The Paris Wife by Paula McLain

Amanda Panda’s Book review for The Paris Wife by Paula McLain 

I ordered my book off of Amazon and when I opened my book a bunch of receipts fell out. All I can say is that this person shops at Target, Joann’s (twice), WinCo foods, and Family Christian. Fellow book owner, it was very interesting to see what you bought. lol 

But to the review! 

For this book, I purposefully didn’t look up information on Hadley. I wanted things to be a surprise, because the book was enjoyable from the start.  However, as an English Lit major for my undergrad degree, I already knew plenty about Ernest Hemingway to know what to expect. 

It’s rare for a book to hold my interest as much as this one did – especially when the book is not EXACTLY my cup of tea (it was very gendered and very book-clubby). 

To me, the book is a case study on marriage. The Modernists were very interesting characters despite their literature. My favorite parts included the glimpses of Stein and their (Hadley and Hemingway’s) interactions with her and Alice. 

If you like the Modernists, then you will like this book – because it offers a perspective on them that I had not considered before (the perspective of an outsider so close to them). It was also very interesting to see/consider how the publishing industry functioned WAY BACK WHEN. Things sure have changed now.

Side note, I want a Gertrude Stein of my very own, thank you. 

Though my view of Hemingway did not change after I read this book (I do not like Hemingway as a person. He is too cruel and too-self involved) I learned about Hadley and grew to dislike her. In fact, I like Hemingway more than her. Not because she is as messed up as Hemingway or anything, but because she is more selfish than he was. Well…at least her character in this book was. 

Even I resented her for losing Hemingway’s manuscript. But I resented her more when she was careless about her birth control. She knew who Hemingway ‘was’ deep down and why the HELL would she want to produce offspring with him? She was the most selfish character in this book. 

But I will stop ranting. 

My overall judgment of this book: It is worth reading. Especially if you need something to calm you down after watching The Great Gatsby.  But it won’t change your life… It will certainly leave you reconsidering your life choices, but it won’t change your life. Was a B book. 

But, Good pick for the list, Hel! 

Hel Speak:

I've been wanting to read this book for years, after I heard a review of it on NPR. I've always hated Hemingway - both his writing and his person. But I am fascinated by the roaring twenties, Paris life, and the authors that Hadley socialized with, grew with.

In a way, this book broke my heart. By its accounts, the authors I've always admired - like F. Scott Fitzgerald and Ezra Pound - are scum. Not to mention the women they engaged with. There were few decent people in the world, according to this book - or, at least, Hadley never really came across any of them. Maybe that is her character flaw.

I didn't hate Hadley herself, at least not while I was reading it. I was too busy feeling sorry for her. But, looking back, I wonder what kind of a person she must have been to let Hemingway treat her the way he did. I don't care if you love someone. You must also love and respect yourself, and she didn't do that. If she did, she wouldn't have let Hemingway's mistress move in with them. She should have stuck up for herself, in many ways. As a mother, I was also shocked by her ability to leave her infant son behind with a nanny for weeks at a time. What kind of a parent does that??

Hemingway was an ass, and we all know that. I didn't expect this book to change my opinion of him. It actually did change my opinion, but not for the better. In the book, we caught brief glimpses of situations from Hemingway's point of view. It showed that he wasn't just completely lacking in empathy. He knew he was hurting people, he just didn't care enough to stop. He was too selfish. It was almost like he thrived off of it. Hurting people DID hurt him, but maybe in a positive way - it inspired him.

As far as the writing goes, I have no complaints. It is neither bad nor mind blowing. This is the type of book where the story over shadows everything else, including the writing. However,  I really admire the authors ability to paint such a passionate and complete picture. It's as if she had really been there. The research that went into this book must have been immense.

I agree with Panda on her final thoughts: it's a good book to read, but it won't change your life. I give it a B++.

-Hel 

::IMPORTANT NEWS:: 

This wraps up our first year of 12 books in 12 months! It’s been bumpy, but fun. We’ve finally got the groove of things, and so we won’t stop now. HOWEVER: 

Next “year” we’ll be mixing it up by genre – instead of overtly reading the same book at the same time, Hel and I will be reading books from the same genre.  It might mean we read the same book, but it also means we have freedom to seek out whatever our fancy within the same genre.

