Happy Hispanic Heritage Month! While you should ideally read diversely year-round, I'm trying to supporting Hispanic/Latinx authors by reading all of the Hispanic/Latinx-authored books on my Kindle that I couldn't get to throughout the rest of the year.
A TASTE OF SAGE was an impulse buy for me (aren't they always?). I'm a sucker for food-themed books, and the idea of an enemies-to-lovers romance between two rival chefs who both favor the cuisines of their childhood really spoke to me. Also, it's a bit of a workplace romance, too, because when Lumi's business goes under forcing her to job hunt, she ends up being forced to work for Julien.
I was shocked at how low the ratings were for this book... until I got to the halfway mark. You see, throughout this book, recipes are interspersed at key points so you can make the food the characters are talking about-- which is a great touch. Or it was, until one of the characters gets grievously injured in a kitchen and this horrendous accident is followed by... you guessed it. Another recipe.
Talk about tonal whiplash.
I think books like these are actually the perfect examples of situations where illustrated covers don't work. I saw a TikTok (I believe it was by chels_ebooks) that talked about how old skool romance covers were usually a pretty good indicator of the spice level (although not always). If the lady looked prim and dainty on the cover, it was a likely bet that it was going to be a "clean" regency romance. And if the lady was bursting out of her top in the aggressive embrace of the hero, the likelihood of spice (and probably dub-con) goes up in the mind of the person looking at the cover, and they can make their purchase accordingly.
When people look at illustrated covers, they picture light and sweet, so when a book has a cutesy cover but actually has really dark and depressing moments, readers can feel consciously or subconsciously cheated. I feel like a better cover for this book would have been a wooden table with photographs of food, and the table could be covered with chopped herbs. Maybe a picture of a knife in the foreground. I think that would have hinted at the food, the magic-realism, the homeyness, and also a little hint of menace (subconsciously) because of the knife. The illustrated cover here really does not work.
I actually really liked both characters and loved the recipes. I don't think this book is as bad as everyone says it is, but the tonal shift was definitely a game-changer that impacted my overall enjoyment of the book as a whole. But ultimately, the magic-realism, the ode to Dominican fusion, and the premise of two flawed and headstrong characters falling in love ended up saving the book for me. Just go into this book knowing that it gets a little miserable for a while halfway through, and if you or someone you know recently suffered from a bad burn, this could potentially be triggering.
I was so excited to buddy-read this book with s.penkevich. I've admired their literary-fiction reviews for a while and thought the idea of checking out this surreal work of Japanese literature with such a book friend was really fun. Especially since the listlessness and ennui of the heroine can be overwhelming at times.
Our heroine is a thirty-six-year-old woman with burnout who repeatedly goes to the same employment agency over the course of the novel to request more jobs. She wants something close to home with no reading or writing involved and, ideally, very little thinking.
Her jobs get progressively weirder and weirder. Her first job is in video surveillance, watching a man who may be in unknowing league with a contrabander. Her second job is working for an advertising agency for a bus company. Her third job is writing trivia that go on the packets of fried rice snacks. Her fourth job is putting up environmental awareness posters in a small community. And her fifth job is manning the cabin in the middle of a man-made park filled with fruit trees.
THERE'S NO SUCH THING AS AN EASY JOB is such a strange book. It's so strange that several times, I would set the book down and think, "Do I really like this book?" I considered DNF-ing even, but was unable to stop reading. There's an almost supernatural bent to some of her jobs, which can sometimes make them feel creepy (especially in the case of the bus advertisements and poster jobs), but it's never outright scary or anything, just in a way that makes the reader feel uneasy.
For once, I think the comparisons in the blurb of this book are on the mark. This really is like a cross between MY YEAR OF REST AND RELAXATION and CONVENIENCE STORE WOMAN. The comparisons are rarely that apt, so I'm actually impressed, because that's how I probably would have described this book, too. It's a book about how our jobs shape us and vice-versa, a criticism (I think?) about hustle/gig culture, and just a really interesting story about a disaffected woman trying to live her life as best she can. For people who enjoy character-driven stories, this will be quite the treat.
THE CRANE HUSBAND is such a bizarre book. When I was young, I had a book of fairytales from all over the world and this story could have been ripped from its pages. Even though it's set in contemporary times, there's something chillingly timeless and old-fashioned about it, outside of those modern references. It seems to float in its own bubble.
