I promised the round-up and here it is.
Mysterious Skin - Scott Heim
This book started out fast and compelling; remember, I didn’t want to put it down? But it quickly got tedious. I just couldn’t read one more description of the child molestation and/or gay sex that makes up the impetus of the book, I’m sorry. (My opinion – for what it’s worth - I don’t read romance novels for (among others) similar reasons: no one can write really good/well-written sex scenes because the actual act of sex is inherently silly. Silly body positions, noises, etc. It’s fun and passionate and blah-blah-blah, but it’s pretty silly.) The characters were sympathetic and I wanted to know what happened to them until it turned into a book about, essentially, hustling. I really don’t think I am being simplistic here; it reminded me of Alan Hollinghurst’s Line of Beauty – the writing may have been just fine and the characters interesting, but what they were doing, on and on and on, was sex. I know I sound uptight or prudish; I am not, really. I just think homosexuality is a pretty hot commodity in the lit world right now. And so a lot of the books being recommended have that going for them. It was by no means a bad book; I just got bored.
Emma and Me - Elizabeth Flock
How many books do we need about little poverty-stricken Southern girls being molested and abused by their loser stepfathers while their dull and useless mothers look on and let it happen? Apparently someone thought we needed another. They were wrong.
Noonday Demon - Andrew Solomon
This is the second time I have tried to read this book. The first time I attributed my lack of interest to my mood. This time I readily admit that coming off Mysterious Skin directly influenced my decision to put down this book. When I opened it to leaf through and immediately starting reading about how the author, who is clearly very depressed, goes out and has irresponsible unsafe homosexual sex with anyone he can pick up in order to contract AIDS so he can die, I got thoroughly disgusted and closed it. I admit I’d already had it with the sex; but also, this is just STUPID. There are so many easier and less harmful-to-other-people ways to kill oneself, that I was incredibly pissed off. I have no idea what the man has to say about depression; with thinking like this, I don’t want to know what he has to say.
Ok, so what now? I am halfway through The Language of Baklava by Diana Abu-Jaber. I loved the characters, especially her father, a Jordanian immigrant who longs for his homeland even though he lives a safer and arguably better life in America. He cooks delicious Middle Eastern food for his family, trying to teach his daughters about their ancestry and his history. Her cool, tall, American mother (who feeds them Velveeta grilled cheese and Fluffernutters); her sisters; her multicultural high school friends with their own crazy pasts and families; and the hordes of eccentric relatives are all detailed beautifully. And the food descriptions made me positively ravenous.
I picked up The Forsyte Saga to bring to work with me today; maybe a classic will snap me out of this reading rut. If that doesn’t work, I’ll try the last Edith Wharton I picked up, Custom of the Country.
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This morning I was in the kitchen cleaning up from breakfast. The boys were upstairs playing, Dan was at the gym. I heard him come in, but then he went back out, and I heard him talking to someone. Next thing, I hear the front door slam open – scrabbling claws on hardwood floors – a streak of tan and white as my cat Emmy runs past – and then this gorgeous, enormous, simply magnificent dog runs through my kitchen. I was fully expecting a dog, due to the scrabbling claws – a normal sized dog. This dog was gloriously gigantic, she looked like she should be in a Phillip Pullman novel as someone’s daemon. Turns out her name is Rosie and she belongs to a friend of a friend whom Dan had run into coming home from the gym. He had left the front door open and the dog took off after our cat. No harm done, and I am in love. I am not a dog person by any means, but this dog….man, she took my breath away. I want her to be my daemon, even though a small, sedate, greyish cat who sleeps a lot is much more me.
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Note to self: S comes AFTER P and R.
Don't ask.
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