Readalike rundown

I have been so busy reading I forgot to write some reviews.  Here’s a rundown on some fall reads you might enjoy:

If you liked Bossypants by Tina Fey you might want to try Ali in Wonderland  by Alexandra Wentworth.  She’s great at delivering punch lines about her life as a rich kid in Washington, actress in Los Angeles, and mother back in Washington.  I found her more entertaining than Mindy Kaling, whose Is Everyone Hanging Out Without Me? (And Other Concerns) is also touted as a successor to Bossypants.  Mindy was just too young for my middle age patience.  I also tried to like another supposed Bossypants readalike, Let’s Pretend This Never Happened by Jenny Lawson, but her childhood was so sad it was depressing.

If you liked Pride and Prejudice, you will enjoy Death Comes to Pemberley by P.D. James.  This is more successful than other Jane Austen sequels I’ve read because P.D. James has perfect dialogue.  And it ends in a marriage, naturally.

If you liked the Graceling/Fire/Bitterblue trilogy of young adult fantasies by Kristen Cashore (aren’t we all stealing out of the YA section these days?) you might want to try Seraphina by Rachel Hartman.  Seraphina is half human, and half dragon, and this imaginative story presents an intriguing new world and tough heroine.  It’s the start of a series.

If you liked How To Be Good by Nick Hornby, you might like the zany world of Christopher Moore.  I zoomed through A Dirty Job about Charlie Fletcher, who discovers he is a death merchant responsible for transferring soul vessels.  That plot summary gives a good sense of Moore’s interests.  Warning- Moore doesn’t let concerns about losing the reader in gleeful idiocy get in the way of a Badump bump pun.

If you liked Midnight in the Garden of Good and Evil by John Berendt, you might like The Hare With the Amber Eyes by Edmund De Waal.  He’s an artist who researches the history behind his family’s netsuke collection.  These small carved Japanese animals and people were collected by his great uncle.  He tells the story of the various owners through the 20^th century, as they move around the world.

If you liked The Family Fang by Kevin Wilson, you might enjoy Object of Beauty by Steve Martin.  It’s the story of Lacey, a beautiful, smart and amoral art dealer in New York.  If you are curious about modern art and/or interested in the life of an ambitious golden girl, you might enjoy it.  I also liked it because I learned about the modern art business on the side.  It’s always good to get a little nonfiction learning in on the side during a great story!

If you liked A Fine Balance by Rohinton Mistry, you will enjoy the heft and drama of Cutting for Stone by Abraham Verghese.  This one broke my usual “nothing thicker than a phone book” rule.  However, everyone else in book club liked this story about two doctor twins in Ethiopia, so I’ll mention it for those with perseverance.

If you liked Eat, Pray, Love by Elizabeth Gilbert you might like Wild by Cheryl Strayed.  It’s a nonfiction biography of the author’s life changing hike on the Pacific Coast Trail.  However, since Oprah has been promoting the novel, it is unlikely there are many out there who haven’t read this one!

 

The Chaperone: a lovely character study of two women

I just finished a delightful novel called The Chaperone by Laura Moriarty.  It is a character piece about the relationship between two women.  Cora is a sensitive and conservative wife and mother in 1920's Wichita, Kansas.  A fictitious character, she offers to accompany a real person, future screen actress Louise Brooks, to New York for dance training.  Cora has a personal motive for offering to play chaperone which she is too private to reveal to Louise.   I would recommend this to readers who like character driven historical fiction.  There isn't a tightly wound plot, but evocative scenes that convey rare moments of understanding between people, and how two people influence each other.  I enjoyed the setting of New York in the 1920s, when social mores were shifting.

Siblings survive their artist parents

Just finished a book that might appeal to bookclubs that enjoy something a little quirky, like Miriam Toews or Jessica Grant characters.  The Family Fang by Kevin Wilson is the story of a family of performance artists.  Caleb and Camille are completely devoted to their art.  They enlist their children Annie and Buster (called A&B) in their disruptive performances.  It is comic and painful at the same time.  It could lead to some interesting book club discussions around what exactly is art, and where is the line between being a professional and being a parent drawn?

