u/Brent_Goose

My baby is three months old, so I try to read when she's sleeping rather than mindlessly scroll on my phone. It does mean a lot of starting and stopping in the middle of pages!

Drive Your Plow Over the Bones of the Dead - this got a lot of attention back when Tokarczuk won the Nobel; despite not being her most-acclaimed work out was published in English that same year so ended up being the book English-speakers are most likely to have encountered. It was at that time I put it on my TBR then just never got round to it until I finally bit the bullet.

I liked it. I think selling it as a murder mystery is doing it a disservice and is why it gets a lackluster reception from a lot of people. I found it to be an interesting character study and examination of local, small-town politics. I had a lot of personal feelings towards the narrator, Janina - like her I'm a vegetarian and anti-hunting, and her eccentricities reminded me of a girlfriend I had (many) years ago. I don't usually draw from my own life experiences when deciding if I like a fictional work, but having seen criticism from people about neither liking the narrator nor finding her engaging, I think being able to relate to her helped.

Though the Bodies Fall - A debut novel, and very good despite some weaker parts. It details the life of a middle-aged Micheál who lives alone in the family cottage that's situated at a popular suicide spot. He's taken it upon himself to inherit the duty of his now-deceased parents to try and save those who pass the house on their way to the cliffs.

The narration jumps around time periods and we piece together Micheál's story out-of-sync. It's a very well-done exploration of grief, family bitterness, PTSD and obligation. If anyone ever needed to be told "you can't set yourself on fire to keep somebody else warm" it's Micheál, but is it that easy when it's keeping someone else alive rather than just warm?

I really enjoy stories where the landscape functions as a character in and of itself, and the headland is a constant presence, even in Micheál's university years away from the town. My only issue is O'Regan seems to lack confidence in either himself or his reader, and on several occasions has another character explain the symbolism or parallel the reader has just been presented with.

The Land in Winter - Nominated for the Booker I thought it would be interesting - two couples in the 60s stuck during the Big Freeze of 63. What it was instead was just a bunch of boring people going to work and then maybe each other's houses. It's focused on the characters rather than plot, but when the characters are this dull who cares? The most exciting thing happens at about two-thirds of the way through, when something is revealed, and then... it's barely touched again. To be uncharitable, I think Miller didn't know how to write anything introspective in the light of the revelation so just didn't.

I didn't like it.

The Vicar of Wakefield - Very popular when it was published in the 18th Century, I chose to read this because of a hobby of mine. One of the relics found of the lost Franklin Expedition was a copy of this. Out of my interest in all things Franklin, I read it.

It's rather fun and predictable. The ending is very contrived and could be seen from a mile off, but honestly there's something endearing about it.

Wrong Norma - A collection of primarily prose poetry by Anne Carson. Carson is a master of playing with words and using them to present an experience outside of the standard reading a narrative. She's said before during a live reading that she doesn't want to give people endings or answers to take away with them, rather she'd prefer them to be in the experience and then let it go away. I think that's a good way to approach Wrong Norma - if you go in wanting resolution and answers, you're going to leave disappointed. Better to take your time to enjoy each word, line, paragraph and/or stanza as it builds and then leave it behind.