Fairly early in December, LitHub compiles a list of the books that landed on the most "best of" lists (https://lithub.com/the-ultimate-best-books-of-2019-list/); I immediately start perusing the list and asking myself, "Why haven't I read that . . . or that . . . or that?" So I start madly trying to get my hands on some of the books I haven't read (this continues through February); some prove to be worth it while others make me scratch my head. December's reading was definitely peppered with items from that list, as well as other random choices. Here are the more interesting titles from December.
Note: I read two books of poetry this month--The Tradition, by Jericho Brown and Hybrida, by Tina Chang. Both have some beautiful language and imagery but I find I have nothing intelligent to say about them, so . . .
Fiction
My Sister the Serial Killer, by Oyinkan Braithwaite. Korede is a well-respected nurse in a hospital in Nigeria. Her more beautiful and Instagram-obsessed sister Ayoola is a bit of a challenge, calling her from time to time to help clean up the mess that results when she kills her latest boyfriend. Then Ayoola starts dating a doctor from Korede's hospital, the doctor Korede just happens to have been in love with for ages. What is Korede going to do? The book is a satirical look at sibling relationships and social media--a quick look at reader reviews on Amazon shows that many people love this book. I enjoyed some of the humor but wasn't entirely won over by the absurdity of the situation.
Akin, by Emma Donoghue. An elderly man who is about to make a pilgrimage to his hometown in Europe learns that he is the sole relative available to provide temporary care to his 12-year-old great nephew. The boy's mother is in jail, his father and his paternal grandparents are dead, and the maternal grandmother with whom he has been living has just died. A social worker agrees to let the boy travel to Europe with the great uncle, and the book is he story of their "adventures." In some ways the book is endearing, as the simultaneous experience of investigating his mother's history and learning to cope with the young boy opens the old man's mind and heart. However, the situation is so ridiculously unfeasible (what social worker would go for this plan?) and the two characters make so many bad decisions (that's my kind way of saying they are obnoxious) that I became weary of the book about half way through.
Normal People, by Sally Rooney. Very near the top of the LitHub list (and a favorite of President Obama's for 2019) but not universally loved on GoodReads, Normal People is the story of a relationship between two bright teenagers, the wealthy loner Marianne and Connell, a member of the "in crowd" at school whose mother works for Marianne's family. The two start a secret sexual relationship that waxes and wanes as they go off to college and enter early adulthood. Although they are drawn to each other, they can't seem to establish a healthy relationship as they struggle with self-esteem issues and the need to please/impress their friend groups. This will probably seem weird, but the relationship reminded me of Rhett and Scarlett in Gone with the Wind. In the end, the author leaves the future of the relationship to our imaginations.
Red at the Bone, by Jacqueline Woodson. Also high on the LitHub list, Red at the Bone examines the effects of a teen pregnancy on two African American families, one successful, the other struggling. The book is told nonlinearly from the perspectives of the child Melody, her parents Aubrey and Iris, and her grandparents. Woodson goes back into the grandparents' memories of violent racist attacks on their family and the struggle to overcome, relates Aubrey and Iris's teen marriage and the sadness that persists as a result of Iris's rejection of both her daughter and her husband, and explores Melody's dating and friendships. While there is great sadness and pain, there is also uplift in the way in which Aubrey essentially became the child of Iris's parents and the love with which Melody was surrounded. And, of course, there is Woodson's exquisite prose, crafted to express five distinct voices. Definitely recommended.
Rules for Visiting, by Jessica Frances Kane. I really enjoyed this light book featuring May, a gardener at a college. When she gets an extra month of vacation from her job, she decides to use it visiting four old friends that she hasn't seen for years. Feeling herself not well-versed in friendship, she studies up on how visitors should behave. The resulting visits are awkward, funny, and sometimes touching. And there's a lot of information about plants. If it sounds silly, it is a bit--but it's a good silly.
