Weetzie Bat prequel

I just found out through Francesca Lia Block's facebook page that she has written a prequel to Weetzie Bat! I'm so excited!!! According to Amazon, it's set to be released on January 24, 2012 and the title is
Pink Smog: Becoming Weetzie

Whichbook.net : Personalized reading suggestions

   If you're like me, sometimes you know you want to read a book that is funny, or dark, or epic (whatever your mood is), but you just don't know exactly which book to choose. Well, whichbook.net has solved this problem.  This site has several sliding scales that you can personalize to fit your mood or desired reading experience, and then it generates book suggestions based on these choices.  But the great thing is that you don't have to just pick "happy" or "sad" or "short" or "long." You can narrow your choices down through 12 different sliding scales to find book suggestions that are just right for you.

   This site is seriously awesome!!  I tried out a few different combinations and it generated a lot of books that I had never heard of before.  Their database is very large and very diverse, which is great when you know you want to read something, but you're just not sure how to narrow it down.

The Particular Sadness of Lemon Cake by Aimee Bender

   Rose is just 9 years old when she realizes that she has a unique ability.  She can taste people's emotions by eating the food they prepare.  She discovers this while eating a slice of lemon cake her mother baked, and even though the cake is delicious, it also tastes of "smallness, the sensation of shrinking, of upset, tasting a distance I somehow knew was connected to my mother" (p 10).

   After several years of eating food that tastes like sadness, guilt, anger, desire, etc., Rose decides to try and stick to food that is highly processed and made by no one in particular.  She is only a child, and the strain of feeling these adult emotions is too much to bear sometimes.  Rose becomes reclusive and "suspicious of people and all the complications of interior lives" (p 125).  The novel chronicles Rose's life into her twenties as she struggles in finding ways to cope with her abilities, which can be both a blessing and a curse.

   I really like the premise of this book.  It's unique and interesting with the potential to be an amazing novel, but for me, it just did not live up to its potential.  I know a lot of people really loved this book, but I had trouble getting past the clunky grammatical structure.  Aimee Bender did not use quotation marks in dialogue scenes, so there were a lot of "he saids" and "she saids" on every page.  I thought this was very distracting and limiting to the dialogue.

   I also felt that the novel ended very abruptly without working out many of the central conflicts.  I know we can't expect all novels to be wrapped up in a neat little bow with an epilogue, but in order for characters to be dynamic, there needs to be at least some growth and change.  Sometimes authors write flat characters on purpose, in order to make other characters stand out in contrast, but I found all of the characters in this book to be stagnant, which made it difficult to stay committed to the book.  Overall, I think Aimee Bender came up with a really unique concept for this novel, and I really tried to love it, but I found it difficult to relate to the characters and was often distracted by awkward dialogue and the general lack of cohesiveness throughout the plot.

American Rose by Karen Abbott

   American Rose is Karen Abbott's biography of Gypsy Rose Lee - one of the first Burlesque performers in America.  But this book is more than just a biography of one woman and her family.  It chronicles the fall of Vaudeville, which led to the rise of Burlesque in live theatres all over the country around the time of the depression.

   Gypsy Rose Lee spent her childhood touring the country with her mother, Rose, and her sister, June (actress June Havoc).  Traveling was extremely difficult on the girls, as was the long nights of exhausting performances, but Rose would accept nothing less from her daughters - they were her ticket to fame and fortune.  Needless to say, Gypsy (Louise) and June had a very distorted childhood, and their relationships with Rose remained tumultuous.

   Karen Abbott's research for this book is amazing (the bibliography is over 50 pages long, which includes interviews with June and Gypsy's son, Erik).  At times, it reads like a history books, but that does not make the story any less interesting.  If you're someone who admires old Hollywood and the art of Burlesque, then you will definitely enjoy this book. If you don't know much about this time period in performance theatre history, then American Rose is a great place to start.  Gypsy Rose Lee is widely recognized as America's first famous stripteaser (the original Bettie Page or Dita Von Teese) and with this book, Karen Abbott has provided us not only with a history of the art itself, but also of the woman who practically invented it.


