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gotossmycausticsalad's reviews
482 reviews
Bullet Points by Mark Watson
4.0
I originally read this when it first came out, so my opinion might be a bit coloured by nostalgia - and the fact that I love Mark Watson as a comedian - but I found it to be a solid read. Funny and with some excellent descriptions. The language is a bit outdated, but it's hard to tell whether that's a deliberate choice to situate the narrator in time, or just the early 00s being the early 00s.
More Than You'll Ever Know by Katie Gutierrez
3.0
More of a soap opera than a thriller.
I find true crime somewhat ghoulish, wading around in real people's misery for kicks - which to be fair this novel does try to address somewhat as it highlights the tension between Cassie's desire to get her career off the ground and the real risk of upending (even further) the lives of Lore's family.
I think it muddies this a little with the epilogue -when it's revealed that Cassie conveniently managed to write a book that was hailed as a respectful masterpiece of crime writing, neatly sidestepping the ethical concerns that had been plaguing the novel and wrapping everything up nice and neatly with no real cost.
The chapters from Lore's 1980's perspective are the strongest in the novel, watching her build two parallel lives and somehow manage to hold them together for so long. Cassie's meanwhile are less interesting, she commits an unforgivable sin for a first person narrator - being quite irritating.
I find true crime somewhat ghoulish, wading around in real people's misery for kicks - which to be fair this novel does try to address somewhat as it highlights the tension between Cassie's desire to get her career off the ground and the real risk of upending (even further) the lives of Lore's family.
I think it muddies this a little with the epilogue -
The chapters from Lore's 1980's perspective are the strongest in the novel, watching her build two parallel lives and somehow manage to hold them together for so long. Cassie's meanwhile are less interesting, she commits an unforgivable sin for a first person narrator - being quite irritating.
Beneath the Rising by Premee Mohamed
2.75
Picked this up because it was recommended by one of my favourite authors but it really didn't grab me. I felt like I was reading a mediocre YA book at times, the banter was tedious, and the characters occasionally speak like they're in a therapy session. I skimmed it from about 50% onwards.
If I Survive You by Jonathan Escoffery
5.0
I didn't even really twig it was a collection of short stories until I saw the reviews on the back cover - it read like a novel with a slightly unconventional timeline to me.
The stories switch between perspectives, but they're at their strongest in second person. The story that focuses on racial identity was especially powerful from that perspective - as Trelawney grows up and is told by one person after another that he's this race or that, as he searches for belonging - that it's not coming from an I perspective but also you the reader being told that you are experiencing this - really added another layer to an already interesting narrative.
The stories switch between perspectives, but they're at their strongest in second person. The story that focuses on racial identity was especially powerful from that perspective - as Trelawney grows up and is told by one person after another that he's this race or that, as he searches for belonging - that it's not coming from an I perspective but also you the reader being told that you are experiencing this - really added another layer to an already interesting narrative.
Talonsister by Jen Williams
4.0
A fascinating world with decent - although not outstanding - writing. I struggled to stay focused from about the first third onward, having to fight hard not to skim bits, but I don't know how much of that is the fault of the book and how much is just my brain refusing to cooperate.
I wasn't wild about the romance, felt like something you find in a mediocre YA book, could have been better written.
I wasn't wild about the romance, felt like something you find in a mediocre YA book, could have been better written.
The Gamekeeper by Barry Hines
4.5
Sharply political - George at the start of the novel seems wholly bought into his employers mindset - saying of a local poaching family that they ought to be gassed in their beds - but you see flickers of his class consciousness and resentment flare up as it goes on. When he allows one of the shooting guests to injure himself, when he supports the strikers.
The contrast is sharply drawn between him - an ex miner who knows the power of a striking worker, and the head keeper - from a long line of toadying servants of power, when the beaters go on strike. George supports them, encourages them to ask for more because he knows this is the one moment they have leverage, even if it's his section of the shoot they're holding it over.
I've seen this book described as an observation of "unsentimental country life" and I'm not sure I agree entirely. George is sentimental when he can afford to be. The "enemies of game" he can afford no kindness to, doing so would directly endanger his livelihood and home. Nature that he is not at war with, though, he treats almost sympathetically.
He raises the pheasants for the express purpose of being killed, and yet when that moment comes he wonders why he does this. He can't help celebrating when one escapes, despite the trouble that would have landed him in if he was seen.
And it's not just the pheasants - he picks up a greenfinch he finds fallen during the shoot, and then when it dies he slyly gives it to one of the game retrieval dogs to bring back to its master, as if to confront the shooters with the collateral damage of their sport.
The contrast is sharply drawn between him - an ex miner who knows the power of a striking worker, and the head keeper - from a long line of toadying servants of power, when the beaters go on strike. George supports them, encourages them to ask for more because he knows this is the one moment they have leverage, even if it's his section of the shoot they're holding it over.
I've seen this book described as an observation of "unsentimental country life" and I'm not sure I agree entirely. George is sentimental when he can afford to be. The "enemies of game" he can afford no kindness to, doing so would directly endanger his livelihood and home. Nature that he is not at war with, though, he treats almost sympathetically.
And it's not just the pheasants - he picks up a greenfinch he finds fallen during the shoot, and then when it dies he slyly gives it to one of the game retrieval dogs to bring back to its master, as if to confront the shooters with the collateral damage of their sport.