Where'd You Go, Bernadette? by Maria Semple

A review &

the difference

between

audiobooks &

e-books
(and probably paper & ink books, too)

 In 2012, shortly after Where'd You Go, Bernadette was published, I'd listened to the audiobook version. My husband was still working full-time. I was still doing a lot of driving back and forth between home and where my daughter was attending college about an hour and a half away. I still had lots of alone time in the car to listen to whatever audio book I cared to listen to.

(Prior to moving to Florida in 2010, I spent lots and lots of time in the car alone, giving me plenty of time to listen to audiobooks. I think that's how I managed to complete an average of more than 2 books a week in 2009.)

A few weeks ago, I realized that I still had the Where'd You Go, Bernadette audiobook on the second generation iPod that lives in my car. This is the May book for my community book club so I started to listen. It worked fine when I was in the car alone. Not so much so when my husband was in the car. Remember, he's not a reader. And it meant I had to catch him up to the point of the story before I could start listening. I ended up taking the e-book out of the library and finished up the book that way.

I loved Where'd You Go, Bernadette? when I listened to it 4 years ago. I really liked it a lot when I read it traditionally this second time. (You might also remember that I don't usually like to reread. In this case I reread because I remembered liking some of the quirkiness of the characters - but couldn't remember the exact quirky traits. I also remembered that the book did divulge where Bernadette had gone and I couldn't remember that!)

Where'd You Go, Bernadette? is a book that consists of narratives told by Bernadette's daughter, Bee. It's also a bit of an epistolary novel as it includes all sorts of written documents - e-mails, magazine articles, doctors' reports, secret correspondence, etc. Somehow (don't want to insert a spoiler here), Bee is given these documents during the period that Bernadette is missing. Bee takes these documents and writes a book about her mother during that time. In other words, it's a book within a book.

At the start of the book, Bernadette, Bee and Elgin, Bernadette's husband, are living in the Seattle, Washington area. Bernadette is a quirky stay-at-home mom, Bee is a brilliant 8th grader and Elgin is a workaholic Microsoft employee. Bee has made it through her entire early education with straight A's (or as Bernadette likes to point out, straight S's since that's what they assign at Bee's second tier private school) and as a reward both her parents agree to take her on a trip to Antarctica. Bernadette hires a virtual assistant from India to help her plan the trip.

We quickly learn that Bernadette's personality goes way beyond quirky, that Bee had health issues earlier in life and that somehow the family isn't how it seems in the opening pages. Bernadette quickly begins to unravel as she's dealing with the stress of planning Bee's dream trip and she has a few altercations with one of the moms at Bee's school.

The book is satirical  and pokes fun at the Microsoft culture, the community at Bee's second tier private school and people who call Seattle home and the city itself. The pace for most of the book is quick. Quick wit, clever, sometimes laugh-out-loud funny. The pace slows down a little bit after Bernadette goes missing. And while I did really like the book, even the second time around, the ending is disappointing. (Maybe that's why I had no memories of how the book ended?) Even with a disappointing ending, I'd still recommend the book. 

I think I enjoyed the book more as an audiobook not only because it was the first time "reading" Where'd You Go, Bernadette? but because the satirical humor somehow seemed funnier and more endearing listening to it rather than reading it. You'd think a novel based on written correspondence would do better in written form. I'm not so sure.

Here are my thoughts on the difference between audiobooks. I'd love to hear your thoughts.

The difference between

audiobooks & e-books

Traditional Books	Audiobooks
Can read anywhere, anytime without needing the cooperation of someone else.	Much easier to listen to when you’re on your own. So listening in the car when you’re not alone can be a problem. (Some people I know like to listen to audiobooks while doing housework. That wouldn’t be me!)
Can easily go back and reread exactly what you need to reread.	With the way some audiobooks are tracked, it’s difficult to rewind to precisely the right spot if you need to “reread.”
You can choose where to skim and where to pick up serious reading.	Zoning out while listening to an audiobook is not the same as skimming. It means that you probably won’t realize when it’s time to do some serious listening.
Skimming can shorten the length of time it takes for you to complete a book.	The length of the reading of the book is the length of the reading of the book.
Requires no training beyond knowing how to read.	It took me several books until I got into the swing of audiobooks.
It’s your voice reading the book to you. You need to imagine more of the story.	A professional reader is reading to you. A bad reader can ruin an audiobook for you. You also hear the book the way the reader reads it which might not be the same as the way you’d read it to yourself.
Jargon and dialect can really slow down your reading experience.	Personally, I find it easier to understand both jargon and dialect when I’m listening to it. I know that’s not the case for everyone.
Available at your public library.	Available at your public library.

