What Are We Reading, Page 14

I reported that spam. Hope everyone finds me here.

Thanks for starting the new thread! I'm about to start reading Painted clay for this month's Virago theme of writers from Australia and NZ. I'm also reading The storm of echoes which is the final part of a French YA fantasy quartet, and rereading Gideon the Ninth as I've just received Nona the Ninth and need to catch up.

>1 vwinsloe: Thanks for the new thread. I read a couple of books by Annie Ernaux, but I can't remember why I picked her up. Once a few years ago there was a tv show, maybe Homecoming or Homegrown or something like that. One of the characters was a French woman who had married a US soldier after WWII and moved to the US. She lived as she had always lived, but all her US neighbors found her rude and pushy. Happening is about Ernaux's abortion in which she comes across as rather rude. So I guess the show was on to something. Aside from the cultural differences the book is very well done. Well, also aside from her saying the abortion takes place when she's 3 months pregnant but everything points to more like a 5-month fetus. It's a step-by-step chronicle of all the people she must see and processes she must complete to rid herself of an unintended pregnancy. It's just the sort of thing that makes republicans with their condemnation of "abortion on demand" fume. The other book is I Remain in Darkness about dealing with her mother's dementia. It also seems very straightforward and accurate. Dementia is personally world-shattering but it also must be dealt with day to day. Have I mentioned that my sister has frontal-temporal lobe dementia? My beautiful, intelligent librarian sister seems to change and her world grow smaller and smaller every day. I like the way Ernaux casually discusses the steps she has taken from moving her mother in with her to moving her to a nursing home to then visiting her weekly in the nursing home as she declines. If one goal of literature is illumination, she certainly achieves it.

>3 Citizenjoyce:. Annie Ernaux won the Nobel for literature this year, and I was surprised that I never heard of her. I have Happening on my wish list and now I will look for I Remain in Darkness as well. I didn't know about your sister, but my 93 year old mother has what is called "mild cognitive impairment" which seems to me not to be mild at all. She can do her basic activities of daily living, but no "complex" operations like paying her bills or balancing her checkbook. At any given moment, she forgets her cats' names. It is frustrating for me, but even more so for her. I will look for Ernaux's book.

>4 vwinsloe: Ah, that must be why I read her. Thanks.
If I live to be 93 I'm sure I would have the same diagnosis. My sister is 66 and her dementia is very advanced to the point that they have to keep the doors locked or she will wander away, once wandered across a busy street to a restaurant. By some good fortune, the workers there realized the problem and called the police and her husband brought her home. She also has gotten into cars with strangers, one took her on his afternoon errands and then brought her back where he picked her up, just down the street from her home. Also, the connection between her stomach and brain has been interrupted so she always wants to eat and doesn't believe she just had a meal. She's always been the slimmest and most health-conscious of us sisters, and now she has a belly. If she knew it would horrify her. Diseases of the mind don't show on the body, so that makes it so difficult, when we look at her, to believe that she really is not there.

>5 Citizenjoyce:. I am so sorry. I don't personally know anyone closely with such dementia, particularly at an early age. I hope that there is more family around her and you to lean on.

My bitching is confined to my mother asking 3 or 4 times in the space of 10 minutes yesterday "where are we going?" and "what's the name of the place that we are going to?" It's really a problem for me since I don't have much patience, and I am the only somewhat local (1.5 hours away) person available to help her. Yesterday, I am proud to say that I just calmly repeated my answer over and over. It seems so trivial, but one reason that I didn't have children is that I am temperamentally unsuited.

Back to books, I am really enjoying The Stars are Legion, even though I didn't need much distraction from the red tide (red wave did not materialize, apparently.) Next in my rotation is nonfiction, so I will have to start browsing the TBR shelves.

I decided to finally read All the Single Ladies. I was prompted to read it when I saw that a Fox guest remarked that the GOP needed to get single women married so that they would vote Republican. Apparently, at least 68 percent of all young single women voted for the Democratic ticket in the mid-terms. Of course, it is no surprise that young women voted Democrat after the SCOTUS overturned Roe, but the fact that they were predominantly single women is intriguing. This book was written 6 years ago now, but I think that Traister may have been on to something.

>7 vwinsloe: Someone just posted something about this on Facebook and I recommended the book. Single women are so threatening to the status quo, but I think often they don't understand their political power. Yay for the single women, especially in this crazy political age.

I just finished Haven by Emma Donoghue. This is the tenth book of hers I've read, each one better than the last, though I admit I like her historical fiction better than her contemporary stuff. This book is set in the 7th Century. Artt, a respected ascetic saint-wannabe, has a dream that he and two monks live on a deserted island and dedicate their lives to the glory of god. He picks two monks from a monastery he is visiting, Cormac an older storyteller and musician and Trian, a younger sailor-worker, musician and decides they will fulfill this dream. The saint wannabe knows god loves nothing more than hard work and self denial. I have little use for religious people, even less for ascetics, and even less for those who impose that asceticism on others. Artt spends the book making sure he destroys every bit of happiness he can for the glory of god. Every few pages I found myself saying "Jesus Christ" or "Lord o' Mercy" so you can see it was a very religious experience.

>9 Citizenjoyce:. Lol. On my list, thanks. I've been busy, so I'm still slowly reading All the Single Ladies. One of the reasons that I waited so long before reading it is that I thought that it wouldn't have any new information for me. I was very wrong.

>10 vwinsloe: I love when that happens.

I did finish All the Single Ladies last night, and I picked up The Book Woman of Troublesome Creek. I had let it sit on the shelf for a while because it is the same subject as The Giver of Stars which I read some time ago now. It seems as though this book has a different spin.

>12 vwinsloe: There's a controversy that Jojo Moyes plagiarized her book from Kim Michele Richardson because of the extreme similarities so I've been reluctant to read the Moyes book.

>13 Citizenjoyce:. So far the only similarities that I can see is that both books are about the Pack Librarians in rural KY. The blue people were not mentioned in The Giver of Stars as I recall, but there was certainly domestic violence and bigotry. It only got 3 stars from me.

>14 vwinsloe: I hope you like Book woman better.

>15 Citizenjoyce:. Yes, I liked The Book Woman of Troublesome Creek better than The Giver of Stars. Kim Michele Richardson's vividly detailed descriptions seemed very authentic, which makes sense since she lives in Kentucky. Of course, the marriage plot was a bit predictable, but I always enjoy a book from which I learn something.

On another subject, I don't know whether you have read These Precious Days yet since it was apparently just published on 11/1/22. A friend just recommended it to me and sent me the link for the first essay which can be read by anyone at:

https://harpers.org/archive/2021/01/these-precious-days-ann-patchett-psilocybin-...

I found it quite unlike anyone else's pandemic story.

Now to decide on my next read. I think I need something contemporary. Hmmm.

>16 vwinsloe: Yes, I read it in January which must be when it was published because I know I didn't read it as an arc. It was a mixed bag for me, but overall I loved it. I love anything by her. My little review: I just finished These Precious Days: Essays and loved it which was a surprise since I didn't like it at first. Sometimes our favorite fiction writers aren't all that interesting in nonfiction, plus she has great respect for the Catholic religion or for practitioners of it. My Year of No Shopping didn't really apply to most of us since, as Patchett says, she's rich. She has so much accumulated stuff that she doesn't need to shop for more. She doesn't even need to get a new dress for an extra special occasion since she has lots of extra special dresses. But that wasn't the one that got me - The Worthless Servant was. In fact, I came very close to abandoning the book after this nonsense about faith and self-sacrifice. But, it's Ann Patchett, so I continued and loved the rest of the book, and was inspired and uplifted by it. The woman knows how to do friendship.

