Tag: Fiction Review

Books, Fiction

Bed Time Story of Christmas Cheer with Buddy the Elf

RaeAnna
Recreating my own Elf moment by climbing on the tree to hang the star. | Pajamas |

Worth A Read Yes
Length 44
Quick Review A less time consuming way to enjoy Elf the movie.

If you love Will Ferrell’s adventures in New York City as Buddy the [oversized] elf, then this is the perfect book for you and the children in your life. Based on the movie by David Berenbaum Elf, is a great addition to your bedtime reading list or something sweet to put on the coffee table this time of year. 

I’m not going to go over the plot of the book because everyone—should know—knows what happens because it’s a Christmas fucking classic with all the heartwarmth, songs, and baked goods this season requires. 

Being Silly

That was a lie; I’m going to talk about a couple plot points. The movie does a better job explaining why Buddy is able to escape by way of Santa. The book, however, does not. Buddy wanders into the sleigh and is discovered at the North Pole. Instead of going “Oh no! Let’s find his family.” Santa goes, “Sure. A baby. I’ll let an elf adopt the child I accidentally kidnapped.” No mention of Mommy, at all. The more logical and Santa-like thing of ‘Oops! Let’s deliver this baby back home, pop it under the Christmas tree with a bow on his head, and pretend like nothing happened.’ And since there is no mention of the mom, how did she react? Did she respond with a, “K, cool. My kid’s been napped.” She’s nowhere in the story! She probably died of heartbreak.

What I love most about the book is that it keeps some of the most memorable lines from the movie. “Some people just lose sight of what’s important in life.” It does an amazing job of being sweet and funny and Christmassy all at the same time. Buddy is as ridiculous and wonderful as Will Ferrell portrays him in the movie version. 

Kim Smith does a fabulous job bringing Buddy, the elves, Santa, and New York City to life through her illustrations. 

Christmas is about joy and happiness and good cheer. Buddy has become an iconic bringer of cheer for children of all ages since the movie was released. I love that Elf is now in book form to be read around the fire or curled up in bed. 

Memorable Quotes
The Code of the Elves “2. There’s room for everyone on the nice list”
“You’re not a cotton-headed ninny muggins. You’re just… special!”
“Buddy, you’re more of an elf than anyone I’ve ever met.”

bisous und обьятий,
RaeAnna

Buy on Amazon
Shop the Post
[show_shopthepost_widget id=”4307279″]

Title: Elf
Based on the film by: David Berenbaum
Illustrator: Kim Smith
Publisher: Quirk Books
Copyright: 2020
ISBN: 9781683692201 

Fiction

Ignore the Title Paula McLain’s Love and Ruin Isn’t That Bad

RaeAnna

Worth a Read Meh
Length 432
Quick Review A fictional look into the tumultuous relationship between Martha Gellhorn and Ernest Hemingway as she grows from a talented young woman into a fearless writer. 

Love and Ruin by Paula McLain in Ames, Iowa | Dress | Watch | Hair Pins

Ernest Hemingway is one of the most revered writers. Martha Gellhorn is known as one of the greatest war correspondents. Yet one name is internationally renowned, and the other is recalled as the wife of the other if recalled at all – except in certain literary circles. These two remarkable humans met and fell in love, and their love story has been one of great interest. Paula McLain brings Martha to life in Love and Ruin. 

Martha Gellhorn was an incredible woman and exceptional for her time. Born in 1908 in Saint Louis, she went to college but left to follow her dreams of becoming a war correspondent, which was unheard of at the time. She was a career woman with ambition, and that ambition caught the eye of Ernest Hemingway, an already great author, while she was on family vacation in 1936 in the Florida Keys. Assignments took them both to Spain, where they traveled and lived together. They began their relationship while he was still married to his second wife. It was a tumultuous time as wars raged on. Ernest was looking to stay put, but Marty was looking to stay in the action. She refused to let a brilliant man extinguish her ambition. 

Throughout Love and Ruin Marty Gellhorn is incredibly easy to relate to. She’s a free spirit, who wants to live life, make her own way, and be brilliant. She was a modern woman for her time, and people might even say she’s ahead of our current time. McLain creates an interesting and composed picture of the woman she was, torn by passion and purpose. One of the most moving moments was when Marty declares, “I wanted to say, when you fell in love with me you must also have been in love with my wings. Love them now. Love me. Love me, and let me go.” So many women have felt this way and, like Marty, never said it. 