We can change your mind!

I'm just back from Books and Beer Club. Attendance was small but we had a great meeting. Tonight we discussed Jane Austen's Persuasion. Of the seven of us at the meeting, six of us gave the book a thumbs up. And one gave a sidewise thumb. The language was tedious, there were too many characters, it was too difficult to get into. "But I really liked the story."

Our fearless leader, Wendy, is a huge Jane Austen fan. I'd only ever read Pride and Prejudice before. I'm not sure of the Austen history of the rest of the members. You can read my review of Persuasion here. Those were the views I shared with the group. There was a lot of agreement amongst the readers and some small differences of opinion.

As the meeting was coming to a close, our dissenter said, "You know what. I think I can switch to a thumbs up. After discussing the book with you all, I realize how much I really did like it."

A few of the members planned to read more Austen. I'm not sure how quickly I'll pick up another book. Too many books, too little time! 

Next month we'll be reading mystery. Three of us met for dinner before the book club meeting and started talking about what book to suggest for next month. We realized that none of us had read any Agatha Christie. So... for May we'll be reading Murder on the Orient Express. If you've read the book or seen the movie, please don't spoil it for me!

Aren't you that woman from the book club?

Sometimes I feel like I'm a celebrity. If people don't recognize my face from book club meetings, they recognize my name from book club e-mails or the articles that I write about our book club for a monthly local newspaper. There are surely worse ways to be known.

The best part is that every time I'm recognized as "the woman from the book club," I get to talk about books. It happened twice last week.

I was at the pool last Tuesday, minding my own business, working really hard in water aerobics class when I sensed that people were talking about me. I wasn't being egotistical or crazy. When class ended, a new friend of mine came up to me and said that she'd been talking to another woman in the pool (who wasn't in the class) about the book club. She thought this other woman might be interested in joining the book club. Once we were all out of the pool and drying off before heading off to the remainder of our days, we talked. About book club. And about books. They shared titles of books they'd recently read and enjoyed (wish I'd had my phone - or a pad and paper to jot down the titles - I always think I'll remember but I rarely do). I told them that our community book club is reading Where'd You Go, Bernadette? by Maria Semple for our May book club meeting. I also mentioned that I was reading Persuasion by Jane Austen for Books and Beer Club. We then talked about how with all the books we've read, we've read so few of the classics. My new friend and I attended the same high school at different times. (Midwood High School in Brooklyn, New York in case you're curious.) We wondered why our curriculum included so few classics. "But then again, aren't you enjoying them more as a adult than you might have as a kid in high school?" Woman in the pool said she'd email me to get more information about the community book club. It hasn't happened yet, but maybe she forgotten my "easy enough to remember" book club email address. We're not as young as we used to be!

Thursday I was at a well-attended luncheon when a woman named Sue came up to me and said, "You're Sue. From the book club, right?" When I said that was me, she said that I was missed at the last community book club meeting where Cross Creek, a memoir by Marjorie Kinnan Rawlings was discussed. As I was admitting that I haven't yet finished the book, a neighbor who is also a member of our community book club walked up to us and said that once she realized she wasn't free on the day of the book club, she dropped the book. I still plan to finish Cross Creek. I purchased the e-book and so I shared that I don't feel pressured to finish the book at any particular time. We're talking about taking a day trip up to Cross Creek (yes, it's an actual place in Florida, not too far from where we live) and I also shared that I need (yes, need) to have the book finished by then. Neighbor asked if it was worth finishing. Sue said that it was.

