Month: September 2023

Tom Lake–book review

Tom Lake, by Ann Patchett

Another great read from Ann Patchett. I loved The Dutch House, so was minded to enjoy this new work. And I did, though maybe not quite as much.

Tom Lake is really a tribute to Thornton Wilder, who is a bit out of my frame, not being a big reader of Americana, but no matter. The story centres around his play, Our Town, that feels very pancakes-on-the-griddle homely and probably doesn’t have the connotations for non-Americans that those folksy folk enjoy. Our narrator, Lara, finds herself (almost accidentally) type-cast as the fresh faced young woman in Our Town, first in her home town and later at Tom Lake, a theatre company in Michigan. She is Emily, the sweet thing. She can’t seem to pull off anything else.

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Yellowface–book review

Yellowface, by Rebecca Kuang

I don’t know about this book. I didn’t like it. I feel a bit like I’ve been stuck in one of those one-sided conversations where you agree with the argument but feel you’re being hit about the head with a puppet.

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We Were Liars – book review

We Were Liars, by e lockhart (her l/c)

I read this soon after the fatuous Pineapple Street, confirming that the joy of reading (of course!) is all in the writing rather than the setting. This story, again, features wealthy New Yorkers with more privilege entitled on them than seems fair. This family have their own island on which they spend summer; grandfather and the aunts all in separate houses through which the kids wander. But where Pineapple Street struts the flashy surface of monied lives, We Were Liars goes deep with plot and character and story. It’s a good story, a coming of age and a mystery you don’t realise is a mystery until things stop adding up.  Here, our girl, Cadence, introduces us to her three companions and lets the story rip.

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Everything is Beautiful and Everything Hurts –book review

Everything is Beautiful and Everything Hurts, by Josie Shapiro

Partly, this book is the story of a woman running the Auckland marathon. There’s a lot of determination, a lot of pain, much questioning and self-doubt. It is a tactical race, and we get the feel early on that our runner, Mickey, knows what she is about and is in it to win it. This race runs alongside the story of how our woman came to be here, next to the ocean, running her heart out. I thought the marathon was superbly written (and run) and I was with Mickey through all the pain and the euphoria.

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