Christina

I've been lucky enough to read some excellent short story collections this year (Bad Thoughts by Nada Alic, Stories from the Tenants Downstairs by Sidik Fofana, You Never Get it Back by Cara Blue Adams), and Bliss Montage by Ling Ma is yet another standout. (How I'll manage to wedge it into my already-overcrowded “favorite short story collection” section of my bookshelf is unclear, but a great problem to have.)

The stories in this collection are surreal but they all feel real. This is the brilliance - Ma brings it all to life, as implausible (and at times grotesque) as some of it may be. She finds the universal in the specific (not to mention the impossible) and writes it in ways that stun in the moment and reverberate long after you've finished. Her style is detached, not intimate - so the fact that she manages to hit the emotional nail on the head in such an indirect way is all the more impressive. I loved this book and can't wait to reread.

Thanks to Farrar, Straus and Giroux and Netgalley for my ARC in exchange for an honest review.

I really loved this book. Others have covered the plot points and the story's expected - but still delightful! - overlap with Strout's other books, so I'll stick to how she made me feel: unexpectedly, utterly soothed.

‘Lucy by the Sea' is hot tea with honey in your favorite mug, in book form. It made me not only want to call my mom, but connect with strangers. Strout's writing always reminds me of the John Donne poem - “any man's death diminishes me, because I am involved in mankind” - because it's just bursting with humanity. This is no exception, and probably my favorite thing she's written so far.

This debut short story collection is my favorite kind of funny. Not ha-ha funny, not dad-joke funny, not even SNL-funny. It's dark funny, sardonic funny, holy-shit-she-nailed-it funny. Picture four out of five people scratching their heads, and the fifth one (me) unabashedly snort-laughing as I underline. It's completely disturbing and utterly delightful. The kind of book I'll recommend to my younger sister, not my mom.

My one critique: while the premise of each story is thrillingly unique, the actual narratives seemed to blur together. Our fourteen protagonists face a wide range of absurdist circumstances - for example, ‘Earth to Lydia' centers on an all-too-plausible support group that helps people struggling with capitalism to embrace greed and materialism, and in ‘Ghost Baby', our cynical narrator is “the spirit of a proto-child assigned to a couple whose chemistry is waning,” writhing in disembodied frustration as its parents fail to conceive it. As much as I love Alic's voice, I wish it had been more distinct from story to story - after the fact, specific sentences and moments are sharp in my mind, but it's hard to remember where they came from.

That said, I will EAGERLY pick up anything Alic writes from now on. This irreverent, biting, and unexpectedly vulnerable collection is reminiscent of Gabriela Wiener's Nine Moons, another favorite among the 200+ books I've read so far this year.

Thanks to Knopf Doubleday Publishing Group, Vintage and NetGalley for an ARC in exchange for my honest review.

WHAAAAAAT. WHAT WHAT WHAT. This book had me on the edge of my seat.

Haley, our fifteen-year-old protagonist, is used to not so much mediating between her divorced parents as choosing between them; it seems she can never make one happy without hurting the other, so the best she can do is toggle between them. It's not easy, but she's mostly got it under control - that is, until her dad kidnaps her and her younger brother. He brings them to a hideaway house with his fellow preppers and survivalists, where he believes they'll be safe from the upcoming pandemic. From there, it's fair to say things ... escalate.

Throughout the book, Haley veers from extreme to extreme in considering who to believe, whose version of reality to embrace: her father's (the pandemic-to-end-all-pandemics is upon us!) or her mother's (the world is just fine, thank you very much!). While this sounds dark, the book is at times quite funny - yes, there's trust issues and impending doom aplenty, but also crushes and hilariously consistent interactions with her parents, despite the chaotic circumstances.

And, of course, every time she thinks she's finally got things figured out - the rug gets pulled out from beneath her (and the reader!) again and again.

Plot-wise, I thought this story was propulsive and compelling. It probably could have been shorter - some of the back-and-forth, I'm-with-dad-no-I'm-with-mom started to feel stale after a while - and the writing was clunky in some places (Haley's voice sometimes felt less authentically and more stereotypically teenaged). But I'm overlooking that because I could. not. put. it. down. 4.5 stars, rounded up to 5.

Thanks to Harper Perennial and NetGalley for my ARC.

