"Sometimes a Few Must Be Sacrificed for the Greater Good"

I wouldn't necessarily say that historical fiction (written in current times) would be my go-to literary genre. Maybe this is because I feel a lot of it skews toward WWII and sometimes, they feel as though they blend together (I know, I know, I need to just widen my scope of what I'm looking at for historical fiction). But The Lost Girls of Paris was bequeathed to me and not necessarily what I would have chosen, so here we are, reading a WWII historical fiction novel. 

And surprisingly, I enjoyed it very much. I usually do, so I don't know what I'm griping about. The story is about a group of female secret agents operating out of England and who were deployed into France to act as operatives and radio operators, supporting the resistance. Women were only considered for these jobs because they would be able to function more effectively given that no one would suspect women to be spies (women can't do that, can they??). Also as part of the novel, a few years after the war has ended, a young woman finds a suitcase in Grand Central Station with photographs of the women (not knowing the origin of the photos or their stories) and is determined to uncover who they are. She uncovers a betrayal has occurred, but by who and why?

The twist of the betrayal was really what had me hooked into the novel. A bit of a mystery thrown in there. And given that everyone was a spy and had something to gain, it felt like it could have been anyone. The book seemed very meticulously researched which gave it a very strong feeling of authenticity. But knowing that this was based on true events gives such a level of awe to the courage of these women - to know that they had to be terrified every moment while they were doing what they were doing and yet doing it anyway is the hallmark of bravery. So while much is celebrated about the armed forces who fought to win the war, I do enjoy hearing these types of stories of all of the other everyday people who fought in different, maybe more subtle ways, but still showed remarkable levels of courage nonetheless. 

I am using The Lost Girls of Paris for the PopSugar Reading Challenge prompt of "book with 'Girl' in the title." 

Switching back to the book lists, up next is The Well of Loneliness by Radclyffe Hall. Happy reading!  

"I Feel Sad for People and the Queer Part We Play in Our Own Disasters."

It's always interesting to me that through the course of reading the books on my book lists, that I come across a book that I never in a million years would have picked up myself and it ends up being something that I am enthralled with. I would put White Noise into that camp. I'm so so glad that this novel was one that I read.

Consumerism, capitalism, misinformation, herd mentality, technology, self-centeredness, bright and shiny everything, ie, the constant white noise drowning out our ability to hear our own thoughts. And the ridiculousness of it all given that we're all just going to die anyway. A commentary on our modern culture that is centered around throw-away convenience at the expense of human connection. There is so much packed into this novel, it feels like one that would benefit from a second reading. And kind of amazing that, while written in the 1980s, it's so appropriate today (even moreso). 

The book is chock full of dark, observational humor, taking our everyday, heightening it to almost cringe-worthy levels. The Gladney family, helmed by Jack, a professor of Hitler, and his fourth wife, Babette, and their Brady Bunch-esque children from all of their many previous marriages navigate their modern world, when along comes the Airborne Toxic Event, a literal black cloud of toxins (metaphor much?) that centers over their small town and all the residents are forced to flee to avoid...to avoid what? They don't really know. The contents of the cloud are unclear and the symptoms of exposure change by the minute. Jack finds out later that his choice to put gas in the car during their evacuation may have exposed him to unsafe levels of the toxin that may or may not cause him to die in 30 years (mind you, he's in his mid 40s, so dying in 30 years would put him at the normal human lifespan anyway). This leads him to heighten his already manic obsession/fear of death. Similarly, his wife has an obsessive fear of dying (especially before her husband), so much so that she takes an investigational drug to block out this fear of death.  

The one thing that this book managed to do was to give me a pearl of wisdom that felt like an "ah ha" moment. And that very rarely happens to me. And even more rarely happens from something that I read in a fiction novel. But the most profound thing I took away from this book was the idea that life is not important and not of value without death. If we lived forever, nothing would mean anything anymore - you would have unlimited time to see and do everything, so all of those moments wouldn't achieve the level of importance that they currently do. Death is the inevitable anchor that forces us to live our lives to the fullest and to be grateful for the lives that we do have. I have found myself thinking about this a lot since finishing the book.

