent novel, Sarah Dunant's 2013 Blood and Beauty. To get started, I would definitely recommend The Pope's Daughter to Dunant's readers.

Like Blood and Beauty, The Pope's Daughter tasks itself with reinventing or redefining Lucrezia, whose reputation has tended to be that of a femme fatale. Fò tries to show us that she was an intelligent, strong woman who often resisted her family's manipulations and who truly loved and was loved in return.

Unlike Dunant's novel, Fò writes his in a tone that reads as history- in other words, you might forget that you're reading fiction.

All of the many chroniclers and historians of the Borgia agree that Rodrigo came to Rome at roughly the age of eighteen, eager to place himself under the protection of the Spanish pontiff. This is just the first sign of the shameless nepotism of this high prelate, who gladly footed the bill for all the expenses the young man faced. Rodrigo had as his personal instructor none other than Maestro Gaspare da Verona, a man of great learning and extraordinary skill as a teacher.

He continues in this vein and even interleaves his own illustrations of the characters throughout the narrative, as if he were writing a textbook and not a novel. But it is fiction even though it's based on history. He is clearly smitten with Lucrezia. "No one," he writes, "would ever have suspected that there was such a fiery spirit in her," as she tries to raise troops to save her brother from one of his escapades. He gives his leading lady a tender side when it comes to personal relationships; she cares deeply for her father-in-law Ercole and develops a tight friendship with his daughter, a powerful woman in her own right. Fò portrays Lucrezia as a player with a heart, a woman who grows from a malleable girl to a shrewd and tough woman who can hit as hard as she kisses.

Overall I found the novel entertaining. The action flows along at a good clip and getting to know his Lucrezia is fun. Fò does less than Dunant to portray her sex life and he tries to dispel the incest rumors that have dogged her reputation. He portrays Cesare as almost uninterested in women and
really doesn't have much to say about her other brothers. He portrays Rodrigo as a kind of boor and his relationship with his daughter as affectionate but distant.  I think the book would be great for historical fiction readers, maybe as something different for people who have read all those Tudor books and want a new scandalous family chronicle for the beach bag or book club. It's a solid read and very enjoyable.

This is my 15th book for the 2015 Europa Challenge.

Rating: BACKLIST

FTC Disclosure: I did not receive this book for review.

Europa Challenge Catch-Up Part 2

Well now I've officially surpassed my goal of 12 Europa books, having just read my 13th, Fabio Bartolomei's delightful Alfa Romeo 1300 and Other Miracles. I will admit I haven't loved them all unreservedly but there have definitely been some gems.


Billie, by Anna Gavalda. I liked this okay but didn't love it. The narration was somewhat manic and confusing at times; a girl is waiting with her best friend who's been injured on a hike. Little by little we get the story of their friendship, and how they ended up in this situation. She's worried her friend will die, and she recounts their story as much for herself as for him. It would be a good YA crossover title. Translated from the French. Backlist.

The Frost on His Shoulders, by Lorenzo Mediano. I feel like I want to re-read this. It's a beautiful and moving story of forbidden love and the price one man pays to prove himself worthy of the woman of his dreams. The story takes place amid a deeply traditional rural Spanish community and reads a bit like a fairy tale. I rated it 4 stars on LibraryThing and I remember liking it a lot. Translated from the Spanish. Buy.

The Distant Marvels, by Chantel Acevedo. A group of women are trapped together during the hurricane that took place in Cuba in 1963, which heavily damaged the island. One woman reminisces about her life during the revolution and the role her family played. She also reveals the terrible secret of her son's fate, a sad tangle of good intentions and misunderstanding. Buy.

The Proof of the Honey, by Salwa Al Neimi. An Arab Muslim woman talks about sex and its role in the Arab world, or lack thereof. It's an interesting and provocative read. Translated from the Arabic. Buy.

Of this batch my favorite is definitely The Distant Marvels, an old-school historical tearjerker, but The Frost on His Shoulders is a sleeper that I think a lot of people would really enjoy.

I'm not done with Europa this year! I still have a couple of unread titles on my bookshelves (you know, one or two), including the new Massimo Carlotto, Elena Ferrante and much more. And there's great stuff still coming out! I'm particularly excited about The Pope's Daughter, a take on Lucrezia Borgia from Dario Fò. Having read Sarah Dunant's Blood and Beauty not too long ago, I'll be interested to read Fò's version.

Participate in Europa Challenge at EuropaChallenge.blogspot.com.

Review: BLOOD BROTHERS, by Ernst Haffner

Blood Brothers, by Ernst Haffner. Published 2015 by Other Press. Originally published 1932, Verlag Bruno Cassirer. Literary Fiction. Translated from the German by Michael Hofmann.

