This Is the Saddest Funny Book I’ve Ever Read

My Boyfriend Wrote a Book About Me

By: Hilary Winston

I thought this was going to be a book of funny essays. Something along the lines of Chelsea Handler or Mindy Kaling (but never Tina – no one can hold a candle to Tina). My assumption was not unfounded – the title is semi-ironic, Winston writes for Community, and the book is even described as “funny” on the dust jacket (I went back and checked)

I was so wrong. This book is not funny. It’s just sad.

My Boyfriend Wrote a Book About Me recounts all of Winston’s “adventures” in dating and relationships. She airs all of her dirty laundry including her body weight issues, her deep love of her cat (even though he pees everywhere), her first asshole boyfriend and her latest asshole boyfriend (see: the book’s title), her mom’s battle with cancer, and every awkward date and sexual encounter she’s ever had. Winston has a lot to work with – there is plenty of room for funny commentary – but every single story came across as pathetic and sad. If you’re getting over a horrible break-up and need some outside validation that men suck and that everyone’s life is terrible, then this is the book for you. If you’re looking for a light read and a few laughs, then turn your attention elsewhere.

Don’t get me wrong – this wasn’t a bad book. Winston is a decent writer and I ripped through the book pretty quickly. I just feel duped. I went in expecting to at least giggle out loud a few times and instead came out feeling incredibly sorry for this poor girl.

Side note: A quick Google search showed me that Winston’s titular ex-boyfriend actually exists and he actually wrote a book that references her. If it’s any consolation, he looks like a real jerk-store and she’s clearly better off without him.

In a nutshell: Two and a half stars. This book needs a marketing makeover.

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I’m Glad I Got This One From the Library

Chanel Bonfire

By: Wendy Lawless

Maybe I’ve read too many books. Maybe I’ve read too many memoirs by women with terrible childhoods. Maybe I’ve read too many good memoirs by women with terrible childhoods. Maybe I’m too cynical.

Whatever it is, I found this book a little underwhelming. In Chanel Bonfire, Lawless tells the story of her legitimately unbalanced mother who did some truly awful things to her daughters. It was a quick, fairly compelling read, but Lawless wrote in a very detached way – like an outsider looking in on her experience. She described her mother’s non-stop drinking, constant manipulations, and attempts at killing herself and her children almost clinically, without much emotion. She then wrapped up each episode with a pithy, clichéd statement like the following, “At night, before bed, my sister and I would watch the dolphins… swimming alongside the ship… Unlike us, they seemed to know where they were going.”

A little heavy-handed, don’t you think?

I’ve read this book before. The Glass Castle, The Liar’s Club, pretty much anything by Augusten Burroughs… And they were all a lot better. Don’t get me wrong – I not only finished this book, but I ripped through it quickly. It just lacked the depth and introspection I would have expected from a memoir.

In a nutshell: A quick read, but not a very deep one. Two and a half stars.

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Maybe a Little Too Civil

Rules of Civility
By: Amor Towles

Rules of Civility has been getting a lot of buzz lately, so I snapped it up thinking it would be a good romp through jazz-age New York City with some interesting characters in tow. However, after reading the book, I’d probably describe it as less of a romp and more of a leisurely stroll.

Strolling in and of itself isn’t a bad thing, except that given the story line and the setting, Rules of Civility should have been a much more compelling read. There are plenty of interesting plot points – a car crash, a secret May-December romance, society folks, ambitious career ladder-climbing, and plenty of money. But the story just never picked up the pace. As I was reading it, it felt like things were randomly happening with very little reflection by the characters, making the story feel a little dull and detached. Who knows – maybe that was the tone Towles was going for – but it wasn’t one I connected with.

I did finish this book and I finished it pretty quickly – it was by no means a strenuous read. But I feel like I finished it more to get it done than because I was dying to know what happened. Not exactly a ringing endorsement.

In a nutshell: Rules of Civility was fine. I don’t have anything strongly positive or negative to say about it, but that should tell you something. Two and a half stars.

 

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Bridge Book

A Feast for Crows
By: George R.R. Martin

I took a break from the Game of Thrones series for a bit and then dove back in this fall with book four, A Feast for Crows. I’ll keep the review short, even though it took me a long time to get through the book. (I kept reading other things while reading this one – that should tell you something)

Similar to Catching Fire in the Hunger Games series, this is the bridge book in the series. It’s connecting the beginning and the end of the multi-book story by filling in some gaps and allowing for some character development. Also like Catching Fire, this book was a little boring. The characters are roaming all over Westeros, no big secrets are revealed… no one important even dies. And despite the fact the Martin intentionally left half the characters out of this book, it still felt like there were too many people to keep track of.

