Challenge Review: Jane Eyre

My #dymocks52challenge book 20/38, for week 34.

Title: Jane Eyre
Author: Charlotte Bronte
Published: 16/10/1847
First appearance in 101: 2008 (#10)
Years in 101: 12
2019 101 ranking: #46
Rating: 4 stars

Why I chose this book:
This one is a classic, and has featured on EVERY Dymocks 101 list since 2008. Pretty impressive! I do love the classics, but this one never really attracted me before this challenge. I was happy to add it, but wasn't sure it would be my thing.

Thoughts:

Thankfully this exceeded my expectations and ended up being a great read. I'm not a huge fan of romance but this drew me in with the mystery of that 3rd floor room and then of course I ended up becoming invested in the relationship between Jane and Rochester. It was a wild ride that took a few turns, so it had some unexpected surprises.

You can read my full review on Goodreads here.


Verdict: Was it worthy?

Definitely. Classics are classics for a reason! This one is written beautifully and features a strong female lead who goes against the norm to follow her heart and do what makes her happy. Its themes will resonate throughout time, meaning it is a great read no matter when you choose to pick it up.

Review: Queen of Ruin

Queen of Ruin by Tracy Banghart
My rating: 3 of 5 stars

The Good:
- Girl Power
- Malachi <3
- Nomi being stubborn
- Serina being a BOSS
- Conclusion

The Bad:
- Less tension
- The hookups were pretty mediocre
- Zero history lessons/world building
- It was all just a little too easy

I enjoyed it, but mostly because I love the themes of this story. But I think that's also its weakness? The feminism is strong in this one and the ladies are facing some heavy duty oppression, which means it resonates with real world issues. The problem is that it's too black and white - oppressing women is bad, all the soldiers are evil, 'if we overthrow the evil men, women can finally be acknowledged as being equal with men and have rights and wages etc ...' - there's no grey. Aside from the love interests, there are basically no sympathetic males, and no blissfully unaware women. There is no glimpse of the okay-ish side of things, no real exploration of the depths of characters who feel differently. It's just the badass women fighting back against an evil tyrant.

Don't get me wrong - I loved the badass women fighting back. It's what made the first book so powerful. But I think this book wrapped things up a little too quickly and neatly. I'm hoping for a third book where everything falls apart, and at the very least I want the history lessons, because I want to know more about the warrior queens of the past. Also, what the heck is going on in other nations while all this is going down? Do they not even care?

The scope of this story was so TINY so while I loved it it did feel a little ... shallow. I am invested in this world for the long haul - now gimme the haul, dammit! (Please.)

Overall though it was a fun read and it went pretty easy on my emotions for which I was thankful. I mean, tbh, I was expecting a lot more, darker drama than I actually got. So my emotions didn't really go far beyond 'YASSSS QUEENS!' and 'Awwww Malachi <3'.

I have really enjoyed this series, though, so I'm hanging out for more!

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Dymocks 52 Challenge Halftime Musings

Having just finished Book 19 of 38 for my #Dymocks52Challenge refined, I figured it was time to do another update.

To recap:

This year, Australian book retailer Dymocks challenged readers to read one book a week for the entire year, adding up to 52 books.

As a voracious reader, I was well ahead come April, so I decided to make the challenge a little harder for myself for the remaining 38 weeks of the year.

Since 2008 (as far as my research could indicate), Dymocks has produced a list of the Top 101 books, as voted by readers. Using lists from the past five years, as well as unread books on my shelf, I compiled a list of 38 books that I would attempt to read before the end of the year (one a week from time of commencement).

Some of these are books I've never been interested in reading, or books I've been putting off, or books I've intentionally avoided. Others are books I've been looking forward to, and some are books I hadn't actually heard of. It promised to be a diverse challenge.

Now, here at the halfway point, I can admit that this has already been an interesting, worthy ride.

