Bronwyn

This was really charming and simple. Not much happens but it doesn't matter. It's more about place and time and people. There is the slight excitement at the end with the grave site, but that's about it. Really beautiful.

Overall this was very good, just not quite what it set out to be I think. It's too detailed in some areas and too thin in others. I'm not entirely sure why these four people were picked though. Eliot makes sense, but all I can figure it Goldstein just liked the other three enough that he wanted to include them. Still, this was interesting and I'm glad I read it. I think I'd recommend Constellation of Genius by Kevin Jackson over this if someone was interested in 1922.

This was really enjoyable. It's very much of the British women's books that I like, plus the “sliding doors” aspect which I also really like. Claudia is really interesting and I loved seeing the similarities and differences in the different versions of her. I'm glad to have read this and I'm glad the British Library is working to put these books back into circulation.

This was so simple and well done. I wasn't always quite sure what was going on, what Bridget's deal was. It was more Hen's story as told by Bridge and once I realized that it was easier to get on with. The title is perfect; how many of us have these kinds of phantoms, parents, grandparents, whomever. The end was really well done and I got a bit choked up. There's quite a bit of Hen in my grandmother I think, and reading about her in those moments was a lot.

I waffled between four and five stars, but I think five is appropriate. It's a beautifully told story about the difficulties of family, of mothers and daughters. It can be hard to read, but it's so worth it if you do.

Galen read this whole thing to us! Feb 28-Mar 8, 2023.

He says it was very good and exciting. I'm so glad he's found something that got him into reading finally; before it was just something he had to do, this he wanted to read.

This was really interesting. It's really just a bunch of scenes in our narrator's life in this “dystopian” England, rather than a cohesive story. There's an uncomfortable undercurrent to the whole, but hope as well.

We don't really know our narrator, don't know if they're a man or a woman, but it doesn't ultimately matter, but we know they write and love books and their friends. The friends are artists of various sorts. And who They are isn't clear either. They want conformity and don't want all the art. But who and why, we don't know.

I wish we had a bit more context for what was going on - it was a little too sparse in some ways - but there's something interesting in being able to come up with your own ideas about what's going on here. For such a sparse book there's a lot to consider. (The writing is gorgeous, too, which helps.)

Because of the way I read this (audiobook along with the text) I got a foreword by Carmen Maria Machado and an afterword by Lucy Scholes. There's some overlap in what they talk about, but both have insights the other doesn't mention. You can't go wrong with either version I think. I'm so glad McNally Editions is publishing “lost” books like this.

I didn't always get on with Mortimer's writing style, but overall I think I liked this? I'm glad to have read it at any rate. Some of the chapters or Ruth's internal monologues felt a bit odd to me. But the rest of it is well done. It's definitely the abortion novel, isn't it? And for that I do think it's good it's back in print, especially now that we're back (in some states) to these days and circumstances.

I feel like if I just put this quote from the introduction it'll pretty well suffice: “Comyns wants to catch her readers off guard, and so charming daffiness runs right alongside frank and understated evocations of what it was like to be young, female, and crushingly poor.”

Seriously though, this book is so charming and easy to read, but what you're reading about is just heartbreaking. I loved Sophia even when she's being young and stupid. The book is sort of framed as she's telling her story to a friend, and you really feel like that friend. I loved this. I own one other Comyns, but I'll definitely be looking out for more of her. She's fabulous.

Galen read this at the library (February 23, 2023) and loved it. I loved listening to him read. Another mom there was super impressed and that he's only in kindergarten. ❤️

Galen read: 3/20-4/10/23

“I liked meeting Napoleon and everybody.” He also said it's 1400 stars and I had to remind him it's only out of five. This is the book he picked at the book fair that started us on the Bad Food journey. :)

Overall I really enjoyed this! I knew of most of the people (sorry to Elsa, Alberto, and Kenneth) but really enjoyed these brief biographies. Some people were given more time than others, but it was all interesting and a of jumping off point if you want to learn about them. I need to read more of these men and women, though!

Man this was so dense and interesting. I feel like it's something to come back to though, so you can really get it all. Edwards did a lot of research and it shows (helps to be the current Detection Club President :) ). This is meticulous and so well done.

I know a decent amount about Christie, and some about Sayers. Otherwise what I know is mainly from the Shedunnit podcast (highly recommend!), so this was a really great way to learn about these authors. I need to get on reading some of these lesser known (to me at least) authors. (Thank goodness for the British Library reissuing so many!)

Also! I didn't know Anthony Berkeley and E. M. Delafield were so close! Or that Evelyn Waugh wrote a biography of Ronald Knox (though I may have read that years ago when I was reading a lot about Waugh, but I wouldn't've known who Knox was then). There's just so much in this!

