Intermezzo by Sally Rooney

Sunday, Nov. 3, 2024--San Antonio

Intermezzo by Sally Rooney has received great reviews which refer to it as an almost perfect novel and has been listed by many sources as a top book of 2024.  I had to wait weeks to get it online via the Libby app.  The story, set in Dublin and surrounding communities in modern times, centers around two young brothers--one 32 and the other 22--and those adjacent to them.  It is built around the push of society to make everyone conform to conventions.  The father and the mother of both boys separated when eldest was a teenager and the other was quite young.  The mother left the boys with the father.  Because of that, the elder son felt as if he was mostly responsible for his young brother.  Neither liked spending much time with their mother because she was raising step-kids in her new marriage who were favored over her own kids.  Peter is the elder son.  He is a lawyer who also teaches law at the university.  He is considered to be charming and outgoing by most people.  He was in a very serious relationship with Sylvia in his college days to the point that she came to be accepted as a member of the family--loved by all.  But Sylvia was in a very bad accident which resulted in injuries, never detailed, that made it impossible for her to have penetrative sex.  Although they loved each other, she ended the the old relationship with Peter.  However, it has continued as a very close friendship in which they love each other.  Peter has never been able to mentally accept the loss of the old relationship with Sylvia who remains the love of his life.  He has moved on to have sexual relationships with others and has developed a continuing one recently with Naomi, a 22-year-old student who lives as a squatter with other students in an abandoned building and has a side gig of having sex for money with others--both online via a website such as Only Fans and in person.  Peter has become a long-time partner (but not exclusively), and he also "pays" her by giving her money to buy things she desires or when she comes up short (which is frequently) in terms of being able to pay her bills.  Peter has kept Naomi a secret from his family and friends.  The younger brother Ivan is a chess prodigy and somewhat of the stereotypical classic nerd--wanting to meet girls and have sex, but always being awkward in doing so to the point that he has not yet had a relationship at 22.  The father has died just before the time of opening of the story, and both sons are finding it difficult to handle life.  Their age difference keeps them from being close and causes them to have conflicts.  Ivan has been floundering and dropping in his ranking as a chess player.  He doesn't have a full-time job and has no interest in one.  Instead, he uses his IT educational background and innate ability to analyze that has made him a chess prodigy to do short-term contracting jobs analyzing the data collected by IT companies to make sense to their administrators of what data patterns exist and what they mean.  He is happy to wear only second-hand clothing and work only to pay his month-to-month expenses (which are few).  In the beginning of the story, he has gone to a regional cultural center to make money by playing all the members of the local chess club--10-12 games going on at once.  Margaret, the 35-year-old director of the center who has booked this event for center and is married but separated from her alcoholic husband, is scheduled to give him a ride to his hotel after the evening event.  Ivan is lonely and desperate for company and somehow manages to ask if she wants to come up to his room.  That sets up the last conflict with societal expectations.  The mother has abandoned her family leaving the boys with their father.  Peter is still in love with Syliva and sees her regularly while maintaining a daily affair with a woman who is essentially a part-time prostitute and much younger than he is.  Ivan finally has a girlfriend, but she is 13 years older than he is, is still married but separated from her husband who everyone in their town likes, and Margaret and Peter (who is the only one who knows about Margaret and reacted badly when he heard) are both concerned about the age difference between Ivan and Margaret.  No one seems to show much concern about the similar age difference between Peter and Noami.  Both relationships are secret--one because of the age difference and the other because of the side work done by the young female.  All of this creates tensions, causes fights, and requires that the characters make decisions regarding their lives.  I gave the book 4 1/2 stars out of 5.

