Julie at Thirty: My Reading in 2021

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Julie at Thirty: My Reading in 2021

1Julie_in_the_Library
Dez. 31, 2020, 2:34 pm

Hi, I'm Julie, from Massachusetts. This is my second year in Club Read, but my first full year, since I joined part way through 2020. 2021 will also be my first full year living on my own in the condo.

My reading goal this year is simply to read, hopefully consistently. Also to update this thread consistently, too, but that may be pushing it. xD

Looking forward to discussing books with you all throughout the year!

2Julie_in_the_Library
Bearbeitet: Apr. 25, 2021, 4:20 pm

Quarter One: January Through March

January
1. The Last Wish by Andrzej Sapkowski: 3.5 stars

4Julie_in_the_Library
Bearbeitet: Okt. 26, 2021, 6:30 pm

Quarter Three: July Through September

July
1. Kwaidan by Lafcadio Hearn: 2.5 stars
2. The Thursday Murder Club by Richard Osman: 4 stars
3. Ghost Stories of an Antiquary by M.R. James: 3.5 stars

September
1. Going Postal by Terry Pratchett: 4.5 stars

5Julie_in_the_Library
Bearbeitet: Dez. 31, 2021, 12:36 pm

Quarter Four: October Through December

October
1. Mort by Terry Pratchett: 3 stars

November
1. The One I Left Behind by Jennifer McMahon:3.5 stars

December
1. People Love Dead Jews: Reports from a Haunted Present by Dara Horn: 5 stars
2. Reaper Man by Terry Pratchett: 3.5 stars

6Julie_in_the_Library
Bearbeitet: Dez. 25, 2021, 10:04 am

Articles, Essays, and Blog Posts

I only recently started keeping track of these, so this list will only cover mid-October through the end of the year this year. Next year I plan to track these from the start like I do the books I read.

October
1. Becoming the Thing That Haunts the House: Gothic Fiction and the Fear of Change by Holly Kybett
2. The libraries of Who We Are by Molly Temple

November
1. Exploring What Remains of Henry Ford’s Abandoned Plan to Build a Colonial Village in Sudbury by Christopher Butler
2. What Agatha Christie's Novels—And Life—Have to Teach Today’s Crime Writers by Lori Rader-Day
3. The Lure of Objects: On the Outsized Importance of Talismans and Symbols by Heather Redmond

December
1. A Surreal New Bookstore Has Just Opened in China by Elizabeth Stamp
2. Morioka Shoten: The Japanese Bookstore That Only Sells One Book by Emily Martin

7Julie_in_the_Library
Bearbeitet: Dez. 31, 2021, 1:00 pm

Stats and Fun

Total Books Read in 2020: 20
Fiction: 12
Nonfiction: 8

Fiction Genres
Fantasy: 4
Gothic/Supernatural/Horror: 6
Mystery:2

Nonfiction Genres
Writing Craft: 4
Poetry: 2
Other: 3 (self-help/mental health, folklore, antisemitism/current events/history)

Author Genders
Total Authors: 18
Men: 10
Women: 8

Decades Published
1760s: 1
1900s: 1
1970s: 1
1980s: 2
1990s: 3
2000s: 4
2010s: 6
2020s: 2

8BLBera
Jan. 1, 2021, 11:30 am

Happy New Year, Julie.

9Julie_in_the_Library
Jan. 1, 2021, 12:44 pm

>8 BLBera: Thanks! And Happy New Year to you, too!

10AnnieMod
Jan. 1, 2021, 5:35 pm

>1 Julie_in_the_Library:

Living alone for the first time is always challenging so good luck! At least you won't have anyone telling you off for yet another box of books appearing from somewhere ;) Happy new Year!

11OscarWilde87
Jan. 2, 2021, 4:11 am

Happy New Year and welcome to your first full year in the group! I have quite similar thoughts about my reading goal for this year: Just do it and don't let it slump too much.

12dchaikin
Jan. 2, 2021, 1:21 pm

It's a nice goal for the year. Wish you a happy 2021!

13avaland
Jan. 2, 2021, 4:55 pm

Happy New Year, Julie; waving from northwest of us, just over the border.

14Julie_in_the_Library
Jan. 5, 2021, 1:03 pm

Currently Reading: The Last Wish by Andrzej Sapkowski, translated by Danusia Stok.



15sallypursell
Jan. 6, 2021, 9:12 am

Happy New Year, Julie! That is a good reading goal.

16Julie_in_the_Library
Jan. 6, 2021, 9:14 am

>15 sallypursell: Thanks, Sally. And Happy New Year to you, too!

17LolaWalser
Jan. 23, 2021, 5:59 pm

Hi, Julie! That book intrigues me, Polish fantasy that gets translated into English must have lots to recommend it.

18Julie_in_the_Library
Jan. 23, 2021, 7:52 pm

>17 LolaWalser: The Witcher series is the only Polish fantasy I've tried so far, but it's very interesting. I'm really liking it so far, though there are some elements that don't thrill me. It's definitely different than the American fantasy I'm more familiar with.

I'd encourage you to give it a try. The popularity of the Netflix series means that copies of the books are pretty easy to find these days.

I started out of order, but in hindsight I think starting with the first book of short stories and going in series order is probably the best way to go about it.

19Julie_in_the_Library
Jan. 28, 2021, 2:45 pm

I finished The Last Wish by Andrzej Sapkowski yesterday afternoon. I rated it 3.5 stars. I'll be posting a review here in the next day or so, hopefully.

My next read will probably be No Saving Throw by Kristin McFarland, which I received from a friend for my birthday this month.

20Julie_in_the_Library
Jan. 30, 2021, 1:57 pm



The Last Wish by Andrzej Sapkowski, translated by Danusia Stok: 3.5 stars

The Last Wish, a collection of short stories centering on the monster-hunting "witcher" Geralt, is the first book in the series from which both The Witcher video games and Netflix's 2020 series The Witcher are adapted.

Overall, I really like this collection. A few things stood out to me as particularly good: the book's clever and well-executed structure, the rich and immersive worldbuilding, and the portrayal of moral complexity.

Unfortunately, there were also some things in this book that made me very uncomfortable, and kept me from rating it a full four stars, notably the text's attitude toward sexual assault.

The book is structured around one longer story set in the present whose chapters are interwoven with shorter, self-contained stories set in Geralt's past. The events of the shorter stories serve to illuminate, explain, or give further context to the chapters of the longer story with which they are juxtaposed. This structure is amazingly effective, especially as an introduction to Geralt and the world he inhabits.

Which brings me to the next attribute of this book that really stood out to me: the worldbuilding. The Last Wish and the rest of the Witcher series are secondary world fantasy, and Sapkowski renders that secondary world for the reader with tremendous skill. By casually peppering the narrative and dialogue with place and political names and references to religious practices, gods, historical incidents, and politics, Sapkowski creates a world that feels deep and real and lived in - a world that feels like it exists beyond the borders of the page, and continues to go on when we close the book.

Another thing that makes the world of the The Last Wish feel so real is the way that the morality of the situations portrayed in it are invariably complex and impossible to boil down to a simple right vs wrong binary. Nobody in this book is perfect, and even the worst of characters has an argument that's difficult to simply dismiss out of hand. Like all of us, Geralt is trying to do the right thing in a world where 'the right thing' is rarely obvious or unambiguous, and nearly every choice involves compromising some ideal in favor of another.

Another aspect I find interesting about this book, and the series as a whole, is as a response to the worlds of rpgs like Dungeons and Dragons. Now, I love D&D. I play in a weekly game. I've read some of the official tie-in novels, and enjoyed them. But the world of Faerün makes absolutely no sense at all.

