What Are We Currently Reading?

[peacheslatour]

Quote

We got to read Their Eyes Were Watching God instead of the Scarlet Letter. Did anyone else have to read The Fountainhead in high school?

Oh god, no. Yikes, Ayn Rand. And I could never get through The Scarlet Letter. I started reading it on my own because Dark Shadows was kind of doing a mash up between it and The Crucible.

[thomasdown92]

I'm reading Murakami's After Dark. Relatively short read compared to Murakami's other works. I'm 85% through and have loved it thus far. There are many loose strings in the novel, and I'm hoping Murakami would tie them all in his unique way; the intricate ties that unravel more than it conceals. 

I've also started reading Mohsin Hamid's Exit West. Just a few pages through and it seems like a page-turner. There are already some subtle shots taken at the global and Western norms. Eagerly looking forward to reading the rest.

[EtheltoTillie]

13 hours ago, grommit2 said:

The Sun Also Rises. 
Gads...I already know the major themes.
And that Hemingway is lauded as a great writer.
But, geez, I am struggling to find any redeeming value in this novel. 
 

 

10 hours ago, sugarbaker design said:

Never a fan of his novels, although I recently read one of his short stories "A Clean, Well-Lighted Place".  I loved it.  Can't wait to reread it.

 

13 hours ago, WinnieWinkle said:

Speaking of assigned reading I do remember reading a couple of Hemingway short stories in high school and thinking they were very good - and made me understand why he considered one of the great ones,,,but man I could not get past the first couple of pages of any his novels that I attempted!

Ditto from me and my informal three-person book club. We watched the recent documentary and dipped into some of the stories, which we found very powerful. The Sun Also Rises, not so much. 

Edited May 5, 2021 by GussieK

[Jenniferbug]

I finished Beneath Devil's Bridge by Loreth Anne White last night. It was my Kindle First Reads pick for May. It was alright. I found it engaging enough, but also felt like anytime I thought "ok, if I was going to put a twist in this story, what would it be?", I was correct which made it feel somewhat predictable. Maybe I've just read too many mystery novels! I'd recommend it if you're looking for a pretty quick and engaging read, but wouldn't expect seasoned mystery readers to be surprised by any of the plot. 

Spoiler

Honestly I think I would have liked it more if Maddy had accidentally killed her. I felt like she was let off the hook way too easily after being such a hateful character for the whole book. And I didn't like that Johnny got off scott free for what was essentially raping Leena. I'm guessing they can't press charges so late for either assault or rape, but it still kind of bugged me that they just got to go about their lives with their kids and all was dandy. 

Also it got a little preachy at the end about bullying. And let me be clear- that's an important message. But I don't think the reading audience for this book are high schoolers who need to hear it. It felt out of place from the rest of the book, like suddenly everything was fine because they're going to give some talks about bullying at the high school. Even though it was stated that the guidance counselor (who yes, was scum) had already had those talks with the former students who will now be giving the talks. I don't know, it fell flat for me. I didn't really buy into the redemption and remorse of Maddy to believe she would be at all effective in giving these talks. 

 

[Haleth]

17 hours ago, grommit2 said:

The Sun Also Rises. 
Gads...I already know the major themes.
And that Hemingway is lauded as a great writer.
But, geez, I am struggling to find any redeeming value in this novel. 
 

I read it in HS and think I liked it. Can’t really remember, but a few years ago I read A Farewell to Arms and wanted to throw it across the room. 

[dubbel zout]

I really liked A Moveable Feast, about Hemingway's time in Paris. 

[EtheltoTillie]

1 hour ago, Haleth said:

I read it in HS and think I liked it. Can’t really remember, but a few years ago I read A Farewell to Arms and wanted to throw it across the room. 

Correction to my previous post.  We tried A Farewell to Arms, not SAR.  Didn't  like it either. 

[peacheslatour]

1 hour ago, dubbel zout said:

I really liked A Moveable Feast, about Hemingway's time in Paris. 

I use Gertrude Stein's cucumber sandwich recipe from that book.

