The Mermaid Chair by Sue Monk Kidd

Published in 2006 by Penguin (Non-Classics)
2 Stars

Goodreads Review
Sue Monk Kidd's phenomenal debut, The Secret Life of Bees, became a runaway bestseller that is still on the New York Times bestseller list more than two years after its paperback publication. Now, in her luminous new novel, Kidd has woven a transcendent tale that will thrill her legion of fans. Telling the story of Jessie Sullivan-a love story between a woman and a monk, a woman and her husband, and ultimately a woman and her own soul-Kidd charts a journey of awakening and self-discovery illuminated with a brilliance that only a writer of her ability could conjure.


Side note, this review is slightly spoilery, but I wanted to talk about some of the themes.  You have been warned ;)


Review:  The mermaid chair was the first book I read by Sue Monk Kidd, being attracted to her books after seeing the movie of The Secret Life of Bees.  While I really enjoyed the movie, my first  step into her books was sadly disappointing.


I found the plot of The Mermaid Chair to have great themes, but poor execution.  It's a story about how relationships can fizzle out after a while and the temptation to find that spark in someone new.  It's also about how the sense of duty and propriety can prevent a person from choosing their own happiness.  But at the same time The Mermaid Chair is also about how people can have a life changing experience with a person even though they only know them for a short while and that meaningful relationships don't have to happen over twenty years.  I just didn't like how these themes were displayed.  There is very little room for the reader to draw their own conclusions, for the author will spell out each and every (obvious) symbolic meaning.  


The biggest problem was my inability to care about the characters.  On one hand I can totally understand Jessie and the choices that she made, having been there myself, but in reading her thoughts all I could think was that she was selfish and shallow.  I didn't feel any sense of empathy towards her and couldn't bring myself to understand why she felt the way she did about her husband.  I also didn't believe her "love" with Whit.  It was definitely more of a case of lust and using a lover to hide from depression than true romantic love.  


I want to make it clear that I didn't mind the affair, I can actually completely understand why she did that and her emotions behind it.  I just didn't like how it seemed like she was fooling herself by calling it love.  I wish she has at least cared enough about her husband to let him go first.  He seemed like a honest man and didn't deserve her betrayal.  Why are we all so afraid to admit our unhappiness to the people we care about before we do something that will end up hurting them way more than just telling the truth?   


Whit was probably the best character.  I could really identify with the choices he made in going to the monastery and his inner conflict trying to decide to stay or go, both from the monastery and his relationship with Jessie.  I like the theme of taking that cave time to heal from something bad, but then also realizing when it is time to come out of the cave and begin to create a new path in life.  The religious aspects and events that can totally shake the foundation of your faith and make you question everything you've always believed to be true was very interesting and well handled.  


Overall I really liked the themes in The Mermaid Chair, and some of the setting and imagery was very nice, but the deliverance of the themes in general fell flat and unemotional.  

Top Ten Tuesday 11/29/2011: Top Ten books on My TBR List for Winter

Top Ten Tuesday is an original feature/weekly meme created at The Broke and the Bookish.  This meme was created because we are particularly fond of lists here at The Broke and the Bookish.  We'd love to share our lists with other bookish folks and would LOVE to see your top ten lists!

Each week we will post a new top ten list complete with one of our bloggers' answers.  Everyone is welcome to join.  All we ask is that you link back to The Broke and the Bookish on your own Top Ten Tuesday post AND post a comment on our post with a link to your Top Ten Tuesday post to share with us and all those who are participating.  If you don't have a blog, just post your answers in the comments.

TOP TEN BOOKS ON MY TBR LIST FOR WINTER

It's kind of funny this is this week's top ten Tuesday because I just did a video about my TBR pile.  I made this video based solely on good reads ratings so some of the books I was like really?  That's rated 4.56?  Who knows, I guess I'll give them a go.  Watch the video to see my TBR pile!

Best Friends

So this has nothing to do with books, but I saw this today and LOST. MY. BUSINESS.  Enjoy.

Shine by Lauren Myracle

Published April 27, 2011 by Amulet Books
5 Stars

Goodreads Review

When her best guy friend falls victim to a vicious hate crime, sixteen-year-old Cat sets out to discover who in her small town did it. Richly atmospheric, this daring mystery mines the secrets of a tightly knit Southern community and examines the strength of will it takes to go against everyone you know in the name of justice. 

Against a backdrop of poverty, clannishness, drugs, and intolerance, Myracle has crafted a harrowing coming-of-age tale couched in a deeply intelligent mystery. Smart, fearless, and compassionate, this is an unforgettable work from a beloved author.