Blood Brothers is both a historical curiosity and a portrait of desperation. Originally published in 1932 and banned by Hitler for reasons that are not entirely clear, it tells the story of a group of itinerant young men in Weimar Germany- teens and young adults scraping their way on the margins of society, in a society in which the poor, and crime, were not supposed to exist.

Writing about crime, and the poor, was therefore a rebellious act in and of itself. Author Ernst Haffner was a journalist and social worker, but not Jewish although his publisher was. What happened to him during World War 2 is not known. So the reasons for Hitler's ire probably have to do as much with the message as with the messenger. In any case what he left is this book, which reflects the chaos and uncertainty of a country at a crisis point- the last years before Hitler's rise to power- and life on the margins of that country.

The story follows a group of boys and young men who form a loose gang and do what they can to survive. The most harrowing sequence involves one boy's journey on the bottom of a train, and another boy telling him how to hold tight to the gears to avoid being crushed to death. From there the boys battle with the police, the system of incarceration and the loopholes in the law that can both keep them safe and keep them on the run. The individual characters are almost less important than the big picture, the race for survival. These kids want love, want something like a family, but mostly they just want to eat, and to get to tomorrow. Two of them manage to set up a little scheme involving refurbishing used shoes, but they know the wolf is always at their heels.

And it's on that kind of note that the book ends, cautiously optimistic but knowing danger is never far. I'd recommend Blood Brothers to readers interested in the period, in coming of age stories and stories about young men on the edge. It's unforgettable.

Rating: Backlist

FTC Disclosure: I received this book for review.

Europa Challenge- Playing Catch-Up

Taking the NYC subway has given me a lot of time to read and most days you can find me with my nose stuck in a book, usually a Europa. But I haven't been blogging a lot, for various reasons, and once again I'm behind on reviews. So I'm going to do a big post with lots of little reviews to catch up.

Of Beasts and Beings, by Ian Holding. This book is comprised of two intertwined stories, one set in modern day Zimbabwe as a white teacher named Ian is getting ready to pull up stakes for South Africa. He's disassembling his home, selling possessions, saying goodbye to friends and his longtime servant. He's also reassessing his life and himself. The second story is set in a nameless place and indefinite time, about a man who becomes literally shackled to an itinerant group who use him as a human mule. One story is terrifying, the other thought-provoking, and then they intersect in a most unexpected way. I loved this book but it was a tough read in places. Buy.

Arctic Summer, by Damon Galgut, is a fictionalized biography of E.M.Forster. I'd recommend it to readers of memoir and biography, because it is so heavily character-driven. It covers the period of his life leading up to the creation of his masterpiece A Passage to India and features his failed attempts at relationships. Galgut depicts his character has self-absorbed, misogynistic and insecure, and yet still makes the narrative compelling. I enjoyed reading Arctic Summer but it was slow at times. LGBT. Backlist.

The Island of Last Truth, by Flavia Company, is a quick read about a man trapped on a desert island after the boat he is sailing is overrun by pirates. This is a modern-day story and the pirates are terrorists of the sea, engaging in any number of crimes. The man finds out he's not alone, and what comes next is breathtakingly suspenseful and ends with a shocking twist. I liked this one a lot but it was too short. Translated from the Italian. Backlist.

My Berlin Child, by Anne Wiazemsky, is a World War 2 story about a privileged young woman named Claire who becomes an ambulance driver and falls in love with an impoverished Russian prince. Based on the life of Claire Mauriac and written by her daughter, it's romantic but probably only of interest to fans of the author, a famous French actress, or her mother, the daughter of writer Francois Mauriac. It would make a good movie probably but I found it self-absorbed and dull. Translated from the French. Borrow.

Gourmet Rhapsody, by Muriel Barbery. Since Europa just announced they'll be publishing her third book, I thought I should catch up and make sure I've read the first two. This book takes a minor character from The Elegance of the Hedgehog and put him front and center as he's dying.  Pierre Arthens, famous food critic, is dying and reminiscing about his favorite foods. Rhapsodic food writing alternates with bitter remembrances by those who knew him, and you can read between the lines in his chapters to get his take on the relationships in his life. I enjoyed this book but didn't love it. It felt a little disjointed to me. Translated from the French. Backlist.

I have a few more to review so stay tuned over the next week or so.

Review: JAMRACH'S MENAGERIE, by Carol Birch

Jamrach's Menagerie, by Carol Birch. Published 2011 by Canongate Books. Literary Fiction.