Light and sweet British comedy of manners

Been busy reading "teen" fiction and "so junky I don't want to admit it" fiction and even a little "unhappy" fiction.  But here's a happy one I can recommend for book clubs.

Major Pettigrew's Last Stand is by Helen Simonson. Major Pettigrew is a retired widower in a small British town. He falls in love with Mrs. Ali, the Pakistani shopkeeper, who has also been widowed. Their fumbling romance is closely observed by the other inhabitants of the village. The characters are realistic and three dimensional and I've grown to love them. If I saw Major Pettigrew in the street I would rush over to shake his hand, much to his chagrin no doubt.

In high school I enjoyed books by Miss Read and Jane Austen. This has a similar tone. There's social criticism in them, but it's delivered in a light manner.

How is it that I am recommending a book with sadness in the title for my happy book club choices blog?  The Particular Sadness of Lemon Cake by Aimee Bender is a fantastical tale of Rose who can taste the emotions of people who prepared the food she eats. This isn’t as enchanting as it sounds, because Rose's mother is unhappy, and all the emotions flood over her daughter. Rose is also trying to figure out the mystery around her brother, who also has an unusual talent.  Underneath the story of fantastical gifts, Lemon Cake is a portrait of a girl being overwhelmed by the world. Watching her learn to cope is a realistic and moving experience. 

Two literary choices set in warm places

Brazil and Egypt.  I enjoy learning about other places through novels, and in winter it's those warm settings that appeal!  State of Wonder by Ann Patchett is the story of Marina, a scientist searching for her missing lab partner Anders in Brazil.   First Marina has to find intelligent, single minded Dr. Swenson who lives deep in the Amazon pursuing her research.   The first half of the novel is slow as Marina's locked up character is revealed.  The reader experiences the same waiting frustration as Marina as she navigates Dr. Swenson's blockades.  Then it's up the river into a female version of Heart of Darkness.  The plot speeds up as the story explores the clash of western and native culture, whether the end justifies the means, and the pull of motherhood.  The novel ends suddenly, with many plot threads still to be worked through.  If you like deep exploration of character like in Patchett's Bel Canto, you will enjoy this book.

Anatomy of a Disappearance opens in Alexandria, Egypt.  Author Hisham Matar gives us Nuri, a young boy mourning the death of his mother.  He falls in love with a beautiful woman named Mona, whom his political dissident father weds.  It is an uneasy trio of characters full of hidden motivations.  When his father is kidnapped and disappears, Nuri struggles to understand.  He slowly unravels the truth, and learns to live with the huge absence of his father.  This is also a novel of characters facing terrible challenges.

Run away to the Night Circus

Do you enjoy Cirque du Soleil shows?  If yes, you will want to read The Night Circus by Erin Morgenstern.  It tells the story of Celia and Marco, two magicians dueling with magic inside a travelling circus at the turn of the 20^th century. Although the love story follows well worn patterns, there are unique supporting characters. 

 This novel is more about looking around and enjoying the circus experience instead of following a plot through to a conclusion.  Now I’m done, what I remember are the imaginative descriptions of the circus itself.  What remains vivid are the bonfire in the courtyard, the bright red scarves of the devoted fans the Reveurs, the hot chocolate with cinnamon, and the various tents with their magical offerings.

If you enjoy being read to, I recommend listening to the book CD of this story, read by Jim Dale.  He’s the versatile voice actor who read 146  different characters in Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows.  He creates a separate voice for each person, extending their characterization.  It’s like the way an illustrator can develop characters in ways not outlined in the plot. 

An interesting sideline about this bestseller is that there is a Night Circus game on Twitter so that you can connect with other readers to extend the reading experience.  The use of social media and online gaming is fascinating to watch.  How will we take the solitary joy of reading and make it a social experience?   I’m sticking with my friends in book club.  But then, I’m all about the food.  And now to put some cinnamon in my hot chocolate….