The Odditorium: Stories

When I was younger, I didn’t like short story collections. I felt teased by only a small portion of a larger story and frustrated when my search for a connecting thread turned up fruitless. Thankfully now, I have case aside my hesitancy and am enjoying short story collections, including my latest read, The Odditorium by Melissa Pritchard.

The Odditorium touches on multiple genres: Westerns, historical fiction, murder mysteries, religious fiction and more. To shape each story, Pritchard plucks out obscure people, places and events from history and the modern world. While I enjoyed all of the stories, here are a few of my favorites:

1. “Watanya Ciclia” is the story about the friendship between Annie Oakley and Sitting Bull. Sitting Bull watches Annie at a show, and eventually agrees to join Buffalo Bill Cody’s Wild West Show, despite the boos and jeers, to spend time with Annie.  The story is a touching tribute to two friends and sympathic view of the plight of Sitting Bull.

2. “Captain Brown and the Royal Victoria Military Hospital” is the longest story in the collection – and one many other readers didn’t like. This story resonated with me, however. Captain Brown is an American naval surgeon who must convert a Victorian-era British military hospital into a feat of modern medicine –  all before the Allied’s planned attack on D-Day. Brown was fallible and honest, and despite his career successes, was guilty about decisions he made in his life. This would have made a wonderful novel.

3. “Patricide” takes place at the hotel that houses a courtyard played in by Edgar Allan Poe. Two sisters meet there to discuss their dying father. The oldest sister, Avis, who was to inherit her father’s riches, was considered a disappointment by her father, and he cut Avis out of his will.  When Signe, the other sister, sees the pain Avis is in from an arthritic knee, Signe wonders if she could kill her father now so she can rush the money to her ailing sister. Throughout the story, we learn about Signe’s life, including a recent scandal from her job as a teacher. Mixed into the story are wonderful lines from Poe’s poetry.

All in all, I was immersed in great storytelling and fantastic writing. I highly recommend The Odditorium to readers who enjoyed high-quality short stories and lovers of literary fiction. (  )

This review was written for LibraryThing Early Reviewers.

A Good Hard Look

A Good Hard Look is the fascinating, fictional account of Flannery O’Connor’s last years, settled in her farm in Milledgeville, Georgia. O’Connor suffered from lupus, and she fled home to her family’s farm to write and raise a menagarie of birds, including peacocks. While the reader is treated to a wonderful portrayal of O’Connor, Ann Napolitano creates a moving story featuring other memorable characters: Cookie, the hometown queen who despised Flannery; her husband, Melvin, a New Yorker trying to navigate small town Georgia; Lona, a seamstress who falls in love with a boy more than half her age; and Gigi, Lona’s daughter who pays the price for it all.

While I haven’t read much by Flannery O’Connor (side note: something to be rectified!), the story line of A Good Hard Look reminds me of the stories I have read by O’Connor. Each character makes a decision, knowing the consequences, and as the story evolves, tragedy strikes. The tragedies open up new lives and new decisions for the characters, and you hope they learn from their past and move on to happier times.

A Good Hard Look is divided into two concurrent stories. First, there’s the story of Cookie, Melvin and Flannery. Cookie and Melvin are recently married and settled into Milledgeville. Melvin is a New Yorker at heart, and despite his wife’s wishes, he strikes up a secret friendship with Flannery. For Melvin, Flannery is like the city – spontaneous, honest and forthright. Second, there’s the story of Lona and Joe. Lona is a lonely, pot-smoking seamstress who agrees to take on her friend’s 17-year-old son, Joe, as an assistant. As they spend time together, they become attracted to each other. Their romance culminates until a a fateful afternoon begins a chain reaction of tragedies for their families – as well as the lives of Cookie, Melvin and Flannery.

Expertly written and beautifully rendered, Ann Napolitano draws the reader into the lives of these characters and creates a story of love and loss. Equally important, she sheds light on one of American’s most talented, and perhaps unsung, writers. I highly recommend A Good Hard Look to readers who enjoy literary fiction and stories about the American South.

The Night Circus

Step right up, ladies and gentlemen! Come closer to learn more about a true visual spectacle – a mind twister of a book – The Night Circus by Erin Morgenstern. No bearded ladies or five-legged goats – just a book that bends your imagination and senses.

Yes, it’s a circus book, and certainly we’ve had our share of circus stories lately. While most books focus on the oddities, The Night Circus offers up something more. It’s a veritable feast for your senses. Your mind’s eye will almost tire from the stimulation. Your nose will go into overtime imagining the aromas. And your skin will tingle from conjuring the sensations of the circus. (Has anyone bought the movie rights yet? Tim Burton, this has your name written all over it!)