I’ll definitely continue on with the series, but this one was a real struggle to get through.

In a nutshell: The most boring book in the series so far. Two and a half stars.

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Back to Blah

Back to Blood
By: Tom Wolfe

The Man in the Ice Cream Suit

I was so so excited for this book. Tom Wolfe is one of my favorite authors (read The Right Stuff and Bonfire of the Vanities immediately, if you haven’t already) and it’s been a long minute since he last published a new book. Unfortunately, Back to Blood didn’t live up to my expectations – it felt like a retread of stories he’s already told.

One of my favorite things about Tom Wolfe is the way he can put a phrase together that just perfectly captures the moment or intention (see: Social X-Ray). He can still do that, but I noticed some repetition in this book. I’ve heard some of the phrases used in Back to Blood before, making the writing feel a little stale.

The other thing I love about Tom Wolfe is his ability to perfectly skewer an aspect of current society so that it seems more approachable and somewhat ridiculous. No one and no group is safe from his sharp tongue. With that in mind, I get what he was trying to do with this book – turn a critical eye on Miami, a city representative of the tension between the country’s booming Latino/Hispanic population and the established white population and the resulting impact on the “status quo”.  But, that critical eye and sharp tongue just weren’t quite there in Back to Blood.

And Tom, why did it take you six years to write basically the same characters you’ve written before? They’re all here – Magdalena, the beautiful but insecure woman (aka Charlotte Simmons), Nestor Camacho, the guy with the huge ego (aka Sherman McCoy from Bonfire), Edward Topping IV, the uptight, upper class white guy (aka Charles Croker from A Man in Full)… You get the point.

Overall, this book didn’t feel fresh. And because I love Tom Wolfe so much, I feel let down.

In a nutshell: Say it ain’t so, Tom! You can do so much better! Two and a half stars.

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Quick Wrap-Up on February

As if February weren’t bad enough on its own, turns out it was a lame book month. I read four books this month, none of which were that good. One of them – Headhunters by Jo Nesbo – will get its own review soon. But the other three just didn’t make enough of an impression on me to warrant separate reviews. Instead I’ve provided a quick run-down on each below:

• The Piano Teacher: I really thought I would like this one. Society Brits living in Hong Kong during World War II, gossiping, drinking, and having affairs. What’s not to like? Unfortunately, it just didn’t live up to my expectations. From a history nerd perspective, I found the part of the book about the Japanese occupation of Hong Kong interesting, but the “steamy” affairs at the center of the story weren’t that interesting.
• The Autobiography of Mrs. Tom Thumb: I should have known better on this one. I read Melanie Benjamin’s other book, Alice I Have Been, and didn’t like it. Mrs. Tom Thumb wasn’t as bad as Alice, but again, it just wasn’t great. It’s a fictionalized account of the life of Lavinia Warren, a small person who actually married Tom Thumb and worked for P.T. Barnum. This book was too long and I ended up being a lot more interest in Barnum than Lavinia. In fact, I’m planning to pick up a biography on Barnum.
• This Life is In Your Hands: This is the only non-fiction book in the bunch. I was really looking forward to reading this book and even convinced my book club that it should be this our next read. Turns out I let my book club down (sorry guys). In the book, Melissa Coleman tells the story of her family’s attempt at “homesteading” or living off an organic farm, before the concept of “organic” food even existed. Homesteading is not an easy life and on top of it, Melissa’s sister dies and her parents eventually split up, forcing them off the farm. This was a great story in concept, but not so great in execution. Unfortunately, the writing wasn’t great and the story was pretty boring – too heavy on the principles behind homesteading and too much wisdom and reflection inserted into a small child’s memories. Coleman also seems to hint that the tragedies her family endured are related to their attempt at homesteading, but in the next breath defends the theories and benefits of homesteading. I realize that nothing is simple black and white, but I found the point of her book muddled.

In a nutshell: Two and a half stars across the board. I’m looking forward to March.

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Hemingway and His Paris Wife – From Two Angles

The Paris Wife by Paula McClain
and
A Moveable Feast by Ernest Hemingway

Hemingway's Passport Photo from 1923

I recently read The Paris Wife by Paula McClain a novel about Ernest Hemingway’s first marriage to Hadley Richardson and their years living in Paris in the 19020’s. I then immediately followed it up with A Moveable Feast, Hemingway’s posthumous memoir about the same time. Both essentially cover the same subject but are told from opposite perspectives, giving a pretty well-rounded view of what Hemingway was like as a young man. I’ve captured what I think are the key similarities and differences about each book below.