I'll give a more complete review of Cross Creek once I've actually finished the book. But I was quick to share my thoughts on what I've read so far with Sue and neighbor. What I don't like about Cross Creek and what Sue shared that many at the book club meeting agreed with is that it's written anecdotally, almost short stories, but not quite, that aren't in chronological order or written in a way that you can really make sense of who the other characters in Rawlings story are. I would have loved a true narrative. This is why I moved to Cross Creek. This is when I moved to Cross Creek. This happened first, this happened next. Here's the conflict. Let's wrap up with the resolution. 42% of my way through the book and it's not like that at all. That's what I wish it was.

What I'm really enjoying about Cross Creek is allowing my mind to wander, to get a better sense of Florida in the 1940s, to get a truer sense of how Florida really was one of the final frontiers in the United States. For example, I grew up in Brooklyn, New York. When I try to imagine what Brooklyn was like 60 years ago - or 100 years ago - or when my parents were growing up - in my mind the buildings are still in place. They're only older looking (which I realize makes no sense since the buildings I'm talking about were much newer back then and seriously older now). Maybe they're really more old-fashioned looking? The point is that I have a visualization going on that is probably not too far from the truth. When I try to imagine what things were like even 30 years ago in this part of Florida, I can't imagine. That means it's even more difficult to imagine what it was like 70 or 80 years ago. Just how wild and untamed was Central Florida in the middle of the 20th Century?

Shouldn't anyone who has decided to call this part of the state his or her home have a better picture of what things were like way back when?

Persuasion by Jane Austen - I can check another classic off the list of books I never read in high school!

Not the actual edition that I read.
I read the Project Gutenberg e-book edition.
More about Project Gutenberg at the end
of today's post.

My formal literature education ended in high school. The only English class I took in college was a freshman writing seminar. And in retrospect, my exposure to the classics was very limited. I'm not sure I understand why. I did take AP English my senior year of high school. I wish I could remember what books we read then. The only one I remember definitely was Anna Karenina. I liked the story but somehow got bogged down in the writing.

I remember slogging through Shakespeare with my mom reading aloud to me, kind of acting it out, to make it more exciting. But I don't remember her take on "The Classics."

Since joining Books and Beer Club a few years ago, I have probably read more classics than ever before. I'd never read any Jane Austen until I read Pride and Prejudice with Books and Beer a few years ago. Did I mention that Persuasion is the April book club read for Books and Beer Club?

What I loved about Persuasion by Jane Austen was how timeless the story is. It was set in early 19th Century England but the plot could just as easily take place in early 21st Century - anywhere! The protagonist, Anne Elliott, is an intelligent woman in her late 20s when the story begins. She's kind of an outcast in her family. Her father and older sister, Elizabeth, are a bit on the vain side. Younger sister, Mary, is a bit of a drama queen. Anne is the only one who has common sense.

She's been pining over a lost love for nearly 8 years. She and Frederick Wentworth were estranged after Miss Elliott's dear friend and mentor (and fill-in for her deceased mother), Mrs. Russell, persuaded her to break off the relationship.

Fast forward 8 years. Sir Elliott is near financial ruin. He is forced to rent out his estate and move to a different part of the country to avoid shame. His estate, Kelllynch, is rented out by the Crofts. As coincidence would have it, Mrs. Croft is the sister of Frederick Wentworth, who is now Captain Wentworth. Can their feelings for each other be reignited? Is that even necessary?

The relationships between friends, cousins, neighbors were all very realistic, even by today's standards. The only thing that never seems realistic to me when reading these old English books is the idleness of most of the characters in the book. In Persuasion, the only characters who seem to work are those in the Navy. Otherwise. the characters don't have professions and keep themselves occupied by taking walks, playing cards and the like. Maybe that was the reality of early 19th Century England, but it makes no sense in modern times.

I looked to see if there was a modern interpretation of Persuasion as a movie but wasn't able to find one. Please let me know if you are aware of one. I'd love to see it. I might look to see if there are contemporary novel adaptations as well. I should probably consider rereading The Jane Austen Book Club by Karen Joy Fowler. The connections would make so much more sense after reading at least some Jane Austen.


