The Bookish Life of Nina Hill by Abbi Waxman
Publisher: Berkley
Release Date: July 9, 2019
My rating: 4 of 5 stars
Publisher’s Description:
The only child of a single mother, Nina has her life just as she wants it: a job in a bookstore, a kick-butt trivia team, a world-class planner and a cat named Phil. If she sometimes suspects there might be more to life than reading, she just shrugs and picks up a new book.
When the father Nina never knew existed suddenly dies, leaving behind innumerable sisters, brothers, nieces, and nephews, Nina is horrified. They all live close by! They’re all—or mostly all—excited to meet her! She’ll have to Speak. To. Strangers. It’s a disaster! And as if that wasn’t enough, Tom, her trivia nemesis, has turned out to be cute, funny, and deeply interested in getting to know her. Doesn’t he realize what a terrible idea that is?
Nina considers her options.
1. Completely change her name and appearance. (Too drastic, plus she likes her hair.)
2. Flee to a deserted island. (Hard pass, see: coffee).
3. Hide in a corner of her apartment and rock back and forth. (Already doing it.)
It’s time for Nina to come out of her comfortable shell, but she isn’t convinced real life could ever live up to fiction. It’s going to take a brand-new family, a persistent suitor, and the combined effects of ice cream and trivia to make her turn her own fresh page.
The Bookish Life of Nina Hill is a book nerd’s beach read. I would love to be Nina in an alternate universe – she works at a bookstore, plays on a winning pub trivia team and has a cat. What more could you want in life? A family, I suppose.
Nina was raised by a single mom who told her she didn’t know who her father was. But one day a man walks into the bookstore and tells Nina that her father has died. He’s her father’s lawyer and he’s come to invite her to the will reading. Nina is very taken aback of course. Her new family ends up being a diverse cast of characters.
At the same time, Nina meets Tom, a player on a rival trivia team. He’s interested in her but she’s not so sure about him. Also, she’s pretty busy dealing with her new crazy family.
Even though this book was a little predictable at times (what romantic comedy isn’t?), I found the story to be funny and charming. Nina’s cat Phil has an inner dialogue that’s hilarious. There is some depth to the story as well. It was the February selection for one of my book clubs and we found plenty to talk about. There’s a discussion guide in the back of the paperback edition that was helpful. Recommended, especially for fellow book nerds.
March 4th, 2020 in
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Becoming by Michelle Obama
Publisher: Crown Publishing Group
Release Date: November 13, 2018
My rating: 4.5 of 5 stars
Publisher’s Description:
In a life filled with meaning and accomplishment, Michelle Obama has emerged as one of the most iconic and compelling women of our era. As First Lady of the United States of America—the first African American to serve in that role—she helped create the most welcoming and inclusive White House in history, while also establishing herself as a powerful advocate for women and girls in the U.S. and around the world, dramatically changing the ways that families pursue healthier and more active lives, and standing with her husband as he led America through some of its most harrowing moments. Along the way, she showed us a few dance moves, crushed Carpool Karaoke, and raised two down-to-earth daughters under an unforgiving media glare.
In her memoir, a work of deep reflection and mesmerizing storytelling, Michelle Obama invites readers into her world, chronicling the experiences that have shaped her—from her childhood on the South Side of Chicago to her years as an executive balancing the demands of motherhood and work, to her time spent at the world’s most famous address. With unerring honesty and lively wit, she describes her triumphs and her disappointments, both public and private, telling her full story as she has lived it—in her own words and on her own terms. Warm, wise, and revelatory, Becoming is the deeply personal reckoning of a woman of soul and substance who has steadily defied expectations—and whose story inspires us to do the same.
Michelle Obama will long be remembered as America’s first black First Lady. However, she is a remarkable person in her own right, not just because she’s married to a former president. I knew she went to an Ivy League law school but I didn’t realize that she gave up her career as a well-payed corporate lawyer to do more meaningful legal work that didn’t pay nearly as well.
Michelle starts Becoming with her childhood in Chicago and ends it at the end of Barak Obama’s presidency. My favorite part of the book was when she talked about her relationship with Barak because she wrote it like any of us would when talking about our spouses. She’s honest about their disagreements. For example, she’s very structured and believe it or not, he is not! That was a source of conflict early in their marriage. They had to go through fertility treatments to start a family, something I could relate to having gone through them myself for my first child. I appreciated her honesty – she doesn’t shy away from addressing her shortcomings and mistakes that she’s made.
