Constant Reader discussion

Kat wrote: "I finished The Solitude of Prime Numbers by Paolo Giordano last night and gave it four stars. (I very rarely give five.) Though by an Italian author you would hardly know it; setting..."

I also rated it 4 stars
From my review:
Giordano writes with such elegance about the landscape of loneliness, the need for love and acceptance. This is an intimate study of the psychology of two damaged characters. Both Mattia and Alice lack the strength to truly connect to someone else, yet have the strength to live alone and isolated.

Reading Station Eleven. Not quite halfway through and my interest is flagging.

Ruth wrote: "Reading Station Eleven. Not quite halfway through and my interest is flagging."

Mine dipped as well, but I stuck it out--it was worth it, although I guessed the, well, I suppose it was supposed to be a reveal, way ahead of time.

Book Concierge wrote: "Both Mattia and Alice lack the strength to truly connect to someone else, yet have the strength to live alone and isolated. ."

Very well put, BC. It was such an absorbing and moving story.

Sara wrote: "Ruth wrote: "Reading Station Eleven. Not quite halfway through and my interest is flagging."

Mine dipped as well, but I stuck it out--it was worth it, although I guessed the, well, I suppose it wa..."

Yes, I remember both the dip and the too-obvious reveal. But I do think it's well worth finishing. Though that reveal was obvious far ahead of time, the general nature of the ending wasn't, and it rewards.

Kat wrote: "Sara wrote: "Ruth wrote: "Reading Station Eleven. Not quite halfway through and my interest is flagging."

Mine dipped as well, but I stuck it out--it was worth it, although I guessed the, well, I ..."

Totally agree.

The Women by T C Boyle – 3***
Boyle tells the story of Frank Lloyd Wright through the eyes of the women who loved him: his three wives and his mistress. The chronology moves back and forth, beginning with Wright’s last love, and the story line seemed somewhat fractured. Despite the title and the organization of the book, the women come off as secondary to the man. Frank Lloyd Wright is a bigger-than-life presence here, and I grew tired of him.
Full Review HERE

I am currently reading The Song of the Lark by Willa Cather. The opening chapters were very slow paced, but I am glad the action has finally picked up a little bit.

I'm about 3/4 finished with The Secret Chord by Geraldine Brooks. It's the story of how David became King, told by Natan, a seer. It reminds me very much of the action in The Iliad which I finished recently. Much war, much killing, with the addition of much adultery. It's rather disconcerting to read a very grownup version of the Bible stories we were told as children. I think my mommy left a lot of stuff out.

Finished up Station Eleven. Underwhelmed. But perhaps that's not fair. I don't generally like distopian books.

Finished reading Just Mercy: A Story of Justice and Redemption by Bryan Stevenson. Pretty impressive. Now I'm going to dive into Can You Forgive Her? by Anthony Trollope.

I am starting The Flame Throwers by Rachel Kushner. So far, I like it.

❁Lisa Ann❃ wrote: "I am currently reading The Song of the Lark by Willa Cather. The opening chapters were very slow paced, but I am glad the action ..."
Lisa Ann, I loved The Song of the Lark! It has been a while, though. I think I liked the parts that took place in the Southwest the best, but over all it is a great meditation on the price of being an artist... Hope you continue to enjoy it.

I loved The Song of the Lark, but did find some of it slow. Although that's true of a lot of the books I like.

Finished The Flame Throwers in one fell swoop. Remarkable novel which I totally enjoyed.

Hmm. I keep wavering about whether to read the Flame Throwers. Maybe I'll add it to TBR.

I finished Hemingway's A FAREWELL TO ARMS yesterday, which I avoided for years because of the widely repeated charges against Hemingway's portrait of Catherine. Not saying I disagree with them, but the book is still so worth reading. Wonderful, wonderful dialogue. It's not the first Hemingway I've read, but it's the first in many years, and I enjoyed it so much.

Kat wrote: "Hmm. I keep wavering about whether to read the Flame Throwers. Maybe I'll add it to TBR.

I finished Hemingway's A FAREWELL TO ARMS yesterday, which I avoided for years because of the widely repeat..."

