Status Updates From There There

gifted this book by a friend 💗 it’s an absolute gut punch already

A debut novel featuring interconnected stories which is my favorite (The Nix) - really good doesn’t quite leave things feeling complete? I’ll be thinking about it for some time. Perhaps that is the point. I think it would benefit from a reread. Fitting to finish on Indigenous peoples day

Today I read about the upcoming Powwow at the Oakland Coliseum. It makes me very sad to think about the horrific effects of colonization on Native people. I like this book, though, because it has a modern narrator commenting on all this.

We are.. slightly cooking

The emotion-to-page ratio in this book is astounding

Ok we are starting to cook a little

I feel so sure this book will be good. I would just like for it to get started

“Before you were born, you were an egg in your mom who was an egg in her mom. Before you were born, you were the nested Russian grandmother doll of possibility in your mom’s
ovaries. You were two halves of a thousand different kinds of possibilities, a million heads or tails, flip-shine on a spun coin.”
Oh I’m crying, of course!!

things are piecing together but there’s so many Povs i’m struggling a little (also i’m listening on audio)

oh this is gonna be GOOD

Crying actual tears!

I have a book club on Fable reading this book. Come check it out: The Nēnē Book Club.

Some of the characters' lives are starting to intersect in interesting ways. Everything is building up to the big powwow in the Oakland Coliseum. Everything seems very ominous; I hope something good will happen for at least some of the characters.

One of the things I love about this book is that as we gear closer to the final act the chapters get shorter and shorter. We spend less time with the characters and it adds a sense of urgency. It almost feels like being in a car with no brakes rushing downhill and all you can do is hold on for the ride

Today I read about Bill Davis, who works at the Oakland Coliseum. It was interesting to read about because that's where I grew up, and he talks about big sporting events in the 1970's that I wasn't alive for. There is tension building as I know one of the characters is headed to the Coliseum with a gun.

DNF- well written, but very sad. Not in the frame of mind to finish.

the suspense is unreal

I remember it all too well

“If you’re fortunate enough to be born into a family whose ancestors directly benefited from genocide and/or slavery, maybe you think the more you don’t know, the more innocent you can stay, which is a good incentive to not find out, […], to walk carefully around the sleeping tiger. Look no further than your last name. Follow it back and you might find your line paved with gold, or beset with traps.”

Preparing myself to be heartbroken again

wow

I’m not sure if I’m fully convinced of Orange’s fiction writing—but wow are his concessions powerful. He’s at his best in the prologue and the interlude thus far, and his writing cuts like bullets, right through you. This is powerful stuff!

I’m not sure if I’m fully convinced of Orange’s fiction writing—but wow are his concessions powerful. He’s at his best in the prologue and the interlude thus far, and his writing cuts like bullets, right through you. This is powerful stuff!

So far it’s gripping but at times hard to get through because it’s subject matter can at times be dark. But I think that’s a good thing it makes you pause and really think about what you’ve just read.

Took a while for me to get into it but im enjoying it now

This book is like really really good guys

So far there, there, a multi-person interconnected narrative about being Native American in Oakland California, has been pretty good. It reminds me of a better, more impactful version of Jennifer Egan's interconnected stories. The audiobook has been pretty good!

He just shit himself doing a sit up

I forgot about the impending heartbreak!! Starting to regret re-reading this one 😭

60