I started with Nevernight by Jay Kristoff, and it was a great book to start with - 5 stars. My 19th, most recent read, was the worst - 1 star and my first DNF of the challenge. The offending book was Clementine Ford's Fight Like A Girl. This was a book I wanted to throw down in disgust after only a couple of chapters, but I'd given myself the rule of reading at least 50% before giving up on a book (DNF = Did Not Finish) so I struggled through 55% before I finally threw in the towel for good.

With other reads, the 50% rule served me well - The Light Between Oceans was a struggle for a while but I thoroughly enjoyed the final third of it, and Boy Swallows Universe had me worried but took off about 50 pages in and ended up being a fantastic read.

My favourite book so far has been The Final Empire by Brandon Sanderson, and that was a fun discovery because the size of this novel has had me putting it off for years. I was also pleasantly surprised by how much I enjoyed The Happiest Refugee by Aussie comedian Anh Do. 

There's been a couple of disappointments - aside from Fight Like a Girl, Circe left me rather more underwhelmed than I expected, as did Assassin's Apprentice. 

Moving forward, I'm most looking forward to reading The Subtle Art of Not Giving a F*ck, and I'm most nervous about Shantaram, which is of course a 900+ page monster about horrible, horrible things.

The Book Thief, despite having remained in the Top 10 for the past 7 years, and taking out the top spot for three of those, is still neglected. I've been putting it off for years due to my general disappointment in most stories set in WWI and WWII so, true to that, I'm saving it til last.

It's been an interesting challenge to force myself to read assigned books when there's so many other great reads waiting on my shelf. I'm looking forward to continuing to challenge myself.

***

Stats so far:

Books read: 20

Pages read: 7771

Average rating: 3.2 stars

Most popular GR review: The Final Empire 

Least popular GR review: Fight Like a Girl

Oldest book read: Jane Eyre *

Newest book read: Becoming

*Note: I've recently finished Jane Eyre, which is book 20, however the write up is still to come. For statistics, I've included it.

***

AA = Australian Author
Titles not in bold are yet to be purchased

1. The Book Thief - Markus Zusak (AA)
2. The Happiest Refugee - Anh Do (AA) (12)  4*
3. Jasper Jones - Craig Silvey (AA) (5) 2*
4. Outlander - Diana Gabaldon
5. Jane Eyre - Charlotte Bronte (20) 4*
6. The Light Between Oceans - M. L. Stedman (AA) (17) 3*
7. The Narrow Road to the Deep North - Richard Flanagan (AA)
8. The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy - Douglas Adams (13) 2*
9. Assassin's Apprentice (The Farseer Trilogy) - Robin Hobb (14) 2*
10. The Goldfinch - Donna Tartt
11. The Husband's Secret - Liane Moriarty (AA)
12. The Martian - Andy Weir
13. My Brilliant Friend (The Neapolitan Series) - Elena Ferrante (11) 2*
14. The Guernsey Literary & Potato Peel Pie Society - Mary Ann Shaffer & Annie Barrows (3) 4*
15. Ready Player One - Ernest Cline
16. Shantaram - Gregory David Roberts (AA)
17. All the Bright Places - Jennifer Niven
18. Big Little Lies - Liane Moriarty (AA) (10) 3*
19. Reckoning - Magda Szubanski (AA)
20. A Little Life - Hanya Yanagihara
21. The Subtle Art of Not Giving a F*ck - Mark Manson
22. The Historian - Elizabeth Kostova
23. The Final Empire (The Mistborn Series) - Brandon Sanderson (6) 5*
24. Wool - Hugh Howey
25. Eleanor Oliphant is Completely Fine - Gail Honeyman (2) 4*
26. Boy Swallows Universe - Trent Dalton (AA) (16) 4*
27. Nevernight (The Nevernight Chronicles) - Jay Kristoff (AA) (1) 5*
28. Simon VS the Homo Sapiens Agenda - Becky Albertalli (4) 4*
29. Fight Like a Girl - Clementine Ford (AA) (19) 1*
30. Circe - Madeline Miller (7) 2*
31. Mythos - Stephen Fry
32. The Lost Flowers of Alice Hart - Holly Ringland (AA)
33. Becoming - Michelle Obama (15) 4*
34. A Discovery of Witches - Deborah Harkness
35. Crazy Rich Asians - Kevin Kwan
36. Scrublands - Chris Hammer (AA) (9) 4*
37. Normal People - Sally Rooney (18) 3*
38. Nine Perfect Strangers - Liane Moriarty (AA) (8) 2*

Challenge Review: Fight Like A Girl

My #dymocks52challenge book 19/38, for week 33.