>17 Citizenjoyce:. I will read it when it comes to me, but thanks for the heads up about her lack of self-awareness regarding her wealth and the religiosity. I suppose not everything will resonate with every reader. I particularly liked in the title story when Sooki confessed that she was reluctant to be a house guest because she is a vegetarian. I totally get that.

I've picked up a rather large novel by a man that I have been putting off for some time, so I may not have much to add here for a while.

>18 vwinsloe: Not only am I vegetarian but because of some intestinal issues in the last year, I'm also mostly gluten-free with very little dairy and sugar (No milk substitute works well in coffee for me, so I do use about 1/4 cup of Lactaid in the mornings). My daughter-in-law didn't know what to do about Thanksgiving, but I assured her that I would be fine, I wouldn't starve and I'd enjoy the company, plus I could bring food I can eat that everyone else could enjoy. That worked great for one meal. I don't know what I'd do if I had to stay at someone else's home for a long period of time. I'd spent years mocking the gluten-free "phase." It's only appropriate that I pay my dues now.

>19 Citizenjoyce:. Oh, that's difficult. I know I hate to have anyone go out of their way or single me out and make something special for me in a crowd. I haven't eaten meat since 1980 or so, but I do eat seafood, and that makes it worse somehow in that situation. I'd rather just eat side dishes or stay home. Since we got our dog just before the pandemic lockdown, I have him as an excuse to stay home now.

>20 vwinsloe: pets and pandemic, 2 great excuses to avoid large gatherings.

I finished Honor by Thrity Umrigar which I read because my daughter's alumnae book group read it. I have long thought that nothing could make me want to go to India, and here's one more reason for that feeling. The book is about a journalist's investigation of an honor killing and, surprisingly, is one of the few books I've read in which the Muslims come off as reasonable. One of the characters says why he loves living in India so much, it boils down to "if you're rich and have servants, life is pleasant." My daughter says, "Yeah, that's true everywhere." The book shows the big cultural difference between rural and urban India, but it seems to me that everywhere there is a rather disgusting reverence for hierarchy. I know this is the system many religions and politicians prefer and push my country toward. I keep hoping we can resist.

>22 Citizenjoyce: I had an American friend who passed away many years ago from breast cancer, who loved going to India. When I asked her why she liked India so much, she said, "Because it is SO not here." It was an interesting thing to say since she was a lesbian, and when she traveled there, it was long before the changes in law and policy toward LGBTQ people that have taken place in the last decade. She described the colors, the languages, the scenery, the smells as being so incredibly different than here in the US. On the basis of that recommendation, I have always longed to go, although I doubt that I will ever get there.

On another note, I started The Raven Tower. Leckie seems to be doing a bit of her trademark gender bending, although this fantasy is much different than her space operas. I could almost say that it is SO not here, to carry on with the theme.

>23 vwinsloe: So not here. Right. I wonder if that's why I have no desire to go there. My family (traditional christian republicans) will tell you I'm a rebel iconoclast, but the reality is that I am pitifully mundane. So not here is so not my style.
I read Spear by Nicola Griffith after a recommendation here and loved it. Myths retold from a female perspective always grab me.
I just finished The Scent Keeper by Erica Bauermeister and was slightly disappointed. Maybe it's because the writing was close but no cigars or maybe it was because I listened to it on audio, as usual, and the narrator was wrong. Every time Emmeline says "I'm sorry" (which she must do millions of times) it's voiced with a question mark at the end. I know linguists have decided that upspeak is just another way of speaking and doesn't need to be derided, but Emmeline is raised on an island apart from all other humans except her father with no connection with the outside world. She would not have developed upspeak all on her own. Narrator aside, the book was a fascinating look at scent and its effects.

>24 Citizenjoyce: That's good to hear about Spear. My copy just arrived a couple of days ago. I have liked everything else I have read by Griffith - which is most of her catalog at this point.

>25 ScoLgo: I read Ammonite some years ago. I don't know why it didn't do much for me, maybe I just didn't get it. I should try again.

>26 Citizenjoyce: Ammonite is probably my favorite Griffith book - but it's been a while since I first read it. I too should probably try it again. I recall liking the world-building and the change of scope from the claustrophobic opening segment, where Marghe is first arriving at Jeep, to the anthropological explorations once she reaches the planet's surface. I found the writing, setting, and characterization very reminiscent of one of my favorite authors, Ursula Le Guin.

>24 Citizenjoyce: & >25 ScoLgo:. I was entitled to a free book at Thriftbooks, so I just got Spear. Thanks for the reminder!

>26 Citizenjoyce:, I felt the same about Ammonite but I read it when it was published. Or I may have that backwards. Maybe it was Slow River that I didn't get and Ammonite that I liked. It was a long time ago.

I just finished one of the most engrossing books I've read in a very long time. When Will There Be Good News? by Kate Atkinson is the third in the Jackson Brody series. I read the first two and liked them well enough, but this one is so full of strong, confused, and nontypical women (and men) I couldn't resist. It is indeed full of bad news, more than you would think, but absolutely wonderful. Now I guess I have to go on with the rest of the series.

>29 Citizenjoyce:. Could When will There Be Good News? stand alone? I'm not much of a mystery reader and don't think that I would read the first two in order to get to the jackpot third book.

>30 vwinsloe: I read the first two some time ago and forgot them so this was like reading a stand alone. There are references to happenings in the other books, but you don't need to have read them to figure out what was going on.

>31 Citizenjoyce:. Thanks, I'll put it on my list then.

I finished The Raven Tower and, while I enjoyed it, it was not my favorite of hers. I would have liked to know more about the characters in order to be invested in them.

I've started So You want to Talk About Race which is similar to other books that I have read in the same vein, but I hope will expand my understanding.

>33 vwinsloe: Let us know how it is. I think the more I read about racism, the more "white fragile" I become. I was going to read You Sound Like a White Girl: The Case for Rejecting Assimilation by Julissa Arce this month, then I sent the book back without starting it. I'm tired of being stereotyped. The ubiquitous use of the word Karen isn't helping any. I'm unsure of how to read about racism without confronting a wall of hate for my mere existence. It is giving me insight into how I come off about misogyny, so that's a help.

>34 Citizenjoyce:. I used to feel that way. Now the voice inside my head says "not all white women!" and I smile and move forward less defensively. Because if you are sick of being stereotyped, just imagine what it must be like. So You Want to Talk About Race does a good job of conveying what it must be like to be a black woman. That point of view contrasts with White Fragility which was good in a different way.

The author begins with a conversation about how not to talk about race that she had with her white mother. Her white mother gets upset because she is called out by a black co-worker for trying to tell a joke for a black audience. Since she has two black children, the mother is identifying with them, but in reality, she has no idea what it's like to be black. If nothing else, the takeway from this book seems to be that black women are the only ones who have lived through being a black woman, and they are the experts in that regard.

>35 vwinsloe: Well, that's certainly true.

I finished So You Want to Talk About Race which was full of down to earth practical advice, mostly for well intentioned people who want to engage and keep putting their foot in their mouths.

Now I've started Oh William, and, as always, I marvel at how well Elizabeth Strout captures complicated feelings.

>37 vwinsloe: It wasn't my favorite Elizabeth Strout, but I didn end up liking it. I do like when exes can be friends.