[blackwing]

All this talk about The Grapes of Wrath is making me wonder if I ever read it.  Back in 8th grade, we had a project where each person had to "become" a famous author.  We had to read their books and be prepared to discuss them with the class and give a presentation as the author.  The culmination was Author Day or something like that where we each sat at a table and adult judges would visit each of us and award prizes. 

I think in preparation for that project, I started reading TGOW.  I remember carrying the hardback copy around.  But I must have given up.  Because I ended up picking F. Scott Fitzgerald, mainly because I discovered he was an alcoholic and had a crazy wife and thought that would play well in the Author Day presentation.  You think high school students in their junior or senior year aren't mature enough for The Great Gatsby, Tender is the Night, The Beautiful and Damned, This Side of Paradise, or The Last Tycoon?  Imagine trying to read those as a 13 year old.  I have no idea if I actually read them, understood them, or just read Cliff Notes and faked it.  And remember thinking that maybe TGOW wouldn't have been a bad choice after all.

In any event, this thread has inspired me to give The Grapes of Wrath another try.  I have too much on my "to be read" plate so I think I'll get the audiobook and listen during my commute.

[peacheslatour]

Quote

All this talk about The Grapes of Wrath is making me wonder if I ever read it.  Back in 8th grade, we had a project where each person had to "become" a famous author.  We had to read their books and be prepared to discuss them with the class and give a presentation as the author. 

That's actually a really cool idea.

[isalicat]

8 minutes ago, peacheslatour said:

That's actually a really cool idea.

Off topic, but I used to teach religious education classes to both children and adults and would have participants "become" one of the people in a particular Bible story and then hold a press conference wherein the other students would quiz the people in the story about their motivations and feelings. (So, in the story of the prodigal son you would have the son, his older brother and the father, and everyone else would be in the press corp asking them questions.) Completely workable for anyone age 7 or 8 on up!

[proserpina65]

On 5/1/2021 at 6:32 PM, peacheslatour said:

Well, is is a true ghost story or was the governess nuts? I remember Henry James would never tell. I don't think there is an answer but I'm interested to hear what school kids would think.

I always thought the governess was nuts, but I love that Henry James left the question open.

On 5/3/2021 at 4:02 PM, dubbel zout said:

One thing that's definitely changed is that every book isn't written by a dead white male.

They weren't when I was in school in the early 80s.  We read stuff by the Brontes and Jane Austen as well.  Of course, those are dead white women, so . . . 

23 hours ago, grommit2 said:

The Sun Also Rises. 
Gads...I already know the major themes.
And that Hemingway is lauded as a great writer.
But, geez, I am struggling to find any redeeming value in this novel. 
 

I hate Hemingway.  I had to slog through The Old Man and the Sea in an American fiction class in high school, and I thought it would never end despite being a fairly short book.  I just wanted the main character to die already.  I'd have felt the same about the author, but he was already dead.

21 hours ago, Jenniferbug said:

William Faulkner was always my least favorite to read in both high school and college. 

I've never tried any of his novels, but we did read A Rose For Emily in high school.  Read it again in college, man, we really missed the big secret in high school.

 

[peacheslatour]

Quote

I hate Hemingway.  I had to slog through The Old Man and the Sea in an American fiction class in high school, and I thought it would never end despite being a fairly short book.  I just wanted the main character to die already.  I'd have felt the same about the author, but he was already dead.

Hemingway was a jerk but he did a lot for the cats in his area.

[Browncoat]

1 hour ago, proserpina65 said:

but we did read A Rose For Emily in high school. 

One of my friends wrote a paper on that, and titled it, "But He Never Rose For Emily".

[blackwing]

On 5/3/2021 at 3:02 PM, dubbel zout said:

One thing that's definitely changed is that every book isn't written by a dead white male.

 

1 hour ago, proserpina65 said:

They weren't when I was in school in the early 80s.  We read stuff by the Brontes and Jane Austen as well.  Of course, those are dead white women, so . . . 

I do agree, the books in junior high and high school were mostly written by dead white males, but I think that most of the books considered "the classics" of the 17th, 18th, 19th centuries were largely written by dead white males.  We did read stuff by Jane Austen and the Brontes, as well as Mary Shelley, Emily Dickinson, and Elizabeth Barrett Browning.  And one unit we did poetry and read Gwendolyn Brooks, Maya Angelou and Langston Hughes.