The story is about a small family: a teenage girl and her younger brother, who both live with their self-absorbed artist mother on a farm. Their dad is dead and their bohemian mother has entertained affairs with people of all genders, but one day, she brings home a crane. And the crane is kind of a huge douchebag. All of the farm animals are afraid of him, and when he and the mom spend the night together, she comes down the stairs covered in blood. Obviously, the crane has to go.
But the mother insists she loves him.
I feel like this is an allegory for how abuse transforms people, and how people who commit violence against others are like animals. I have read other stories that turn abuse into metaphor, which simultaneously makes it more chilling and more palatable. Fantasy can be a vehicle to explore trauma with a remove that makes it feel safer, psychologically. I feel like THE CRANE HUSBAND does this.
The story was a little too weird and disjointed for me to fully love it, and the anachronism was tonally jarring, but I thought the writing was gorgeous and I really appreciated what the author was trying to do. At times, it almost gave me a Boy and the Heron vibe. If you like Angela Carter, you'll probably enjoy this. I'll definitely be checking out more of her work.
This is a pretty solid Southern Gothic. There's elements of Practical Magic and dabs and dashes of Roanoke Girls, but it's got too much Sarah Addison Allen in it to be truly creepy. What it ends up being is a pretty teen-friendly novel about first love and quiet scares that verges on but doesn't quite succeed at being horrifying.
Thanks to the publisher for sending me a copy in exchange for an honest review!
THE SHADOW SISTER is one of those "trust the process" books because it takes a while to get going, and until about 10% from the end, I had no idea how it was going to end. If you're a fan of YA folk horror, and books like LOVELY BONES and HOUSE OF HOLLOW, you're going to love SHADOW SISTER, plain and simple.
This story is about two sisters, Sutton and Casey. Sutton is the pretty, popular sister. Casey is the weird, introverted, prickly sister. One day, Sutton goes missing and it basically tears their little family apart, especially since Sutton was her mother's not-so-secret favorite. Casey feels torn about her sister's disappearance because their relationship was so fraught-- Sutton terrorized her and basically treated her like shit, in the way that sisters sometimes do, so she's not exactly sorry that she's gone, even though she still loves her at some level.
It's a shock to everyone when Sutton comes back, but when she does, she's not exactly the same. She's lost all her memories, the family dog is suspicious of her, and she is fucking obsessed with Casey in a way that she never was before, to the extent that she wants to be around her all the time. Casey is suspicious that it's all just a clever ruse. But it might actually be worse.
This is a great book. It rocks at being a thriller, horror, and magical-realism, but it also offers great commentary on slavery, biraciality, family favoritism, colorism, religious abuse, and the bias in the way that police investigate the disappearances of white girls versus black girls. Despite all these pretty heavy topics, it doesn't feel oppressive, and I thought the author did a fantastic job writing about such dark content so delicately. Also, we stan morally grey characters who get a redemption arc. I even teared up a little at the end (although if you pressed me on it, I'd never admit it).
I seem to be in my YA folk horror era and I don't think I want to leave anytime soon.
When I saw that HURRICANE CHILD was on sale for an incredibly affordable seventy-five cents in the Kindle store, I was all over that like white on rice. Especially since it's written by Kacen Callender, one of my favorite YA authors. They always write about dark and serious issues, but they do it with heart and nuance, so I never feel like I'm being lectured at or pandered to: they allow the characters to tell their own stories simply by dint of being themselves.
HURRICANE CHILD is the story of a young girl named Caroline, who lives on Water Island, one of the Virgin Islands, a mere boat away from Saint Thomas (which I believe is where the author comes from). She was born during a hurricane, which according to island superstition means a lifetime of bad luck and no happiness. Right now, for her, it feels like it's true. Her mother disappeared when she was young, she's bullied at school for being willful and having dark skin by students and faculty alike, and she's filled with an anger that seems to come from feeling very, very depressed.