Enlightenment by Sarah Perry

Saturday, Oct. 26, 2024--San Antonio

Enlightenment by Sarah Perry was an exciting book to read.  It deals with so many topics--conservative religion vs. science, unrequited love, what makes a worthwhile life, the difficulties of women to be recognized for their accomplishments, righting wrongs from the past, being able to both hate and love the same person, researching to resolve a mystery, living two lives at one time, whether ghosts from the past are really ghosts or just tricks of the dwelling mind, etc.   It's the unrequited love stories that make this a heartbreaker.  It's the slow discovery of clues to a mystery from the past that make it hopeful.  It's the affects of conservative religion on people's lives that make it heartrending.  It's all of those together that make it exciting from beginning to end.  Longlisted for the Booker Prize, it is well written with a number of interesting characters including the following:  Nathan,  who is the son of a deceased pastor of the Baptist church, who continues to attend services although he questions the teachings, who writes a regular column for the local newspaper, and who escapes the village (and the church) for multiple days at a time in London to live more freely.  Grace, who has become essentially the voluntarily adopted god daughter of Thomas, who falls in love with a young man early in her life and can never get past the relationship not continuing, and who has rebellious tendencies against the teachings of the church while not being able to avoid condemning others for their religious transgressions.  The ghost from the 1800s, who was a  Bulgarian woman with a great scientific mind, who was in an unhappy marriage to the owner of the local manor house, and who hid various clues to in the house and on the grounds of the estate that reveal her story.  There were a few times I became confused and had to backtrack to determine who was "talking" or what was really happening, but overall I give the book 4 1/2 stars out of 5.

Creation Lake by Rachel Kushner

Wednesday, Oct. 9, 2024--San Antonio

Creation Lake by Rachel Kushner is one of the most in-demand books this year (I waited for about 9 weeks on hold to get it on my Kindle from my library) and has been shortlisted for the Booker Prize and longlisted for the National Book Award.  It is also the most complex story I have read recently.  The central character is a former U.S. government operative who is now doing private contract undercover work around the world.  During the time covered by the book, she is in France.  She is infiltrating a cult-like commune by becoming the lover of the childhood best friend of the leader of the group. While her lover, a film producer, is in southern France on his latest project, she volunteers to go to his family's unoccupied estate near the commune and, while there, to assist the best friend and other members of the commune in translating their writings about how life should be organized and lived.  (She is fluent in several languages.)  But it is all a plan by her employers for her to determine whether this is a group intending to lead insurrection against the government.  And eventually, with the approval of a great increase in pay, the plan involves her being expected to arrange an attempt to assassinate a government official whose planned projects for the area are of concern to local citizens because they will promote huge agricultural farming (putting the local small farmers out of business) and have the potential for creating a water crisis.  Tied in with all of this is the background story of a writer/insurrectionist whose writings and counselings have led to the establishment of this particular commune she is infiltrating.  I gave the book 4 stars out of 5.

The Pairing by Casey McQuiston

Saturday, Sept. 29, 2024--San Antonio

The Pairing by Casey McQuiston was recommended in a TIME feature recently explaining the new popularity of romance novels and the improved quality of such stories.  I previously read the author's Red, White, and Royal Blue after noting the popularity of the TV series made from it (on a streaming service to which I do not subscribe).  This latest book by her was a bit confusing to me at first.  It's a history of the relationship between Theo and Kit who became childhood friends in elementary school, eventually became lovers, and, at the time the book starts, have been apart a few years due to a breakup.  The first half of the book is told by Theo.  The second half is told by Kit.  The reader slowly learns their entire story.  It's told in a way that there are strange nuggets dropped that could be easily passed over, but that, if noticed, somewhat boggle the reader's mind--raising questions such as: Does that really make sense?  Why that?  Is ___ going to happen?   Later, something is told in the story that answers those questions and makes sense out of the things that seemed strange.  Because of the interests of the two main characters, there are lots of details related to art history, food, and wine.  As I understand is common and expected in most romance novels, there are also a LOT of detailed sex scenes; as far as I was concerned, there were too many that lasted for too long.  But the general story is a good one.  I gave the book 4 stars out of 5.

