December 27, 2010

A Wind in the Door :: Madeleine L'Engle

Title: A Wind in the Door
Author: Madeleine L'Engle
Read: NYC, MA
Format: Trade paperback

Last year I reread A Wrinkle in Time and liked it just fine, but I wasn't in a huge rush to continue with the series. Over a year later, I picked up A Wind in the Door.

At the beginning of this novel, we find the precocious prodigy Charles Wallace is sick and still unusual. His sister and a gang of adventurers attempt to get to the bottom of his illness by succeeding in three trials. Also, they battle evil itself in Charles' body. What?!

Overall, I found this second installment of the "Time Quintet" unimpressive. Because I was already invested in the characters, I was kind of interested in the events. However, I ended up annoyed with how unnecessarily complicated the plot was. I mean, I was able to follow it: it's a children's book after all. I just found the whole thing anticlimactic. Yes, it was a sort-of interesting and different premise. Yet, was it worthwhile? Does it set up future books? Does it develop the world of our characters? Do I care? On all counts: not really.

I think I'm done with this series for now. I like the Murry children, but on the whole I think theirs might be a good, but not great, tale.

Fine for what it is, but the last Murry adventure for me.
3 out of 5 stars.

December 20, 2010

The Russian Debutante's Handbook :: Gary Shteyngart


Title: The Russian Debutante's Handbook
Author: Gary Shteyngart
Read: NYC, Paris, Boston
Format: Trade paperback

I read - and loved - Super Sad True Love Story by Gary Shteyngart this summer. Shortly after finishing it, I went to see the author read at the Tenement Museum on the Lower East Side of Manhattan. He was funny and nice and I decided to buy the only one of his novels I hadn't read and I had it signed - woo!

The next night, I was at the bar in Brooklyn I always go to and who should sidle up to the bar stool next to me? Gary Shteyngart. I did not talk to him because I am shy. However, I did take it as a sign that clearly I should read Russian Debutante asap.

And I would have. I mean, I started it asap. But despite being told by the sales associate at the Tenement Museum (and others) that this was the best of his books, I just couldn't latch on. I loved Absurdistan and Super Sad True Love Story and I'm very glad I read them first. Had I started with Russian Debutante, I would not have picked the others up.

I don't mean to say that TRDH was bad, because it was certainly not. However, plot-wise I found it unwieldy - even meandering at times - and I never did grow fond of Vladimir, our narrator, either. Plus, while I'm interested in some of the themes explored (immigration, assimilation, otherness, success, expectations, legitimacy), I felt that they exploded into a lot of directions and the result felt unruly.

All that said, I like Shteyngart's prose style. As a writer, he skillfully can turn a clever (yet not glib) phrase all while being sincere (and never saccharine). It's a difficult balance, but one Shteyngart achieves in all of his novels.

Some prefer Absurdistan to Super Sad True Love Story, but I don't. I think Shteyngart's work has steadily improved and even though I didn't love Russian Debutante, I look forward to reading all this author's future works. I like his style and sometimes that beats all.

Good writing in need of a story editor:
3 out of 5 stars.

December 06, 2010

Tender is the Night :: F Scott Fitzgerald

Title: Tender is the Night [book club selection, VM]
Author: F. Scott Fitzgerald
Read: CDG > JFK, NYC
Format: trade paperback

I've had Tender is the Night on my bookshelf since 1999 when I was supposed to read it for my 20th Century American Novel class. I was inspired to actually go ahead and read it after re-reading The Great Gatsby last year. Clearly, I was slow to respond to that inspiration. In any event, when it came time for me to choose the next Anything Goes Book Club selection I decided thought it might be a good option. My fellow readers agreed.

One of the reasons I was so interested in reading Fitzgerald again was how swept away I was with the writing in Gatsby. I was really looking forward to that same caliber of lyrical prose and while Tender is the Night was beautiful in its own right, it didn't quite compare. The strength of this novel lies in Fitzgerald's wrenching development of his and Zelda's semi-autobiographical stand-ins, Dick and Nicole Diver. It is this couple's relationship that is the centerpiece of the novel. In it, their life is chronicled from their glorious (glorified?) early days through the challenges and changes that test not just their marriage, but them as individuals.

I'm not sure if it was one of the ladies at the club meeting or if it was in the introduction, but someone notes that the novel starts out one way (through the eyes of a young Hollywood ingenue who is smiiten with and eventually tempts Dick Diver) and ends in another (as a study of Nicole and Dick's chiasmatic relationship). I believe the introduction also explains that the novel was much, much longer and was considerably edited. I think my biggest complaints about the work can be explained by these facts/observations. First, the story does read as unintentionally uneven because of the change in perspective. But, death of the author be damned. Fitzgerald was clearly inspired by his own experience; so much so that the work he started out writing morphed in the process. Knowing this makes the book feel more personal and more beautiful, in its own way. Secondly, the novel seems a little out of balance in some ways. That is, some portions seem intensely detailed - to the point of tedium - and others seem wildly under-described. It's very possible that this is a casualty of massive editing, but I have to imagine that something could have been done to prevent such distinct pockets of dense description alongside single sentences that change the trajectory of the novel.

All in all, a beautiful novel. Even if I don't believe it to be Fitzgerald's greatest work (as some critics claim).
4 out of 5 stars

December 05, 2010

The Gardner Heist :: Ulrich Boser

Title: The Gardner Heist, The True Story of the World's Largest Unsolved Art Theft [NF 2010 #6!]
Author: Ulrich Boser
Read: Boston, NYC
Format: Trade paperback

Recently on a very good night in Cambridge, I went to both Mr. & Mrs. Bartley's Burger Cottage and the Harvard Book Store. Feeling generally nostalgic for my youth's home, I decided to pick up this book about the notorious Isabella Stewart Gardner Museum theft of 1990.

Other than a general knowledge of its occurrence, I knew very little about this crime. Now I know a lot. Including:

- there's a bunch of scary gangsters in Boston
- art theft is cool-sounding and all, but it's really bad
- investigators get obsessed with this case, but all the leads are now cold
- the museum has not replaced the missing canvases with any other works
- a man (Harold Smith) with NO NOSE helped the author learn more about the case
- my hometown of Brockton is mentioned as a place the paintings might be
- nobody KNOWS who did it, but a lot of people think that that Whitey Bulger guy might have something to do with it
- Whitey Bulger and Billy Bulger are brothers
- there were NO CLUES at the scene of the crime

The writing in the book is a little wack. Ulrich Boser really loves the sentence composition that begins with a descriptive clause and leads into the statement. Like this:

"A tall man with dark hair and glasses, John So-and-So took his work very seriously."

When 60% of your sentences follow this construction, it gets silly fast. And after about 100 pages, it starts to make you roll your eyes. No matter, though. The topic was interesting enough for me to fight through the mediocre writing and I'm glad to know more about this fascinating event. Also, as much as I like to pretend it is all progressive state legislature and patrician ideals, Massachusetts has a very real, very seedy criminal underbelly. Though one of the most infamous crimes - debatable, I know - would be an art heist.

Also, it has a section of glossy color pictures in the middle. That's always fun.

Fascinating and suspenseful. Goofy writing.
4 out of 5 stars