A very good reading month, including ❊ Stag Dance - by Torrey Peters ❊ The Last Samurai - by Helen DeWitt ❊ On the Calculation of Volume I & II - by Solvej Balle
When Sarah Chihaya (author of Bibliophobia) was deeply depressed and unable to read, her best friend (Merve Emre!!!) told her to go to a bookstore and buy The Last Samurai. It's the book that pulled her out of a clinical depression. I just bought the book myself and I am so excited to read it. I loved The English Understand Wool by deWitt so much and I know that this one will be different but .... still... can't wait.
I'm excited to read your thoughts whenever you get to it! I haven't read anything else by her so it'll be interesting to hear how that reference point shapes it.
skipping Vol II review since I haven't been able to force myself to read it yet. I have a love hate relationship with this idea which is strange since I love the idea of time but Balle's writing is frustrating stylistically (I hate highlighted quite a few passages 😂).
I have been so interested in The Last Samurai but I have SO many other doorstoppers to get to first. Strangely you are the second person to mention Infinite Jest today - I own it and have never once seriously considered reading it. I read half the Pale King and just never looked back. I might now.
If it provides any motivation, and without being too specific: the second book has more plot and spends less time with Tara pondering... but I also liked the writing style so I'm biased, ha!
Loved this round-up! I also feel the same about the election 🥲 Relief but also… continued stress that really it wasn’t as simple as voting Carney in… now he has to actually follow through. Plus the NDP losing official party status hurts deeper than I expected alongside the sheer number of votes for the conservatives… Everyone’s saying it feels like a wholehearted rejection of Maga-style politics but somehow the numbers aren’t saying that to me… sigh. Fingers crossed Carney doesn’t disappoint.
seeing several ridings flip from NDP to conservative, and conservatives place *above* NDP
but below the liberals in many historically progressive ridings certainly does not feel like a wholesale rejection of conservative isolationism! but still, a moment of relief.
Absolutely 😭 Although I know some of the ridings near me vote split HARD between NDP/Lib ultimately meaning the disliked Con won. Frustrating to say the least haha. They were previously safe NDP districts.
I have to restack this post because it includes The Last Samurai and those are the rules! I skipped Vol II because I still need to read that but I loved comparing our thoughts on Vol I. It's interesting how she describes their love and romance... but I still suspect this is gonna be the world's quietest divorce plot. Cheers!
Deeply spooky we must be connected because I just ordered Invisible Man!!!!!! Everyone reading Vol 1 and 2 is making me feel like I am at school but in the best way. I echo your review of Vol 2 that tonally, it feels same but also wildly different. My estimation is that Balle is using this series to comment on humanity's relationship to existence, specifically consumption of life (grossly vague from me but maybe you'll get what I mean?) I think I say something in my forthcoming review along the lines of I am deeply unnerved for Tara's sake that this is a 7 part series lmao - but the ending of vol 2 makes me VERY intrigued to see where it goes next.
i'm about 100 pages into invisible man and it is incredible and incredibly intense. one of those books with page-length paragraphs that are a rollercoaster ride to read.
100% in line with your reading- relatedly, one of the most striking scenes to me in book 2 was the moment when she goes to a grocery store (~p 104) and describes at length the packaging and the seasonality of the produce, how easy it is to get completely out of season food packaged neatly in plastic in London in November. I'm avoiding reading too much about the later books, but lining up the (amazing) cover designs realllllly implies that some unnerving change will happen.
When Sarah Chihaya (author of Bibliophobia) was deeply depressed and unable to read, her best friend (Merve Emre!!!) told her to go to a bookstore and buy The Last Samurai. It's the book that pulled her out of a clinical depression. I just bought the book myself and I am so excited to read it. I loved The English Understand Wool by deWitt so much and I know that this one will be different but .... still... can't wait.
I'm excited to read your thoughts whenever you get to it! I haven't read anything else by her so it'll be interesting to hear how that reference point shapes it.
skipping Vol II review since I haven't been able to force myself to read it yet. I have a love hate relationship with this idea which is strange since I love the idea of time but Balle's writing is frustrating stylistically (I hate highlighted quite a few passages 😂).
I have been so interested in The Last Samurai but I have SO many other doorstoppers to get to first. Strangely you are the second person to mention Infinite Jest today - I own it and have never once seriously considered reading it. I read half the Pale King and just never looked back. I might now.
If it provides any motivation, and without being too specific: the second book has more plot and spends less time with Tara pondering... but I also liked the writing style so I'm biased, ha!
Loved this round-up! I also feel the same about the election 🥲 Relief but also… continued stress that really it wasn’t as simple as voting Carney in… now he has to actually follow through. Plus the NDP losing official party status hurts deeper than I expected alongside the sheer number of votes for the conservatives… Everyone’s saying it feels like a wholehearted rejection of Maga-style politics but somehow the numbers aren’t saying that to me… sigh. Fingers crossed Carney doesn’t disappoint.
seeing several ridings flip from NDP to conservative, and conservatives place *above* NDP
but below the liberals in many historically progressive ridings certainly does not feel like a wholesale rejection of conservative isolationism! but still, a moment of relief.
Absolutely 😭 Although I know some of the ridings near me vote split HARD between NDP/Lib ultimately meaning the disliked Con won. Frustrating to say the least haha. They were previously safe NDP districts.
> I’m very interested in having my characters not know things.
!! love this
i think you'd like stag dance! it hits the 'when the short story is better than a novel would be' balance just right
✍️ i'm having a Laurel Read This Q2
I have to restack this post because it includes The Last Samurai and those are the rules! I skipped Vol II because I still need to read that but I loved comparing our thoughts on Vol I. It's interesting how she describes their love and romance... but I still suspect this is gonna be the world's quietest divorce plot. Cheers!
oh, i definitely agree with you on that. not feeling confident that microscopic love will last something this big!
Deeply spooky we must be connected because I just ordered Invisible Man!!!!!! Everyone reading Vol 1 and 2 is making me feel like I am at school but in the best way. I echo your review of Vol 2 that tonally, it feels same but also wildly different. My estimation is that Balle is using this series to comment on humanity's relationship to existence, specifically consumption of life (grossly vague from me but maybe you'll get what I mean?) I think I say something in my forthcoming review along the lines of I am deeply unnerved for Tara's sake that this is a 7 part series lmao - but the ending of vol 2 makes me VERY intrigued to see where it goes next.
i'm about 100 pages into invisible man and it is incredible and incredibly intense. one of those books with page-length paragraphs that are a rollercoaster ride to read.
100% in line with your reading- relatedly, one of the most striking scenes to me in book 2 was the moment when she goes to a grocery store (~p 104) and describes at length the packaging and the seasonality of the produce, how easy it is to get completely out of season food packaged neatly in plastic in London in November. I'm avoiding reading too much about the later books, but lining up the (amazing) cover designs realllllly implies that some unnerving change will happen.