The Thirteenth Tale

I'm currently sequestered upstairs, breathing in the clean fresh air that our top floor has to offer. Jeff is downstairs, painting an elaborate system of built-in drawers and bookcases in our living room, inhaling enough toxic fumes for the two (almost three) of us. We don' t have a tv upstairs and this whole sequestering thing has become a common affair lately while Jeff completes layer after layer of primer and cream paint. This means much book reading. My most recent conquest was The Thirteenth Tale and I loved it.

When I was at Half Price Books last week I almost walked right by the bargain table. The truth is - I judge the bargain table. Part of me assumes that any book that's selling for that cheap must be lame and I usually walk on by. But this time, a stack of The Thirteenth Tale books caught my eye and sparked a memory of reading a good review for this book somewhere - was it Mari's site? Anyways, it was only a dollar! This seemed like a low risk decision, so I bought it. And let's just say that I was pleased with my ROI. This book is creepy and addictive and I a little bit loved it.

The story is about Vida Winter, an aging but very famous fiction writer in England. She's notorious for the mystery that surrounds her personal life - no reporter has ever been able to get the truth out of her. She tells every interviewer a different story about her life, none are true. But now she's old and sick and for one reason or another has chosen Margaret Lea to tell her story to. Margaret is the lonely adult daughter of an antique book seller, an avid reader and author of a few informal biographies. And PS - she also has a bit of secret past herself. Anyways, Margaret goes to stay with the crusty author and Vida tells her real story. And her story is creeepy and mysterious (and there are twins!) and I couldn't put it down. It's not Tana-French-style-creepy-genius, and there was a second where I sniffed a bit of Phillipa-Gregory-style-incest, but it was short lived and the book is still worthy. If you've read and enjoyed Nicholas Christopher (A Trip To the Stars is still one of my favs), I'd say you'd probably appreciate this book as well. No romance (sigh) but give it a try.

In The Woods

I loved this book like I haven't loved a book in a long time. I stayed up way past my bedtime because I literally could not put it down. I finished it around 11:40 last night and was left satisfied, confused, a little creeped out, but mostly really impressed.

In The Woods was recommended to me first by a family friend, Cheryl in August. I promptly forgot about it until it was mentioned again by my friend Heidi a few weeks ago. Then last week, I was leaving my friend Jessie's house when she ran back inside to grab two loaner books for me (she is a human reading machine and always loans me winners) - one of these books was In The Woods by Tana French. I was dubious at first, having just finished a creepy book about a dead kid I wasn't sure that I needed to start another one right away. But I was sucked in by the book's description -

Three children leave their small Dublin neighborhood to play in the surrounding woods. Hours later, their mothers' calls go unanswered. When the police arrive, they find only one of the children, gripping a tree trunk in terror, wearing blood-filled sneakers, and unable to recall a single detail of the previous hours.

Twenty years later, Detective Rob Ryan - the found boy, who has kept his past a secret - and his partner Cassie Maddox investigate the murder of a twelve-year-old girl in the same woods. Now, with only snippets of long-buried memories to guide him, Ryan has the chance to uncover both the mystery of the case before him, and that of his own shadowy past.

Creepy, right? Except it's so much more than just creepy! It's smart, funny, and craftily written. Plus, it's almost Halloween and a murder mystery is the perfect read for this time of year. I don't want to give too much away because I really want you to go read this book and I don't want to spoil it for you. But I will tell you that the mystery is not one of those lame ones where you know what's going to happen all along, in fact even after I finished the book, there were things I was still dying to know. There are so many plot twists and red herrings, but also, there is character development. So often, thrillers and mysteries rely too heavily on plot and you never get to know anyone in the story, but this is not so in this book!

I guess Tana has a new book out (is it out yet?) called The Likeness and it also looks creepy and fantastic. I read the first few pages because they were printed in the back of In The Woods and from what I can gather, the new book is told by Cassie Maddox - Rob Ryan's partner from In The Woods, presumably about another case. Now, this may leave you wondering - Sell out? Series? But it leaves me wondering - do I know anyone who will loan me this book?

The Lovely Bones

I have passed this book up many times over the last 5 years or so. To be honest, one of the only reasons I read it this time around is because it was on The New Classics Challenge list. This is my third book read for the challenge. I never picked it up before because it sounded DEPRESSING.