So, I read Jamrach's Menagerie for my book club, which focuses on books that were nominated for or won the Man Booker Prize. Jamrach's Menagerie was nominated for the prize in 2011 when it was also longlisted for the Orange Prize. The story is about the coming of age of Jaffy Brown, a London boy who gets a job with a zookeeper and is sent on a mission on a whaling vessel, to help bring back a dragon.

The story starts as a lively and entertaining vision of 19th century London life. Jaffy knows the city inside and out, and London is almost a character in the book, so vividly does Carol Birch bring it to life. Jaffy takes right to working with animals and befriends Tim and his sister Ishbel, a beautiful and precocious girl. Charles Jamrach is a larger than life figure and Jaffy loves his work. Life on the boat is hard but Jaffy does his best to adjust. He gets to know the ship, gets to know about whales and whaling, and he meets Dan Rymer, who will have a lasting impact on him in ways he can't imagine right now. Finally they arrive in the south Pacific, and face the dragon.

What happens from here I won't tell you, but it's unforgettable. It's also grisly and grim, and we only have hope because we know Jaffy survives. Carol Birch spares us no detail of the horrors that await these men. I skimmed parts of it, because it was a little too gruesome for me.

It takes about an hour to get from my apartment to the meeting location of my book club, and unfortunately I fell asleep and missed my departure window that Sunday. Just as well. The moderator said she chose this book as a lighter selection after Richard Flanagan's graphic The Narrow Road to the Deep North. The first 3/4 of the book qualify as light but the final quarter eclipses it completely and it's just about dark as dark gets. After the trip Jaffy tries to return to some semblance of normal life, but nothing will ever be the same. I don't feel quite the same either after finishing this deeply disturbing book.

Rating: BACKLIST

FTC Disclosure: I did not receive this book for review.

Review: SWORN VIRGIN, by Elvira Dones

Sworn Virgin, by Elvira Dones. Published 2014 by & Other Stories Press. Translated from Albanian. Literary Fiction.

Hana Doda is a bookish young Albanian woman, an ambitious student who is being pressured into an arranged marriage by her dying uncle. Distraught, and wanting to be independent, she takes advantage, if you can call it that, of an old rural Albanian tradition. Hana is reborn as Mark, and goes to live alone and work as a shepherd- and as a man. In Albanian tradition the way Dones tells it, this is an uncommon but not unheard-of path, the only catch being once you choose it you can never go back to being a woman. But Hana can't abide this tradition either, and decides to emigrate to America- as a woman.

Elvira Dones' narrative takes us back and forth between Hana's new American life and her old Albanian life, first as Hana and then as Mark. Throughout both stories, we read about a young person trying to figure out who they are and where they fit, confounding expectations and crossing and re-crossing boundaries. Mark is not transgender in the sense of believing that he is a man born in a woman's body, and he is not stigmatized or mistreated as a man. And he does not have sexual relationships of any kind while he is Mark- he's forbidden to. When Hana takes on Mark as an identity, celibacy is part of the bargain. And Hana, as a woman, is not gay and is not making the switch to have a relationship with a woman, although such a thing is not unheard-of among people who make this switch. So it's not about sex, and it isn't really about gender identity either. It seems to me to be about finding a way to exist in a society so strict about its gender roles that it would rather see a woman deny her gender than see her in pants or behind the wheel of a truck.

When she moves to America, she lives with a relative and finds a job in a parking garage at first, but eventually she finds her footing and a job selling books. And she's learning how to be female again- how to shop for clothes, how to comport herself, and even making baby steps towards intimacy with a man she meets at the bookstore. The American side of the story feels like a traditional immigrant tale with this very unusual twist. I have to say I really enjoyed this story.  The premise is one I haven't encountered before and the writing is good enough to carry the reader along, make us care about Hana and begin to understand the issues she faces. Actually, I couldn't put it down. I'm really glad I came across this little gem.

Rating: BACKLIST

FTC Disclosure: I did not receive this book for review.

Review: MISSING PERSON, by Patrick Modiano

Missing Person, by Patrick Modiano. Published 2004 by Godine. Literary Fiction. Translated from French.

When Patrick Modiano won the Nobel Prize in 2014 I, like a lot of people, rushed out to get the one book of his that was currently in print in English, Missing Person. It was so much in demand that the copy I had had reserved at a local bookstore was sold out from under me before I could buy it, and on a day when every bookstore in my town (granted, that's 3) was sold out of him. I did finally track down a copy in the more plentifully-stocked New York City and when I did, was able to treat myself to this hypnotic and engaging story about a man looking for himself.

Set somewhere in the late 1950s, Frenchman Guy Roland is trying to find out who he is, or who he was. His name and identity was given to him by his employer, a gentlemen called Hutte, who put him to work in a detective agency. He's going to need all of his skills and smarts to solve the toughest mystery he's seen yet.

