*~*~Reads~*~*
~*~Violet & Claire, by Francesca Lia Block (Harper Collins, $14.95)
Aside from their loner status, 17-year-olds Violet and Claire have little in common. While making a movie together, the two become inseparable-until ambition threatens to tear apart their new friendship.
~*~Don't Look and It Won't Hurt, by Richard Peck (Henry Holt & Co.)
Whether she in school or with family 16-year-old Carol feels trapped and hopelessly invisible in her tiny hometown. But when her sister gets into a serious bind and is forced to move away, Carol pays her a visit and gets her first taste of the outside world.
~*~If I Told You Once, by Judy Budnitz (Picado, $24)
This mesmerizing first novel follows four generations of women, focusing on growth, love and mother-daughter relationships. But it's not as run-of-the-mill as it might sound. Budnitz uses her quirky imaginaton to vividly color the story, which often delves into magic realism, complete with spells, sorcery and a host of strange characters., like the woman who has her husband swept away forever by street cleaners. This is a definite read for anyone bored by traditional tales.
~*~Memoirs of a Geisha, by Arthur Golden (Vintage Contemporaries)
Okay, can we say kleenex? I was crying through the entire book. This was a book that showed you the deepest and most intruging lifestyle of a geisha. I loved every part of this book, even when poor Chiyo was being mentally abused by Hatsumomo. This book she be aspiring for all young women who life takes a turn for the worse. It shows that they should not give up and try to make the best out of the worse situation. Because in the end, the good'girl' always comes out first.
~*~About a Boy(/b>, by Nick Hornby (Riverhead Books)
Truly an excellent read. About a boy that lives with his mom in London.
~*~White Oleander, by Janet Fitch (Little, Brown)
I kept wanting to like White Oleander more than I did. There's something about the intense, powerful, woman-centric plot that made me feel like I should be loving this novel. White Oleander, an Oprah Book Club selection, is told from the point of view of Astrid, a young girl whose beautiful, crazy mother Ingrid murders her defecting lover, Barry, and goes to jail when Astrid is only 12 years old. Ingrid's action--an action Astrid begs and pleads with her not to take--places Astrid in the hands of the child-welfare agencies, and then into a series of foster homes. But White Oleander just tries so hard! Too hard. The lyrical language becomes oppressive, as does the way Astrid speaks like a grown-up, though she's just a child. "Yes, I was tattooed, just as she'd said. Every inch of my skin was penetrated and stained. I was the original painted lady, a Japanese gangster, a walking art gallery. Hold me up to the light, read my bright wounds. If I had warned Barry I might have stopped her. But she had already claimed me." And what made this book hardest for me to enjoy was this: although I felt for Astrid's plight, I didn't much like her. It's interesting to read a story like this one, which often wraps its grittiness in a gauzy, hazy glow. Not that author Janet Fitch romanticizes the experiences of Astrid--quite the contrary--but she does romanticize the characters of both Astrid and Ingrid, making them seem otherworldly, strange, and therefore hard to grasp. The best parts of the book are when Fitch focuses on some of the minor characters that come in and out of Astrid's turbulent life. Her descriptions of them are dead-on. About Astrid's first foster mother, Starr, she writes: "She frowned, pulled the dress over her head, and hung it back up. It still was stretched to fit her figure. Her body in the small dressing room was almost too much to bear. I could only look at her in the mirror, her breasts falling out of the top of her underwired brassiere, the cross hiding between them like a snake in a rock." When Astrid interacts with these lesser characters is when her character is at its most compelling; she seems more astute and in-the-world here than in other parts of the novel. It’s interesting to see how Astrid grows and changes because of these characters, who teach her how the world works. When she starts spending time with a caring neighbor (who's also a prostitute), the neighbor tells her it's a "man's world": "I nodded. A man's world. But what did it mean? That men whistled and stared and yelled things at you, and you had to take it, or you could get raped or beat up. A man's world meant places men could go but not women. It meant they had more money, and didn't have kids, not the way women did, to look after every second. And it meant that women loved them more than they loved the women, that they could want something with all their hearts, and then not." Certainly the book is far from junk, and there's a lot of it that's real and hard and fascinating, but its overwrought language and the inaccessibility of its main character get in the way of its being a book I would strongly recommend.
~*~The Girls' Guide to Hunting and Fishing, by Melissa Bank (Viking)
When we first meet the heroine, Jane Rosenal, she is a 14-year-old pain-in-the-butt little sister. Her brother brings home a girlfriend whom Jane really likes. But then the couple breaks up, and Jane is startled that two good people can be wrong for each other--a theme that runs throughout Jane's own adult relationships. All grown up, Jane works in publishing and advertising and dates a succession of boyfriends, some more meaningful than others. Her most significant paramour is Archie Knox (great name!), an editor significantly older than she. Reading this, I’m wondering, “Why does Jane go for the older man? Why does Archie want or need a younger woman, for that matter?” Unfortunately, The Girls’ Guide provided no answers to my questions. Instead of concentrating on the psychology of the romance, Bank treats it lightly, exploring how Archie and Jane fit (and eventually don't fit) as people, not as an older man and younger woman. This blithe treatment is refreshing initially, but ultimately feels so breezy that it blows right by the reader. In fact, when I glance back through the book, it seems similarly gossamer--here is where Jane's dad gets sick, here is where an older Jane tries to win over a man with guidance from a self-help book. I remember these moments fondly, but not deeply. Bank is funny and talented, but no genius. Sometimes the brisk dialogue is too snappy--no one would ever say some lines in the book aloud. And frankly, I'm not sure what I think of the genre of the single girl's drama, if you can call it a genre. I hate to belittle the experience, but it reads like adolescence, full of troubles that feel real until bigger ones--marriage, children, divorce, mortgages--come along. Still, I do recommend The Girls' Guide as satisfying, airy summer reading; it's humorous, comforting, and a nice read between catnaps at the beach.
Natalie Portman (anywhere but here) "I'm reading Fugitive Pieces [Alfred Knopf] because James Lapine, who directed me in Anne Frank, sent it to me."
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