Bel Canto by Ann Patchett

Tuesday, Sept. 25, 2024--San Antonio

Bel Cando by Ann Patchett was named by TIME as one of the Top 100 books of the 2000s.  It was a book I never wanted to put down.  The story of a situation in an unnamed South American country involving a group of guerrilla fighters and a group of hostages, it follows the months after a failed attempt to capture the president of the country at a birthday party arranged for a Japanese industrialist who is a fan of the top female opera performer in the world.  In a desperate attempt to get a new factory, the country, which has been unsuccessful in getting the industrialist to come there previously, throws the birthday party with the opera singer as the entertainment and an enticement.  The result is a comedy of errors.  The industrialist comes only because of the opera singer and still has no interest at all in building a factory there.  The opera singer comes only because she has an upcoming concert in Buenos Aries and is curious about this Japanese industrialist who is aware of her and has traveled around the world to hear her perform several times.  The birth date of the industrialist is on a Tuesday, but the President is a fan of a very popular soap opera that is on TV on Tuesday nights and never allows anything on his calendar to conflict with staying home and watching the show.  The president agrees to the party because of the need for the hoped-for factory, but secretly plans to back out of attending at the last minute.  The party is to be held at the home of the vice-president, and the guerrillas have an elaborate plan of entering the home in advance through the vents for the air conditioning system and coming out as a surprise at the end of the opera singer's performance to capture the president and whisk him away quickly during all the confusion.  Trying to find the absent president among the crowd eats up so much time that word of what is happening gets out via phone calls, and the military and police arrive to surround the house.  The stand-off begins and lasts for months with the guerrillas trying to make unreasonable and often changing demands and the government never making offers of anything but surrender by the guerrillas and release of the captives.  The real story is what happens during the first weeks and eventually months of captivity within the compound.  Relationships begin to develop.  Guerrillas begin to care for their captives and vice versa.  Strict enforcement of rules by the guerrillas slowly falls to the wayside.  Daily life under the circumstances is better for the guerrillas than it has ever been for them in the jungles.  And the captives also come to realize that life without the responsibilities of their professional lives has its advantages for them.  The reader will learn to care for many among both the guerrillas and the captives and to wish that everything could be resolved with everyone going free.  Is there any chance for that?  I gave the book 4 1/2 stars out of 5.

Austerlitz by W. G. Sebald

 Thursday, Sept. 19, 2024--San Antonio

Austerlitz by W. G. Sebald is considered to be a great novel, and it was listed by TIME as one of the top 100 books of the 2000s.  It is well written and includes lots of interesting observations about life, about architecture, about history, etc.  But it is a SLOW read with page-after-page consisting of one paragraph.  I found myself leaving the book after reading fewer than 20 pages at a time.  After 5-6 days of reading, I was only 40% of the way through the book and having to push myself to go back to it.  Finally, at 42% of the way through it, I decided to quit it.  At times the story had turned interesting, but that would last a while and then go back to observations.  Maybe I should have kept reading, but I wanted something more consistently interesting to read.  I haven't rated the book.  And I may go back to it at some point in time.  But I have probably left it behind permanently since I read mostly for pleasure.

Somewhere Beyond the Sea by TJ Klune

Sunday, Sept. 15, 2025--San Antonio 

Somewhere Beyond the Sea by TJ Klune is the second and final book in a science fiction series.  I read the first in the series, The House in the Cerulean Sea, in March of this year.  This is the continuation of the story of the discrimination against magical people and the efforts of a magical man who is a phoenix to work to create a chosen family of magical children who have especially strong powers and as a result have been abused in foster homes and orphanages and are feared by the government for their power.  However, in this book, one of the children, Lucifer, the son of the Devil, is not only feared by the government but is the target of a plan to capture him and force him to evil deeds at their command to make it the most powerful country in the world.  Why would he do this?  Because he and the other children living together have come to think of themselves as brothers and sisters--as a part of a family--and that Lucifer's concern for his family members would be the motivation to obey the evil demands the government makes of him.  It's an interesting story, but the two books together are more pages to read that I would have preferred.  I never got past the first book in the Harry Potter series as my interested dropped.  Science fiction isn't my favorite category of literature.  So I found myself wanting to get through this second book in the series to go on to others on my list to read.  I gave it 3 1/2 stars out of 5.