That changes when they get a new girl on the island from Barbados. Like Caroline, she has dark skin and natural hair, but Kalinda also has a confidence and a charisma that Caroline does not, and when she shuts down a first attempt to bully her by the Queen Bee herself, she ends up skyrocketing in popularity. Caroline is fascinated by Kalinda and wants to be her friend, but she also feels more than that, too. It's a sort of fascination that moves beyond jealousy or obsession, into the sort of desires that can make you want someone to be a part of your life forever. The bond between the two girls shifts and changes as they take each other into their confidence and Kalinda becomes involved in the mystery of Caroline's disappearance, but honesty, like mystery, can sometimes open doors through which there is no turning back, no matter how much you regret what you find on the other side.
So I loved this book. The magic realism element is way more underplayed than I was expecting but I think it worked for the story. It actually makes me sad how many people were criticizing the heroine for being selfish and unlikable. Caroline actually reminded me a lot of the heroine in I AM NOT YOUR PERFECT MEXICAN DAUGHTER, which shows how depression can manifest itself differently in different cultures, often taking the form of anger in places where it might not be acceptable to publicly show weakness or emotion. I felt like that was the case here. Caroline had a lot of emotional trauma and seemed to be sublimating it into anger, since that was a more acceptable and comfortable emotion for her to feel. I know some readers through this was too dark for MG but I honestly don't think it is, for the right readers. It captures the pure and innocent first crush from a LGBT+ perspective, just like how ANNIE ON MY MIND did, and it's not explicit. It's just sweet and bittersweet and kind of sad.
I also think that, like HOUSE ON MANGO STREET, the magical realism and fairytale like elements of the story allow the author to be vague about the darker subject matter. They do a really good job leaning back at the right times, and only giving enough information for what the story requires. I think HURRICANE CHILD was Kacen Callender's debut novel but it's just as good as their later works.
P.S. Since this was a debut, some copies have the author's dead name on the cover. Make sure you don't use it when talking about the work. The author goes by Kacen now and uses they/them pronouns.
If you take one thing away from THE ICE QUEEN, I really want it to be that the heroine and one of her love interests have both been struck by lighting, and one of them has turned cold inside, and the other is hot (so hot his touch literally burns), and when they have sex, they have to do it in a cold bath tub. And EVEN THEN, his dick is so hot that the first time, she goes to his freezer and sticks ice UP THERE. For relief. Honestly, at least 50% of the entertainment value of this book (at least for me) was trying to figure out the rules of this weird, freaky-deaky magic-realism sex the author thought up.
Apart from that, this is a strange, surreal story that kind of reads like an adult fairytale. The heroine (who I don't think has a name) believes she has the ability to speak wishes and make them truths because when she told her mother she didn't want her to come back, her mother died. And when she said she wanted to be struck by lightning, she got struck by lightening. After those two very traumatic events, she mostly stopped talking much, but the effects of the lightening live on her blood, turning her cold, taking away her ability to see red, and leaving her with strange sensations in her head and heart.
When she ends up in a lightening strike victim study, she hears about this dude who became a total hermit after the lightning strike. This is Mr. Fire Cock, as I like to call him. He and the heroine have instant lust, although because this is ~literary fiction~ and not romance, they wait until the second meeting before having wild and screwy elemental sex, the likes of which causes water in the bathtub to literally boil and requires sticking your hands in the freezer before foreplay. Honestly, if the book was mostly about this, I would have enjoyed it SO much more. But there's a reason that this is a love story and a romance, although when people say it's unhappy, it's probably not for the reasons you think.
The last act kind of goes off the rails. This went from being a poignant, morbidly dreamy book to a depressing mess. Someone (not the love interest) dies. We learn about someone's incredibly traumatic (physical trauma from an accident, not abusive) backstory. and someone chops off their hands with a hatchet(!!!!!). Also, there's several animal deaths, small animals killed by a cat (although one of them could have been saved but the heroine didn't know that and also DO WE REALLY NEED so many gratuitous descriptions of withered animal corpses, she asked). I think I would have liked this more as a teenager when I was all about that edgy depressed emo kid life. In fact, this even came out when that subculture was nearing its peak in 2005, so maybe the author was living her edgy, depressed emo kid life, too. That said, I still actually enjoyed this book more than I did PRACTICAL MAGIC.
THE LAST TALE OF THE FLOWER BRIDE is such a bizarre and surreal story, like an Angela Carter tale: the beauty of the prose masks darkness and biting social commentary that gnaws at the reader like the gouge of teeth on bone. I actually didn't care for the last book I read by this author, but this gender-reverse fairytale is marvelous and the things that it did well, it did phenomenally well.
