2017

The Vanishing Game – Kate Kae Myers

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vanishingJocelyn’s twin brother Jack is dead. At least that’s what she thinks until she receives a letter from him that sends her on a wild chase. First stop: Noah Collier.

Noah becomes a reluctant participant in Jocelyn’s search after her car and belongings are stolen. She’s come to Noah looking for help because Noah had been Jack’s best friend. They’d both worked for the same computer programming company, ISI.

Kate Kae Myers’ YA novel The Vanishing Game is a twisty turny mystery novel that follows Jocelyn and Noah as they race around following Jack’s complicated clues. (Complicated enough that I stopped trying to figure them out, but I was wayyy distracted when I was reading this book.)

Jocelyn, Jack and Noah spent their adolescence at Seale House, a foster home run by Hazel Frey, a drug addict who locked kids in the basement as punishment. Jocelyn is convinced that there are clues in the ruined remains of the place she once called home. (Half the building had burned down.) It’s the first stop on her journey to finding out exactly what happened to her brother and if he is actually really dead.

Jack leaves a series of puzzles for Jocelyn and Noah to solve, puzzles reminiscent of the games they used to play as kids at Seale House. But the clues aren’t they only mystery: Seale House has some ghosts to give up and someone is following the pair as they try to get to the bottom of Jack’s death.

The Vanishing Game will intrigue careful readers

 

 

The American Girl – Kate Horsley

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american girlMeet Quinn Perkins, a seventeen-year-old American exchange student spending a semester in the small French town of St. Roch.

Meet the Blavettes, Quinn’s host family. Sixteen-year-old Noemie, her nineteen-year-old brother, Raphael, and their mom, Emilie.

Meet Molly Swift, an American reporter for American Confessional, an podcast series that takes on “stories of police incompetence or just general incompetence, and find[s] the real story.”

When Quinn wanders out of the woods “barefoot and bloodied” only to be hit by a car (the driver of which doesn’t stop) and left in a coma, Molly and her journalistic muse, Bill, think Quinn would make a perfect story, something about “a young American girl coming of age, going into the world on her own only to encounter the unkindness of a stranger.”

Quinn’s story is slightly more complicated than that, though. Through a series of flashbacks, readers are introduced to the toxic Blavette household: father Marc  has left the family after an incident at the local school (which is attached to the house the family lives in and has subsequently been closed). Madame Blavette now takes exchange students as a way of making ends meet.

First thought to be away on a holiday, it is soon revealed that the Blavette family has disappeared without a trace. When Quinn wakes up in the hospital after her accident, she has no memory. Good thing, too, since Molly feels like the best way to get close to Quinn is to pretend to be her aunt. (Quinn’s father back home in America, is too busy with his much-younger pregnant wife to make the trip to France after Quinn’s accident.)

Kate Horsley’s The American Girl would make a terrific Netflix mini series. It’s populated with a cast of characters who all seem to have ulterior motives making it impossible to decide who is telling the truth. There are subplots galore including threatening Snapchat messages, sinister caves, locked doors and menacing strangers.

If this seems like a lot – it’s really not. The book was a lot of fun to read.

 

Pretty Baby – Mary Kubica

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pretty babyHeidi Wood seems to have it all going on. She’s happily married to Chris, successful dude (mergers and acquisitions), and mother to twelve-year-old, Zoe. They live in a spectacular condo in Chicago. But Mary Kubica’s novel Pretty Baby wants you to believe that Heidi’s life is precariously perched on a knife’s edge and all that it takes to set it off is Willow and her infant daughter, Ruby.

The first time I see her, she is standing at Fullerton Station on the train platform, clutching an infant in her arms….The girl is dressed in a pair of jeans, torn at the knee. Her coat is thin and nylon, an army green. She has no hood, no umbrella….The baby is quiet, stuffed inside the mother’s coat like a joey in a kangaroo pouch.

Heidi can’t get the girl and her baby off her mind. Partly it’s because she “work[s] with people who are often poverty stricken.” But there’s another, deeper reason. In any case, Heidi can’t stop thinking about the girl and when fate brings them into each other’s path again, Heidi acts. Before you can say, wtf, Heidi has moved Willow and Ruby into the condo with her family.

