Cory Day’s Comments (group member since Aug 18, 2012)

Cory Day’s comments from the Reading with Style group.

20.5 Alice Munro (2013) - Awards

Barney's Version by Mordecai Richler

Review: When I started this book, I thought I was in for the type of book I tend not to like – an account of a white, affluent, often Jewish man dissatisfied with his life and obsessed with his penis. I guess to some extent that’s what I got, but Barney’s Version actually has a couple of compelling parts to the story that made me care. I’m not sure that caring was ever extended to the character itself, but that didn’t matter. The mystery of whether or not Barney murdered his friend kind of mixed together with his declining mental state to create a much more compelling journey than I ever expected – just another example of not judging a book until you’ve read it.

+20 Task (Scotiabank Giller Prize 1997)
+10 Review
+5 Combo (10.8 – Canada)

Task Total: 35
Grand Total: 1740

Kate S wrote: "Cory Day wrote: "I've got a question about my scoring - is there a reason my mega finish isn't included? I shifted things around and Kate caught them, and I have no discrepancies on the scoring any..."

No problem! Thanks!

10.6 Australia Day

That Deadman Dance by Kim Scott

Review: I’m not really sure how to review this book, since my thoughts were a little all over the map on it. At first I was totally sucked into this world of first contact between native people and white settlers in Australia – the author mentions wanting to capture a sense of playfulness, which he does, especially at the beginning. But somewhere along the way I started losing track of what perspective I was following, what time period it was, and what was happening overall. By the end, when the inevitable really happens, I found myself kind of not caring much anymore. I am glad I read it, because I learned a little about something of which I basically have no knowledge. The thing that most caught my attention may have been unintentional – I found myself looking up ways of building in Australia during the 1830s and 1840s. I didn’t know the English sometimes brought prefabricated homes with them when settling!

+10 Task (Western Australian Premier’s Book Award for fiction 2010)
+10 Combo (10.2, 10.9 – 3.48)
+10 Review

Task Total: 30
Grand Total: 1705

20.9 Winnie-the-Pooh (1882-1956)

After Midnight by Irmgard Keun

Review: After Midnight is short, and it doesn’t really have much of a plot, but it’s powerful if only because of the setting and timing of its publishing. Keun wrote it when she was very young and published it in 1937, just after fleeing Nazi Germany. The book is proof that even if it might have been difficult to comprehend where Hitler would eventually take Europe, the signs were there a year before Kristallnacht even happened. Keun paints a picture of a Germany that was obviously heading somewhere scary, with her main character fleeing with her lover just as the author had done. It’d be a good book to study to show how little things can eventually add up to something horrifyingly big.

+20 Task (published 1937)
+10 Oldies
+10 Review
+15 Combo (10.2, 10.9 – 3.85, 20.4 – Keun was German, wrote this in German)

Task Total: 55
Grand Total: 1675

20.7 Feminism

Ella Enchanted by Gail Carson Levine

+20 Task
(Lexile 670 – no styles)

Task Total: 20
Grand Total: 1620

Elizabeth (Alaska) wrote: "Cory Day wrote: "I've got a question about my scoring - is there a reason my mega finish isn't included? I shifted things around and Kate caught them, and I have no discrepancies on the scoring any..."

Thanks Elizabeth! I just wanted to make sure I haven't messed up anywhere :)

I've got a question about my scoring - is there a reason my mega finish isn't included? I shifted things around and Kate caught them, and I have no discrepancies on the scoring anywhere. I can list my books for each task if you want, but it'll be a long post - let me know if I should. Thanks!

20.10 Leap Year (EXTRA)

The Troublemaker Next Door by Marie Harte

Review: The Troublemaker Next Door is a good example of the kind of straight contemporary romance that is just fine, but never really connects with me. I’ve never been sure why, since new adult and most male-male romances are set in the present day (and I love both of those genres), those featuring straight couples outside of college are much more hit-or-miss. Anyway, this was fine, and a quick read to finish up my RwS challenge early, but I never really connected with it. There’s a LOT of sex in this book, and while it never really got all that kinky, they do use a lot of dirty talk, which is really not my thing at all. The side characters in many ways stole the show, so I’m hopeful that the later books might be more satisfying. I’m not in any hurry to pick those up though.