Hmmm, I'm struggling with this rating! I would say I enjoyed this book, but not for the reasons one might expect, and I found the first half to be much more compelling than the second.

What worked well for me:
- The descriptions of the tech scene were uncomfortably, uncannily lucid - though I didn't know this when I read it, I'm not at all surprised that the author was the first employee at Instagram!
- The vivid sense of place; San Francisco (and Oakland, and the South Bay, and, hell, even the shuttle!) truly were supporting characters.
- The dynamics between Ethan, our somewhat hapless protagonist, and the much stronger and more opinionated characters around him, like Mona and “the Founder”.
- Ethan's obvious discomfort and struggle to find his footing throughout his time at DateDate and in his early days at “The Corporation”; I thought his thoughtful, tentative interiority - especially contrasted against the brash confidence of his environments - was extremely well-done.

What didn't work so well:
- Just one, but it's a big one: I didn't find the central conflict - will Ethan be able to get back to the “mystery world” and achieve [spoiler]? - particularly clear or compelling. I understand it's sci-fi, but I read a lot of sci-fi, and the logic behind the glitch fell flat for me. I think I would have been willing to overlook this if the events the glitch set in motion were more interesting, but they almost felt like a distraction - I cared more about Ethan's deteriorating relationship with Noma, and his general identity issues, than this plotline. (And I understand that they're related, but ... that felt a little forced.) Overall, the second half of the book - in which this plotline takes precedence - just didn't feel real or exciting to me, even though in theory it should have.

Thanks to Henry Holt & Co and NetGalley for an ARC in exchange for my honest review.

Beautiful, heartbreaking, enriching. But I cannot for the life of me understand the cover!! It gives thriller / read-me-on-the-beach vibes - totally, almost absurdly misaligned with the story.

I enjoyed this book. Maddie is an earnest, funny narrator (we're not supposed to quote from ARCs, but there are many examples I could cite - you'll know what I mean if you read it!). She struck me as both younger and older than 25 at different moments during the story: she's fairly guileless and naive, but shouldering some serious responsibility.

While she loves her dad, who is sick with Parkinson's, she's increasingly tired of being the only one living at home and contributing to his care.

Many of Maddie's early actions are (IMO) frustratingly passive to the point that they strained credulity, but Maame is a story of her growth and evolution. While I do think this book is predictable, I don't think that's necessarily the point - to paraphrase a cliche, it's all about the journey, not so much the destination.

Overall, I think this is a solid debut, and I look forward to reading more by Jessica George.

Thanks to NetGalley and St. Martin's Press for my ARC.

Tabitha, Elizabeth, and Ginger aren't related by blood or by marriage, but they're indisputably family: they're mothers who find themselves (and, in two cases, their partners) indelibly linked after adopting four biological siblings. They've committed to keeping their kids as close to one another as possible, though they've got wildly different ideas of what that looks like; for example, Elizabeth and Ginger could do without the two-week vacation Tabitha's been eagerly anticipating and voraciously planning (down to the minute) for months.

The format of this book - alternating perspectives from each of the women - worked well. While their personalities occasionally teetered on the caricature-esque (the perfect one! the cool one! the anxious one!), they were inarguably vivid. I suspect most readers will find one of the women most relatable (for me, it was Ginger), but will find elements of themselves in all three. I also loved how Brown interspersed notes - I won't say from whom for fear of spoilers - throughout. However, the overall reading experience felt fairly slow (and I love character-driven fiction, so it's not that); it dragged for me, especially in the middle, and I feel like it would have been stronger had it been 50 pages shorter.

Ultimately, I'd describe it as a beach read with a twist - an interesting exploration of what it means to be a family and how our own childhood hopes and fears never really leave us. I think fans of Gina Sorrell's “The Wise Women” and Therese Anne Fowler's “It All Comes Down to This” will really enjoy it.

Thanks to NetGalley and Penguin Group Putnam for my ARC.

This cookbook was a breath of fresh air. I love how empathetic and explicitly non-judgmental Ruby Tandoh is, and how these recipes are truly designed to meet people where they're at - understanding that people have different physical abilities, experiences with cooking, and, frankly, other priorities in life (radical!). I liked the organization of the recipes - because, yes, some days I do want to go all-out, and other days I just want something edible. I found her writing engaging and informal, but still informative. I also deeply valued how she credited other cooks and authors from cultures not her own when she'd learned something from them - I came away from this cookbook with lots of great suggestions for further reading.