If I can say one thing about Pretty Baby, it’s that it’s overstuffed. So, first there’s Heidi and her fascination with this young girl and her baby, despite the fact that she has a (largely ignored) daughter at home. Then there’s Chris, who despite loving the woman he’s spent almost half his life with, finds himself wondering what the comely Cassidy Knudsen (new to his team) might wear to bed. Then there’s Willow, who tells her tale to the decidedly unpleasant Louise Flores, and it’s quite a story. Pull any one of these threads and you’d have enough for a novel, but Kubica tries very hard to weave them together and I can’t say that it was altogether successful.

Just a ‘meh’ for me.

 

 

My year in review, 2017

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I am almost afraid to review my reading year because I really didn’t feel as though I had an especially good one. Usually I have no trouble getting upwards of 50 books in a year – an average of about one book per week. I know there are scads of people who read a lot more than that – like a hundred books and more. I am not sure how they accomplish that unless they read for a living. In any case, I didn’t get nearly as much reading done during the summer as I would have liked and I think I spent wayyyy too much time on my phone. My kids gave me an iPad for Christmas this year and I am going to have to be super careful not to fall into a technology hole. Truthfully, I’d rather be reading, but sometimes at the end of a long day at school it’s just easier to turn on the TV or troll through Facebook. But 2018 is a new year. (And  good riddance, 2017. You sucked.)

Every year for the past few years, I have participated in The Perpetual Reader’s year-end survey. It’s a fun way to take a look back at the reading year that was. Here’s my 2017 edition.

 

Number Of Books You Read: 46
Number of Re-Reads: 2
Genre You Read The Most From: YA

 

best-YA-books-2014

1. Best Book You Read In 2017?

hate

The Hate You Give – Angie Thomas

Everyone was talking about this book, and for good reason. I fell in love with the characters in this book and appreciated a glimpse into a world of which I know nothing.

Runner- Up (for book that was the most fun to read)

kindworth

The Kind Worth Killing – Peter Swanson

A total page-turner by a new-to-me author.

2. Book You Were Excited About & Thought You Were Going To Love More But Didn’t?

Behind Her Eyes – Sarah Pinborough

I know I am in the minority here, but I HATED the ending of this book with a fiery passion.

 3. Most surprising (in a good way or bad way) book you read?

I started my 2017 reading year off with Where They Found Her by Kimberly McCreight, which I was sure was going to be a great beginning because I thoroughly enjoyed her book Reconstructing Amelia. Not so much for this one.

 4. Book You “Pushed” The Most People To Read (And They Did)?

I didn’t really push any of the books I read this year other than The Hate U Give. I intend to encourage a lot of people to read that one in my YA Lit class next semester.

 5. Best series you started in 2017? Best Sequel of 2017? Best Series Ender of 2017?

Series. Blech.

 6. Favorite new author you discovered in 2017?

Peter Swanson. I will definitely be adding more of his books to my tbr shelf.

7. Best book from a genre you don’t typically read/was out of your comfort zone?

I don’t tend to read outside of my comfort zone. Is that bad? Occasionally I read some YA dystopian  or fantasy stuff…just so I can talk about those books with students…but I’m not really a fan. (Unless it’s Patrick Ness. I will always read him.)

 8. Most action-packed/thrilling/unputdownable book of the year?

Ohhh. The Kind Worth Killing was pretty thrilling. I also recently finished The American Girl by Kate Horsley and it was pretty un-put-down-able.

 9. Book You Read In 2017 That You Are Most Likely To Re-Read Next Year?

Nada.

10. Favorite cover of a book you read in 2017?

thornhillIn its simplicity, Thornhill. It is a beautiful book all around.

11. Most memorable character of 2017?

No question: Starr Carter from The Hate U Give.

 12. Most beautifully written book read in 2017?

Probably Ann Patchett’s Commonwealth.

13. Most Thought-Provoking/ Life-Changing Book of 2017?

The Hate U Give. Do you see a theme emerging? I also really got a lot from Jen Waite’s memoir A Beautiful, Terrible Thing. It wasn’t life-changing because in some ways it merely reflected back to me a life I had already sort of lived; however, I did find it thought-provoking.

