Books Read in May 2024

 

I read more books than I expected to in May, a total of nine books. Those books included a graphic novel, a book on my classics club list, a science fiction book, and a time travel book.

Graphic novel

The Book Tour (2019) by Andi Watson

This is a graphic novel with a Kafkaesque storyline. A man goes on a book tour with a suitcase of his books. The suitcase is stolen, so he has no books to sell or sign. He goes to book signing after book signing where no one turns up to see him. A confusing story, but I liked it, both the story and the art.

Fiction

The Lincoln Highway (2021) by Amor Towles

I started this book in April and it took me 10 days to read it. It was the only book on my list that I did not enjoy reading. It is about three young men, all 18 years old, traveling across the United States. The main character, Emmett, has a younger brother, Billy, who is traveling with them. Emmett's plan is to drive from his childhood home in Nebraska to Texas, but the trip eventually leads them in a different direction. All of that sounds good but I did not really grow to like any of the main characters. Yet I found the ending to be satisfying.

The Warden (1859) by Anthony Trollope

I read this for the last Classics Club spin, and I was happy to finally read something by Trollope. This one is the first book in the Chronicles of Barsetshire, and I will be reading more in that series. See my review here.

Science Fiction

The Kaiju Preservation Society (2022) by John Scalzi

This is simply a very fun and funny science fiction novel. The following quote is from the author's notes at the end of the book: “KPS is not, and I say this with absolutely no slight intended, a brooding symphony of a novel. It’s a pop song. It’s meant to be light and catchy, with three minutes of hooks and choruses for you to sing along with, and then you’re done and you go on with your day, hopefully with a smile on your face. I had fun writing this, and I needed to have fun writing this. We all need a pop song from time to time, particularly after a stretch of darkness.”

Time Travel 

A Rip Through Time (2022) by Kelley Armstrong

This novels spans many genres: crime fiction, historical fiction, and time travel. It is part of a trilogy and I will be reading the next two books. See my review here. 

Crime Fiction

What Was Lost (2007) by Catherine O'Flynn

A young girl, ten years old, lives with her grandmother; her goal is to be a detective, and run her own detective agency. She has few friends, hates school, and entertains herself with investigating cases that she has made up. The remaining portions of the book take place in 2004 and 2005, 20 years later, and focus on Kurt, a security guard in the Green Oaks Mall, and Lisa, an employee at a large record store in the mall. My review here.

Newcomer (2001) by Keigo Higashino

Translated by Giles Murray

This Japanese mystery seems at first to be a straightforward police procedural, but the structure of the story is unusual. The case involves the death of a woman who has recently moved to the Nihonbashi area of Tokyo. Each chapter features a location (usually a shop) at which Kaga interviews various prospective witnesses or suspects, and each chapter reads almost like a self-contained short story. See my review here.

Corpse in a Gilded Cage (1984) by Robert Barnard

When the eleventh Earl of Ellesmere dies, Perce Spender, a working-class Londoner, inherits the title and the estate. He is a simple man with simple tastes and doesn't want to live in the huge family estate; he plans to sell everything, but it isn't that simple. His three children and their hangers-on come to stay at the estate for his 60th birthday party. Perce Spender is just about the only likable character in the book. I always enjoy books by Robert Barnard. This one is very, very funny, even with all the unsympathetic characters.

Salt Lane (2018) by William Shaw

I was very glad I read SALT LANE by William Shaw. I had been put off by DS Alexandra Cupidi in THE BIRDWATCHER, but in this start to a new series starring Cupidi, she is a more appealing character. It isn't that there a complete reversal of her behavior but that we get to see more of her background and her family and why she came to work in a small seaside town in Kent. One of the aspects of this book that I especially love is that Cupidi's teenage daughter Zoë is a serious birdwatcher and there are scenes describing birds and bird enthusiasts. And the setting is wonderful.

Currently reading and what's next?

I am reading A Closed and Common Orbit by Becky Chambers. It is in the science fiction genre, the second book in the Wayfarers series. I am loving it.

After having two cataract surgeries in June, I am much behind in my blogging, and I am trying to catch up. I hope to review a few of the books I read in June and put up a summary post for that month and then get back on track to some extent by the end of July. 

 

The photos at the top and bottom of this post were taken in late May at the I Madonnari Italian Street Painting Festival. It was held at Mission Santa Barbara over the Memorial Day weekend, on May 25-27, 2024. Click on the images for best viewing quality.

Short Story Wednesday: the Juliet stories by Alice Munro

Recently I read three short stories from Runaway by Alice Munro. All of these stories are about the same woman, Juliet. Together they total about 110 pages, about the length of a novella. 

The first story, "Chance," takes place in 1965, and tells about how Juliet first meets Eric, the man she later moves in with. Juliet had been teaching in a girls school; Eric fishes for prawns and lives in a cabin in Whale Bay, north of Vancouver.   

In the second story, "Soon," set in 1969, Juliet takes her 13-month-old daughter Penelope to visit her parents in the small town she grew up in. Juliet and Eric are still together but have not married, and this embarrasses her parents. Although Juliet's family has never been affiliated with any religion, a minister visits her mother and lectures Juliet about not raising her daughter with any religious beliefs. 

The third story, "Silence,"  takes place about 20 years later. Juliet now has a job interviewing people on television. Eric died years before while he was out fishing during bad weather. Juliet is taking a ferry ride from Buckley Bay to Denman Island, to see Penelope at a spiritual retreat. She has not seen or heard from her daughter for six months. Penelope invited her to the island but when Juliet arrives, she is not there and no one can tell her where to find her. The issue of the lack of spiritual training comes up again in this story.

I liked all of these stories, but I did find Juliet to be an enigma. She seemed to keep her emotions under the surface, and worried a lot about how people viewed her. As is often true, other readers interpreted these stories differently.

I recommend reading these stories all at the same time (or close together). I read the first story, "Chance," two or three weeks earlier than the other stories. While writing this post I went back and reread "Chance" online. I had not remembered that one of the characters, Christa, had featured prominently in the first and last story. Each one of the stories are fine alone, but as a whole they are more meaningful. I am sure I will reread them again later.

"Chance," "Soon" and "Silence" were first published in The New Yorker in 2004.

The three Juliet stories have been made into a movie directed by Pedro Almodovar, titled Julieta.