Review:  Shine is a very important book that covers the topics of homosexuality, drug use, and small town mentality.  It's about how ignorance can breed fear and hate.  But Shine is also about overcoming social expectations to do what is right.

I really liked how Shine handled such a wide variety of problems without ever feeling forced.  The main story is about a gay hate crime, but as the motivations behind that crime unfold we get to see the fronts put up by everyone in the town fall away.  We see that everyone has things about themselves that they are ashamed about.  Instead of putting things out in the open where they can be resolved and get help they shove it down where it never gets dealt with and just festers and gets worse.  I think this creates a sense of isolation and helplessness. 

However I did find parts of the story very predictable.  There would be times where I figured out something way before Cat and I would just sit there thinking 'Come on girl, figure it out so we can move on."  Eventually she'd figure it out and we'd move on.  There were also times where my imagination was way worse that what actually happened.  I think that because it was a YA book parts of the story were toned down a bit.  I don't have a problem with that but when I was expecting an ocean of hurt and only got a medium sized pond of hurt I felt a little underwhelmed (if that analogy makes any sense at all).

Beyond the who-done-it aspect of the story, I think the most important part is the commentary on how fear causes us to be selfish and act with a fight for survival mentality.  We forsake other's well being for our own when fear takes us over.  And ignorance and misunderstanding cause fear.  We have to all be more tolerate and take an active role to understand each other and people who are different in order ot overcome that fear.

After the cluster that was the WSJ Article of Doom and the more recent National Book Award mess I can only hope that people will continue to read books and make up their own minds about the merits of a book.  Shine is a dark book that covers dark topics yes, but overall it has a message of hope and that even the most prejudice of people can learn to accept and love.

Top Ten Tuesday 11/15/2011: Top Ten Books That Have Been On My Shelf For The Longest But I've Never Read

Top Ten Tuesday is an original feature/weekly meme created at The Broke and the Bookish.  This meme was created because we are particularly fond of lists here at The Broke and the Bookish.  We'd love to share our lists with other bookish folks and would LOVE to see your top ten lists!

Each week we will post a new top ten list complete with one of our bloggers' answers.  Everyone is welcome to join.  All we ask is that you link back to The Broke and the Bookish on your own Top Ten Tuesday post AND post a comment on our post with a link to your Top Ten Tuesday post to share with us and all those who are participating.  If you don't have a blog, just post your answers in the comments.

TOP TEN BOOKS THAT HAVE BEEN ON MY SHELF FOR THE LONGEST BUT I'VE NEVER READ.

These are the YA books that I've either owned for a really long time or have heard about from everyone I know.  I've been meaning to read these for a long time, and I'm hoping to get to these soon because they are awesome. 

1. The Host by Stephanie Meyer
2. Shiver by Maggie Stiefvater
3. Thirteen Reasons Why by Jay Asher
4. Crank by Ellen Hopkins
5. An Abundance of Katherines by John Green
6. A Great and Terrible Beauty by Libba Bray
7. Pretties by Scott Westerfeld
8. The Absolutely True Diary of a Part Time Indian by Sherman Alexie
9. Need by Carrie Jones
10. Before I Fall by Lauren Oliver

Beauty Queens by Libba Bray

Published May 24, 2011 by Scholastic Press

4 Stars

Goodreads Review
The fifty contestants in the Miss Teen Dream pageant thought this was going to be a fun trip to the beach, where they could parade in their state-appropriate costumes and compete in front of the cameras. But sadly, their airplane had another idea crashing on a desert island and leaving the survivors stranded with little food, little water, and practically no eyeliner.

What's a beauty queen to do? Continue to practice for the talent portion of the program--or wrestle snakes to the ground? Get a perfect tan--or learn to run wild? And what should happen when the sexy pirates show up?

Welcome to the heart of non-exfoliated darkness. Your tour guide? None other than Libba Bray, the hilarious, sensational, Printz Award-winning author of A Great and Terrible Beauty and Going Bovine. The result is a novel that will make you laugh, make you think, and make you never see beauty the same way again.

Review:  Zany, wacky, silly, hilarious, empowering, awesome.  All adjectives that can describe Libba Bray's satire on modern beauty stereotypes and women's roles in today's society as well as consumerism, racism, LGBT issues, and politics.  This is a perfect book for fans of Drop Dead Gorgeous, Miss Congeniality, and Legally Blonde (AKA me).