BUT WHAT DOES THAT MEAN FOR YOU? That (potentially) means double the titles covered – and that means double the reviews that can help you form an opinion about whether or not you should read a certain book. 

Watch the blog for more news about this change!

Panda's Punishment Post: Divergent by Veronica Roth

Divergent

By Veronica Roth

I only checked out this book because the author (on her blog) seems like a really nice person and the book is being made into a movie.

The book starts off as a cross between the Harry Potter Sorting Hat Ceremony and the Hunger Games. But then it really takes a Hunger Games turn when the kids have to fight each other. But it’s not as brutal (to me) because they’re not fighting to kill. Also, they’re only fighting to be accepted.

About 75 pages into it I guessed who the main boy character (Four) was (I mean, who he REALLY was – cough cough). There were very little surprises in this book. Everything was expected. But, it was a page turner. Though, I will admit to skimming because, well, it wasn’t that entertaining. You can pretty much read the first and last sentence of each paragraph and get the idea with this book. It’s not complicated stuff.

Granted, it was more fun to read than the Hunger Games. Though, I don’t think it will make for a very great movie (I really liked the Hunger Games movie). 

Why won’t it make a great movie? The world building is kind of bland. It was hard for me to picture – she relied too heavily on making me use my imagination to decorate her world. Although, I really hate it when people bog down their stories with too much world-building. Really, she might as well have said “This setting is kind of like in the Hunger Games. Dystopia, but less Rococo than the Capitol. Done.”

Because that’s basically what she did say. She spends more time describing the uniforms of the fractions than the actual world. Though, I don’t know if that’s a bad thing.

(Can you tell that my passive critique is actually me having very little ‘feelings’ about this book? That should tell you something about the story itself).

Now, as I said, it was a good book to skim – so simple just to glance over. I even skimmed the romance parts – which were really the only things holding the book together.

There were too many dream and dream-like sequences – I lost count toward the end, but who wants to be taken from “reality” THAT much?

On the Factions: The message of the book is more like a pro-con list of human traits. Each human trait has its limitations and gains. I guess the moral of her story was that you can’t and shouldn’t be “one” thing – humans are more complex than that. You shouldn’t go after knowledge for the sake of knowledge or strength over the sake of strength. I get it. And I certainly think her target audience (16 year olds) would get it too.

Because her message is so clear it makes the story itself platitudinous.

If I had any real beef with the book, it would be about how all the boys like Tris (the main character). You could even argue that one boy commits suicide because he can’t be with Tris.

Despite even her boyfriend admitting Tris isn’t the prettiest girl in the faction, she gets a lot of action. But, overall, I’m glad there wasn’t some Twilight love triangle in the center of the book.  

And Four (the main boy character) is VERY MUCH older than Tris (who is 16) She’s not even legal, yet they make out and touch each other a lot. This is book pretty much gives underage girls the OK to go after older guys. But boy are they going to be surprised when said older guys are NOT as abstinent as Four.

IMO, they should have just had sex and gotten it over with – it would let girls get their ‘fix’ without letting them think such romance is attainable in their own lives. I think I would have respected the book more then. Otherwise, the characters’ relationships are little more purposeful than Twilight’s.

FINAL VERDICT:

6/10. The book was average, but didn’t change my life. The world doesn’t need more kids-hurting-kids dystopias.  I don’t really care about what happens in the next book, so I won’t be reading it.  However, this first book, here, wasn’t a total waste of time. Could have used more jokes, less action, less dream sequences. This book only appeals to young girls, which I don’t like because now I won’t be able to talk about this book to my guy friends.

The Last Oracle by James Rollins

Amanda’s So-called Review: The Last Oracle was a (and no surprise here, right?) DNF for me. 

But I’ll tell you why I didn’t finish it. It wasn’t that the book was bad. I just – from the very start – could tell something was missing. The narrator was talking as if certain things should already be familiar to me. I’m all for narrators not treating me like a complete idiot (unless I’m not supposed to like the narrator) but this feeling was different. So, I did some research online (more like looked it up on Wikipedia) and found that this is a book in a series – and it wasn’t the first book.