I finished Oh, William, and I liked it very much. It was almost reminiscent of Margot Livesey in the way that Elizabeth Strout depicted people who were intimately familiar with each other, but who didn't see some very important things about themselves and the other people. In some cases because the information was intentionally hidden and in some cases just because it had not yet been discerned. The most interesting point was how one person can project some meaning onto another person that was never intrinsically there. This pattern was repeated in big and small things, and was very well done.

I've started My Name is Mary Sutter which was a recommendation by Citizenjoyce. I don't read much historical fiction, but this engaged me right away.

>39 vwinsloe: good analysis. You saw things I didn't and explained why Stout is so popular.
I've been reading some Christmas fluff and just finished. Wolfsbane and Mistletoe paranormal Christmas stories edited by Charlaine Harris. There's a cute Sookie Stackhouse I'd read before, a bit too much romance, several depictions of Santa as a vampire, and some pretty good werewolf and magic stories. It was a good Christmas read.

>40 Citizenjoyce: I have yet to acquire or read a Charlaine Harris novel despite the fact that I enjoy reading about vampires. I will have to make a more concerted effort in 2023.

I'm still working on My Name is Mary Sutter and I don't think that I have gotten to the heart of the matter yet since she has been refused medical training as a surgeon and a nurse.

>41 vwinsloe: She's fun. The Sookie Stackhouse novels bear little relationship to the True Blood TV series which seemed to have been designed to provide some great eye candy. My little minnie dachshund is named after Amelia Broadway who plays a significant part as a semi-competent witch in the later books and isn't in the tv series at all.
Mary Sutter goes through some things as she tries to heal those around her. The first book is a satisfying setup for the second, Winter Sisters which is amazingly good for a second in a series.

>42 Citizenjoyce: The book description of Dead Until Dark sounds amusing.

Luckily, I picked up a copy of Winter Sisters at the same library sale where I got My Name is Mary Sutter. I may read something else in between, but I already own it so I will get to it promptly.

>43 vwinsloe: I think you'll be glad you did especially since you're reading Mary Sutter there was at least a year between my reading of the two, and I think I would have enjoyed Sisters more had I read them closer together.

>44 Citizenjoyce: Considering the fact that the next book in my neglected TBR queue is a large science fiction book by a man, I decided to move right on to Winter Sisters. There seems to be a blizzard involved, so it seems like the right time for it.

I found My Name is Mary Sutter to be a good read, if you could get past the gore.

>45 vwinsloe: I envy you reading Sisters so soon after Mary Sutter.

>46 Citizenjoyce:. I finished Winter Sisters yesterday after having spent a long Christmas day in bed with a cold. It was a good read that was deftly plotted. Thanks.

>47 vwinsloe: I'm glad you liked the book but sorry about your rotten Christmas. I hope you're feeling better. Right now I'm reading The Ink Black Heart by Robert Galbraith. After years of being online trolled and, I'm sure, threatened with all manner of bodily harm Rowlings has responded with a thousand-page book about vile online trollers connecting them with white supremacists, pedophiles, and murderers. If you come for a beloved, intelligent, rich, powerful author you should expect her to respond just like this. Good for her.

>48 Citizenjoyce: I'm starting to feel much better, thanks.

Didn't J.K.Rowling come for trans people first? She has been so vocally bigoted against trans people on social media that I have tuned her out, although I was never much of a fan anyway.

>49 vwinsloe: I don't see her as coming for trans people. She values womanhood and has little love for men who think they can just assume womanhood. She's also concerned that children could be encouraged to change their gender including treatments that would be irreversible later should they decide to rebecome the gender they were born into. Life is long. It's concerning to me also that children could make enormously consequential decisions they will later regret. All the things she has said have been said out of concern, not malice, yet, to me, unbelievable malice has been directed toward her. This book, in which she supports women against men who delight in taking advantage of them, is her response to that malice.

>50 Citizenjoyce: That's my take on it too. I read an article in which she set out some very supportive views of trans people while being definitely pro-woman as a sex rather than a gender.

>50 Citizenjoyce: & >51 SChant: There is a strong opposing view, such as:

https://www.vox.com/culture/21285396/jk-rowling-transphobic-backlash-harry-potte...

I'm absolutely sure that Rowling has been subjected to vile online attacks. It seems that every woman who speaks up about anything has been. I do think that it is a mistake for any prominent person to publicly disparage an oppressed group, even supposedly in defense of another oppressed group.

Long ago I read a long piece by Michelle Tea covering the Michigan Womyn's Music Festival, or rather covering "Camp Trans" which is a place outside of the Festival because the Festival organizers ban transwomen entry. It can still be found online at: https://www.mcsweeneys.net/articles/transmissions-from-camp-trans-2003

This piece strongly reinforced my views regarding women who discriminate against transwomen. I was shocked when I witnessed such behavior before, when I attended a Women's Law Conference at Yale, so it struck a chord of recognition with me.

I guess what I am trying to say is just that people with a big following should be careful not to punch down, even if they themselves feel like they are low in society's hierarchy.

>52 vwinsloe: I read the first one and about half of the second one. I see their point but
"some women have a penis
some men don’t
and the rest of the world
is just going to have to get the
fuck over it"
Doesn't work for me. I'm for protecting all people who are traumatized and abused. We can all work for that without wholeheartedly accepting the "fact" that some women have penises and promoting the idea of pregnant persons and chest-feeding fathers. In 21 years as a labor and delivery nurse, I cared for a variety of pregnant and breastfeeding women. If I had been assigned to care for a trans man, I certainly would have, but I would have known it was her female body that was giving birth and feeding her baby, no matter her gender. No, I wouldn't have shamed her or given her inferior care, but I could not have seen her body as anything but female. I'm kind of amazed at the extreme hatred voiced toward those of us who feel the same.

>53 Citizenjoyce:. I guess that there is extreme hatred for women and no excuse is needed for vile harassment (See e.g., Hilary Clinton, Michele Obama, etc.) I don't think that it is special hatred for just trans allies. But cisgendered women saying things about trans women that sound like Donald Trump talking about immigrants at the southern border? Well, I personally find it shocking.

With any traumatized and abused group, sometimes I think that it is best to be careful not to share our non-supportive opinions in the event that it may be hurtful. In the case of trans people, most of us are not medical or psychological experts in that specialized field, and sometimes I get the sense that experts are even feeling their way along. I know there was a time not long ago when babies were born with anomalous external genitalia and surgery was done without consulting the parents (and certainly without regard to the child's feelings). I hope that they have evolved from that. Time will tell if they swung too far in the other direction, but I leave it to affected parents, children and the experts. It must be devastating.

Sometimes, boy do I ever, make mistakes, and I say things that could be hurtful. But I am trying to learn to not get to defensive and to sincerely apologize when I do, instead of getting defensive and doubling down.

>54 vwinsloe: I admire your attitude. I could use more of it.

>55 Citizenjoyce: Thanks, but as a highly vocal and opinionated person, it has been an uphill battle for me. I think that many "strong" women of my generation have modeled themselves on male behavior and it is difficult to check ourselves after having to push in to get the attention we deserve. I know that I used to be guilty of talking over other people in meetings constantly. I'm not sure that I ever broke myself of the habit.

>56 vwinsloe: "many "strong" women of my generation have modeled themselves on male behavior" Oh, I have such a hard time with that idea, and maybe that's why the whole transgender thing is such a problem for me. People have different styles. I don't see them as gender-related just as varying styles. I don't see why you can't be whoever you are with whatever style is most natural for you without designating yourself as something specific. I think it would benefit us all to be less confrontational and more supportive, but I don't see that as being less male and more female, maybe as being more integratedly human.

