Adult Fiction

The Chocolate Thief

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by Laura Florand
First line: “Sylvain Marquis knew what women desired: chocolate.”
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Review copy snagged from the ARC shelves at my place of employment.
Content: Very little swearing (in English; perhaps if I knew French, this would be higher), but it’s most definitely a Blush Book. I may never think about climbing stairs the same. It would be in the adult fiction section of the bookstore, if we carried it.

I was pursuing my TBR shelf, looking for something light to read, when my eye caught this. I remember a bunch of YAckers loving it (and plus: CHOCOLATE and PARIS), so I picked it up. It is most definitely light and fluffy. And sexy. And not much else.

Cade Corey is the daughter of a Hershey’s-like family. They’re in the basic chocolate bar business, and own a huge percentage of the market. While she’s not the CEO, she’s being groomed to take over the company. But what she really wants is Parisian chocolates. Artisan chocolates. Sylvain Marquis’s chocolates, since they’re the best. But she quickly discovers that while money can buy a whole lot it can’t buy her Sylvain. He’s much, much too proud of his French chocolates and much much too disdainful of her American crap. So, she does the only logical thing (right.): breaks into his store, and pilfers through his chocolates, tasting, eating, leaving hints of herself behind.

Which totally turns him on.

From there, the plot is immaterial. It’s all sex. sex. sex. and then more sex. Mostly tastefully written (but not-off screen) sex. And there’s chocolate. Descriptions of luscious, rich, delicate, expensive chocolate. I found myself craving chocolate while I read, so I think Florand did her job. I did have issues with the way that Cad wanted Sylvain to control her… part of me rebelled at the idea of a man being SO in charge of sex, of wanting to master a woman, but to each their own. It did what I wanted to do: transport me to Paris (not enough of that, though), indulge me in chocolate, and be eye candy.

I have no interest in reading the others, though. And I may need some non-fiction to follow up on all that candy. But it was enjoyable while it lasted.

Audiobook: The Cuckoo’s Calling

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by Robert Galbraith
read by Robert Glenister
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Content: None of the murders are grisly — they’re all alluded to — and there’s some talk of sex, but none actual on screen. However, the language is very adult (including many, many f-bombs), and for that reason, it’s in the mystery section (well, also because it’s a mystery) of the bookstore.

Cormoran Strike is hard up on his luck. Retired from the military due to an accident in which he lost part of his leg, and recently broken up with his posh, upper class girlfriend, the only thing Strike has is his private detective practice. And even that’s not doing terribly well. He can’t afford the temporary secretary that’s shown up, and he’s pretty sure he’s going to default on the loan his estranged (but famous) father gave him.

Things are looking pretty down when John Bristow, adopted brother of supermodel Lula Landry walks in Strike’s office with an incredible story. Bristow claims that the police have it wrong: that Landry’s death was not a suicide as originally thought, but rather murder. Someone pushed her off her third floor balcony to her death. The question is: who?

I really didn’t have expectations going into this one. I knew it was J. K. Rowling but I don’t really read many mysteries, so I wasn’t dying to get to this one. But, when I saw the audio book, I figured it was worth a try. I didn’t love it, but I was intrigued by it.

Perhaps it was because I knew it was Rowling before I went in, but I could tell that it was Rowling’s work. The way she described things (and because it’s audio, I don’t have a handy example) felt similar to the Harry Potter books. That, and she really does have a gift for names. The plotting was good as well; she kept up a good pace, and even though there were some bits that weren’t vitally necessary, it wasn’t under-edited. And the twist at the end didn’t come out of nowhere; something which was incredibly important to me.

I did feel like she under-utilized the administrative assistant, Robin. She gave us background on her, and made her a sympathetic character, but really didn’t have her do much of anything. I kept waiting for a grand Robin Moment that never quite came. The narration was excellent; I was impressed with the range of accents and voices that Glenister could do; perhaps one of the reasons I stayed interested in the book was because his narration was so compelling.