Basically, a man meets a woman named Indigo while on vacation and ends up falling in love with her. They get married, but in return, he must never ask about her secrets. In this other narrative thread, we meet Azure, Indigo's childhood friend, who falls under the same seductive spell that our narrative bridegroom has. We are unsure if either of them escaped the spider-like snare of their shared seductress, however, although the numerous analogies to Bluebeard, The Robber Bridegroom, and Melusine hint at tragedy, despair, and doom.
For the first half of this book, I was really into it. I thought the weaving of the fairytale mythos into the magic-realism elements was great, I loved the diverse characters, and I'm also a huge fan of a good female villain. I do feel like the second half was a little confusing, and not necessarily in a good way. However, I was still invested enough in the writing and the story that I didn't care too much.
Despite the three-star rating, I highly recommend this to anyone who loves gothic horror, magic-realism, and fairytales. I'll definitely have to check out more of Chokshi's work. This book is hard proof that even if you really didn't like a book by an author, sometimes, they totally deserve that second chance.
The way this jumped my to-read list because of lila's review. (Seriously, if you're torn on whether or not to buy this book still, read hers for comparison; she outlines all the reasons why this book is good.)
I was really excited to read IF YOU COULD SEE THE SUN. I love me some magical realism and it's always awesome to see YA that isn't set in the United States. This book is set in a very exclusive school in Beijing, and Alice, the heroine, isn't going to be able to attend much longer even with her scholarship due to her family's dwindling funds.
There is a lot about this book that is pretty cool. I liked the setting, the morally grey heroine (blackmailing your fellow students for fun and profit?), the academic enemies-to-rivals, the FOOD PORN. But I didn't really like the execution and I felt like the characterization and story-telling felt a little... lackluster. Especially with the romance. I really didn't feel a connection b/w Alice and Henry. Maybe this is a me thing-- it's probably a me thing-- but this book didn't click for me.
Most of my friends really liked this book, and I think whether you will too will depend largely on (1) how you feel about books written in verse and (2) how you feel about really experimental books that sometimes don't make sense. I can go either way when it comes to (1) but (2) is where this book kind of lost me. The magic-realism element is really quite strange. I loved the parts about Nima and her family, and I felt like Elihillo managed to capture the ache that comes from being both too much and not enough when it comes to how people of color are "othered," but the whole bit with Yasmeen, her alter ego, was a bit too strange and sometimes the narrative felt incredibly dissociative as a result.
This is a stylistic thing for me, so you might very well enjoy this book.
I don't read a ton of literature now because I read a lot of the ones most worth reading when I was younger (at least, the ones I thought worth reading), but one of my recent projects is revisiting some of the books I read as a teen and seeing if I liked them just as much upon taking a second look. I read LIKE WATER FOR CHOCOLATE when I was in high school and I remember being totally shocked at all the scandalous sex scenes and family drama. In many ways, this is kind of like a magic-realism take on the V.C. Andrews fucked-up family Gothic, with all of its secret lusts, hidden violence, and tempestuous relationships, all lorded over by an evil matriarch who has it in for the heroine and wants to make her miserable.
Narrated by the grand-niece of the heroine, this is a story about a star-crossed romance. Tita, the heroine, is the youngest daughter of Mama Elena, which means that she must take care of her mother until she dies. When Tita falls passionately in love with another man, Pedro, her mother rebuffs his offer and hitches him to her other daughter instead, Rosaura. Pedro agrees only because marrying Rosaura means being close to Tita and he hopes to have an affair with her.
Lots of other things happen too, and some of them are totally crazy. Like, imagine causing fireworks displays and visions of the Northern lights every time you bang (you might be in a Sarah J. Maas novel!) Feelings also get transmitted to food, so depending on the mood of the chef that day, you might find yourself moved to bitter tears (to the point of death) or so desperately horny that you set your bath on fire. This fantastical element keeps the story moving and gives it an interesting, fairytale-like quality that I found fascinating, even though some of the characters made me want to knock their heads together.
If you're new to the magic-realism genre, this is a fun book to start out with. It's short, which makes it easy to read, and has all these fabulous descriptions of rustic Mexican cuisine. The romance is also fun, even if it doesn't really have the sort of HEA romance readers might expect, and has an over-the-top bodice-ripper vibe that I think I appreciate more now as an adult who reads bodice-rippers. Some people might say it's too racy for teens but I disagree-- for some teen girls, this will probably be the hook that gets them into classic literature and shows them that it's not all stuffed shirts and dusty parlors.
