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hernamewaslily's reviews
237 reviews
Revolutionary Road by Richard Yates
5.0
A devastating and poignant commentary on the shackles of suburban life, Richard Yates’ ‘Revolutionary Road’ is nothing short of a mid-century masterpiece. Published in 1961, the text destroys the popular image of 1950s American life, revealing the toxicity of the nuclear family ideal that the era has come to defined by.
The novel follows Frank and April Wheeler: Frank works a mind-numbing, 9-5 corporate job, whilst April plays housewife and mother to their two children. Though a seemingly perfect pair of suburbanites, Frank and April begin to question their life choices and impulsively hatch a plan to move to France to escape the constraints of American life. However, when things unexpectedly start to pick up at work for Frank and April discovers, much to her dismay, an unplanned surprise, their dream of bohemian living, galivanting across Europe, becomes a distant fantasy. The couple are forced to reckon with their lives, their relationship, and their future.
Written in a beautifully rendered prose, this heart-breaking tale of the stifling constraints of suburbia is truly a classic worthy of a place on everyone’s bookshelf. Though it was written over fifty years ago, it’s themes still ring true today.
The novel follows Frank and April Wheeler: Frank works a mind-numbing, 9-5 corporate job, whilst April plays housewife and mother to their two children. Though a seemingly perfect pair of suburbanites, Frank and April begin to question their life choices and impulsively hatch a plan to move to France to escape the constraints of American life. However, when things unexpectedly start to pick up at work for Frank and April discovers, much to her dismay, an unplanned surprise, their dream of bohemian living, galivanting across Europe, becomes a distant fantasy. The couple are forced to reckon with their lives, their relationship, and their future.
Written in a beautifully rendered prose, this heart-breaking tale of the stifling constraints of suburbia is truly a classic worthy of a place on everyone’s bookshelf. Though it was written over fifty years ago, it’s themes still ring true today.
Checkout 19 by Claire-Louise Bennett
3.0
An experimental text that blends fiction, memoir, and essay, Claire-Louise Bennett’s ‘Checkout-19’ is not going to be for everyone. In the simplest terms, it is a coming-of-age story that follows the narrator as she discovers her love her literature and writing, and how this goes on to affect her life from childhood through adolescence to adulthood. Bennett covers topics ranging from childhood crushes on teachers and periods to uneasy sexual relationships and what it means to be a working-class woman in bourgeois circles, all of which are dealt with in a refreshingly personal and relatable way.
Some parts of the novel were dense and hard to get through. This was not helped by the intentional repetition that Bennett employs whereby some elements of the story reoccur at various points in the text. However, as the narrator states, “I experience, every few years, an urge to recall this moment and the events that preceded it. Not only to recall it, but to write it down, again. Again”, thus this repetition is a purposeful literary tool that reinforces the text’s meta-commentary on the function of writing and literature.
An intelligent, insightful piece of work that delves into the female psyche through a study of literature and writing.
Some parts of the novel were dense and hard to get through. This was not helped by the intentional repetition that Bennett employs whereby some elements of the story reoccur at various points in the text. However, as the narrator states, “I experience, every few years, an urge to recall this moment and the events that preceded it. Not only to recall it, but to write it down, again. Again”, thus this repetition is a purposeful literary tool that reinforces the text’s meta-commentary on the function of writing and literature.
An intelligent, insightful piece of work that delves into the female psyche through a study of literature and writing.
Raise High the Roof Beam, Carpenters and Seymour: An Introduction by J.D. Salinger
4.0
‘Raise High the Roof Beam, Carpenters’ and ‘Seymour: An Introduction’ both originally featured in The New Yorker in 1955 and 1959, respectively, before being republished in this anthology in 1963.
The first story, ‘Raise High the Roof Beam, Carpenters,’ follows narrator Buddy Glass as he traverses the aftermath of his brother Seymour’s wedding, who failed to show face. Left standing outside the empty church, he jumps into a car that unbeknownst to him is full of the jilted bride’s friends and relatives. Not wanting to out himself as a blood relative, Buddy keeps quiet and listens in to the complaints and concerns of the other passengers. He is thus forced to reckon with acknowledging his brothers flaws whilst desperately wanting to defend him.
The second story, ‘Seymour: An Introduction,’ is told by Buddy, who by this point is an old man, and, at its title suggests, is an introduction to Seymour, who by this point is dead. This story felt looser than Salinger’s typical body of work with its diaristic, stream-of-consciousness style, though it still contains the trappings expected from Salinger for it to feel familiar; it’s wry humour and it’s tenderness, for example.
Whilst I preferred the first story to the last, I cannot deny that both are great. Salinger always turns out a perfectly crafted, witty tale and this collection was no exception.
The first story, ‘Raise High the Roof Beam, Carpenters,’ follows narrator Buddy Glass as he traverses the aftermath of his brother Seymour’s wedding, who failed to show face. Left standing outside the empty church, he jumps into a car that unbeknownst to him is full of the jilted bride’s friends and relatives. Not wanting to out himself as a blood relative, Buddy keeps quiet and listens in to the complaints and concerns of the other passengers. He is thus forced to reckon with acknowledging his brothers flaws whilst desperately wanting to defend him.
The second story, ‘Seymour: An Introduction,’ is told by Buddy, who by this point is an old man, and, at its title suggests, is an introduction to Seymour, who by this point is dead. This story felt looser than Salinger’s typical body of work with its diaristic, stream-of-consciousness style, though it still contains the trappings expected from Salinger for it to feel familiar; it’s wry humour and it’s tenderness, for example.
Whilst I preferred the first story to the last, I cannot deny that both are great. Salinger always turns out a perfectly crafted, witty tale and this collection was no exception.
A Single Man by Christopher Isherwood
4.0
A Single Man is a tale of loss and the loneliness that comes with it. The novel follows a day in the life of George, a middle-aged university professor from England living in California, who has recently lost his long-term partner, Jim.
Not only is George mourning the loss of his one true love, but he is also mourning the loss of his future and his past, and finds himself stuck somewhere between the two, unable to resolve them into anything that makes sense. Throughout the novel he visits a number of people – his dead lovers’ former lover, his best friend and fellow ex-pat, Charlotte, one of his male students – in order to find an answer as how to move on. But just as he seems to be coming to grips with this, the universe plays a cruel trick…
This was my second Isherwood – I’d previously read ‘Goodbye to Berlin’ for my masters – and it won’t be my last. His prose is captivating and his penchant for the melancholy is beautifully alluring.
Not only is George mourning the loss of his one true love, but he is also mourning the loss of his future and his past, and finds himself stuck somewhere between the two, unable to resolve them into anything that makes sense. Throughout the novel he visits a number of people – his dead lovers’ former lover, his best friend and fellow ex-pat, Charlotte, one of his male students – in order to find an answer as how to move on. But just as he seems to be coming to grips with this, the universe plays a cruel trick…
This was my second Isherwood – I’d previously read ‘Goodbye to Berlin’ for my masters – and it won’t be my last. His prose is captivating and his penchant for the melancholy is beautifully alluring.