What I’m Reading

I’m trying to do these posts more often so I don’t forget what the books were about in the meantime. I was pleased to see that the only 5-star read from my last book post, Demon Copperhead by Barbara Kingsolver, received a Pulitzer in the Fiction category.

The Heart’s Invisible Furies, John Boyne (2017)

My only 5-star read this time is an historical fiction that tells the story of Cyril, a homosexual boy growing up in a very conservative and religious Ireland in the 1940s. The story jumps ahead in seven year chunks, following Cyril from Dublin to a far more liberal Amsterdam, then to New York City during the rise of the AIDS epidemic, and then back to a changed Ireland.

I suspected I’d like this novel when I read the first line:

Long before we discovered that he had fathered two children by two different women, one in Drimoleague and one in Clonakilty, Father James Monroe stood on the altar of the Church of Our Lady, Star of the Sea, in the parish of Goleen, West Cork, and denounced my mother as a whore.

I couldn’t recall having ever read another novel with a gay protagonist and although Cyril is, like all the characters, flawed, I felt great empathy for the impossible situation he found himself in. Despite the sometimes heavy subject matter, the book is full of witty banter so there’s plenty of comic relief mixed in.

I like to read the one-star reviews for books I really enjoyed to get a different perspective. For this one, the main complaints were that it was vulgar in places and that the characters weren’t likeable. I’ve always found that latter critique interesting as I’ve rarely met a well-developed character I didn’t like, which is not to say I’d want to be friends with them, but rather that the author has humanized them for me. I understand why they behave the way they do.

Shuggie Bain, Douglas Stuart (2020)

By sheer coincidence, the next book I picked up also had a gay protagonist. It’s a coming-of-age novel about a young boy named Shuggie, growing up amidst poverty and addiction in Glasgow during the Thatcher era. The focus of the book is on Shuggie’s relationship with his alcoholic mother, but also his struggles with growing up ‘different’, so there were some commonalities with The Heart’s Invisible Furies and it was interesting to read the two back-to-back.

It is, without question, a bleak book, but also a well-written and hard-hitting one. It won the Booker Prize in 2020. Four stars, but proceed with caution if you don’t like depressing reads.

Tomorrow, and Tomorrow, and Tomorrow, Gabrielle Zevin (2022)

I borrowed this book from Nick who received it as a Christmas gift from Meg’s parents. It’s about three friends who make video games together. It’s also about platonic love based on a shared passion and creative connection. It’s a character-driven novel, with the plot being secondary, so an interest in gaming isn’t necessary to enjoy it. It includes a lot of astute observations about life and relationships, often by applying concepts from gaming to real life.

A few quotes I liked:

“What is a game?” Marx said. “It’s tomorrow, and tomorrow, and tomorrow. It’s the possibility of infinite rebirth, infinite redemption. The idea that if you keep playing, you could win. No loss is permanent, because nothing is permanent, ever.” 

“We are all living, at most, half of a life, she thought. There was the life you lived, which consisted of the choices you made. And then, there was the other life, the one that was the things you hadn’t chosen.” 

“This is what time travel is. It’s looking at a person, and seeing them in the present and the past, concurrently. And that mode of transport only worked with those one had known a significant time.”

“Sam’s doctor said to him, ‘The good news is that the pain is in your head.’
But I am in my head, Sam thought.” 

Unlike the first two novels, this one doesn’t easily fit into a genre, and its originality was a large part of its appeal. It might have been a tad longer than it needed to be, but that’s nit-picking. Four stars.

The Henna Artist, Alka Joshi (2020)

This was a book club selection that – as far as I recall – we all enjoyed. We also all enjoyed the Indian food that was served at our book club meeting as we try to keep the food & drink in line with the book’s setting. This novel is set in India in the 1950s and tells the story of Lakshmi, who leaves her village and an unhappy marriage behind at the age of 17 and makes a fresh start as a henna artist and herbalist to the wealthy. Her life gets more complicated when a 13-year old sister she didn’t know existed shows up on the scene. It was an interesting and enjoyable read and the subject matter wasn’t too heavy.

This was the first book in a trilogy, with the next two books following the lives of other characters in the story. Four stars.

The Elegance of the Hedgehog, Muriel Barbery (2006)

I first picked up the original French version of this book when I was on language training. The terminology was too complex for me to understand so I didn’t get far, but from what I could decipher, it seemed like a book I’d enjoy. Unaware of that, Ray happened to give me the English version for my birthday.

Without having read it, I suggested it for our book club. It received mixed reviews from the group. It’s easy to understand why as there’s no plot and very little dialogue for the first three-quarters of the book. It definitely falls into the literary fiction category.

The story is set in a high-end apartment complex and the two main characters, a dowdy middle-aged concierge who secretly reads Tolstoy and listens to Mozart, and a 12-year old girl with a very high IQ who is contemplating ending her life on her 13th birthday, work and live in the building respectively. These two characters take turns writing philosophical treatises on various subjects, in the form of diary entries. Both are highly intelligent and searching for meaning. There is much in the book about the beauty to be found in art, music, nature, food and language. If you’re not into philosophy, and frankly, even if you are, those chapters, which are more like mini-essays, can be a bit dense.

Whether intended or not, one of the effects of this structure is that the reader comes to appreciate the sense of isolation and loneliness of these two characters. They each spend a lot of time alone with their thoughts and it’s only when a new tenant moves in that life – and the story – gains some momentum.

The most common critique of the book is that it’s pretentious and/or the characters are pretentious. I agree that the characters are pretentious and judgemental, but I wanted to know why. What are they afraid of? Why are they prickly like a hedgehog on the outside? Show me the soft underbelly.

We do get those answers eventually, but it’s a long, and sometimes rambling, road to get there.

You might love it or you might hate it. Three-and-a-half stars for me.

That Summer in Berlin, Lecia Cornwall (2022)

When it comes to fiction genres, I’m not much into spy novels, or romance novels, or novels that are more plot-driven than character-driven. This book was all three, so it already had three strikes against it, but it wasn’t particularly well-written either, so all hope was lost. It was a ‘blind’ book club pick (i.e., none of us had read it) and we all found it lacking. Two-and-a-half stars.

Outlive: The Science & Art of Longevity, Dr. Peter Attia (2023)

It’s rather unusual for me to read non-fiction that isn’t a memoir, but I’m trying to focus more on my health these days and I’d seen a few references to this book on longevity that piqued my interest. Longevity doesn’t really run in my family. The average lifespan of my parents and grandparents is about 66. Fortunately genetics only accounts for about 25% of longevity, so there’s a lot I can do to stack the deck in my favour.

I already know most of what I should be doing and I’m doing all right in some areas. I don’t smoke or do drugs, I drink relatively little alcohol, and I eat fairly healthy most of the time. My cholesterol and weight are within the normal range. But…I’ve been on blood pressure medication for years, courtesy of my dad’s genes and I’m not nearly as physically active as I need to be.

One of the main arguments of the book is that exercise is the single most important thing you can do to increase not only your lifespan, but your healthspan (the number of years you can continue to do the things you want to do). Exercise has a greater impact on your longevity than smoking.

As I was reading the book, I realized that Ray would likely outlive me by about 30 years unless I made some changes. All my ‘hobbies’ are sedentary – reading, writing, researching, doing crosswords, teaching kids to read, drinking tea, eating ice cream – and I’m really quite lazy when it comes to physical activity. I’ve been taking some steps to improve that already, paying a personal trainer to make me lift heavy things, cycling and dragon boating.

The book put a scare into me, but I’ve yet to determine if it will result in lasting change. If it does, it will deserve 5 stars. Rating TBD.