Supper Club, by Lara Williams. This one was lower on the LitHub list, but I can't imagine how it got onto even four "best of 2019" lists. Maybe it's a millennial thing. The protagonist Roberta and friend Stevie, stuck in unrewarding jobs straight out of college, start a supper club for women in which they make elaborate dishes from foods they have obtained through dumpster diving. They eat until they feel sick, hoping to be able to take up more space in the male-dominated world in which they live (The Guardian described the supper club as a female version of Fight Club). This is an interesting, if somewhat nauseating, idea, but the supper club is only a piece of the story, which also deals with Roberta's dysfunctional childhood, rape, self-harm, and painful/bad relationships. Maybe this could all add up to something insightful, but for me, it does not.
The Other Americans, by Laila Lalami. At the heart of this novel, also lower down on the LitHub list, is the hit-and-run killing of Driss Guerraoui, a Moroccan immigrant who owns a small restaurant in a small California desert town. His daughter Nora, a composer (not a career her parents would have chosen for her) believes the accident might have been a hate crime, and the investigation into this possibility provides a through thread for the novel. At the same time, through multiple narrators, Lalami explores the conflict between self-interest and doing the right thing, the longing for home, the particular stresses in immigrant families, the effects of violence/PTSD, and more. While some of the content and themes may seem to be particular to the immigrant experience, I found the author's insights equally applicable to all people. The author's skill in weaving together different perspectives and themes while keeping the narrative of the accident moving forward was impressive. Recommended.
Mystery
The Nanny, by Gilly Macmillan. Macmillan has written some very good mysteries. The Nanny is so-so. I found it predictable and also winced at the "bad mother" theme that seems to be common in recent mysteries.
How the Dead Speak, by Val McDermid. Years ago, I read a lot of Val McDermid. Then I decided she was getting too dark for me, so I stopped until about five years ago, when I started reading her newer series. I enjoyed several of them quite a bit. Sadly, I found How the Dead Speak, which is number 11 in the Tony Hill/Carol Jordan series, somewhat dull, though you'd think dozens of children's bodies found in the yard of an orphanage would make for an interesting read. Perhaps it's because Tony and Carol aren't actually the main characters in the book. Perhaps it's because Tony is in prison, trying to use his psychological skills to help other inmates while avoiding getting beaten. Perhaps it's because there's a major coincidence that ties two cases together in an unbelievable way. This one just didn't do it for me.
Sci-Fi/Speculative Fiction
Hyperion, by Dan Simmons. My friend Suzy, who is a big reader of sci-fi, recommended this book. Its structure is interesting, in that the bulk of the book is devoted to seven travellers telling their stories a la The Canterbury Tales. Because I am very bad at getting the gestalt of fictional worlds, here is a slightly edited version of Wikipedia's overview of the context: In the 29th century, the Hegemony of Man comprises thousands of planets connected by farcaser portals. The Hegemony maintains an uneasy alliance with the TecnoCore, a civilisation of AIs. Modified humans known as Ousters live in space stations and are in conflict with the Hegemony. Hyperion is a planet with no farcasters that is difficult to access without significant time dilation. It is home to structures known as the time Tombs, which are moving backward in time and guarded by a creature known as the Shrike. On the eve of an Ouster invasion of Hyperion, a pilgrimage to the Time Tombs has been organized. I found several of the pilgrims' tales to be very interesting; however, I was put off by not having a better understanding of the point of their pilgrimage and by the ending, which was an obvious indicator that there would be a sequel (which there was).
The Dreamers, by Karen Thompson Walker. In a small college town in California, people suddenly fall into a deep sleep. Some die, others just keep sleeping. In the fear engendered by the sleeping illness, people and institutions take drastic actions to try to prevent its spread and the reader experiences those actions through the eyes of various townspeople.Eventually, for no apparent reason, some people start to wake up, bringing with them memories of dreams they believe predict the future--and some seem to. Yet others of the dreams, while still perceived as images of the future, are actually forgotten events of the past. The book leaves us with many more questions than answers. My description does not do the book justice--it's highly entertaining and also thought-provoking.