Further Reading:

Gypsy: Memoirs of America's Most Celebrated Stripper - Gypsy Rose Lee and Eric Preminger
  -Gypsy Rose Lee's autobiography, co-authored by her son, Erik.  These memoirs inspired the musical
   Gypsy

The G-String Murders - Gypsy Rose Lee
   - Gypsy Rose Lee's mystery novel

Before I Go to Sleep by S J Watson

  If any book deserves a spot on your summer reading shelf, let it be this one.

Belle Weather by Celia Rivenbark

   If you're the type of person who wants to enhance your knowledge of Southern American culture and improve your Southern accent, then I suggest reading Belle Weather out loud.  Now, since I'm from Tennessee, y'all know my twang is natural-born, but I did notice my speech becoming much twangier as I read this book out loud to my husband.  I have read all of her books to him, but I think this one is my favorite.  Celia Rivenbark's sharp wit and sarcasm could come across as bitchy, but not when it comes from a Southern woman - then it's so endearing that you don't know what hit you.

   Topics in this collection of essays include home renovation, ballroom dancing, "customer dis-service," and a particularly hilarious account of how Mrs. Rivenbark survived her daughter's first major slumber party (she sure is creative when it comes to getting kids to shut up!).  Like I mentioned in my Laurie Notaro blog, a lot of crazy folks mistake Celia Rivenbark's books for "chick lit," but there are enough fart jokes to keep my husband coming back for more!  If you're from the south, you'll absolutely adore her books, and if you're not, you'll probably consider moving down here.  After all, our bugs are cuter, our tea is sweeter, and the weather is "Mostly Sunny With a Chance of Scattered Hissy Fits."

   Celia Rivenbark's newest book, You Don't Sweat Much for a Fat Girl, will be released this August and can I just say? Best. Title. EVER!

Happy Birthday, Francoise Sagan

 

   Francoise Sagan died in 2004, but if she were alive today, she would be 76 years old.  In honor of her birthday (and because she is one of my favorite writers), I thought I would mention a few things about my favorite book of hers, Bonjour Tristesse, which translates as "Hello Sadness." 

Literature Map

Want to know how to discover new authors? This Literature Map is a site similar to Pandora that generates author suggestions based similarities between an author of your choosing and other writers.  According to the map, "the closer two writers are, the more likely someone will like both of them. ." It's just about the coolest thing I've seen in a while.  And it works waaaaayyyy better than Whatshouldireadnext.com.  The have a music map too, which is also very cool.

My New American Life by Francine Prose

    This new novel by Francine Prose tells the story of Lula, an Albanian immigrant who moved to the U.S. just after 9/11.  When we meet Lula, she has landed a job as a "nanny" to a wealthy New Jersey man's 17 year-old son.  Mr Stanley and his son, Zeke, welcome Lula into their home and treat her like family, but even so, Lula is bored, which may be why she takes to lying about her past and the state of affairs in her homeland.  While Albania is still ruled by a strict, militant government, its citizens are not under quite as much distress as Lula claims.  But these exaggerations work to her benefit, as her employer and legal adviser feel so sorry for her that they put her on a fast track to obtaining a green card, and eventually citizenship.  She already knows more about American history and the English language than most natural-born citizens, so she looks pretty good on paper, too.

   Lula's life has become quite predictable (an American trait she considers bittersweet) until one morning, a black SUV parks outside of Mr. Stanley's home and three men emerge and ring the doorbell.  They tell Lula that they are friends of her cousin and could she please just do one small tiny favor for them?  Could she just hang on to a handgun for an unspecified amount of time with no explanation as to why the gun should be hidden?  This is how bored she is...she actually agrees to their shady request.  Needless to say, the subsequent events cure her of boredom in very unexpected ways, and Lula's new life takes on many different dimensions.

   This book offers poignant (and sometimes satirical) commentary on the lives of American immigrants - desperate to fit into American culture coupled with the deep roots of their own homelands and the desire to maintain that connection.  Often an unavoidable identity crisis ensues.  Lula's character is a great example of this condition and Francine Prose does an excellent job of presenting Lula's two selves - her Albanian self and her "new American" self, both converging somewhere around New Jersey.

Birthday Books (part 2)

Here is the list of books I got for my birthday, either as a gift or something I purchased with a gift card, book store credit, etc... And I must say, I am very pleased with my birthday haul this year!