sarahxify's Reviews (703)

 This was well-written, but ultimately disappointing. I wasn't particularly enthused by any of Shafak's points or arguments, and found them to be lazy, recycled, and vague. 

 I enjoyed reading this and got through it quickly, but ultimately I found it unsatisfying. I wanted more from the ending, it slowly built up for the whole novel and the fizzled out in a sad way. I really wanted more of an arc for the characters and more of an ending. 

I learned so much from this novel, and I am really glad to see these kinds of storylines being picked up and promoted in the more mainstream literary space, like the Women's Prize. 

As a concept this story is really interesting, three women trying to negotiate sharing parenthood and what motherhood means for women, as well as how it can be used as a kind of benchmark for acceptance and an exclusion of some women who are not mothers. Unfortunately, in execution it really fell flat for me. The characters and their reasons for getting to the aforementioned dilemmas regarding parenthood didn't really make sense to me, making the overall storyline feel quite forced. I also found the dialogue in this to be quite silly, often characters would give wordy, one-sided expositions in response to some issue or question raised by another. It didn't feel at all reminiscent of how people talk to each other in real life. 

Having said all that, it's still a novel that engrossed me and kept me interested, and I would definitely read Torrey Peters' next novel.  

 I inhaled this in one day, which is probably the best praise you can give any book. A completely engrossing and desperate story about Jeanie and her brother Julius and a story that took me completely by surprise. I really felt for the cahracters and their situations, and was totally pulled in by this novel. 

 

So many cells in my body have died and regenerated since the days of the Dream House. My blood and taste buds and skin have long since re-created themselves. My fat still remembers, but just barely - within a few years, it will have turned itself over completely. My bones too. But my nervous system remembers. 

We think of cliches as boring and predictable, but they are actually one of the most dangerous things in the world. Your brain can't engage a clich, not properly - it skitters right over the phrase or sentence or idea without a second thought. To describe an abusive situation is almost certainly to deploy cliche. "if I can't have you, no one can." "Who will believe you?" "It was good, tehn it was basd, then it was good again." "If I stated, I would have died." Awful, dehumanising, and yet straight out of central casting. This triteness, this predictabilitiy, has a flattening effect, making singularly boring what is a defining and terrible experience. 

This was such an original and engrossing way to tell a memoir. Machado is frank and raw, telling her story and the stories of many queer women who are caught in abusive and inescapable situations. 

I would also recommend reading Jess Hill's See What You Made Me Do alongside this, which details the complexities and barriers that are faced by victims on domestic abuse. 

 A well-written and comprehensive presentation of the centuries of British colonisation of India. Tharoor attacks common arguments from modern-day apologists for colonialism and contemporary issues about education of the history of the British Empire and the immense scale of India's contribution to Britain during the Second World War. He also dicusses the loathsome actions and beliefs of popular figures such as Winston Churchill, and the dangers of this kind of selective narrative.

Sobering, essential reading.

 We discussed this in an episode recommending non-fiction of the Bookcast Club podcast (episode #68). Episode here: https://www.buzzsprout.com/1116755/10480720

This series is incredibly creative and imaginative, and I really am in awe of NK Jemisin for creating such a comprehensive and detailed parallel Earth. However, in general I found this book to be quite confusing and detail-oriented with respect to the world building and shallow characterisation that, for me, left a lot to be desired. 

 This book is kind of nuts; a virus spreads throughout Australia, causing people to lose a lot of their cognition and rational thought processes, and start understanding animals. It was a compulsive read, I flew through this. There is a tense and taut undertone throughout this novel which keeps you reading, and gives a sense of urgency. It takes a grim tone when the animals start talking, which is unexpected and adds to the overall sense of uncomfortable strangeness. The writing is really effective, and this atmosphere is very engrossing. However, I personally found the characters to be extremely one-dimnesional and quite stereotyped, particularly in the case of the main character. She is an older conversative white Australian, and I thought the author really leaned into lazy tropes when describing her to the reader, resulting overall in a character whose personal journey and story I was not at all invested in.

For fans of The Day of the Triffids by John Wyndham and Flowers for Algernon by Daniel Keyes.