On 5/4/2021 at 11:27 AM, dubbel zout said:

Oof. I read this in college. I'd read Billy Budd in high school so was familiar with Melville's style, but it was still one of the biggest slogs I've ever slogged. At the final, the prof asked us to rank our most liked and hated books if we had leftover time. We all cackled, and he said, "Oh, you can't put Moby Dick on the hate list, and we all whined like 6-year-olds. Hee.

Moby Dick was assigned for my English class freshman year in college... the grad student teaching the class refused to teach it, she assigned one chapter and asked us to read it for the sake of saying we covered the book, and then we moved on.  At the start of pandemic I was going to read it, but decided on Gone With the Wind instead.  One of these days I will get around to reading it.  That and Anna Karenina.  I actually started AK but put it down.  I just need to keep at it, and will finish it one of these days.

[Haleth]

2 hours ago, peacheslatour said:

Hemingway was a jerk but he did a lot for the cats in his area.

And their descendants are still there!

[peacheslatour]

1 hour ago, blackwing said:

 

I do agree, the books in junior high and high school were mostly written by dead white males, but I think that most of the books considered "the classics" of the 17th, 18th, 19th centuries were largely written by dead white males.  We did read stuff by Jane Austen and the Brontes, as well as Mary Shelley, Emily Dickinson, and Elizabeth Barrett Browning.  And one unit we did poetry and read Gwendolyn Brooks, Maya Angelou and Langston Hughes.

Moby Dick was assigned for my English class freshman year in college... the grad student teaching the class refused to teach it, she assigned one chapter and asked us to read it for the sake of saying we covered the book, and then we moved on.  At the start of pandemic I was going to read it, but decided on Gone With the Wind instead.  One of these days I will get around to reading it.  That and Anna Karenina.  I actually started AK but put it down.  I just need to keep at it, and will finish it one of these days.

This is probably a UO but instead of being some kind of tragic, romantic heroine, I thought she was kind of an idiot. YMMV.

[sugarbaker design]

16 hours ago, peacheslatour said:

This is probably a UO but instead of being some kind of tragic, romantic heroine, I thought she was kind of an idiot. YMMV.

Not an UO with me.  That was one of the huge surprises (for me) about Anna Karenina.  Prior to reading I thought she was a symbol of doomed romance.  Boy was I wrong, she was a selfish, vain woman.  No wonder the aristocracy was overthrown!  I was much more enthralled with the other sub-plot about Konstantin Levin and his wife Kitty.  They were the real heroes of AK.

Edited May 6, 2021 by sugarbaker design

[peacheslatour]

4 minutes ago, sugarbaker design said:

Not an UO with me.  That was one of the huge surprises (for me) about Anna Karenina.  Prior to reading I thought she was a symbol of doomed romance.  Boy was I wrong, she was a selfish, vain woman.  No wonder the aristocracy was overthrown!  I was much more enthralled with the other sub-plot about Konstantin Levin and his wife Kitty.  They were the real heroes of AK.

Agreed.

[lasu]

On 5/4/2021 at 10:02 PM, Constant Viewer said:

We got to read Their Eyes Were Watching God instead of the Scarlet Letter.

 

We got both of these.  I was trying to think of books by minority authors I read in high school, and Eyes as all I could come up with (which is such a huge favorite of mine to this day).  I feel like I have to be forgetting some, but I know the Toni Morrison I read back then was on my own time.

[peacheslatour]

55 minutes ago, lasu said:

 

We got both of these.  I was trying to think of books by minority authors I read in high school, and Eyes as all I could come up with (which is such a huge favorite of mine to this day).  I feel like I have to be forgetting some, but I know the Toni Morrison I read back then was on my own time.

As I stated previously, I was assigned Giovannis Room by James Baldwin and I read The Count of Monte Cristo on my own but I think that's it for high school.

[peacheslatour]

On 5/7/2021 at 9:15 AM, peacheslatour said:

As I stated previously, I was assigned Giovanni's Room by James Baldwin and I read The Count of Monte Cristo on my own but I think that's it for high school.