Title: Fight Like a Girl
Author: Clementine Ford (AA)
Published: 28/9/16
First appearance in 101: 2017 (#43)
Years in 101: 2
2019 101 ranking: #2
Rating: 1 star

Why I chose this book:
Hooray feminism! As a girl who enjoys fighting (literally) and believes in gender equality (and human equality, really) I was really looking forward to a book that inspires women to stand up for themselves and not back down. This one is nice and recent and definitely appeals to modern ideals so I had to read it.

Thoughts:

Oh my lord. Talk about disappointing. This was my very first DNF of the challenge and I'm so glad I gave myself the DNF out at 50% because this was hard to choke down after only a chapter or two. It's vulgar, coarse, rude and bitter and so full of anger at the world. The message she's trying to get across is so important but it was utterly lost to me because of the feisty way she chose to deliver it. Not my thing at all; it really hurt my heart to read as much as I did. DNF @ 55%
You can read my full review on Goodreads here.


Verdict: Was it worthy?

This book, in my opinion, is everything that's wrong with the feminist movement. It spends so much time being angry and bitter that it alienates anyone who isn't of the same feisty opinions. While the message of fighting for equality, and to be yourself unconditionally, is so incredibly vital, the way it was delivered here will leave a bitter taste in a lot of mouths, and possibly do more harm than good. I hope this disappears from the list soon.

Review: In Love With the World: What a Buddhist Monk Can Teach You About Living from Nearly Dying

In Love With the World: What a Buddhist Monk Can Teach You About Living from Nearly Dying by Yongey Mingyur Rinpoche
My rating: 3 of 5 stars

This is a tricky one to rate.

There's two aspects to it, really: the Monk's journey (or, the beginning of it) and Buddhist teachings on life and death.

I think it was the contrast between the two that made this such a slow read for me, because it's two topics I'm rather fascinated by but it was jarring to switch between the two constantly with this book.

The journey: Yongey Mingyur Rinpoche has lived his life as a Buddhist monk in relative comfort and luxury. He has risen through ranks with dedication to the teachings of Buddhist ways and is highly respected and thus treated with considerable respect. However he's decided it's time to discover how to 'be comfortable being uncomfortable' (my words, not his) so he sneaks out of the monastery compound with little money and possessions and sets out to explore. This book follows the first leg of his journey, where he sleeps at a train station for a few nights then moves on to a Buddhist site (sorry, the names are all a thousand letters long and hard to pronounce, so equally hard to remember and attempt to spell) where he eventually becomes sick.

The plug of the novel is what this book can teach you from his experience of nearly dying, but the near-death occurrence doesn't happen until nearly 200 pages in. So a lot of this book is spent waiting for things to take that dark turn, and when it does it's kind of ... underwhelming. SORRY. This guy actually nearly died and here I am talking about how his relating the experience was underwhelming! SORRY. But he's just so CHILL about it! It was really interesting but also I was just so baffled that he did nothing except meditate on it. I'm not reaching enlightenment any time soon, my sense of self-preservation is way too strong.

To be honest, I would have been really fascinated to read about his entire 'wander', since he apparently wandered for four years, and this only detailed a few weeks or so. It was fascinating to read about how his teachings comforted him (or didn't) when faced with unique experiences.

However, the story itself was constantly interrupted by ...

The teachings: While there were some interesting ideas amongst it all, this is heavy stuff. It is pages and pages of walls of text and it is full of concepts that kind of start by making sense but drift into me wondering where I lost the thread. It is full on. It was kind of like a race-car driver trying to explain to a two-year-old how to drive. With instructions like, 'the accelerator makes you move so you just stick your foot on it and drive' but the kid doesn't even know what any of those words mean.