I really enjoyed all of the girls on the island and their unique personalities.  What I liked was how each girl started off with their own preconceived notions, their own mold that they were trying to stuff themselves into (in particular Mary Lou was amazing).  As the book progressed they learn how to let go of society's demands and expectations of them and to become the girls that they truly are.  I think this is a lovely message for the book and I really enjoyed the delivery.

The humor in this book is pretty out there, I will admit.  I consider my sense of humor to be pretty dry, so this over the top slap stick humor was a little too much for me at times.  Other times this humor was right on point and had some very poignant undertones.  Beauty Queens has varying levels of humor, so don't be surprised if you find yourself simultaneously rolling your eyes and laughing out loud. 

Overall Beauty Queens is a very funny satire that comments on beauty and how we try and contain it and give it structure and definition instead of letting it be the wild exciting thing it is.  While the humor doesn't always hit the mark for me, when it's on it's SO ON and speaks truly about sexuality and growing up.

Friday Face Off Cover Reveal: Arise

Friday Face Off is a meme hosted by one of my favorite book bloggers Misty over at The Book Rat.  Usually this meme focuses on different cover designs for the same book and decides which is better for the story.  I wanted to take this meme and add a little twist to it today by discussing a cover reveal!

The cover for Arise by Tara Hudson was just released.  This book is the sequel to Hereafter which was published June of 2011.  I bought Hereafter because of the beautiful cover, but I haven't read it yet.  

I think the series looks really beautiful together.  I like how her body is transparent (she's a ghost) and the overall color schemes.  The cover of Hereafter is absolutely beautiful in person, so I'm going to be that Arise will have similar vibrancy.  My only complaint is that I hate it when books feature headless bodies.  I like Hereafter more because you can see her whole head (granted it's the back of her head but still).  What do you think?  Let me know in the comments.

ALSO I reached 50 followers!  Thank you to everyone who has started following my blog, it means a lot!

Miss Peregrine's Home for Peculiar Children by Ransom Riggs

Published June 7, 2011 by Quirk Publishing
4 Stars

Goodreads Review

A mysterious island.

An abandoned orphanage

.

A strange collection of very curious photographs.

It all waits to be discovered in Miss Peregrine’s Home for Peculiar Children, an unforgettable novel that mixes fiction and photography in a thrilling reading experience. As our story opens, a horrific family tragedy sets sixteen-year-old Jacob journeying to a remote island off the coast of Wales, where he discovers the crumbling ruins of Miss Peregrine’s Home for Peculiar Children. As Jacob explores its abandoned bedrooms and hallways, it becomes clear that the children were more than just peculiar. They may have been dangerous. They may have been quarantined on a deserted island for good reason. And somehow—impossible though it seems—they may still be alive.

A spine-tingling fantasy illustrated with haunting vintage photography,Miss Peregrine’s Home for Peculiar Children will delight adults, teens, and anyone who relishes an adventure in the shadows.

Review:  Miss Peregrines is an excellent adventure story that is part historical, part fantasy, part art book, and 100% awesome!  I loved the quirkiness and uniqueness and I wish it had been taken further.  There is a little something for everyone; family drama, exciting adventures, weird magic, romance. 

First let's talk about the photographs.  I really like it when books include pictures, illustrations, and other visual clues that help support the plot.  Heck I geek out when there's a map on the inside cover of a fantasy book.  I think it enhances the entire reading experience, and the weird photographs in Miss Peregrine's certainly did just that.  It gets especially creepy when you realize that these photographs are unaltered.  They are genuine weird-o photographs that Riggs found.  Taking it a step further I loved the entire package of the book.  The book has a unique binding, the paper it's printed on is high quality and glossy, the cover is a beautiful red cloth with gold embossed letters, and the paper used on the inside covers is like an antique photo album.  The entire presentation of the book  lends to the atmosphere. 

The good parts of this book were the villains and their mythology.  I liked how they were revealed and the horror aspect to them.  These villains were monsters and there was no ambiguity to their monstrosity, and in this day and age of sparkly vampires and sexy werewolves, I found it refreshing.  I don't want to give away too much about these characters because they are what makes the book so interesting. 

I would say that at times this book feels a little over-written, especially for a YA book.  Sometimes the photos, as awesome as they were, felt a little forced into the story as opposed to supporting the experience.  This isn't a negative necessarily, but I think sometimes the writing got in the way of the story telling.  I think that it does rely heavily on the appearance of the book and listening to the audio would severely detract from the experience.  Rigg's strength is definitely in visual media, have you SEEN the trailer for this book?  It's beautiful and is at such a higher quality than other book trailers it's in a league of it's own. 