THE MIRROR SEASON was one of my Pride Month picks (the heroine is pansexual), but I didn't know much about it except that it was a loose retelling of The Snow Queen, which is one of my favorite faerie tales of all time. It is that, but it is also so much more. The premise revolves around the heroine, Ciela, realizing that she and the new boy, Lock, were both sexually assaulted at the same party. The culprits are some of the most powerful kids in their private school, whereas she and Lock are incredibly low on the tier. The assault leaves its mark on them, inside and out. Ciela finds that she has lost her gift to predict the pastries people want at her family's pasteleria, and Lock has lost his quiet gentleness, and has instead become a fount of anger.
I don't want to say too much about this book because ~spoilers~, but I basically devoured it in a sitting. Some of this author's other works were too fluffy/light for me to pick up, but this is the best kind of hurt/comfort romance that has two people taking solace in one another while trying to move on from past trauma. The relationship between Ciela and Lock had so much depth, and even though third-act breakups usually make me roll my eyes, this one actually made sense.
I could go on and on about the visuals-- the way faerie tales are used as a motif to express danger and trauma in safe, childlike mode expression; the birds that symbolize happiness and freedom; the use of ice and glass to represent freezing over trauma and shutting down emotionally. I loved the focus on food as a point of comfort, and the love that Ciela and Lock both had with their families. I also liked that healing was a central part of this book's storyline, and how the author represented healing not as a linear path but one that moves you forward and backward, sometimes not equally.
I don't normally read the author's notes at the end, but I recommend reading this one. They wrote this story from their own experience as a survivor, including an incident that mirrors that of the characters in this book. It's a beautiful, heartbreaking story with a happy, hopeful ending. Picture SPEAK or I AM NOT YOUR PERFECT MEXICAN DAUGHTER, but way more lyrical and intense.
Wild and beautiful, the Torres girls catch a lot of attention in their community because of their tragic homelife and unpredictable ways. The boys across the street watch them constantly and decide to follow when the four girls run away. This results in the girls being immediately found and brought back, which has the indirect consequence of causing the eldest, Ana, to die.
There are three sisters remaining. Jessica, the next-oldest, now assumes responsibility as the primary breadwinner while navigating an emotionally abusive relationship. Iridian, the middle daughter, suffers under the yoke of her guilt and unresolved conflicts with Ana, and retreats first into fiction and then into writing, where she explores the passions she doesn't feel confident or safe enough to pursue. And Rosa, the youngest and kindest, is haunted by visions of a hyena.
TIGERS, NOT DAUGHTERS reminded me a lot of I AM NOT YOUR PERFECT MEXICAN DAUGHTER, especially with how grief is experienced (or repressed) in the Latinx community. This was especially noticeable with poor Jessica, who turned to anger as a defense mechanism. The magic realism elements were really well done and added an almost Gothic element to the story, what with all the animal sightings and ghosts.
This is such an unusual book that it's really hard to compare it to anything else. The characters stand on their own and the ending is bittersweet. If you like stories about difficult girls navigating through adolescence and learning important life lessons while still being permitted to deviate from the path, I think you'll really enjoy this book. It's a short quick read but it's the kind of story that lingers.
I remember when this first came out, my friend Heather got an ARC and she was telling me about how creepy this was, and how it was like a thriller but also a fantasy-- maybe. Maybe? MAYBE? I had to check it out. And now that I've read it, I can definitely see the "maybe" element to the fantasy. This kind of reads like an R-rated version of John Connolly's THE BOOK OF LOST THINGS, where it's a mystery wrapped in alternating layers of fantasy and reality, to the point where you're no longer sure what is real and what isn't.
Cassandra Tipp was a famous romance novelist who made tons of money off her Harlequin-esque publications. But before that, she was a girl in a house, with two siblings, and two parents... and a faerie friend named the Pepper-Man. As Cassandra grows older, Pepper-Man and the surrounding faeries insert themselves into her life, in unpleasant and increasingly disturbing ways. ACOTAR, this is not. These are the faeries of ancient myth: the ones who will steal your soul and eat your heart, and grant you a wish that feels more like a curse.
