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Posted on August 11, 2022August 11, 2022

Lessons in Chemistry by Bonnie Garmus. ***Review aka my random thoughts*** I had read a

Lessons in Chemistry by Bonnie Garmus.
***Review aka my random thoughts***

I had read a lot about this book. It's a debut and has smashed all types of records in terms of sales and readership and its author is a former and very experienced copywriter so you'd be hoping that it'd be written well.
It is written very well. It zips along nicely with some excellent characters and a neatly woven plot.

 This is a fun story about our main character, Elizabeth Zott. She is a chemist who hosts a cooking show because it's the early 1960s and sexism, sexual assault, scientific theft and discrimination all prevent her from working as the actual scientist she craves to be. But when she becomes utterly famous on her TV show, "Supper At Six," things start to get interesting.

I read this book quickly and I read it over the holidays in France. It's a perfect holiday read, whatever that means. To me it means that it's easy to pick up wherever you are.

I loved Elizabeth though she does come across very unlikeable. I admire her not giving a sh€ # about other people's opinions but I also found it implausible that a woman in that time would push things as hard as she had. I found other really serious issues like rape and sexual assault were not given enough space in the writing in terms of how this impacted on Elizabeth. It was dealt with in a very sparkly let's move on kinda way. Come on, gals, toughen up! 😬

This will absolutely be a film or a TV series and it's worth reading for the realisation you might have that things have changed ever so slightly for females and the world of seemingly masculine careers like science.

A fun book club read. I'd be happy to have written this type of plot and characterisation.



Posted on August 3, 2022August 11, 2022

Trespasses by Louise Kennedy. *Review* This book has been on my radar but the lovely


Trespasses by Louise Kennedy. *Review*
This book has been on my radar but the lovely bookworm @littlecassreads prompted me to buy it when I was n Belfast in the gorgeous bookshop @noalibispress.
This book is not perfect.
It's set in Belfast during the troubles. A love story with a teacher and solicitor as  the star crossed.
The attention to detail in terms of the backdrop of Northern Ireland is impeccable. The characters are absolutely perfectly written and rendered. Louise' dialogue is exceptional. It's so natural and hilarious!
As a teacher, the main character, who is a teacher, is so plausible and realistic. I wonder was Louise a teacher in another life, that is how genuine the school abd the teachers were written.
The bad guys, the bad characters in this story were all multi dimensional, neither black nor white but a spectrum that is the human race.
The drama, the way the story kept going till the perfectly apt ending, left me feeling quite in awe of the skill of this novel. Plot and character is so hard and it's where a story and a novel can lose its way very easily if these are not good.
The ending is really sad, so well done, predictable to me but still it felt satisfying as a reader.
The imperfections of this book were minor. It started with a lot of telling and no showing. In many areas, paragraphs leapt out of nowhere with no connection to the last. I surprised an careful reading team or editor didn't get these.
But even mentioning these feel petty. The remainder of the work, the characters and their plausibility and charisma, the setting, the history, the plot and the importance of the evocation of the pain this awful time in Northern Ireland was is so, so well done.
I'm ordering her short story collection off the back of this. Bow down to Louise Kennedy and huge kudos to her.

Posted on July 27, 2022August 11, 2022

Sea State by Tabitha Lasley. This is a memoir about a former journalist, who after


Sea State by Tabitha Lasley.
This is a memoir about a former journalist, who after having her laptop (and her novel in progress) stolen and a suffering a bad breakup, decides to leave her job writing for a magazine to write that book.
She wants to write a book about oil rig workers in the North Sea and heads to Aberdeen to interview hundreds of those workers. Her initial question is what happens to men when women are not around? She interviews 103 different men in all types of bars, clubs and settings and it gets rough and ready.
The first man she interviews is a guy called Caden. He's married and they start an affair.
Her writing is pitch perfect and it's a unique voice we have here. She evokes the city of Aberdeen so well, a place where it seems to rain or snow all the time.
Caden becomes a study of what it means to really be an oil rig worker, its uber and toxic masculinity is clear.
This started off quick then went very slow but once I started to see the signs of Caden and how they the reveal of the plot and indeed the overarching theme of the book, I could not put the book down!

