get out of your own head

Leave the World Behind by Rumaan Alam

Rating: 3 stars (out of 5)

Genre: fiction (creepy)

Review: On the second night of their vacation in the Hamptons, Amanda and Clay answer the door of their Airbnb rental to a couple claiming to be the owners of the house.  Apparently, there's been a major blackout in New York City and they didn't know where else to go.  The mystery, the creep factor, has little to do with the question of whether these people are who they say are.  It becomes clear fairly quickly that they are telling the truth and that there has been a major event of some kind, but with cell phones, landlines, internet, and television all out, no-one knows any details.  Cue the dramatic music.

This book was very suspenseful, due to two things: First, the characters' lack of knowledge.  The reader, through the omniscient narrator, knows quite a bit more than the character do about what's going on.  Not that it helps.  Second, this book is deeply introspective.  Alam slides seamlessly from the perspective of one character another, and we are privy to each one's sense of insecurity that they aren't responding "well" to the crisis.  And it turns out that the inside of peoples' heads during a mysterious calamity is a deeply creepy place.

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

the devil is in the details

The Invisible Life of Addie LaRue by V. E. Schwab

Rating: 4 stars (out of 5)

Genre: fiction/historical fiction

Review: Addie LaRue is completely unable to make a mark on this world.  She is forgotten the moment she is out of sight, her writing erases itself, and she can't even manage to hold on to any material possessions, except a wooden ring that is the symbol of her deal with the devil.  Addie asked for freedom, to not be tied down to convention, but we all know that you have to be careful what you wish for.  Addie has all the freedom she could want, and then some, and her bargain is good until she tires of being unendingly forgotten, at which point the devil will claim her soul.

The devil thinks he's gotten a good deal, making a bargain with a rash young girl, but he didn't count on Addie.  Realizing that "ideas are wilder than memories" and can't be so easily controlled, she makes the terms of the bargain work for her.  Perhaps she is an artist's muse for a while, or she plants a musical riff that grows into a hit song, or finds some other way to live on (anonymously) through art.  On top of that, she really does have freedom to experience all the world has to offer, and she's been experiencing it for 300 years.

And then, someone remembers her.  After so much time, can Addie even have a relationship with someone who actually remembers her from one day to the next?  What will she learn about her relationship to the world?  And will it make her rethink the bargain she made so long ago?

Addie is a wonderfully strong, brave character, who will stick with you (haunt you?) long after you finish this book.  The book is a trifle too long, but the payoff at the end is worth it.

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

this is what a feminist looks like

Out of Left Field by Ellen Klages

Rating: 5 stars (out of 5)

Genre: historical fiction

Review: Katy Gordon doesn't think of herself as a feminist.  She doesn't think of herself as a fighter in the struggle for equal rights.  She know it's not fair that she was denied the place that she earned on her local Little League team just because she's a girl.  So she starts by writing a letter to Little League headquarters in Williamsport, PA.  When they respond by telling her that baseball is, and always has been, a sport for boys and men, she sets out to prove them wrong.  Her journey opens up a world of women in baseball that Katy (like probably most readers of this book) had no idea existed.

And what a world it is!  Of course, Katy learns about the All-American Girls Professional Baseball League, which by 1957 has already faded away, but she also learns about women who made it to the minor leagues, only to have their contracts cancelled because of their gender.  She learns about women who played in the Negro Leagues, and women who formed barnstorming teams.  She meets some of these women and interviews them for a school project.  Through Katy, we learn so much about this history, and Katy's sheer excitement at finding so many other women who share her passion is infectious.

When I was a girl and played Little League, it didn't occur to me even to think about the girls and women who had come before me, let alone thank them, but after reading this book, I will never forget them.  That's due in equal measure to the wonderful writing as to the short bios of some of these players that Klages includes at the end of the books, ending with Maria Pepe, who in 1974, with the support of NOW, finally made Little League change their rules.  So, as someone who walked on the path they paved, I now know enough to thank them, and to also thank Ellen Klages for doing a masterful job at bringing their stories to a new generation.