Fiction – Page 14 – …on the B.L.

Bridges

October 6, 2017 RaeAnna

Read No
Length 194
Quick Review The plot is flat, and the characters are superficial at best. For having a grammar police of a main character, the syntax is riddled with errors. The cover is incredibly misleading. Overall, it reads like a sub par young adult novel.

Bridges by Maria Murnane is a novel about female friendship. Three women, who met in college, are in very different points in their lives. Told through the eyes of Daphne, a divorcée, mom and aspiring novelist from Ohio; she meets her friends in New York City for a long weekend. Daphne celebrates the impending marriage of the successful and perpetually single Skylar along with KC, the hottest, youngest grandma there ever was. Though they are close, they still have things to learn about each other, which could bring them together or drive them apart.

The story centers around three women in their forties, but the cover is incredibly misleading picturing three women looking to be in their early twenties. Not only is the cover mismatched but the title, as well. I have finished the book, and I still am not quite sure where Bridges comes into play.

Murnane tries to tackle the complexities of female friendship but falls short. Her characters are hollow. Their friendship feels incredibly surface. One of the largest contributing factors to this is the dialogue. Murnane makes a concerted effort to keep the dialogue light and true to how people talk; however, it doesn’t flow naturally. She tries too hard to make the dialogue witty and interesting. There are unnecessary characters, who do nothing to further the plot. Murnane is trying to stay relevant by using Lokai bracelets, but it’s kitschy and overdone. She also tries to incorporate internet dating through an irrelevant side character. The “horrifying” dating experiences she comes up with may have been avant garde in the 1940’s, but they’re nothing to bat an eye at for any actively dating woman under the age of 45.

Daphne seems to be a fictional version of Murnane as an aspiring novelist. The other characters are always referring to Daphne as something of a grammar police. She shows her knowledge of grammar in ludicrous ways, which add nothing to the story except irritate and distract the reader. After constant mention of being the perfect icon of grammar, the novel itself is riddled with grammar mistakes and odd word choices.

Overall, the novel could be something really interesting, but, as it stands, Bridges is a let down falling short of a the complexity that is female friendship. I would be happy to recommend you better novels about female friendship. Just let me know!

Memorable Quotes
“… love is completely random. There’s no rhyme nor reason whatsoever to where we’ll find it, or how.”

Title: Bridges
Author: Maria Murnane
Publisher: Self-Published
Copyright: 2017
ISBN: 9780980042511

Books, Fiction

Children of the Jacaranda Tree

October 3, 2017 RaeAnna

Read Yes
Length 285
Quick Review The complexities of being a parent making choices forever impacting children, and children forever remembering and reeling from their parents’ choices.

Delijani begins Children of the Jacaranda Tree with a booming voice describing a mother’s love and desperate journey for survival. With moments of roman á clef, it is evident the topic of the novel is very near to Delijani’s heart.

The novel is about children growing up against the backdrop of Iran in the midst of the war with Iraq and struggle with the revolution during the 1980’s as well as the early 2000’s. The adults are revolutionaries in prison or raising the children of revolutionaries in prison. The children are grown up trying to piece together the meaning of their lives in relation to their parents and their home country.

The jacaranda tree is in the backyard of a grandmother. Every character goes in and out of this woman’s house. Some stay longer than others, but the tree plays a very small role in the book. Though it becomes a powerful symbol for each person; though, to each person it symbolizes something different.

Delijani is able to write with a palpable sense of fear as it permeates every main and supporting characters’ life in Iran as women, as men, as people, as revolutionaries. The adults fear for their lives and their freedom; they fear how to explain reality to their children. Though the children are too young to comprehend, they are able to sense fear. Every parent must explain the revolution and Evin prison to their children, but each struggles to explain it in a different way. As every parent must explain struggle and hardship, they do the best they can.

History repeats itself. Though decades separate the struggles of the parents and the children, they end up fighting the same battles with the same repercussions always with a sense of fear they will end up in Evin prison, where their parents once were imprisoned. The children repeat their parents’ hopes, actions, lives, and even mistakes. Some children know the details of their parents’ pasts, and some do not. The actions and pasts of their parents belong to the children in one way or another impacting their lives.