 14. Book you can’t believe you waited UNTIL 2017 to finally read? 

20th century

20th Century Ghosts by Joe Hill. I read Heart-Shaped Box pretty much when it first came out and loved it. I bought 20th Century Ghosts not long after, but it has languished on my tbr shelf for ages…like years. Finally got around to it.

 15. Favorite Passage/Quote From A Book You Read In 2017?

Nothing stands out…and half of the books on my list are at school. So, I got nothing.

16.Shortest & Longest Book You Read In 2017?

Me Being Me is Exactly as Insane as You Being You – Todd Hasak-Lowy (656 pages)

Nutshell – Ian MacEwan & This Gorgeous Game – Donna Freitas (tied with 208 pages)

 17. Book That Shocked You The Most

(Because of a plot twist, character death, left you hanging with your mouth wide open, etc.)

Sandra Brown’s Seeing Red shocked me with how BAD it was.

18. OTP OF THE YEAR (you will go down with this ship!)

Can’t say I have one this year.

(OTP = one true pairing if you aren’t familiar)

19. Favorite Non-Romantic Relationship Of The Year

100% the Carter family in The Hate U Give.

20. Favorite Book You Read in 2017 From An Author You’ve Read Previously

Of the books I read in 2017, several were from previously read authors:

 

Of those titles, I probably enjoyed I Found You the most enjoyable.

21. Best Book You Read In 2017 That You Read Based SOLELY On A Recommendation From Somebody Else/Peer Pressure:

I never feel pressure to read any recommendations – except for book club picks, I read what I want.

22. Newest fictional crush from a book you read in 2017?

I got  nothing.

23. Best 2017 debut you read?

The Hate U Give.

24. Best Worldbuilding/Most Vivid Setting You Read This Year?

Probably Salt to the Sea.

25. Book That Put A Smile On Your Face/Was The Most FUN To Read?

Geesh, looking over the books I read this year – most of them were pretty grim. Maybe that’s why I had such a hard time reading this year. Chopsticks was fun to read because it was a story mostly told with pictures.

26. Book That Made You Cry Or Nearly Cry in 2017?

Not even a lump in the throat this year.

27. Hidden Gem Of The Year?

truth

The Truth Commission – Susan Juby

Quirky, funny and Canadian.

28. Book That Crushed Your Soul?

Nope.

29. Most Unique Book You Read In 2017?

askthedark

Ask the Dark – Henry Turner

The narrator’s voice was super unique and memorable. Creepy story, too.

30. Book That Made You The Most Mad (doesn’t necessarily mean you didn’t like it)?

Behind Her Eyes pissed me off. A lot. Even as I kept turning the pages.

book-blogging

1. New favorite book blog you discovered in 2017?

Didn’t spend too much time reading blogs this year. I keep saying that that’s something I am going to change. Yeah. I’m going to get on that.

2. Favorite review that you wrote in 2017?

billy_idol_dancing_with_myself_final_cover-1

I like the review I wrote for Billy Idol’s memoir Dancing With Myself.

3. Best discussion/non-review post you had on your blog?

I don’t think I posted anything that wasn’t a review this year.

4. Best event that you participated in (author signings, festivals, virtual events, memes, etc.)?

Still really enjoy my occasional chats on CBC’s Information Morning. Here’s one I did in May 2017.

5. Best moment of bookish/blogging life in 2017?

Meeting Fantasy Chick from Litsy. I participated in a #secretsantagoespostal event and I got matched up with someone who lives about 15 minutes away from where my son attends university. Instead of mailing her gift, I was able to arrange to meet her and hand it over in person. That was cool.

6. Most challenging thing about blogging or your reading life this year?

I felt sort of lethargic this year – in all aspects of my life. I wonder if it was the political climate…or too much work…or I dunno. I am hoping 2018 will be better.

7. Most Popular Post This Year On Your Blog (whether it be by comments or views)?

Other than a visit to my home page, my page “What is a ludic reader?” got the most love.

8. Post You Wished Got A Little More Love?

I don’t really keep this blog for the ‘love’ although it’s always nice when people interact with the posts.

9. Best bookish discover (book related sites, book stores, etc.)?

I enjoy Litsy. I love Book Outlet just a teensy bit too much.