That said, it was a good, solid mystery. Nothing too spectacular, but nothing mundane or pedantic. Which means it’s just about right.

So Long a Letter

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by Mariama Ba
First sentence: “Dear Aissatou, I have received your letter.”
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Content: It’s pretty serious and deals with issues of infidelity and polygamy and out-of-wedlock pregnancy. But there’s no swearing, sex, or violence. It’d be in the adult section of the bookstore.

Recently widowed, Ramatoulaye sits down to write a long letter to her best friend about all the events that led up to Ramatoulaye’s husband’s death. It was a happy story:  for 25 years, they were happily married. Ramatoulaye spent her life in devotion to her husband, bearing 12 children. Then one of his daughter’s friends caught his eye, and he woos her, and takes her as a second wife (as is permitted in Islam). That simple act wrecks Ramatoulaye, but she manages to survive as a single mother.

It’s a slim novel, and an interesting one. I didn’t particularly like the format –why, if she’s writing to her best friend, would Ramatoulaye need to recount her friends’ history (which was much like her own; her husband took a second wife. The difference is that Aissatou left her husband)? It didn’t make sense to me, logically, some of the things Ramatoulaye included in her letter. That said, if when I was able to get past that, I found the story was simultaneously enlightening and disheartening.

Enlightening, because that’s an area of the world I know very little about. And through Ramatoulaye, Ba brings to life the ordinary lives of Senegalese women. And disheartening because they have so few rights, as we have come to think of them. I read this book in the middle of the #WeNeedDiverseBooks campaign, and this is a prime example why I need to read more books like this. In my privileged home in my privileged country, it’s easy for me not to think about Senegalese women and their lives. But books like these help me. It helps that Ba is a good writer (aside from the format, of course), and was able to draw me into Rmatoulaye’s life.

And that’s what makes this book worthwhile.

The Storied Life of A. J. Fikry

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by Gabrielle Zevin
First sentence: “On the ferry from Hyannis to Alice Island, Amelia Loman paints her nails yellow and, while waiting for them to dry, skims her predecessor’s notes.”
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Review copy is the one that’s being passed around the bookstore staff.
Content: There’s a lot of language, including a handful of f-bombs. I would give it to a bookish teenager, if they expressed interest.

A.J. Fikry is the owner of Island Books on Alice Island (off the coast of Massachusetts), and it’s not something he’s terribly fond of. In the twenty-one months since his wife’s accidental death after an author event, he’s become increasingly more reclusive and cranky. Then two things happen: someone steals his first edition copy of Tamerlane, by Edgar Allen Poe and someone leaves a two-year-old girl on the doorstep of the bookstore. The first is significant because selling Tamerlane was A. J.’s retirement fund. Without it, he’s stuck on the island, running this bookstore, for the unforeseeable future.  The second is significant because it changes his life.

He is a reluctant father, mostly because his wife was pregnant when she died, and he hasn’t quite gotten over the loss. But his daughter, whom he names Maya Tamerand Fikry when he finally adopts her, gets under his skin and the skin of the community. It’s through concern for her (and for A. J. as her father) that the bookstore finds a second life. As does A. J. Through taking care of Maya and getting involved in the community, he finds that running a bookstore isn’t half bad. Even if you sometimes have to sell pulp fiction in order to carry the literary fiction.

It’s really a love song to community and to bookselling, and the connection between the two. And even though I didn’t find it to be deep or meaningful, I did (as a bookseller) relate to it, finding it charming. It was one of those books where you like everything, wanting to live next door to these quirky characters because they’re so interesting. However, it lacked the emotional punch at the end that I think Zevin was going for; I wasn’t even the tiniest bit sad. (Maybe that’s more me than Zevin. Even though I liked the characters, I didn’t feel emotionally connected enough to be moved.)

In the end, though, it was simply delightful.

