Review: The Guernsey Literary and Potato Peel Pie Society

The Guernsey Literary and Potato Peel Pie Society
5 stars

Reasons for reading: liked the sound of it; it's one of those It Books this year; book club selection; New-to-Me Author for Triple 8 Challenge

Book description: "January 1946: London is emerging from the shadow of the Second World War, and writer Juliet Ashton is looking for her next book subject. Who could imagine that she would find it in a letter from a man she’s never met, a native of the island of Guernsey, who has come across her name written inside a book by Charles Lamb….As Juliet and her new correspondent exchange letters, Juliet is drawn into the world of this man and his friends—and what a wonderfully eccentric world it is. The Guernsey Literary and Potato Peel Pie Society—born as a spur-of-the-moment alibi when its members were discovered breaking curfew by the Germans occupying their island—boasts a charming, funny, deeply human cast of characters, from pig farmers to phrenologists, literature lovers all.Juliet begins a remarkable correspondence with the society’s members, learning about their island, their taste in books, and the impact the recent German occupation has had on their lives. Captivated by their stories, she sets sail for Guernsey, and what she finds will change her forever."

My thoughts: The word that kept running through my head as I read this book was "charming." It also reminded me a lot of 84, Charing Cross Road, which I really enjoyed last year. I'm wavering between 4.5 and 5 stars, but I decided to go for 5 because I really enjoyed it. The only thing that would make it lose 1/2 a star is that towards the end I found it, for lack of a better word, wobbled a bit - I wasn't 100% sold on the part Isola's notebook played in the ending,for example. But that's a fairly minor quibble.

Heather J asked: Did the letter writing format work for you? Does it live up to all the hype I've been hearing about it?

Yes, I enjoyed the letter format. But I've always been a fan of epistolary novels. One of the women in my book club said she found it a bit hard to follow at times. But I thought it was really wonderful the way Juliet could communicate and become friends with the Guernsey folks through letters, before she'd met them. And also, it fits the time period. Obviously, there was no e-mail, but even phone technology wasn't all that advanced in the 40's, plus I'm sure the war had knocked a lot of it out. The older British folks I know still treat the phone as an expensive luxury, actually. It also works as a way to bring together all of the characters - I think a Juliet chapter, then an Isola chapter, then a Sidney chapter, etc. would've been rather boring. The letter format really makes it seem like things are unfolding in real time.

I do think it lives up to the hype. We were trying to decide at book club why it has such hype, and came up with some theories. I think it's that the title really stays in your memory and that it's about the love of reading and bookish people like bookish books. Another club member pointed out that Eat Pray Love's Elizabeth Gilbert did the blurb, which is pretty huge. As I said, I found it charming and also feel it has a bit of everything - lots of humour, interesting characters, romance, history, and some tragic tales to go along with the lighter ones. I think also that people (like me!) don't know much about the German occupation of the Channel Islands, so that makes it even more interesting than other novels set in the same period.

Off for a bit

I'm off to a conference and then a bit of vacation - see you next week!

Review: The Willoughbys

The Willoughbys by Lois Lowry
3 stars

Reasons for reading: assigned it to our kids' book club at the library (without reading it first, oops!); Lois Lowry = children's lit queen; sounded funny

Description: Abandoned by their ill-humored parents to the care of an odious nanny, Tim, the twins, Barnaby A and Barnaby B, and their sister, Jane, attempt to fulfill their roles as good oldfashioned children. Following the models set in lauded tales from A Christmas Carol to Mary Poppins, the four Willoughbys hope to attain their proscribed happy ending too, or at least a satisfyingly maudlin one. However, it is an unquestionably ruthless act that sets in motion the transformations that lead to their salvation and to happy endings for not only the four children, but their nanny, an abandoned baby, a candy magnate, and his long-lost son too.

Heather J asks:
Would an almost-7-yr-old boy enjoy this as a read with mom book?