 

[Luckylyn]

I am starting In The Garden Of Beasts by Erik Larson about the rise of Hitler focusing on an American family living in Germany.  I have always heard good things about Larson’s non fiction books. 

[Jeanne222]

15 minutes ago, Luckylyn said:

I am starting In The Garden Of Beasts by Erik Larson about the rise of Hitler focusing on an American family living in Germany.  I have always heard good things about Larson’s non fiction books. 

It been a while but I think that's the book our book club read and it's very good!

[Jeanne222]

I just finished reading Something In The Water by Catherine Steadman.  I liked it.  

It's a Reese Witherspoon book club selection.

[MargeGunderson]

8 hours ago, Luckylyn said:

I am starting In The Garden Of Beasts by Erik Larson about the rise of Hitler focusing on an American family living in Germany.  I have always heard good things about Larson’s non fiction books. 

I hope you like it! It’s one of my favorite books. His most recent book, The Splendid and the Vile, was also good (about Winston Churchill). 

[catlover79]

With CNN running its miniseries about the history of American late night TV, I decided to reread the story of the "late night wars" again...

 

[GHScorpiosRule]

I just slogged my way through Nalini Singh's Ocean Light and Alpha Night.

It's a tie as to which one I liked least. Okay, Alpha Night has a slight edge being better because of seeing Valentin again. After Ocean, I thought Nalini was back on track with Wolf Rain, but Alpha was just frustrating to get through. She threw all these new characters and one pup that had me comparing them with the SnowDancer lieutenants and pups, where the latter have more layers and who I was interested in learning more about. 

BlackEdge? pfft. Too forced. Could have done without second tier murder mystery.

In these kinds of stories/series, I like knowing who the Big Bad is. I mean, sure, make it a bit of a mystery at first, like with the one in Slave to Sensation, but I pretty much figured mid-way who the killer was; but this arc with the Architect is driving me nutso.

I just could not get invested in either Bo/Kaia or Selenka/Ethan.

At this point, I (and yes, I know it's selfish of me) want to just go back to the SnowDancer Wolves and DarkRiver Leopards.

[DearEvette]

1 hour ago, GHScorpiosRule said:

It's a tie as to which one I liked least. Okay, Alpha Night has a slight edge being better because of seeing Valentin again. After Ocean, I thought Nalini was back on track with Wolf Rain, but Alpha was just frustrating to get through. She threw all these new characters and one pup that had me comparing them with the SnowDancer lieutenants and pups, where the latter have more layers and who I was interested in learning more about. 

Agreed on Ocean Light because it was rather boring, imo.  Not enough investment in the characters.  I think she made a misstep with Bo (and humans overall in the series) in his previous appearances and I have no real interest in the Blacksea changelings beyond Malachi and Miane.  Even though the idea of them is cool, they are strangers in a long running series that feel tacked on and setting us amongst them for the entire book just felt very alien and disconnected from the rest of the series.

I liked Alpha Night a quite a bit more because even though Selenka/Ethan were not a great on page couple the book did a lot to advance the overaching story arc.  Also I thought she played with some interesting themes.  Making the female the clear dominant person of the pairing and also

Spoiler

making one of the Arrows an empath.

Which honestly makes a lot of sense even though it feels unnatural and unexpected, because of course the probability and the way the Netmind works there would be at least one.  Also I just liked having more face time with Kaleb, Memory and Sexy Alexi.  And I actually liked the turmoil going on within Blackedge.

But overall yes, from a main character standpoint these have been her two weakest installments.  But I still give it to her, this is one of the most cohesive, well thought out long running series that has a shit ton of well developed continuity and a world build that is really immersive.

[GHScorpiosRule]

5 minutes ago, DearEvette said:

Agreed on Ocean Light because it was rather boring, imo.  Not enough investment in the characters.  I think she made a misstep with Bo (and humans overall in the series) in his previous appearances and I have no real interest in the Blacksea changelings beyond Malachi and Miane.  Even though the idea of them is cool, they are strangers in a long running series that feel tacked on and setting us amongst them for the entire book just felt very alien and disconnected from the rest of the series.