10.  Did you complete any reading challenges or goals that you had set for yourself at the beginning of this year?

I always say I am going to read x amount of books…but I think I will give myself a pass this year. I’m just going to read.

looking-ahead-books-2015

1. One Book You Didn’t Get To In 2017 But Will Be Your Number 1 Priority in 2018?

Too many to name but top of the list: John Green’s Turtles All the Way Down. It’s been on my bedside table for six weeks.

2. Book You Are Most Anticipating For 2018 (non-debut)?

Don’t follow this stuff, really.

3. 2018 Debut You Are Most Anticipating?

See above.

 4. Series Ending/A Sequel You Are Most Anticipating in 2018?

Nothing. I have an aversion to series.

5. One Thing You Hope To Accomplish Or Do In Your Reading/Blogging Life In 2018?

I would like to try vlogging.

 

 

Salt to the Sea – Ruta Sepetys

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salt-to-the-sea-bigcoverA couple years ago I read Ruta Sepetys’ novel Between Shades of Gray with my grade nine students and we all really loved it. Salt to the Sea treads familiar ground, telling the story of four very different young adults fleeing their homes to escape advancing Russian troops during World War Two.

There’s Joana, a Lithuanian nurse, who had fled her homeland four years earlier for the relative safety of East Prussia and who is now on the run again.

There’s Florian, a talented Prussian artist who had been working for the Nazi cause  as an art restorer.

There’s Emilia, a pregnant fifteen-year-old from Poland.

And there’s Alfred, a self-aggrandizing sailor for Hitler’s navy.

Joana, along with an old shoe-maker, a little boy and a tall woman named Eva,  is already making her way towards Gutenhafen where she hopes to board a ship that will take her to safety.

Germany had invaded Russia in 1941. For the past four years, the two countries had committed unspeakable atrocities, not only against each other, but against innocent civilians in their path. Stories had been whispered by those we passed on the road. Hitler was exterminating millions of Jews and had an expanding list of undesirables who were being killed or imprisoned. Stalin was destroying the people of Poland, Ukraine and the Baltics.

Emilia and Florian meet by accident in the woods. They don’t speak the same language, but Emilia sees Florian as a white knight, a title Florian does not want or even believe he deserves. They soon meet up with Joana and her group. They are all heading in the same direction and it is at the port where they meet Alfred.

The novel’s short chapters and alternating points of view make it a perfect novel for younger readers, although the subject matter is quite often upsetting. As happened with Between Shades of Gray, I fell in love with these characters (well, not Alfred) and I so wanted to see them find their way to safety.

Salt to the Sea, while a work of fiction, is based on the real life sinking of the Wilhelm Gustloff,  “the deadliest disaster in maritime history, with losses dwarfing the death tolls of the famous ships Titanic and Lusitania.” In her author’s notes, Sepetys tells us that in 1945, it is estimated that 25,000 people lost their lives in the Baltic Sea.

I think one of Sepetys’ gifts is her ability to create flesh and blood characters, giving voice to the thousands of innocent children and men and women whose lives were irrevocably changed by the horrors of war.

I loved the time I spent with these brave young people, and only wish that the ending hadn’t felt so rushed. This was the one little niggle I had with Between Shades of Gray, too. I would have happily read another fifty pages just to have a little more time with these characters.

 

I Found You – Lisa Jewell

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IFoundYouIn present day, Lily Monrose’s husband is missing. Newly married, Lily is frantic to find the man she loves, the man who came “home with gifts, with ‘two-week anniversary’ cards, with flowers.” Her husband, Carl, is “certainly never more than a minute late,” but he’s seemingly just vanished.

Alice Lake is a single mom with three kids who lives in a ramshackle cottage by the sea in Ridinghouse Bay. One day, from her window, she spies a man sitting on the beach.

He’s been there all day, since she opened her curtains at seven o’clock this morning, sitting on the damp sand, his arms around his knees, staring and staring out to sea.

Finally, Alice goes out to see if the man is okay and he admits “I think…that I have lost my memory…Bcause I don’t know what my name is. And I must have a name.”

Alice invites him in to her home and together they try to uncover who he is and where he came from.