Every character in the story is trapped. Some are physically bound, and others are restrained psychologically. They are trapped by past, by grief, by tradition, by prison, by family, by responsibility, by secrets, and more.

Delijani writes a vibrant and emotionally charged novel about a subject so often forgotten, glanced over, or blatantly ignored. It is difficult to imagine this being the reality children had to grow up in less than thirty years ago. Delijani is able to bring that reality to life by telling the stories of so many children left behind.

Memorable Quotes
“It was important to her to know that she could choose those dresses, that this choice, although hidden from view, was still hers.”
“He was no longer anywhere.”
“The past is slippery, unreliable, like melting snow on marble stairs.”
“For secrets steal your childhood away from you.”

Title: Children of the Jacaranda Tree
Author: Sahar Delijani
Publisher: Atria Paperback (Simon & Schuster)
Copyright: 2014
ISBN: 9781476709109

Books, Fiction

Blueprints for Building Better Girls

September 21, 2017 RaeAnna

Read Yes
Length 288
Quick Review A collection of eight stories loosely connected exploring the pressures of being female in a rapidly changing world.

Elissa Schappell tries to approach the issues of modern womanhood with her collection of Blueprints for Building Better Girls. She approaches issues concerning women: sexual assault, rape, motherhood, working, miscarriage, marriage, education, and eating disorders. The women in Schappell’s stories are post-modern women trying to carve out their own paths, but are constantly bombarded with advice from the old guard. Many women eventually succumb to the roles their mother’s filled. Even the characters who go against the traditional have a subconscious voicing the opinions of the older generation. This voice comes out in their opinions of other women; always critiquing and judging other women on their appearance, look, and life choices. The stories are all told from the female perspective. Motherhood, being the perfect mom. The story also explores the complexities of a mother-daughter relationship from both viewpoints of mother and daughter. It also has a brief glimpse into the influence men can have on women as husbands, fathers, brothers, and people in society.

Schappell writes with moments of true insight into the essence of womanhood. She crafts some truly lovely sentences, which scream to be quoted. The stories are loosely linked as some characters or their actions show up in the stories of others. I enjoyed this component of the book, but I also found it highly confusing. Anytime a character was named, I was trying to figure out where I had, if I had, seen them before in the book; it encouraged active reading, but also created a sort of chunkiness to the flow. There were stories with a high level of interaction with the book as a whole; while others called their real importance into question for the collection as a whole.

One of my favorite stories was “Out of the Blue and into the Black.” The main character, Belinda/Bender, is a young woman in college trying to find her own way in the world while figuring out how to live her life on campus after her friend, a main character from another story, was raped by a fraternity boy. Bender was there the night her friend was raped; she feels like she is the only one who remembers her friend and her struggle. The most interesting part of this story was when she calls attention to the fact her guy friends were in an uproar when they found out about the rape. The guys said they would go and beat him up. Another said he would talk to the fraternity president because they needed to know. After time passed and nothing happened, Bender realized it was just male bravado. Men act upset but never actually do anything. The friend who said he’d talk to the president kept brushing it off saying it was a “private issue.” I think this moment in the story makes a point about how swept under the rug and how common place and how ignored and how accepted rape is by the gender who commits it the majority of the time.

The stories take place in different time periods with different aged protagonists from different backgrounds. The majority of the women were educated, middle-class women, all assumably white. The perspective and narrator differs from story to story. This allows for each story to stand apart from the other, but it causes some difficulty with cohesiveness.

Overall, I really enjoyed the book. I don’t think it makes sense entirely as a whole. Each part is really wonderful. Schappell brings attention to a lot of important issues women deal with throughout history and will continue to experience for a long time to come.

Memorable Quotes
“If I stopped him, we’d have to talk. The last thing I wanted to do is talk.”
“I don’t know why he’s so desperate to name me.”
“The label was slut, not charity worker.”
“People have always hated strong women. They fear we’re one turkey-baster away from abolishing men.”
“At least she’d lost weight. Ten pounds in three weeks. What did her mother always say? You have such a pretty face.”
“What did a woman who didn’t want children want? Or what did she want more than children? It was creepy.”
“Still, it wouldn’t be the worst thing to never see my mother again.”