The story is narrated in second person, by Cassandra, to her two heirs: her niece and nephew, Penelope and Janus. In order to inherit, they have to read her story and find the secret code that she's buried in the pages. Then and only then can they claim the money. But Cassandra's story is horrific, and the only thing scarier than faeries is the idea that maybe they don't exist at all. I haven't read many stories in the second person-- just Caroline Kepnes's YOU and Laura Fraser's ITALIAN AFFAIR. It's a narrative style that can come off as twee, but I actually really liked it here. I also liked the unreliable narrator: another device that can be twee in the wrong hands, but was done masterfully here.
I'm not really sure how to rate this. It wasn't quite as disturbing as I'd braced myself for it to be and much of the violence is couched in ornate fairytale style language that mitigates the overall effect. I'm not usually a fan of stories that are open-ended but I think it kind of works here, even if it did leave me thinking, UM, ANSWERS, PLEASE. But as frustrating as it could be at times, I found myself morbidly fascinated by this story and reading between the lines, looking for answers, just like Janus and Penelope. I read it in just a few hours and couldn't stop thinking about it until I'd finished, so I feel like if a story grips you like that and holds you in its thrall, then it kind of just HAS to be a five.
THE NIGHT TIGER was an OK read. There were some things about this book that I really enjoyed, and other things I didn't. The book is set in 1930s Malaya (Malaysia), when it was still under British rule. There are two main characters: Ren, an 11-year-old houseboy to British doctor William Acton, and Ji Lin, a dressmaker moonlighting as a dance hall girl. Their stories end up interconnecting due to a severed finger in a vial that Ji Lin obtains from one of her clients. The finger belongs to Ren's old master, and he has only 49 days to get the finger back to his master's grave before his soul is lost forever. At the same time, the women that William Acton fraternizes with keep turning up missing, dead, or both, often looking as though they were mauled by a tiger, and Ji Lin keeps having strange dreams about a river and a train, with a boy who tells her about five people whose names resemble the five Confucian values, and a terrible curse...
So what did I like about this book? It has the creepy, murder plot of a BBC murder mystery. I like how the murders were steeped in Chinese mythology and magic realism, and the looming specters of the weretiger, as well as the finger in the vial, were both suitably creepy. I didn't guess who (or what) was responsible until the very end, so there was a very nice series of reveals to make me feel as if the journey had been worth it. That's important in a murder mystery novel, I think you'll agree. Ji Lin was a great character and I liked that she had a job that was looked down on as being morally loose, and that she didn't tolerate any shit-talking from people about her career. Ren took longer for me to like, and I'm not sure I bought his "cat whiskers" premonitions. That was really strange.
So what didn't I like about this book? Good Lord, it was long, and took forever to get to the damn point. The first 100 pages or so were a breeze, and I thought I wouldn't be able to put the book down. Then the book started to drag a lot without revealing a whole lot of new information. While I did like Ji Lin's eventual love interest, that whole subplot was also dragged out for what seemed like emotional tension, and kind of felt like another excuse to pad the already bloated plot. I also felt like the ending was simultaneously too neat while failing to wrap up a few loose ends. I know on the surface that sounds like it doesn't make sense, but THE NIGHT TIGER focuses more on the kismet between the main characters, and yet ignores the rather glaring problem of the other severed fingers in the hospital, as Chelsea pointed out in her review. Do those souls just never get saved? Lame.
THE NIGHT TIGER is an interesting book, and I like the author's style of writing. I bought her other book, THE GHOST BRIDE, relatively recently and I'm hoping it'll be better than this one. I didn't hate THE NIGHT TIGER, but it has all the good ideas/less than optimal execution dichotomies and pacing issues of a debut novel, and since this isn't a debut novel, that isn't good. Still, it's great to see #OwnVoices historical fiction that explores time periods and situations that aren't getting as much representation as, say, Tudor England or British/American-fought WWII, so kudos for that.
Thanks to Netgalley/the publisher for the review copy!
I received an ARC of this a while ago but never got around to reading it because the reviews of my friends who had read it were overwhelmingly negative (and many others seem to feel the same, with an average rating of 3.07 at the time that I posted this review). Eventually, curiosity got the better of me. I read the ARC.