Cloud Atlas

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by David Mitchell
First sentence: “Beyond the Indian hamlet, upon a forlorn strand, I happened on a trail of recent footprints.”
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Content: There is some language, including strong language in some of the chapters, and some implied sex. It’s in the adult fiction section at the bookstore, and I think, while there are some kids who might like this, it’s a good place for it.

I won’t say that I had high expectations going into this. Or that I really wanted to read it. Actually, after S., I kind of didn’t want to have anything to do with adult fiction for a good long while. But, this was our book group pick, and I’m a good book group member, so I picked it up.

I’m not even going to try a plot summary; mostly because I’m not sure there is a plot. There are multiple plots. And, even though I kind of liked some of them, they’re not worth recounting. It’s because this book isn’t about plot. It’s about Style and Meaning. And it doesn’t even really pretend (unlike S.) to be anything else.

But that’s what infuriated me. Aside from the stories stopping halfway through (very annoying, that), I wanted there to be some real connection between the individual stories. (Mostly because it’s a “novel” rather than a collection of stories.) But there wasn’t. Sure, the previous story is referenced in the next as a book or a movie (Symbolizing The Interconnectedness Of Our Existence or something Deep like that), but I wanted a character to travel through time. Or it to be someone’s descendant. Or something like that. And so, I spent too much of my time trying to figure out how the stories interconnected.

Plus, I’m not a careful reader. I miss details. And if you miss details in this, you loose Meaning and Substance.

I was game to finish the book, reading it as it’s “supposed” to be read (I did, briefly, contemplate jumping and finishing each individual story before moving on.), but I bailed when I got to the “middle” story, not just because I was increasingly frustrated with the book, but because of this: “I watched the clock’s tickers that mornin’ too tll Abbess came back from her augurin’ an’ sat ‘cross from me. She telled me Old Georgie was hungerin’ for my soul, so he’d put a cuss on my dreamin’s to fog their meanin’.” I. Don’t. Like. Dialect. I find it hard enough to read in the most normal of circumstances, but to throw dialect on me, in addition to all the other frustrations, was the straw that broke the camel’s back.

I bailed. I did go and check on Wikipedia to see what I missed, and I found that (at least according to them) I didn’t miss much.

THIS is why I read kids’ books.

Audiobook: One More Thing

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by B. J. Novak
read by the author
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Content: lots of language, both mild and strong. Most of it unnecessary, but I don’t think I expected anything less. Is in the adult fiction section of the bookstore, but I bet older teens would like it.

I picked this up because people at work were raving about it. Said it was hilarious. And I decided that I need some humor in my life. So, even though it’s by an actor I’ve never heard of (I didn’t watch The Office, though he was the “other guy” — the one that I didn’t recognize – in Saving Mr. Banks), I figured why not give it a try.

It says it’s “stories and more stories” but I think it’s more “jokes, observations, and a couple of stories.” There were 64 in the book, and sometimes that felt derivative. Not that I minded: some of the shortest stories were some of the funniest ones. Novak is a great narrator, by the way, and he got a whole bunch of other celebrities to help him out, though he used Rainn Wilson and Mindy Kahling the most

My favorite of the whole book was “The Something by John Grisham,” where John Grisham’s newest novel gets published with his place-saving title instead of a “real” one. I was guffawing at the idea that Grisham’s novel would not only get published with such a bad title, but get rave reviews. Just because he’s John Grisham. (I suppose there’s a poignant commentary there on publishing and fame, but I was laughing too hard to find it.) I did like “No One Goes to Heaven to See Dan Fogelberg”, which is an imagining of what Heaven will be like, and how, maybe, we won’t want to spend time with people we didn’t know well in life, even if they are family. Some of them — like the “Comedy Central Roast of Nelson Mandela — made me uncomfortable, and I thought Novak’s humor was more mean than observant. But, for the most part, like in Wikipedia Brown and the Case of the Missing Bicycle” — a spoof on Encyclopedia Brown — or “Bingo” — where three cousins are vying to win Bingo at a resort, only to lose to their grandpa — or “Closure” — where a girl whose boyfriend has broken up with him gets absolute closure I was highly amused. And the discussion questions at the end of a couple stories, as well as the end of the book, I thought were a nice touch.