In conclusion, I enjoyed Persuasion much more than I enjoyed Pride and Prejudice. There was less rambling, it was more straight and to the point, and it was a story that I could relate to. Dare I read more Jane Austen?

Project Gutenberg
Project Gutenberg offers over 50,000 free ebooks: choose among free epub books, free kindle books, download them or read them online.

The Little Paris Bookshop

This morning, as I was sitting drinking coffee with my iPad standing up in front of me, my husband asked, "What are you doing?"

"Reading."

"I think you'd be happy in this house alone, with 3 rooms full of books."

"I'd miss you some of the time."

I've mentioned before that he's a non-reader. He doesn't get what reading means to me. Okay, maybe I should say, he didn't get what reading means to me... until I read him an excerpt from the Acknowledgements from The Little Paris Bookshop and an excerpt from an interview with the author, Nina George.

I enjoyed the book well enough, but I really enjoyed the Acknowledgements and the interview even more. They wouldn't have stood alone on their own as something to love. But they were the icing on what was an otherwise wordy cake.

From the Acknowledgements:

      P.S. Thanks also to all the booksellers who help the magic to work

 on me. Books help me breathe better - it's that simple.

From the interview with Nina George:

Why has this novel resonated so deeply with readers?

Because it's a story about death and about how much we can be shaped 

by loss, by missing a person. Grieving, or admitting that the loss of a loved 

one has  derailed us, was unfashionable, forbidden for much

 of the past. Also, there is a dedicated community of people

 in the world who will always be able to ocnnect with each

 other across all languages, boundaries, and religions. 

It is the "Readers' Club."

 People who read a lot, starting at a very young age, 

are people who were raised by books. They have learned about

 forms of love and hate, kindness, respect, and ideas

 that are different from their own.

They experience the world as something infinitely larger 

than before. They enjoy the indescribable feeling of having 

found their trust selves...
We readers are book people, and Jean Perdu [the protagonist]is one of us.

The Little Paris Bookshop is about Jean Perdu who likes to call himself the "Literary Apothecary." He knows which book each person is meant to read to cure what ails that particular person. He uses books to cure the ills of the lives of his customers. He can heal everyone else's heart but he is unable to heal his own. He had lost the love of his life 21 years earlier and was unable to move past that loss.

The whole premise of the book, being able to detect what book a specific person should read, reminded me so much of The Language of Flowers by Vanessa Diffenbaugh. In that book, Victoria matches specific flowers to specific customers to help them overcome their problems. Meanwhile, she struggles to overcome the earlier hardships of her own life. I guess that's where the similarity ends. I guess that's where the similarity ends.

The "little Paris bookshop" is actually a barge that sits in the Seine. So when Jean Perdu suddenly realizes that he needs to do something concrete to heal his old wounds and start living life again, without much thought, he lifts anchor and off he goes. Joining him on board is a young bestselling author, a one hit wonder, struggling to come up with an encore act. Along the way they meet a lovelorn Italian chef. Traveling towards the south of France by boat, they share experiences as they which may or may not help the trio get their lives figured out.

The novel is billed as "a love letter to books." That's what I was expecting. I thought there would be many more literary references or opportunities to see which books got matched with which personalities and/or problems. Instead, it was really more of a love letter to readers. Which was fine. It just wasn't what I expected. It was also a book about overcoming loss. Loss of a loved one, loss of the family unit, loss due to disappearance, loss due to death. 

Parts of the book dragged a little for me. Perhaps because the book was translated from either German or French, some of the passages came off as being particularly wordy. (What's ironic is that the language reminded me of The Elegance of the Hedgehog by Muriel Barbary. Turns out that Jean Perdu's favorite book is The Elegance of the Hedgehog!) The positive of that type of writing is that the ending wasn't at all rushed. It was somewhat predictable... but then again it wasn't. I had watery eyes a couple of times during my reading, but when books somehow intersect with things the reader is dealing with in real life, that can happen.

I gave this book 3-stars on goodreads.com. I liked it. To whom would I recommend it? Probably to someone who loved The Elegance of the Hedgehog. Or to someone who loves to read books that are more character study driven than plot driver. And to someone who likes to be an armchair traveler to France.