I liked Alpha Night a quite a bit more because even though Selenka/Ethan were not a great on page couple the book did a lot to advance the overaching story arc.  Also I thought she played with some interesting themes.  Making the female the clear dominant person of the pairing and also

  Reveal spoiler

making one of the Arrows an empath.

Which honestly makes a lot of sense even though it feels unnatural and unexpected, because of course the probability and the way the Netmind works there would be at least one.  Also I just liked having more face time with Kaleb, Memory and Sexy Alexi.  And I actually liked the turmoil going on within Blackedge.

But overall yes, from a main character standpoint these have been her two weakest installments.  But I still give it to her, this is one of the most cohesive, well thought out long running series that has a shit ton of well developed continuity and a world build that is really immersive.

Totally agree! You expressed it better than I did. And I forgot to add that not everyone can bat a thousand.

D'OH! Forgot to mention how much I loved seeing Kaleb, Alexi (Growly Wolf) and even Lucas, though he only had a line or two.

I had a feeling that was what Ethan was.

I don't mind if the dominant person of the pairing is a woman, but the whole story took over like a week, and the first half, up to 46% was just one day! And there was no courting. Selenka pretty much couldn't be bothered with Ethan until 2/3 into the book.

I was hoping for a Judd cameo.

But yeah, the only BlackSea changelings I'm interested in are Malachi and Miane. Don't care about the cousins.

But so looking forward to the Zoom event with Nalini next month!

[GaT]

3 hours ago, GHScorpiosRule said:

At this point, I (and yes, I know it's selfish of me) want to just go back to the SnowDancer Wolves and DarkRiver Leopards.

That pretty much sums it up for me, I don't care about any other shifters.

[Spartan Girl]

I’m reading Katherine Parr: The Sixth Wife the final book in Alison Weir’s Tudor Queen’s series. I don’t know if this will follow the continuity with Innocent Traitor and The Lady Elizabeth regarding the Thomas Seymour/Elizabeth scandal, but I’m looking forward to it regardless!

[babyhouseman]

I'm reading Lorna Landvik's Angry Housewives Eating Bon Bons. It's kind of like Liane Moriarty when women get together. 

[Katy M]

25 minutes ago, babyhouseman said:

I'm reading Lorna Landvik's Angry Housewives Eating Bon Bons. It's kind of like Liane Moriarty when women get together. 

I read that a few years ago. i didn't care for it all that much.

[blackwing]

16 hours ago, Spartan Girl said:

I’m reading Katherine Parr: The Sixth Wife the final book in Alison Weir’s Tudor Queen’s series. I don’t know if this will follow the continuity with Innocent Traitor and The Lady Elizabeth regarding the Thomas Seymour/Elizabeth scandal, but I’m looking forward to it regardless!

I love her non-fiction work, even if it is always obvious where her biases lay.  I may have asked this a few years ago, but how is her fiction?  I read Innocent Traitor when it first came out and for some reason I never felt compelled to keep going and read the rest.

[sugarbaker design]

17 hours ago, Spartan Girl said:

I’m reading Katherine Parr: The Sixth Wife the final book in Alison Weir’s Tudor Queen’s series.

I love Alison Weir!  Her Eleanor of Aquitaine bio is still in my top ten of biographies.  I actually just finished The Mirror & The Light, and while it wasn't my favorite in Mantel's trilogy, it did spur an interest in Lady Margaret Douglas, who conveniently has been profiled by Weir in The Lost Tudor Princess.

[blackwing]

I just finished Ready Player Two by Ernest Cline.  While I have mostly forgotten a lot of the details from the first book, I found this sequel to be extremely entertaining.  There are a TON of fun 1980s pop culture references.  Wade/Parzival gets sent on The Quest for the Seven Shards of the Siren's Soul and some of the places he gets sent are so fun, the book reads like a video game or Dungeons and Dragons module.  There is a shard in a world based on John Hughes' filmography and a shard in a world devoted to Prince/TAFKAP.

I had a lot of fun reading this book, I enjoyed it even more than the first one.