The concept is fresh as is the writing and it does answer the initial question of what happens to men when there are no women around?

The whole subject of oil rigs and the oil corporations was unknown to me. That exploration in itself is brilliant reading.

I just hope Caden( not real name) reads the book. I'll say no more.

I've been quite obsessed with Tabitha Lasley since then. Googling photos of her and then trying to see if I could get one of her and Caden for though she writes him well, I'd still love to see what he looks like.

I hope Tabitha is happy or happier and that she has met someone who will realise what a gem she is and what a talented writer she is. 

I'd really recommend this book if you fancy something different but extremely readable. It will leave you thinking, for sure.

***** review

Posted on July 6, 2022July 6, 2022

The Fell by Sarah Moss. Apocalypse isn’t what it used to be these days.. And


The Fell by Sarah Moss.

Apocalypse isn’t what it used to be these days.. And the fact that“humanity’s ending appears to be slow, lacking in cliffhangers or indeed any satisfactory narrative shape; characterized, for the lucky, by the gradual vindication of accumulating dread.”
The Fell is written from the perspectives of four characters during 2020, Covid-19 lockdown and pandemic. I read this in two sittings. I kept thinking about it and the characters. The writing is quite rambling but beautifully done and comes out in the character's mind, a sort of free consciousness. If you don't like this or need punctuation marks then this book may not appeal to you!
I thoroughly enjoyed this one. A nice, short read that responds to a very bad and sad time in our world.


--

Rozz Lewis

Posted on May 14, 2022May 22, 2022

No one belongs here more than you. Stories by Miranda July.


No one belongs here more than you. Stories by Miranda July.

Posted on December 27, 2021May 22, 2022

Wunderland by Caitriona Lally. I love when you get a gift of a book that


Wunderland by Caitriona Lally.
I love when you get a gift of a book that you maybe would not have picked up yourself. Thank you to @hamsterfox, fellow book-nerd and very fast reader too.
I've heard of Caitriona Lally, of course. She's won some pretty big writing prizes and Wunderland is her 2nd novel.
I really really liked many things about this book.
I admired Caitriona's ability to tell a unique, often untold and not understood story of depression, mental lllness and suicide. Yes, it's a hard read but I read it quickly.
The story centres around a brother and sister. The brother has been effectively banished by his family to Hamburg and his sister stays with him for 6 days. Roy, the brother is a cleaner in a Wunderland museum, a museum of miniature lands and people. Gert, the sister is running away from her married life, her children and her husband who suffers from depression and has attempted suicide many times.
Gert and Roy rub off each other in bad ways. They annoy each other. At times they dislike each other.
Roy is also odd, different, strange. He is building his own miniature world in his bedroom which culminates in a wonderfully paced ending. And the ending is great. It dangles a small bit of hope yet it reminds us we can never run away from what's in our own heads. What's in the head needs to be dealt with first.
As I said I did really like this. Caitriona writes inner thoughts superbly. At times I thought the inner thoughts could have been pulled back a bit and I would have liked to see why Roy and Gert were so wounded. Their parents were quite normal. But maybe that's the point.
@newislandBooks

Posted on October 23, 2021May 22, 2022

I think that books you read on a holiday become very special. A book that


I think that books you read on a holiday become very special. A book that is average can be enhanced by a holiday vibe. And prosecco. And a rooftop view of the Parthenon in Athens but it sounds like I'm boasting a bit now.

However, Piranesi by Susanna Clarke needs no enhancing. I'm finding it riveting and mind bending. Oh and easy to read.

Posted on September 4, 2021May 22, 2022

Me and the big house. The festival of writing and ideas runs, in pre pandemic


Me and the big house.
The festival of writing and ideas runs, in pre pandemic times, every June.

We have been attending it for ten years now. Every year!

This year the 2021 managed to go in August.

It was much smaller in terms of attendees but the original small festival feel was back in force with the artists, writers, musicians and speakers all mingling on the lawn.

