false 9 107 103 true 5822622 read 4 true 4239270 currently-reading 0 true 4239269 to-read 31 false 4241384 graphic-novels 3 false 4764475 hush 2 false 4763312 do-audiobooks-count 2 false 4763495 the-movie-let-me-down 1 false 4753078 design-and-type http://www.goodreads.com/review/show/51512998 to: Valiant: A Modern Tale of Faerie (Book 2) by Holly Black
bookshelves: hush
My personal favorite in the Ironside series, perhaps because it features a mortal female protagonist instead of a faerie, who thinks her life is hard until she falls in with a group of street kids who act as drug-runners for a troll -- and, unbeknownst to him, have been dipping into his supply.

Val is both tough and realistically naive, a lacrosse-playing tomboy kicked off her team for punching one too many teammates, who deals with a highly unpleasant revelation by running away without any plans but an unqualified assurance that everything will work out for her. She finds she doesn't even know the beginning of a troubled life, but she learns to adapt.

Like Kaye in Tithe and Ironside, Val is not merely a passive vessel of desire and rescue for male characters, but a character who grows in the face of hard discoveries, both about the world she thought she knew and about herself. Val ends up controlling and honing her aggression into swordfighting, which, of course, comes in useful -- and finds that her strength of character and athletic ability makes her a worthy foe for the cruel and capricious faeries. And I liked this very much. More Vals, please!

(Also, who knew trolls were so sexy?) ]]> http://www.goodreads.com/review/show/51522615 Half Asleep in Frog Pajamas (Paperback) by Tom Robbins
I know I finished this because I read it at a time in my life before I realized that I'm not compelled to finish any books I don't like. That having been said, I don't remember much of it, except for an utterly unlikeable main character -- a shrill woman who wants to play the market, but apparently has no talent for it, and wants to put her beat parents far behind her -- and some rebellious man with a pretty penis and cancer who becomes her love interest.

Robbins usually makes enjoyably flawed characters, but the protagonist was too far gone, too cold and unpleasant to relate to -- a fact made more apparent by Robbins' use of second person narrative. I didn't want to be this woman.

Also, the complex chain of interconnected events and obscure religions that play a part in the story were just too much, even for Robbins. I found myself simply not caring about the holistic series of happenings. Everything felt extraneous to the central fact that I didn't like this woman and certainly didn't like being asked to experience the story from her point of view. ]]> http://www.goodreads.com/review/show/61387001 to: The Late Bloomer's Revolution (Hardcover) by Amy Cohen
I learned that apparently, even if you have a successful career by your early 30s, which includes being on television, and can afford your own apartment in Manhattan, trips to other countries and a private dermatologist, you are a "late bloomer" if you're not married. Really!

I am partly to blame, due to my differing expectations: as a person whose career hasn't really taken ground, I was looking for inspiration on that front, thinking of people who didn't really find their calling until their 50s. I've been feeling sluggish about my motivations and direction and thought some light-hearted read about a similar shlub might provide a little inspiration.

I know people who want to get married and have children probably do feel like failures when they don't make their goal and wind up at 38 without a husband, but ... it wasn't even that funny of a book, really. More sad and pathetic and self-loathing, but not even in an interesting way. The humor is watery and is poorly juxtaposed with attempts at seriousness, plus the targets of her humor and their accompanying critiques are largely predictable.

Overall, this book was more depressing than enlightening. The chapter in which she finally learns to ride a bike at 35 is completely self-deprecating and hopeless -- eventually it's implied that she does learn to keep her balance and stay on the bicycle -- but late bloomer stories are usually success stories, not failure stories.

I guess I can always read a biography on Grandma Moses for that punch in the arm. File this book under the worst excesses of "chick lit." ]]> http://www.goodreads.com/review/show/59353350 to: Potential (Paperback) by Ariel Schrag
bookshelves: graphic-novels
]]> http://www.goodreads.com/review/show/59351474 to: Likewise: The High School Comic Chronicles of Ariel Schrag (Paperback) by Ariel Schrag
bookshelves: graphic-novels
I waited for this book for five years and I was not disappointed, although I don't think Likewise is as accessible as Schrag's previous books, it does show growth in her style and some incredibly bold pretention for a then 18-year-old. The Joycean stream of consciousness can get a little tiresome, but in context, the young author had her mind blown by Ulysses and can't be faulted for trying to achieve a similar effect in writing her own story in the same style.

As it did in Potential, the art fluctuates wildly from loose gestural sketches to more realistic drawing.

I admit my understanding and appreciation of Likewise largely depended on my having read Potential and wanting to see what happened with her and Sally or her parents' divorce. This book follows the aftermath of both plots (her mother's detailed "custody log" is not to be missed) and brings Ariel's confusion about the biological basis for homosexuality and the experiences of being a young, published, autobiographical comics artist -- a young journalist at a magazine party begs Ariel not to put an impending make-out session into her next comic -- into the forefront. ]]> http://www.goodreads.com/review/show/51523691 to: Lying Awake (Paperback) by Mark Salzman
]]> http://www.goodreads.com/review/show/51523541 to: Me Talk Pretty One Day (Paperback) by David Sedaris
]]> http://www.goodreads.com/review/show/51523515 to: Dress Your Family in Corduroy and Denim (Paperback) by David Sedaris
bookshelves: do-audiobooks-count
]]> http://www.goodreads.com/review/show/51523493 Barrel Fever: Stories and Essays (Paperback) by David Sedaris
]]> http://www.goodreads.com/review/show/51523469 to: When You Are Engulfed in Flames (Hardcover) by David Sedaris
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