I started out listening to the audiobook but switched to the print version about halfway though. Michelle reads the audiobook herself and she reads the book in the same slow, deliberate way she talks when she’s giving a speech. She is an amazing public speaker and while I think her speaking style is wonderful for speeches, I found it a little tedious to listen to for long periods of time. The print version zipped right along.
Becoming is an inspiring memoir of a phenomenal woman. While there is some political content, I honestly think it will appeal to people on both sides of the aisle. Highly recommended.
February 19th, 2020 in
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Pachinko by Min Jin Lee
Publisher: Grand Central Publishing
Release Date: February 7, 2017
My rating: 5 of 5 stars
Publisher’s Description:
In the early 1900s, teenaged Sunja, the adored daughter of a crippled fisherman, falls for a wealthy stranger at the seashore near her home in Korea. He promises her the world, but when she discovers she is pregnant–and that her lover is married–she refuses to be bought. Instead, she accepts an offer of marriage from a gentle, sickly minister passing through on his way to Japan. But her decision to abandon her home, and to reject her son’s powerful father, sets off a dramatic saga that will echo down through the generations.
Richly told and profoundly moving, Pachinko is a story of love, sacrifice, ambition, and loyalty. From bustling street markets to the halls of Japan’s finest universities to the pachinko parlors of the criminal underworld, Lee’s complex and passionate characters–strong, stubborn women, devoted sisters and sons, fathers shaken by moral crisis–survive and thrive against the indifferent arc of history.
Pachinko is the kind of epic family saga that I love. It spans four generations by my count. It starts with Sunja, a naive girl who is seduced by a wealthy, older married man. Rather than becoming the rich man’s mistress, she accepts a humble minister’s offer of marriage. She must keep her child’s true father a secret which causes complications for a long time and a lot of people. Life is hard in Japan for Sunja and her family because Koreans are horribly discriminated against.
I learned so much from reading this book. I didn’t know anything about the history between Japan and Korea, especially not how much the Japanese hated Koreans and vice versa. I had also never heard of the game pachinko or pachinko parlors, which can have ties to the mob. Both Korean and Japanese people have strict customs and manners, especially in the early years of this book, and I enjoyed learning more about those as well.
The characters in Pachinko are rich and deeply flawed. I felt like I knew them since both the actual book and the timeline the book covers are long. I spent a lot of time with them. Even so, I didn’t want it to end. Pachinko has won several awards and rightly so. Highly recommended.
February 4th, 2020 in
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When We Were Vikings by Andrew David MacDonald
Publisher: Gallery/Scout Press
January 28, 2020 – that’s today!
My rating: 5 of 5 stars
Publisher’s Description:
Sometimes life isn’t as simple as heroes and villains.
For Zelda, a twenty-one-year-old Viking enthusiast who lives with her older brother, Gert, life is best lived with some basic rules:
1. A smile means “thank you for doing something small that I liked.”
2. Fist bumps and dabs = respect.
3. Strange people are not appreciated in her home.
4. Tomatoes must go in the middle of the sandwich and not get the bread wet.
5. Sometimes the most important things don’t fit on lists.
But when Zelda finds out that Gert has resorted to some questionable—and dangerous—methods to make enough money to keep them afloat, Zelda decides to launch her own quest. Her mission: to be legendary. It isn’t long before Zelda finds herself in a battle that tests the reach of her heroism, her love for her brother, and the depth of her Viking strength.
When We Were Vikings is an uplifting debut about an unlikely heroine whose journey will leave you wanting to embark on a quest of your own, because after all…
We are all legends of our own making.
Zelda has Fetal Alcohol Syndrome, which has left her with some cognitive issues that affect her outlook on life. She’s obsessed with Vikings and desperately wants to be a Viking herself. She lives with her older brother Gert, who is also her caretaker. He’s extremely protective of her – to a fault. During the day, she goes to a community center for people with intellectual disabilities and even has a boyfriend named Marxy who goes there too.
I love Zelda. She’s earnest, kind and even though she’s intellectually challenged, she can be very insightful. She can also be unintentionally funny but MacDonald writes her in a way that never makes fun of her. The Viking code she lives by could be useful for everyone. When her brother Gert gets into trouble, Zelda vows to help him. Gert is in over his head trying to take care of Zelda now that’s she’s an adult. His intentions are good but he doesn’t always makes the best choices regarding Zelda or his life in general. In addition to Gert, Zelda has a wonderful “tribe” of people that support her emotionally, including Gert’s on-again, off-again girlfriend and the people that work at the center. They are fabulous supporting characters.