Nonfiction
Heavy: An American Memoir, by Kiese Laymon. Kiese Laymon is an accomplished writer and educator. Reading his memoir about growing up in Mississippi and the long-term effects of abuse of varied types, pervasive violence, and racism makes one wonder how he has managed to achieve so much. Clearly, his success has not been easily won, as he has struggled with addictive behavior (exercise, eating, gambling), psychological issues, and persistent racism. He addresses the memoir to his mother, which is an act of courage, given that she was at the heart of many of the troubling aspects of his childhood (and she is still alive). Heavy is a courageous, troubling, and intense book that can be uncomfortable reading--but will worth the discomfort.
What My Mother and I Don't Talk About, edited by Michelle Filgate. I found it somewhat ironic to be reading this book in the last week of the year in which my mother died. There were certainly plenty of topics we did not talk about but reading the 15 essays in this collection made me feel like the pain and anger under those silences are fairly low key in comparison to what others have experienced. The parental failures to accept their children, to address their traumas, to be there recounted in some of the essays are heartrending, and one can understand how estrangement between parent and child happens. Other essays deal with silences that seem less significant to me; an NPR reviewer classified these as wanting to know "what to know what their moms were like before they were moms." Trying to unravel the mysteries of our parents' youth is certainly interesting but it's a silence of a different nature (believe me, as I am currently transcribing my grandmother's diaries, I have some questions about the family narrative, but I am not obsessed with finding answers). I don't think I had any major insights into my relationship with my mother (or my children) as a result of reading this book, but I did find it interesting.
YA
An Absolutely Remarkable Thing, by Hank Green. Hank Green, brother of mega-popular YA author John Green, has created a fast-paced tale about graphic designer April May, who comes across a giant Transformer-like statue on a Manhattan street. She calls her videographer friend and they post a video about the statue on YouTube; when it turns out that these statues have appeared simultaneously in cities across the world, the video goes viral and April becomes a media star. The book deals with serious themes--fame/celebrity and their effect on people, how social media is changing culture, fear of the unknown and how it can be exploited, and more. The book is entertaining but the ending is clearly a set-up for a sequel (to be published in 2020), which is something I'm not fond of. Interestingly, my granddaughter couldn't get into the book while it's her best friend's all-time favorite.
Favorite Passages
His girl will love and be loved. She will suffer, and she will cause suffering. She will be known and unknown. She will be content and discontented. She will sometimes be lonely and sometimes less so. She will dream and be dreamed of. She will grieve and be grieved for. She will struggle and triumph and fail. There will be days of spectacular beauty, sublime and unearned. There will be moments of rapture. She will sometimes feel afraid. The sun will warm her face. The earth will ground her body. And her heart--now thrumming strong and steady, against her father's chest, as he rocks her to sleep on a porch swing one evening in early summer, at the very start of a life--that heart: it will beat, and it will someday cease to beat. And so much of this life will remain always beyond her understanding, as obscure as the landscapes of someone else's dreams."
Karen Thompson Walker, The Dreamers
For too long we said nothing. There was something moving through me like a razor in my chest--I didn't know then if it was rage or sadness or fear. Maybe Iris felt it too because she moved closer to me, rested her hand on the back of my neck, and pressed her lips into my hair. I wanted more, though--a hug, a kindness whispered into my ear. I wanted her to tell me I was beautiful, that she didn't care what music played, that she loved me. I wanted her to laugh with me about the ridiculousness of garters and stockings.
Jacqueline Woodson, Red at the Bone (and very relevant to What My Mother and I Don't Talk About)
Perhaps memory is not merely the preservation of a moment in the mind, but the process of repeatedly returning to it, carefully breaking it up in parts and assembling them again until we can make sense of what we remember.
Laila Lalami, The Other Americans
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