THE REGULARS is an odd duck. It's about three 'friends' named Krista, Evie, and Willow, who all hate the way they look and seem to feel that if only they could be as beautiful as the gorgeous New York elite, their lives would be so much better and all their problems would be fixed. Then one day, Krista meets an old friend from one of her improv classes who gives her a tincture that she claims changed her life. It's a lilac-colored serum called "Pretty" that... well, makes people pretty. One drop, one week.
Although skeptical, one after another, they try Pretty. After an explosive intestinal reaction (ugh), it works, and they find themselves all looking like supermodels. Krista, a struggling actress, is immediately presented with a major movie deal. Evie, a copy-editor for a magazine, ends up becoming a features host. And Willow, the socialite who dabbles in art (and incidentally, the prettiest of their group, pre-Pretty) is... pretty.Their looks open doors that were previously closed and people who wouldn't give them the time of day before are suddenly lapping up their attention. But of course, as with all things, there's a cost.
I can definitely see why people didn't like this book. Beauty standards are a thorny issue, involving things like feminism, colorism, and racism, which a lot of people either aren't comfortable talking about or aren't equipped to talk about, and when handled badly the result can be downright offensive even if the intentions were good. Georgia Clark is clearly trying to show that beauty is not a "quick-fix" to one's problems, and that if you're screwed up on the inside your problems will only persist even if you manage to completely change the outside. However, I didn't feel like she went about this in the best way, and some of the messages this book sends are mixed. The biggest problem is how this book handles race: Pretty makes Krista, who is Indian, whiter and shrinks the size of her nose. She also changes the name of her Pretty alter ego to "Lenka Penka," which kind of felt like naming someone who is Asian "Ching Chong." Like something an insensitive 90s movie that didn't know any better might do for cheap laughs. I side-eyed the hell out of that.
Krista/Lenka, Evie/Chloe, and Willow/Caroline are all horribly selfish and incredibly unlikable people. Krista is a flake and a user, and her money problems and superficiality were never resolved to my satisfaction. What she did to Tristan was also pretty awful, and I felt bad that we didn't get much closer about him (and was also kind of shocked that he seemed so quick to forgive her - men are exempt from many of the beauty standards women are held to, except when it comes to weight and the size of their junk, and as a 'heartthrob', what happened to him would seriously affect his career). Evie is also a liar, and the ending of the story annoyed me, because it felt much too neat. What is the moral here? That you need to be lied to in order to understand how much lying hurts? Willow's self-destructive arc was the worst - and I couldn't help but wonder if she fared the worst because she had nothing solid to hold onto, and the author was saying that if you only define yourself by your looks, you'll wind up in an existential crisis that turns into self-harm? Her photo gallery at the end was super creepy and weird, and I found myself disturbed by many of the things she said and did. All of the women in this book have serious self-esteem issues, but Willow's seemed to border on body dysmorphia, and the way she led her boyfriend, Mark, on by honey-trapping him into sleeping with her alter ego and then getting upset at him when he did was just weird. She needed help and didn't get any. None of the women did. It felt like this whole journey with Pretty was some over-blown lesson to teach them to be satisfied with their lot, like some sort of heavy-handed Medieval Morality Play.
I guess the question to ask yourself when looking at a book like this and wondering if you'll enjoy it or hate it is 1) did you enjoy books like SOCIAL CREATURE and SOCIABLE, where the humor wallows in its own sense of misanthropic humor based in the belief that people are fundamentally garbage? and 2) do you not mind reading about books where all of the characters are, in fact, fundamentally garbage, and you will spend most of the book feeling less worried and protective in these characters, and more like you're listening in to someone in a public space having a very loud and self-destructive phone call with a relative while everyone tries to pretend not to listen? If you answered 'yes' to both questions, you will enjoy this book. If you answered 'no,' stay away...
Thanks to Netgalley/the publisher for the review copy!
When I looked at my friends' reviews for THE PARTICULAR SADNESS OF LEMON CAKE, I noticed that almost all of my friends who read it gave it negative reviews. After reading this book for myself, all I have to say is that this book proved to me that you can't always trust your friends. (Sorry, friends!) Reading is such a highly subjective experience, and what works for you doesn't always work for someone else (and vice-versa).
