Title: You Should Have Known
Author: Jean Hanff Korelitz
Rating: 4 out of 5 stars
Summary: Grace Sachs has an enviable life--she lives in Manhattan with her pediatric oncologist husband and son. A successful therapist, her first book, You Should Have Known, is about to be released. The premise of her book is that women generally have only themselves to blame when their relationships begin to fall apart. Grace argues that problems of infidelity or poor money management or emotional unavailability are obvious very early on, but women have a tendency to overlook these things. In other words, they should have known.
When the mom of a kid at the school that Grace's son's attends is murdered, Grace is stunned when the cops show up at her door asking the whereabouts of her husband. He could never do such a thing--he's a pediatric oncologist loved by his patients and their parents. Turns out, he's also a sociopath. Grace's life as she knows it disintegrates.
Review: When I read books like this I can't help but wonder what I would do if I were in the same situation. Inevitably, the women in these books seem to have more resources than me. In Grace's situation, she has the luxury of escaping to her summer place in Connecticut, where she takes the next few months off so she can process what has happened and what her next steps will be. Granted, the summer place isn't winterized and Grace and her son end up moving there in the winter. So they have that to deal with. But both their Manhattan apartment and the Connecticut summer home are paid for because they've been in Grace's family for years.
I know I shouldn't take these books so literally--they're fiction. But I can't help it. In Grace's defense, she states a few times in the book that they couldn't afford their Manhattan apartment if they had to buy it with their salaries. But she still has it. And yes, I realize these people aren't real. But it's this inability for me to relate to her convenient financial situation that led me to give this four stars over five. If my husband turned out to be a sociopath, I would still have a mortgage to pay with two kids in daycare. I wouldn't have the ability to run away to our summer place. If I was lucky I'd have friends that would let me stay at their summer places, but I'd still need to work to pay for the aforementioned mortgage and other bills.
The rest of the book was great. There's the right amount of buildup to Grace's discovery, and her reaction feels real and raw. But I just couldn't get past my frustration (and envy?) that her financial situation oversimplified things for me.
Saturday, November 29, 2014
Tuesday, November 25, 2014
Book review: All Joy and No Fun
Title: All Joy and No Fun: The Paradox of Modern Parenting
Author: Jennifer Senior
Rating: 2 out of 5 stars
Summary: Parenting is tough. This book outlines in great detail and with a lot of supporting studies how tough parenting is no matter what age your children are.
Review: I couldn't finish this book. It was too stressful. In hindsight perhaps I thought this book would be funnier. I think I was looking for confirmation that I'm not the only one that gets overwhelmed with parenthood sometimes. And I got that confirmation. Ms. Senior does a fantastic job citing study after study of how parenting has changed. And there's certainly room for debate on the influences of those changes and if parenting has changed for the better or worse. But it wasn't very reassuring or comforting.
All it did was make me feel more incompetent than I already feel at times and dread adolescence even more than I already am. Not because it's going to be a difficult time, but because that's when they're going to start to distance themselves from me, and that makes me really sad. Because as much as they drive me crazy sometimes, the best part of my day is when they come running up to me when I get home with big hugs. Well, this has been an uplifting post. No worries, I have two more to write and post soon.
Author: Jennifer Senior
Rating: 2 out of 5 stars
Summary: Parenting is tough. This book outlines in great detail and with a lot of supporting studies how tough parenting is no matter what age your children are.
Review: I couldn't finish this book. It was too stressful. In hindsight perhaps I thought this book would be funnier. I think I was looking for confirmation that I'm not the only one that gets overwhelmed with parenthood sometimes. And I got that confirmation. Ms. Senior does a fantastic job citing study after study of how parenting has changed. And there's certainly room for debate on the influences of those changes and if parenting has changed for the better or worse. But it wasn't very reassuring or comforting.
All it did was make me feel more incompetent than I already feel at times and dread adolescence even more than I already am. Not because it's going to be a difficult time, but because that's when they're going to start to distance themselves from me, and that makes me really sad. Because as much as they drive me crazy sometimes, the best part of my day is when they come running up to me when I get home with big hugs. Well, this has been an uplifting post. No worries, I have two more to write and post soon.
Monday, November 10, 2014
Book review: Black Chalk
Title: Black Chalk
Author: Christopher J. Yates
Rating: 3 out of 5 stars
Summary: Six friends at Oxford University embark on a game. Initially it's fun, but as the game progresses, the stakes get higher and it's not as fun. Fourteen years later, the remaining players come back together to decide the winner.
Review: Admittedly, this review is overdue. I finished this book a few weeks ago and as I write this review, all I can think about is it reminded me a lot of Donna Tartt's The Secret History. But not as good as the Secret History.
When I write these reviews, I never know how much to give away. There are a few twists--the person whose perspective this is told from isn't who you think it is initially. Also, it lacked chapters, which sort of drives me crazy. I like chapters. It helps to provide a break for those of us who may not have all day to sit down and read a book.