I loved this book. I read it in one afternoon which is rare for me. There are some tense moments when Zelda is trying to secretly help Gert in his dealings with some extremely unsavory people. My stomach was in knots as a furiously read to see if Gert and Zelda were going to have a happy ending. Surprisingly, When We Were Vikings is MacDonald’s debut novel. I can’t wait to see what he comes up with next. Highly recommended.
(I received a complimentary copy of this book for review.)
January 28th, 2020 in
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Generation Friends: An Inside Look at the Show That Defined a Television Era by Saul Austerlitz
Publisher: Dutton
Release Date: September 17, 2019
My rating: 4 of 5 stars
Publisher’s Description:
A fascinating behind-the-scenes look at Friends, published for the twenty-fifth anniversary of the show’s premiere. Howyoudoin’?
In September 1994, six friends sat down in their favorite coffee shop and began bantering about sex, relationships, jobs, and just about everything else. A quarter of a century later, new fans are still finding their way into the lives of Rachel, Ross, Joey, Chandler, Monica, and Phoebe, and thanks to the show’s immensely talented creators, its intimate understanding of its youthful audience, and its reign during network television’s last moment of dominance, Friends has become the most influential and beloved show of its era. Friends has never gone on a break, and this is the story of how it all happened.
Noted pop culture historian Saul Austerlitz utilizes exclusive interviews with creators David Crane and Marta Kauffman, executive producer Kevin Bright, director James Burrows, and many other producers, writers, and cast members to tell the story of Friends’ creation, its remarkable decade-long run, and its astonishing Netflix-fueled afterlife. Readers will go behind the scenes to hear from the people who were present as the show was developed and cast, written and filmed. There will be talk of trivia contests, prom videos, trips to London, Super Bowls, lesbian weddings, wildly popular hairstyles, superstar cameos, mad dashes to the airport, and million-dollar contracts. They’ll also discover surprising details—that Monica and Joey were the show’s original romantic couple, how Danielle Steel probably saved Jennifer Aniston’s career, and why Friends is still so popular that if it was a new show, its over-the-air broadcast reruns would be the ninth-highest-rated program on TV.
The show that defined the 1990s has a legacy that has endured beyond wildest expectations. And in this hilarious, informative, and entertaining book, readers will now understand why.
I’ve been a die-hard Friends fan from day one – which was twenty-five years ago! When I heard about this book, I knew I had to have it. Saul Austerlitz starts from the very beginning – how the creators came up with the concept for the show, the casting process, and the network machinations to get the show on the air. There was quite a bit that I didn’t know.
Instead of moving through the show episode by episode, he covers plotlines – like Ross and Rachel, Monica and Chandler, on so-on. He discusses the writers’ processes and offers some editorializing too. He seems to think none of us liked the Rachel/Joey pairing but I did! I was not a huge fan of Ross and Rachel – mainly because of Ross. But I digress – I could write a whole other post on my feelings about Ross and Rachel.
This is truly a book about the show, not the actors. He does cover their famous all for one, one for all philosophy concerning contract negotiations and other aspects of their professional lives but you won’t find much behind the scenes personal dirt on any of the stars. And that’s the way it should be for this type of book.
I really wish I would have read this book before Friends stopped streaming on Netflix. There are several episodes I want to rewatch. Even though I’ve seen each episode multiple times, Austerlitz managed to include tidbits about some of them that I didn’t notice. I do have all 10 seasons on DVD packed away somewhere around here. Time to dig them out! This book is a must read for Friends fans everywhere.
January 21st, 2020 in
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The Immortalists by Chloe Benjamin
Publisher: G.P. Putnam’s Sons
Release Date: January 9, 2018
My rating: 4.5 of 5 stars
Publisher’s Description:
If you knew the date of your death, how would you live your life?
It’s 1969 in New York City’s Lower East Side, and word has spread of the arrival of a mystical woman, a traveling psychic who claims to be able to tell anyone the day they will die. The Gold children–four adolescents on the cusp of self-awareness–sneak out to hear their fortunes.
The prophecies inform their next five decades. Golden boy Simon escapes to the West Coast, searching for love in ’80s San Francisco; dreamy Klara becomes a Las Vegas magician obsessed with blurring reality and fantasy; eldest son Daniel struggles to maintain security as an army doctor post-9/11; and bookish Varya throws herself into longevity research, where she tests the boundary between science and immortality.
