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Category: Fiction

Fight Night by Miriam Toews

Fight Night by Miriam Toews

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Miriam Toews is one of my favourite writers whose books I always look forward to reading. She is a Canadian author and many of her novels focus on Mennonites, as Toews herself was raised in a Mennonite community in Manitoba. Fundamentalist Mennonites do not come across very well in Toews’ novels. It seems like a very oppressive belief system that focuses too much on sin and damnation, rather than the teaches of Jesus, who said that God’s greatest commandment is to love God and to love each other. Although, I do not believe this is unique to Mennonites. Fight Night is not set within a Mennonite community, like Toews’ A Complicated Kindness (a great book that still lingers in my mind many years after I read it), Irma Voth and Women Talking (which is based on the disgusting real life events of women in a Mennonite community being drugged at night and waking up to find that they have been sexually assaulted, and then gaslighted by the men of their community who said that they must be imagining things). The characters in Fight Night no longer live in a Mennonite community, but their experiences within the community still inform their lives.

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The Evening and the Morning by Ken Follett

The Evening and the Morning by Ken Follett

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Have I mentioned that I like historical fiction? I really, really like historical fiction. Ken Follett can be relied on to write some pretty good historical fiction novels, whether it is the Kingsbridge series or the Century Trilogy. The Evening and the Morning is part of the Kingsbridge series, which started with The Pillars of the Earth. The Pillars of the Earth is set in twelfth-century England in a town called Kingsbridge. It is about a prior who wants to build the greatest cathedral the world has ever known, so yes, religion plays an important role in the Kingsbridge novels. There are two sequels to The Pillars of the Earth: the first one is called World Without End and it is also set in Kingsbridge but at the beginning of the fourteenth century. Some of the characters in World Without End are descendants of the characters in The Pillars of the Earth. The second sequel is called A Column of Fire and is set in the sixteenth century. The Evening and the Morning is the prequel to The Pillars of the Earth. It is set at the beginning of the eleventh century and is about how the town of Kingsbridge was founded. These novels could each be read on their own or in any order, but I do highly recommend you read all of them if you like historical fiction.

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The Dutch House by Ann Patchett

The Dutch House by Ann Patchett

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I love me some family drama. I am absolutely fascinated by family dynamics, and the more the dysfunctional the dynamics, the better (do not worry, I prefer to read about fictional dysfunctional families and not focus on real dysfunctional families). I should have devoured The Dutch House and enjoyed every minute of it. And I did devour it; I was absolutely engrossed by it. But did I enjoy it? It is supposed to be a heartwarming family saga about making peace with the past and learning forgiveness, but after expanding my reading horizons this year and learning more about the experiences of Black and Indigenous people, I cannot say that I really enjoyed reading The Dutch House because its message gets diluted by the reek of white privilege.

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Ace of Spades by Faridah Àbíké-Íyímídé

Ace of Spades by Faridah Àbíké-Íyímídé

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This is Harmony’s last appearance on my blog. She was the best furry reading companion I could have ever hoped for and she will forever be missed.

Ace of Spades is Faridah Àbíké-Íyímídé’s debut novel. Her inspiration for the novel came from the TV show Gossip Girl (which I have never watched) and the Jordan Peele movie Get Out (which I have watched). The novel is about two Black teens, Devon Richards and Chiamaka Adebayo, who are the only Black students at the private school that they attend, and who become the targets of anonymous text messages sent to the entire student body by someone called “Aces” who is exposing secrets about them that threatens to ruin their lives. If you have seen Get Out, you will have some idea of who “Aces” is and why they are targeting Devon and Chiamaka, but that does not make Ace of Spades any less thrilling to read.

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Jonny Appleseed by Joshua Whitehead

Jonny Appleseed by Joshua Whitehead

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Jonny Appleseed is the first novel by Two-Spirit/Indigenous Queer writer Joshua Whitehead. Whitehead’s protagonist, Jonny, is also Two-Spirit/Indigenous Queer, and the novel is about Jonny ruminating on his upbringing on “the rez”. Jonny Appleseed is an introspective novel; if you prefer novels that are plot-focused, then you will probably not like it. However, if you enjoy immersing yourself in other people’s lives and experiences, then I think you should definitely give Jonny Appleseed a read.