And the world Sapkowski created in the Witcher series feels very much, to me, like a pointed response to gaming settings like Faerün, which work well enough for play but break down the minute you give them any actual, logical thought.

In the Witcher books, Sapkowski has created a world inhabited by both monsters and many of the traditional rpg fantasy races (elves, dwarves, humans, etc), with professional monster-hunters (witchers) and bards and sorcerers, but he's done so in a way that actually stands up to critical thinking. The monsters exist for reasons, and they're not just 'always evil obstacles to be killed without thought or guilt.' The world has a history, technology and society that changes over time. It has political mechanations and movements that fundamentally change the setting going forward. It has internal logic. It's possible to imagine regular people living there, in a way that you, or at least I, really can't with gaming settings like Faerün.

I don't know if Sapkowski was actually trying to respond to rpg fantasy settings when he wrote these books. I haven't read anything he's said about his work yet. But I wouldn't be surprised if something like this had at least been on his mind while writing.

All in all, well worth a read, and I definitely recommend it, with the caveat that those particularly sensitive to topics like sexual assault might want to skip both this book, and this series.

21LolaWalser
Jan. 30, 2021, 3:33 pm

>20 Julie_in_the_Library:

I didn't know it was based off a video game; must admit that aspect is a turnoff for me. Have you perhaps played it?

22baswood
Jan. 31, 2021, 4:08 am

>20 Julie_in_the_Library: that sounds interesting and takes me back to the days when I played AD&D.

23Julie_in_the_Library
Jan. 31, 2021, 12:35 pm

>21 LolaWalser: The books aren't based off a video game; it's the other way around. There are video games based off of the books. There's also a Netflix series based on the books that dropped in January of 2020.

I wouldn't let the video game thing turn you off, since the books came first, and so the video games had no influence on them.

I've read enough of the official D&D tie-in novels to say that these don't read like game tie-ins at all. The Witcher books read like books, and not clunkily-written ones, either. You can tell that they're translated from another language - which is a merit, in my opinion, I like my translated work to feel translated, to retain some of the flavor of the original language, for lack of a better phrasing - but there's none of that weird, choppy narration that you sometimes get in tie-ins where it feels like the narratization of a play by play, or anything.

I have not played the video games. I'm not really a video game person. I've played almost no video games in my life. I'm much more into tabletop rpgs, and even in that realm, I'm most familiar with D&D, though I've also played the fantasy flight Star Wars tabletop Edge of Empire.

24Julie_in_the_Library
Jan. 31, 2021, 12:45 pm

>22 baswood: I've never played AD&D, but I've heard the math was more complicated back then, especially stuff like armor class and figuring out what did and did not hit.

I started with 3.5 in college, as a 12th level wizard, because it didn't occur to the guys in the college rpg club that that was not a good first character for someone who had never played a tabletop rpg before in her life. Luckily, I still had fun and that experience didn't turn me off D&D for life. :-) I'm really enjoying 5th edition, though I also like 3.5.

25LolaWalser
Jan. 31, 2021, 2:22 pm

>23 Julie_in_the_Library:

Thanks for the explanation, I'll keep Sapkowski in mind.

26Julie_in_the_Library
Jan. 31, 2021, 3:04 pm

>25 LolaWalser: You're welcome!

27valkyrdeath
Feb. 24, 2021, 6:21 pm

>20 Julie_in_the_Library: I enjoyed your review of The Last Wish. I've been up and down on whether to read that for a while but I think you've convinced me it's probably worth a try! I love The Witcher games and the complex morality of them is definitely one of my favourite aspects, so I'm glad to see that's something that was carried over from the books.

28Julie_in_the_Library
Apr. 25, 2021, 5:07 pm

So it's been a while, but I've finally finished another book, though it's not either of the books I started after finishing The Last Wish - No Saving Throw and No Plot? No Problem - both of which I'm still only partway through.

Instead, I've finished reading, or more accurately rereading, one of the texts I still have from a poetry writing class I took my freshman year of college: Writing Poems (7th edition) by Michelle Boisseau, Robert Wallace, and Randall Mann.



I started rereading this book, along with The Making of a Poem by Mark Strand and Eavan Boland, of which I've still got a little bit left to read, at the end of March in preparation for Camp NaNoWriMo.

My project for Camp this month has been to write 30 poems over the month of April. That poetry class in college over a decade ago was the last time I really wrote any poetry, so it's been quite a ride!

I have absolutely no memory of having read any of Writing Poems back in college, though the highlighting I did in it proves that I must have read at least some of it, so reading it this time felt a lot like reading it for the first time.

My main takeaway is that I really like this book, and have found it very helpful.

I do think it would be of more use to someone taking a formal poetry class than to someone in my situation, attempting to improve their poetry writing on their own - indeed, the book is addressed to students in such classes, and regularly references concepts like "your class" and "your classmates' poems."

However, it is still a great tool for the solo beginner poet, and I would recommend it to anyone looking to get into, or back into, poetry writing.

I've found the exercises, in particular, of great usefulness. More than one of the poems I've written so far this month have grown out of exercises suggested in this book.

The prose itself leans toward the poetic, which is hardly surprising given that all three authors are poets themselves, which made the experience of reading it more fun.

The book covers a breadth of topics and is organized in a way that really worked for me. There is also an introductory section for teachers and professors advising different ways the book might be approached, depending on whether it's being used for a poetry class, a general creative writing class, a single unit of a broader subject, etc. I had no use for that section, but I read it anyway and found it very interesting.

The book includes a lot of different poems by a range of poets, and uses them well to illustrate the concepts being discussed in each chapter. Each chapter also includes a supplementary section of "poems to consider" which relate to or demonstrate the chapter's main topic.

In the years since this seventh edition came out in 2008, though, certain elements of the book have become dated.

The discussion of poetry journals and submission practices at the end of the book, for instance, is considerably out of date - it mentions that "a few journals have begun to accept only electronic submissions," and advises an if-in-doubt submission strategy involving bond paper and a self-addressed, stamped envelope. From the vantage point of 2021, that whole section is largely functionally useless.

And, of course, no poems, poets, or changes in the landscape of English-language poetry later than the 2008 publication date appear in this edition.

I would definitely recommend that someone looking for a copy of their own try for a newer edition, assuming that one has been issued.

On the whole Writing Poems has been both an excellent, interesting read and a useful, practical guide in my foray into poetry writing, and I would recommend it to anyone looking to make such a foray of their own.

29dchaikin
Apr. 25, 2021, 7:50 pm

>28 Julie_in_the_Library: hmm. I’m interested. And cool that you’re writing poetry. Wish you a good NaNoWriMo.

30Julie_in_the_Library
Apr. 25, 2021, 7:53 pm

31Julie_in_the_Library
Bearbeitet: Apr. 28, 2021, 10:55 am

I've finished The Making of a Poem by Mark Strand and Eavan Boland. Review to come, hopefully later today.

32avaland
Apr. 28, 2021, 5:41 pm

>28 Julie_in_the_Library: I also had the Robert Wallace book when I took a poetry class in the 90s. I like reading what I call poetry "reference" books -- books about poetry (studies, criticism, how to write, essays on...etc) almost as much as I like reading poetry. They have made me a better poet but also a much better reader of poetry. I don't write much now, just an occasional random poem. I hope you keep at it!

33Julie_in_the_Library
Mai 2, 2021, 12:08 pm

>32 avaland: I love reading writing craft books, too! They're both useful and so interesting.

I'm much more a fiction writer than a poet, myself. The program I did in college required all of the creative writing students to take a semester each of narrative and poetic techniques, regardless of whether we were fiction or poetry track. After that semester of poetic techniques, I didn't try writing poetry again until last month, when I decided to do it for Camp NaNoWriMo. I had fun doing it, though, so I doubt I'll stop writing poetry entirely even now that it's over.