Both a dazzling family love story and a sweeping novel of remarkable ambition and depth, The Immortalists probes the line between destiny and choice, reality and illusion, this world and the next. It is a deeply moving testament to the power of story, the nature of belief, and the unrelenting pull of familial bonds.
The four Gold siblings range in age from seven to thirteen years old when they pay a visit to the woman on Hester Street, a mysterious woman who is rumored to be able to give a person his or her exact date of death. Some of the siblings are given an early death date, while others are told they will have a long life. Each of them internalizes this information differently.
The Immortalists was one of my book club’s selections and turned out to be a great choice. There is a discussion guide at the back of the paperback edition. We had a deep conversation about whether or not knowing the supposed date of our deaths would cause us to live our lives any differently. And would it make a difference how far into the future the date was? We also talked about how each character lived their lives in response to knowing the date they were predicted to die.
I love epic books that follow families for decades. The Immortalists is one of those books. I loved getting to know each Gold sibling in depth even though I didn’t always actually love them. It’s hard to say much more without spoiling it. The Immortalists is a sweeping novel that will stay with you for a time after you read it. Recommended.
November 21st, 2019 in
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Heartland: A Memoir of Working Hard and Being Broke in the Richest Country on Earth by Sarah Smarsh
Publisher: Scribner
Release Date: September 18, 2018
My rating: 4 of 5 stars
Publisher’s Description:
Sarah Smarsh was born a fifth generation Kansas wheat farmer on her paternal side, and the product of generations of teen mothers on her maternal side. Through her experiences growing up on a farm thirty miles west of Wichita, we are given a unique and essential look into the lives of poor and working class Americans living in the heartland.
During Sarah’s turbulent childhood in Kansas in the 1980s and 1990s, she enjoyed the freedom of a country childhood, but observed the painful challenges of the poverty around her; untreated medical conditions for lack of insurance or consistent care, unsafe job conditions, abusive relationships, and limited resources and information that would provide for the upward mobility that is the American Dream. By telling the story of her life and the lives of the people she loves with clarity and precision but without judgement, Smarsh challenges us to look more closely at the class divide in our country.
A beautifully written memoir that combines personal narrative with powerful analysis and cultural commentary, Heartland examines the myths about people thought to be less because they earn less.
Heartland is Sarah Smarsh’s memoir of growing up in rural Kansas. Smarsh addresses her memoir to her unborn child. A child she was never pregnant with because she saw what her mother and other women in her family went through as teenage mothers and vowed that would never be her. Which is great but as a literary device it was a little weird and awkward. Thankfully, she doesn’t speak to her imaginary child too terribly often.
Heartland drives home that the “pull yourself up by your bootstraps” philosophy is hogwash. Sometimes the deck is just too stacked and the cycle of poverty nearly impossible to break. Smarsh herself managed to get out but after reading about her family, one understands why they did not. Comparisons have been made to Hillbilly Elegy and they are definitely similar. However, if you can only read one, choose Heartland. Smarsh is a better writer (sorry JD!) and she has more insight into the class divide and her family’s circumstances.
I listed to the audiobook of Heartland, which Smarsh reads herself. She has a pleasant voice with just a hint of a Southern accent that made this book an enjoyable listen. Recommended.
November 19th, 2019 in
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There There by Tommy Orange
Publisher: Knopf
Release Date: June 5, 2018
My rating: 4.5 of 5 stars
Publisher’s Description:
Tommy Orange’s wondrous and shattering novel follows twelve characters from Native communities: all traveling to the Big Oakland Powwow, all connected to one another in ways they may not yet realize. Among them is Jacquie Red Feather, newly sober and trying to make it back to the family she left behind. Dene Oxendene, pulling his life together after his uncle’s death and working at the powwow to honor his memory. Fourteen-year-old Orvil, coming to perform traditional dance for the very first time. Together, this chorus of voices tells of the plight of the urban Native American—grappling with a complex and painful history, with an inheritance of beauty and spirituality, with communion and sacrifice and heroism. Hailed as an instant classic, There There is at once poignant and unflinching, utterly contemporary and truly unforgettable.
There There follows several seemingly unrelated characters as they travel to the Big Oakland Powwow. It’s one of those novels where it’s clear that connections amongst them will be revealed by the end but it’s unclear at the start what they could be. The cast of characters was large but luckily there was a character list at the beginning of the book. I had to refer to it often but I didn’t mind.
