BOOK REVIEW: Dark Matter, by Blake Crouch

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BOOK REVIEW: Dark Matter, by Blake CrouchTitle: Dark Matter by Blake Crouch
Published by Crown Publishing
Published: July 26th 2016
Genres: Science Fiction
Pages: 342
Format: Hardcover
Source: Blogging for Books
Goodreads

“Are you happy with your life?” Those are the last words Jason Dessen hears before the masked abductor knocks him unconscious. Before he awakens to find himself strapped to a gurney, surrounded by strangers in hazmat suits. Before a man Jason’s never met smiles down at him and says, “Welcome back, my friend.”
In this world he’s woken up to, Jason’s life is not the one he knows. His wife is not his wife. His son was never born. And Jason is not an ordinary college physics professor but a celebrated genius who has achieved something remarkable--something impossible.
Is it this world or the other that’s the dream? And even if the home he remembers is real, how can Jason possibly make it back to the family he loves? The answers lie in a journey more wondrous and horrifying than anything he could’ve imagined—one that will force him to confront the darkest parts of himself even as he battles a terrifying, seemingly unbeatable foe.

 I suppose we’re both just trying to come to terms with how horrifying infinity really is.

Dark Matter is a wild ride through alternate realities and the realities we create for ourselves. It’s a fast-paced thriller that will keep you guessing about the twists and turns until the very end.

Jason lives a comfortable, happy life, but from the beginning we see that he’s consistently plagued with the question what if. What if he didn’t marry his wife and settle down with a kid? What if he won a prestigious prize instead of his friend? What if he continued on his research instead of losing funding because he decided to focus on his family? Jason confronts those what-ifs when he’s abducted and pushed into a different reality. In the first reality that is different from his own, he sees what his world could have been if he decided to focus on his work rather than focus on his family, and in the midst of trying to get back to his “home” reality, Jason realizes that his other self has stepped into his role and taken over his alternate self’s what-ifs.

It’s bendy, it will probably make you think what just happened many times until everything comes to a head and you have to read to the very end. It raises the questions of reality, that realities can be created together and shared together, and that our futures are created every nanosecond along the way. If you aren’t careful, your split selves may come back for you. And ultimately it’s a romance in the sense that Jason realizes that life isn’t worth truly living unless he’s with his Daniela, no matter how many versions of her he meets along the way back home.

I really enjoyed this. It’s an exciting, breezy read that makes me hope that there will be a mini-series or a movie of this, because it would be so cool to see some of the scenes played out on screen.

Thank you to Crown Publishing and Blogging for Books for a review copy!

BOOK REVIEW: A Little Life, by Hanya Yanagihara

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BOOK REVIEW: A Little Life, by Hanya YanagiharaTitle: A Little Life by Hanya Yanagihara
Published by Doubleday
Published: March 10th 2015
Genres: Fiction
Pages: 720
Format: Trade Paper
Source: Purchased
Goodreads

When four classmates from a small Massachusetts college move to New York to make their way, they're broke, adrift, and buoyed only by their friendship and ambition. There is kind, handsome Willem, an aspiring actor; JB, a quick-witted, sometimes cruel Brooklyn-born painter seeking entry to the art world; Malcolm, a frustrated architect at a prominent firm; and withdrawn, brilliant, enigmatic Jude, who serves as their center of gravity. Over the decades, their relationships deepen and darken, tinged by addiction, success, and pride. Yet their greatest challenge, each comes to realize, is Jude himself, by midlife a terrifyingly talented litigator yet an increasingly broken man, his mind and body scarred by an unspeakable childhood, and haunted by what he fears is a degree of trauma that he’ll not only be unable to overcome—but that will define his life forever.

 Life is so sad, he would think in those moments. It’s so sad, and yet we all do it. We all cling to it; we all search for something to give us solace.

This is one of those books that everyone’s been talking about forever, and I finally decided to get it and read it, and oh my god, I cried a lot. It’s a difficult, graphic, and upsetting novel, and it’s one that requires a dedication to read it, because once I reached the halfway point, I made the decision to finish it that night.

This novel follows the lives of four friends who graduate from college and live in New York City. Most of the novel revolves around one character, Jude St. Francis, and the narration switches between past and present, first and third person. It is very much a character novel, and it explores the relationships of these four friends with each other and others throughout Jude’s life.

I initially had a few issues with it. This novel is timeless. The events in the novel take place in a New York that is not cemented in any specific time. There are no references to 9/11, no references to election years, no reference to politics or major news. I also felt that this was a little too long. Don’t get me wrong, I could read endlessly about any and all of these characters and would love to, and I got the impression that we as readers want to feel as if these four specific friends are our four specific friends. But. I felt that with some removal of some scenes, the novel could have been more solidly focused around Jude because, in essence, this is a novel about Jude. And finally, sometimes I couldn’t tell whether or not I was reading about a Jude (or a Willem, or a JB, or a Malcolm) who was twenty-five or a Jude (or a Willem, or a JB, or a Malcolm) who was forty-five. Some people don’t change, sometimes our inner voice stays and sounds the same throughout our entire lives, but I really wanted to hear that growth sometimes. Again, it adds to the timelessness of the novel, that we’re who we are no matter who or what anyone else says or does, so I understand.