It's me. I'm the kid.

I tried really hard to follow all the stuff about bardos and in-between and dying every day etc but in the end I honestly had no fkn clue what this dude was talking about. He's just so used to his way of life that it's impossible for him to dumb it down because he already thinks he is.

That was my impression, anyway. Perhaps people smarter than me, or with more experience of Buddhist teachings, will appreciate his message a little more.

So the story itself was a 4-star, but way too bogged down by the teachings. And the ideas in the teachings were about a 3-star, but then they were too dense for my dense mind to understand so the delivery was 2-star.

So overall I guess we have a 3-star novel with an interesting story, interesting ideas, but a slow, tedious, confusing sort of delivery.

Not one to read on a whim, friends, but if you want some deep insight into Buddhist living this account is well worth a read.

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Challenge Review: Normal People

My #dymocks52challenge book 18/38, for week 32.

Title: Normal People
Author: Sally Rooney
Published: 28/8/18
First appearance in 101: 2019 (#47)
Years in 101: 1
2019 101 ranking: #47
Rating: 3 stars

Why I chose this book:
This one has been receiving a lot of praise, though it's not normally the sort of book I'd go for. So when it came to filling the extra slots for this challenge, I tried to still branch a little out of my comfort zone. This seemed like an interesting choice.

Thoughts:
There is some brilliant characterisation in this book, but the story itself is pretty repetitive, and the book seems to rely on the gimmick of messing with format and style to make itself stand out. I wasn't particularly impressed overall, but it did somehow end up being an addictive, easy read.

You can read my full review on Goodreads here.


Verdict: Was it worthy?

No. This will make waves for a little while because of its depth of characterisation and the way it explores the nature of relationships, but ultimately I'd say it's pretty forgettable. It relies too heavily on unusual styling to stand out, so people are more likely to remember that over the story. I suspect it won't linger long in readers' minds.

Review: Chasing Odysseus

Chasing Odysseus by Sulari Gentill
My rating: 2 of 5 stars

I'm not mad, I'm just disappointed.

No, wait.

I'm kinda mad, too.

I LOVE myths and legends. I love epic sagas with quests and heroes and mythical creatures and gods. So, obviously, I'm a big fan of Homer's The Odyssey. Odysseus himself is one of my favourite characters to read about repeatedly because he was so cunning, clever, diplomatic, patriotic, and ultimately a pretty decent guy.

So, yeah, it kinda sucked to read this re-telling, where he was reduced to seeming no more than a petulant child and arrogant tyrant.

If you're looking for an easy-to-read overview of The Odyssey, this is decent because it pretty much recounts everything that befell Odysseus after the fall of Troy. But it flips the script and turns O into the Big Bad, and throws us a bunch of kids as accidental heroes instead.

The story seemed pretty weak to me. The kids made a lot of questionable decisions, and the reasoning was terrible. Their entire quest to follow O in order to restore their good name was a bit far-fetched, and because it was trying so hard to re-tell O's story, the story of the herdsmen's adventure felt quite forced. Also kinda ridiculous that these three insignificant kids have friends in all the right places, while the legendary warrior Odysseus cops eye rolls and ire everywhere he goes. (view spoiler)[Also, WTF was with the whole, 'O is old so no one will want to sleep with him, whereas these teenage boys are looking FINE' crap???! UMMMMMM. I mean aside from that seeming entirely inaccurate, and inappropriate even, why the emphasis on how terrible and ugly he is just because he's older??? I don't get it? All the references to the boys having romantic relations just seemed so forced and uncomfortable. (hide spoiler)]

It irked me immensely that everyone fawned over these dumb kids when O was copping sh*t from all directions. Like, basically O is the bad guy and EVERY SINGLE OTHER PERSON OR THING he encounters is just misunderstood. There was also a really strange contrast between the YA format and the bloody, brutal, vulgar and downright indecent happenings of the original story seeping in. It really just felt like a messy splice of two stories that never really fit but kinda just got shoved together haphazardly.