[GHScorpiosRule]

On 5/11/2021 at 2:50 PM, GaT said:

That pretty much sums it up for me, I don't care about any other shifters.

So now I'm going back to re-re-re-read Visions of Heat, then jump to Blaze of Memory, because yummmmm,❤️❤️‍🔥 💘💗Dev Santos💘💗❤️‍🔥❤️

At least with the Leopards and SnowDancer wolves, we got to see them in their animal forms throughout their stories*, instead of at.the.end.of.the.book. with Kaia and Selenka.

*Brenna and Dorian

 

the exception because of what Enrique did to Brenna, and Dorian being latent until his own story.

Heart of Obsidian remains my favorite Psy-Psy story, because ❤️❤️‍🔥❤️Kaleb.❤️❤️‍🔥❤️

Edited May 12, 2021 by GHScorpiosRule

[Spartan Girl]

4 hours ago, blackwing said:

I love her non-fiction work, even if it is always obvious where her biases lay.  I may have asked this a few years ago, but how is her fiction?  I read Innocent Traitor when it first came out and for some reason I never felt compelled to keep going and read the rest.

Her fiction is pretty good! Better than Philippa Gregory’s.

[Haleth]

9 hours ago, sugarbaker design said:

I love Alison Weir!  Her Eleanor of Aquitaine bio is still in my top ten of biographies.  I actually just finished The Mirror & The Light, and while it wasn't my favorite in Mantel's trilogy, it did spur an interest in Lady Margaret Douglas, who conveniently has been profiled by Weir in The Lost Tudor Princess.

On on a waiting list for her second volume (nonfiction) of Queens of the Crusade about the Plantagenet queens. This volume starts with Eleanor. (I read Weir’s bio some time back.). I’ll have to look up her book about Margaret Douglas. She was quite the spitfire in The Spanish Princess. 

[Madding crowd]

I just finished The Other People by CJ Tudor and really liked it. Now I’m starting Lynwood Barclay’s newest Find You First.

[dubbel zout]

I've blown through a bunch of books I've liked:

Code Name Hèléne, by Ariel Lawhon. Novel based on a real WWII spy's life.

Above the Bay of Angels, by Rhys Bowen. Stand-alone novel set in Victorian times by the author of Her Royal Spyness mysteries. These days I enjoy her stand-alones better than the series, as the series is getting a little tired to me.

The Seven Husbands of Evelyn Hugo, by Taylor Jenkins Reid. Novel about an old Hollywood star with a secret, by the author of Daisy Jones and the Six.

Currently I'm reading The Ex Talk, by Rachel Lynn Solomon, about two local NPR hosts who pretend to have been a couple for a new talk show, to save their jobs. Lots of fun so far.

[Dani-Ellie]

4 hours ago, Madding crowd said:

I just finished The Other People by CJ Tudor and really liked it.

I enjoy CJ Tudor's books a lot. The newest one, The Burning Girls, I think is my favorite.

[Madding crowd]

1 hour ago, Dani-Ellie said:

I enjoy CJ Tudor's books a lot. The newest one, The Burning Girls, I think is my favorite.

Thanks I will look for that one next. I like her books too.

[helenamonster]

Just finished: Eternal by Lisa Scottoline. Gotta say, I was kind of disappointed, which is a bummer. This was clearly a passion project for her (she didn't release any books in 2020, and she's been on a 2-a-year schedule for some time), but it just didn't deliver for me. The subject matter is interesting (love and loss in Fascist Italy, with major focus on what the Roman Jews went through), but it just felt overly simple. Which is weird because a lot happened and a lot of themes were explored, but it never went anywhere compelling or had anything particularly insightful to say.

Next up: Too Good To Be True by Carola Lovering

[Crs97]

I just finished The Memory Police by Yoko Ogawa for book club.  If anyone wants to tell me what the hell just happened, I would be most appreciative.

[lasu]

On 5/17/2021 at 6:03 PM, dubbel zout said:

The Seven Husbands of Evelyn Hugo, by Taylor Jenkins Reid. Novel about an old Hollywood star with a secret, by the author of Daisy Jones and the Six.