34Julie_in_the_Library
Bearbeitet: Mai 12, 2021, 10:11 am



The Making of a Poem: A Norton Anthology of Poetic Forms by Mark Strand and Eavan Boland: 3 stars

Like Writing Poems, The Making of a Poem has been sitting in my book collection since I bought it for a poetry writing course my freshman year of college.

As you can see from the lower star rating, I found this book less impressive than Writing Poems.

There are good things about this anthology. The explanations of the forms are clear and concise. For the most part, the examples chosen serve the book well in illustrating each form, and the attempt at including diverse voices, which Strand and Boland discuss in their Introductory Statement, is laudable. The prose is readable and poetic. I found the book useful in my month of poetry writing, though not as much so as Writing Poems.

Those positives were balanced out, however, by a pretty large flaw: for an anthology of English language poetic forms, there are a lot of forms not found in The Making of a Poem.

I recognize, or course, that it would be impossible to write a single-volume anthology of every formal poetic form used in English language poetry; there are far too many for that. But this book omits not just obscure forms, forms only recently introduced into the accepted canon of English poetry at the time of publication (such as the ghazal), or variations on included forms, but also widely used, popular forms that one would expect in a book of this type, such as the limerick, any of the variations of the cinquain, or the rondeau (of In Flanders Field fame).

I did have one other issue with this book, which was rather more personal: I felt blindsided and uncomfortable with a couple of the poems included in the book, especially because they were not discussed or given context at all. However, I know that poetry is subject, and that it is both a characteristic and function of poetry to address subjects that make people uncomfortable. Poetry is supposed to make you feel something.

Ultimately, though I won't deny that my discomfort, which was evoked by poems toward the end of the anthology, probably influenced me, my rating of the book largely came down to the omission of multiple important forms, which felt like a lack of follow through on the premise of the book.

35dchaikin
Mai 12, 2021, 10:28 am

>34 Julie_in_the_Library: enjoyed your interesting commentary.

36Julie_in_the_Library
Mai 12, 2021, 10:33 am

37Julie_in_the_Library
Bearbeitet: Mai 13, 2021, 3:44 pm



No Plot? No Problem!: A Low-Stress, High-Velocity Guide to Writing a Novel in 30 Days by Chris Baty: 3 stars

I've been doing National Novel Writing Month, or NaNoWriMo, since 2019, and I love it, so I was sold on that premise before I ever picked up this book by the challenge's founder, Chris Baty. I started reading No Plot? No Problem! wanting to love it. And for the most part, I did love it. I loved the tone, the voice, the advice, the mindset - all of it. I was zipping through the book, looking forward to giving it a full four stars - I reserve five stars for those rare, truly special books, so from me, four stars is high praise - and then I hit chapter four.

In chapter four, Chris Baty displays a casual ableism toward the mentally ill - a group that includes not only myself but also all of my closest friends - that hurt and angered me so much that I put off reading the rest of the book, and which still bothers me now.

I ended up giving the book 3 stars. I didn't want to give one chapter, or one factor, more weight than the rest of the book combined, but I couldn't bring myself to let it slide, either. It may only be one flaw, but it's a pretty significant one. I'm still not sure if three stars accurately reflects how I feel about No Plot? No Problem!, but it's the best I can come up with for now.

So, to start with, the good:

As I said, I love NaNoWriMo, and this book is all about the joy of NaNoWriMo. It's always a treat to see other people being enthusiastic about the things we love, and this book does that for me. It was also fun to read National Novel Writing Month's origin story, so to speak.

And, of course, Baty's arguments for why people can and should participate in NaNoWriMo are ones that I agree with wholeheartedly.

The narrative voice that Baty employs in this book is jaunty, irreverent, and most of all, fun. The prose in this book is entertaining. The tone is light.

A lot, though not all, of Baty's observations on the NaNoWriMo process line up with my own. Most of the advice he gives throughout the book is, in my opinion, good advice. I plan to try a lot of it come November, if not sooner, for July Camp.

The barrier to entry is so low as to be nonexistent - Baty doesn't throw around any literary or writing jargon in a way that would alienate readers not already enmeshed in the creative writing or literary communities.

Finally, while this isn't laugh out loud funny, Baty's sense of humor definitely works for me.

But marring all of that is the ableist sucker punch Baty delivers in chapter four.

That sounds melodramatic, but that really is how it felt to read it.

In chapter four, Baty introduces the concept of what he calls "the two Magna Cartas" - one list of what a writer personally thinks "makes a good novel," (86} and one list of "those things that bore or depress you in novels" (88).

The advice makes sense, and I don't doubt that it works as Baty describes. He's absolutely right that "if you won't enjoy reading it, you won't enjoy writing it" (89). The problem comes when Baty discusses his own second list, which includes the bullet point, "mentally ill main characters" (88).

Baty is, of course, entitled to his own preferences. But a book is not a confession; it is a deliberately crafted work that a writer composes, as Baty knows very well. Putting that bullet point on his list when using this technique in his own NaNo forays, and including it here, in a published book intended for the public, are entirely different things. And if anyone knows the difference between private drafting techniques and the choice to include something in a published work, it ought to be the author of a writing craft guide like this one.

Baty doesn't leave it at that, either. He goes on to describe books about mentally ill protagonists - characters, in other words, who are like me - as "dry and unpalatable" and like the literary equivalent of "bran flakes" - good for you, but no fun to consume.

People like me, according to Baty, aren't the protagonists of fun stories, only depressing, serious ones with weighty themes. Our very presence in the narrative is apparently enough to move a story from the former category to the latter. The only reason any writer would include a mentally ill person, Brady all but states, is in pursuit of "self-improvement" (90).

Reading that was crushing for me. It always is when you discover that someone you admire thinks badly of the type of person you are. As an Autistic Jewish woman with clinical depression, this is not, admittedly, an uncommon experience for me. But it still hurts every time. More, in cases like this, where the admired person in question doesn't even have the (admittedly feeble) defense of having lived in "different times", like Degas or Dorothy Sayers.

I was also angered, and offended.

The only way to arrive at the casual assumption that a mentally ill protagonist can only exist in stories that are about mental illness is to not view mentally ill people as fully human, with the same complexities and multifaceted lives and possibilities as everyone else.

The only way to conclude that a mentally ill character couldn't be the protagonist of a space opera or a comedy or a story about "superpowered, kung-fu koalas who wear pink capes" (90) is to flatten us down to stereotypes whose lives are composed entirely of and revolve entirely around our disabilities or illnesses.

Worse still, I know for a fact that I am not, by any stretch, the only mentally ill member of the NaNo community. Chris Baty is casually disrespectful and insulting to a not insignificant portion of the community that he himself founded and about which he wrote this book.

And, of course, this type of advice to new writers just leads to the perpetuation of the a literary landscape in which mentally ill protagonists largely do only appear in stories about mental illness - not because that's the only type of story we can belong in, but because most writers assume that it is.

So while, for the most part, I think No Plot? No Problem! is a great book - fun, engaging, witty, and helpful - it has a streak of rot at its center that keeps the book from being even "good," and leaves it at merely "okay," - and even that leaves me a little uncomfortable. Which is a real shame.

38LolaWalser
Mai 13, 2021, 8:40 pm

>37 Julie_in_the_Library:

Oh, my. I'm sorry that what started as a pleasant read turned out so bad. That's a huge blind spot on the part of the author, and frankly it would make me question his judgement in general.

39dchaikin
Bearbeitet: Mai 13, 2021, 9:54 pm

Yes, a really strange blind spot.

Considering how complex the human mind is and how much literature makes of that...