Ernest was just complicated enough to be interesting without taking the spotlight away from Martha. The entire novel, anyone in their right mind would be warning Martha away from the brilliant, narcissist he was. There was never any room in his life for another star, let alone another literary star. McLain allows him a few short chapters from his perspective, but Marty is the star in the relationship in a way she wasn’t in life. 

Love and Ruin by Paula McLain

Love and Ruin is a woman’s coming into her own story as much as it is a love story. She allows herself to fall in love, fall in life, and get back up. I’m not completely sure Love and Ruin is the appropriate title for this book. It implies to love Hemingway was to simultaneously be ruined. Yes, he did have a dramatic impact on the course of her life, but he in no way ruined her. She was an absolute success. She overcame so much to become one of the most important and insightful war correspondents of the 20th century, and she was a woman! Titling the book as such is a disservice to her memory even if the book is not. 

It’s a lovely piece of historical fiction. Honestly, I would have liked a book that focused on Martha Gellhorn as a person rather than the period of her life that related to Hemingway. Choosing one of the most famous and most covered portions of her life is a little boring. She had fifty-four productive and incredible years of her life post-Hemingway. Those deserve attention as much if not more than her love affair and first marriage.  

Memorable Quotes
“Women were so rare at the front they might as well have been nonexistent.”
“I had said yes. And yes always came with a price.”

bisous und обьятий,
RaeAnna

Buy on Amazon | Buy on Book Depository
Shop the Post
[show_shopthepost_widget id=”4205903″]

Title: Love and Ruin
Author: Paula McLain
Publisher: Ballantine Books
Copyright: 2019
ISBN: 9781101967393

Books, Fiction

Relatable Millionaires in Jade Chang’s The Wangs vs. The World

RaeAnna

Worth A Read It’s Cute
Length 355
Quick Review The Wangs are broke and muddling through their own personal problems while trying to figure out how to not be rich anymore. 

Vienna wanted to be front and center. | The Wangs vs. The World | Dress | Shoes | Belt | Watch

Most of us remember the financial crisis of 2007-2008. It was no laughing matter, but Jade Chang brings a sense of humor and ridiculousness to the crisis in The Wangs vs. The World. Maybe there’s been enough time to enjoy the plot’s dark humor or it’s the fact I wasn’t old enough to lose anything in the financial crisis, but this is a fun book with a great sense of character and humor. 

The Wangs are a Chinese/Taiwanese family living in California. Charles, the father and business mogul, lost everything after investing his life and savings into a new ethnically friendly makeup line that flopped. With his accounts frozen and the house and everything else repossessed, there’s nothing left to do but pack up the entire family in his housekeeper’s car on a cross-country road trip to live with his eldest daughter, Saina. His second wife, Barbara, is packed in the car to pick up Grace, the youngest daughter, from boarding school and Andrew, the middle child, from Arizona State University. Along the way, the Wangs encounter problem after problem. 

The Wangs vs. The World by Jade Chang

The Wangs vs. The World is completely ridiculous and yet completely believable. Smart people makes stupid decisions, which is exactly what happens over and over and over again. The kids are kids. Grace has decided to live in a delusion that the road trip and bankruptcy is just testing her before she can access her inheritance. Andrew wants nothing more than to be a stand-up comic, and yet, he is the worst comedian. Saina is down to earth but makes terrible choices. Charles, well, he’s a man. Barbra, who named herself after Streisand, gets less narrative than the car does until halfway through the book.   

The road trip is the best part of the novel. It highlights the unbelievable opportunities for strangeness because of America’s enormity and diversity. Instead of being an “other” as immigrants and first-generation Americans, The Wangs are a part of the country and its vast diversity. Chang infuses The Wangs vs. The World with transliterated Mandarin, which goes without translation. The lack of understanding causes a rift between the novel and the reader, giving a hint of the reality Charles Wang faces as an immigrant. It’s an homage to the men and women who have made their home in a country that is not always welcoming and accepting. 

Jade Chang creates a family that is both irritating and relatable in her debut novel. Though most of us can’t relate to the problem of losing a multi-million conglomerate or a trust fund, most can relate to the feeling of facing off against the world, which is exactly what Charles Wang and his family do in The Wangs vs. The World.

