I loved this book so much that when I turned the final page, I hugged the book to my body and just sat with it a while. I love the style of alternating stories, shifting perspectives, working the story from the outside and slowly closing in on the important pieces. Phillips allows me to get to know her characters as an observer instead of describing their personalities in obvious ways. "She would always be herself, pretty and tarnished."

Dying is not a direct action. Like a plane in turbulence, people dip and dive, maybe hit a smooth spot and recover a little, before the flight ends.

I was about to risk the safety of my carefully managed unhappiness for the possibility of something more.

It breaks my heart not to rave about this book. Roy is brilliant author and much of the writing just took my breath away. But I also found the historical and military context of India confusing and the scope of this book just too much for me to handle. It's an epic and I wanted to instead focus on just a few of her dynamic characters' stories.

The moment I saw her, a part of me walked out of my body and wrapped itself around her. And there it still remains.

I fell head over heart for the beautiful ache of this novel. Difficult subjects and not much plot line, but the emotional truths and the intense beauty of the writing spoke to my soul. Loved it.

I'm not quite sure what to make of this book. It was such an awkward start, with a young attorney involved in a ludicrous contract, falling immediately in love with a mysterious women. I had a very hard time buying into the storyline and never particularly liked the protagonist. But there's something compelling about Schlink's simple and direct writing. I finished this in two sittings. This book finished stronger than it began.

Wow. These stories are really good. Centered primarily around Vietnamese refugees, Nguyen covers a wide array of experiences and perspectives. Each story definitely stands on it own -- great arc, developed characters, complexity-- yet they hold together so strongly in theme that I had the satisfaction of reading a full novel.

At first glance I thought the cover image was Wonder Woman.

It's been a while for me a #Litsy but #WorldBookDay and this marvelous, life changing bit of brilliance seemed a good reason to return.

My wonderful husband, who first introduced me to Billy Collins, bought me his new collection for my birthday. This poem stopped me in my tracks. I've read it over and over again.

My friend of almost 30 years wrote a book!!!! And this morning I have a little time to myself to read it. He is brilliant! ☕️📖

Be still my heart! Autographed to me from My favorite author, Ann Patchett, straight from Parnassus Books. My book-geek joy can barely be contained!

This is a very compelling, kind of creepy novel about a family crumbling as quickly as the dilapidated home in which they're living. Liars, scammers and cheaters all set in an idyllic lakeside home with a deep history. Just a great page turner.

This little beauty paired wonderfully with lots and lots of book talk! #dirtywatermelon #booklovers #booksandbooze

I believe one of the reasons people are reluctant to read Shakespeare is because his language is so dense. The humor, emotions, characters, double and triple meanings are all extremely deep.

This modern retelling of The Taming of the Shrew is pleasant and witty, often funny and pretty true to the original. But it is not deep.

I can't quite figure out the buzz on this book...it's good, and unique, but I'm not sure it's amazing. I found all of its characters so unlikable that I almost gave up after 100 pages, but I'm glad I stuck it out. The second half picks up; the questions become more interesting; but the characters never became people I cared for.

In life one rarely knows which remarks of the hundreds uttered in the course of a day will turn out to be auspicious. In fiction, foreshadowing is planted and flagged in some (hopefully or desperately) subtle way, drama demands it.

I just couldn't engage. I've liked her other novels so I honestly don't know if it's the book or just the place I'm in right now. Moving on

I liked this a lot -- enough to stay up too late and sneak chapters in between errands. Mostly I appreciate its sense of unrest -- artistic, political, racial, relationship-based. I think Burton writes women well and there was enough mystery in the plot to make me want to keep turning pages.

I had yearned for eccentric, confident people to enhance my life; I thought I deserved them, the sort of people you only found in novels.

After hearing so many raves and waiting to read it, I just could not engage in this book. Might just be a timing issue, as I was trying to make time during a crazy week, but I'm going to step away.

This is a good effort for a debut novel but it felt a little timid. Elements of magical realism are interesting and creative, but Feldman could have explored those further. She paints the typical portrait of the segregated South, but didn't really break any new territory. There was a lot of potential in the premise of 2 sisters, 1 black 1 white, but I was left wanting more.

Unless you a beautiful princess locked in a tower or some magical sleep, ain't no man ever gonna come rescue you. They ain't interested in your misery.

I'm not even sure how to rate this strange little book. I chose it for its title and brevity and I didn't dislike it but I didn't exactly like it. It's almost poetry more than a novel so I needed to reset my brain.

The language and chaos and heartbreak of grief are terrific, but there were many times that I felt a little dumb, like I wasn't getting some of the allusions and deeper meanings.

Kind of frustrating.