I've got this on my library hold.  I read another TJR book, Maybe in Another Life, and didn't really like it.  Without realizing it was the same author, I then listened to the audio version of Daisy Jones, which is ah-maze-ing.  I think the voice actors do a phenomenal job and make it an even better story.  I strongly recommend the audio version over the print, in this instance.

I recently read My Dark Vanessa and Circe, both recs from here that I absolutely loved.  Excellent suggestions.

HOWEVER, I just finished 50 Words for Rain which was awful.  If someone here recommended that, we duel at noon.  It started out alright, but at the same time absolutely hilarious because it began like a blueprint from Flowers in the Attic: 

Spoiler

Book: Poor mother takes child to her childhood home and insanely wealthy parents with no explanation.
Me:  Hmmh, sounds familiar.
Book: Mother tells child she must under all circumstances obey her grandmother.
Me:  As long as they don't lock her in the attic.
Book:  locks child in attic.
Me: Wut.
Book: Grandmother abuses child for the mother's sins.
Me: well thank goodness she's an only child with no brother for incest.
Book: here's her long lost brother.
Me: 🙄

The incest vibe was no joke.  Even if I hadn't been primed to be on the lookout for it, the writing was weird - he was constantly kissing and petting her, and the protagonist kept talking about how her skin tingled when he touched her and things like that.  It was creepy.  And to add to the Flowers vibe, while no one is pounding on people's chests with tiny fists, but I cannot count how many times men "smirk" and women "whimper".

It started going downhill pretty fast, but by the time I realized it was actually bad, I figured I was too close to the end to not just finish it off.  This...was a mistake.

Spoiler

The book takes place in Japan, and the matriarch of the family is obsessed with a heir to the dynasty.  She abuses the protagonist, keeps her locked in an attic, then sells her to a whorehouse at age 10.  The protagonist is recused by her brother, then lots more tragedy porn.  Her long lost brother is killed in a car accident (the same as the brother in Flower in the Attic!), and the grandparents force the protagonist (who is a bastard of an American GI) out of Japan.  She wanders the world for a while, finally setteling in London with the only person who loved her, other than her dead brother.  She lives with her friend, and falls in love with a nice guy, gets engaged.  Then the grandmother pretends to be dead to lure her back to Japan to receive her inheritance, just before her wedding.  In Japan, she finds out she is pregnant. The grandmother is not dead and reveals the car accident that killed the beloved brother was a hit meant for her, not the brother.  The protagonist then decides to fuck over her friend who loved her like a sister and her very nice fiance, and agreed to stay in Japan, marry a man of her grandmother's choosing, and continue the dynasty.  The end.  That last bit takes place over about five pages.  

So you have your protagonist being abused, raped, losing everyone she loves, etc  for the whole entire book.  She finally finds a home and people who love her.  And then with no explanation, she turns her back on these people to take over a dynasty that had treated her like shit?  It was considered a mistake that she wasn't killed upon birth, but suddenly this dynasty is going to accept her son, who is a bastard of a bastard and only 1/4 Japanese?  OK, sure. 

Infuriating.

Edited May 19, 2021 by lasu

[Mabinogia]

7 hours ago, lasu said:

HOWEVER, I just finished 50 Words for Rain which was awful.  If someone here recommended that, we duel at noon.  It started out alright, but at the same time absolutely hilarious because it began like a blueprint from Flowers in the Attic: 

Just read the spoilers, thank you for saving me from ever coming anywhere near that book! YIKES!

[Luckylyn]

I will definitely be reading more Erik Larson nonfiction because In The Garden of Beasts was very engrossing.  I feel like there are parallels to modern times in that people have become so casual about their bigotry.  

 I am starting a romance called Beyond the Sea by Keira Andrews. It’s a romance  about a two men a pop star and pilot who end up stuck on an island after a plane crash.  I am in the mood for that guaranteed happy ending that makes romance one of my favorite genres.

[Spartan Girl]

@lasu you summed up EVERYTHING I hated about Fifty Words for Rain, but I didn’t pick up on the incest vibe until you brought it to my attention! ICK! Now I hate it even more. What a suck-o book.