can she move on?

George & Lizzie by Nancy Pearl
Rating: 4.5 stars (out of 5)
Genre: fiction
Review: As a public librarian, Nancy Pearl is, of course, my hero (yes, I have the Nancy Pearl action figure).  Nobody does reader's advisory like Nancy Pearl does reader's advisory!  So when I heard she wrote a book, I naturally wanted to read it right away.  At the same, I was a little apprehensive, because knowing what goes into a good book doesn't necessarily mean that you can write a good book.  I needn't have worried.

Although the book is called George & Lizzie, this is really Lizzie's story.  One is tempted to say that she was raised by wolves, but of course that's not true.  She was really raised by behavioral psychologists, who treated her every action as an idea for further research.  Predictably, she acts out by doing some, shall we say, less-than-socially-acceptable things.  These things have repercussions, of course, in her later relationships, but we can't help loving Lizzie, even while she does everything possible to sabotage her own life and happiness.

Then comes George.  We learn enough about George's childhood and family to make him a believable character, but since the book still focuses more on Lizzie, the real question is whether she can get over herself long enough to actually make a positive long-lasting relationship with George.  There were a few plot points that I couldn't quite suss out (including the somewhat important point of why Lizzie agreed to marry George in the first place when she was still obsessed (yes, obsessed) with someone else), but those confusions were easily overcome in the excellent writing that continued to pull me forward.

And pulled forward I was, right up until the very natural and well-done ending.  Pearl never takes the easy road with her characters, and the whole book moves along without ever giving the reader the feeling that the whole thing is just one big contrivance.  Brava to Mrs. Pearl for making the leap from reader to author.  I look forward to reading more.

FTC Disclaimer: I received this book from the publisher in exchange for this review.

powerful history

March trilogy by John Lewis
Rating: 5 stars (out of 5)
Genre: graphic memoir
Review: John Lewis's story is powerful no matter how it's told, whether in person (as I had the privilege of first hearing it), written long-form in his memoirs for adult audiences, or written more simply in this graphic format for younger audiences.

Setting his story within the frame of the day of Barack Obama's inauguration is such a powerful counterpoint that it gave me the shivers.  Thinking about his story in terms of what's happening in this country now makes me want to cry.

no hook

Start Without Me by Joshua Max Feldman
Rating: 2.5 stars (out of 5)
Genre: fiction
Review: Adam is nine months sober and still fighting for every day of it.  He's attempting his first family event in a long time, and it doesn't go well.  Flight attendant Marissa is the daughter of an alcoholic, and struggling with her own life choices, both good and bad.  She's attempting her husband's family gathering for Thanksgiving, and it doesn't go well either.  And there you have pretty much the entire story.  I found the characters to be lightly drawn on the page, and neither drew me in much at all.  I found the conflicts to be contrived and over-dramatic, and couldn't really bring myself to care how they got resolved, or what choices the characters made.  The book does zip along, and isn't poorly written, but it does lack that je ne sais quoi that engages me as a reader.

FTC Disclaimer: I received this book from the publisher in exchange for this review.