After reading the summary, I will admit to rolling my eyes a little. "Oh goody," I thought, "an all-white retelling of LIKE WATER FOR CHOCOLATE." Of course, my skepticism didn't stop me from wanting to read it anyway. Like LIKE WATER FOR CHOCOLATE, TPSOLC is about emotions and food, and how they influence the characters around them. Unlike LIKE WATER FOR CHOCOLATE, the main character, Rose, is a passive individual in the experience. She doesn't cook the food and transfer her emotions to others; she receives those feelings. There also isn't much in the way of romance, so it lakes the passion of LIKE WATER FOR CHOCOLATE.
But did I think it was a bad book? No. Absolutely not.
When Rose eats a piece of food, she can immediately tell how the person was feeling when they cooked or prepared it; where the food was from; and whether it was organic or processed. Can you imagine how bad your coffee would taste if the barista who prepared it was in a bad mood and you tasted her frustration and annoyance? As you can imagine, this often results in highly unpleasant experiences and she avoids eating her own family's cooking after she tastes her mother's unhappiness in a piece of lemon cake and, later, the guilt she's feeling about an extramarital affair in a piece of roasted meat from dinner. The only safe food is processed food, because that's food that's made by cold, unfeeling machines, and therefore doesn't result in any unwanted feelings.
Rose also has a brother named Joseph who appears to be on the Autism spectrum, and a good part of the book is about her tempestuous relationship with him. He's her mother's favorite - a fact that she doesn't even try to hide- and that gets to Rose, especially since Joseph appears largely indifferent to his mother's affection. He also is largely indifferent to Rose, ignoring her, shunning her, or sometimes even being outright mean to her. It isn't until later that Rose finds out that he has a special ability of his own, which he has been using to withdraw further and further from the world.
I really enjoyed TPSOLC. I think one of the biggest issues that people had with it is that it's largely character driven and not a lot of stuff happens. Luckily for me, I enjoy character-driven novels (assuming I like the characters) and am fascinated by people living out their daily lives (I'm really nosy). The family dynamic was incredibly well done and I really liked how Rose's ability was blended in. It was similar enough to LIKE WATER FOR CHOCOLATE that I kind of felt nostalgic for LIKE WATER FOR CHOCOLATE and wanted to read it again, but it wasn't similar enough that I felt like I was reading an outright copy, either. TPSOLC really provides an interesting perspective on where food is coming from and how it's prepared and distributed. Also, the sensory descriptions are amazing. There's a scene close to the end that's probably my favorite part in the story, where Rose does a "food tasting" of a quiche, and man, I have never wanted a quiche as bad as I did then.
If you enjoy stories of magic-realism and character driven stories that make you work for it a little, I think you'll like THE PARTICULAR SADNESS OF LEMON CAKE. It was weird, but charmingly so, and a very gentle, pleasant story that was surprisingly deep and moving. I really liked it!
This week I'm doing a project called Hype Week, where I read the really popular books I've been putting off reading for years. Since graphic novels are pretty niche, this one might be cheating, but it was a nominee for the Goodreads Choice Awards in 2014, which I'd say at least nudges it at least partially into the mainstream.
SECONDS is a really good book and it wasn't what I was expecting at all. It's also totally different from the Scott Pilgrim series, which doesn't really age all that well. This standalone is about a woman named Katie, who's twenty-nine, and is a chef at a pretty successful restaurant and is now on the verge of opening her own. One day, one of her staff suffers a horrible accident in the kitchen, and she sees a mysterious girl in her room perching on an old dresser. Inside one of the drawers is a notepad for writing down mistakes, a list of instructions, and some mushrooms. When Katie eats the mushroom, the server is no longer burned. Everything is completely different.
...or is it?
This is like a cross between Groundhog's Day, Mirrormask, and Coraline, and I really, really enjoyed it. Katie is a perfect flawed heroine and even though she behaved selfishly, you could see how she was really trying to get her life to be the way she wanted it and how her perfectionism and impulsivity were constantly at war with each other, and how quickly that mix turned self-destructive. There's also a fairytale bent to this story that starts to turn really creepy towards the end. There were a couple parts that gave me actual chills. Less is definitely more going into this book, but I loved how strange it was, and I could totally see this being a movie, especially a creepy stop-motion one.
Nenia ✨ I yeet my books back and forth ✨
>
Books:
magic-realism
(19)
Loading...