>57 Citizenjoyce:. Maybe there are some personal styles to some degree, of course, but we are so steeped in patriarchal societal norms that it is impossible to tell. It's definitely "a thing" that women are told, and they believe, that they must act more like men to succeed in the workplace (easy google). There is some work on this being done on the male side right now (see e.g., Remaking Manhood: Stories from the Front Lines of Change), and it is long overdue, considering how unrealistic "masculine" expectations have become toxic. I agree that it would benefit us all to be less confrontational and more supportive, but for men, that is often seen as less masculine and "weak." So I think that it is a goal that we are far from realizing.

>24 Citizenjoyce: & >25 ScoLgo: I'm ringing in the new year with Spear. I've only just started it, and I am enjoying the beautifully descriptive prose that sets up the narrative. It reminds me a bit of Tehanu, which is my favorite LeGuin.

Happy New Year everyone!

I'm ringing in the new year with These Is My Words, historical fiction about pioneers to the west starting in 1881 written in diary form. I'm loving it so far. There is the obligatory romance, but the life she describes feels very real.

>59 vwinsloe: Hah! I just read Spear earlier this week and loved it. I can't claim that it's a perfect book, but I read it at a perfect time for me so it became only my 2nd 5-star read of the year. Hope you enjoy it too.

>57 Citizenjoyce: >58 vwinsloe: I also have to say that, reading the recent back & forth about Rowling... it is extremely refreshing to see an online forum with a modicum of disagreement where the discussion remains calm, non-toxic, and non-confrontational. It's great to see people actually trying to see the other viewpoint instead of digging in and slinging dirt, which sadly seems to be the norm these days. So, thank you both for that.

>61 ScoLgo: Book people. You can't beat 'em.

>61 ScoLgo:. I really appreciate this group. The fact that there are only 4-5 of us who post with any regularity now makes it even more important to me. We lost a bunch of folks when another group split off a few years ago. That group seems to have gone dormant, and, without this group, I would never have found out about books like Spear, which I am savoring.

I think that SChant mentioned Spear originally, so thanks, SChant where ever you are.

>63 vwinsloe:

We lost a bunch of folks when another group split off a few years ago.

You are misremembering, and in the process scapegoating "Reading books by women" and me, its creator. This group didn't "lose a bunch of folks" to RBBW; those who joined it were by and large posters who hadn't joined Girlybooks AT ALL. "Girlybooks" is Join To Post; "Reading Books By Women" is open to all.There was some but in general little overlap between posters in the two groups. Since RBBW was regularly far less active than Girlybooks, went dormant more than once and has been dormant for years, it makes even less sense to blame it for whatever you think is amiss here.

Apart from the features of THIS group that may bear responsibility for the status quo, which I leave to you to consider, keep in mind that Talk has lost hugely in activity since the first years. Active groups are now rare exceptions, just as this type of social media interaction is pretty much internet history.

>63 vwinsloe: I'm glad we've kept this a comfortable place for women to post thoughts about books by women. It has stayed active largely to your encouragement and remains one of my favorite places on LibraryThing.

>64 LolaWalser:. Nice to see you posting here again. I hope that my misapprehension will not deter you from posting in the future.

>65 Citizenjoyce:. Thanks, it is definitely one of my favorite groups as well!

I finished Spear, and I wished that it were longer. I am definitely going to try to get to Hild this year.

I started The Sentence last night because I own it, and the book is high up on the LibraryThing Top Five Books of 2022. I've read a couple of Louise Erdrich's books before, but, knowing nothing about The Sentence, I was not expecting farce. Should be a fun read.

I'm reading Liberation by Imogen Kealey about Nancy Wake known as the White Mouse as she worked with the allies and the French resistance to liberate France. She was famous, receiving medals from the UK, the US, France, Australia, and New Zealand, and I had never heard of her. Isn't it amazing the number of famous, accomplished people we've never heard of? It's a real swashbuckling book dramatizing acts of courage and intelligence. According to Wikipedia, who knows what's true? Would they say this if the hero were a man?

>66 vwinsloe:

Thanks -- as you can see, I never left this group and skim it occasionally (although this recent posting was sheer coincidence, if not for the holidays I'd probably have missed your post). Since I usually post as the whim takes me, anything is possible, but as I've been more serious about tending to a personal thread in a record-keeping group, involvement in other groups is that much less likely (some people cross-post; I've never liked that).

Incidentally, I forgot to mention--I think you were asking above about LTer SChant--I could be wrong but I'm fairly certain I've seen that moniker in Science Fiction and/or "Feminist SF"; fairly recently I mean (but given what my memory's getting like, this could be days or months...)

Happy new year!

>69 LolaWalser: Yes Lola - that's me in both of those groups. Happy New Year to everyone.

>69 LolaWalser: BTW - I used to really appreciate your in-depth look at some of the older SF works - interesting and thought-provoking.

>68 Citizenjoyce:, I recently read A Woman of No Importance which was about an American spy in WWII. I had never heard of her either and felt the same way. It is amazing that we have never heard of them, but I think that a lot of information about these people may have been classified by their respective intelligence organizations.

>70 SChant: There you are, I was looking for you to thank you for recommending Spear and Hild, which I will definitely get to now.

>72 vwinsloe: I enjoyed Hild very much. Brilliant evocation of place and time, and very much focussed on women.

>73 SChant:. I'm moving it toward the top of the TBR stack. Thanks.

Happy New Year everyone! I hope it will be a good one for you all.

I had started typing a post when I finished The mandarins at the end of last year but obviously logged out without posting. I found this a very long but consistently interesting read. It follows a group of French intellectuals after the end of WWII as they seek to reconcile their political and social views with the new reality. There are two main narrative threads, one focusing on Henri (based on Albert Camus), which is narrated in a tight third-person voice, and the other on Anne (based on De Beauvoir herself) which is told in the first person. They and their friends and colleagues face moral, social and political challenges as the world changes around them. This year I will try to read the volumes of de Beauvoir's autobiography that cover this period in her life.

I also read The microcosm by Maureen Duffy, which took me a while to get into but which I found fascinating by the end. It's a mosaic novel linked by the lesbian bar House of Shades, with long internal monologues by various characters from across the spectrum of 1960s queer society. There's Marie who repressed her sexuality and is unhappily married; Cathy who has to move to London and discover that she's not "the only one" in order to be happy; Steve who is a games teacher, dreading that one of her pupils will develop a crush and throw suspicion onto her; and linking the characters, Matt, the bartender who lives as a man with his wife Rae. I think the afterword would have been better placed at the beginning of the book, for me. It explains that Duffy intended the book to be a non-fiction collection of narratives recorded from lesbian women, but she was persuaded that no-one would publish such a book. So she turned the experiences she had collected into the tales that form this novel. It's quite daring structurally as well as in its content. It's not an easy read, but worth persevering with.

My first book completed in 2023 is The Moonday letters, a Finnish SF novel with strong ecological themes. I loved this. It's told in epistolary form by a woman who is awaiting her absent spouse, whose trail leads her from settlements on Mars, to a cylinder habitat in space, to a flooded Earth. It's more of an introspective book than an action packed narrative, exploring character and themes of identity and belonging as well as making the reader think about the impact of our actions on society and the environment. Interestingly, it blends traditional shamanistic practices with SF in a way that I found convincing. This is the third book I've read by the author and I have loved every one.

