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3.09 AVERAGE
3.09 AVERAGE
I loved The Memory Keeper's Daughter; it is one of my favorite novels so this was a big, fat disappointment. The writing just seems cheesy. Edwards seems to be trying so hard to make this a flowery, beautifully written mystery and all I got from it was this: the narrator, Lucy, is a dick to everyone because her dad died and she feels guilty, the letters were way more interesting than her story and the "mystery" of her dad's death was so predictable I sighed when the big reveal came up. Hopefully her next novel is better.
Although the pace was a bit slow for my preference, everything was drawn together in a conclusion which not only made sense, but served to echo the author's themes. She makes extensive use of metaphor, which at times seems labored, yet at other times is exquisite.
I love poetry. I love prose. I love beautiful language. But dear god, Kim Edwards, give it a rest. I don't need to know that your lemonade is the yellow of a dandelion on a sunny day. So much unneeded description in this book; it would be half the size if she had left it out. The main characters is also kind of self-absorbed and you want to shake her and tell her to make up her mind. But underneath everything is an interesting concept, and I enjoyed the historical aspect of the story, even though it was a huge stretch how everything fit together.
The author crammed a lot of issues into one book (feminism, environmentalism, racism, etc.) and the main story line was just not interesting enough to support it all. I think I could have been more interested in learning about the ancestor whose letters the main character discovers but those letters were too sketchy and just never really connected with me.
This is one of those I-finished-it-because-I-started-it books. It was interesting enough, yet I tired of the repeated and quite elaborate descriptions of places, things,and people. It was very appealling initially, but the volume of unecessary words grew and billowed and became completely out of proportion for this reader. The story lines are clever and appealing, so if you don't mind repetition and like a decent story, this may be the book for you.
The Lake of Dreams is the name of the (fake) town in upstate New York where this book takes place, somewhere in the area that contains Rochester and Seneca Falls. I've been up there a number of times, it's beautiful country (in the summer) and I could picture this all in my mind, as the setting is a huge part of the story. Family history, family mysteries, unwinding stories, long-lost love and the growing-up-together kind of love, reminiscing about the past and making life-changing discoveries and decisions -- all are a part of this very interesting story.
This is one of my favorite books, I read it every few years. Probably helps that much of it takes place in my absolute dream house, a cottage on a lake. And the rest speaks to women in spirituality, my other passion. Ms. Edwards descriptive and lyrical way of writing puts me right there...I can feel the water, hear the reeds rustling in the wind.
Very unexpected pleasure. Some of the prose tripped over itself and the plot can feel melodramatic, but I was constantly engaged.
Slowest. Damn. Read. Ever.
Okay, so I admit I made a mistake; I judged the book by its pretty cover and the fame of the author and the 'oooohh mystery, family intrigue, secrets' description. My bad.
I was sweating blood to get through it-I persevered and succeeded, only to be able to say I didn't waste my money on that book.
This author apparently thinks it's cool to write these LOOOOOOOOOOONG, WIIIIIINDING, MEANDERING descriptions of EVERY SINGLE BLOODY THING THAT THE MAIN CHARACTER [who was boring and flat with the common sense of a grasshopper, mind you] DOES FROM HOW SHE GETS OUT OF BED TO HOW SHE SITS DOWN ON THE COUCH.
Seriously, she puts Dickens to shame.
And I was so near to giving up-at the end of every page basically. Because-nothing-was-happening.
Basically, this chick decides to go back to her home town [called the Lake of Dreams. Seriously, if a place exists that is called something similar-The Meadow of Sunshine or something, I'll eat my shoe], and embarks on a super slow, pointless discovery of some ancient relative. The author tries really hard to make these family secrets seem all mega interesting and awesome, throwing in some awkward and underdeveloped romance plots or whatever. BUT FAIL. FAIL. FAIL.
The last 2 chapters were the only fast read of the entire book. Not that it helped much, but at least it earned it its two stars.
I can't imagine any person in the world who would see the world from the point of view of the main character-hell, I can't even remember her name. She makes out with her perfect ex boyfriend while her current Japanese boyfriend is planning to come over, almost gets his son killed, spills the secret that her sister in law is pregnant, wrecks her family's office, and all the while feels the need to continue searching for some wild fantasy ancestor who shock and horror only lived in the 1900's, so it's not even anything that old or mysterious. Turns out this woman was a suffragette-so cue all the descriptions of the wonderful things that these women did, because according to Edwards, what the world needs is more feminism.
And the ending. Gah. I refuse to comment.
Over and out. Off to find a decent read.
Okay, so I admit I made a mistake; I judged the book by its pretty cover and the fame of the author and the 'oooohh mystery, family intrigue, secrets' description. My bad.
I was sweating blood to get through it-I persevered and succeeded, only to be able to say I didn't waste my money on that book.
This author apparently thinks it's cool to write these LOOOOOOOOOOONG, WIIIIIINDING, MEANDERING descriptions of EVERY SINGLE BLOODY THING THAT THE MAIN CHARACTER [who was boring and flat with the common sense of a grasshopper, mind you] DOES FROM HOW SHE GETS OUT OF BED TO HOW SHE SITS DOWN ON THE COUCH.
Seriously, she puts Dickens to shame.
And I was so near to giving up-at the end of every page basically. Because-nothing-was-happening.
Basically, this chick decides to go back to her home town [called the Lake of Dreams. Seriously, if a place exists that is called something similar-The Meadow of Sunshine or something, I'll eat my shoe], and embarks on a super slow, pointless discovery of some ancient relative. The author tries really hard to make these family secrets seem all mega interesting and awesome, throwing in some awkward and underdeveloped romance plots or whatever. BUT FAIL. FAIL. FAIL.
The last 2 chapters were the only fast read of the entire book. Not that it helped much, but at least it earned it its two stars.
I can't imagine any person in the world who would see the world from the point of view of the main character-hell, I can't even remember her name. She makes out with her perfect ex boyfriend while her current Japanese boyfriend is planning to come over, almost gets his son killed, spills the secret that her sister in law is pregnant, wrecks her family's office, and all the while feels the need to continue searching for some wild fantasy ancestor who shock and horror only lived in the 1900's, so it's not even anything that old or mysterious. Turns out this woman was a suffragette-so cue all the descriptions of the wonderful things that these women did, because according to Edwards, what the world needs is more feminism.
And the ending. Gah. I refuse to comment.
Over and out. Off to find a decent read.
This book was OK. The plot was rich, but the characters were flat. If the characters were more dimensional, I feel that this book would have been truly excellent.