Finally, is anyone’s life that consistently miserable? I read a handful of reviews after finishing it that called it “grief porn” or something to that effect, and in some ways I agree, because I can’t see how anyone who considers Jude that much of a friend would let so much of his later-life violence happen to him. All of Jude’s close friends at some point or another seemed to enable Jude’s behavior. How, after such atrocities have been committed against a person, does anyone, including the victim, allow it to continue happening to such a violent degree? Yes, I know, at some point we’ve got to let the person live his life, that he’s allowed to have his own say in what happens. I know there are legalities regarding committing people, to help them. It just seemed so implausible that there was no hope for Jude.  Half the novel was implausible, but the fact that there’s a prevalent trope of gay men always having unhappy endings is disheartening?? There’s a sense of dread surrounding Jude, a sense of wondering when that suffering is going to end and who’s going to end it and when, because there’s no hope for happiness for him and that’s probably the most upsetting part about the entire thing.

The more I thought about the problems I had with the novel, the more I thought about the history and construction of various genres of the novel. And it hit me. There’s a reason for all of this.

It’s so Gothic it hurts.

A Little Life is a modern Gothic novel, with its secrets,  its big empty living spaces, and its explorations of love and death. Jude is our virginal maiden, Brother Luke and Caleb are our villainous tyrants (members the clergy in Gothic literature are often evil, and god is Brother Luke and everyone in that monastery evil), Willem and Andy are our heroes, the spaces in which Jude lives are often characters in themselves, and so much of the violence occurs at night, that psychological overlay of darkness. The Gothic novel is wildly implausible, preys on our emotions, is utterly sensational, and pleases us with its terror.

This is one of the best, most engaging novels I’ve read in a long time. There were times when I didn’t even realize I was turning pages. I’d look at a page number, and some time later, a hundred or more pages had been turned. It’s visceral, it’s violent, it’s emotional, and it’s powerful. Yanagihara has a way with words and development that kept me reading long after I should have been in bed. She makes us care immensely for Jude and his friends before she delivers the hefty, difficult stuff, so that makes us ache and cry even more. She is unflinching in her descriptions of abuse, of love, of friendship, of the ache of life, and I couldn’t put it down.

Read it, laugh and cry a little, and live that little life.

BOOK REVIEW: The Book of Esther, by Emily Barton

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BOOK REVIEW: The Book of Esther, by Emily BartonTitle: The Book of Esther by Emily Barton
Published by Tim Duggan Books
Published: June 14th 2016
Genres: Fiction, Magical Realism
Pages: 432
Format: Hardcover
Source: Blogging for Books
Goodreads

What if an empire of Jewish warriors that really existed in the Middle Ages had never fallen—and was the only thing standing between Hitler and his conquest of Russia? 
Eastern Europe, August 1942. The Khazar kaganate, an isolated nation of Turkic warrior Jews, lies between the Pontus Euxinus (the Black Sea) and the Khazar Sea (the Caspian). It also happens to lie between a belligerent nation to the west that the Khazars call Germania—and a city the rest of the world calls Stalingrad.
After years of Jewish refugees streaming across the border from Europa, fleeing the war, Germania launches its siege of Khazaria. Only Esther, the daughter of the nation’s chief policy adviser, sees the ominous implications of Germania's disregard for Jewish lives. Only she realizes that this isn’t just another war but an existential threat. After witnessing the enemy warplanes’ first foray into sovereign Khazar territory, Esther knows she must fight for her country. But as the elder daughter in a traditional home, her urgent question is how.
Before daybreak one fateful morning, she embarks on a perilous journey across the open steppe. She seeks a fabled village of Kabbalists who may hold the key to her destiny: their rumored ability to change her into a man so that she may convince her entire nation to join in the fight for its very existence against an enemy like none Khazaria has ever faced before.The Book of Esther is a profound saga of war, technology, mysticism, power, and faith. This novel—simultaneously a steampunk Joan of Arc and a genre-bending tale of a counterfactual Jewish state by a writer who invents worlds “out of Calvino or Borges” (The New Yorker)—is a stunning achievement. Reminiscent of Michael Chabon’s The Yiddish Policemen’s Union and Philip Roth’s The Plot Against America, The Book of Esther reaffirms Barton’s place as one of her generation’s most gifted storytellers.

I am Esther, and like my namesake before me, I will save the Jewish people.

Emily Barton’s The Book of Esther is an anomaly. Take Joan of Arc, dieselpunk, magical realism, let it simmer with Judaism, and you’ve got a very distilled essence of what this book contains. It doesn’t fit neatly into a genre, and it’s a little chaotic, but it’s worth reading for so many reasons.