I really can't say enough great things about the book - highly recommend. And I'm excited to see the movie. I've heard that it stays very faithful to the novel, which if executed well, would be a remarkable feat. 

I'm using White Noise to fulfill the PopSugar Challenge prompt of a book becoming a TV series or movie in 2023 (ok so technically it was released on December 30th, 2022, but imma count it anyway). 

Next up is a quick sojourn from the lists to read The Lost Girls of Paris by Pam Jenoff. My parents were moving a couple months ago and my mom unloaded a handful of books to me, so I'm happy to dig into those too. 

180 to go.  

"Everything Human Was Imperfect and Ultimately Absurd."

I started reading Fear of Flying last summer, shortly after finishing Portnoy's Complaint. And within the first two pages, I knew that I wasn't ready for another novel of similar ilk. A restless, unhappy woman who has no problem with repeated infidelity against her husband, either real or imagined. 

Now, I have absolutely no problem with vulgar. With blunt, often shocking discussions about sex. Or even with literary stories about infidelity. But I think it was just too much of the same thing within a short time frame. Oddly enough, Portnoy was even mentioned in this book, so apparently the similarities were not just me connecting the two that I happened to read in close proximity and were the author connecting them herself. 

The novel is about Isadora Wing, who is attending a psychiatric conference in Vienna with her husband. We find out early while she's on the plane there that many of the conference attendees have either been Isadora's lover, or her shrink, or both. At the conference, Isadora meets Adrian, a free-spirited, tell-it-like-it-is shrink with a penchant for analyzing her (although in fairness, all of the shrinks do) and they commence a torrid love affair in full view of everyone, including her husband, Bennett. Per Adrian's request, she leaves her husband and they take off together to drive around Europe together for the duration of the summer. The entire time they're gone, Isadora has constant emotional turmoil about all of her past and current relationships, much of which she shares with Adrian. 

And while the above describes the actual storyline of the book, it's really so much more about relationships and the maintenance of one's identity while in them, particularly for the woman. I found the character of Isadora insufferable and I don't know if I've ever wanted to crawl through a book and smack someone as much as I wanted to smack her. She constantly wallows in self-pity, insecurity, and the banality of life yet mocked and derided all others - married women, mothers, people at the beach just enjoying themselves. Projecting her misery onto others. There was so much I really disliked about the book when it came to how it was written - it felt like just a lot of whining and bitching about things while being 100% completely self-aware that you're the problem (insert sound clip of Taylor Swift's, "It's me, hi, I'm the problem, it's me," here). 

But when it came to a lot of the observations about identity in relationships, there were some snippets that I did enjoy and putting it into context of being written in the early 1970s, it was interesting to see how much of that has changed in 50 years. Particularly about women having to be married for any kind of stability, but the author takes it even farther that women need to be in a relationship to have any kind of emotional stability as well. And that seemed to be the biggest thing that the character of Isadora was railing against. I ended up liking the book more than I thought I would when I set it aside last year but definitely not one I would recommend to others or would want to read again.

And so onto the next. Which is White Noise by Don Delillo. 

A friend of mine introduced me to the PopSugar Reading Challenge, which is a list of 50 reading prompts, to try to read one book for each prompt during 2023. I am delighted and excited to give this a shot! Although reading 50 books in one year would be about double what I did last year. But we'll see how it goes! And I must admit that just plotting it out takes quite a bit of time. So I'll be counting Fear of Flying for the prompt of "A book you meant to read in 2022."

181 to go!

"The Picture, Changed or Unchanged, Would be to Him the Visible Emblem of Conscience."

I honestly don't know how I didn't read The Picture of Dorian Gray sooner than at 43 years of age. I read The Importance of Being Earnest a few years back and just loved Wilde's style of writing, humor, and yes, everyone's favorite adjective to describe him, wit. But I guess I never looked into what the novel was about, the circumstances around Wilde and his life, and really didn't know much about it. Boy, do I wish I had read it sooner. 