I understand and appreciate why she chose to avoid photos, and I LOVED the illustrations by Sinae Park. However, my one qualm: I wish the art would have been used more frequently as a tool to make instructions more concrete. For example, in one recipe, she talks about breaking out cauliflower into its leaves (then into green leafy parts versus “ribs”), florets, and stalk. I'm a visual thinker, and I would have loved to have seen that depicted in art form versus text alone. The abstract drawings were lovely and conveyed a wonderful sense of coziness and warmth, but I wish there would have been a bit more integration with the recipes themselves - I think that would have made them even less intimidating / more accessible.

Thanks to Knopf Doubleday Publishing Group and NetGalley for my ARC.

I loved this book! Thrillers aren't my preferred genre, and I rarely find them memorable - I tend to enjoy them enough as I'm reading them, but forget them almost as soon as I'm done. Small Game was an exception: in fact, as soon as I finished it, I started again. A few reasons it stood out for me:

- Braverman is a strong writer - again, with thrillers I often find the actual writing to be secondary (if not tertiary) to the conceptual plot, and I was pleasantly surprised that wasn't at all the case here. (This is her debut novel, though she's written two nonfiction books - one a memoir that I've added to my TBR.)

- The story itself was propulsive and immersive. Another pleasant surprise: I felt like I got a stronger-than-usual sense for most of the characters, especially Mara, the protagonist - but in a slow and semi-stunted way, which feels appropriate given Mara's personality. She's quite introverted, and connection doesn't come naturally to her, but when it does it's real and deep. I found her not just believable but relatable.

- The blurb teases that “the cast wakes up one morning to find something has gone horribly wrong.” I personally loved the process of finding out what exactly it was that had gone so off-the-rails, and I was very satisfied with the resolution. I won't say more for fear of spoilers!

- I've seen a few reviews complaining that the ending felt rushed. Yes, it wasn't fleshed out, but I don't think it should have been. The story was about a specific experience from start to finish. I'd argue anything else doesn't belong.

Overall, I'd recommend this to anyone curious about survivalism in search of a well-written thriller they'll get lost in (metaphorically, though a bit on-the-nose considering the plot!). 4.5 stars, rounded up to 5. Thanks to NetGalley and Ecco for my ARC.

I found Schmutz by Felicia Berliner equal parts fascinating and disconcerting. I wouldn't say I enjoyed it per se - it made me deeply uncomfortable! - but I valued, admired, and appreciated it, and am glad it exists. It's unusual, clever, and provocative, both in the sexual sense and the thought-provoking one.

I finished it about a week ago, and what I remember most vividly is the stark contrast between the increasingly intense porn Raizl finds herself drawn to and the limits of her language and knowledge to describe what she's seeing and feeling. There's one scene where she's describing the men and women in her videos - in the most intensely sexual situations imaginable - in almost absurdly sexless geometric terms. There was something so guileless about her, but - as with many areas of her life - she's determined to understand.

Overall, this book was less funny and more complex than I'd expected based on the description; it resisted easy definitions or judgements. By the end, I genuinely wasn't sure what I wanted for Raizl - there's no obvious path forward, and frankly no real way for her to integrate the wildly disparate things she cares about into one life - but I was left just slightly more hopeful than fearful.

Thanks to Atria Books and NetGalley for my ARC.

There's a rare but delightful category of great books - something like ‘Books I wouldn't necessarily want to read based on the premise, but can't put down once I start' - and Tomorrow, and Tomorrow, and Tomorrow falls squarely into it. I was inspired to read this book about 1% based on its description, 99% based on rave reviews from people I trust; I don't have much to add to their effusive commentary other than to say the hype is JUSTIFIED. I was utterly invested in the three characters, I was engrossed by the plot, and I even managed to grow curious about video games - something I genuinely never thought I'd say. I found this book fascinating, heartrending, and heartwarming, and I'll be purchasing a hard copy when it's published - this is a book that warrants at least one reread, and I can't wait to lend it out.

Thanks to NetGalley and Knopf for my ARC.