+20 Task
+5 Series
+10 Review
+5 Combo (10.9 – 3.81)

Task Total: 40
RwS Completion Bonus: 100
Mega Finish: 200
Grand Total: 1600

20.8 Best of 2015

Fever Pitch by Heidi Cullinan

Review: Fever Pitch is the sequel to Cullinan’s Love Lessons, which I read last year. I think I liked this one even better than that one (and it looks like I gave it an extra star, so there we go). Aaron is a very confused new high school graduate when we meet him, and Giles is an out gay guy anxious to leave for college in order to escape his closed minded small Minnesota town. When they run into each other at a party held by one of their classmates, they share an evening that neither can forget. They soon end up in college, and despite some silly misunderstandings caused by not talking to each other they have a sweet romance together. I liked that the main conflict in the book ended up being external to the romance. It also looks like it leads nicely into the third in the series, which I’ll have to restrain myself from finding right away. I wish my libraries (and I have three library cards!) carried more of Cullinan’s books.

+20 Task (NPR Book Concierge)
+10 Review
+5 Series

Task Total: 35
Grand Total: 1260

10.10 Group Reads

My Brilliant Friend by Elena Ferrante

Review: I don’t exactly know what I expected from this book, but I didn’t really expect it to be as engaging as it was. Maybe it’s because I’ve heard so much about it from more “literary” circles, or because it’s a sprawling saga, but I thought I’d be kind of bored by it. Instead, I found myself continuing with it even after downloading a romance I really wanted to read. My Brilliant Friend is good, although I did find the writing (or translation?) kind of clunky. It still tells a story that was just different enough to be interesting, opening the world of post-WWII Naples in a way that made me feel like I was learning something. I almost wanted to continue straight to the next book since this one doesn’t exactly have a satisfying ending, but I have too many other books out of the library for that!!

+10 Task
+10 Review
+5 Series
+10 Combo (10.9 – 3.96, 20.4 – Italian woman – it’s a pen name but everything I’ve read says she’s female – and originally written in Italian)

Task Total: 35
Grand Total: 1225

I’d also like to switch Three Moments of an Explosion: Stories by China Miéville from post 694 from 20.8 to 10.3.

New Totals:

+10 Task
+10 Review
+15 Combo (10.2 – 3.62, 20.8, 20.10)

Task Total: 35
Grand Total: 1190

Thanks again!

I’d like to change Edge of Dark by Brenda Cooper from post 396 from 10.9 to 10.1.

New totals:

+10 Task (http://www.locusmag.com/Magazine/2015...)
+10 Review
+10 Combo (10.2, 10.9 – 3.26)

Task Total: 30
Grand Total: 1200

Thanks!

20.2 Sigrid Undset (1928)

Beauty and the Beast by Hannah Howell

Review: This book left me feeling basically… blah. Maybe it was my mood. Maybe it was the setting. Maybe it was the publication date – a little earlier than I’ve been tending toward in romances. Whatever the reason, I didn’t enjoy it the way I should have. The good: mainly the main female character, who was pretty awesome. The not as good: “Beauty and the Beast” was really a misnomer, since the main physical flaw the guy has is that he’s large and red haired. Also, Howell’s writing wasn’t awful, but she’d get stuck on words. Most of them would just be used a few times close together (words like “hirsute”), although one continued to recur (“howbeit”). It was distracting and unnecessary, making an already plodding plot even more drawn out.

+20 Task (set in 1365)
+10 Review
+5 Combo (10.9 – 3.86)

Task Total: 35
Grand Total: 1195

15.1 – Dominoes (round 2)

The Aeronaut's Windlass by Jim Butcher

+15 Task

Task Total: 15
Grand Total: 1160

20.8 Best of 2015

Three Moments of an Explosion: Stories by China Miéville

Review: China Miéville has so many ideas and such attention to language that his writing can tire me out a little. Short stories work really well for that – one ends, and I can pick something up to cleanse my palate. As with most collections, I found these a little hit or miss, but some of them will really stick with me. In one of the earliest (the first?) reminded me of an episode of Doctor Who, the things that have been disappearing from the environment (icebergs, coral reefs, rainforests, etc.) begin reappearing in strange locations. Most of the stories trend closer to magical realism than anything else, but some could technically happen now, but would make for a scary world, like the one where some psychologists take to assassination in order to help their patients.