Boy did I feel dumb. This was a book from my list! I had no clue it was part of a series. I just liked the cover blurb and what the author had said about Emily Dickenson in his Author’s note-thing.  

Wikipedia also said that James Rollins did some work on an Indiana Jones script, and I can really tell. The Last Oracle really feels like a mix between The Da Vinci Code and a Jones movie.

Needless to say, it’s not that it was a terrible book and that’s why I put it down. It’s just that I really want to start out on the right path with something if I’m going to really invest in it.

The concept was really interesting to me – gypsies and oracles and the Christian mythos. At the very least, I’d watch the movies (when/if they come out).

Hel Speak:

I actually finished this book, and I have to say - it sucked balls. No, that would be too generous. It sucked butt holes.

I didn't feel like the book talked as if I should already know things. After Panda told me it wasn't the first book in the series, I could tell that the author was explaining things in a way that felt a bit contrived, like doing a "on the last episode of..." blurb. So i felt like you could easily read this book without any of the others. It really stands a lone. The only thing that really mattered was that Monk, one of the main characters, had gone missing in the last book and was presumed dead. It probably would have had more of an impact on me if I had already known Monk in the past.

I agree that this was a mix of Indiana Jones and The Da Vinci code. Except not good. For several reasons.

First, I felt like there were several main plots. The main MAIN one was Russia's attempt to take over the world, but I felt that their means of doing so were weak and unrealistic, unworthy of a book.

Second, it was written like an action movie. Like the author expected it to be made into a movie, or was writing a detailed script. The action scenes were ridiculous, as was the "witty" banter. Let me give you a glimpse into one of my favorite (note the sarcasm) scenes:

"Nicolas lowered his outstretched arms - and revealed what was hidden behind the pile of I-beams. The man's hand had been out of view until now.

A second pistol.

It pointed at Gray's belly and fired.

Gray managed to twist sideways, but the bullet still burned a line of fire across his stomach....

...(Gray was) Out of bullets.

The same could not be sad for Nicolas.

The Russian drew a dead bead upon Gray.

As a consequence of his concentration, Nicolas moved the movement along the roof..."

Do I even need to point out the faults here? DODGING BULLETS? My favorite part, of course, is the line "as a consequence of his concentration". Really, you couldn't have worded this any different??? Not to mention that Gray is supposed to be "the best of the best of the best, SIR". So why the hell did it not occur to him that maybe Nicolas was hiding a gun in the hand he was hiding behind an I-BEAM???

ARGGGGH.

Moving on.

Thirdly, it's clear that Rollins did his history. He knows everything about everything. And he wants to show us that he does. Any time there is even the smallest opportunity for a character to lecture, they start speaking in a forced, textbook manner. It's ostentatious. Just shut up.

Fourth, this book had pictures. Yes, PICTURES.

'Nuff said. Don't read it. Just watch the movie.

His Majesty's Dragon by Naomi Novik

Panda’s Punishment Post on: His Majesty’s Dragon by Naomi Novik. 

HMD is book one of the Temeaire series. 

My grade: 6/10. 

I read this book years ago. The things I can remember about it is: it had dragons and is an alternate history set during the Napoleonic wars where dragons act as airplanes for battle. I can’t really remember names or the breeds of dragons. Nor do I really care to look them up. 

The dragon-concept is kind of like Eragon, where the dragon imprints on the human of its choosing (that was an Eragon thing right?). But it’s also like Pirates of the Caribbean in the fact that there are ships and navy stuff goes on. It was an interesting concept. 

 

Buuuut. 

The novel was 1) too long, 2) too much like a romance novel (as my Fantasy Literature professor pointed out to me: at one point the main character gives the dragon a NECKLACE. And, he – the MC – is super monogamous with her…to the point he doesn’t have a girlfriend or real human relationship

because he’s so devoted to his Dragon), and 3) there were not enough human interactions, 4) the Dragon types were too complicated to keep up with, and 5) the book is part of an overdone genre – dragon and historical fantasy-wise.   

In a lot of ways it felt like it was TRYING to be the Pirates of the Caribbean of Dragon tales. It also felt like Novik ripped off some of the POTC ideas. There’s even a Mr. Gibbs character – WITH THE SAME NAME. 