Tommy Orange’s mission is to show the reader that there are all types of Native Americans – they don’t all live on reservations. Many are “urban Indians”, that is, they live in cities just like anyone else. However, they experience a sense of disconnection and loss borne from years and years of horrific treatment of their ancestors. Orange conveys this abstract feeling through his characters expertly. I felt like I learned a lot about the modern Native American experience. Though the book is largely character driven, there is a strong plot as well. I won’t say much about it except that the last section left me stunned – it was a gut punch.
This book was a selection for my book club. I think everyone felt like they came away from this book with more understanding of what it means to be a Native American. Although we agreed that as white people, we can never fully understand the depth of what they experience.
There There is Tommy Orange’s debut novel. He is definitely one to watch – I’m looking forward to reading whatever he comes out with next.
November 14th, 2019 in
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If I Stay by Gayle Forman
Publisher: Dutton Books for Young Readers
Release Date: April 2, 2009
My rating: 4 of 5 stars
Publisher’s Description:
In the blink of an eye everything changes. Seventeen year-old Mia has no memory of the accident; she can only recall what happened afterwards, watching her own damaged body being taken from the wreck. Little by little she struggles to put together the pieces- to figure out what she has lost, what she has left, and the very difficult choice she must make. Heartwrenchingly beautiful, this will change the way you look at life, love, and family.
Seventeen year-old Mia and her family go for a drive on a snowy day and end up in a car accident that leaves Mia in a coma. She’s not sure what happened to the rest of her family but it’s clear that it’s up to her whether or not she stays alive and wakes up or dies. She can hear the people around her and slowly pieces together what happened. There’s not much more to say without spoilers. Be careful of other reviews – spoilers abound!
If I Stay is a book that had me thinking for days after I read it about what I would do if I were in Mia’s situation. While Mia is in the coma, she flashes back on her life up to the time of the accident so we get to know her really well. Even so, I had no idea what choice she would make right up to the end of the book. I found out after I read the book that a movie based on the book was released in 2014. There is also a sequel to the book called Where She Went that I’d like to read.
Even though If I Stay is a young adult novel, it has plenty that will appeal to adults. I actually think it would make a pretty good book club selection. I imagine there could be a lot to discuss around Mia’s ultimate decision. Recommended.
November 7th, 2019 in
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My So-Called Bollywood Life by Nisha Sharma
Publisher: Crown Books for Young Readers
Release Date: May 15, 2018
My rating: 4 of 5 stars
Publisher’s Description:
Winnie Mehta was never really convinced that Raj was her soul mate, but their love was written in the stars. Literally, a pandit predicted Winnie would find the love of her life before her eighteenth birthday, and Raj meets all the qualifications. Which is why Winnie is shocked when she returns from her summer at film camp to find her boyfriend of three years hooking up with Jenny Dickens. As a self-proclaimed Bollywood expert, Winnie knows this is not how her perfect ending is scripted.
Then there’s Dev, a fellow film geek and one of the few people Winnie can count on. Dev is smart and charming, and he challenges Winnie to look beyond her horoscope and find someone she’d pick for herself. But does falling for Dev mean giving up on her prophecy and her chance to live happily ever after? To find her perfect ending, Winnie will need a little bit of help from fate, family, and of course, a Bollywood movie star.
Winnie is a huge Bollywood fan and now her life has turned into a Bollywood rom-com. Her boyfriend of three years has dumped her for another girl. How could he do that to her when he meets all the criteria that a pandit predicted her soul-mate would have? And now she still has to organize her school’s film festival with him. Awkward.
Winnie has a Bollywood movie review blog and each chapter begins with her review of a real-life Bollywood movie. There is also an appendix that lists all of the movies that Winnie refers to throughout the book. I’m looking forward to finding and watching some of the films.
My So-Called Bollywood Life was a cute, young-adult romance. It’s a little predictable but aren’t most teenage romances? It didn’t bother me – I still enjoyed the book and I really liked Dev, the third member of Winnie’s love triangle. I would have loved for him to be my high school boyfriend but he doesn’t appear to fulfill Winnie’s prophecy so she’s not sure about him.
I think most rom-com fans will like this book and if you know anything about Bollywood, then you’ll appreciate all of the movie references and enjoy it even more.
(I received a complimentary copy of this book for review.)
November 5th, 2019 in
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