peeled_grape's reviews
137 reviews

Swamplandia! by Karen Russell

3.0

Hmm. Hmmm...

I've never read a book more rooted in history and place. It's a blend of historical fiction/horror with a shit ton of geographic detail. Sometimes this was lazy. Sometimes I felt like Kiwi only existed as an excuse to pack in historical detail

(and to rescue Ossie, at the end)

, and that felt kind of lazy. Karen Russell is very good at descriptions. She is incredible at accurately describing a feeling, a noise, a motion, etc. in a handful of words.

The beginning and middle of this book are very long -- I wouldn't say dragged out, but long. Then so much happens in the last 50 pages. Every sentence introduces some big leap. This didn't feel purposeful enough to me.

As far as the ending goes:

This book loses its magic quickly. That's not saying it gets bad quickly, but it just loses every supernatural, absurd or otherwise unreal element to it. It feels like being dragged to the surface all at once, an "oh haha, that was all silly" feeling. You know when you leave the movie theater and it's bright in the hallway and it sinks in, again, that there's a real world out there? Like that. It was abrupt. I like books that let you feel the gravity of this situation, and this did that! But the last 100 pages did NOT match the first 300. (Think: Kelly Link for 300 pages, George Saunders for the last 100.) This reminded me of "Stephen Florida" in terms of bizarre, technically-realistic-but-so-weird-it's-not details, but I hoped it would do the same kind of unanswerable ending, where you don't know what happens, really, and there's a lot to speculate on. I wasn't satisfied with the ending.

Also, this was a very small portion of the book but it is something that gets me incredibly angry when it is done wrong: Do! Not! Write! About! Journalists! If! You! Clearly! Know! Nothing! About! Journalism! I think these parts were supposed to be exaggerated, but really, what happened is that Russell bloated the stereotype of a journalist, and it was lazy. It's not funny. It's not cute. It's not creative. Just move on.

Homesick for Another World by Ottessa Moshfegh

2.0

All of the stories here were good without being great. They're all very alive, but very forgettable. I found that "A Better Place" was the only one I found moving in some way -- the rest just kind of exist, and that's okay, but not mind-blowing. Every person in these stories is very disturbed, for one reason or another. It's a collection about bad people knowingly doing crappy things to other people, who are sometimes also crappy/weird/disturbing/disgusting. Moshfegh's voice is electric, but there was something about these stories that was bored with itself, and it got kind of repetitive. TL;DR: I found this really easy to read, and the stories are all good, but nothing caught my attention in particular.

Stop Kiss by Diana Son

2.0

A very fast read. It was okay, I guess. It feels cliché. It's a romance story. There are two people. They fall in love. Something happens that gets in the way of their love.

I hate that it's set "Now." Son doesn't set a year, it's just set as "Now." First of all: Why? If you're not straight, then it just makes it feel like stuff like what happened to Sara will never not happen because it will always take place now and will never change. Is this for straight people, then, to get them to Do Something to stop hate crimes/homophobia/etc.? I hate that most literature I've seen around the LGBTQ+ community is centered on homophobia, or that most of its message is directed at straight people. Oh, look, more gay people getting beat up. How edgy. How original. What I would like is happy homosexual couples, or, at least, ones that exist without being a big deal to the other characters -- the kind of relationship that just exists, and it's normal, and that's it, the normalcy given to heterosexual relationships. Yeah, homophobia is real, and this stuff happens, but this exists in so many stories that I literally never want to see it again. (It's also worth noting that every time I've seen this shit, it comes from straight writers. Can y'all stop.) I know this was written in 2000, but if you want this to take place in the perpetual Now, then it gets my criticism of Now.

The Kingdom of This World by Alejo Carpentier

1.0

I know I'm not a very focused person, and I have the attention span of a goldfish, but sometimes I just didn't really know what was happening. There were a lot of passive sentences so I couldn't really tell who was doing what, the way actions were described weren't super clear, and there are a ton of jumps between people and time (with third person narration, which always trips me up). I spent a lot of time confused. (I wonder how much of it was translation?)

That being said: this is very well done. It's centered around the Haitian Revolution and leaves out the actual revolution, which, first of all, is a power move. It actually leaves out most big historical figures, which places the emphasis on voudou/voodoo and the characters that Carpentier thought were more intriguing. The form lends itself to the definition of the "marvelous real" very well. If you're into magical realism, read the intro -- I thought it was interesting.