In 1993, we meet Gray, 17, and Kirsty, 15, who are staying Rabbit Cottage in Ridinghouse Bay with their parents. They are on holiday, enjoying their family time when they meet Mark, a boy just a little older than Gray and for whom Gray takes an immediate dislike.

When Mark stops to chat to the family on the beach, Gray notes that the

smile on his face [looked] to Gray suspiciously like triumph. As though this ‘spontaneous’ conversation with his family was not just a passing moment of friendly human interaction, but the first brilliant stroke of a much bigger master plan.

Gray is right to be wary.

From these seemingly unconnected threads, British writer Lisa Jewell weaves an often riveting account of family, love and obsession. Although I was less interested in Lily’s situation – something about her irked me – I was wholly invested in Gray and Kirsty.  Their relationship was really believable and their part in the story provided the most heart-pounding moments.

As for Alice and her mystery man, well, obviously I don’t want to spoil anything. Alice is a likeable character, kind-hearted  and slightly reckless. As they work to peel back the layers of missing memory, the threads of this story start to come together. I found some of the machinations a bit clunky, but overall I Found You had me turning the pages way past my bedtime.

Off the Shelf – Just in time for Christmas

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Listen here.

Books are an excellent gift to give someone, but it’s actually pretty hard to pick books for other people. I have often had people give me books as gifts and while I certainly appreciate the gesture – I am, after all, addicted to books – those gifts have often languished on my tbr shelf for eons. My brother Mark gave me a book literally five years ago and I still haven’t read it. Sorry, Mark. I am sure it’s a very good book.

So, now it seems ridiculous that I am going to offer some books suggestions for the bibliophile on your list – but there you have it.

i think i love youSo, David Cassidy just died. My poor heart could barely stand it…but the last few years have not been kind to him. If you loved him, though, or you know someone who loved him – I highly recommend Allison Pearson’s novel I Think I Love You. It’s the story of 13-year-old Petra, a Welsh girl in love with David Cassidy during the time when he was the biggest star on the planet. And yes – there was a time when he was just that. It’s also the story of Bill, a young writer who has been hired to work for The Essential David Cassidy Magazine, not just write for it but to be David himself. It’s just a lovely story about being young, being in love…and it will be total nostalgia for women of a certain age. It’s a great little book.

And, hey, while we’re talking about death…Emma Cline’s novel These Girls is a gripping read for anyone interested in Charles Manson. This is a fictional account of a young girl, Edie, who meets a group of older girls and falls under their spell. They take her out to the desert where they have this commune led by the charismatic Russell. And the story unravels and we pretty much know how it turns out. It’s a page-turner, though, and the writing is terrific.

If you’re looking for a meaningful book to give to mature teenagers, I highly recommend hate Angie Thomas’ debut novel The Hate U Give. This title might be familiar because it’s been on everyone’s radar and for very good reason. It’s the story of Starr, a 16 year old African American girl who loves with her siblings (one older half-brother and a younger brother) and her parents in Garden Heights, an inner city neighbourhood. Starr and her siblings attend a predominantly white school in a better part of town and so Starr straddles two very different worlds. Then tragedy strikes and Starr must face up to the prejudice that she always knew existed. It’s so important that teens be exposed to diverse books and this book was just eye-opening, heartbreaking and  it’s important. I actually think it should be read by everybody…and there’s a movie in the works so I definitely encourage people to read it before that happens.

thornhillFor middle grade readers, I recommend Thornhill by Pam Smy. It’s a hybrid novel – so it’s both pictures and text – and it tells the story of two pre-teen girls separated by 25 years. In text we read Mary’s diary about her time at Thornhill, a sort of half-way house for girls waiting for adoption or fostering. Mary’s an odd, silent child, who spends her time mostly alone making puppets and avoiding one of her housemates who is doing her best to make Mary miserable. In pictures only we meet Ella, who moves into a new house with her dad, and her bedroom happens to look out on the shell of Thornhill. She becomes curious about what happened there and the mysterious girl she sees in the garden. It’s a mystery, it’s sort of spooky and it’s also sort of sad, but very accessible for middle-grade readers…say 11-13.

As for me, there’s a few books I hope Santa puts under the tree.