I fear the wrath of the reading world but I didn't LOVE this novel. I'm in awe as it is an impressive feat of storytelling, tracing 9 generations of sisters' offspring through slavery and race conflict in both Africa & America. Beautiful language and some hard-to-face truths, which I loved.
But the style left me strangely dissatisfied. This is a novel I will admire, but it doesn't "live inside me" as the author would say.

The need to call this thing "good" and this thing "bad," this thing "white" and this thing "black," was an impulse that Effia did not understand. In her village, everything was everything. Everything bore the weight of everything else.

👍👍👍👍👍Just wow. This book is very much in my wheelhouse - cerebral and emotional, filled with questions and doubt, smatterings of historical context and events told from multiple perspectives. Plus, the writing is so lush and gorgeous. Just wow!

I finally did sleep for a little while, only it was like the difference between Pringles and actual chips, like someone took sleep and then put it through a horrible industrial machine, made it into a paste, and re-formed it and baked it into a shape that was supposed to look like sleep but was not anything even close.

Today's #libraryhaul was outstanding. Wish I didn't have to go back to work next week.

What a great way to spend a day with a book. The comparisons to To Kill a Mockingbird are apt, and though I didn't fall in love with Olivia to quite that extent, she's still a dependable and engaging narrator. Race relations, poverty, mountain life, violence all come together especially as the book picks ups momentum in he second half.

Another dysfunctional mother-daughter duo.

Not the best choice for a beach read as it takes place in a refugee camp during Sri Lanka's Civil War, but despite the fact that I can't locate Sri Lanka on a map, I was drawn into this book. If you don't want 4 pages devoted to the description of bathing, this is not for you. The author painstakingly details living in the midst of chaos, death, fear and despair. It's hard and it's incredibly sad, but also beautiful and extremely well written.

Things just happen and we have to accept them. Happiness and sadness are for epitome who can control what happens to them.

I can only offer a list of adjectives: brilliant, desolate, violent, searing, linguistically perfect.
1951 South Dakota is not my typical read but everything about this novel captured me. I will certainly read more of Watson.

Wow! This is a brave debut novel centered around a woman who makes some terrible choices before and after 9/11. It's a marvelous feat that I continued to like her and root for her. A lot of promise in his author.

Does life get any better?

I had no trouble getting through 500 pages, back in Cormoran Strike's world, but I didn't like this one as much as the first two. The killer's perspective was interesting (and disgusting) and I was kept guessing throughout, but there was way too much Robin/Cormoran romantic tension. It felt more like Moonlighting than the accomplished writing I expect.

Another excellent WWII novel to recommend. Multiple characters and perspectives are layered beautifully to tell a story of courage. Courage not only in the face of battle (although there are compelling depictions of that), but courage to live and to love and to believe even in the face of relentless siege.

I have my work cut out for me this vacation! 📚📚📚

"One knows one won't be killed, but that's hardly the same as living."

#recommendsday Darkly comic (and sometimes just dark), the Fangs live at the border between life and art. "Art, if you love it, was worth any amount of unhappiness and pain." Wilson takes this thought-provoking premise and fills it with these wonderful characters. Buster and Annie are exactly the products we might expect from a dysfuntional family. I couldn't help falling in love with them as the story twisted through to its conclusion.

#tbrtuesday My pile just keeps growing. Interesting that my next read is a title I can't find on @Litsy , Let Him Go

This debut didn't quite live up to its considerable hype, but I'm still impressed. Fascinating topic and Evie is an engaging protagonist. But I'm not sure Cline fully brought the cult mentality of 1969 to life. Felt a bit unfinished. Still, it's way better than so-so.

"I thought that loving someone acted as a kind of protective measure, like they'd understand the scale and intensity of your feelings and act accordingly. That seemed fair to me, as if fairness were a measure the universe cared anything about."

Climbing on the bandwagon. I devoured Part 1 this morning before the sun got too hot on my deck. Can't wait to return later today.

The references to Mousetrap in this book were spot on, as I find that game overly complicated with too many pieces. There is so much going on in this novel about fracking, community, addiction, loneliness, family, marriage...I had trouble keeping the pieces straight. Haigh is a talented writer and brought it together in the end, but it just felt unfocused.

This week's #libraryhaul. Some new. Some old. I really need vacation to come.

Funny, the things that usually drive me batty - self involved characters, melodrama, contrived plot points - are all here, but the whole thing worked for me. Jansma's writing is so damn smart and these broken hearted 20-somethings just sucked me right in. I pretty much love this writer.

The seas are full of forgotten monsters, yes, but they're full of forgotten glories too. And the people who stay home and sit out the war never get to see them.