My best talk was John Banville who seemed to be in jovial form.
I'd still prefer it to run in June though as August is birthday city in our family in August but either way we thoroughly enjoyed it and soaked up the ideas and debated /argued as normal after the talks.
Thank you @writingandideas

Posted on April 26, 2021May 22, 2022

Leonard and Hungry Paul by Ronan Hession Leonard and Hungry Paul is Dublin’s One City,


Leonard and Hungry Paul by Ronan Hession

Leonard and Hungry Paul is Dublin’s One City, one book for 2021. It has been recommended to me by two friends. They recommended it to me with such happiness and excitement that I had to get started.

It is a very quiet book about two unremarkable men with two unremarkable lives. Leonard’s mother passes away on the first page. Nothing much happens to Hungry Paul on the first page. I read the book quickly, really savouring its low key pace and most of its characters. I think a little bit more direction could have been given to Hungry Paul’s sister, Grace for she does represent a conventional type of Irish woman who is mad to get married. However she is described as being unique, quirky and different at many points by the author but I just didn’t see that.

The dialogue dragged along slightly as it seemed like it was being replicated from real conversations people have. On occasion, I did not care what the characters were talking about as it seemed like normal life. Thereby it lacked tension, drama and emotion at times though in others it sang of these things.

Leonard and Hungry Paul is very funny. It takes a lot to make me laugh while I am reading but I did here. There were many beautiful pieces of writing throughout and many beautiful quotables that would look wondrous in a frame. I thought about this book with a real fuzzy feeling after reading it but I do think I wouldn’t be keen to read a similar type of quiet, uneventful type book again as if this was merely replicated it could become tedious as a style. Even though it was set in Ireland, I thought it smacked of a British setting aka Arian Mole territory. I am not sure if these type of folk exist very much in Ireland or maybe I just don’t bump into them.

Hession’s writing is witty yet can be affecting within two sentences of his prose. His observations of life and the human condition are spot on and I loved the whole meditation theme throughout but I wonder do we want our fiction to be unremarkable, mainstream and normal humdrum? I will leave that to you. It’s a taste thing.

Leonard and Hungry Paul by Ronan Hession is published by Blue moose

Posted on March 27, 2021May 22, 2022

A Crooked Tree by Una Mannion. I have always admired Una's short fiction so I


A Crooked Tree by Una Mannion.

I have always admired Una's short fiction so I was excited to get my hands on her debut novel.
It doesn't disappoint though it's a slow, slow start and it remains slow but by the time you get to end, you will enjoy that relaxed pace as it suits the story and the characters.

Libby is out for a drive at night with her siblings. Her mother is driving. We feel the tension but when Ellen, Libby's younger sister frustrates her frazzled mum, her mum basically dumps Ellen on the roadside and speeds off.
 
The story rocks on from this one awful decision and we learn about Libby and her connection with her father who has passed away.

This novel, set in an 80s rural Philadelphia, has all the feels of a  Goonies movie or an episode of Stranger Things. Una's writing never falters but I found the descriptions of nature and trees a little bit lengthy at times. It's clear she revels in writing about nature.

Overal, I found it to be a mesmerising read. Una's writing is carefully placed throughout and her plotting is excellent.

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My Goodreads

Rozz's books

Tender
3 of 5 stars
Tender
by Belinda McKeon
Davy Byrnes Stories 2014
4 of 5 stars
Davy Byrnes Stories 2014
by Sara Baume
Foster
5 of 5 stars
Foster
by Claire Keegan
Superb, perfect short story telling from the genius of the form.
Everything Ravaged, Everything Burned
4 of 5 stars
Everything Ravaged, Everything Burned
by Wells Tower
hilarious and dark and funked up!
The Good House
1 of 5 stars
The Good House
by Ann Leary

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My Goodreads

Rozz’s books

Tender
3 of 5 stars
Tender
by Belinda McKeon

Davy Byrnes Stories 2014
4 of 5 stars
Davy Byrnes Stories 2014
by Sara Baume

Foster
5 of 5 stars
Foster
by Claire Keegan
Superb, perfect short story telling from the genius of the form.

Everything Ravaged, Everything Burned
4 of 5 stars
Everything Ravaged, Everything Burned
by Wells Tower
hilarious and dark and funked up!

The Good House
1 of 5 stars
The Good House
by Ann Leary




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