I am looking forward to reading Celest Ng’s Little Fires Everywhere. You may remember me gushing about Everything I Never Told You a few months ago. I loved that book sooo much – if you haven’t read that, definitely put that on your wish list. Little Fires Everywhere is “Both an intricate and captivating portrait of an eerily perfect suburban town with its dark undertones not-quite-hidden from view and a powerful and suspenseful novel about motherhood… Ng explores the complexities of adoption, surrogacy, abortion, privacy, and class, questioning all the while who earns, who claims, and who loses the right to be called a mother.”  – Publishers Weekly

I am also hoping to read Gabriel Tallent’s novel My Absolute Darling which has earned rave reviews and also cautions about its difficult subject matter. There are also a few books about books that I would love to get my hands on: My Life With Bob by Pamela Paul, a memoir from a woman who kept a record of every book she’s ever read…so Bob is not a person, but a book of books. I’d also like to get my hands on Reading with Patrick by Michelle Kuo, which is about the relationship between the author and a former student who is in jail for murder. As an English teacher, I am fascinated by any books that deal with the notion that reading can change lives…and this one sounds like a winner.

I am hoping for a few quiet hours over the holidays to catch up on some reading.

 

Welcome to the Dark House – Laurie Faria Stolarz

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darkhouseWho doesn’t love a good scare? Not Ivy Jensen. That’s not her fault, though. When she was 12, someone broke into her house and slaughtered her parents. In her recurring nightmare about that horrible night, Ivy wakes “with a gasp, covered in [her] own blood. It’s everywhere. Soaking into the bed covers, splattered against the wall, running through the cracks in the hardwood floor, and dripping over [her] fingers and hands.”

Ivy is just one of the teens in Laurie Faria Stolarz’s YA novel, Welcome to the Dark House. She decides to enter a contest sponsored by Justin Blake, director of several famous (infamous) horror films featuring the Nightmare Elf. Intrigued by the promise that her nightmares will disappear, Ivy submits an essay describing her worst fear. So do Frankie, Garth, Parker, Shayla, Natalie and Taylor.

These teens win an exclusive weekend away to meet Justin Blake and get an exclusive look at his latest project. For some of the attendees, this is the chance of a lifetime. Boy-crazy Shayla is on a mission to “”make the most of every moment” [and] have a fun and fulfilling life.” Garth, Frankie and Natalie are uber-fans. Parker is an aspiring film maker. Taylor is…well…missing. Ivy just wants her nightmares to go away.

When the group arrives at the B & B where they will be staying, they find their rooms kitted out with their most favourite things. Their hostess is Midge, “the psycho chamber-maid who collects her victims’ fingers in the pockets of her apron.” The next afternoon, the teens are taken to a nightmarish amusement park in the middle of nowhere.

It’s like something out of a dream. WELCOME, DARK HOUSE DREAMERS is lit up in Gothic lettering, hanging above an entrance gate. There’s also a Ferris wheel, a merry-go-round, and a ride called Hotel 9; with multiple pointed roofs, it looks like the hotel in the movie.

The rules are simple: the group has to leave their cell pones and recording devices behind, ride the rides and have some snacks, but each participant MUST ride the ride that has been specifically tailored to them. The prize? Well, “the camera’s already rolling” and so essentially, in a found-footage way, these guys are the stars of Blake’s latest project.

Of course, this is when things start to get a little hairy.

Welcome to the Dark House is reminiscent of teen horror movies like Friday the 13th and Nightmare on Elm Street. This isn’t necessarily a bad thing. Fans of horror movies (and horror fiction) will likely enjoy the inventive ‘rides’ and these characters – although you don’t get to know any one of them particularly well. Of course, you wouldn’t want to get too attached now, would you? There are some truly creepy moments and a cliff hanger ending, so you’ll have to read the sequel, Return to the Dark House to discover how it all turns out.

 

 

Nutshell – Ian McEwan

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nutshellThere’s no arguing with the fact that Ian McEwan is an astoundingly good writer. I have read enough of his books over the years to know that I like him, even when he’s hard work. (I have read Saturday, On Chesil Beach, and The Children Act   Predating this blog I’ve read First Love, Last Rites, The Comfort of Strangers, The Cement Garden and my favourite McEwan novel, the devastating Atonement. I have a couple more on my tbr shelf.) McEwan is astonishingly prolific and you really never feel like you are reading the same book over and over. He has lots to say about a variety of topics and he says it well.