I hope to post here more often this year!

>75I was trying to think of the book brought to mind by your description of The Microcosm. I think it was Cantoras by Carolina De Robertis which follows a group of lesbians through decades of political and social change in Uraguay. Funny how other countries are becoming more accepting of differences as the US becomes more intolerant.

>75 Sakerfalcon:. I'm putting The Moonday Letters on my wish list. I've never read her - in fact, I'm not sure that I've read anything by a Finnish author.

Looking forward to your posting here more in 2023!

>77 vwinsloe: It does look intriguing.

>75 Sakerfalcon: "...perfect for fans of Octavia Butler and Emily St. John Mandel."

Welp... I'm in. Added to my planned reading for this year.

I recommended The Moonday Letters to Libby. I hope they get it.

I hope you all enjoy it!

I just finished The Old Woman with the Knife by Gu Byeong-mo a South Korean novel about Hornclaw, an aging, amoral, emotionally stunted paid assassin who works for an agency that takes contracts with no regard for reason. It's just a job, and a job she has done well her whole life, but now she's concerned that she's slipping a little and no longer valuable to her agency. Her mistakes are mocked by a younger agent in the firm who is valuable for his special skills. He is chosen by clients who want their object to suffer before death. I don't think any of us would want to trade places with Hornclaw even with her special talents, but her contemplation of aging in the face of strict self-reliance is absorbing.

I finished The Sentence. What a way to start the year. Louise Erdrich managed somehow to make a smooth transition from farce to pathos in this satisfying book. I learned a lot, was entertained, and gained some perspective on the events of 2020.

It's hard to follow up a book like that, but I started Sea of Tranquility which was also ranked high on LibraryThing's Top Five Books of 2022.

>83 vwinsloe: every January I post a challenge to read from best of the previous year's lists. This year, as usual, I'm overcommitted. The lists are:
Amazon: https://www.amazon.com/b/?ie=UTF8&node=16857165011&tag=googhydr-20&h....
Atlantic: https://www.theatlantic.com/books/archive/2022/12/best-books-2022-hua-hsu-gabrie....
Book Riot: https://bookriot.com/bestbooks2022/
Boston.com
Readers' choice: https://www.boston.com/community/readers-say/we-asked-for-your-favorite-reads-of....
Critics' choice: https://www.boston.com/culture/books/2022/12/19/best-books-2022/
Five Books: https://fivebooks.com/best-books/award-winning-nonfiction-books-of-2022-sophie-r....
DC Public Library: https://dcist.com/story/22/12/27/dc-library-most-popular-books-2022/
Goodreads most read: https://booksofbrilliance.com/2022/12/05/goodreads-most-read-books-of-2022/
The Guardian: https://www.theguardian.com/books/series/best-books-2022
History and Politics: https://www.theguardian.com/books/2022/dec/03/the-best-history-and-politics-book....
Kahani: https://bestkahani.com/web-stories/must-read-books-2022/
Literary Hub: https://lithub.com/the-award-winning-novels-of-2022/
New York Post: https://nypost.com/web-stories/top-5-best-books-of-2022/
https://nypost.com/2022/12/17/best-books-of-2022-top-30-must-read-titles-of-the-....
New York Times:
Best Historical Fiction 2022 https://www.nytimes.com/2022/12/04/books/review/the-best-historical-fiction-of-2....
Critic Picks: https://www.nytimes.com/2022/12/08/books/review/2022-reading-picks-from-times-st....
Sixty and Me: https://sixtyandme.com/list-favorite-books/
Slate: https://slate.com/culture/2022/12/best-books-2022-slate-book-critic-fiction-nonf....
Tictoc: https://bookriot.com/tiktok-book-recommendations-2022/
Time: https://time.com/6238663/best-fiction-books-2022/
Vanity Fair: https://www.vanityfair.com/style/photos/2022/12/best-books-of-2022
Vogue: https://www.vogue.com/article/best-books-2022
Washington Post: https://www.washingtonpost.com/books/2022/11/17/best-books/
Best Nonfiction: https://www.washingtonpost.com/business/best-nonfiction-of-2022-great-books-that....

I'm starting with The Rabbit Hutch by Tess Gunty

>84 Citizenjoyce:. Yes, I wondered whether you were going to do that this year. Obviously, not every book on every list works for everyone, but it seems like when there is some consensus about a book, I generally like it.
Thanks for doing this!

>83 vwinsloe: Both The sentence and Sea of Tranquility are on my TBR pile. I'll try and get to the Erdrich at least sooner rather than later.

I've started reading Living next door to the god of love, which is SF by Justina Robson. It's a follow-on from Natural history which I enjoyed.

>86 Sakerfalcon: I finished Sea of Tranquility last night, and I enjoyed it although maybe not quite as much as The Sentence. I don't know why I was surprised to see that Sea of Tranquility also involves a pandemic.

I have not read Justina Robson but she seems to have some very interesting ideas. I will keep my eye out for Natural History. Thanks for mentioning it.

>87 vwinsloe: Had you read The Glass Hotel before Sea of Tranquility? I would not call SoT an actual sequel, but both story lines are related.

>88 ScoLgo: No, I have not read The Glass Hotel. I did not know that the two books were related. My methods of obtaining books are a little hit or miss: Library sales, used bookstores, Little Free Libraries, etc. Now that I know they are related, I will make a concerted effort to find it. Thanks for mentioning it.

I finished Lucy by the Sea by Elizabeth Strout which is the sequal to Oh, William. I like it much better because it has some politics and the pandemic. Lucy is much like vwinsloe in that she is much more accepting of people whose ideas might differ from hers. She espouses the old idea that Trump's followers are reacting to economic fear rather than what I think that they love the idea of being able to discriminate right out in the open.
I also finished The Second Coming of the KKK: The Ku Klux Klan of the 1920s and the American Political Tradition by Linda Gordon in which she devotes quite a bit of time to women in the KKK. It seems like Thomas Jefferson they are staunchly behind equality as long as it's equality for people like them and not for humans they consider inferior.
My last two books were much like each other even though they featured people at opposite ends of the economic system. Night of the Living Rez by Morgan Talty is about young men on the reservation who seem to care about nothing but smoking and taking drugs (though it does show the Indian Health system as being a pusher of addictive drugs to Native Americans). In The Social Graces by Renée Rosen we see the doyennes of the Gilded Age who care about nothing but conspicuous consumption and vanity, though eventually we get to Alva Vanderbilt's support of women's rights. It is hard to know what to do with your life, but it has to be more than living moment to moment and ignoring the rest of the world.
Next up a couple of books by men about Hiroshima.

>90 Citizenjoyce: I am looking forward to reading Lucy By the Sea, but I would have to say that I am quite intolerant of intolerance, even when I may comprehend the reason behind it. But tell me, how did you touchstone my name? I thought that only worked with authors and works?

Regarding The Second Coming of the KKK, strangely, I never thought about women in the KKK. I don't imagine that they wore the white sheets and burned crosses, did they? I mean now that I say that, I am sure that they were certainly capable, but I wonder whether the KKK men involved would allow them to to do that, given their hierarchical beliefs.