Memorable Quotes
“A satellite, after all, can still look like a star.”
“Whole universes were built and destroyed in the course of a good conversation.”

bisous und обьятий,
RaeAnna

Buy on Amazon | Buy on Book Depository
Shop the Post
[show_shopthepost_widget id=”4191022″]

Title: The Wangs vs. The World
Author: Jade Chang
Publisher: Houghton Mifflin Harcourt
Copyright: 2016
ISBN: 9780544734098

Books, Fiction

Toxicity in Sally Thorne’s The Hating Game

RaeAnna
I like the picture better than the book. | The Hating Game by Sally Thorne | Dress | Shirt |

Worth A Read Hard Pass
Length 386
Quick Review A tale as old as time. Who knew the hate being felt from/for someone was just a big misunderstanding and just love in disguise… 

The Hating Game by Sally Thorne is not a romantic love story but a cautionary tale. It was stupid, archaic, toxic, and quite frankly set women back seventy years. Part of me wants to be shocked that “love” stories like this are still getting published, but I’m too realistic for that. I don’t know why women read this stuff and what it is they find attractive about a tall asshole. These are not the kind of relationships we should be glorifying. There’s far more interesting and sexy things to read than this troped up, crap novel.  

Lucy and Joshua sit next to each other after a merger between two publishing houses. They hate each other and are up for the same promotion. They’re complete opposites. She’s super short, bubbly, and sweet. He’s cold, calculated, and rude. Gasp! Circumstances bring them together, and oh my God, they’re attracted to each other. 

By page 50, I was utterly exhausted from reading how short Lucy was in comparison to how tall and masculine Joshua was. It was boring and cliché at the best of times.

The entire premise of The Hating Game rides on the back of the kindergarten playground advice given to young girls: “He’s mean to you because he likes you.” I’m pretty sure we’ve realized how that sets girls up for complicated relationships with attraction at best and abusive and violent relationships at worst.  

I kept seeing how great this book was… I don’t get it. It’s kind of funny, but the problematic plot and characters are impossible for me to get passed. The fact the plot is beyond formulaic and predictable almost doesn’t even register due to the toxic relationship between Lucy and Joshua. Honestly, if your friend were to come and tell you all of these things Lucy went through in real time, you would never encourage her to have a relationship with that man. I doubt Joshua’s friends would encourage him to be with Lucy because she wasn’t so great to him either. Love does not and should never wash away the toxic, problematic, or rude interactions leading up to feelings. 

Had The Hating Game ended with a good, long visit to a therapist instead of unrealistic sex (I know it’s a novel, no one wants realistic sex in novels) with boring and problematic co-worker, I would have liked it more. If you ever find yourself in Lucy’s position, go to a therapist instead of on a date. You deserve better. Lucy deserves better. Joshua deserves better. These two should never date. 

Memorable Quotes
“I’m not about to be ravished. No one boils water before-hand [sex], except maybe in the Middle Ages.”

bisous und обьятий,
RaeAnna

Buy on Amazon | Buy on Book Depository
Shop the Post
[show_shopthepost_widget id=”4138296″]

Title: The Hating Game
Author: Sally Thorne
Publisher: William Morrow (HarperCollins)
Copyright: 2016
ISBN: 9780062439598

Books, Fiction

Siri, Who Am I? by Sam Tschida

RaeAnna

Worth A Read Yes
Length 352
Quick Review A novel diving into the dichotomy between people’s lives on social media and their realties. Tapping into pop culture, the book explores identity in the modern era. 

DSC_0061

202004281902471640864856162
Siri, Who Am I? by Sam Tschida | Tiara | Dress | Earrings

I meant to post this last week on the fifth, which was supposed to be Sam Tschida and Siri, Who Am I?’s publishing day, but that would have meant I would have had to write this. I read it weeks ago, but life has kept me away from my computer because puppies. The pandemic pushed the publishing date… so expect this one to hit shelves in January! If you pre-order now, you’re supporting publishers and authors during this hard time, and you’ll probably forget you ordered it, so it will be a surprise to yourself in eight months! 

Mia wakes up in a hospital with a bad case of amnesia. With absolutely no idea who she is, what she does, where she lives, or who she trusts, she leaves the hospital in a fancy expensive dress, her phone, and a pretty red lipstick. Through social media, she finds “her” house, which happens to be house-sat by a nerdy scientist. He becomes her right-hand man, helping her piece together her life story. 

