imperfectcj's reviews
2149 reviews

Liars by Sarah Manguso

challenging emotional reflective fast-paced

• Plot- or character-driven? Character
• Strong character development? Yes
• Loveable characters? It's complicated
• Diverse cast of characters? No
• Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

4.0

This is a quick one (read/listened to it all today), and I really liked it. It's kind of brutal, but it's more relatable for me than All Fours, which has similar themes (midlife, the unequal nature of marriage, etc). The weaponized incompetence, the shifting of narrative so the actions of one partner are always justified, the inclination of the other partner to internalize all of the problems in the marriage...all feel true/familiar.

The Book of Love by Kelly Link

dark emotional mysterious slow-paced

• Plot- or character-driven? A mix
• Strong character development? Yes
• Loveable characters? It's complicated
• Diverse cast of characters? Yes
• Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

3.5

I went back and forth between the ebook and January LaVoy's awesome narration with this one. Overall, it's a soft pick for me. I like some of the things Link does with these characters, but the novel just feels really long. My favorite thing about this novel was listening to the audiobook for how January LaVoy transitions from teen voices to kid voices to adult voices and trying to figure out what she's doing in her body to create each. 

The Extinction of Irena Rey by Jennifer Croft

challenging mysterious slow-paced

• Plot- or character-driven? A mix
• Strong character development? Yes
• Diverse cast of characters? Yes
• Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

3.0

There. I finished it. It doesn't feel like a waste of time, but I'm also not sure if I "enjoyed" it, per se. There seem to be a lot of inside jokes and references here, and mostly it feels like a book directed at someone who isn't me, like reading someone else's parents' letters to each other. The connections and threads are interesting, but they don't really have significance to me, which is saying something as I'm usually able to center myself in any story.

Black Sheep by Rachel Harrison

dark funny fast-paced

• Plot- or character-driven? Plot

3.0

This one's not amazing or anything, but it is fun. It says some things about organized religion and about family dynamics and how hard it is to move away from them. There's also some in there about coming into our own as adults. But mostly it's just fun.

The Pale Horse by Agatha Christie

dark funny mysterious medium-paced

• Plot- or character-driven? Plot

4.0

I actually really like this one. There are a couple of silly things and a couple of pieces that aren't explained to my satisfaction, but I enjoy the setup of the mystery. It's pleasantly convoluted, and the misdirection, for the most part, fits with the story rather than feeling like something contrived by the author to throw the reader off (which always feels unfair to me).

Great Expectations: A Novel by Vinson Cunningham

informative reflective slow-paced

• Plot- or character-driven? A mix
• Strong character development? Yes

3.0

I'm not sure what to think of this novel. It's something if a coming-of-age story about a young man learning the contours of his world in the context of his participation in the 2008 presidential election. There's a sense of hope, disillusionment, and something like acceptance. It was interesting to look back at that time from David's perspective, but I'm not sure this one is going to stick with me.

The Book Censor's Library by Bothayna Al-Essa

emotional mysterious tense fast-paced

• Plot- or character-driven? Plot

4.0

I like this one a lot. I'm not sure about the ending, but it says some very interesting things about thinking as resistance. I think about the current backlash against the "intellectual elite" in the US, the drop in literacy/reading, and this idea that looking beneath the surface of things is at best a waste of time and at worst unpatriotic/immoral. The antidote appears to be to think/read, but that doesn't seem like enough.

Brat by Gabriel Smith

dark funny slow-paced

• Plot- or character-driven? Character

3.0

My reactions to this novel cycled through, 1) "Oh, this is good," 2) "Um, ew?" 3) "Wait...what?" 4) "Why is this guy fighting so much?" 

Overall, it's a unique look at how family secrets and dysfunctional habits can surface in the face of grief. It presents the reordering of a family after a death as a sort of forced metamorphosis, especially the part where the caterpillar becomes, like, soup before becoming a butterfly.

Christmas and Other Horrors: A Winter Solstice Anthology by Ellen Datlow

dark funny tense fast-paced

4.0

This is a lovely assortment of creepy holiday stories, sort of like the seasonal ghost story version of a Whitman's Sampler (which used to capture my imagination as a child, with its little map and exotic-sounding candy names). I feel like there's a little bit for everyone here. My favorites at the moment are the stories by Christopher Golden and Kaaron Warren, but each story in the collection holds its own. (No icky orange creams.)

Kill Your Darling by Clay McLeod Chapman

dark emotional fast-paced

• Plot- or character-driven? Character
• Strong character development? Yes
• Loveable characters? It's complicated
• Diverse cast of characters? No
• Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

3.5

This is my third by Chapman, and it might be my favorite. It's got some small tense issues and a timeline or two that don't match up (if someone has three kids in quick succession, those kids will no longer be children after 40 years pass), but perhaps these are intentional, given the narrator. It's an interesting look at grief and vengeance.