That’s the saving grace of Nutshell, which was chosen as our book club selection this month. I did a little inward grown when Sylvie revealed this book. Not because it was McEwan – clearly that wouldn’t bother ne – but because I already knew about the novel’s conceit and I wasn’t really interested in reading this book. At all. But then: it’s McEwan. In less capable hands, this book would be a dog’s breakfast and instead it was, while not exactly enjoyable, an easy read.

So here I am, upside down in a woman. Arms patiently crossed, waiting, waiting and wondering who I’m in, what I’m in for. My eyes close nostalgically when I remember how I once drifted in my translucent body bag, floated dreamily in the bubble of my thoughts through my private ocean in slow-motion somersaults, colliding gently against the transparent bounds of my confinement, the confiding membrane that vibrated with, even as it muffled, the voices of conspirators in a vile enterprise. That was in my careless youth.

That’s the opening of Nutshell. If it’s not obvious, the narrator of McEwan’s book is an unnamed fetus. He’s sentient and trapped inside his mother’s womb. I say trapped because instead of biding his time until he’s born, he must listen to his mother, Trudy, plot with her lover, Claude, to kill Trudy’s husband, John. Matters are further complicated by the fact that Claude and John are brothers. If any of this sounds familiar, you know your Shakespeare. That’s all I’ll say about that.

Although the conceit of having the story narrated by a fetus might have proven problematic in less capable hands, Nutshell, is totally readable. Of course it is. Our narrator relates overheard conversations and imagines others to which he is not privy. Through him we see the adults in this story – none of them particularly likeable.  For example, he describes Claude as “a man who prefers to repeat himself. A man of riffs….This Claude is a property developer who composes nothing, invents nothing.” As for Trudy, “my untrue Trudy, whose apple-flesh arms and breasts and green regard I long for”, our narrator both loves and hates her. John, his father, was “Born under an obliging star, eager to please, too kind, too earnest, he has nothing of the ambitious poet’s quiet greed.”

As the narrator contemplates his mother and her lover’s plans to kill John, he also waxes poetic on a variety of topics including philosophy, poetry, and the best wine. He might be stuck where he is, but remarkably (or maybe not remarkably: this is McEwan, after all) the plot moves along at the pace of a good page-turner. Careful readers will love the allusions and readers smarter than me will likely find the overall reading experience intellectually satisfying.

Nutshell  is classy fan fiction by a writer whose talent and intelligence are undeniable, but I wouldn’t have ever picked this book up on my own.

 

 

We’ll Never Be Apart – Emiko Jean

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wetogetherSeventeen-year-old Alice is a patient at Savage Isle, an institute for adolescents with mental health problems. She’s recovering after a devastating fire, set by her twin Cellie, killed her boyfriend, Jason.

In the prologue of Emiko Jean’s YA novel We’ll Never Be Apart, Cellie says

…I’ll say it was an accident. An unfortunate tragedy. But it was neither. When they asked me what happened that night, I’ll say, It was a mistake. But is wasn’t. I don’t remember, I’ll say. But I do.

After the death of their grandfather, Alice and Cellie bounce around to various foster homes. In one of those places, “the worst home yet,”  they meet Jason. Jason becomes their protector from their foster father. “He’d wrap his arms around us like a comforting blanket. He smelled of clean laundry, a smell that still makes me feel loved and protected. Cherished.”

Jason’s flaw is that he loves fire. Cellie does, too. Alice can only watch helplessly, but it doesn’t prevent her from falling in love with Jason. After his death, she vows revenge against her sister who turns up at Savage Isle, too, albeit in a locked ward. Alice needs another patient’s help to find her so she can kill her.

The story is told in present day – as Alice, with the help of Chase, attempts to find a way to get to Cellie, and also unfolds the girls’ tragic story through a series of journal entries.  Readers might sense that the narration is unreliable – and they’d be right. There’s a propulsive element to Jean’s story, as we follow Alice on her search for the truth of what happened the night Jason was killed.

We’ll Never Be Apart will probably be enjoyable to mature teens who like a twisty tale with a sympathetic narrator.