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renatasnacks's reviews
2411 reviews
The Beet Queen by Louise Erdrich
4.0
Oh gosh, another great book. It's interesting; this, Tracks, and Love Medicine are very different in some ways, and yet they all had the same lovely style of prose. It's obvious they are by the same author, and yet she's not confined at all to any one "type" of book, even though she's writing about the same families of characters.
I don't have anything smart to say, except that it is gorgeous and sad and hopeful and you should pretty much go read it, and her other books, right now.
I don't have anything smart to say, except that it is gorgeous and sad and hopeful and you should pretty much go read it, and her other books, right now.
Watchmen by Alan Moore
4.0
a re-read; it had been awhile and i wanted to see if it was as good as i remembered. it wasn't... i remember it totally blowing my mind, and this time around it... didn't. but at one time it did, and it's still brilliant storytelling.
The Graveyard Book by Neil Gaiman
4.0
Huh. I am not sure about this. When I think about it reading it (which was yesterday) I have a favorable impression of it. Like basically everything Neil Gaiman does, it was clever and well-written and slyly funny. But... I don't even know what my "but" is. Somehow it just didn't grab me as much as other Gaiman books have. Ah well, you can please some of the people all of the time and all of the people some of the time?
The Elegance of the Hedgehog by Muriel Barbery
4.0
First of all, I know a lot of people said this book was pretentious. And indeed it has two very pretentious narrators. But I think it is overall the story of the two narrators outgrowing their pretensions and sincerely embracing life and art. I savored the style of this book and really fell in love with these two pretentious characters.
Disgrace by J.M. Coetzee
4.0
I'm beginning to really enjoy Coetzee's spare, elegant style. I didn't enjoy this as much as I did Elizabeth Costello, but I don't think this book was necessarily less good than Elizabeth Costello. Disgrace is more masculine, and even as I understand the novel to be an exploration of gender roles and masculinity, I still found the protagonist to be off-putting. Intentionally so, and well done, but I didn't LIKE the book as much. You know? Okay good.
Custer Died for Your Sins: An Indian Manifesto by Vine Deloria Jr.
4.0
Hmm! I definitely learned from this book, although I'm moderately knowledgeable about Native American history. I particularly enjoyed the section about the black civil rights movement and why Indians didn't join in/why their movement is so different from other civil rights movements. I liked the history/memoir/essay blend. Of course, since the book came out in 1968 I really want a followup in the same tone.