A Farewell to Arms is probably my favorite Hemingway novel--his short stories top any of the novels. As to the portrait of Catherine, I think we need to view how women are portrayed in the context of the times. Wearing current PC lenses is both limiting and unfair.

Joan wrote: "Kat wrote: "Hmm. I keep wavering about whether to read the Flame Throwers. Maybe I'll add it to TBR.

I finished Hemingway's A FAREWELL TO ARMS yesterday, which I avoided for years because of the w..."

The problem with Catherine isn't so much that it's a sexist portrait as that it's a cardboard one, it never comes to life. Although there's probably a connection between the two things. Anyway, there are many (relatively) complex literary portraits of women from the same era: Elizabeth Bowen, F. Scott Fitzgerald, Alberto Moravia, and Gertrude Stein (in her own way!) all created interesting (not necessarily positive) women characters. I hold everyone after Shakespeare accountable for failure to write complex female characters!

The Love Queen of the Amazon by Cecile Pineda – 4****
This is a wonderful send-up of magical realism, with a decidedly feminist bent. I laughed out loud at the ridiculous antics and over-the-top descriptions. I was engaged and pulled into the story from page one, and when I finished, I wanted to start from the beginning and read it again.
Full Review HERE

Theft: A Love Story by Peter Carey – 3***
The novel is told by the two brothers in alternating chapters. The plot is convoluted and intricate, as befits a psychological thriller, but I didn’t find it a grippingly fast read. I was interested but puzzled about where this was going for a good third of the novel. Simon Vance is superb as the narrator of the audio version. He gives each brother a unique voice, which makes it easy to tell who is narrating.
Full Review HERE

I am reading The Green Road by Anne Enright. I am thoroughly enjoying it - which is a good thing because I nominated it for the CR discussion, which begins February 15.

Here's part of the blurb from Amazon:
Spanning thirty years, The Green Road tells the story of Rosaleen, matriarch of the Madigans, a family on the cusp of either coming together or falling irreparably apart. As they grow up, Rosaleen's four children leave the west of Ireland for lives they could have never imagined in Dublin, New York, and Mali, West Africa. In her early old age their difficult, wonderful mother announces that she’s decided to sell the house and divide the proceeds. Her adult children come back for a last Christmas, with the feeling that their childhoods are being erased, their personal history bought and sold.

I nominated it because I really liked Enright's book The Gathering, which won the Booker Prize. This book was longlisted for the same prize.

The writing is full of wit and insight. I hope many of you are planning on joining the discussion.

I'm reading The Green Road too, Ann, and am really liking it. Before this, I read The Gathering and The Forgotten Waltz by Enright as well as her collection of short stories. So far, I think this is the best and I loved those previous ones.

Barb, I'm so glad you are also reading The Green Road. It should be a good discussion.

Your note made me realize that the other Enright book I read was The Forgotten Waltz. I didn't realize she had 3 novels. I still have The Gathering to look forward to.

Hi, friends. I'm enjoying catching up with everyone's recent reads. I am finishing up My Name Is Lucy Barton, which is quite short. I dunno. I was a fan of Olive Kitteridge, this one not so much. Another book I liked this year was Barefoot Dogs: Stories, related stories about an upper-class Mexican family forced to leave their country.

I'm taking a short course on some of Samuel Beckett's works. We read, discuss, watch a performance on DVD and discuss some more. I've been enjoying it immensely. So far.... Rockaby (very like a poem, or perhaps something with a Greek chorus), Act Without Words II - A mime for two players (reminiscent of Charlie Chaplin, or perhaps a Sisyphus story), Come and Go - A dramaticule (minimalist, constrained, beautiful colors, mysterious). Tonight I will read Krapp's Last Tape, which I've actually seen before. And still to come: Endgame and Waiting for Godot.

The Astronaut Wives Club by Lily Koppel – 4****
The wives of the original U.S. Astronauts had just as much of the “right stuff” as their hero-husbands. Koppel reveals their strengths, their weaknesses, their fears and joys, their stumbles and triumphs. These were some STRONG women, and it’s about time they were recognized. Orlagh Cassidy does a marvelous job narrating the audio book. Her pace is good, and she has enough skill as a voice artist to give the women sufficiently distinct voices (most of the time), so there is little confusion.
Full Review HERE

I just finished West with the Night by Beryl Markham. What a wonderful book - and author too. Beryl Markham was so brave and daring in a time when women were not brave and daring. She had courage and was steadfast in her goals.