Overall Miss Peregrine's Home for Peculiar Children is a visually unique and pleasing book with a story that almost matches.  I wish the story and characters had been as well rounded as the beautiful presentation of the book, but it is still an exciting and interesting read.  I am looking forward to the sequel as well as his photography book "Talking Pictures" set to be published in January 2012.

Friday Face Off: The Mockingbirds and The Rivals by Daisy Whitney

Friday Face Off is a meme hosted by one of my favorite book bloggers Misty over at The Book Rat.  This is a double dip because not only am I going to show a new cover for The Rivals by Daisy Whitney but I'm also going to show the original covers vs. the new design.

Here is the ARC cover and final  hardcover for The Mockingbirds and the ARC cover for The Rivals:

I like these designs.  They don't say much about the story, but they are unique and really caught my eye.  I love the bold text, and I like the blue cover better than the red, it looks cleaner.  I especially loved the cover of The Rivals.  I thought the purple and green were really pretty and I love the doberman.  It make me even more interested in this series. 

Here are the new cover designs.  The first is the paperback of The Mockingbirds and the one on the left is the final cover design for The Rivals.

I have mixed feelings about these.  The original covers are a more sophisticated and adult design while these are firmly in the YA genre.I like that they look like pictures from the yearbook and that someone has written over the picture, like when someone signs your yearbook or you write BITCH over the head cheerleader (not saying all cheerleader are bitches, but I may or may not have done that...(ok I did)).  So while these covers probably have more to do with the actual story, I think they are less unique than the original covers.  The new covers look like every other YA book out there, so I would be less interested in reading them.  

And yet again another case of my hardback copy of the first book in a series not matching the rest of the series.  SO ANNOYING! 

Top Ten Tuesday 11/1/2011: Top Ten Books I Had Strong Emotions Over

Top Ten Tuesday is an original feature/weekly meme created at The Broke and the Bookish.  This meme was created because we are particularly fond of lists here at The Broke and the Bookish.  We'd love to share our lists with other bookish folks and would LOVE to see your top ten lists!

Each week we will post a new top ten list complete with one of our bloggers' answers.  Everyone is welcome to join.  All we ask is that you link back to The Broke and the Bookish on your own Top Ten Tuesday post AND post a comment on our post with a link to your Top Ten Tuesday post to share with us and all those who are participating.  If you don't have a blog, just post your answers in the comments.

TOP TEN BOOKS I HAVE STRONG EMOTIONS OVER

1.  Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix by J.K. Rowling - This is my least favorite Harry Potter book, but it definitely gets me riled up.  Poor Harry just gets shit on for 800 pages.  Seriously, nothing good happens, and it makes me rage.  Also I bawled at the ending.  I'm not ashamed to admit it.  (Don't get me wrong I love all of Harry Potter, but he really couldn't catch a break in this one could he?)

2.  Life of Pi by Yann Martel - I expected to love this book.  It seemed like it would be right up by alley.  But no, I HATED IT.  This is one of my most hated books I've ever read.  And not because it's poorly written, but because I couldn't stand the pretentious nature of the book.  It was all like, ooh look at me, I'm full of symbolism and so deep and if you don't like me you just don't get it.  No I got it, you're just an idiot, so shut up.

3.  The Book Thief by Markus Zusak - This book made me cry too, but out of just pure despair.  I am a sucker for WWII stories, and I loved how this showed that the Jewish people weren't the only victims from this horrible time.  A lot of German citizens were against the Nazi party as well, and I think we as a world culture tend to vilify all of Germany as this one mass of evil I think this book does an excellent job of showing the people on both sides of the fence.

4.  And Then There Were None by Agatha Christie - I read this book as a little kid (around 8 maybe 9 years old?), and it was the first book that really just blew my mind.  I got to the ending and was just like WTF JUST HAPPENED!??  It remains one of my favorite books to this day, and in my opinion one of the best mystery books ever written.

5.  Feed by Mira Grant - This is an awesome zombie book.  I am a huge advocate for this book, and I encourage EVERYONE to read this.  It's that awesome.  And the ending?  wow.  I seriously did not expect to just cry the way I did, but man I just let it all out.  And yes, all of that emotion came from a zombie book.

That's really about it.  I can't think of ten because there are few books that create strong emotions in me so I didn't want to create a list where I tried to force out ten.  (I could get into religion books, but I'm not going to go there, I don't want to be too big of a douche.  Suffice it to say I have some strong opinions about certain religion books and if you really want to know you can email me)