I feel like this book would have really resonated with me had I read it a decade ago! Like the protagonists, I'm in my early 30s - and while you'd imagine that would make them relatable to me, I agree wholeheartedly with another NetGalley reviewer who said they felt younger. Reading about them brought me back to my early 20s, but not in a particularly entertaining or illuminating way. Their dynamics, both inter- and intra-personal, felt overly familiar in the sense that reading an old journal might. It wasn't that I didn't enjoy the experience, but it wasn't new or especially interesting.

For a novel about women, it revolved around men; I'm not confident it would pass the Bechdel test, though I get that it was in large part the point. I do think that Casale did a really nice job building up the character of Theo - his relationship with Joy felt realistic and nuanced, and I understood why she gravitated towards him. I also liked how Joy and Annie's friendship ebbed and flowed throughout the book - their dynamic was a little bit messy, and that felt authentic. Celine, to me, felt like an afterthought - while I probably liked the writing in her sections the most, she didn't feel quite as believable or fleshed-out to me as Joy and Annie did.

Overall, 3.5 stars for me, rounded up to 4. Thanks to NetGalley and Random House Publishing Group—The Dial Press for my ARC.

I found this book lighter than expected considering its subject matter! It's a well-written, clever, and entertaining debut.

The story follows Geeta, a thirty-something-year-old woman living in - and ostracized by - a small village in India; everyone assumes she had something to do with her husband's mysterious disappearance. She tells herself she's made peace with her pariah status, but when a woman in her loan group comes to her for help ‘taking care of' her own abusive husband, she can't bring herself to ignore her - and finds herself in an increasingly tangled web of plans, lies, and backstabbers. Enemies turn to friends and back again as the women examine their relationships and grapple with the age-old question: How many murders is too many, anyway?

Thanks to Ballantine Books and NetGalley for my ARC.

I liked this book well enough, but I didn't find it particularly interesting or memorable. In my opinion, high points included Ellie's interactions with Larry - I feel like Fairbrother really brought his character to life (I just wanted to give him a hug!) - and her roommates. I also enjoyed the descriptions of DC. Overall, though, I think where this fell flat for me is that it tried to be both character- and plot-driven, and I don't believe it fully committed to (or was super successful at) either. 3-3.5 stars.

Thanks to NetGalley and Random House for the ARC.

TL;DR: If you loved Station Eleven, I think you'll love The Light Pirate. And that's just about the highest praise I can give.

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Any time a publisher tries to compare a book to Emily St. John Mandel's Station Eleven, arguably my favorite novel of all time, I'm going to be skeptical. Lucky for me (and readers everywhere), on rare occasion my natural cynicism proves not just unwarranted but spectacularly, joyfully, scream-it-from-the-rooftops wrong. That was the case here. The Light Pirate by Lily Brooks-Dalton is magnificent.

Fair warning: it is also devastating, on many levels, at many moments. You get attached, and then in an instant - gone. That said, just like in Station Eleven, “post-apocalypic joy” does exist, and it's especially stunning for being heartbreakingly hard-won. (Here, though, it's post-climate destruction, not a global pandemic.)

The writing is beautiful and almost painfully vivid. So many passages struck me, I wound up with pages upon pages of highlights. I won't quote anything in full yet as I know it's an uncorrected proof, but I will say that Lily Brooks-Dalton's metaphors are exquisite.

Speculative fiction is one of my favorite genres. This is one of the most stunning examples of it I've read since, well, Station Eleven. It reminds me of an excerpt of a Dobyns poem I love: “This is where we are in history - to think / the table will remain full; to think the forest will / remain where we have pushed it; to think our bubble of / good fortune will save us from the night”. This is one of those books that I wish everyone would read, not only because it's exceptional (which it is) but because it's critical. To paraphrase Brooks-Dalton, we all know that what we're doing to our world isn't sustainable - but we've hung our hats on the question of proximity, betting that we'll squeak through a closing drawbridge, that the worst won't come until we're gone. The Light Pirate - out later this year - calls our bluff.

Thanks to NetGalley and Grand Central Publishing for an ARC in exchange for my honest review.

This was a slow burn for me. It took me a while to get into, especially compared to Moreno-Garcia's previous novels Mexican Gothic and Velvet Was The Night, and for the first third I found the plot to be almost entirely predictable (note: I've never read H. G. Wells' The Island of Doctor Moreau, so that's not why!).

