2011 Book #21: The Year of the Flood
The Year of the Flood isn’t really a sequel to Oryx and Crake like I expected it to be. The two novels’ events happen at the same time: the plots and characters are interwoven. The Year of the Flood is narrated by two of these characters, Toby and Ren. They’re both part of an environmentalist […]
2011 Book #20: The Blue Sword
The Blue Sword seems much longer than it is. It’s a kids’ book that doesn’t read like a kids’ book. In fact, I’m kind of confused about why it’s even in the juvenile section of the library rather than, at least, the young adult section. Maybe it was the style that made me read it […]
2011 Book #19: Brideshead Revisited
I enjoyed Brideshead Revisited sooooo much more than I thought I would. In fact, I think it’s one of my favorite books ever. Evelyn Waugh has a lot in common with Fitzgerald and Hemingway, though it was published twenty years after The Great Gatsby and The Sun Also Rises. Brideshead Revisited is about wealthy English […]
2011 Book #18: The Grapes of Wrath
I usually make myself write these blog posts within hours of finishing the book so I don’t forget what I want to say about them. Except I finished reading The Grapes of Wrath a couple of days ago, so I don’t have as much to talk about. I really loved this novel. It’s the most […]
2011 Book #17: Crime and Punishment
So. I read Crime and Punishment and liked it, though not as much as I thought I would when I was halfway through. At one point, I thought it might trump One Hundred Years of Solitude, but it didn’t. I’m not going to summarize it here because everyone is familiar with it. The funny thing […]
2011 Book #16: Chronicle of a Death Foretold
Chronicle of a Death Foretold is short, and I guess that’s my only real complaint. It’s similar, in a lot of ways, to One Hundred Years of Solitude, minus the vast epicness, which is my favorite thing about that novel. I’m not saying that means I didn’t like this one. It’s a novel(la?) spiraling around […]
2011 Book #15: Mockingjay
I think I’ve said all I want to about the Hunger Games trilogy. Mockingjay was just like the other two, but this time, instead of ending with a cliffhanger, it just ended. Think about the end of Harry Potter, the summing up several years in the future, but badly. In Harry Potter, I think such […]
2011 Book #14: Disgrace
J.M. Coetzee has been following me around. I hadn’t heard of him until relatively recently, and then his name started popping up everywhere. Book-related everywheres, anyway. So when I happened to pick up Disgrace and read the blurb, I decided to give it a try, recalling how much I’ve liked South African lit in the […]
2011 Book #13: Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep?
I liked Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep? much more than I thought I would, though I don’t have too much to say about it. It’s about the difference (or lack of) between real humans and animals and electronic, man-made androids and animals. It’s a really interesting read: I couldn’t put it down. This morning, […]
2011 Book #12: Catching Fire
Okay, I was wrong. I said I probably wouldn’t bother reading Catching Fire, the sequel to The Hunger Games. In my defense, Borges made my brain hurt, and I needed some serious leisure reading. This one certainly qualifies. If you haven’t read these books and think you might like to, you should probably stop here. […]