The Paris Wife

• This book is told from Hadley’s perspective and focuses more on her and Hemingway’s marriage than A Moveable Feast does, but I also got more insight into Hemingway’s writing process than I did from A Moveable Feast.
• It was interesting to see Hemingway from another angle. I typically think of him as the quintessential man’s man – likes fishing, bull-fighting, and drinking, and just lived hard in general (kind of like Teddy Roosevelt with a smattering of alcoholism). But through The Paris Wife, it was clear that Hemingway was passionate about his writing, had clear ideas about what constituted good writing and slaved away over his stories to make them good.
• It was also clear that he loved Hadley very much in his own blustery way.
• I found this book to be quietly good – each incident and story is told in a fairly calm and steady manner, which was reflective of Hadley’s personality. It felt like McClain’s writing style matched who Hadley was as a person. And even though the book was written from Hadley’s perspective, it was very much a story about Hadley and Hemingway and his impact on her.

A Moveable Feast

• A Moveable Feast is a series short vignettes and less of a narrative story.
• Hemingway’s book is not really about their marriage, but more about his experiences while living in Paris. There are brief mentions of Hadley throughout the book, but their relationship is not the primary theme. It’s more about what it was like to be a struggling writer in 1920’s Paris surrounded by a lot of other semi-struggling artists trying to make a go of it.
• It’s been awhile since I have read anything by Hemingway and I’ll admit, I had to get about a third of the way through the book before I adjusted to his style. He is all about short, straightforward statements and does not use flowery language. That’s not to say that The Paris Wife is flowery, but it is a novel so it’s more descriptive. Plus, it wasn’t written by Hemingway.
• For me, the most interesting part of the book was that he devotes all of maybe five pages at the very end to the demise of his marriage. And he frames it up in a way that makes it sound like his marriage-ending affair was something that just happened to him, like getting hit by a car, as opposed to something that he had a direct and complicit role in. The affair is kind of framed in a similar way in The Paris Wife – a freak occurence that just happened to them – but at least in the novel I saw the implications of that freak occurence. Hemingway does not really reflect on what the affair meant or how it impacted him or Hadley in A Moveable Feast.

I will admit that reading The Paris Wife first probably primed me to go into A Moveable Feast with a biased perspective – I expected more of Hemingway’s book to be about Hadley and was a little disappointed that she played such a minor role in it. The little that he does include about the ending of their marriage felt so tacked-on that it took me surprise. By the time I got to the last chapter, I figured he wasn’t going to mention it all because Hadley had received so little attention up to that point.

As a sidenote: something these books had in common was that they both made me want to go back and read The Great Gatsby. F. Scott Fitzgerald and his wife, Zelda, show up in both books and I got some interesting perspective on who they were and what their relationship was like.

In a nutshell: I would probably recommend The Paris Wife over A Moveable Feast, but I realize that it’s not really fair to compare them side-by-side. Taken together though, they do give a unique view of Hemingway as he was making his way in the literary world.

• The Paris Wife: Three and a half stars
• A Moveable Feast: Two and a half stars

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Reliably Creepy

A Reliable Wife
By: Robert Goolrick

It just looks all sweet and innocent...

 I grabbed A Reliable Wife at a used book store because the premise seemed intriguing: a man places an ad for a “reliable wife” in a paper, a woman responds, but she’s anything but reliable. Turns out, he isn’t either. It sounded like it would be a good, buttoned-up, Victorian-type thriller. Well, the author not only nailed the Victorian part, but threw in a heavy dose of Greek tragedy with plenty of Gothic seasoning. See below for a more specific break-down:

• Victorian (50%): This book reminded me of The Scarlett Letter because of all the repressed sexual frustration and its accompanying guilt.
• Gothic (20%): This book was much darker and more graphic I expected. There is a lot of drinking, opium smoking, and whoring, as well as plenty of freak accidents and insanity.
• Greek Tragedy (30%): There are all kinds of layered familial hate in this book. The son hates the father, the father beats the son, the son desires both his new “mother” and his biological mother – there are zero healthy family relationships in this one. Eat your heart out, Oedipus.