Read it if you’re into that sort of thing (as in Dragons). But it won’t change your life. I think it would make an interesting movie though. I would watch it. And it’s better than any other dragon book I’ve read (I hate Christopher Paolini’s books, if that helps decipher my opinion). In reality, I think it would have made a better game than a book - participating in the scenes would have been better than reading them (it was a dense read at times).

 

I only mention this because Novik actually used to be a game designer. Or, I could be wrong. But, if I’m right…I’m pretty sure she should stick to games, sorry.  

Another interesting thing is that all – or most – of the books in the series were copyrighted AT THE SAME TIME. That probably means she wrote them all before publishing the first one. Which means she either is 1) a really prolific writer or 2) it took a long-ass time to sell this first book, allowing her to work on the others as well. Not sure what that means, but… 

I recommend  watching How to Train Your Dragon. Dragons don’t get better than that.

Wild by Cheryl Strayed

Panda grumbles: Wild was a DNF (again) for me. I read up to 146/315 pages, though. So, I’m still going to review what I read and tell you why I didn’t finish (Panda is nothing but helpful). 

By page 5, when I read she had been a homecoming queen and a cheerleader I already hated her. But I knew that “cheerleader” was kind of a different stereotype for back then, so I forgave her (something I felt like I was having to do a lot in this book, another reason I eventually stopped reading) and kept at it.

She, the author, is very self-involved – even going so far as to say she helped her ex-husband apply for grad school – as if she had anything to do with him getting accepted (because of course you’re accepted based on who you’re married to). It was her little comments like that that made me want to punch her in the face. She thinks the world revolves around her.  Everyone she meets on her “adventure” seems so poised to help her. She had no struggle at all – nothing she was really fighting against except her own stupid self – something I could not sympathize with because I AM NOTHING LIKE HER.

Another thing about the book that I hated was that… Well, she meets so many guys on the trail. She sexualizes ALL of them as if all they were – or should have been – into her. She goes on the trail to get away from her sex life (and other things) only to create a new one there. News flash, girl friend, you are not God’s gift to man and you are not God’s gift to the memoir. Your story was pointless and emphasizes the fact you are full of yourself.  

Writing a punishment post is a pleasure if I don’t have to finish your book! lol.


Hel speaks:

I agree with Amanda's points, but they didn't ruin the book for me. You don't have to be like Strayed to appreciate her struggle. I think (and Amanda would have realized this if she had finished :P) that Strayed's honesty about her admittedly horrible, self centered, depraved personality is not a boast but a depiction of the evolution of her character while out on the trail. It's really no surprise that she thinks she is the cats meow, because everyone she comes across seems to think she is as well. That breeds ego. I've looked at her website and have to admit that she still comes across like an abrasive person and definitely not someone I would like in real life, but I admire her perseverance and courage. I could only dream of doing what she did (and dream of it I do!)

Strayed jumps around in her story telling. She begins the book towards the middle of her hike and then back tracks. Throughout her hike, she looks back on her life and explains the things that made her who she was on that trail. I liked this continual unfolding, but I can see how it is also a detriment for readers like Panda who hate Strayed for who she was at the beginning of the trail without knowing WHY. Maybe the reasons don't matter, but there are valid ones. SPOILER ALERT. Strayed is abused by her father as a child, and was forced to watch him abuse her siblings and mother. Strayed is raised by her mother and later step father in a very interesting setting - on a huge plot of land in Minnesota, first in a little handmade shack with an outhouse and later in a small house that they also built themselves. She became extremely close to her mom so watching her die an agonizing death breaks her as a person. She becomes a sex addict, cheats numerous times on her husband, leaves him and lives in a cocaine (or was it heroine?) haze for a while, etc etc, until she finally decides she needs something to wake her up: a one thousand mile hike.

The interesting/enthralling part of this book isn't the writing (which is very good, in my opinion), or the character, but the hike. The obstacles she and the other hikers face, and how they overcome them. Seeing them struggle and overcome is mind boggling and makes you feel powerful, like humans can do anything. It was certainly an inspiration to me.

To contradict Panda, as I always do - I would highly recommend this book.