CBR10Bingo: Dream Vacation (BINGO!) Emily X.R. Pan’s The Astonishing Colour of After begins with teenager Leigh recounting the day her mother died from suicide, leaving a crumpled note in the trash with a crossed out message: “I want you to remember.” Soon after, a mysterious red bird leaves a gift for Leigh: a package filled with mementos of her mother. Leigh convinces her father to take her to Taiwan for the first time to meet her mother’s estranged family, secretly hoping she’ll also be able […]
I wish this book had never come to me (or: I’ll take “Lazy, Unfunny Review Titles for Lazy, Unfunny Books” for $200, Alex)
CBR10Bingo: Alabama Pink (BINGO!) I chose Chelsea Handler’s My Horizontal Life: A Collection of One-Night Stands for my Alabama Pink square, thinking I could breeze through it, laughing a bit along the way and then completely forgetting it as soon as I finished, but man, this book was so bad that I couldn’t get past the fifth chapter. I’d already powered my way through some terrible books this year, and the world is just too crappy a place right now, so I gave myself permission […]
But I don’t care how many times you change your ways, what’s in you is in you, and it’s got to come out
CBR10Bingo: White Whale I know why this book sat on my shelf for so long. I read Giovanni’s Room several years ago, and while I loved James Baldwin’s writing, I really did not care for the story, particularly the way it ended. I’ve picked up Go Tell It on the Mountain several times when looking for my next read, and each time, I put it away, never quite in the right mood for this book that felt too heavy with expectation and history, like a […]
Their names written on water. Or scorched into the earth. Or atomized into the air. Legion.
CBR10Bingo: This Is The End (BINGO!) Have you ever read a book that you hated to put down but also hated to keep reading because you couldn’t bear the thought of reaching the end? That’s how I felt reading Kate Atkinson’s A God in Ruins, the companion to her brilliant Life After Life. Unlike Ursula in Life After Life, her younger brother Teddy only gets one shot at life. He still becomes a bomber pilot during World War II, still gets shot down over Germany, […]
You know your love keeps on lifting me, lifting me higher and higher
CBR10Bingo: Fahrenheit 451 (BINGO!) When I named Toni Morrison’s Song of Solomon as one of my three desert island books earlier this year, I realized two things: (1) I’ve only read it once, and that was about 15 years ago, and (2) I haven’t even owned a copy for half that time, having lost track of my original through several big moves (I blame my ex). I bought a fresh copy this spring, and when CBR10Bingo rolled around, I had this book in mind for […]
The power of good-bye
CBR10Bingo: Brain Candy (BINGO!) Before this year, I wasn’t much of a YA reader. I saw myself as more of a Serious Reader, too serious for the frivolity of YA lit. And while my favorite books are still likely to be denser and heavier literary fiction and hard sci-fi, I’ve come to enjoy the balance that YA brings to my library with the quicker read and lighter tone even when the subject matter isn’t so light. Thus, the Brain Candy square was always going to […]
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