_lia_reads_'s Reviews (757)

This was one of my most-anticipated reads of 2019 and it did not disappoint, becoming one of my top reads this year. It is also a difficult book to review and articulate what I liked (especially without revealing the plot!). Morgenstern has such a way with words, creating an ethereal, poetic world that you will not want to leave when the book is done. Her characters all have their quirks but in a way that makes them feel realistic.

The book alternates between little vignettes of stories that do not seem to connect and a more linear plot line following graduate student Zachary Ezra Rawlins. Zachary discovers a mysterious book, leading him to two people and a mysterious world. You begin the book much like Zachary, enjoying the stories but not really seeing how it all connects (but don’t worry, it does come together in the most magical way possible). I cared so much about all of the characters throughout and loved seeing the bits of the puzzle come together. It is one of those stories that I have continued to think about after it was over.

This book is not quite fantasy, not quite reality. It is a love letter to books, video games, mysterious societies, myths, and storytelling.

I don't read a lot of non-fiction outside of the books that I have read for work but I was intrigued by the premise of Murphy's book: people think that they are good listeners but they are actually missing important nuances which affects relationships with each other. Each chapter goes into a specific aspect of this thesis, drawing on studies done in sociology, biology, and psychology to explore how we interact with one another. Murphy uses her experience as a journalist to make her explanations very approachable without completely dumbing down the science. I think that this is a book that everyone will learn something from, and especially the chapter on relationships should be required reading. So many of Murphy's observations resonated with me, as she highlighted things that I have definitely done in conversations without even realizing it. The book has encouraged me to work on my listening skills and put into practice some of the things that Murphy suggests.

Kureger writes in the Afterword of this book that he set out initially to update Huckleberry Finn, and the result is a book that combines themes from Twain's classic with that of an updated Odyssey and themes of other myths and legends. The character Odie tells the story of the journey he took when he was 12 years old with his brother and two friends, escaping from an Indian school. Odie has a gift for storytelling, weaving a tale that can only be described as an epic. He himself acknowledges his unreliability a couple of times, but the truthfulness-or not-of the story isn't the point. Rather, it is a stirring look at the Midwest in the 1930s, right at the height of the Great Depression. The people that Odie and his friends encounter represent different facets of life in this time period, shedding light on the hardships that many went through. But it is also an adventure story, where you are rooting for the characters' success.

I found the writing, tone, and themes to be reminiscent of many classics. The story gripped me and I wanted to know what happened to the characters in the end. Odie was at times annoying, especially with the choices he made and more so than any other character, but that is to be expected of a 12-year-old, I guess. Overall, this was an excellent book that I found myself not wanting to finish.

Thanks HarperVia and BookishFirst for an ARC of this book!

The End of the Ocean alternates between two plot lines: Signe in 2019, setting sail from Norway to the South of France, haunted by memories of her past; and David in 2041, desperately trying to survive in a world stricken by drought. While I enjoyed both of the POVs, I ultimately found David's more compelling. The world that Lunde paints, tainted by a lack of rain and freshwater, was frighteningly realistic. I found David's struggle to keep alive and care for his daughter to be heartbreaking while also revealing the hardships of those around him. As for Signe's story, I was more interested in her reminisces than I was in the journey that she was on. I enjoyed learning about the climate-related strikes that she participated in during her youth and their entanglement with failure of her first relationship. However, in her present-day, I continually got hung up on all the technical language used to describe her boat; I know very little about boats and couldn't always keep up. I appreciated the stark contrasts between the two POVs as well: woman struggling on her own vs. man caring for his child; world completely on water vs. one where it was scarce; ice vs. heat. However, I wanted the stories to come together a little more in the end.

Overall, The End of the Ocean was a highly readable book that explores a not-impossible situation in a not too distant future. 3.5 stars, rounded up to 4

I had really high hopes for this one and I think for some readers, it will be a hit. Moreno Garcia has created an interesting world, based in Mayan myth and with strong themes from other fairy tales, particularly Cinderella. Unfortunately the book lost me a little bit with the Mayan mythology, which I am not very familiar with. I found Casiopea's quest to be very interesting, especially as it reaches its climax, but I often felt that things wrapped up too easily and quickly. I never felt as though I connected with any of the characters, and they moved so quickly between the different settings that I was not always sure of where we were. The story felt really unique but I just wanted a little bit more from it.

I like WWII fiction (especially set in France) and I enjoyed Kristin Hannah's book, The Great Alone, so it is no surprise that The Nightingale was a hit for me. The story of Vianne and Isabelle gripped me fro the beginning and I enjoyed reading the different ways in which their wars unfolded. Hannah has a way of weaving a story that is highly readable and makes it hard to put the book down. The strength of her two main characters was admirable and a true show of the lengths to which people went to protect themselves and survive during the war.

