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lgl88's Reviews (820)
I listened to an audiobook version of this novel on LibriVox and didn't find much meaning in it. Since reading up some on the concept of Dickensian novels functioning as fiction that promotes social hierarchy and the idea that poverty is tied to morality, I've been far more critical of his works. A quote from UCSC Dickens Project: "Writers, politicians, social workers, and philanthropists of Dickens’s time tended to distinguish between the 'deserving' and the 'undeserving' poor—categories that were enshrined in the Poor Law of 1834... Certainly Dickens was sympathetic to the working poor—what he would have considered to be the good or 'deserving' poor... But Dickens was also, like many of his contemporaries, worried, even afraid of the potential for crime and violence in poverty... there is a barely-controlled anxiety in many of his works about an unredeemable evil in some poor people." At some point, I decided to drop this book because I was listening only to complete another "classic" and not to read. Perhaps I'll try it again in the future.
I tried my hardest to keep reading this book, but it was just too disappointing and dense. I feel as though the summary lied about what the book was about, as it described a young Jewish girl who loved the Beatles and grew up watching them in Liverpool while struggling with her Jewish heritage and her family. At the beginning of the book she does go to see the Beatles, but only because her friends are going. She doesn't even like them and her interior monologue in the Cavern is just about how ugly and overrated they are! After that initial scene they are never mentioned again. The writing was really dull too. About the only thing I enjoyed was learning about Jewish culture and Yiddish. Maybe if I hadn't gone in expecting more of a Beatles cameo I would have finished it.
I read about half of this book before dropping it for good. it’s set during the cultural revolution in china, and the summary led me to believe that it was a feminist book about the solidarity between all of these sisters. it was misogynistic, pro-rape, and depicted all of the women as competitors who hated one another. I don’t think a single woman in this book had a real relationship with another woman that wasn’t dependent on competition and loathing. the narrator and the characters talk about how beneficial the gang rape of one of the sisters is in making her more obedient and less narcissistic. the father is described as having affairs with many women, but a lot of the ‘affairs’ read more like rape... he is a rapist. so gross.