I read on another site that if you put @ in front of the user name it touchstones it.
Regarding women in the KKK that was the big fight. Some of these women were great strategists and were the guiding force to building up the organization, then, of course, the men wanted to take the credit. Many organizations had female auxiliaries and the women found they loved their power and respect within their organizations. Then when the men wanted to take them over there was quite a bit of pushback. Ultimately the men won, but women had their time and emphasized they could do everything the men could do. Ah, equality.
Earlier I read a book about women in modern white supremacist organizations, Sisters in Hate: American Women on the Front Lines of White Nationalism by Seyward Darby and it's the same thing. Both men and women push the patriarchy and the importance of women devoting themselves to reproducing more little terrorists, but there are some strong women who try not to marry or have children because they just love the fight. They're great at recruiting and stirring up emotions, but eventually, the men wake up and try to take away their power. It doesn't seem to occur to them that as important as they find equality, the very people they fight against value the same thing.

>92 Citizenjoyce:. Okay, thanks. I thought I used the @ thing once and it didn't work.

Regarding white nationalist women, the cognitive dissonance must be stressful.

>93 vwinsloe: It doesn't seem to me that, if the dissonance is strong enough, it is stressful.

About to start Nomad Century by Gaia Vince - an examination of the human migration issues forced upon us by the current climate crisis and how these can be mitigated, given the political will, of course. I went to hear her speak about it at a book event in October and she was very passionate and committed.

>95 SChant: That looks like essential reading.

I'm making my way through Great Circle which is enjoyable so far.

I'm reading Our missing hearts which one of you (Citizenjoyce?) praised on here. It's very good so far.

>97 Sakerfalcon: I know I really liked it. Top book of 2022 for me.

>97 Sakerfalcon: It really is good. Amazing how easy, and I guess comforting, it is to pick a group to be the cause of all your problems.

>98 vwinsloe:, >99 Citizenjoyce: I am completely hooked. I wish I could say that the premise is far-fetched, but it really isn't.

>100 Sakerfalcon: Pre Covid we might have said it was far fetched, but people proved us wrong.

Ditto the positive comments on Our Missing Hearts. I was turned off by all the hype as it was coming out, but it is excellent. And the fact that the basic premise no longer feels unimaginable, is very troubling.

>102 shearon: It seemed that a lot of people were interested in the book because of all the hype as it was coming out, but some were turned off for opposing reasons. For some, it seemed too politically pointed at the right-wing. (read the comments on the book's main page on LibraryThing, for example.) For others, it was just too heartbreaking to read. The latter was closer to my experience. I don't have children, and, even so, I was reading with a lump in my throat for most of the book. Celeste Ng did this without coming across as manipulative, and the book seemed to be attempting to change public opinion through public art. Public protest art was a theme of the novel, so I found it to be satisfyingly meta.

I finished Great Circle and it was really a good read. I think that it could have been a great read, except for the fact that the contemporary plot line just sort of petered out. I was interested in the protagonist of that plot line, and felt she was too well established to be used simply as a narrative device. I appreciated the change of tone from the melodramatic telling of the story set in the 1930s and 40s to the more modern style of the contemporary narrative, and the commonality in the stories of the two women, but I did not see any real parallel conclusion, which, for me, flawed an otherwise outstanding book.

I also read Beauty which was given to me by my godchild for Christmas after I mentioned to her that her favorite author Robin McKinley was recently named a Grand Master of the Science Fiction & Fantasy Writers Association. I thoroughly enjoyed it, and I can see why it is a comfort read for so many girls and women.

Now I am reading Blue Ticket. I have not read anything else by Sophie Mackintosh, but this book is quite disturbing so far. It is about a dystopian society in which women are pre-selected as mothers or not permitted to have children. The protagonist is designated a non-mother at puberty, but she rebels and gets pregnant in almost a reverse Handmaid's Tale.

>104 vwinsloe: You're spot on with Blue Ticket which made it a little disappointing for me, but the strength of the desire to have a baby can't be denied.
I looked for Beauty and Libby doen't have it on audio. It does, however, have Deerskin which looks good. The review keeps mentioning the dogs. Does anyone know if the dogs narrate? If so, they'd fulfill a challenge for this month

>105 Citizenjoyce: I don't remember the narration in Deerskin but I am fairly certain that the dogs did not.

>106 vwinsloe: Too bad, but I think I'll read it anyway.

>105 Citizenjoyce: I finished Blue Ticket, and I think, for me anyway, that there was insufficient world-building to explain the underpinnings of that particular fictional society. For that reason, I couldn't quite suspend my disbelief enough for this dystopia to work, even though the writing was really good.

Have you read The Water Cure? That seems to be the book that Sophie Mackintosh is known for.

>108 vwinsloe: No I haven't. I'll check it out.

>104 vwinsloe:, >105 Citizenjoyce:, >106 vwinsloe: Robin McKinley is one of my favourite fantasy authors! No, the dogs don't narrate in Deerskin. That's my favourite book by her, though it is dark. Rose daughter is her second retelling of Beauty and the Beast, and goes in quite a different direction.

I'm about to start a couple of contrasting books - Dorothea Tanning: Transformations, a lavishly illustrated exploration of this fascinating surrealist artist by academic Victoria Carruthers; and in fiction A Psalm for the Wild Built by Becky Chambers, in my opinion one of the most thoughtful and humane science-fiction authors of recent years.

I've just put A Prayer for the Crown-Shy on hold. I agree with your opinion of Becky Chambers - what a wonderful addition to science fiction and humanitarian literature in general.

>112 SChant: I love Dorothea Tanning's work. I have the catalogue from a recent-ish exhibition and her short novel Chasm: a weekend on my TBR piles.

I'm currently reading SF by C. S. Friedman - This virtual night - and a novel by a woman but about a man - Maurice Guest by Henry Handel Richardson. It's set in 1890s Leipzig among the young music students, and I'm finding the secondary characters far more engaging than the protagonist and his love interest.

I went to see the film version of Women Talking last night, and I highly recommend it. The film was very close to the book insofar as I recall it, with a few omissions from the plot but nothing changed. I went with a friend who did not read the book, and although some of the plot points were unclear to her, she cried through much of the second half, and found it to be very moving, without being emotionally manipulative. The acting was superb.

I've decided to take something out of the backlog of books TBR, and am starting Salvage the Bones. I read Jesmyn Ward's novel Sing, Unburied, Sing quite some time ago, and, although I liked it quite a bit, I never got around to the prior book until now.

>115 vwinsloe: I agree about the movie. It's wonderful, the best I've seen in a long time. Everyone did such a good job.
I liked Salvage the Bones very much. We read Sing, Unburied, Sing for my book club and I hated it. It's very well written but so ugly with such a truly horrible mother I could never recommend it to anyone.

Oh dear, it's happened again. I've read a book that has me disgusted with the vitriol of the trans-supportive community. I thought Her Majesty's Royal Coven by Juno Dawson would be an enjoyable book about witches and alternative history. Her majesty's royal coven was established by Queen Elizabeth and is active in Britain today. Fun and interesting with different witches with differing talents expressing them in their own personal ways. If the book stopped at this I would recommend it to anyone, but no. Instead, it seems to be an attack on anyone who has doubts about the reasonableness of letting children determine the course of their entire lives in the guise of the most appealing and innocent transgender girl and a narcissistic, irrational woman who wants to keep men out of her coven. Surprise, the woman says things that could have come right out of J. K. Rowling's mouth. Even more surprising, even horrifying to me, was the ending of the book. How can people who pretend to honor equality spew such hatred into the world? I feel that the stance of transgender supporters seems to be that people who disagree with their stance are not only wrong but that they are evil and deserve any bad thing that can happen to them. Is my understanding of history wrong, or is this attitude unique in this particular fight for "equality?" Has our thinking become so black and white that there is no room for tolerance or humanity?