While I don't think the predictability ever vanished (I've been deliberately vague in this next statement, but just in case, I'll mark it as a spoiler) I thought the secret about Carlota, the titular character, was anything but - I found myself more and more drawn into the story, especially once the Lizaldes showed up. I flew through the last two-thirds in one sitting, to the point that I was surprised and a little disappointed to hit the end.

I'm not entirely sure how to position it - unlike her other works I'm familiar with, it's not a gothic horror novel nor a straight thriller. I guess I'd characterize it as historical fiction with a magical realism / sci-fi bent. I really enjoyed the historical fiction elements - I learned a remarkable amount about the Yucatán peninsula in the late 19th century - and I admire Moreno-Garcia's ability to move across genres.

Thanks to NetGalley and Random House Publishing Group - Ballentine for my ARC.

I loved this book. I've read many coming-of-age stories, many coming-to-America stories, and this one is jarringly memorable.

The narrator, Hira, who's found herself in a small town in Oregon for an exchange program, adroitly pinpoints and unsparingly skewers a range of unexamined American beliefs and behaviors. From the assumption that of course she must be grateful to have ‘escaped' Pakistan to her disgust about toilet paper, I found her observations and monologues - both inner and outer! - utterly immersive.

I'm surprised by how many reviewers have called Hira unlikeable, bitter, or worse. Sure, she has her issues - as do we all, especially as teenagers! - but she's by no means unaware of them, especially since she's telling the story retrospectively. (She's looking back from some unspecified time later in life, which I think was a smart choice on the writer's part.) I actually found her to be sympathetic and relatable; even though our life experiences are wildly different, she brought me right back to what it felt like to be sixteen. Also, let's be honest: it's not like her complaints about America are entirely off-base.

While I rarely recommend ebooks over physical ones, reading on my Kindle was so helpful since it made it easy to look up words and references I wasn't familiar with. There were still non-English banter and phrases I couldn't follow, but I could get the gist from the context. I would say the first third of this book, when Hira is still in Pakistan, is a little more work because of that, but I don't say that as a negative - books don't have to be easy to be worthwhile, and this one definitely was.

Thanks to Skyhorse Publishing and NetGalley for an ARC in exchange for my honest review.

“Dark, edgy, and wickedly funny” - yes, yes, and yes. How to Be Eaten is a gorgeously written story about a modern-day support group comprised of five women who've survived so-called fairy tales, from the traditional (like Gretel, who - unsurprisingly - struggles with a deep mistrust of food and those who try to feed her) to the contemporary (like Ashlee, the 21-year-old ‘winner' of the most recent Bachelor). It is TWISTED, and it is excellent.

In terms of plot, it of course reminded me of The Final Girl Support Group by Grady Hendrix, which I enjoyed - but I'd put TFGSG squarely in the thriller category, whereas I think How To Be Eaten is more ambiguous. It has thriller-esque elements, particularly around the therapist and his motivations, but it's much more character-driven than your typical mystery, and there's magical realism too. I'd actually compare it most closely to Silvia Moreno-Garcia's Mexican Gothic - both books expertly create a sense of creeping unease (and visceral shock!) as you move through them.

The one thing I didn't like about this book was the cover - I think it's misleading. It suggests that Ruby's (Little Red Riding Hood's) story will be the central one, but that's not the case. (The women get roughly equal ‘page time', but if there's an argument to be made for one central character, I'd go with Bernice or maybe Raina.) I would have preferred a more abstract design, or one that managed to integrate elements of all five women's stories - I think that would have set a much stronger orientation.

That said, I loved this book. I loved it so much I had to force myself to stop reading when I was 70% of the way through so that I could savor it through more than one sitting. To put it in context, I read an absurd amount - I'm at 80+ books in 2022 so far - and I can already tell this will be a contender for one of my favorites.

Thanks to NetGalley and Little, Brown and Company for my ARC.

This is a book I'd buy and display for the cover and title alone. As an outgoing yet wildly introverted human who's been gifted that “Please Leave By 9” banner by not one but several friends, and whose attempts at small talk either fall flat or evolve (devolve?) into therapy-esque territory in the first five minutes, I laughed out loud when I saw this book. The only way I'd ever display one of those horrible, ubiquitous ‘Good Vibes Only' signs is if I'd been kidnapped and needed to somehow signal to my loved ones that all was not well without tipping off my kidnappers, so, yes, I felt deeply and immediately seen.

