For the bibliophiles

With windchills in the -35 to -40 range and heavy snowfall, it’s been the perfect weather to stay indoors, curled up by the fire with a cup of tea and a book.

Most people know I like to read, but you’d probably be surprised to learn that Ray reads more than I do. He read 30 books last year to my 24. Part of the reason for the perception/reality discrepancy is that Ray has so many other interests that reading gets a bit overshadowed by those. He’s also not a bibliophile like me. He fails to understand, for example, why someone would order new books on Amazon when there are hundreds of perfectly good unread books around the house (“yes, but we don’t have this book”).

Ray is the tortoise and I’m the hare. He reads in short but regular spurts – early morning, late afternoon and before going to sleep. I’m a binge reader. I inhale books. Once I start, I do little else until I get to the last page. I might read five books one month and then go six weeks without reading a thing. ‘Slow and steady wins the race’, appears to be accurate in this instance.

I read mostly memoirs, historical fiction, and character-driven novels. I’m drawn to stories about the strength of the human spirit to overcome adversity. I rarely read fantasy, sci-fi, mystery, horror, thriller, romance or self-help genres, but there are always exceptions.

I’ve decided to add an occasional post about the books I’ve been reading, for those of you who are also avid readers. Given my hare-like tendencies, the posts will be sporadic. I’m about 45 pages into a 400+ page novel called L’élégance du hérisson, (The Elegance of the Hedgehog), so it could be a looooong time before the next post about books. I’m attempting to read the french version in prep for our 2-month pet sit in France this spring. The book is about a dowdy middle-aged concierge who reads philosophy and is highly-intelligent, but hides that fact from the rich, bourgeois tenants; and a bright, intuitive 12-year old who’s grappling with existential questions and has decided to kill herself on her 13th birthday. Given my level of french comprehension, it will be a very shallow read of what sounds like a deep, philosophical book. We’ll see how far I get.

In the meantime, here are my 2019 reads so far:

The Tattooist of Auschwitz (Heather Morris) – Rating: 3 out of 5
This is a fictionalized account of a true story, as told to the author by Lali Sokolov, who, as a prisoner in Auschwitz, received the task of tattooing numbers onto the other prisoners as they arrived. He met and fell in love with his future wife in the camp. The book tells the story of how one couple’s love provided hope amidst the horror.

I’ve read a few memoirs by Auschwitz survivors, including Night and Man’s Search for Meaning, but by far the most impactful were If This is a Man (US title: Survival in Auschwitz) and The Drowned and the Saved, by Primo Levi. They’re among my top 10 books of all time, not only for their account of Levi’s experiences, but also for his insights on human nature, and his discussion on the grey zone between good and evil. The Tattooist pales in comparison.

The Orphan’s Tale (Pam Jenoff) – Rating: 3 out of 5
A teenage girl, shunned by her family, impulsively saves a Jewish baby from the boxcar of a train during WWII. A Jewish woman is rejected by her soldier husband by order of the Nazi party. Both women end up performing in a travelling circus whose owner helps hide them from the authorities. The novel is about the bond that develops between the two women and the sacrifices they make for each other.

Despite an interesting premise, inspired by historical events, the novel fell flat for me because the emotional connections between the characters didn’t feel authentic.

Little Green (Tish Cohen) – Rating: 3.5 out of 5
The cover of Little Green poses the question: “How Much Pressure Can a Marriage Take?” In this book, an equestrian sacrifices time with her husband and daughter to pursue her Olympic dream. Her husband, a lawyer, sacrifices his own dreams to take on the role of supportive spouse and primary caregiver. Their marriage is stretched to the breaking point when 8-year old Gracie goes missing. The book explores the tightrope act required to balance one’s own dreams with having a family.

The plot lacked credibility at times and the ending was a bit too “wrapped up in a bow” for my liking, but overall a good beach or airplane read. This was the third novel I’d read by Tish Cohen, a Canadian author, the others being Town House and Inside Out Girl. Town House was my favourite of the three.

All My Puny Sorrows (Miriam Toews) – Rating: 4.5 out of 5
All My Puny Sorrows is about two sisters, one of whom wants to die, and the other desperate to stop that from happening. The novel draws heavily on Toews’ (pronounced Taves) own life experience. It’s full of sadness and rage and despair, but also humour and joy and love. It’s about many things – how mental patients are treated, the free-spiritedness of childhood and the heaviness of becoming an adult, suicidal tendencies, impossible choices, psychic pain, sisterly love, the bonds of family and friendship that carry us through the tough times, and the need to find humour amidst the sadness in life.

I’d previously read A Complicated Kindness by Toews (also Canadian), and after reading this one, I’ll pick up more of her work. I love her writing style and her wit (though I wouldn’t recommend this one as a beach read – it’s a bit heart-wrenching). I identified more than usual with the characters in this book, particularly the closeness of the sisters and the humorous lens the author views the world through even during the traumatic events she’s experienced. I don’t think a book has ever brought me to tears, but suffice to say, my sister would have sobbed her way through this one.

One sign that a book has affected me deeply is that I get frustrated with negative reviews, arrogantly deciding that those readers just didn’t ‘get it’, so if you decide to read this one and don’t like it, maybe keep that opinion to yourself. I might judge.

With that caveat, feel free to use the comments section to let me know what you thought of these books if you’ve read them and/or to recommend a book you think I’d enjoy, because you can never have too many unread books lying around the house.