It really felt as close to a perfect novel as I think I've ever read. The concept of a person's soul being encapsulated in a painting and then deteriorating as the human himself behaves in reprehensible ways, while his human form remains youthful, beautiful, and flawless, is so simple, but quite brilliant. And it wasn't just this basis that gave the book its strength, but how Wilde wove his insightful commentary on the human condition as it pertained to what Dorian was going through. Even though this commentary was often very egotistical, self-centered, lacking compassion for others, and vanity personified. There are countless passages I could have used for the quote in my heading, but here are just a few that I loved:

"Because to influence a person is to give him one's own soul. He does not think his natural thoughts, or burn with his natural passions. His virtues are not real to him. His sins, if there are such things as sins, are borrowed. He becomes an echo of some one else's music, an actor of a part that has not been written for him. The aim of life is self-development. To realize one's nature perfectly - that is what each of us is here for. People are afraid of themselves, nowadays. They have forgotten the highest of all duties, the duty that one owes to one's self."

"It is a sad thing to think of, but there is no doubt that Genius lasts longer than Beauty. That accounts for the fact that we all take such pains to over-educate ourselves. In the wild struggle for existence, we want to have something that endures, and so we fill our minds with rubbish and facts, in the silly hope of keeping our place. The thoroughly well-informed man 0 that is the modern ideal. And the mind of the thoroughly well-informed man is a dreadful thing."

"I never approve, or disapprove, or anything now. It is an absurd attitude to take towards life. We are not sent into the world to air our moral prejudices. I never take any notice of what common people say, and I never interfere with what charming people do."

"The worship of the senses has often, and with much justice, been decried, men feeling a natural instinct of terror about passions and sensations that seem stronger than themselves, and that they are conscious of sharing with the less highly organized forms of existence. But it appeared to Dorian Gray that the true nature of the senses had never been understood, and that they had remained savage and animal merely because the world had sought to starve them into submission or to kill them by pain, instead of aiming at making them elements of a new spirituality, of which a fine instinct for beauty was to be the dominant characteristic."

And that last passage really seems to speak to Wilde himself. It's quite sad reading this ~130 years later knowing that he served 2 years in prison/hard labor for "gross indecency" with men for being gay. And eventually died at a young age in abject poverty. 

I don't generally like to go back and re-read books. I'm a one and done kind of gal. I think the only books I've re-read were Beloved and The Bell Jar, which are both two of my favorites. I can absolutely see this being one I eventually read again as well. It was just so rich and like I said, felt like the perfect novel. I feel like I could admire and appreciate so much more on a second read, so we'll see if I one day get around to that. 

So while I close out 2022 with this book, I'm proud to say that I read 26 books this year, which is the most I've ever done (at least since I've been tracking). A key component to this which I recently embraced, are audiobooks. I've read a few this year, and at some point in the near future, I'll devote a post summarizing those that I've read (none from the book lists). But up next, I'll circle back around to Fear of Flying by Erica Jong. I started reading this book last summer, got about 3 pages in, and didn't want to continue. I think it was because I had just finished Portnoy's Complaint and had consumed plenty of vulgarity (and I'm definitely no square!!) and infidelity for a moment. But I think I'm ready to try again. Wish me luck. 

182 left. 

"Preventing Your Heart From Forgiving Someone You Love is Actually a Hell of a Lot Harder Than Simply Forgiving Them."

I took a quick sojourn from the book lists to read a popular author to see what the fuss was all about. So I read It Ends With Us by Colleen Hoover. For those of you who don't know, Colleen Hoover has all but dominated the fiction market in the last couple years, occupying most of the spaces on the NYT Bestsellers list for most of 2022. My sister is a big fan so I wanted to see how I felt about this hype. 

And lemme tell ya, it's been a minute since I've read a book that make me mad (probably since Go Set a Watchman, but for very very different reasons). From the jump, I despised the trope of the here's-the-super-goodlooking-neurosurgeon-who-doesn't-believe-in-love-but-she's-the-one-woman-he'll-change-all-of-that-for. Lily's (the main character) love interest, Ryle, was a toxic piece of shit right out of the gate. And it legit made me angry that he was written in a way to intentionally make (female) readers fall for this guy as a "charmer." Awww, he went knocking on 29 peoples' doors in the middle of the night because he just had to find her? So sweet! Wrong. Toxic AF. He was begging her to have sex with him because he couldn't stop thinking of her! He must be in love. Wrong. Toxic AF. 