It’s like David Sedaris without the sardonic undertones.

I’m not sure I would have liked this as much if I hadn’t have listened to it. (Much like me and David Sedaris, come to think of it.) There’s something about hearing jokes, as opposed to reading them, that makes the humor work better for me. It’s not a deep book, or one that’s going to stay with me for a long time. But it was amusing, and it did make the drive back and forth to work enjoyable.

Audiobook: The Art Forger

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by B. A. Shapiro
read by Xe Sands
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Content: All kinds of swearing, plus some explicit (but not graphic) sex. Definitely deserves to be in the adult fiction section.

Claire Roth is three years out of grad school, and she’s been blacklisted as an artist. It was a bit of a big deal with one of her professors whom she was having an affair with (and who ended up killing himself). But now, when the owner of the most prestigious art gallery in Boston — Aiden Markel of Markel G — comes to her with a Degas — no, the Degas from the 1990 Gardiner heist — asking her to create a forgery of it, she can’t refuse.

Well, she could have. But then we wouldn’t have a story.

This, in many ways, is a story of obsession and compulsion, and because I watch White Collar (which is a quite fantastic show, that) I was already familiar with the idea of how art becomes a compulsion. That said, I still don’t… get it. The depth of obsession, the idea of owning something priceless. It’s just paintings on a wall, right?

That said, I really enjoyed the journey Shapiro took us on. The initial journey of Claire’s painting the forgery, the gradual unfolding of how she became blacklisted, the relationship between her and  Aiden, and the unraveling of all their best-laid plans. Shapiro had a lot of different threads going, and she kept me wondering how they all fit together.

Which does lead me to the end. It all felt too tidy for me. She did manage to wrap everything up with a bit of an idealistic bow (it is fiction after all), and I’m not quite sure I’m satisfied with the way she did that. But that said, getting there was such an intriguing ride, I’m not unhappy I took it.

One note on the audiobook: while Sands was a good narrator — I loved that she did all the voices, though her men all sounded the same — she made Claire often out to be simpering. And that grated on me. Not enough to bail on the book, but I didn’t see Claire as someone who was insecure and simpering. Indecisive and unsure of herself, perhaps. But not simpering.

That’s just a personal problem, though, and only with the audiobook. The book itself was quite fascinating.

The Crane Wife

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by Patrick Ness
First sentence: “
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Review copy given me by the Penguin rep.
Content: Multiple f-bombs and other language, some off-screen sex. Rightly sits with the adult fiction at the bookstore.

George is your very typical kind-of-loser guy. He’s divorced (nine years) with a child (who’s in her 20s) and can’t seem to keep a relationship (he’s too nice; they always break it off, but he’s always friends with them after). Even though he’s the owner of a print shop, he’s a bit of a pushover, letting his one employee, Mehmet, push him around. But, because he’s nice, because he’s George, when a crane with an arrow piercing its wing unexpectedly lands in his suburban London backyard in the middle of the night, he helps it out.

The next day, a woman named Kumiko shows up in George’s print shop. And suddenly, George’s life — and the life of his daughter, Amanda — are irrevocably changed.

Yes, this is a fairy tale. A very charming, sweet, wonderful fairy tale. Ness divides its time between George, Amanda, and Kumiko’s tales, but does so in a way that doesn’t feel awkward or forced. But it’s not just a fairy tale — or at least not just a one-dimensional fairy tale — art (in this case, paper cuttings) and a slight Japanese-inspired tale within a tale play major roles, which gives the book depth and substance.

But what I enjoyed most with this one was Ness’s use of the language. The fact that one of his characters, Rachel (who is very confused and not at all nice), speaks entirely in questions. Or the way he uses “…” to represent silence. Or the way George and Amanda think of themselves. And descriptive sentences like “He loved physical books with the same avidity other people loved horses or wine or prog rock.” (60) or “Stories do not explain. They seem to, but all they provide is a starting point. A story never ends at the end.” (141-142) or “She stopped, her face scrunching up in some really, really unattractive crying.” (161) There were others, but those are the ones that I marked.