The Book of Esther follows the journey of a young Jewish woman named Esther, who takes it upon herself to follow her calling even though she is initially hesitant, even though she faces opposition from her family and her village, and even though she knows her journey will be a difficult one. This novel explores the roles of women in Jewish society, and it shows the strength it takes to overcome the captivity women sometimes face in traditional roles. Barton also challenges the divide of male and female roles in Jewish/traditional society by having Esther go on a journey to transform herself into a male, because she knows that only in a male form will she be accepted and taken seriously by her society. Esther also meets a scholar who has transitioned from female to male by faith in the Hashem (in effort to keep this review as spoiler free as possible, I won’t name names!), and I loved how Barton weaves this into the story and celebrates his identity, especially his identity in his faith. Barton allows Esther to be naive regarding this scholar, and both characters grow and learn about identity and what it means to be oneself through each other. However, Esther learns along the way that no matter what the mystics have whispered, she cannot be anyone but herself. By the end of the novel, instead of encouraging every woman to follow her radical lead, Esther quietly encourages those she meets to be themselves, whoever and whatever they are and choose to be.

There are some things to keep in mind about the novel that might deter or confuse some readers. This novel requires some sort of knowledge of Judaism and Jewish history to fully appreciate because it explores the magical parts of creation and Jewish and Kabbalist mysticism. Having prior knowledge will help in the beginning of the novel when some ideas and concepts are glossed over because it is presumed the reader has prior knowledge. This novel is religious, but it’s not out to convert the reader to a particular belief or reinforce in readers that a particular belief is “correct.” This novel has a love triangle, but it’s not key or essential to Esther’s story.

All in all, The Book of Esther is a must read if you enjoy magical realism infused with a Jewish Joan of Arc, dieselpunk with mechanical horses, and a feminist journey of identity. I enjoyed it immensely, and I still think about it frequently because Esther has inspired me to keep questioning everything because she questions everything. Through that questioning, Esther learns a lot about herself and her identity. She told throughout the entire novel that she can’t do this or that because she’s a girl. Instead of giving up, she follows her heart and does it anyway. And you know what? People listen.

I received a free review copy from Blogging for Books. All opinions are my own.

One Year Online!!

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I wanted to make a small post celebrating one year online and thanking every one of you for visiting and commenting! I can’t believe it’s been a year already!

I started this blog with the tiny shred of ideas of what I wanted to do last August at the beginning of my first year of teaching, and I feel like it’s taken almost that long to feel like I know what I’m doing and what I want to do. Here’s to many more years!

BOOK REVIEW: Everyone Brave is Forgiven, by Chris Cleave

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BOOK REVIEW: Everyone Brave is Forgiven, by Chris CleaveTitle: Everyone Brave is Forgiven by Chris Cleave
Published by Simon & Schuster
Published: May 3rd 2016
Genres: Fiction
Pages: 418
Format: eBook
Source: Netgalley
Goodreads

From the author of the #1 New York Times bestselling Little Bee, a spellbinding novel about three unforgettable individuals thrown together by war, love, and their search for belonging in the ever-changing landscape of WWII London.
It’s 1939 and Mary, a young socialite, is determined to shock her blueblood political family by volunteering for the war effort. She is assigned as a teacher to children who were evacuated from London and have been rejected by the countryside because they are infirm, mentally disabled, or—like Mary’s favorite student, Zachary—have colored skin.
Tom, an education administrator, is distraught when his best friend, Alastair, enlists. Alastair, an art restorer, has always seemed far removed from the violent life to which he has now condemned himself. But Tom finds distraction in Mary, first as her employer and then as their relationship quickly develops in the emotionally charged times. When Mary meets Alastair, the three are drawn into a tragic love triangle and—while war escalates and bombs begin falling around them—further into a new world unlike any they’ve ever known.
A sweeping epic with the kind of unforgettable characters, cultural insights, and indelible scenes that made Little Bee so incredible, Chris Cleave’s latest novel explores the disenfranchised, the bereaved, the elite, the embattled. Everyone Brave Is Forgiven is a heartbreakingly beautiful story of love, loss, and incredible courage.

War was declared at 11:15, and Mary North signed up at noon.

Chris Cleave’s Everyone Brave is Forgiven is a wonderful, heartbreaking novel about the people who find themselves at the beginning of and in the midst of a brutal world war. This novel brings the reader to the front and center of the lives of Londoners at the beginning of WWII, and the reader is able to experience how the war affected people both on the home front and at the war front.

Mary North, a young London socialite, is determined to make a difference in her life and in the lives of others, and she volunteers her services to the war effort. She is assigned to be a teacher to children who have been evacuated from London. There she meets Tom, her employer and future lover, and learns about Alastair, Tom’s friend who has enlisted and about whom Tom is distraught.

There’s bravery on the war front, with men and women facing dangers not seen before, but there is also bravery on the home front, fighting class and racial prejudices. It’s a deft combination of all sorts of bravery and how it affects each of the characters while each are dealing with feelings of longing, belonging, loyalty, and love.

If you’ve read Doerr’s All the Light You Cannot See and Hannah’s The Nightingale and want more to read in a similar vein, this one comes highly recommended.

Thank you to Netgalley for a review copy!