She was attacked by a lion when young, trained and raced horses, and flew the first flight from England to the U.S. She truly lived an exciting life.

Gina wrote: "I just finished West with the Night by Beryl Markham. What a wonderful book - and author too. Beryl Markham was so brave and daring in a time when women were not brave and..."

I loved this book! I have Paula McLain's Circling the Sun which is historical fiction about Markham, but haven't read it yet.

Gina wrote: "I just finished West with the Night by Beryl Markham. What a wonderful book - and author too. Beryl Markham was so brave and daring in a time when women were not brave and..."

It was a good book--too bad that Beryl Markham didn't write it.
http://www.nytimes.com/1993/08/24/boo...

I've heard these rumors before about the writing of West With the Night but the last thing I read was the previous biography of Markham that refuted them somewhat. If this most recent biography is correct, it's too bad that they didn't list themselves as joint authors.

No matter who wrote it, it was a wonderful book. But that was an interesting article, Joan. I knew there was a link between Out of Africa and Meryl Markham but I didn't know what that link was.

I recently finished two books that give different perspectives on life in Italy.
The Other Side of the Tiber: Reflections on Time in Italy by Wallis Wilde-Menozzi took me a long time to read. It is a series of memoirish essays by Wilde-Menotti, largely looking back on her first years in Rome, a young American woman who had fled a broken marriage in England to become a writer. Her many expatriate years in Italy inform her reflections on exemplary characteristics of the country and the people, often starting with something as simple as a pair of shoes. Beautifully written, best enjoyed, I think, in sips, not downed in a gulp!

Donna Leon's About Face, like all her Brunetti novels, has a more jaundiced view of a society grown complacent about corruption on every level. I love the series, but would not recommend this book, which had a real resting-on-my-laurels feel to it.

Joan. thanks for the NY Times article on Markham. I became very interested in Karen Blixen. Beryl Markham. and Denis Finch-Hatten after I read Judith Thurman's biography of Karen BlixenIsak Dinesen. Highly recommended.

I am reading Morte D'Urban by J. F. Powers. It is far funnier than one would expect the story of the woes of a celebrity priest who has been assigned to a Minnesota backwater to be. The lone star of a foundering order that is described as being remarkable for being remarkable for nothing, Urban's popularity has put some clerical noses out of joint. Thus his move to the crumbling former alcoholic's sanitarium which has been donated to the order, and which the annoying Father Wilf is trying to make into a retreat center. For Wilf, imagine Powell's Widemerpool in a cassock. A mid-century prize winner and best seller, Morte D'Urban has been much neglected, I had never heard of it, until Yardley reviewed it in his "Second Readings" column. I am glad I stumbled on a 1963 paperback of it in the give away book cupboard at work. Remembered Yardley's review and decided to give it a go.

Ruth wrote: "Finished up Station Eleven. Underwhelmed. But perhaps that's not fair. I don't generally like distopian books."

Ruth I'm reading this at the moment (on Chp44) and quite enjoying it, but then I love fantasy novels. I think she has done a good job of getting the reading to think about the ordinary everyday things of life that we do take for granted which have disappeared in her scenario. I hadn't come across this book except for people mentioning it here. So far I am glad I picked it up.

Sheila wrote: "Ruth wrote: "Finished up Station Eleven. Underwhelmed. But perhaps that's not fair. I don't generally like distopian books."

Ruth I'm reading this at the moment (on Chp44) and quite enjoying it, b..."

I'm going to hear Emily St. John Mandel speak tomorrow night. I'll be interested to hear what she has to say.

The Girl on the Train by Paula Hawkins – 4****
The girl on the train is Rachel – a depressed alcoholic who is sure she has witnessed important information concerning a missing woman. Or was that accurate? This is a gripping, fascinating psychological thriller. I was hooked from the beginning and didn’t guess the culprit until the reveal. The ending is nothing short of chilling. The audio is capably narrated by three voice artists: Clare Corbett, Louise Brealey and India Fisher. But I have no way of knowing who voices which character.
Full Review HERE

a bend in the road n.sparks just started so haven'gotten only 2chapters in but ne of favorite authors

I started reading The Kite Runner a couple of days ago. I couldn't get into it at first and now I can't seem to put it down. I'm also trying to get back to the reading list. I miss being a part of the discussions.

