It’s too easy to conflate one novel of an author with the total of that author’s work, as it’s also too easy to conflate an author winning the Nobel Prize as being a representative of their respective country as a stand-in for all literature of that country. Obviously there’s some Western chauvinism at play in doing so but also it’s quite limiting in its estimation of what that body of work might contain. Adrift on the Nile is a very different novel from Palace Walk (and […]
One time my friend…
One time my friend, who is a musician, wrote this album and I bought it. I listened to it a handful of times and afterward I was like…..oh no, I think he got a divorce. Because the songs were so sad and pleading and heartfelt I was worried. So some internet snooping later, it turns out I was right. I get the same feeling from this collection of stories. It’s not the saddest thing I have ever read, but it has such a motif of […]
“He answered victoriously”
It’s hard to distill this 530 page novel into its essence for a short review. But we start off the novel with the wife of a middle-class store owner in Cairo in 1905 (ish) waking up at midnight in order to be ready to serve him when he comes home from a night of carousing. It doesn’t get much better for her. Over all, this novel is not a bleak dour recounting of how poorly treated the wives of Cairo were at the time, but […]
I was fooled by Jeremy Irons
I was fooled into listening to this because it was narrated by Jeremy Irons. If you find this on overdrive or the library and you’re thinking Oh! Jeremy Irons….Scar! Hans Gruber’s brother in Die Hard with a Vengeance! I will listen to this and it will be great. Well, it will be, kind of, because Jeremy Irons truly is great. But instead, you should get his reading Lolita instead and you will be treated to a truly beautiful and terrible rendition of that novel. Here’s what […]
Harry Potter and Back to the Future II
This is kind of a bummer in general. I hadn’t planned on reading this, and even thought about reading it one day at Barnes and Noble and just sort of decided not to. Then, they had it available on Overdrive when I was sort of looking for something to take up some dinnertime reading. And now I have read it. It’s like a what-if comic book or one of the evil ream episodes of Star Trek: Deep Space Nine. It’s not only not very good; […]
Daniel Handler is no Tim Curry, but it’s actually ok.
I wanted to outpace our watching of the Netflix show at my house, but we lost a little steam after the first two episodes. I liked them just fine and it’s a little disappointing in general, but good enough to keep going. So here’s the next two books (after I reviewed The Reptile Room awhile back). I listened to these two books while I did morning chores and then went on a long walk around town. I am on Spring Break and in order to […]
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