14 year old Susie Salmon is brutally raped and murdered. She tells her story from heaven as she watches her family, friends and her killer on earth. Don't get me wrong, I can get down with a good cry, but this sounded a little too close to an all out sob fest.

I was right and wrong about this book. I loved it, but also a little bit hated it.

It felt almost entirely dependent on the concept (dead girl, narrating from heaven), and it didn't come off like the most skillfully crafted book. The writing seemed inconsistent for a 14 year old narrator, it started strong - very youthful but smart. But then there were times when it seemed like someone with much more experience, insight, and plain old vocabulary than a 14 year old girl was narrating the story. I suppose with death comes clarity and maturity, but it wasn't done consistently and for that, it bothered me.

I also didn't like heaven. It felt kind of half-assed to me. Supposedly, heaven is what you make of it - if you can envision something for yourself, it will appear. If I flash back to myself at 14, my heaven would have been pretty awesome. Instead, for Susie Salmon, heaven is high school, where she has a roommate who plays a saxophone/flute duet with their old lady neighbor while a bunch of dogs dance around? Ummm... what? If I'm honest, maybe part of the reason for my disappointment with heaven was that I badly wanted it to be awesome for Susie. I was so depressed and horrified when she told the story of her own murder that I needed to know her heaven was at least some sort of reward for her. Instead, her heaven bummed me out further.

Lastly, and I know I'm kind of ragging on Alice Sebold here, but this book gave me nightmares! For reals. For you to understand why my nightmare was Alice's fault, I must first give you a small spoiler - Susie Salmon's murderer is a serial killer that lives just down the street from her family and goes unsuspected for an entire year after the murder. He is also officially the creepiest character I've ever read about in a book (even more than Cathy in East of Eden) - end spoiler. So a few nights ago, I had the scariest dream ever that there was a killer lurking in my neighborhood and that when he came for me I couldn't yell for help and ran like I was running through a big pile of molasses. After that, I stopped reading this book before bed.

Okay, end of rag session. Complaints aside, I really did fall in love with the Salmon family. I really felt for every one of the characters, particularly her father who was my favorite but made me cry almost constantly. I was always dying to know what was happening with Ruth and Ray. I appreciated that finally, towards the end of the book, some justice was dealt and that some semblance of healing and peace came to the characters left on earth. Like it or not, the book definitely left me with some clear imagery that will not fade quickly.

Breaking Dawn

Shame washes over me as I type this. Why after I totally hated Eclipse did I still borrow Breaking Dawn from my coworker? And why did I read this mammoth book in less than 48 hours? What is wrong with me?! Stephanie Meyer is sprinkling crack on her books. That's the only explanation.

Lindsey asked me in the comments of my Eclipse review last week if I was going to read the last book in the series and I have to say that I agree with her comments. Even though I was totally over Edward and Bella and all the spirit stories, I just felt that I needed to know how it was all going to wrap up. Was she ever going to just become a vampire? Would they really get married? Would Jacob ever just give up? And most importantly, were Edward and Bella ever going to stop teasing me with tame make out sessions and just DO IT already? And by "it" I totally mean the same thing I meant in the 3rd grade when I used the phrase. Without spoiling too much, let me just tell you that all of these questions are FINALLY answered in Breaking Dawn. And thank God, because I was getting crank-ee.

I will admit (as long as I'm in full confessional mode) that I found many of the answers to my questions above answered in a very satisfying manner. This book brought me much more satisfaction than I expected. But now I am going to spoil something (SPOILER ALERT) because I can't not do it. I just have one word to say, or rather, ask. Renesmee? RENESMEE??!! I have never in my life heard a more horrible name and this whole plot line, while completely addictive, was kind of weird and gross and instead of feeling all entranced by Renesmee, I felt totally creeped out by her. But maybe I felt kind of weird and grossed out in a Flowers in the Attic sort of way? Or like Flowers in the Attic meets Rosemary's Baby. And by this I mean that I couldn't tear my eyes away. (END OF SPOILER)

One last complaint and then I'll stop pretending that this is a legit book and that it deserves an actual critique. This book was filled with so many typos that I honestly started to wonder if they employed an editor at all before they just sent it along to the press.

Finally, I would just like to say to anyone in the Pacific Northwest that they are all officially invited to join me on November 21st to see the premier of what will simultaneously be the best and worst movie ever - Twilight. Call me.