Title: Blueprints for Building Better Girls
Author: Elissa Schappell
Publisher: Simon & Schuster
Copyright: 2011
ISBN: 9780743276702

Books, Fiction

Interpreter of Maladies

August 10, 2017 RaeAnna

Read Yes
Length 198
Quick Review A collection of eight short stories exploring the meaning of disappointment and unfulfilled expectations.

I had never read anything by Jhumpa Lahiri, so I was excited to experience her writing for the first time. She did not disappoint. Lahiri explores the meaning of disappointment and the feeling of unfulfilled expectations. In most of the stories, the hopes and expectations of the characters are met in a drastically different way than they hope; driving home the message that life gives us what we want, it may not be how we want. Lahiri shows the build up, the enjoyment of living in a world filled with expectation, the realisation, and the mourning period when the inevitability of life is so painfully tangible.

The following eight short stories are in the order they appear in the book. They are each around twenty pages in length, give or take a few.

A Temporary Matter
Shukumar and Shoba were both born in the US. They are of Indian heritage; unlike Shoba, Shukumar does not have childhood memories of visits to India. They are going through a difficult time in their marriage after the stillbirth of their first child because the pain has become a barrier dividing them instead of bringing them together. They reconnect during an hourly power outtage every night for a week.

When Mr. Pirzada Came to Dine
A young girl and her family open their home to Mr. Pirzada, a Bengali man working on his degree in the US while separated from his family. The girl is torn between feeling like an outsider in her own home and excitement for having a new person visit every evening. She is also beginning to understand the difference between her family’s culture and that of the one she is surrounded by.

Interpreter of Maladies
Mr. Kapasi is a driver for tourists on the weekend, but during the week he works as an interpreter for a doctor.. He is driving a young family and developes a small crush on the wife. As they begin to talk, he realizes she is just as flawed as everyone else in the world and not a perfect creature.

Sexy
A young, career woman, Miranda, began an affair with an older married, Indian man, Dev, as she listens to her coworker, Laxmi, console a cousin whose husband is having an affair. To keep her affair alive, she spends money on a beautiful dress and lingerie hoping to wear it for Dev one day. Miranda ends up babysitting for the son of Laxmi’s cousin, who is aware of the affair his father had. Through an afternoon spent with a young boy, she becomes aware of the consequences her situation can have.

Mrs. Sen’s
Mrs. Sen watches Eliot after school, as she is trying to learn how to drive a car. Mrs. Sen is learning to drive and function in a new society. Mrs. Sen hates being far away from her home in India where she has whole fish and independence without a car. She has everything her family believes the could want like a rainbow of saris and a professional husband, but she misses the comfort of home.

This Blessed House
Twinkle and Sanjeev are newly weds in a house. Sanjeev isn’t sure he loves his wife but he’s irritated by her love of finding and keeping the Christian items left throughout the house by the previous owners. At their housewarming everyone is dazzled by Twinkle, and Sanjeev realizes he enjoys the status of his new, beautiful, young, charming wife.

The Treatment of Bibi Haldar
Bibi Haldar was plagued by an illness no one could diagnose or fix – which was probably epilepsy. She dreamt of having a husband to take care of. It was her only hope, and she couldn’t stop talking about it. After a particular episode, she was prescribed marriage to ease her symptoms, but no one would take her on as a wife because of her reputation as a lune. After a difficult few months of seclusion she was found pregnant. She never married, but, instead, had a son who she cared for without being plighted by another episode.

The Third and Final Continent
He was born in India, studied in London, and worked in Cambridge at MIT. His wife Mala joined him in the US having been married for six weeks but only spending five days together. They were strangers at the beginning of their journey, but looking back on their life in Cambridge they can’t imagine not knowing each other.

Memorable Quotes
““I only spoil children who are incapable of spoiling.””
“… life, I realized, was being lived in Dacca first.”
“It means loving someone you don’t know.”
“He did not know if he loved her.”
“ She wanted to be spoken for, protected, placed on her path in life.”