40sallypursell
Mai 14, 2021, 1:48 pm

>37 Julie_in_the_Library: Julie, I too have a clinical depression, and several physical ailments in addition, to add to my unlikelihood of being the protagonist in a space opera or comedy. But I will wear a pink cape and practice kung fu if I want to! In addition, I have two children with mental illness. I have a daughter with schizophrenia who could certainly do those things--she is very accomplished, and has novels at Amazon for sale, has degrees, etc., and bakes cakes and pies from scratch, too. I agree with Lola that I would have trouble trusting Mr. Baty overall. I wonder what experiences he has had that led him to this viewpoint.

41Julie_in_the_Library
Mai 14, 2021, 4:11 pm

>40 sallypursell: Thanks for the support! Your daughter sounds great, and very accomplished. I also love to bake from scratch.

As for what experiences Baty had that led him to this viewpoint, I imagine it's less a matter of experiences and more a matter of never questioning an assumption.

I'd guess thatthe only books he'd ever read with mentally ill main characters at the time he wrote the book in 2004, and revised it in 2014, were Serious Literature about mental illness assigned to him in academic settings, or which he pushed himself to read for self-improvement.

That, a lack of examples of mentally ill characters in story lines not directly about mental illness in the general pop culture, and a lack of mentally ill friends or family, would likely do the trick. He's hardly alone in this opinion, after all.

The point that Baty was actually making in that chapter was 'don't feel like you have to write Serious Literature or the Next Great American Novel to make doing NaNoWriMo worth it, and in fact you will probably have more success, and more fun, if you write something you'd enjoy reading rather than aiming for Serious Literary Merit,' and that's a thought I agree with 100%.

It's the example, which was only one on a list of such examples, of 'novels about mentally ill characters' as being something only found in boring and Deliberately Improving Literature that I object to, and honestly, I doubt he ever gave it any thought at all. To him, it was likely a minor detail.

I'm still angry, and hurt. These aren't excuses - he should have done better. But he's hardly alone, and in retrospect, it's not really surprising. The stigma around mental illness is still very pervasive.

As to whether I trust him, I'm not sure that I'd frame it that way. I'm not just throwing away everything he says in the book altogether. It's more accurate for me to say that I keep this in mind when I weigh the other things he says in the book.

Some of his advice is influenced by his own personal biases, and some of it just isn't right for me and my personal writing process, but some of it is good advice that will help me going forward.

The trick, as it always is when reading nonfiction, is learning to sort one from the other.

Regardless, I'm not going to let an insult Chris Baty made without even knowing he was making it ruin my enjoyment of National Novel Writing Month. He doesn't get that kind of power.

42Julie_in_the_Library
Bearbeitet: Mai 29, 2021, 12:34 pm



I've finished The Castle of Otranto. I found it interesting, though I did have some trouble with the formatting. Trying to figure out who's speaking in a book written before the convention of starting a new paragraph for each new speaker, or even the use of quotation marks, definitely slowed me down and made it harder to parse what was going on.

The plot was interesting, and definitely contains the elements we now associate with the Gothic genre. Interestingly, it also has a lot of the hallmarks of the classic tragedy.

From a modern standpoint, the characterization was flat and in some cases even inconsistent, but Walpole hardly seems to have been going for round, believable characterization, and at the time he wrote the book, that wasn't a fault, as far as I know.

And even with that wooden characterization, I still found myself wanting Matilda to get her happy ending, and dismayed when she was killed, which is quite a feat on Walpole's part.

The pacing felt rushed, to me, but again, stylistic differences in fiction writing between the 18th century and now account for that.

All in all, I think it's an okay story whose importance lies in its breaking with contemporary literary trends and its place as the beginning of the Gothic genre. Clery's introduction (my copy is the Oxford World Classics edition, and includes a 36 page introduction by E.J. CLery) was fascinating, and definitely enhanced my reading experience by providing the historical context necessary to get the most out of the novel itself.

43sallypursell
Mai 15, 2021, 7:10 pm

44sallypursell
Mai 15, 2021, 8:13 pm

>41 Julie_in_the_Library: I think not speaking about mental illness doesn't mean that there were not mentally ill characters in books--if they don't mention it, they may just not talk about that issue, while still the character may be a sufferer. I have noticed that some people think "crazy people" act altogether differently from others, whereas the truth is that we act most of the time the same. We may have periods where we are different, or situations where we are different, and we may be in psychic pain when it is not obvious. Still, though, with a few exceptions, most of us with mental illness are just like everyone else most of the time. What I mean is that this gentleman might not realize that many of us are indistinguishable from others who do not have a mental illness.

45Julie_in_the_Library
Mai 16, 2021, 12:49 pm

>44 sallypursell: It's true that mentally ill people are often indistinguishable from the outside from everyone else. And I agree that Baty clearly doesn't seem to get that. And I agree that that's a problem.

But I wouldn't go so far as to say that there are mentally ill characters who just never say so or show it in any way.

Because fictional characters aren't real. They don't actually exist off the page. If we can't see something, or the results/effects of something that point to it being true, within the actual text, then it isn't really accurate to say it's happening. A character in a book is only what can be proven with the text of the book, by literal statement or implication or a combination of both, because beyond the boundaries of the text, they aren't actually real.

I hope that that makes sense. I had trouble putting it into words.

46Julie_in_the_Library
Mai 18, 2021, 9:50 pm

I started, and finished, another book today: The Winter People by Jennifer McMahon. It was very good, as evidenced by the fact that I read the whole book in a single day. Hopefully I'll have a review up in the next few days.

47dchaikin
Mai 19, 2021, 6:38 am

>42 Julie_in_the_Library: fun post. Enjoyed your thoughts on The Castle of Otranto.

48Julie_in_the_Library
Mai 19, 2021, 11:50 am

>47 dchaikin: Thanks! Discussing established classics and genre staples is always a little different than discussing other books, so it was fun to write.

49Julie_in_the_Library
Bearbeitet: Mai 29, 2021, 12:36 pm



The Winter People by Jennifer McMahon: 4 stars

This one was a book bullet from Carol420 in the Mystery and Suspense group.

I read this book in a single day - I started it at 12:38 pm over lunch, and finished it at 6:12 pm, over dinner - and I really enjoyed it. The plot and mystery kept me absorbed all the way through, to the point where I found myself resenting phone calls from friends, the need to make dinner, and the call of nature, because they interrupted my reading.

The setting was vivid. The town of West Hall felt very real, with appropriate complexity and depth, and rang true as a small New England town, albeit one more rural than the small New England town in which I live.

The characters were similarly well-rendered. Like real people, I didn't love or even like all of them - I had an antipathy for Martin from the moment he entered the novel, and that's nothing on how I felt about his brother - but even those for whom I felt little sympathy struck me as entirely believable.

Likewise, the relationships depicted throughout the novel all felt deep, complex, and incredibly real. The novel particularly focuses on mother-daughter relationships, and one sibling relationship, all explored in depth and with thematic resonance. While none of these reflected the particular mother-daughter or sibling relationships that I'm part of in my own life, I'm sure that many women will see their own experiences reflected in this book.

I also really like the plot itself. The ending surprised me, and yet also felt entirely right. I closed the final page feeling exactly what I felt that I should be feeling - a mix of satisfaction, sated curiosity, and melancholy, with a twist of unease. Not to mention a certain degree of awe at McMahon's skill at weaving the story together.

I will say that certain facets of the narration - the prose - left something to be desired. Some of the writing struck me as needing a final polish. But the story was more than gripping enough that the narrative prose quickly faded to the back of my mind as I lost myself in the story anyway. This is not a book in which the beauty of the prose is the focus or the point, and the things that are the focus, this book does very well, indeed.