It did all the things I want a book to do: it gave me characters to care about, and transported me away from the dreary winter months. It delighted me, and made me wish I was even a tiny bit artistic.

Delightful.

S.

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by J. J. Abrams and Doug Dorst
First sentence: “If found, please return to the workroom B19, Main Library, Pollard State University.”
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Content: Language, including lots of f-bombs. And some violence. It’s in the adult section of the bookstore.

The thing that piqued my interest about this book was the buzz about the form. We had a sample copy and I perused through it. The format — a book published in 1948, stolen from a high school library, with notes scribbled in the margins — was intriguing. Enough so, that I bought myself a copy for Christmas, and eagerly dove in. It IS an intriguing concept, reading someone else’s notes, figuring out the story as you go.

It’s an incredibly layered book: the “book” is one Ship of Theseus, written by the mysterious V. M. Straka. A book where the main character, S., has amnesia, and goes on a journey to figure out who he really is. In doing so, he finds out that he was involved with some shady figures. The second layer is the work that a disenfranchised grad student, Eric, is doing to figure out the real identity of V. M. Straka. All that’s really known about him is that he was involved in this mysterious organization, the S. Eric gets help on this quest from a struggling undergrad, Jen, who finds Ship of Theseus laying in the stacks and begins a conversation. Which brings me to layer three: Jen and Eric’s story. They work together, and over the course of the book, develop their own relationship.

I realized fairly early on that the layers were too dense for me. I couldn’t hold everything in my mind, for starters. I ended up giving up the main Ship of Theseus story, partially because it was boring, but also because I just couldn’t keep multiple storylines in my head. Call it being out of practice, or lack of interest, but I just couldn’t do it. But there was also the fact that the story’s told  inside out and backward. I did think that maybe if I had read it in shifts — read Ship of Theseus first, then the inked-comments, then maybe it would have made sense.

So, in the end, this was all form and no substance. In the end, all the thrills, chills, and mystery They were promising weren’t there. It was a simple story, one that tries to give grad school a mystique and make it cool (it doesn’t succeed). It did succeed in being a homage to paper books — there’s no way this would make a decent e-book. But it wasn’t much else.

And in the end, I found that disappointing.

The Importance of Being Ernest

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by Ernest Cline
First sentence: “I started writing and performing poetry in the mid-90s when I moved to Austin, TX.”
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Content: Chock full of sex talk (no actual sex, though), f-bombs, and other swearing.

I’m going to start a review — granted this is more a reaction than a review; then again, most of my “reviews” are “reactions”, I’m just being up front about this one — the way I’m not supposed to and say: I dislike poetry.

I don’t “get” it, I don’t particularly like it, and even though we have a shelf of poetry books — collected best-ofs as well as the Shel Silverstein/Jack Pretlusky ones parents are supposed to have — I rarely crack them open.

And so when my manager — who usually is spot-on pinpointing taste and books people will like — suggested I give this one a shot (because I really did love Ready Player One) I didn’t jump up and say, “Sure! I’d love to!”  It was only as we were paring down the inventory after Christmas when she said she thinks it’s worth a shot, and couldn’t I please give it a look over so maybe we can sell it? Please?

So I did.

And.

It’s Geeky poetry. There’s that.
But I’m not sure I’m the target audience.
And they are really foul. Like REALLY. Foul.
I’m not one to get turned off by language, usually,
but I did this time.

Some of the poems — most notably
“When I Was a Kid” —
made me laugh.
And “Nerd Porn Auteur” was spot-on
about smart girls
even though it made me blush.

But some of it was just
very Geek Gamer Guy
which I’m not.
And I don’t care enough
about poetry
in order to care enough
about Geeky Gamers
to like/get/understand
this collection.

That said,
I guess I know who I
can sell it to now.