+20 Task (NPR Book Concierge)
+10 Review
+10 Combo (10.2 – 3.62, 20.10)

Task Total: 40
Grand Total: 1140

20.1 Grazia Deledda (1926) - Sense of place

Provoked by Joanna Chambers

Review: This might be my first historical male-male romance (although, I will warn, it is very much part of a trilogy). I’ve always found myself having a harder time buying into any kind of happy ending for homosexual couples much earlier than present day, even though I know that’s kind of a ridiculous thing to think for a number of reasons. Anyway, I got over myself and read this, and kind of want to go straight on to the next one in the series. The story follows David, a young lawyer with strong ideals that have led him both to helping a group of Scottish rebels with their legal trouble and also to thinking that having feelings for other men is a great sin. Not a ton of character development happens during this installment, but the end promises a good deal more of it from future books.

+20 Task (http://dearauthor.com/misc/reading-li... - in the comments by Jorrie Spencer)
+10 Review
+5 Series
+5 Combo (10.2)

Task Total: 40
Grand Total: 1100

20.9 Winnie-the-Pooh (1882-1956)

Palladian by Elizabeth Taylor

Review: The description of Palladian says it subverts the conventions of a traditional novel telling the story of a governess who falls in love with her employer. Reviews say it’s a satire, and the introduction in my copy calls it a ‘fairy-story’ of sorts. All of those are true, yet I found it fell completely flat for me. It’s clearly both influenced by and criticizing books like Jane Eyre, Wuthering Heights, and the works of Jane Austen, explicitly mentioning all three as well as referencing them indirectly. But to me it felt more like a combination of loosely connected short stories than a novel, and the atmospheric qualities of all the references were missing. I also guessed at least part of the twist at the end, if you can call it that. My overall impression was that I feel like I skimmed the book rather than truly engaging with it, although whether that was my fault or the book’s I’m not sure.

+20 Task (published 1946)
+10 Review
+5 Combo (10.9 – 3.63)
+5 Oldies

Task Total: 40
Grand Total: 1060

20.7 Feminism

Who Fears Death by Nnedi Okorafor

Review: Who Fears Death took longer for me to read than many books do. Most of that is my failing rather than Okorafor’s – when reading something so far removed from stories using typical white European backgrounds, even fantasy can be difficult to sink into. There might have been a pacing issue, but I think this tale – part science fiction, part folk lore, and part all too real – is worth the slow middle. It certainly belongs on the list of feminist books, since the themes almost entirely revolved around the realities of being a woman, subject to discrimination and rape. I have a hard time saying anything more directly about the plot, not because I’m avoiding spoilers but because it’s almost dreamlike in how it unfolds.

+20 Task (#96)
+15 Combo (10.2, 10.3 - #97, 10.9 – 3.91)
+10 Review

Task Total: 45
Grand Total: 1020

10.8 Winter Solstice

The Deal by Elle Kennedy

Review: The Deal is yet another “New Adult” romance set in a fictional Northeastern US college and featuring a hockey player hero. I’m a sucker for these kinds of books, and this one didn’t disappoint. Hannah and Garrett are both pretty cute and Kennedy did an okay job keeping the unnecessary angst to a minimum. Both characters have pretty messed up backgrounds, but the story doesn’t lean too heavily on them for cheap emotions. They even did a good job communicating with each other – in one case in particular, I expected one particular misunderstanding to result in chapters’ worth of not talking, but they resolved it in one scene. It’s nice when characters use their brains.

+10 Task (born in Canada)
+5 Series
+10 Review

Task Total: 25
Grand Total: 975

20.1 Grazia Deledda (1926) - Sense of place

A Dangerous Man by Anne Brooke

Review: I had this book filed under romance, and it really is anything but. I was glad to read some reviews ahead of time warning me of that fact, because I would’ve been devastated by the end of the book otherwise. It’s really more of a psychological thriller in which you never really find out all the details of what’s happening. Calling it romance is a little like calling Gone Girl romance, although the first half could easily be part of a J.L. Merrow story with a happy ending. I have to say, I prefer Merrow, but this was a good book. I’m a little worried about picking up more of the author’s work, because she writes in a bunch of genres and I’m not sure what I’d get.

+20 Task (http://www.arecafe.com/books/a-danger...)
+10 Review
+10 Combo (10.2, 10.9)

Task Total: 40
Grand Total: 950