As a final note, I'll add that I usually avoid anything that could be classed as horror, because I don't enjoy being afraid. I haven't tried to watch Criminal Minds since I moved into my own place. I don't go on roller coasters for the same reason.

But I tried this anyway, because the story intrigued me and it came highly recommended, and I don't regret it even a little bit. I did find myself a little spooked while and directly after reading, but not nearly enough to detract from my enjoyment of the book. And, of course, it does point to McMahon's skill as a writer, that she was able to convey tone so well that it affected me so much.

I picked up three of McMahon's other books at the library yesterday, as well, and will be starting Don't Breathe a Word either this afternoon or tomorrow.

50Julie_in_the_Library
Mai 20, 2021, 7:44 pm

I've finished Don't Breathe a Word. Review to come in the next few days.

51sallypursell
Mai 22, 2021, 4:19 pm

>45 Julie_in_the_Library: Your second paragraph is well-taken. I was considering fictional people as real, and I shouldn't. I didn't mean that there are mentally ill people who "never show it in any way". I meant that if this were a real person he might be able to avoid showing a mental illness in his public persona--most of the time. You have expressed it much better than I.

52Julie_in_the_Library
Mai 23, 2021, 3:08 pm

>46 Julie_in_the_Library: well-written fiction encourages us to think of the characters as real people. It's not surprising that we fall into the habit.

53sallypursell
Mai 23, 2021, 3:12 pm

>52 Julie_in_the_Library: What a lovely, gentle, thing to say.

54Julie_in_the_Library
Bearbeitet: Mai 29, 2021, 12:39 pm



Don't Breathe a Word by Jennifer McMahon: 3.5 stars

I enjoyed reading this book. As with The Winter People, the mystery/suspense plot drew me in and held my attention - so much that I finished the whole book in a single day.

(I've done that twice now, both times with suspense novels by Jennifer McMahon, and I feel like I could continue, but I'm actively deciding not to. It turns out that reading books in single days requires the setting aside of all other responsibilities and tasks, which, while fun, isn't really practical more than once in a while. Alas.)

In this book, McMahon takes on the folklore of Faerie and changelings, all with a dark, sinister twist. While I was never really afraid while reading, per se, Don't Breathe a Word definitely left me unsettled, and a little reluctant to turn out the lights for a while. In this book McMahon more than demonstrates her ability to create atmosphere and leave a lasting impression on her readers.

Don't Breathe a Word, which was published in 2011 and was McMahon's fourth novel, is concerned with some of the same themes and contains some of the same motifs, as in The Winter People, which was published three years later in 2014: the question of whether places can be evil, the idea of doors to other worlds hidden in seemingly ordinary landscapes, sibling relationships, mother-daughter relationships, motherhood, family, the ways that the past haunts the present. I'm sure there are more that I've left off and will think of as soon as I hit post.

I'm only on page 50 of 322 of McMahon's 2015 novel The Night Sister, and some of these themes and motifs are already evident in that work, as well.

These themes and motifs do not come across as stale for their repeated exploration, however. Each McMahon novel I have read so far has come at these questions and relationships from a different angle and through a different lens, and wrapped in an exciting suspense plot that more than keeps things interesting, besides.

It was evident while reading Don't Breathe a Word, especially having read The Winter People first, that Don't Breathe a Word was an earlier effort by an author gaining in skill with each new book. Certain elements of the writing in this book are noticeably less polished than in the later book. For instance, McMahon in 2011 was very liberal with parentheticals in her prose in a way that she had reigned in by 2014. She also outright states themes in the voices of characters a few times here, where by 2014 she had gotten significantly more subtle.

That's to be expected, of course - writers should improve the more they write, just as anyone improves in their craft as they gain experience. And while Don't Breathe a Word isn't quite as accomplished as The Winter People, it's still a great read and well worth it in its own right, not just as a comparison for McMahon's later work.

Creating and rendering complex, believable, full characters seems to be a particular strength of McMahon's from early on, and it's on full display here. The main character, Phoebe, in particular felt real right from page one.

Unlike The Winter People and The Night Sister, both of which employ multiple POV styles in alternating chapters, Don't Breathe a Word is told from a single, deep, limited-third-person point of view - that of the main character, Phoebe. I found this strategy less effective than the alternating POV - as apparently, did McMahon, given that she seems to have abandoned it in later books.

I did have a problem with faux-cursive font in which the book excerpts included throughout the book are rendered. The use of this font, clearly meant to mimic handwriting, is an unnecessary affectation that comes across as silly, artificial, and too try-hard. It' also an ableist barrier to entry for readers with learning disorders and disabilities such as dyslexia or even bad eyesight. I found the font difficult to parse myself, and I have no such organic handicap hindering me - I can't imagine how difficult and obnoxious it must be to readers who do have disabilities of that type.

All in all, despite some technical flaws that kept it from a full four stars, Don't Breathe a Word is a gripping suspense novel that looks at interesting themes and asks interesting questions, and I'd recommend it to anyone who enjoys suspense, supernatural or horror mystery, darker looks at faerie folklore, or McMahon's other books.

55Julie_in_the_Library
Bearbeitet: Mai 28, 2021, 2:36 pm

I've finished another Jennifer McMahon novel, The Night Sister. Review to come.

56bragan
Mai 29, 2021, 1:23 am

>54 Julie_in_the_Library: I really enjoyed Don't Breathe a Word, but I haven't read any other McMahon. Now I'm thinking maybe I should put The Winter People on the wishlist.

57Julie_in_the_Library
Mai 29, 2021, 12:22 pm

>56 bragan: If you liked Don't Breathe a Word, then you should definitely try McMahon's later books. So far I've only read two others, The Winter People and The Night Sister, but they were both good enough that I feel comfortable recommending giving anything McMahon wrote post Don't Breathe a Word a try.

I plan to try her earlier books as well, but I don't feel comfortable recommending any until I have. My guess is that even in her first few novels, the stories are probably riveting and thought-provoking enough to make up for any early-author weaknesses in the writing, as was true with Don't Breathe a Word itself, but I can't vouch for that, yet.

I can vouch for the fact that McMahon's writing definitely improves with each book, at least in my opinion, so if you liked Don't Breathe a Word, her later novels will probably work for you, too.

My reading order is partially predetermined by library due date order* - that's why her 2019 novel The Invited is next on my list - but within batches of books with the same due date, I'm trying to go from earliest to latest. I find that watching her writing skills and style develop across her books adds to the fun for me. :-)

58bragan
Mai 31, 2021, 12:42 pm

>57 Julie_in_the_Library: All excellent to know! I think my one criticism of Don't Breathe A Word, when I read it, was with the writing -- specifically her writing of dialog -- but the story was so absorbing I kind of didn't care much. So if her writing just gets better, then I'm really looking forward to more of it! And I have, indeed, now added The Winter People to the wishlist.

59Julie_in_the_Library
Jun. 14, 2021, 10:47 am

I've finished another two books - The Invited by Jennifer McMahon and You Mean I'm Not Lazy, Stupid or Crazy?! by Kate Kelly and Peggy Ramundo.

I'm a little behind on reviews, but I hope to catch up soon.

60Julie_in_the_Library
Jul. 8, 2021, 11:02 am

I've just finished a book of Japanese folktales written in the early 20th century by Lafcadio Hearn, a Japanophile from Europe and the US, called Kwaidan. It was interesting, albeit tinged with more than a little exoticism, and an easy, entertaining enough read, up until the end, when Hearn went off topic and off the deep end into social-darwinist theory.

At some point, I'd like to read a collection of Japanese folktales written and translated by a Japanese author and translator, both for comparison and for a look at the folktales without the Western Christian lens and framing.