>117 Citizenjoyce: I really enjoyed Jill Filopovic's recent blog post on this topic

https://jill.substack.com/p/its-always-an-option-to-just-myob?r=1g00o&utm_ca...

All things that are not strictly male or female have been under attack by the far-right these days. Drag queens and transgender folk are lumped in the same bucket. Self-questioning youth are bullied and commit suicide where they see themselves as societal pariahs. So, yeah, I think that other people (particularly those who are or who love someone who is trans) have become very defensive about it. There is really no reason for the general public to be weighing in pro or con about someone else's existence. It didn't used to be this way, but it has become part of the right-wing culture wars.

>118 vwinsloe: Oh yes, the right-wing culture wars stirring up fear about nothing to cover their economic policies. But these wars have stirred up so much that mere opinions have become causes for hate. J. K. Rowling didn't shoot fire hoses at anyone or set dogs on them. She expressed an opinion, yet she is being treated as if she personally has caused death. She expressed an opinion, yet she is turned in the book into a homicidal narcissist. We should be able to talk. We should be able to share our opinions without fearing for our lives.

>119 Citizenjoyce: Mean people suck, on that we can agree. But I think that it has become really taboo to talk about other people's bodies, including gender. Even fat shaming. Jeesh, can't even fat shame any more without being lambasted.

But I digress. I do blame the right-wing for stirring up hatred to the point of literal murder against pro-choice advocates, drag queens, librarians and LGBTQ people. So I think that is where the equally vehement defense comes from.

But I think that I will skip Her Majesty's Royal Coven. Thanks for the head's up.

>120 vwinsloe: I'm worried that the work of Russia in stirring up this hatred surrounding gender issues is paying off by tearing us apart from the idea of equality rather than promoting it. I'm almost finished with a reread of The Heart Is A Lonely Hunter. Although it was written in 1940 it emphasizes problems of inequality that don't seem to have a solution. Humans are just too fallible. As the drunk union organizer Jake yells, "You're dumb, dumb, dumb." How can human beings, whose intelligence we seem to honor, be so incapable of solving our social problems? Rich people want to get richer, and everyone else blames everyone else for not having enough. Religious people, acknowledging the fallibility, want us to put our trust in god. But my god is better than your god, so the hatred continues. The Bernie Sanders folk think economic reform will do the trick, but there are always people who know how to work any economic reform so that the rich continue to get richer. Maybe evolution beyond the dinosaurs was a big mistake.

I knew nothing of Kate Chopin except The Awakening but The Library of America published a little tribute to her on Facebook with a link to a couple of her stories. I knew she was exceptional, but I didn't know she was this exceptional.
https://storyoftheweek.loa.org/2023/02/a-visit-to-avoyelles.html?fbclid=IwAR0HWv...
Evidently Désirée’s Baby is a well known story, but I hadn't heard of it.

>121 Citizenjoyce: I agree. It is so easy to turn us on one another, instead of raising each other up. You know, I have not read The Heart is A Lonely Hunter. It is another book that languishes in my TBR stacks. I think that I will make it a goal to read it this year.

>122 Citizenjoyce: The Awakening is all I knew of Kate Chopin as well. Thanks for posting that.

I've finished Salvage the Bones. The dog fighting scenes were a bit difficult for me to get through, but I persevered and ended up enjoying the family relationships, particularly among the siblings. I'm glad that I read it.

Now I think I'll read the other two Robin McKinley books that I got for Christmas, starting with The Blue Sword. Historian Heather Cox Richardson mentioned that she reads children's books for fun and that The Blue Sword is one of her favorites. I want to find out why.

>123 vwinsloe: The Heart Is A Lonely Hunter pretty much stomps your heart into the ground. I think I can find the movie streaming somewhere and plan to rewatch it.
I didn't know that about Heather Cox Richardson. I'll have to give it a try.

>124 Citizenjoyce:. I think that you will really like The Blue Sword. It's a young YA, but what a comfort read. I'm starting to appreciate Robin McKinley more and more because of the animals in her stories. Horses, dogs and even cats in this one.

I finished The Hero and the Crown, and I really liked it. In the mid-80s, I had just begun my career and had no idea that young adult literature had taken such a wonderful turn. Robin McKinley's women protagonists are absolutely heroic in the classic sense, and not too much familial or societal resistance is noted about their undertakings. I wish that I had these books as a young reader, but even now, they are a pleasure and a comfort to read.

I just started Tomorrow and Tomorrow and Tomorrow. I had a gift card for a small independent bookstore, and I was really torn on what to do with this rare opportunity. It was a fabulous bookstore, and it had so many books that are on my wishlist. In the end, I chose Tomorrow and Tomorrow and Tomorrow for three reasons: (1) because it was high on the LibraryThing Top 5 list, (2) because Citizenjoyce recommended it, and (3) because it is a hardcover and had that new book smell that I rarely experience! So, I've started it, and it grabbed my attention right away, and I am happy with my pick, although I probably could have gotten two paperbacks instead.

>126 vwinsloe: I think you'll like Tomorrow and Tomorrow and Tomorrow. I've read a couple of places that it was the best-selling book last year. I don't think it's quite that good, but Gabrielle Zevin has become kind of a can't-miss author for me.

>127 Citizenjoyce: I liked Tomorrow and Tomorrow and Tomorrow far better than I expected. I had previously read The Storied Life of A.J. Fikry which I found to be pleasantly "meh," so this was a pleasant surprise. In addition to being a good read, it was very smart.

>88 ScoLgo: I found The Glass Hotel on my library sales cart shortly after our exchange above. I will start it today, before Sea of Tranquility fades from my memory.

I've started reading Femina which is a history of the Middle Ages focused around women's lives. It uses some specific women, of whom textual and archaeological evidence exists, to explore the lives of women and expand our knowledge of the societies in which they lived. It's very good so far.

>128 vwinsloe: I'm glad you liked it. I get so many good recommendations here.
>129 Sakerfalcon: Femina looks good, I've recommended it to Libby.
I recently finished Stone Blind and loved this retelling of the Medusa myth, but I have to show my ignorance here in my confusion. Who was it who left her father and married a hero, gave him two children but then killed them when he left her for another and so she was turned into a monster? I thought it was Medusa.

>129 Sakerfalcon:. I'm really curious about the source material for Femina: A New History of the Middle Ages, since, as noted in the title, women were written out of history (I assume because they were not educated and priests did most of the writing). Is there a lot of conjecture or ?

>130 Citizenjoyce: Medea? Mentioned in some book I just read, can't remember which, otherwise I never would have guessed. I don't think she was turned into a monster though, so maybe I have the wrong character.

>131 vwinsloe: There are some recent archaeological discoveries - DNA testing revealing that warrior graves assumed to be male are actually female; combing through manuscripts for references to women; looking at art and literature of the period. The author is careful to note where she is conjecturing, and the book is copiously footnoted to show sources. One thing I like is that each chapter opens with the story of the discovery which has led to our knowledge of the woman in question; in some cases these have revealed the role of women as extraordinary as those being studied.

>130 Citizenjoyce:, >131 vwinsloe: Yes, that's Medea although I too have never heard of her turning into a monster. Jason, of course, gets away scot-free.

>132 Sakerfalcon:. Thanks. That sounds really interesting. I'm putting it on my wishlist.