He does find out who he was, what life he lead, and as much as he will ever know about the woman in that life. The answers to his questions are tied up in World War 2, the salons and art rooms of the wealthy, political machinations that stretch across the sea and a desperate flight across the snowy fields of Europe.

In tone the book is a noir, all dark corners and dirty secrets, but its themes are wider and deeper than most. This is definitely a book to linger over and savor over a long rainy afternoon. I'm looking forward to reading more from this author and I'm glad the Nobel brought him to my attention.

Rating: BACKLIST

FTC Disclosure: I did not receive this book for review.

My Thoughts: The Bone Clocks, by David Mitchell

The Bone Clocks, by David Mitchell. Published 2014 by Random House. Literary Fiction, SFF.

I finished The Bone Clocks last night, finally. It's been with me for a couple of weeks now, given that it's a long book and my life has been hectic and I haven't always had much time to read. But reading has provided a nice escape and needed breaks from the chaos of moving and I've been glad to have such a meaty book to escape into.

The book blends literary fiction and urban fantasy, like Cloud Atlas, but powered by the paranormal rather than technology. He also uses interrelated narratives to tell the story. And just for fun, a couple of characters from that book have a cameo appearance in this one. But you don't need to have read Cloud Atlas to enjoy The Bone Clocks.

The main character is Holly Sykes, an ordinary Londoner whose life becomes a battleground in a war between two races of immortals. Mitchell starts when Holly is a teenager and runs away after fighting with her mother over a boyfriend. He introduces the main characters and sets up the battle in this section, then shifts perspective, telling Holly's story from the points of view of the men in her life for much of the middle of the book. Finally he rounds back to her and changes course again for a depressing post-apocalyptic vision of the future. But he finishes out with a satisfying ending that ties it all together at long last.

For me this book was good escapism. Sometimes it was confusing, especially during the big epic showdown between the Anchorites (bad guys, think of them as a kind of vampire) and the Atemporals (good guys, think of them as benign body-snatchers) and the infodump contained therein. And sometimes I questioned the import of those long Holly-less passages. But I loved the characters and wanted to see how it would all turn out.

I'd definitely recommend literary and science fiction readers try it. It got a very positive write-up in SFX Magazine, one of the premiere sources of information in science fiction and fantasy. I usually enjoy the books they rate highly and I enjoyed this one too. I can't say it's a favorite but it was worth the time I gave it.

Rating: Backlist

FTC Disclosure: I did not receive a copy of this book for review.

Review: DOUBLE NEGATIVE, by Ivan Vladislavić

Double Negative, by Ivan Vladislavić. Published 2013 by And Other Stories Press. Literary Fiction.

A while back the publisher of And Other Stories Press came to visit the bookstore where I work, to tell us about his company and the kinds of books they publish. And Other Stories is a small press based in London which specializes in translations and literary fiction- in other words, just the kinds of things I read. Double Negative is a recent novel by South African writer IvanVladislavić, about a photographer dealing with post-Apartheid South Africa through the lens of his camera, and that other another and more famous photographer whom our protagonist, Neville Lister, met when he was young.

Neville didn't just meet the famous photographer, one Saul Auerbach. He went out on a shoot with Auerbach and watched as Auerbach photographed ordinary people in their homes, in a particular poor area of Johannesburg. Auerbach asks Neville to choose three houses to visit and they visit two of them. The stories the residents tell are beyond sad. The photos become famous, and Neville becomes a professional photographer although a commercial one and not an artistic one (or so he claims). Years pass. Neville moves away from South Africa to avoid military service and returns when Apartheid has been overturned. He has the opportunity to meet Auerbach again, at an exhibit of Auerbach's work. And he has become an unofficial archivist in his own right, holding a collection of dead letters. But over the years he's remained curious about the people they visited that day, and the one house they never did.

Author and photographer Teju Cole wrote a great introduction to this book where he talks about how Vladislavić uses metaphor to underscore the themes of memory, loss, growing up and coming to terms. The plot in this book is very thin; it feels like a memoir, like someone just telling you what happened, without adornment. The structure of the book and the use of metaphorical language throughout undercuts this plainness though. The book is a very carefully crafted meditation on truth and identity, but couched in a way that allows the reader to relax.

I enjoyed reading Double Negative a lot and I want to read more of Vladislavić's books and more of And Other Stories' books too. It didn't have the big emotional impact on me that books set in South Africa tend to- it lacks melodrama and harshness that one can find- but it was well worth reading and I look forward to more from Vladislavić and his publisher.

Rating: BACKLIST

FTC Disclosure: I did not receive this book for review.