lauren groff – Page 2 – Cannonball Read 17

and now, for something completely different

Fates and Furies by Lauren Groff

March 12, 2022 by wicherwill 2 Comments

Wow, people are really divided on this book, aren’t they? It’s like “5 stars amazing best thing ever” and “1 star this is drivel did no one tell the author that blood sausages weren’t sold during WW2?” and literally nothing in between. I find myself not quite in between–the dreaded three star, I don’t really have an opinion, but here are 500 words on this book anyway–but this was definitely a book that a) grew on me and b) washed over me. One thing I […]

Medieval Mean Girls

Matrix by Lauren Groff

January 28, 2022 by CoffeeShopReader 2 Comments

I both do and do not understand how Matrix could possibly have made it onto “Best Books” lists for 2021. I hated the narrative style of first person present combined with free indirect discourse with a touch of narrative omniscience. I do not enjoy first person present narration in the first place and the ambiguity and unbalance between knowing what Marie thinks and feels, but also displaying knowledge of things Marie does not know (or at least not yet) just did not work for me. […]

Taking a Triple Cannonball into the Rising Sea Level!

The Way the World Ends by Jess Walter

Boca Raton by Lauren Groff

Controller by Jesse Kellerman

There's No Place Like Home by Edan Lepucki

Falls the Shadow by Skip Horack

The Hillside by Jane Smiley

At the Bottom of New Lake by Sonya Larson

December 30, 2020 by andtheIToldYouSos 10 Comments

Is it hot in here, or is it just these stories? oh, the temperature is definitely rising folks, from GLOBAL WARMING! I struggle with looking climate change in the face; I am concerned, I am trying to do my part, but the onslaught of facts is just too depressing. Climate-change based fiction, though, clicks in a way that I was not expecting. I suppose there is a level of empathy that transcends the “just the facts” nature of the news when the same information is […]

She misses believing in God.

Florida by Lauren Groff

December 25, 2019 by Sophia Leave a Comment

Florida (2018) by Lauren Groff was strongly recommended to me by my boyfriend. He was surprised I hadn’t heard of it, and I probably should have. It was a National Book Award Finalist and on NPR’s Best Books of 2018 List. I read the first part of the first story on his iPad and was interested enough to read the rest of the book. Short stories are not my go-to. Most of the time I have a hard time connecting to the characters before the next story begins […]

I have somehow become a woman who yells.

Florida by Lauren Groff

July 4, 2019 by vel veeter Leave a Comment

CBR 11 – The Collection This is the National Book Award finalist collection by Lauren Groff, the author of Fates and Furies, a book that a lot of people loved and I thought was not good. This collection is better than that novel, but limited in other ways. Part of the reason that I didn’t like Fates and Furies is that there was an inconsistent tone, which had the novel straddling a line between realistic and unrealistic (either would be fine and good) but that […]

An Eden of dangerous things.

Florida by Lauren Groff

June 23, 2019 by Leedock Leave a Comment

I don’t generally read a lot of short story collections. When I do, I prefer the ones that have some kind of thread that tie them together. This book fit that particular bill. While each of the stories in this collection have something to do with the state of Florida, the thread that I found the most intriguing was parenthood. What does it mean to parent? How much of one’s identity is tied up in the role of parent? Is there a limit to what […]

Zirza on A Gothic Classic for a ReasonIt's one of those wish-you-could-read-it-again-for-the-first-time books. I loved it.
Emmalita on “It came to something when you found yourself hoping that the footsteps you heard were ghosts.”I loved the ending! I don’t think it’s been out long enough to talk about why though.
Dixie on Track Her Down by Melinda LeighI am just starting Track Her Down and I have read them all in order till now and thought I...
Roland of Gilead on How can you give us the gift of a crazy character named Rando Thoughtful and then just as suddenly take that gift away? We need to talk, Uncle Stevie.I came across this randomly years after it was written because I was searching "Random Thoughtful. But I have the...
Emmalita on “Only you, Em, would refer to heartbreak as a distraction. I think I would have a more sympathetic response if I asked to marry a bookcase.”Oh my goodness, Gallifrey was beautiful. I’m sure her mittens were gloriously murdery.

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