My first thought was, probably not. But then, I think that it depends on your son. If he's got an amazing vocabulary and has already enjoyed longer stories - classics, Roald Dahl, and/or Lemony Snicket, for example - he might. But I found it to be one of those books that's actually aimed more at adults. It is a funny book with kid appeal in that Snickety sort of way, but it's definitely a parody of old-fashioned children's stories like Heidi, The Bobbsey Twins (which I enjoyed - I sneered at the BT's when I was a kid), Anne of Green Gables and many others, including a few I'd never actually heard of, from the 19th century. There are tons of ten-dollar words and even the glossary at the end isn't overly helpful (though it is funny). We haven't had the meeting of my library's 10-13 book club yet, so I'n not sure what their reaction will be, but one girl did tell my assistant that it had too many big words. It was a quick read and I did enjoy it, but I was so conscious of the parody aspect that I found it hard to see as a children's book. But I think that the right, 9-12 year-old reader who gets the joke and who has maybe read a few of the books referenced will get a kick out of it. But I'd say that most almost-7's that I know would be too young.

Here's a post from someone else who found it rather adult-aimed.

Review: On Beauty

On Beauty by Zadie Smith
4 stars

Reasons for reading: it's been on my TBR list for quite a while; Orange Prize winner for the Book Awards Challenge; English author for the Orbis Terrarum Challenge

Summary (from Booklist): "The Belsey family is multicultural as well as multinational. Howard is English, teaching art history at liberal Wellington College near Boston. His wife, Kiki, is from Florida, and as practical as her husband is intellectual. Although they love each other dearly, Howard's waning career and wandering eye have caused a strain. Their children follow their own paths: Jerome is a Christian; Zora is a socially concerned intellectual; and Levi is trying to be a black man of the streets. When Jerome falls in love with the daughter of Howard's archrival, Monty Kipps, the two families are thrown together in a personal and cultural battle. Although the romance sours, Howard and Monty's rivalry kicks up a notch, while Kiki and Mrs. Kipps develop an unlikely bond. Intermingled with the analysis of family and marriage are commentaries on affirmative action, liberal versus conservative, and prejudices in many forms."

First line: "One may as well begin with Jerome's e-mails to his father"

My thoughts: There's a lot going on in this book! Family, marriage, friendship, nationality, gender, race, class, education...the characters are brought together and pushed apart by
these.

Smith acknowledges EM Forster as one of her influences and says this book is an hommage to him. I confess, it's been a really long time since I read any Forster, probably at least 15 years ago, when I was an undergrad. So those references went completely over my head. Given the role universities play in the book, I might have gotten more out of it had I read it back when I was attending one. But still, the book had so much going on, it would be impossible not to get something out of it.

What I liked best about the book was the humour. Smith has some great turns of phrase. One of my favourites was of a chaotic house that had "too many knicks and a dangerous density of knacks." I really enjoyed her description of the Belseys' house, too, with its one stained glass window that casts a colourful patch on the floor that no family member will walk through and the parade of family photographs that follows the staircase down all 4 floors. There's also a great scene where Howard reacts to a hilarious glee club performance.

I found the differences between the black, white, American and British characters very interesting. While they're both black women, Caribbean-British matriarch Carlene Kipps is conservative, religious, and traditional and Southern American Kiki Belsey, who is a feminist and portrays herself as a big, sassy black woman, are very different in many ways, yet they find common ground and become friends. Howard and Monty Kipps are both British academics, yet not only are they different racially, they have completely different views on politics and life in general. British-born Jerome and Zora Belsey seem to enjoy their privileged, academic upbringing, while American-born Levi Belsey tries to hide his private-school education and pretends to be the epitome of "street" and longs to fit in with the local Haitian refugees (despite his iPod and $120 sneakers). The black/white and liberal/conservative angles were quite interesting to read about in the days leading up to the US election, actually.

The central character, it could be said, is Howard and he's a stunning study in self-centredness - he's a liberal academic who doesn't believe in anything. While he does love his family, he basically refuses to let them care about anything other than academic or theoretical matters. Anything that goes against his "beliefs" is met with mockery. He can't admit he's wrong or apologize. Even his life's work, the study of Rembrandt, has basically been to discredit anything good other scholars have said about the painter's works.

Beauty obviously plays a role - having it, not having it, losing it. Kiki was once very beautiful, but is now very overweight - the beauty is still in there, but it's buried. Howard is described as having been beautiful in his youth, yet it's hard to see in the middle-aged curmudgeon he's become. Victoria Kipps is stunning and knows how to use it. Zora Belsey is not and it frustrates her - she alternates between trying too hard and not trying at all.

This book took a lot of reading and sometimes, especially with the references to art and poetry, I felt like I wasn't quite getting everything I could out of it. But it has humour, it raises some thought-provoking issues, the two rival families are filled with interesting characters, and it ends with hope. I can definitely see why it won the Orange Prize and was short-listed for the Booker.