(I used the audiobook while waiting in the school line, and overall it was good, but there were weird pauses after some sentences that were distracting.)

Will give this another try some other time. It's not just working for me right now and there are people waiting for it from the library.

Overall this was really interesting! I don't know where I first heard of The Souls - maybe a book about Sargent, or the BYTs and the Coterie - but I'm glad I finally found a copy of this and read it. I definitely got bogged down in all the political stuff, but the early years and then the WWI parts were really interesting.

You really can't go wrong with Elizabeth Taylor. This was so good. Almost nothing ended how I wanted, but that's life isn't it? Everyone felt very real, though some of the dialog was a bit much sometimes. I really felt like I knew this place and people. I liked that it was the old part of town, and so kept the amount of people down but didn't feel forced. Just a lovely book (plus some deception... but cest la vie).

This was interesting. More a series of scenes all centered around Louki. I really like the feeling of the book, but it was a bit slight for me.

I heard of this in Monster, She Wrote and was intrigued. It was only $1 on kindle so here we are.

I think the tagline comparing this to The Hunger Games and The Man in the High Castle does it a disservice. There're only vague similarities between this and either of those two. There is an alternate dimension or time travel; there is a sort of competition that the upper classes run, but it's only briefly shown and is nothing like THG.

This is a really interesting earlyish fantasy/scifi. It's a bit dated in places, but the concept is really interesting. I wanted more of Ulithia than we got, but the structure of 2118's Philadelphia was pretty well done.

(I don't usually picture characters as anyone specific, but I pictured Trenmore as Cleary from The Knick.)

I'm glad I read this. It is definitely worth the dollar.

Man, I love everything about this book.

There's a line in Parrott's son's afterword that I misread - well not misread, but mistook what he meant - that people drink in Ex-Wife. He meant literally (there's so much drinking), but I mean it in that I just drank this in. It reads so easy and is so real. I loved watching Pat grow over the course of the book. Her loves and losses are just so well done.

Pat's story (and apparently a lot of Ursula's) reminded me of bits of Our Spoons Came From Woolworths, but then it turns into something else. It's like The Best of Everything in the nightlife and friendships. Add in some of the feel of Gatsby.

I figured I'd like this since it ticks off so many of my boxes, but man did I love it. And maybe I'm just in an emotional state, but the second to last chapter had me tearing up. It's all so good.

This was pretty good! I read this before in probably middle school, so didn't remember anything. I think I confused it with They Came To Baghdad, too, because I was thinking it was middle eastern, not African. Anyhow.

This was a fun story. Very twisty and lots of happening to be in the right place at the right time. Anne is a fun character to be in the head of.

There's, of course, some sexism and racism since it's from 1924 and a lot takes place in South Africa, Botswana, and Rhodesia (they go to Rhodes' grave...). But it's not terrible all things considered.

This was so bizarre but really enjoyable. Marian is a fun narrator; I loved how everything that happens in the book just... is. It's kind of hard to sum up, but it's really great. The afterword by Tokarczuk is really good too. I think I'll need to read this a couple times to really love it, but I think I definitely could. (This time I also used the audiobook, and Sian Philips' narration is really good! I knew I loved her.)

This was really sweet. I hope as G starts school, books like this will help some.

Galen read: August 13, 2022.

Another that was vaguely familiar, so I was able to figure it out. But really well done, interesting characters, good mystery, just enough confusion.

Really well done. I didn't see that coming at all.

Not my favorite. I didn't really like the narrator and the resolution was just fine. The mystery was lacking a bit. Miss Marple didn't even show up till two thirds of the way through and was very peripheral at that.

Won through Goodreads.[b:Lost States: True Stories of Texlahoma, Transylvania, and Other States That Never Made it 7655172 Lost States True Stories of Texlahoma, Transylvania, and Other States That Never Made it Michael J. Trinklein http://photo.goodreads.com/books/1275701905s/7655172.jpg 10225383] is a book that's right up my alley. I love history and geography and this book combines both of them. :) The book gave lots of really great information about why different states didn't make it. Most were just little pipe dreams, some actually came very close to statehood, and others are other countries that might've become territories if not states. I was hoping for a bit more in depth information (more along the lines of [b:How the States Got Their Shapes 3090529 How the States Got Their Shapes Mark Stein http://photo.goodreads.com/books/1267769279s/3090529.jpg 3121631]), but since Trinklein says in the introduction that he's not going to give a lot of information on each state, I can't really complain it. The book has definitely done what Trinklein says he hopes it would, it's made me want to learn more about some of these states and their failure or relative success. The book's very easy to read and very enjoyable. I highly recommend it to anyone at all interested in the forming of the US. :)