61Julie_in_the_Library
Jul. 9, 2021, 5:33 pm

I've finished The Thursday Murder Club by Richard Osman. I enjoyed it a lot, and have rated it four stars.

62Julie_in_the_Library
Jul. 31, 2021, 9:49 am

Yesterday I finished M.R. James' short story collection Ghost Stories of an Antiquary, which I downloaded as an ebook from Project Gutenberg.

I enjoyed the collection overall. I thought the stories were interesting, well constructed, and in a few cases even eerie, if not actually frightening, and the humor worked for me.

Unfortunately, I found the running thread of...I'm not even sure what to call it, Christian supremacy, maybe? Pro-Christian propaganda? Anti-non-Christian bigotry? Well, whatever it was, I found it incredibly off-putting.
It noticeably detracted from my enjoyment of the stories, enough so that it brought my rating down from 4 stars to 3.5.

For anyone not bothered by that sort of thing, this collection will probably be a solid read. I will note that I was able to read several stories by phone on my balcony after dark without trouble, and I've gotten spooked watching Criminal Minds alone on sunny afternoons, so those looking for the truly frightening should probably look elsewhere.

63Julie_in_the_Library
Sept. 23, 2021, 12:03 pm

So I've been gone for a while, but I'm back! Again! (This is something of a chronic issue with me, and I expect, despite my best efforts, that it will continue to be. Some things are just part of the personality, I guess. *shrugs*)

I did read in August - I've been working my way through the Gutenberg Press ebook version of Four Weird Tales by Algernon Blackwood on my phone, and am currently part-way through the last story, "Sand," - but I didn't finish any books in August.

I've been very distracted, mainly by hiking, wildlife photography, and posting photos of various types of wildlife to iNaturalist. It's a lot of fun!

I have, however, finally returned to books. I even brought my latest read out on hikes, to read in nature, which was highly enjoyable. There's nothing quite like reading on a bench in a meadow or by a pond.

So far, I've finished one book, Going Postal by Terry Pratchett, and I've got three more from the library to pick from next.

A slightly belated L'shana tovah and happy new year to everyone who celebrated - it was great to be able to do so in person this year, even masked and outdoors - and I look forward to chatting with everyone again!

64Julie_in_the_Library
Bearbeitet: Sept. 23, 2021, 12:34 pm



Going Postal by Terry Pratchett: 4.5 stars

This book was my first foray into Pratchett's Discworld, and I really enjoyed it. The characters were fun and convincing, as were the plot and the world. The social commentary was, with one or two exceptions, spot-on and masterfully done, and it never takes precedence over or gets in the way of the story being told.

Pratchett's prose is very stylized, but it works for me and adds to the fun of reading his work; likewise his humor.

I will note that if you find either off-putting, you probably won't enjoy this. This is definitely not the sort of book where the authorial/narrative voice fades into the background as you get into it; the voice is definitely front-and-center.

I'm not quite sure how to classify the tone of the novel - there are certainly comedic parts, and the book as a whole could even be classified as comedic, but there are also very serious and important themes, ideas, and social issues being discussed, and the book takes them seriously even at the most comedic moments.

None of the main characters are flat or only there for the joke. They never break characterization for a joke (or to move the plot along, either, for that matter), and the relationships they form with one another are well-rounded and genuine.

And to top it all off, it has a good ending. I won't spoil, but I will say that not only does the ending make sense from the characters, it also acknowledges the complexities of the issues at hand in a way that felt really refreshing.

It wasn't the sort of breathtaking, near-perfect read that I give 5 stars - almost nothing is - but Going Postal was very, very good, and I look forward to returning to the Discworld again sometime soon.

65stretch
Sept. 23, 2021, 1:48 pm

>64 Julie_in_the_Library: I never thought of Going Postal or any of the industrial novels as an entry point to the Discworld. Makes sense with them being his later works. I think you'll find that Pratchett is pretty consistent with his humor and commentary of our world being reflected in his fantasy setting.

66Julie_in_the_Library
Sept. 24, 2021, 7:40 am

>65 stretch: I wanted to start right away, so I was limited by what was on the shelf at my local library. Of the Discworld novels on the shelf when I was there, Going Postal was the only one that was a character introduction/start of a mini-series per the online reading order lists, so that's what I went with.

I've heard and read a lot of good things about Pratchett and Discworld, so I'm looking forward to reading more.

67Julie_in_the_Library
Sept. 28, 2021, 8:35 am

I have started another Discworld novel: Mort. The lack of chapter breaks drives me nuts, and Pratchett's writing is definitely less matured than it was by the time he wrote Going Postal, but so far I'm enjoying the story and looking forward to seeing where it goes.

I've already gotten Reaper Man, as well as the other two books in the Moist mini-series, from the library for when I finish.

I've also been given two new books by my dad, the first two books in Ben H. Winters's The Last Policeman trilogy, with the third to come once he's finished reading it himself.

I definitely want to read them - they were on my tbr before my dad ever even heard of them - but with so many books to read, who knows when it will happen. I will get to them...at some point.

68wandering_star
Sept. 28, 2021, 6:16 pm

>63 Julie_in_the_Library: iNaturalist is great, isn't it?

69Julie_in_the_Library
Sept. 30, 2021, 9:58 am

>68 wandering_star: It is fantastic!

70Crazymamie
Okt. 26, 2021, 12:28 pm

Thanks so much for providing me with a link to your thread. I loved reading your reviews. Your thoughtful and articulate comments in >37 Julie_in_the_Library: especially hit home as my oldest daughter has Asperger's syndrome.

I am adding The Winter People to my list - sounds good!

>67 Julie_in_the_Library: I really enjoyed The Last Policeman - I need to give it a reread and then read the other two books in the trilogy. I got sidetracked by shiny new books and never got back to it.

71Julie_in_the_Library
Okt. 26, 2021, 6:29 pm

>70 Crazymamie: I'm glad that you enjoy my reviews!

I really struggled with the writing of that particular review. It means a lot to me that it resonated with you so much.

I won't lie and say that being Autistic isn't a struggle a lot of the time, but there's joy in it, too. If you ever want to talk about it, feel free to bring it up.

The Winter People was very good. I picked it up based on another Club Read member's reviews. I love that my review has inspired you to read it in turn - that's one of the things I love about this site.

72Julie_in_the_Library
Okt. 26, 2021, 6:30 pm

I've finally finished Mort by Terry Pratchett. Review to come.

73dchaikin
Okt. 26, 2021, 8:58 pm

Hi. I’m catching up. So just seeing you’re checking out Pratchett. I’m still working through them slowly. Going Postal is an odd start (I haven’t read it). Mort then takes you to one of his earliest and maybe earliest widely liked one. (I love his first two, but they have issues.) I’m not sure which you will like better, Mort or Reaper Man, but I remember thinking RM is a more mature book. Anyway, enjoy the quirky wonderful thing that is discworld.

74Julie_in_the_Library
Okt. 30, 2021, 10:35 am



Mort by Terry Pratchett: 3 stars.

I expected to love this book. I wanted to love this book. Alas, I did not love this book.

To start with, coming of age tales, with their foolish protagonists who get themselves into embarrassing and entirely avoidable quagmires, are not my genre of choice. They inevitably set off my second-hand embarrassment, which does not make for a fun reading experience.

Also, I found the characters flat and plot-driven. I couldn't for the life of me understand why Mort, for instance, kept making things worse other than 'because the plot requires him to.' Maybe it's just that I've never experienced a crush/attraction, but his behavior reads to me as forced and unbelievable. Death's motivations and behavior seem just as dictated by the plot, as do those of most of the other characters.

