Review: Love Warrior

Love Warrior by Glennon Doyle Melton
My rating: 5 of 5 stars

I love love love love loved this book. I am a hug fan of Melton's and was so excited to hear her speak at the Massachusetts Women's Conference just weeks after reading this. She is a recovering addict who has generously shared her ongoing life story through her blog and several memoirs. I did not love her first book - finding it a bit repetitive from her blog, but this one was really good. I find her as a person (and her books) to be so honest and revealing and true, while also being rooted in her faith. She refers to Anne Lamott (whom I've also been reading) as her patron saint, and I love that and think she is like my generation's Anne.

In this book, Melton covers the breakdown of her marriage. But she starts with her wedding day and chronicles pieces of her story I had not heard about or read before. She's funny, honest, neurotic, and direct.

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Review: The Summer Before the War

The Summer Before the War by Helen Simonson
My rating: 4 of 5 stars

I truly loved Major Pettigrew's Last Stand so I was excited to read this by the same author. It wasn't quite as ... zippy? ... as Major P., but I enjoyed it. It is about a small English town right before WWI breaks out. A young woman arrives to become the local school's Latin teacher, and her arrival is just one of several catalysts for change and politics in the town. This book had a great sense of time and place, and the frustrations of British manners. There were juicy characters, interminable committee meetings, and enough plot twists to keep me busy. While a little long in places, it more than made of for it with its charm. Were you in an intergenerational book club, this would be a delightful choice.

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Review: Mr. Penumbra's 24-Hour Bookstore

Mr. Penumbra's 24-Hour Bookstore by Robin Sloan
My rating: 4 of 5 stars

I really enjoyed this book. It was unlike anything I've read lately (although not altogether different in theme from The Circle), and yet somewhat reminiscent of The Thirteenth Tale or even The Da Vinci Code. Yet smarter than all three of them.

It was a mystery, sort of, but also a fable. It followed a young man who, victimized by the internet economy, takes a job in a bookstore. However, the bookstore turns out to be an outpost of a secret society, and he begins to unravel the story of, and puzzles within, the group. It's a story about the tension between old and new, progress and history, and machine learning vs human ingenuity. Truly a book for our time, and one I will remember for a while.

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Review: Modern Lovers

Modern Lovers by Emma Straub
My rating: 4 of 5 stars

I liked this book well enough - an easy read but well-written and well-developed. It is the story of several friends who had been in a band in college. One woman breaks out into general fame, then dies young. Years later, a movie is produced about her, and the rest of the band, now "grownups" with families, problems, and marriages, need to consent to their music and likenesses being used. I liked the characters and the neighborhood they lived in, and I appreciated how well the plotting was done.

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Review: Shrill: Notes from a Loud Woman

Shrill: Notes from a Loud Woman by Lindy West
My rating: 4 of 5 stars

A new friend (Liz) recommended this to me. It's a memoir of sorts - or at least a meditation on society told through one women's point of view. West is a comedian, one who is physically and personality-wise large. She writes about how women are expected to be neither of those things, and how society treats them (us). I found the first few chapters difficult to relate to, as she references several characters and people I didn't really know. However, as she continues on, she makes some very astute and sadly unfortunate observations about how we treat overweight people and how we treat women who speak their minds.

The final section of the book was a retelling of a story I had heard on This American Life, of her finding and confronting an Internet troll who was abusing her online. No less shocking in print, it's a remarkable story of anger, hurt, and reconciliation - sort of. Overall, a really interesting read as a woman in today's world.

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Review: The Girls

The Girls by Emma Cline
My rating: 3 of 5 stars

This was one of the "it" books this summer, but I didn't love it. It was memorable, and well-written, but it left me feeling - icky? Maybe that is a good thing, and a testament to the book's accomplishing its goal. The story follows a young woman whose rocky adolescence leads her to a cult. While she is taken under the wing of the cult's leader as well as a powerful ally of is, she somewhat remains on the outside, still connected to her family and comfortable way of life. She narrowly misses being involved in a violent crime, and that - the crime, as well as her lack of participation - defines the rest of her life.

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