Yesterday I listened to the audio of Cormac McCarthy's The Sunset Limited Wow! What dialog! So much in 100 minutes. I went stratight away and bought and watched the movie version immediately after finishing the book. Both are fantastic. Highly recommend this intense discussion of life and religion as "Black" tries to stop "White" from comitting suicide. My Review

All the Light We Cannot See by Anthony Doerr – 4****
A blind French girl and a young German orphan find their lives intersect in the walled Brittany town of Saint-Malo in August 1944. Doerr gives us wonderful descriptions, letting the reader experience the world as Marie-Laure or Werner does. Doerr peoples the novel with a wide assortment of characters, but the two young people at its core will stay with me for a long time, as will the haunting strains of Clair de Lune. The audio version is performed by Zach Appelman, who does a marvelous job. His gift as a voice artist makes it easy to believe he is speaking for a blind teenaged girl, a confused German boy, an elderly uncle, or a gruff soldier.
Full Review HERE

Book Concierge wrote: " All the Light We Cannot See by Anthony Doerr – 4****
A blind French girl and a young German orphan find their lives intersect in the walled Brittany..."

We had a very good discussion of this. You might be interested in it. https://www.goodreads.com/topic/show/...

Edwin O'Connor's I Was Dancing. Waltzing Daniel Considine, a retired vaudevillian, decides to move in as a permanent guest at his son's. However, after a year son and wife have had enough. Very funny battle of wills ensues. Many of the laughs come from the conversations between the wily Daniel and his screwball friends. Yardley reviewed the novel in his "Second Readings" column for the Washington Post. It's out-of-print, but found a gently used copy on-line. Lots of fun.

Just finished Binti the second of Nnedi Okorafor's books that I read. I am just totally engrossed by her African take on scifi and intrigued to see where this genre mixing style of hers goes . I'm going to try more of her writing.My Review

I am giving John Banville a second chance with The Book of Evidence. I'm about halfway through, and I'm liking it much better than The Sea, though I can see common points of literary technique. He'll perhaps never be my favorite author, but he does seem to be worth a read.

Sheila wrote: "Just finished Binti the second of Nnedi Okorafor's books that I read. I am just totally engrossed by her African take on scifi and intrigued to see where this genre ..."

Oooh, glad to hear that, Sheila. That book keeps popping up on my radar - clearly I'm meant to read it.

Right now I'm treating myself to Bill Bryson's new book, The Road to Little Dribbling: Adventures of an American in Britain, which I somehow managed to order in large print. I think my subconscious is trying to tell me something.

I am so looking forward to Bryson's new book, Peggy. Come back and let us know what you think when you finish. The NY Times Book Review podcast did an interview with him recently and I was like a fangirl listening to it.

The Wise Men: 6 Friends and the World They Made. I stumbled on this book at a used book sale and I'm so glad I did. Fascinating account of 6 men who shaped our foreign policy and advised presidents from FDR to Ronald Reagan, men who were "the Establishment", men who were lawyers and bankers who served their country and their Presidents in official capacities and in ad hoc roles over decades: Averell Harriman, Dean Acheson, George Kennan, John McCloy, Charles Bohlen and Robert Lovett. Among many accomplishments and also some missteps and failures, they were responsible for the Marshall Plan and the reconstruction of Europe, the creation of NATO, and "containment" of the Soviets. Written by Walter Isaacson and Evan Thomas; published in 1986. Highly readable - more like a story than a history book.

I finished both West with the Night and Circling the Sun, and loved spending mental time in the African space of those books. Looking forward to the discussion to come.

I read Sarah's Key today, a quick read, for an in person book club. Nothing was bad about the book, but I found it a little formulaic and though the 1942 story of the French roundup of Jews was a compelling one, I did not connect to the modern day story interspersed with it.

I'm in the middle of The Children's Crusade, and am enjoying it.

I am just about to start Ben Lerner's Leaving the Atocha Station. Many, many years ago I spent the summer in Madrid and look forward to returning via this novel.