An update, 09/12/20: I originally wrote the review above three days ago and rated it three stars, but the longer I sit on this, the less I like it. There are things that Carpentier did that I really hate. The protagonist is canonically a rapist, but this is treated so casually. Was I supposed to empathize with him? Was I supposed to gloss over that fact like the narrative did? Because, if so, that's disgusting. He sees victory, and to mark that victory, he has to rape someone because "men can't control their appetites" or "it's been too long" or whatever. This is a fictional character! Carpentier really did not have to make this happen, or to make it happen so casually! The only prominent female character in the entire book is depicted in the stereotypical "man writing a woman" nonsense. Her body is the only one described (especially in this much detail!), and of course, it's focusing on the parts men can derive pleasure from. She's one of those "temptress" characters. God. I know that this book is supposed to be the origins of magical realism, and I know that it's one of the few fictional works on the Haitian Revolution, but the blatant sexism in this and the way it's been ignored is infuriating. TL;DR: Women only exist in this novel as sex objects, and this narrative disgusts me more the more time I sit with it.

Pedro Páramo by Juan Rulfo

4.0

This one surprised me. I've probably said this before, but: My favorite thing ever in books is when the form of it matches its content. This does that for sure -- the living and the dead are in conversation with one another, the past and the present are implicit and sometimes indistinguishable. I read this for one of my classes, and I'm glad I did -- I got way more out of it, especially considering the historical context of the book. (The historical grounding of this novel is purposely a background issue; it reminds me a lot of how "The Kingdom of This World" is centered around the Haitian Revolution without including the actual Haitian Revolution.) Even if you just read it without the context, it's great. If you haven't read it yet, maybe go into it with the idea that it is written in a confusing manner, and that's on purpose. Be patient with it. It's worth it.

Sweat by Lynn Nottage

3.0

I was a little bored by this. It's not bad, it just wasn't super interesting to me. Some of the characters are just outright stupid, in my opinion. And no one is happy, ever. It's just straight-up depression the whole time. I liked that Jason's white supremacy arc is never explained (it doesn't need an explanation). I disliked the fact that forgiveness is emphasized. I hate when people think that forgiveness is the answer -- in a lot of cases, it's not, and this is a hill I will die on. Nothing really caught my attention, and nothing really impressed me, but I also really didn't see anything in this I disliked. It was perfectly "meh."

Barren Lives by Graciliano Ramos

3.0

I liked this, but it felt simple. The narrative is very clear, despite moving through people and time. This book is most interesting when you think about its symbolism -- the parrot, the dog, etc. That's a whole essay topic for someone, I think, so I'm not going into depth on that, but the liaisons (bull imagery, for example) and the symbolism was definitely what caught my attention. The only reason it gets three stars is that it wasn't emotionally moving, to me, and wasn't striking in a way that interested me.

Water by the Spoonful (Revised Tcg Edition) by Quiara Alegría Hudes

3.0

REREAD: I am so sick of the "Americans go invade other countries, kill them, and then come home to write about how sad they were doing it" form of literature. Liberal ass play. 

Okay, first of all, ouch. Second of all,  wow. There's a lot going on in this play, and all of it is very good. These characters are all so round. Everyone is so complex and they all get their own problems and dreams -- it's incredible. I really like the concept of people connecting over the internet and what it means. The humor landed for me. Yeah, just wow. It's heartbreaking. And the scene where the title comes from is haunting. This is sticking with me for awhile.

The Death of Artemio Cruz by Carlos Fuentes

2.0

There are a lot of compelling things about this novel and then there are a lot of things that are extremely detrimental to the text. The blatant sexism is one of those detrimental things. And I don't even mean the "you belong in the kitchen" kind of sexism, I mean the "women can enjoy being raped and come to love their rapist if they're honorable enough" kind of sexism. The form of this novel is great, and I found myself really taken by the doubles/pairs/repetition that occurs here as well as the play with time. It's intentionally foggy, which is frustrating at first, but you get used to it. There are really well-written scenes, and it's very complex. BUT it felt too over-the-top with the toxic masculinity, and I could not get into it too much because of that.

Body Awareness by Annie Baker

3.0

Not bad -- I just didn't love it. It reminds me of Stephen Florida in all its awkward shamelessness. There's some things that don't go explored that I think should have been, like Joyce's experiences with her dad. We don't get too deep into any particular character's experience. I think there was too much time spent stagnant and it didn't really go anywhere. Again, not bad, but it wasn't really moving.