Moving along to the content! Like the author, I am a Taylor Swift aficionado. She's a spectacular songwriter - and the gorgeous, gut-punching power of her work comes from her specificity. The ten-minute masterpiece All Too Well, for example, is chock-full of details - and while I've never literally left a scarf at a former lover's sister's house (as far as I'm aware), nor have I had weepy encounters with famous actresses in party bathrooms, I scream-sing along and I feel every bit of the emotion in it. On the other hand, it's no coincidence that ME!, arguably the most maligned song in her discography, is also her most generic.

I swear this digression has a point, and it's this: By far my favorite essays were the ones where McInerny got personal, sharing specific details of her and her loved ones' lives. In my opinion, two of the standouts were ‘Stay-At-Home Mom', where she examines her lack of interest in travel (in stark contrast to her activity- and adventure-inclined second husband) and then relates their dynamic to the disparities in her parents' relationship, and ‘Asking for a Friend', in which she recounts growing apart from - and eventually reconnecting with - her childhood friends after her first husband dies. On the other hand, ‘Competitive Parenting Association', which didn't center or even mention her own experiences, read like a tired (if amusingly written) rant I could probably recite offhand if required. Overall, I liked most of these essays and loved a few - and in all seriousness, I'm in awe of McInerny's ability to find the humor in almost everything.

When I think of books to compare this to, strangely, Bittersweet by Susan Cain comes to mind. While that's traditional nonfiction and this, while true to her own life, decidedly isn't, it felt like a more casual, more personal, and far funnier exploration of that same phenomenon.

Thanks to NetGalley and Atria Books for an ARC in exchange for my honest opinion.

“How was it possible that I knew so much about how to think, but so little about what to do? On some level, I knew I was overthinking things, but from where I stood, it seemed as if everyone else was underthinking things and I was thinking about them the right amount.”

It's possible I've never related to a protagonist quite as much as I did in this moment. (I can't say so definitively, because then I'd have to think back on every book that's ever resonated with me to be sure ... oh, what's that? I'm overthinking?)

Evelyn Kominsky Kumamoto has just left her PhD program, following the siren song of late-stage capitalism and the private sector - specifically, Big Tech. When we meet her, she's just started working at “the third-most popular internet company,” and she's in disbelief that she's actually making money as a researcher - enough that she can splurge on fancy cheese and fresh-cut flowers on her way home. (“A woman with fresh-cut flowers on the dining room table was a real woman, a real person.”) But before long, doubts start creeping in. Her team is working on an app designed to quantify and optimize users' happiness. It's no spoiler to say: yikes. Or to note that Evelyn, who is half-Japanese, seems to be picking up on things her predominantly white coworkers, especially her single-minded manager, aren't ignoring so much as not seeing at all.

Evelyn's ambivalence and low-level sense of existential dread extends beyond work, too. Does she want to marry Jamie, her long-term, irrepressibly - sometimes to the point of ignorantly - optimistic boyfriend? (There's a bizarrely romantic, exceptionally written moment involving ticks.) Does she want to be a mother? What does she want out of her relationship with her father?

This is such a timely book. It didn't so much raise new questions as better articulate ones that have been percolating in my brain for some time (I'm a UX researcher working in tech, so...) The ending seemed a tiny bit pat to me, but in a way that felt less like a cop-out and more like a relief. I've mentioned I'm not a huge book-club person, but this is a book I'd love to discuss.

Enjoyable - not the most memorable book but a great standalone reading experience.

I fully expected to love this book based on the description - “a brilliant, provocative, up-to-the-minute novel about a young white man's education and miseducation in contemporary America” who falls in love with a black woman from Nigeria and is forced to reckon with his racist upbringing and society at large? Wow, yes, sign me up. Unfortunately, I found the description far more intriguing and powerful than the book itself.

It started off strong - we begin with a teenage Harry enduring a safari in Tanzania with his unabashedly racist parents, Chevy and Wayne, who “wear their ignorance with confidence, like a God-given and indisputable birthright” - but by the halfway point (once Harry moves out), it had become something I had to push my way through, and it remained that way through the end.