Siri, Who Am I? is a crash course in pop culture. It’s quite something. I didn’t understand the vast majority or the references because I live under a rock. Hashtags pop up with alarming regularity; I would hate it, but it works in this novel because of the content and story being told. It bolsters the image of the shallow life that is being played out for an Instagram feed. Tschida relies on technology to help the story move; to the point it is more than a presence, it’s a character in it’s own right. Technology takes up the same amount of space in the novel as it does in most of our daily lives. 

The footnotes made the novel for me. It establishes passing thoughts, judgements, side comments, questions and more. The footnotes are the inner monologue of the novel. It was a great addition, and I loved them. 

It is a twenty-something creation story set in the modern era of Instagram “Thank God for Instagram. I’d already written a story for myself, and damn if it wasn’t pretty.” On the surface, it’s a fun novel and love story arriving just in time for summer. It’s actually far more interesting. Tschida explores the influence of social media on identity. Does personality affect what is put on social media or is social media influencing and changing identity? 

As the pandemic continues to rage on, I suggest picking this one up and reading it. Siri, Who Am I? can’t help being fun, but it’s also a probing look into my generations’ obsession with social media. 

Buy Amazon | Buy Book Depository
Shop the Post
[show_shopthepost_widget id=”4026545″]

bisous und обьятий,
RaeAnna

Title: Siri, Who Am I?
Author: Sam Tschida
Publisher: Quirk Books
Copyright: 2020
ISBN: 9781683691686

Books, Fiction

Christmas in London by Anita Hughes

RaeAnna

Worth A Read Meh
Length 288
Quick Review Two women spend Christmas in London to make a cooking show, and their lives find new purposes. 

wp-1578169066050

wp-1578169065977
Christmas in London by Anita Hughes at Levy Park in Houston. | Green Dress | Red Heels | Sapphire Necklace | Sapphire Earrings | Fossil Watch | Pearl Bracelets |

Christmas in London by Anita Hughes has a lot of things you want in a Christmas story, but it falls short in just as many ways. 

Louisa is a small time pastry chef working in New York City. Kate is a producer for a local cooking show. They spend Christmas in London to be a part of a holiday cooking show. Louisa grows close to an assistant from New York, and Kate revisits people from her past. 

I’m fairly ambivalent about this book. It’s not bad. It’s definitely not great, but it’s what people want and expect during the holidays. Loads of ridiculous romantic stuff and drama for no reason. Hughes writes in the third person and switches between Louisa and Kates’s point of views throughout Christmas in London. It’s mostly told in the present, except for when Kate has flashbacks to the past for a muddy subplot. Honestly, the writing is really boring and cliché. There is an abundance of similes. Hughes is overly descriptive to the point of monotony. It became so repetitive when as the narrative said in one way or another “a man showed up and she realized it was Trevor/Noah.” Yuck. It doesn’t build suspense. It’s just boring and a waste of ink. 

I could get past the writing if the characters were more believable or even likable. Louisa and her love interest felt like they were in high school more than adults starting out in a romantic relationship. Kate is more mature but not by a lot. I have a hard time identifying with adults in relationships who are completely lacking in mature communication skills. At the same time, their conflict resolution comes far too easily after they’ve bungled the whole situation from poor communication skills. They’re also not very likable. The parallels drawn between Louisa and Kate are not subtle; they’re basically living the same story arc.The male characters are the worst. Honestly, I don’t know why either woman put up with it? No man is better than any man. 

Anita Hughes’ Christmas in London is a decent mindless read to keep you busy instead of spending time with the in-laws or family. It’s not great, but it could be a lot worse.

Memorable Quotes
““But there isn’t time to be passionate about more than one thing. If you want something in life, you have to sacrifice everything else to get it.””
“She had never been able to separate love and attraction.”
“That was the problem with sex; it made it impossible to think.”

bisous und обьятий,
RaeAnna

Buy on Amazon | Buy on Barnes & Noble | Buy on Book Depository
Shop the Post
[show_shopthepost_widget id=”3870071″]

Title: Christmas in London
Author: Anita Hughes
Publisher: St. Martin’s Griffin
Copyright: 2017
ISBN: 9781250145796