While overall I enjoyed the book, I had a couple of problems with it that affected my rating. The beginning of the book felt repetitive of many other WWII books I have read, especially A Fire Sparkling, All the Light We Cannot See, and The Flight Portfolio. Once I got into the story, this improved. I also felt as though the romance between Isabelle and Gäetan was not well-developed and I found myself mostly just irritated by him more than enjoying what was happening.

However, overall, the book was enjoyable. 4 Stars.

Thank you to Hachette books for providing me with an advanced copy of this book.

If you go into this book expecting it to be solely a true crime novel, you are going to be sorely disappointed. Instead, what Eisenberg has presented us is part true crime, part memoir. While the basis of the book is the investigation of the murder of two women in Pocahontas County, WV, it is supplemented with the complicated history of the region as well as Eisenberg's own relationship with the area. The book functions like an anthropological study of Appalachia, with the Rainbow Murders serving as a way for us to examine life in this region and question stereotypes held by even those living in the community.

In writing any sort of non-fiction work, it is difficult to separate your own attachment to places and events from what actually happened there. Including the sections about Eisenberg's time in Pocahontas County as a young woman made it feel like a more honest account of her own biases and the place from which she was writing the book. This is a theme that comes up several times in the book, most notably in reference to how many working on the case became fixated on the idea that perpetrator must have been local. The different story lines at times don't seem related but they successfully came together at the end.

While the title, The Third Rainbow Girl, refers to the third woman who had been traveling with the murder victims, I think it should also be taken as a metaphor for Eisenberg herself, as well as those who were involved in the investigation of the murder (perhaps even the county itself).

There were times when the book was slow and times when it was difficult to follow. However, I enjoyed the way in which the different narratives were woven together. I recommend listening to the book on audio, which I did for part of my reading. Eisenberg has a very soothing voice and having her read her own work made the experience fuller for me.

Thanks to Flatiron Books for my advanced copy.

Let’s talk about this book that has been literally everywhere on Instagram recently. If you follow my account (_Lia_Reads_), you know that I really enjoyed this one but that I was processing some complicated feelings about it. The question of who gets to write stories about immigrants, as well as the complexity of only showing the violent side of Mexico (especially in light of the current political climate) has been circling in conversations around Bookstagram. I’m glad that this book has brought up those conversations and make me think more deeply about this book beyond “this is very well-written and deeply moving.” As a white woman in the USA, this was something I didn’t think about initially and I’m very glad I went into the book with those concerns in mind.

American Dirt is the story of one woman and her son escaping violence by a deadly drug cartel in Acapulco. When they first flee, they are just running to go somewhere but it quickly becomes clear that the only place that is safe is “el Norte,” the USA. You follow them as they move through Mexico, constantly afraid that the cartel is following them and facing other dangers along the way. Cummins, as she states in her author’s note, has done her research on the different journeys that an immigrant faces as they head through Mexico to the border. She shows us both the perspective of a Mexican immigrant and the Central Americans who come through Mexico to the USA. Your heart breaks for Lydia and Luca as they face unspeakable trials. Despite some of the characters feeling very one-dimensional, the story is gripping and I flew through it. Do I think it’s going to be THE book of 2020? No. But it was still very engaging.

However, there are two failures here, one on the part of the author and the other on the publicity team. Cummins had a great opportunity here to really flesh out the other immigrants, especially the Central American sisters, but many of them fell flat. I wanted more about their stories and perspectives and didn’t get them.

I’m also concerned about the way that the marketing team has pushed Cummins’ own ‘immigrant’ story as a justification for her writing this book. I do not doubt that being the partner of an undocumented European immigrant is nerve-wracking, but also imagine that her now-husband did not go through the same trials that Lydia and Luca do in the story.

What is also problematic for me with the book is the political climate it is appearing in and the way that I think many (especially white) readers will interpret it. As many Bookstagrammers and reviewers of color have pointed out, this is one fictional story about 2 immigrants from Mexico, not a representation of every day life everywhere in the country. But I think there is a risk here at universalizing Lydia and Luca, having them stand in for all Mexican people and all immigrants. I don’t think that means the story shouldn’t have been written (if that were the case, it would bring up a lot of questions about fiction as a whole). But I think that critical conversations need to be had about the story, including voices from different perspectives. This is one book that, if it exists in a vacuum, could serve to perpetuate more stereotypes.