I understand that Harry, especially as he ages into adulthood, is not intended to be a likable character - but he really seemed to push the boundaries of an evil cartoon caricature. I was disgusted by him throughout most of the book (in some moments, that disgust progressed to visceral, skin-crawling repulsion). One of my biggest issues with this story: I couldn't for the life of me find any reason Maryam would tolerate five minutes in his company, let alone pursue a relationship with him.

At one point, Harry recognizes Maryam's (regrettably short-lived) frustration towards him, describing her as “visibly weary of me” - coincidentally, that's exactly how I felt about him and his cowardly, gaslightly, fetishizing, self-pitying behaviors. (I could go on.) This is a man who has accepted a scholarship from a white-supremacy organization and soothed himself by telling himself that it's OK because he's not white in his heart, a man who is constantly comparing his own life to that of slaves and concluding his own circumstances are as bad if not worse. How anyone could perceive him as sympathetic is beyond me.

To be clear, I'm by no means indifferent to this book: I actively hated it. I'm a white woman, and I am open to the idea that I was supposed to hate this book. Maybe there's something that hits a little too close to home: Harry's probably the type of guy to throw a BLM sign on his front lawn, then privately vote NIMBY (and on the off chance that a black family does move in next door, well, how “exotic” for him). That all said, I just didn't find any nuance in Harry's character. Even though he's supposedly reflecting back on his choices at the end, I saw no evidence of real understanding.

Two stars because the writing itself was strong, and frankly because even though I hated this book, it's an accomplishment in that it elicited such strong feelings. (I'm very curious to see how others respond to this book.)

Thanks to NetGalley and Mariner Books for an ARC in exchange for my honest (as honest as it gets!) review.

It took me a few chapters to get into this book, but once I did, I was utterly engrossed. In terms of scope and scale, it reminded me of Pachinko by Min Jin Lee and The Love Songs of W.E.B. DuBois by Honorée Jeffers; though both of those books span generations and The Evening Hero focuses on just one man's life, it manages to feel almost as sweeping - and really, you could argue Dr. Yungman Kwak has lived two lives, one in Korea and one in America. 

It's sweeping, as well, in the emotions it elicits. There were times I was snort-laughing - while I would by no means recommend this to anyone seeking a “light” read, there were some sharp, delightful moments of levity. There were other times I felt enraged or heartbroken - especially the backstory of his childhood during the war, which this book taught me a lot about. (I found these parts the most engaging.) And there were times I found myself shrugging along at the absurdity of the US healthcare system, then - just like Yungman - jolting into a realization of how utterly wrong it is. You could describe it as historical fiction or contemporary satire, and you'd be right on both counts. 

My sympathies for Yungman, his wife, and (to a lesser extent) his son swung wildly throughout the first half of the book, then settled into a kind of balance by the end. I'm extremely impressed by the author's ability to write such multi-layered characters - with all their complexities, flaws, regrets, and desires (to belong, to be loved, to do better). 

This is an awesome book in the purest sense of the world. I will definitely be reading it again when it's released.

Thanks to NetGalley and Simon & Schuster for my ARC.

I'm still reeling from this astonishing memoir.

The premise drew me in immediately; it's a memoir told in seventeen stories, each centering on one of O'Farrell's brushes with death. The writing is beautiful, both lyrical and (at times) disturbingly, can't-look-away visceral.

As an anxiety-prone, risk-averse human, I admit I found myself in disbelief at the frequency and ferocity of O'Farrell's near-death experiences (for example, if I'd survived even one of her three near-drownings, I think I'd probably stop swimming for a while or, uh, forever). Her urge to live life to its absolute fullest, to push boundaries and risk bodies, comes in large part from surviving encephalitis as a child. Remarkably, what she takes away from that experience is that the rest of her life is a bonus, something she lucked into, something to be taken the utmost advantage of rather than tucked away safely on a high shelf.

While all the stories are powerful, by far the most harrowing for me is the first, in which she re-encounters a man on a trail and knows implicitly and unequivocally that he means to harm her. The story of her miscarriage was also gut-wrenching.

This was amazing and I'm glad to have read it. I'm embarrassed to admit I've never read Maggie O'Farrell before - no, not even Hamnet! - and this has skyrocketed her to the top of my list.