Review: 13 Reasons Why

13 Reasons Why by Jay Asher
3.5 stars

Reasons for reading: Number Title for Triple 8 Challenge; sounded interesting

Book description: "Clay Jenkins returns home from school to find a mysterious box with his name on it lying on his porch. Inside he discovers 13 cassette tapes recorded by Hannah Baker—his classmate and crush—who committed suicide two weeks earlier. On tape, Hannah explains that there are thirteen reasons why she decided to end her life. Clay is one of them. If he listens, he’ll find out how he made the list."

First line: "'Sir?' she repeats. 'How soon do you want it to get there?'"

My thoughts: I have mixed feelings about this book. The premise is really a good one - it gets you hooked from the start, wondering what the deal is with the tapes.

But I'm not really sure if I'm supposed to find Hannah stupid for her decision or truly hard-suffering. Or something in between. That's probably the point - her decision will resonate differently with different readers.

I don't want to give away too much, but I have to say, as someone who has found themselves in the pit of despair and someone who didn't have a fab time of it as a fat, weird girl in high school, I didn't have a lot of sympathy for her. Part of it could be that it's a bit hard to keep track of the timeline - the compressed nature of the taped storytelling makes it seem like weeks, yet the events seem to have taken place over two years. Hannah refers to similar events happening in the previous town her family lived in. So, I guess she's meant to have been suffering for years. Yet...some rumors, a couple of bitchy girls, a mean jerk, a creepy jerk, and one really bad guy just don't add up to suicide for me. But then, I guess that's the point - we often never know what leads to suicide and Hannah decides to try and rectify that.

Near the end, Clay says, "Some of us will be too angry at Hannah for killing herself and blaming everyone else." I'm one of those people. She could have turned one jerk in to a teacher, turned the creep over to the police, sucked it up about the bitchy girls like we all have to do... While a few of the people on the tapes really did behave terribly, most of them didn't. Kids endure sexual abuse, horrific bullying in school and online, racism, orphanhood, poverty... Hannah's problems weren't much beyond garden variety, it seemed to me. If she had endured real hardships, the tapes would be understandable, but all she's really doing is making life miserable for 8 people who may not have used the best judgement and weren't as kind as they should have been and one who really tried to help her but she refused the help. Only 3 people really deserved true punishment. Plus, Hannah herself allows a horrible thing to happen to someone else, much worse than anything she's experienced, so she shouldn't be throwing stones. But again, some things do seem to be left out of her story, so perhaps she only told the "relevant" parts to the people on her list.

Overall, though it was a really interesting book. Heavy, but thought-provoking. I hope it shows teens the importance of treating other people well and also that suicide isn't the answer.

The Well-Seasoned Reader Challenge

Melissa the Book Nut is serving up the Well-Seasoned Reader Challenge.

Here's how it works:

Rule #1: The challenge runs from January 1 to March 31.

Rule #2: You must read at least three books.

Rule #3: The books must:
have a food name in the title
OR
be about cooking/eating
OR
have a place name in the title
OR
be about one (or more) person's travel experience
OR
be about a specific culture
OR
be by an author whose ethnicity is other than your own

Rule #4: They must be middle-grade on up, but can be either fiction or non-fiction.

Here's my list!

Food in title:
By Bread Alone by Sarah-Kate Lynch

About cooking:
Dishing With the Kitchen Virgin by Susan Reinhardt

Travel experiences:
Queen of the Road by Doreen Orion

Weekly Geeks #23

The theme this week is to pick a theme and repeat it!

I'm going to combine two of them: #19 - catch up on something (in this case, reviews) and #12 list books you haven't reviewed yet and invite readers to ask questions about them (I confess, I may have missed a few from last time, I'm sorry - I must really not have had much to say about those books).

So, here they are:
1. Rumors: a Luxe novel by Anna Godbersen
2. Gregor the Overlander by Suzanne Collins
3. Breaking Dawn by Stephenie Meyer
4. The Host by Stephenie Meyer
5. The Guernsey Literary and Potato Peel Pie Society by Mary Ann Shaffer - done!
6. The Willoughbys by Lois Lowry - done!
7. A Short History of Tractors in Ukranian by Marina Lewycka

So, if you have any questions about any of these books (or comments about them, yourself!), please post a comment and I'll do my best to answer!