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The Archive of the Forgotten by A. J. Hackwith

The Archive of the Forgotten by A. J. Hackwith

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The Archive of the Forgotten is book two in the Hell’s Library trilogy. WARNING: if you have not read The Library of the Unwritten (book one) yet, do not read any further. I know I was not very enthusiastic in my review of The Library of the Unwritten, but I think it would be worth reading just so you can get to The Archive of the Forgotten.

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The Seven Husbands of Evelyn Hugo by Taylor Jenkins Reid

The Seven Husbands of Evelyn Hugo by Taylor Jenkins Reid

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I have been hearing a lot about Taylor Jenkins Reid in the last couple of years. People really seem to like her novels, so I decided it was about time I read one. I was going to read Daisy Jones & the Six, but then I heard about The Seven Husbands of Evelyn Hugo and the plot sounded more like it was up my alley. Based on this novel, I can understand why her novels are so popular. The story certainly has a tabloid quality that people like to devour, and she practically bludgeons the reader over the head with foreshadowing that will keep you reading instead of doing the prudent thing and going to bed at a decent hour. The Seven Husbands of Evelyn Hugo is certainly an entertaining read, but am I blown away by it? No, not really. I was expecting it to be more original, more profound than it actually is.

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The Bone Code by Kathy Reichs

The Bone Code by Kathy Reichs

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I have read every single Temperance Brennan novel written by Kathy Reichs, and I own most of them. I enjoy reading them; each novel ends up involving multiple, interesting mysteries and they are fast paced. Each chapter ends on a cliff-hanger to keep the momentum going, meaning I stay up way too late reading because it is hard to put these novels down. The character of Temperance Brennan has a dogged determination I cannot help but admire, and she is quick witted.

The Bone Code started out good; I was enjoying it as much as I have ever enjoyed a Temperance Brennan novel. Temperance is asked by a coroner in Charleston to examine two decomposing bodies found in a medical waste container that washed ashore after a hurricane. The bodies are wrapped in plastic sheeting and bound with electrical wire. This is similar to a case that Temperance was involved with 15 years earlier in Montreal. How likely is it that she would end up investigating in two similar cases in two different countries, and that the victims from both cases are related? Not likely, but buckle in for a wild ride and just go with it.

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Catherine House by Elisabeth Thomas

Catherine House by Elisabeth Thomas

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You are either going to really like Catherine House or be like me and wonder, WTF did I just read?? Catherine House is a strange, fever dream of a novel with no clear-cut resolution. I am not even sure that I fully understand what was going on in the novel and what the purpose of the novel is.

In the novel, Catherine House is a college located deep in the Pennsylvania woods with an unusual liberal arts curriculum that somehow has produced some of the world’s best minds as its graduates, such as inventors, prize-winning scientists, Supreme Court justices and at least two presidents. The college is best known for its mysterious “new materials concentration” and the study of “plasm”. The students that attend Catherine House get free tuition and room and board, but the catch is that they must give Catherine House three years of their lives completely removed from the outside world. During these three years, they cannot contact their family and friends, they cannot watch television to keep up with the news and they cannot bring any personal possessions, including clothing, with them (the novel is set in the 1990s, but if it were set in the present, they definitely would not be allowed smart phones either).

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The Guest List by Lucy Foley

The Guest List by Lucy Foley

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I read Lucy Foley’s last novel, The Hunting Party, and found it just difficult enough to figure out that I decided I would read whatever she publishes next. The Guest List is a huge disappointment. It is a mystery thriller that takes place the day before and the day of a wedding on a remote Irish island. It sounds interesting in theory, but in practice the characters, main and supporting, are all clichés and it does not take a lot of effort to figure out who the murder victim is, how all the suspects’ motives connect to the murder victim, and who the killer is. There are no surprises at all in this novel. The setting, the remote Irish island with a bog that is probably full of bodies and rumored to be haunted, is the most interesting part of the novel, but too bad it is underutilized; it is the perfect setting for a supernatural thriller. In any event, it would not take you very long to read The Guest List, but I do not suggest wasting your time on it.