This special blend of sex, guilt, awkward family ties, and deceit made for a pretty depressing book. A Reliable Wife wasn’t a bad book, but I wouldn’t necessarily recommend it because it wasn’t that enjoyable to read. I know not every book is easy or enjoyable to read, but I didn’t feel like I got anything out of this book’s heaviness. Plus, the mystery is given away about mid-way through the book and then things limp along after that waiting for a resolution. The resolution eventually comes, but it’s in line with the rest of the book’s dark twisted-ness and isn’t particularly satisfying.

In a nutshell: Way more intense than expected and not really that enjoyable. Two and a half stars.

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A Confederacy of Duh-unces

A Confederacy of Dunces
By: John Kennedy Toole

Ignatius J. Reilly, of course

A Confederacy of Dunces was a book club pick. We have been reading a lot of new, recently published books, so we decided to go with something that fell into the “classic” category. I’m not sure this one is truly a “classic” , but it’s been around for awhile and is definitely a book that certain people just absolutely love. I was not one of those people – at first.

I really struggled with this one at first. It’s not particularly dense, but I found the story kind of dull and a little pointless. In fact, about 200 pages in, I put it down and didn’t pick it up again for another two weeks (I used the excuse that I had a library book I needed to finish before the due date, despite the fact that this was a library book too. Self-serving logic? Yes, please.) However, with this month’s book club looming, I gave it another go and finished it with a few days to spare.

When it comes to books, I usually go with my first reaction. If I’m not hooked after 50-100 pages, I’m probably not going to come back with a favorable review, if I even finish it (I don’t force myself to finish books I’m not loving). A Confederacy of Dunces was different though. I wasn’t quickly hooked and I didn’t really like it that much after I had finished it. However, it turned out to be one of those books that I have a hard time leaving behind. I’ve been mulling the book over since I put it down (for the second and last time) and it’s actually grown on me. Turns out A Confederacy of Dunces is like cheese or wine – gets a little better with time.

My take on the author’s point: most people are pretty stupid and so wrapped up in their own pointless lives that they don’t realize how stupid they are. This is not exactly a comforting thought – it’s actually kind of harsh, even if it may not be far off the truth. However, instead of creating a depressing, sad book, Toole creates these peculiar characters and sets them down in these ridiculous scenes, but none of the characters realize how peculiar they are or how ridiculous their current situation is. And I came to realize that the aimlessness of the story I originally struggled with, underlined Toole’s point.

I actually think this book would make a good movie – there is a lot of situational humor that would translate well to a visual medium and the story would support a great ensemble cast. Jack Black or Zach Galifianakis could play Ignatius, the obese, over-educated, self-important mama’s boy. Myrna Minkoff, the sex-obsessed politico, could be played by Parker Posey. Ignatius’ tired, possibly alcoholic mother, Irene, could be played by Carol Burnett.

In a nutshell: Originally, I gave this one 2.5 stars, but after some thought, it grew on me and I have bumped my original rating up to a 3.5.

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Water for Elephants? More Like Meh for Elephants

Water for Elephants
By: Sara Gruen

A thirsty elephant

Oh, Water for Elephants… America loves you. America loves you so much that Hollywood is making a movie about you starring Reese and Rob (swoon!). So why can’t I love you too?

Probably because you had so much potential and didn’t live up to it. I will admit, my expectations were a little high, given how much hype has surrounded this book, but I guess it was foolish of me to assume that if a lot of people are loving a book then I would too. Overall, my reaction was just… meh.

I picked up Water for Elephants because:

1. Like I said, other people are really digging this book
2. I was in the mood for a really good love story
3. The setting – a traveling circus – is great

Water for Elephants only really lived up to number three. As I mentioned above, the book didn’t really live up to the hype for me. And the love story was just okay. It wasn’t particularly passionate or compelling – I would call it “love story lite”. I would actually describe the whole book as “lite”. It ended exactly how I expected to end. There were no twists, nothing unexpected, and it just didn’t have much depth. Which is really disappointing because the setting was great. A circus, traveling through the U.S. by train, during the Great Depression, with hundreds of employees and a whole menagerie of animals, including the titular elephant, provides so much potential for an interesting story. Unfortunately, the author didn’t put this great source material to the best use.

Don’t get me wrong – I finished the book and finished it pretty quickly. It was a fast read and there were some good characters, but I just wanted more. More detail, more passion, more depth. Water for Elephants just didn’t go far enough for me.

In a nutshell: Just okay. Water for Elephants would make a decent beach read, but it wasn’t as good as I wanted it to be. Two and a half stars.

And because I love to comment on the casting of movies I haven’t seen based on books I’ve already read – I ain’t buying Robert Pattinson as a red-headed Polska. Nice try studio execs.

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