The hook - boy becomes apprenticed to Death - was plenty intriguing, and the conflict - boy accidentally screws up universe by saving someone destined to die - is full of promise. The execution of these ideas, for me, did not fulfill that promise. The ending, especially, felt abrupt and entirely out of nowhere.

But above all of that, the biggest problem that I had reading Mort is that it reads like it needs another good edit or two.

Terry Pratchett was a very clever writer, even so early in his career. And reading Mort, it's clear that he knew it. A lot of the passages in the book read to me like Pratchett showing off how clever he was.

Pratchett repeated certain 'bits' - the large-scale, beautiful descriptive prose undercut immediately by the mundane, and the jokes about Death being unable to make any expression other than a smile, for example - to the point where they became annoying instead of funny.

He constantly interrupted the momentum of his own plot with beautiful and/or clever passages that should have been cut in the editing process because they didn't serve the story.

While no piece of writing advice is universal, there's a reason that "kill your darlings" is such a popular line in writing circles.

It feels to me like, at this point in his career, Pratchett hadn't yet learned to restrain himself. (Or found an editor willing to do that for him). By Going Postal, which he wrote much later in his career, he clearly had, and it makes for a much better book.

It wasn't all bad. I did enjoy Pratchett's prose, for the most part, and he did make some apt and enjoyable social commentary throughout the novel, which is what brought the rating up from 2 stars (did not enjoy or bad) to 3 stars (average).

My main takeaway: I'm glad I read it. There were some great lines and fun bits. But it wasn't very good, and I probably won't ever read it again.

I look forward to seeing how Pratchett's writing developed over his career as I read the rest of the Discworld books.

75dchaikin
Bearbeitet: Nov. 1, 2021, 7:21 am

Hmm. For what it’s worth, I could say something similar about Pyramids, which I read earlier this year. Seems he is always clever and full of clever ideas, not always plot-drive and pace aware or successful. Enjoyed your thoughts.

76AnnieMod
Nov. 1, 2021, 6:33 am

>74 Julie_in_the_Library: That’s interesting. I found Going Postal to be almost flat when I read it - like he needed to write it because there was a contract out there but was not really inspired as with the earlier books while Mort sounded much better - and the jokes are supposed to get annoying I believe. Not that either is a bad book - I am not sure there is a really bad book in the whole lot. I wonder if the order of getting introduced to the world makes a difference - or even when you had read before that.

Hopefully you like some of the others better. :)

77Julie_in_the_Library
Nov. 5, 2021, 1:13 pm

I've started another Jennifer McMahon novel: The One I Left Behind. I've only just finished chapter three, so I don't have any real comments on the book yet, except that McMahon's skill with characters continues to impress me.

78Julie_in_the_Library
Dez. 1, 2021, 7:23 pm

I have finished The One I Left Behind by Jennifer McMahon. Review to come in the next couple days, but for now I'll say that I enjoyed it, and that McMahon's skill with character and setting continues to impress me.

79Julie_in_the_Library
Bearbeitet: Dez. 9, 2021, 8:58 am

The One I Left Behind by Jennifer McMahon: 3.5 stars

This one did not grip me as much as the rest of the Jennifer McMahon books that I have read so far, but I did enjoy reading it.

McMahon did not include a supernatural or speculative element in The One I Left Behind as she did in all of the other books of hers that I have read so far. This read very much as a straight suspense/mystery novel, with maybe a touch of thriller, as well. I do not think that I would classify this one as horror, even of the non-supernatural slasher variety.

That isn't a problem for me - I read a lot of non-supernatural mystery and suspense - but it is worth noting. I was definitely expecting this to be more like the other McMahon books I have read, and was surprised when no supernatural element turned up as I read.

What was present in this book from McMahon's others is one of her most common themes: the relationship between mothers and daughters, this time in the form of the relationship between the protagonist, Reggie, and her mother, Vera, which is very much at the center of this book.

As usual with McMahon, the perspective on the mother-daughter relationship in this book is different than those in any of the other McMahon books I have read so far, and the relationship itself is well drawn and deftly explored.

Once again, I was struck by McMahon's skill at using concrete details to render vivid characters and settings that feel three dimensional and real. This book, unlike the rest of those I have read so far by McMahon, was set not in Vermont but in small town Connecticut, and McMahon made the town feel so real and so vivid that by the end, I felt like I had actually been there myself.

The use of the inter-cutting of the two time lines to control the story's tension and pacing was masterfully done, and works well for this type of story. The prose itself was well written, fading into the background as I was immersed in the story.

I found the resolution of the murder mystery satisfying, but the resolution of some of the other plot threads left me somewhat less satisfied.

The subplot around Tara and the ouiji board was left dangling, in my opinion, and felt to me almost like a relic of an earlier draft where there was a supernatural element. I also felt that the resolution of the interpersonal conflicts was a little too easy, and the ending was a little too pat.

All in all, The One I Left Behind is a good story with a few problems which, along with the fact that this particular story just didn't grab me as much as some of McMahon's others have, kept it from reaching that full four stars.

80Julie_in_the_Library
Dez. 12, 2021, 9:18 am

People Love Dead Jews: Reports from a Haunted Present by Dara Horn: 5 stars

This book is absolutely, breathtakingly good. I have waited so long to write this review (I finished reading it back on December 7) because I've been struggling to come up with the words to adequately explain just how good, and more importantly (and much harder to articulate) why.

There were lots of bits of Jewish history that I didn't know in this book, and learning them was, of course, part of what I loved about it. I love learning new things; it's part of why I love reading.

There were also references to things that I was already familiar with, such as Daf Yomi, Ilana Kurshan's memoir If All the Seas Were Ink, which I have read, and Kirsten Fermaglich's nook A Rosenberg by Any Other Name, which I have not read, but which I did hear Fermaglich discuss at length on a podcast episode back when it first came out. I always get a kick out of finding references to things I know about like this in books - it feels almost like being part of a club with the author. In this book, I learned that famous (at least in Jewish circles) published author Dara Horn started studying Daf Yomi this cycle after reading the above mentioned Ilana Kurshan memoir just like I did, which only served to heighten that feeling.

I was also highly impressed by Horn's writing, especially her use of juxtaposition, irony, and sarcasm to make her points, and the way that she packs so much into such short pieces. I was also impressed by the way that Horn uses that skillful writing to communicate observations and analysis that are both sharp and accurate.

I also found myself really loving the essay format. It lends itself well to reading in small chunks of time carved out from a busy day, by providing small sections with natural stopping places. This was especially refreshing after just having finished The One I Left Behind, which had a thriller pacing that made putting the book down at the end of my lunch break really hard, and was, quite frankly, a bit exhausting to boot.

But what really struck me about this book was how much of what Horn says in this book resonated with my own observations, emotions, and experiences. And more than that, how well Horn unpacks and articulates those things in a way that I have been struggling to do for a long time now.

And this is the part that I've been worried that I wouldn't be able to put into words properly. I'm still not sure that I have, but I've done my best.

Horn touches on things that have been bothering me, and my other Jewish friends, for a long time now: the "Jewish Heritage Site" tourism industry; the gentile obsession with the Holocaust; the infuriating way that gentile society consistently dismisses incidents of antisemitism unless they involve multiple actual dead bodies, and even then, only if they involve the dead bodies of certain types of Jews (as illustrated in Horn's discussion of the difference in public reaction to the Tree of Life Synagogue shooting in Pittsburgh vs the public reaction to the shooting at the Kosher grocery store in New Jersey, for example).

But Horn also touched on another topic that resonated with me - the need to live a Jewish life centered on Judaism and Jewish tradition, rather than a Jewish life centered on and lived entirely in reaction to the (countless, ongoing) tragedies, massacres, and assaults both large and small on Judaism from those outside of it. (That's where the stuff about Ilana Kurshan's book and Daf Yomi come in, if any of you were wondering).

