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3.73 AVERAGE
3.73 AVERAGE
I thought I was going to really adore this book as I am a great fan of journaling, especially by great writers. This writer's journal however, seemed a bit meandering and lacked substance. I kept expecting something dramatic to happen - either an incident, a revelation or an emotional turning point. One review mentioned that the writer found her journal from a younger period, so I was expecting perhaps "Mortified" like moments, instead it seemed like Caucasian middle age privileged angst.
I loved The Folded Clock! I really enjoyed spending time with Heidi - her entries were often both hilarious and deep, and stuck with me throughout the day.
There were some diary entries that were insightful, funny, thought provoking, etc just like the reviews suggested. There were many others that I wanted to skip over from total lack of interest. Although the premise of the book is truly that it is a diary, it just wasn't my style. It warrants 2.5 stars.
I had a little trouble getting into this at first. It contains excerpts from a diary, and one expects that the excerpts will form a narrative, a record of some dramatic event in the writer’s life. This doesn’t happen. It’s just a record of a pretty ordinary life, given that it’s the work of a writer married to another writer, and she spends her time in New York, Maine and Europe.
So most excerpts begin “Today I…” For example: “Today I went to the Columbia library for the first time in four months.” “Today I wrote a long e-mail to my London friend.” “Today I took my kids to the cemetery to talk to E. B. White.” “Today instead of working I watched YouTube interviews.”
After these beginnings, Heidi Julavits goes off on some kind of tangent, and these often contain rather startling observations. She’s perceptive and interesting, and these pieces read like emails from a thoughtful, self-aware friend. Many of them circle around and end up being very good short pieces, while others don’t quite find themselves. In general, it’s a book worth reading.
Some excerpts:
< I have come to that point in my life where my memories have begun interbreeding. >
< In August, in Maine, it can sometimes seem that everyone everywhere is having the same conversation between the hours of five and eight p.m. >
< We wondered if people mistook for ghost sightings what was, in fact, a primal fear response to poorly arranged rooms. >
So most excerpts begin “Today I…” For example: “Today I went to the Columbia library for the first time in four months.” “Today I wrote a long e-mail to my London friend.” “Today I took my kids to the cemetery to talk to E. B. White.” “Today instead of working I watched YouTube interviews.”
After these beginnings, Heidi Julavits goes off on some kind of tangent, and these often contain rather startling observations. She’s perceptive and interesting, and these pieces read like emails from a thoughtful, self-aware friend. Many of them circle around and end up being very good short pieces, while others don’t quite find themselves. In general, it’s a book worth reading.
Some excerpts:
< I have come to that point in my life where my memories have begun interbreeding. >
< In August, in Maine, it can sometimes seem that everyone everywhere is having the same conversation between the hours of five and eight p.m. >
< We wondered if people mistook for ghost sightings what was, in fact, a primal fear response to poorly arranged rooms. >
More like 3.5 stars. A really honest memoir/diary. Sometimes it felt like she was describing how my brain works. A quick read.
No matter how I was feeling before picking up this book, I felt this sense of sadness shortly after starting to read. It isn't necessarily the content. Just the way it reminds me of the pieces I once was vs the parts I have become.
The book is witty, perceptive, hilarious, insightful and (due to its non-chronological structure)--kind of random. It's also overwritten at times and hard to read straight through. Half a dozen chapters before bed? Witty, perceptive, hilarious, yada yada. Reading it for more than a half hour? Like hanging around a beloved, admired and irritating friend. Recommended in short bursts, just for the writing.
4.5 stars. Not knowing much about Julavits, and after picking up cold, and subsequently discarding, an Anne Lamott prior to this, I decided this time to read a couple of Goodreads reviews before I cracked the book. One of the reviewers commented that reading this book was like having coffee with your smartest friend. Indeed. I thoroughly enjoyed this book and Julavits' writing. This is a selection of her diary entries, written with an eye to publication, over the course of a two-year period, and not in chronological order. It's witty and wry, it's honest, very smart, sometimes laugh-out-loud funny, often cringe-worthy, and very very entertaining. The selection of entries, and the decision around the non-chronological order is very well done - you see the author, warts and all - and learn more about the common life of this uncommon talent. Characters appear and re-appear, themes emerge, and by the end you're sorry to part ways. And that's one of the highest compliments I can pay to any book.