Title: Interpreter of Maladies
Author: Jhumpa Lahiri
Publisher: Mariner Books (Houghton Mifflin Harcourt)
Copyright: 1999
ISBN: 9780395927205

Books, Fiction

If on a winter’s night a traveler

August 5, 2017 RaeAnna

Read Yes
Length 260
Quick Review A really unique novel about the search for the perfect reading experience. I am not completely sure how to describe it.

This is my first Calvino novel. It is by far one of the most distinctive novels I have ever tackled. I am using the word tackle because there were days it felt just like that. Normally, I can finish a book quickly. This one took me awhile to get through due to the ever changing style. It’s hard to get into a rhythm when every fifteen to twenty pages the style and story shifts drastically.

The novel is made up of ten chapters. Each chapter composed of two parts. The first part of the chapter is a book within a book. The second part of the chapter is the book itself, but it is told in the second person. You, the reader, are the one taking part in the action.

The novel opens into a scene full of action, but then abruptly stops shifting to a scene where you, the reader, are thinking about what you just read. The story goes on to involve you searching for the rest of the book you just began because during publishing something happened, and you have actually begun two completely different novels. Each chapter has a different style, tone, and plot. It can get confusing and even frustrating because you’re continually in this game of tug of war with the novel: you’re interested and then the novel pulls back. There is a constant search for resolution within each part and each chapter, but that sense of fulfillment never truly comes.

I highly suggest it. It’s definitely not a mindless read, but if you’re looking for something new and different than what you’re used to, this is a wonderful novel!

I’m looking forward to another Italo Calvino novel to see if this is a normal literary tool for him. I think it might be a few months before I try again. I need a mental break from the constant mental tug of war.

Memorable Quotes
“The real revolution will be when women carry arms.”
“I say “should” because I doubt that written words can give even a partial idea of it.”
“Lovers’ reading of each other’s bodies differs from the reading of written pages in that it is not linear.”
“What makes lovemaking and reading resemble each other most is within both of them times and spaces open, different from measurable time and space.”

Title: If on a winter’s night a traveler
Author: Italo Calvino
Translator: William Weaver
Publisher: A Harvest Book (Harcourt, Inc.)
Copyright: 1979
ISBN: 9780156439619

Books, Fiction

Autobiography of Us

June 22, 2017 RaeAnna

Read Yes
Length 304
Quick Review This is a great summer read about female relationships changing through the years.

Aria Beth Sloss tried to tackle the incredibly complex topic of female friendship in her book Autobiography of Us. Set in the 1960’s in Pasadena, two friends, Rebecca and Alex, live on the same street becoming close friends as children. The story is told through Rebecca’s perspective. She starts telling the story to someone as a reflection upon her past. It is evident that her best friend, Alex, has passed away, which is the catalyst for the story. She begins her narration when Alex moves into the neighborhood. There is immediate tension building between the two. Rebecca deals with an inferiority complex the entire book. Alex was the daughter of extravagantly rich parents, while Rebecca’s family struggle to maintain their wealthy facade. Alex was pretty, and Rebecca was less so. Alex had an air for the dramatic and always pulled everyone’s attention. Coming of age in the sixties, Rebecca was pressured by her family to fulfill all the traditional roles; however, she fought an internal battle contradicting her family and the times she lived in.

Sloss draws attention to the times by often using Rebecca to reference how different the times were then for girls. Usually making the statement about how young she was and naive. Though making some feminist statements throughout, this self-infantilization undermined the attempted message of female empowerment.

Sloss likes to bring characters into scenes without naming them. Integrating them into the action and conversation for paragraphs if not a page or two creates a bit of confusion instead of mystery. I had to look back a few times just to make sure I hadn’t accidentally missed it.

Autobiography of Us is a story about female friendship, familial relationships, societal pressures, and marriage. Sloss adds a few more twists than the usual story, but, in general, she sticks to a generic storyline.

Memorable Quotes
“There are years she meant more to me rush anyone, years our lives besides into each other’s so neatly I’m not sure, to be honest, they ever came undone.”
“How little we know the ones we love. How little we know of anyone, in the end.”
“I believe injustice eventually gives way to justice,” he said ““Slowly, perhaps. With great effort, and too often through the unfortunate medium of violence.””

Title: Autobiography of Us
Author: Aria Beth Sloss
Publisher: Picador
Copyright: 2013
ISBN: 9781250044051