This is not fiction, or even narrative nonfiction, so I don't think it'll spoil anything to say that Horn does not end on tragedy, or antisemitism, or dead Jews, but rather with a deeply moving essay on Talmud study and its place in Jewish life. This is her answer to the question "how do we continue to live our lives in this world filled with so much hate for us?".*

At the end of this book bringing to light and condemning the gentile obsession with dead Jews, Horn finishes by refusing to participate in it. She does not use dead Jews as a rhetorical device with which to conclude her book. She instead makes her own position clear by concluding with an essay that focuses on the joy and resilience of Jewish life.

This is a short book, but it packs a big punch, and the essay format makes it easy to tackle even for the busiest of readers. And the topics that Horn discusses really are important - especially, I think, for non-Jews. I really do recommend People Love Dead Jews: Reports from a Haunted Present by Dara Horn to everyone as strongly as possible.**

*It is not, in my opinion, her answer to the question of "what do we do about that hate?", as was suggested at the synagogue-wide zoom discussion of this book that I attended last week. Her answer to that question, it seems fairly obvious to me, is "write and share books and articles like this one". But I suppose Your Mileage May Vary on that.

**Bolding to draw the attention of those who didn't or doesn't want to read my entire long-winded praise fest. That's fair. Brevity is one of Horn's skills, but I'm well aware that it isn't one of mine. :)

81baswood
Dez. 20, 2021, 6:56 pm

>80 Julie_in_the_Library: Enjoyed reading your excellent review

82Julie_in_the_Library
Dez. 21, 2021, 8:24 am

>81 baswood: Thanks!

83Julie_in_the_Library
Dez. 21, 2021, 8:26 am

I have finished Reaper Man by Terry Pratchett. I plan to write my review later today, so it will almost certainly be up this week. :)

84Crazymamie
Dez. 21, 2021, 8:34 am

>80 Julie_in_the_Library: I love this review - really well done. Adding that title to my List, so thank you for bringing it to my attention. I am also curious about If All the Stars Were Ink - what did you think of that one?

85Julie_in_the_Library
Dez. 24, 2021, 11:07 am

>84 Crazymamie: Thanks so much! A for If All the Stars Were Ink - I loved it. I didn't review it, but I did rate it five stars, and reading it was enough to get me to join the new Daf Yomi cycle when it started in January of 2020. It's well written, and I certainly found Ilana Kurshan both relatable and likeable. I'd definitely recommend it.

86Crazymamie
Dez. 24, 2021, 11:29 am

>85 Julie_in_the_Library: Thanks for that - adding it to my list.

87Julie_in_the_Library
Dez. 24, 2021, 12:19 pm

Reaper Man by Terry Pratchett: 3.5 stars

Reaper Man is the third book I've read so far in my journey through Terry Pratchett's Discworld, and while I did not think it was nearly as good, or like it nearly as much, as I did Going Postal, I do think it is better than Mort, and definitely enjoyed reading it more than I did Mort.

For one thing, while there were still, to my annoyance, no chapter breaks, this book did contain more natural stopping points where I could put the book down, which was helpful and smoothed the reading experience.

For another Pratchett wrote Reaper Man in 1991, four years after he wrote Mort, and the increase in his skill and maturity as a writer and storyteller over that time is very clear. The plot, pacing, and story in Reaper Man are all better than they were in Mort. And while I still found quite a lot of the characters in Reaper Man to be flat and caricatured, a few of the main characters in this one were much more nuanced and believable as people.

Pratchett had also, by the time he wrote Reaper Man, learned to restrain himself from showing off at the expense of the story. The near constant interruptions to the narrative momentum that plagued the prose of Mort do not show up at all in Reaper Man. There are still plenty of witty lines, beautiful descriptions, and sharp, satirical observations, of course - this is Pratchett, after all - but unlike in Mort, in Reaper Man, they serve the story rather than obstruct it, or at least don't get in its way.

The story was funny, and I found myself laughing out loud as I read more than once. And yet there were serious moments, too, which I appreciated - especially the storyline focusing on Death, which I found very effective. Death's reaction to the rat poison incident is absolutely perfect. Pratchett renders Death both believable, nuanced, and vulnerable, while also inherently other-than-human, which is a very difficult line to tread.

I found the storyline involving the wizards and other assorted characters somewhat less effective, especially near the end, where in my opinion it went off the rails entirely. By the end of the book, I had absolutely no idea what was actually, literally happening in the moment by moment plot in that storyline.

I never did figure out what was actually going on, or how it related to the main plot, or why any of it mattered at all. As far as I can tell, that entire subplot was only in the book at all to provide comedic relief from the more serious Death story, and to give Pratchett an opportunity for social commentary and funny shenanigans. It's possible that I'm missing something very obvious that would have made sense of the whole thing, but what that might be, I have no idea. The characters in the subplot were also the flattest, least believable and nuanced in the entire book, which did not help.

I also found myself butting up against Pratchett's ever-present cynicism throughout my reading of Reaper Man. Terry Pratchett is the only author I have ever seen discuss the power of human belief and make it cynical.

I also found Pratchett's take on religion very off-putting.

It isn't just that as a reader who is a practicing Jew, his constant potshots at religions and those who practice them feels insulting, though it does.

Or even just that a white, formerly/culturally Christian atheist taking shots at non-Christian religion, with that tone of 'aren't those religious people so silly and superstitious, aren't we all so much smarter, and better educated, and more advanced than them, haha' comes off as smug, superior, and punching down in an ugly way - though it definitely does.

It's that on top of all of that, all of Pratchett's disparagement of religion in general in Reaper Man is entirely based on a Christian framework*, and is thus not just mean, but *inaccurate* and mean, which feels like a violation of the rules of satire**. So it feels like something that shouldn't be in the book to begin with - like being hit in the face at a party by someone who snuck in through the kitchen because they weren't actually invited.

None of this surprising, exactly - in fact it is a frustratingly common attitude among formerly/culturally Christian atheists, which Terry Pratchett was - but it does get in the way of enjoying the reading experience. Or at least it got in the way for me. As with many things, YMMV.

Despite all of that negativity, though, I did mostly enjoy this book. There was a lot of good in Reaper Man. It was funny, fun, witty, and quotable, with a well-done main story, and at times surprisingly profound. I couldn't rate it four stars for "good," but it's a solid 3.5. By 1991, Pratchett was well on his way to becoming the author who would eventually write Going Postal, and I definitely plan to keep reading my way through the Discworld.

*For one example among many, his claim that the gods of various religions cannot be truly "divine" based on their behavior assumes a Christian definition of "divine" that the peoples whose pantheons he is discussing never actually used.

**whereby you can be mean, but only if you are accurate and mean

88Julie_in_the_Library
Bearbeitet: Dez. 24, 2021, 12:34 pm

To be clear, I do understand that the subplot in Reaper Man has something to do with the idea that shopping malls are evil and kill cities. I don't disagree with Terry Pratchett on that.

I just couldn't follow the literal plot action or parse what was happening on a minute to minute basis, which is perhaps due to a combination of the fact that Pratchett obviously wrote in British English whereas I am American, the descriptions that resulted from Pratchett's attempts to describe modern phenomena, like shopping malls, shopping carts, - which here in the States we have at grocery stores but not, in fact, at shopping malls - and what I think in hindsight might have been escalators, without using their names and from an entirely outside perspective, and my own aphantasia.

I'm also still not sure how we got from 'there's an excess of life energy doing weird things to compost heaps and a backup of ghosts because there is no Death' to 'spontaneous emergence of a shopping mall,' and I think the narrative should have made that more clear.