The actual writing didn't really help, either, because it was a bit too much 'tell' and not enough 'show' or 'feel', so I never really appreciated our heroes. They were very two-dimensional, and even the humour fell flat because there was no sense of spirit to go with it. I didn't really FEEL anything, except mad that O was being exploited for this terrible story.

Also. Just quietly. My money is on the author being vegan. I'm just saying. No problem with it, but this book is very preachy with the whole, 'we are herdsman, we sacrifice fruit and vegetables instead of animals'. I mean how did they not actually p*ss off the gods when everyone else was sacrificing the good sh*t?

I was so looking forward to this but it rubbed me the wrong way, taking an epic story with characters I love and making a farce of it. Poor form, in my opinion.

Not particularly enticed to read the follow-up, unfortunately.

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Challenge Review: The Light Between Oceans

My #dymocks52challenge book 17/38, for week 31.

Title: The Light Between Oceans
Author: M. L. Stedman
Published: 20/3/2012
First appearance in 101: 2015 (#63)
Years in 101: 5
2019 101 ranking: #53
Rating: 3 stars

Why I chose this book:
Five years straight for this one, so it was one of the first added to my list.Interesting that it debuted at #63, but the release of the film adaptation saw it jump up to the top ten for a couple years, before dropping back again this year.

Thoughts:

The story is divided into three parts, and the first two were incredibly dull. However that last third really did get me, in the end, with all the moral dilemmas and trying to work out what was the right thing to do. It was a struggle to get into, and ultimately a bit too dreary for me, but it's nice to at least understand what all the hype was about.

You can read my full review on Goodreads here.


Verdict: Was it worthy?

This one might stick around, although it's not my kind of thing. It's quite gut wrenching towards the end, and it's those final impressions that stay with you once you finish a book. Overall I don't think the book is that special, but I think the questions it raises towards the end are the kind of thing that will stick with people for a while after reading. It hosts an interesting debate, but personally I found it to be quite dull beyond that. 

Review: Recursion

Recursion by Blake Crouch
My rating: 4 of 5 stars

Well this sure as heck did my head in.

Doesn't time travel always?

This time we're dealing with memory travel. Time travelling inside memories. Repeatedly.

My brain hurts.

I really loved the science side of it all, even if it's all pretty far-fetched and I'm sure smart science nerds could find a few plot holes here. It was a unique variation on time travel, and some really interesting concepts to wrap your head around.

It's also a really interesting statement on the greed and self-absorption of the human race.

I don't really know how to critique this properly so I'm just going to keep it simple: this is an intelligent read that will leave your mind spinning.

Rather enjoyed it myself, but I don't think I could re-live it.

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Review: The Astrid Notes

The Astrid Notes by Taryn Bashford
My rating: 4 of 5 stars

Music has always been a pretty constant factor in my life so I was quite interested to read this story about teens taking their music seriously. There's something beautiful and calming, reading about music, and I find it easier to relate to characters who are moved by it.

This story tells of Astrid, who is attempting to fill the rather large shoes of her opera-singer mother, despite crippling stage fright. Into her life wanders Jacob as a student of her father. Jacob is trying to find his voice again in the wake of unspeakable tragedy, and the two naturally come together through the bonds they share.

At first I wasn't sure if this was going to be for me, after all, as I hadn't realised the romance would play such an important part, but in the end the couple won me over.

This is a book about chasing your dreams, and trying to understand the difference between not wanting a thing and just being terrified of it. It had more depth than I expected for a YA novel, and I rather enjoyed getting to know these characters a little deeper. I liked that there wasn't just superficial support between the two -there was real dialogue and that quest to truly understand one another.

It definitely has it's pretty serious cheesy moments, and I did cringe a lot, but overall this was a rather enjoyable story that I connected to through its love of music. I feel like a lot of research went into making sure this world was portrayed just right, and it's payed off.

A lovely novel that I'd definitely recommend for music lovers looking for a nice light read with some deeper characters.

With thanks to the publisher for my ARC.

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