 

Aries - The Sign Behind the Crimes Book 2

It's been over two months since I attended Ronnie Allen's book signing and purchased my autographed copy of Aries. Since I mostly read e-books these days, I had to plan a time that would make sense for me to read a traditional book. I knew I'd be traveling to New York from Florida in April and promised myself that Ronnie's book would be the book that I'd read on the plane.


It's hard to write a review for a book penned by a friend. I feel it's important to state upfront that I'm not a fan of crime novels, thrillers (psychological or otherwise) or the paranormal. I'm not a fan of the genre but I am a fan of Ronnie. I wanted to see how all her hard work paid off. (I hope it's okay here to mention that I found 3 typos in the book. That's something I'd have no trouble mentioning in a review of a novel written by someone I don't know so I feel it's only fair to mention that here as well.)

After reading and enjoying Book 1, Gemini, in The Sign Behind the Crime series as a beta reader and in its published format,  it made sense that I'd read subsequent books in the series.

Aries follows rookie Detective Samantha Wright. Prior to beginning her first day as detective, Sam goes for a jog and literally runs into a murder victim. Literally. She integrates herself into her detective team as they attempt to solve that - and several more connected murders. She's also working on the cold case of the murder of the wife of the psychiatrist on the team, Dr. Frank Khaos. And it wouldn't be a Ronnie Allen novel without the sexual tension of a developing relationship, in this novel it's between Wright and Khaos.

Ronnie and I talked many times throughout the writing of Aries about how she develops a story and about all the research involved to add the details of the story. I can only imagine all the hours spent talking to her experts about weapons, martial arts, psychological evaluations, police protocol and the like. How she even comes up with her ideas is an astonishing accomplishment to me. Should I imagine that most of the sexual content comes from Ronnie's personal experience? That stuff is hot!

Like me, Ronnie was born and raised in Brooklyn. Brooklyn was one of the main settings in Aries. It's always fun to read a novel that mentions actual places that I am very familiar with. (Gemini was set in both NYC and in rural central Florida so I had a similar connection to the first novel.)



Ronnie Allen is a master at plotting and character development. She expertly wove her sub-plots together seamlessly. I also like how she brought in the main characters of Gemini as more minor characters in Aries. Great connection. I can very easily see both of these novels adapted for the big screen.

Ronnie is currently working on the third book in the series, Scorpio. I haven't had a chance to talk to Ronnie about the plot or the setting of Scorpio nor of how it connects to the first two titles in the series. 

For fans of the genre, I can easily recommend getting started with the series, starting with book 1, Gemini.

Way to go, Ronnie, for turning your dreams into reality!

The Two-Family House is a perfect rainy day book

The Two-Family House, a debut novel by Lynda Cohen Loigman, was the perfect book to read on this rainy day. Although it spanned from the late 40s to early 70s, it read with the ease of contemporary fiction. The author had reasons for sticking to that time period. Nothing historical but because of societal norms.

The story revolves around two brothers, Abe and Mort, their families, and the impact a snap decision made on a snowy night had on all the family members. The two brothers jointly own a two-family house in Brooklyn and that's where they start to raise their families. The wives are closer than many real sisters. The cousins are close.

The plot was predictable. Without being told, very early on we know what major snap decision has been made. Even the ending was predictable at a certain point. The ending was wrapped up a little too neatly but that was okay.

Where this book excelled was in character development. We got to really know most of the characters as the story was told from 6 different perspectives. Somehow, Loigman made that work. We got to cheer when most of the characters showed growth in their capacities as human beings. The characters I liked least at the beginning of the tale were among the characters I liked most by the end.

My biggest disappointment with the book is that there was no real feeling of Brooklyn. No references to actual places. Nothing to make me, born and raised in Brooklyn, feel like the setting was my home town. No NYC Subway mentions, no talk of Flatbush Avenue, Brooklyn Bridge. NOTHING! This story could have been set anywhere. It might not bother you but it made me crave touches of Brooklyn.

If you're in the mood for a warm book about family relationships, The Two-Family House might be for you. I look forward to seeing what this author works on next.

