Am I a curmudgeon? Have I lost the ability to take delight in simple pleasures and enjoy things at face value? Is Eligible a charming, quick, witty read, or a slog through utter minutiae and plot threads that go nowhere? I found I was doubting myself as I read this, doubting my ability to discern whether a book was good or crap, even, dear readers, doubting my own taste level. You already know the story of Eligible, it’s Pride and Prejudice moved to the present […]
The Book Within the Book
Man, this is one strange little book. I picked it up because I was going on vacation, and even when Sophie Hannah’s books aren’t very good, they can always be relied on to be interesting. The basic plot of this one is that the Merrison family has picked up and left London for a more peaceful life in Devon. The main character, Justine Merrison, has quit her job and is looking forward to staying home. The story gets going when she finds the beginning of […]
Better than Pride and Prejudice and Zombies
It’s 1812 in England, and Lady Helen Wrexhall is a young woman of means, about to be presented to the Queen and come out into society. The night of the Queen’s ball, she meets Lord Carlston, a disgraced nobleman who finagles his way into her life so he can drop a bombshell: England is infiltrated by a group of terrifying beings (Amazon calls them demons, but I dunno, I feel weird calling them that) who feed off all the negative parts of society, surviving by […]
If I Forget Israel, Let Me Forget my Right Hand
There is a whole world of books out there written by women who have left Mormon fundamentalism, and I think I’ve read about half of them. I don’t know what it is about these books, but reading about this lifestyle is endlessly fascinating to me. Warren Jeffs and his brothers get a lot of media attention, but let me tell you, Ervil LeBaron has Jeffs beat in terms of creepiness any day of the week. Ervil and his brothers led a fundamentalist sect that lived […]