>88 ScoLgo:. I'm almost to the end of The Glass Hotel after having read Sea of Tranquility first. Having read them in the wrong order, I am getting the weirdest sense of deja vu, and the strong feeling that the plot lines and characters in the two books intersect in more than the obvious ways. St. John Mandel keeps using descriptive language like "from another planet" and "parallel universe" and "aliens" like she's teasing the reader. I guess that I will find out in the end, but if I don't, I wonder whether this is a trilogy in the works?

>133 vwinsloe: That's an interesting observation. Mandel has placed connections between four of her books but, reading them in publication order, I did not experience the deja vu you describe. I wonder if taking a different approach might not work better? I plan to re-visit all four connected books again someday (soon-ish) and may just take them in reverse order to see how that feels. Maybe by then there will be a fifth book too?

I also happened across this article recently and found it interesting:

W Magazine Interview with Emily St. John Mandel.

(You may want to click the link after finishing The Glass Hotel in case of spoilers)

>134 ScoLgo:. Thanks. I just finished The Glass Hotel a little while ago, and it seemed to resolve a lot of that Matrix sort of feeling with ghosts...or something. But damn, if she doesn't tease. She even used the words "time travel" toward the end.

I wonder what order she wrote those two books in. How could Alkaitis from The Glass Hotel end up in the same prison cell that housed Gaspery Roberts from the later book Sea of Tranquility? David Mitchell does that thing where he references his other previous works in his current work, but not retroactively.

Anyway, brilliant. Thanks for the article!

>132 Sakerfalcon: Ah, there's the difference. I was confusing Medusa with Medea. Thanks for setting me straight.
>133 vwinsloe:, >135 vwinsloe: Wow, I admire your close reading. I didn't make any such connections. It makes the books far more interesting.

>134 ScoLgo:. That article was helpful in describing what the heck was going on there, and the fact that Cloud Atlas is one of St. John Mandel's favorite books validates my own observations. The "simulation hypothesis" and the theme of "knowing and not knowing at the same time" is kind of what the reader feels when reading her books.

>136 Citizenjoyce: I don't know that I would have discovered the connections myself if I had read the books in the proper order, and if ScoLgo had not encouraged me to go back and read The Glass Hotel right away.

>137 vwinsloe: Honestly, I missed a bunch of those connections when reading the books in publication order. I had also forgotten the character connections to both Station Eleven and The Lola Quartet. That's both the blessing and the curse of having a sieve-like memory; old books are new again but the details don't stick ;-)

I have a feeling I'm going to enjoy re-reading all four books when I get around to it.

Libby purchased Femina so it looks like I'll be reading it next month. I found this little Guardian review: https://www.theguardian.com/books/2022/jul/20/femina-janina-ramirez-review

>138 ScoLgo:. I should definitely go back and re-read Station Eleven, for sure. And I haven't yet read The Lola Quartet. I agree about the sieve-like memory!

I'm reading (or re-reading, I'm not sure) The Dispossessed. There is a group thread on The Dispossessed going on in the Green Dragon group that I hope to participate in.,

>141 vwinsloe: Oh, it's been a long time since I read it. I wonder if I can fit it in.
ETA I just checked Libby. I can't get it for 6 weeks, so I guess I won't be joining the discussion.

>142 Citizenjoyce: You will be welcome to join the discussion when you get hold of The dispossessed! We are all reading at different times and paces and even if most of us have finished by then it's be good to see new comments to reawaken the discussion. I finished it last night and enjoyed it a lot on this my 3rd time around.

I also finished Femina which was a very good read, although I felt some chapters were much stronger than others. The one on Hildegard of Bingen was especially good, but I was less convinced by her analysis of Jadwiga King of Poland (although it was very interesting). I appreciated Ramirez's honestly in stating clearly when she was conjecturing and where evidence was inconclusive, and also that she isn't claiming to have the final say on history - far from it. She states that she hopes she is just starting a new wave of more inclusive historical study.

Now I've started to read The glass hotel, inspired by the discussion up-thread of Mandel's books and how they connect to each other. I'm finding this one very intriguing so far.

>143 Sakerfalcon:. Did you already read Sea Of Tranquility? Or are you reading them in the proper order?

>144 vwinsloe: After reading the comments here, I'm reading The glass hotel first.

>145 Sakerfalcon:. Makes sense, although I am not sorry that I read them in the reverse order.

I was reminded of the discussion of source materials when I started watching the videos of Molly Gloss at fishtrap.org. The Fishtrap writers organization is doing a 6 week reading event of The Jump-Off Creek, and Molly Gloss is speaking at 3 of the streamed gatherings. In the first, she spoke about her love for western novels, and her deep dive for source materials when she was researching The Jump-Off Creek. In the second, she gives her voice to the subject of the Myth of the American West.

If you've read and enjoyed The Jump-Off Creek, you'll like listening to her talks. If you haven't read it, these short talks will probably make you want to read it. The final talk is on March 22, but all of them are being preserved at fishtrap.org and on fishtrap's youtube channel.

Here's a link

https://fishtrap.org/fishtrap-reads-2023/

I'm not fond of revenge literature or movies, but when it's women getting revenge I'm a complete sucker. In Reader I Murdered Him by Betsy Cornwell we get Victorian England's answer to Lisbeth Salander. You know all the jokes about what bad taste in men the Bronte sisters had? Cornwell agrees with them and writes a sequel to Jane Eyre told from the perspective of Adele, Rochester's ward. It's just delicious. I have to admit, due to some complicated events in my life these days, I'm enjoying more simplistic fare, and Cornwell is simply - well, what? I don't want to say thrilling, it's not that powerful, but it's a little thrilling, a little titillating, a little like eating a perfect brownie. Just yum.
Now I'm reading Pegasus: How a Spy in Your Pocket Threatens the End of Privacy, Dignity, and Democracy by Laurent Richard and Sandrine Rigaud which is not yummy at all. It's about an NSO-invented spying device that lets people take control of a person's cell phone, completely without their knowledge. Heads of state have been targeted along with human rights activists and at least 120 investigative journalists. Rachel Maddow writes the forward and had an interview with the authors on her program since she is reasonably concerned about surveillance of journalists. Users were able to trap cartel members by having them click on pornography sites, but they give lists of other sites to pull their victims in from "need help with this demonstration now" to "waffles and Nutella" (which is the one that would get me). Very scary stuff.

Reader I Murdered Him is a great title. I'll look for that one.

Pegasus: How a Spy in Your Pocket sounds like the same sort of thing that the US Government is worried about with TikTok. No wonder they are worried if they invented the concept.

> The NSO in Israel invented the platform. They tried to assure people that they would never sell the platform to any unreliable agents, only to those seeking to thwart terrorism, but if you have multimillions of dollars to spend, you can buy anything, and tyrants and cartels did.

>150 Citizenjoyce:. Ah, yes. I just finished The Dispossessed, and that is illustrative of one of the themes.

I felt like I needed something a little lighter and more contemporary, so I have started Ask Again, Yes. I didn't know much about it, and at about 50 pages in, I'm not sure that it was what I was looking for.

>151 vwinsloe: I went to see In Bruges thinking from the trailer that it was a comedy. Great movie, not at all a comedy, but not being one to learn from my mistakes I recently watched The Banshees - same actors, again, great movie, very far from a comedy. I'm thinking you might be thinking the same thing about Ask Again Yes.

>152 Citizenjoyce:. That's what I get for just going by the title. But you got fooled twice!

Perhaps it's time to change the page. We seem to get spam around the same time as the notice about continuing the topic in another topic appears at the bottom of the page. See you on Page 15.