A non-fantasy reader's review of The Name of the Wind

I finished The Name of the Wind by Patrick Rothfuss at about 7 o'clock this morning. I was pretty relieved to have it finished so quickly went to goodreads to make it as completed. I gave it two stars. And I actually wrote a brief comment in the review section. (I rarely write reviews in goodreads unless I love a book.) I wrote that my 2 stars should be discounted since I'm not a reader of fantasy... BUT... I read the book for book club, showed up at the meeting not having finished the book yet went on to finish it just because. So rather than giving it one star, I gave it two. I think this is the first time ever that I went to book club having not finished a book that I did plan to finish after the fact. And that's what made me bump my review up a star. Usually, if I'm not done with a book by book club, it means that I don't like it at all. In that case, it goes to my "dropped" shelf on goodreads as soon as the meeting is over.

I'm not quite sure why I finished the book. Fantasy is really not my genre. It was long, it took forever to get into - at least 200 pages into the book, I'd imagine. And because it's a trilogy, I knew that there were going to be lots of loose ends at the end of the book. Perhaps it is because I was so close to the end of the book at the time of the book club meeting, and I was wondering where the author was going with this story. I have no desire to read on to find out how these loose ends are tied up. Goodbye Kvothe. So long Denna.

Although members of my book club felt this was fairy tale/fantasy and not coming-of-age/fantasy, the middle section of the novel, which I did enjoy, reminded me of I am Charlotte Simmons by Tom Wolfe. The following quote comes from World Cat Fiction Finder. (What a cool website. I couldn't remember the title or author of Charlotte Simmons - could just remember her name was Charlotte. Typed in "girl in college" into the novel search, up popped an easy to scroll book - and on page 3, there was Charlotte Simmons.) "At Dupont University, an innocent college freshman named Charlotte Simmons learns that her intellect alone will not help her survive."

My favorite part of The Name of the Wind was the middle part of the book where Kvothe finally gets admitted into the university. Both Kvothe and Charlotte were super smart with a high aptitude.Both characters had problems adjusting to life in their institutions of higher learning. This part of the book resonated with me. Interestingly enough, the fantasy lovers in my book club disliked this part of the story, preferring the beginning of the story where Kvothe learns of his magical powers and the end of the book where he gets to use them.

The story took place in a fantasy place in a fantasy time. I'm not even sure if it was the past or the future. It was that different. And oh, the language. I didn't realize I'd need to learn a whole new language to read a fantasy book. Spans were measures of time (most likely 11 days). Jots and silver talents were monetary units. Many of these "foreign" (made up) words I simply glossed over. For all I know the author could have been using some big words I was unfamiliar with that truly exist in the American English language... and I would have no idea!

In a nutshell, The Name of the Wind is Kvothe's story as told to the Chronicler who arrives in town for some undetermined reason. Kvothe's story is the larger story within the smaller story of what's going on in Kvothe's life at the time the Chronicler arrives. Kvothe was born to parents who were traveling performers. It became apparent at an early age that he was gifted in some way. A fellow named Ben joins their troupe for awhile and becomes Kvothe's mentor. As he's teaching Kvothe lessons in life - and in magic - he talks up his time in University. University seems to be a place that Kvothe should be headed for.

As happens with these traveling troupes, Ben decides to stay put in one of the towns they make a stop in. Kvothe is really at a loss after he leaves. Typical to most fairly tales, Kvothe's parents are killed. (This happens early on. I hope this isn't too much of a spoiler.) The rest of Kvothe's story is about his struggles to find his place, get to the University and then his experiences during his first year and a half there.

Can I recommend this book? Not personally. But from the enthusiastic responses of the fantasy lovers in the book club, you might want to pick this one up if you're looking for a good fantasy trilogy.

I was going to pick Cross Creek back up tonight for my bedtime read. Then I got notice from the library that The Two-Family House by Lynda Cohen Loigman is now available as an e-book. I should be able to read this one quickly. There's always time for Cross Creek. Marjorie Kinnan Rawlings isn't going anywhere. (Plus I purchased that e-book anyway!)