2016 Reading: Tender is the Night

#25 A book that takes place during Summer

What. The fuck. Is this book even about?!?! Francis, seriously, I love your work, but godDAMN this book is about nothing. NOTHING!

There are affairs and parties, a little murder (that's completely glossed over), but there is no plot! Every character is thinking mundane and useless things while doing other mundane and useless things. This man claims to love these two women, yet seems to hate them in his thoughts. Like, literally "Dick saw her with an inevitable sense of disappointment. It took him a moment to respond to the unguarded sweetness of her smile" and then immediately thinking how much he's in love with her.

WTF?!

After reading a bit more, I found that the first section (there are three in total) makes the book seem as if it is about Rosemary. This is misleading and I think it's why this book has bothered me so much. The narrative, as it is, goes from person to person and not always the characters that end up being the most important. This style of writing is not my favorite and I think that is why I am not fond of this book. However, the story is an interesting one, and then it isn't, and then it is again.

And then it isn't.

2016 Reading: Poor Unfortunate Souls

I saw the cover of this book and immediately knew that I needed to read it. I love Disney and I especially love stories written from the perspective of the villain. I found this book to be a little confusing at times, since they linked a whole slew of Disney stories together and it was hard to keep up with everything.

But all in all, this book did exactly what I wanted it to do. It made the point of view of the villain clear and showed motivations behind the villainy, which you would really not otherwise see.

I've learned that there are more of these types of books so I think I might try to locate them and give them a chance.

2016 Reading: Phoebe and Her Unicorn (3 books)

I read these at the suggestion of one of my coworkers. She and I are both big fans of regularly updated web comics and we exchange titles and stuff all the time and she thought I would enjoy these.

I do.

I have to admit, I want to slap the unicorn occasionally, but I gather that is the point.

Nice quick little read while I try to power through a difficult book.

2016 Reading: Drowning Instinct

#30 A book with a blue cover

Oh. My. Gawd. This book. I had never heard of this book and then I read the description on some website, I don't even remember. We didn't have a copy in the library so I made a request for it and completely forgot about it until it was plopped in front of me one day.

I could not put this book down once I started it. Imagine Lolita (which is a favorite of mine) but completely mutual with a little bit of "Secretary" (movie, not book) thrown in there as well. Ugh. Love. I full plan on buying this book so that I can read it again someday. I don't do that with a lot of books. So, that means this one is worth it.

I love the way it was written; as a sort of flowing verbal narrative into a tape recorder. This means that the story could be considered unreliable because it is all the recollections of the main character and she even acknowledges that fact in the story, but it is still so compelling and interesting that you just don't care about that.

There are a lot of things happening at once, but the story doesn't feel overwhelming like some others do. Everything flows very nicely, even with the sporadic interruptions that remind us she is telling this story to a specific person. The subject matter may be unpleasant or difficult for some people, but I like books with a dark side to them.

2016 Reading: This Is A Book

Demetri Martin is one of those comedians who don't really tell "jokes." They just kind of talk slowly and state obvious things, yet somehow you can't help but laugh at everything that comes out of his mouth. Much like Mitch Hedberg but with way less drugs.

This is a collection of little Demetri-isms that would definitely be present in his comedy specials or even his short lived TV show. I found one particular little short story very amusing:

Mary Brown was a shy woman, who spoke little and rarely made

eye contact with anyone.  She lived in a small yellow house at the

end of Maple Street, which was where she made her jam and kept

her sex slaves. (p. 113)

To which I promptly texted my friend with the caption, "Hey, Demetri Martin wrote a short story about me!" To which she replied, "Omg yes"

This was a fun, quick little book that made me smile. Now on to more of the challenge list.

2016 Reading: The First True Lie

#14 A book you can finish in a day

I saw this book on the shelf and it was small, but when I read the back... Holy shit.

This kid is amazing and sad and so smart... The whole time, I kept forgetting how old he was because his tone and language made him seem older. I mean, he survived two whole weeks... I definitely could not do that.

It's one thing to deal with death when there are other people around to help you, but this kid was so used to being alone, so used to fending for himself even at such a young age, that he just kept going as if nothing was wrong while his mother's body just rotted away in the bedroom. School, cooking, shopping, clothes... All because no one could know or they would take him to an orphanage.

I would recommend this book to everyone to read at least once because this was amazing.

2016 Reading: I Work at a Public Library

#24 A book with a protagonist who has your occupation

As SOON as I saw the title for this book, I knew I had to read it. We have so many weird people that come in here and we can tell all kinds of weird stories about things that happen in the library so I knew this book would be a hoot.

Yeah, I said 'hoot.' I'm an old librarian. Don't judge me.