The book jumps from the present to 14 years ago, with the present told from the perspective of one person. I'm not very sympathetic to a character that hasn't had to work for the past 14 years. The flashbacks are more interesting, but as characters drop out of the game, they disappear from the story. Which is fine--the point of the story is to focus on the people that are left in the game, but I always like to know what happens to these characters.
I didn't really like any of the players that were left, nor did I think their present day lives really made sense. But again, maybe I'm just not sympathetic to shut-ins?
Author: Christopher J. Yates
Rating: 3 out of 5 stars
Summary: Six friends at Oxford University embark on a game. Initially it's fun, but as the game progresses, the stakes get higher and it's not as fun. Fourteen years later, the remaining players come back together to decide the winner.
Review: Admittedly, this review is overdue. I finished this book a few weeks ago and as I write this review, all I can think about is it reminded me a lot of Donna Tartt's The Secret History. But not as good as the Secret History.
When I write these reviews, I never know how much to give away. There are a few twists--the person whose perspective this is told from isn't who you think it is initially. Also, it lacked chapters, which sort of drives me crazy. I like chapters. It helps to provide a break for those of us who may not have all day to sit down and read a book.
The book jumps from the present to 14 years ago, with the present told from the perspective of one person. I'm not very sympathetic to a character that hasn't had to work for the past 14 years. The flashbacks are more interesting, but as characters drop out of the game, they disappear from the story. Which is fine--the point of the story is to focus on the people that are left in the game, but I always like to know what happens to these characters.
I didn't really like any of the players that were left, nor did I think their present day lives really made sense. But again, maybe I'm just not sympathetic to shut-ins?
Saturday, November 1, 2014
Book review: All Fall Down
Title: All Fall Down
Author: Jennifer Weiner
Rating: 5 out of 5 stars
Summary: Allison has it all--a beautiful house in the suburbs, a beautiful little girl, and a flourishing career as a blogger. Despite this "perfect" life, she's not as happy as things appear. For one, her marriage is struggling--her husband sleeps in the spare bedroom and Allison is starting to suspect he's having an affair, or close to having an affair. Also, her dad just got diagnosed with Alzheimer's. Holding it together for the perfect life is really stressful. Fortunately she has her friends Oxy, Vicodin, and Percocet to help her out.
Review: I listened to this book on CD in my car. This book is stressful at times, probably because this woman's life so closely resembled my own. Also, the daughter's voice was really whiny.
As many women out there know, life is overwhelming sometimes--kids, job, husband, and everything else--it can be a LOT to manage. As I listened to this story (and as I listen now to my own whiny children and can't they just give me 10 minutes to finish this long overdue post?), I couldn't help but think, "wow, this could be me". And if this is why people become addicted to pain killers, I can totally see why. There's so much to do in so little time, it's great to have something to take the edge off and relieve some of that stress so you don't have to worry so much. Unfortunately it can get expensive, especially when you have to seek out illegal ways to get it once you get cut off from your docs.
While this story hit close to home, I love a good addiction story. One of my favorite shows used to be Intervention. Once I had kids I had a hard time watching the ones with the younger addicts--those broke my heart--but it was fascinating to watch Allison's spiral into addiction and her subsequent attempt at recovery.
This was one of those books where as I went through each CD I got a little sad that I was one CD closer to the end of the book. Despite how stressful it was to feel like I was listening to my life, I didn't want this story to end. Highly recommended.
Author: Jennifer Weiner
Rating: 5 out of 5 stars
Summary: Allison has it all--a beautiful house in the suburbs, a beautiful little girl, and a flourishing career as a blogger. Despite this "perfect" life, she's not as happy as things appear. For one, her marriage is struggling--her husband sleeps in the spare bedroom and Allison is starting to suspect he's having an affair, or close to having an affair. Also, her dad just got diagnosed with Alzheimer's. Holding it together for the perfect life is really stressful. Fortunately she has her friends Oxy, Vicodin, and Percocet to help her out.
Review: I listened to this book on CD in my car. This book is stressful at times, probably because this woman's life so closely resembled my own. Also, the daughter's voice was really whiny.
As many women out there know, life is overwhelming sometimes--kids, job, husband, and everything else--it can be a LOT to manage. As I listened to this story (and as I listen now to my own whiny children and can't they just give me 10 minutes to finish this long overdue post?), I couldn't help but think, "wow, this could be me". And if this is why people become addicted to pain killers, I can totally see why. There's so much to do in so little time, it's great to have something to take the edge off and relieve some of that stress so you don't have to worry so much. Unfortunately it can get expensive, especially when you have to seek out illegal ways to get it once you get cut off from your docs.
While this story hit close to home, I love a good addiction story. One of my favorite shows used to be Intervention. Once I had kids I had a hard time watching the ones with the younger addicts--those broke my heart--but it was fascinating to watch Allison's spiral into addiction and her subsequent attempt at recovery.
This was one of those books where as I went through each CD I got a little sad that I was one CD closer to the end of the book. Despite how stressful it was to feel like I was listening to my life, I didn't want this story to end. Highly recommended.
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