And the way Lily's feelings for Ryle were written made me angry. There was no substance to them - she "just loved him" (uhhh, of course any woman from an abusive home who meets the gorgeous doctor who can't get enough of you and love-bombs the fuck out of you is going to believe that it's love). And when he became the abuser, every excuse was made for his behavior. It was an accident, I know he really loves me, I really love him, his brother accidentally shot himself so there's a reason for his repressed anger, etc etc etc. And it all felt like a manipulation of the reader. And while I appreciate that this is likely written to represent all of the excuses that women in abusive relationships use for staying, it felt reckless and irresponsible to be written in this manner. It felt like it had been set up for the reader to want to root more for the "love" this couple had for each other than to want her to leave. The only redemption of this book is that if fulfills the title and Lily does leave her marriage with her child to protect their daughter (sorry, spoiler alert). 

So if this is what Colleen Hoover is about, I think I'm good with stopping at just the one. Good for her for finding a niche that clearly is filling a need that many readers are enjoying, but it's just not for me. 

So it's back to the lists. Next up is The Picture of Dorian Gray by Oscar Wilde. Oddly enough, I have absolutely no idea what this book is about. So we'll find out!

"Everyone, Real or Invented, Deserves the Open Destiny of Life."

I don't really know what to say about Enormous Changes at the Last Minute by Grace Paley. It was a collection of short stories first published in 1960. And I can easily say that I've never read an author who writes the way she does. Maybe a little reminiscent of Dorothy Parker, but blunt in a different kind of way. Not overly wordy or florid language, but sometimes a very honest kind of a gut punch.

All of the stories were largely about single mothers or young women in unhappy marriages, taking place in New York, including the recurrence of one character, Faith, which I guess Paley had used multiple times across many of her writings. There were very open descriptions of sex and sexual relationships which seemed quite avant garde to have been written in the 1950s by a woman. 

And while I have much appreciation and respect for the way Paley crafted the stories, oddly enough, this book is not going to be memorable for me at all. Even now, having finished it not that long ago, I can barely remember any of the actual storylines of any of the vignettes. So it's interesting to me that the way a writer writes can leave more of an impression on me than the stories themselves (and I certainly feel the same way about other writers too in the opposite sense). So overall while I appreciated the book, I probably wouldn't pick it up again or recommend it to others. Is that a bad thing? 

183 to go (I swear I feel like I've been at 183 for an eternity).  

"You Do Not Let Your Eyes See Nor Your Eyes Hear, and That Which is Outside Your Daily Life is Not of Account to You."

I don't know how I've gotten to 43 years of age and not actually seen a movie of or read the novel of Dracula. Sure, I know all of the stuff about vampires; all the cliches, all of the fascination, all of the other stories spawned from this one legend. And you guys: this book was amazing. Given that it was published in 1897 (more on that in a moment), it holds up. It's engaging, suspenseful (and expertly built), with just the right amount of foreshadowing. 

And considering how much focus over the years has landed on the actual character of Dracula, he's surprisingly not in the book all that much. Sure, he's a presence that continues to wreak havoc on a couple of the different female characters (and their male loves in consequence), but we don't see him in his body all that much. Mostly in the beginning when he has made a prisoner of Jonathan Harker, who has travelled to Romania to go over some legal paperwork with the Count himself. I don't want to think that I let my knowledge of Dracula affect my interpretations of what was presented in the novel, but the way he was written was as one cruel being. Sure, he was able to share exchanges of intellect with Jonathan while he was initially in Romania, but after that, he is ruthless and cruel. But his evasiveness and cunning made him even more dangerous. The character in the novel really is the embodiment of pure evil. 

So I know that it's not easy to want to delve into the classics. But this is one I would say DO IT. It holds up to today's standards and is still completely engaging. I was turning the pages at the end in complete suspense for how it was going to end (because, as I mentioned, I didn't actually know the full story). 

Next up is Enormous Changes at the Last Minute by Grace Paley. I don't think I knew that this was a collection of short stories - it was a random selection from my list of works by women writers. We'll see how she goes. 

184 to go.