It’s what The Night Circus does to the corners of your imagination, though, that makes this book a pleasure to read. Erin Morgenstern’s debut is not without flaws. Overall, though, she accomplishes a tremendous feat: to drop the reader into the story, fully immersed like a live witness to the story’s events.

I was less impressed with the love story angle of The Night Circus – it almost felt contrived, not as natural as the rest of the moving parts of the story. I was never convinced that the main characters, Marco and Celia, had a relationship that could sustain beyond the competition.  Star-crossed beautiful lovers from competing sides is the oldest trick in the book – and overplayed. Many will disagree with me, and that’s okay. Perhaps I’ve become old and unromantic.

Circus fiction can read like a three-ring circus, but that’s not the case with this book. Just like the circus, The Night Circus is full of magic and would make for a great book club discussion – and an even better movie. I recommend it to any reader who likes to journey to the unbelievable – even just once in a while. (  )

No One Is Here Except All Of Us

In a small village in Romania, a group of Jewish residents lived in relative harmony. Their village was on a small peninsula where a tiny strip of land connected it to the mainland. One evening, as they gathered for prayer, they witnessed a plane bomb the other side of the mountain. War had finally arrived in their corner of Romania. Bewildered, they weren’t sure what to do. They had read newspapers and heard radio reports about Jews being rounded up and sent to camps. Fearing the same fate, the village listened to the voice of a 11-year-old girl, Lena, who suggested they just start over – to wake up the next day to a new world. And for more than three years, this tactic successfully protected them from the atrocities of World War II.

It takes a tremendous suspension of belief to read No One Is Here Except All Of Us. You, as the reader, must commit to the characters’ idea that the village was reborn into a new world. Families were switched around, time was of no consequence and the village managed to stay self-sufficient and untouched until almost the end of the war. Thankfully, Ausubel is a gifted writer with a knack for creating realistic characters, especially the story’s main character, Lena. Most of the story is told from Lena’s perspective – a young woman who endures more than one should.

Admittedly, I had an easier time reading the novel once the village had to break out of its safe cocoon, though I was saddened that their experiment couldn’t protect them any longer. When the villagers realized the war had arrived at their doorstep, my heart broke for each person.

No One Is Here Except For All Of Us will not be for every reader. It has a poetic feel with simple storytelling that may annoy readers. True realists should stay away from this book completely. But for some of you – the dreamers, the imagineers – this book will works its magic. To you, I recommend No One Is Here Except For All Of Us unreservedly.  (  )

This review was written for LibraryThing Early Reviewers.

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Thank you, thank you, thank you to everyone for participating in Orange January. YOU ALL ROCK!!!!

The Invisible Ones

Ray Lovell is an almost-divorced private investigator who has sworn off missing persons cases. However, when a Gypsy man approaches him to find his long-lost daughter, Ray feels the pull of his Romany past and agrees to help the man. This begins the page-turning, suspense-filled novel, The Invisible Ones, by Stef Penney.

Ray has his work cut out for him. Even though his dad was Gypsy, he’s an outsider to the Janko family, and he needs to build their trust to help him find the lost girl, Rose Janko. Rose had married Ivo Janko, and according to the family, she had disappeared shortly after the birth of their child, Christo. As Ray investigates, things don’t add up as neatly as the Janko family would have him believe.

The Invisible Ones has two narrators: Ray, who leads the reader though the investigation, and JJ, the nephew of the missing Rose. JJ is only 14 and on a journey of his own: to help his cousin, Christo, who is ill with a strange disease, and to find more about his own estranged father. Both narrators are complex, emotional and very human – adding a sense of reality to a story that could almost be written off as implausible.

Penney executes The Invisible Ones like a writer with 20 years experience under her belt. After her successful debut novel, The Tenderness of Wolves, one might wonder if Penney would suffer from a sophomore slump. To that, I would say “definitely not.” The Invisible Ones is a gripping story about grief and loss – one that had me up late at night to learn more about this complex family saga.

Fans of Kate Atkinson’s Jackson Brodie character will find a welcome home in this novel (Jackson and Ray remind me of each other) – but even if you don’t like mysteries or suspense dramas, I would encourage you to give The Invisible Ones a try. At its surface, it’s a murder mystery, but when you peel away the layers, the book emerges as a fine piece of writing craft. (  )

This review was written for LibraryThing Early Reviewers.

GIVEAWAY CLOSED

Up for Grabs: Wolf Hall by Hilary Mantel

Orange Connection: Short List, 2010

Who’s Eligible to Win?: Anyone participating in Orange January – no matter where you live or if you’ve won a giveaway already this month. You’re also welcome to participate in the activity, even if you don’t want the book. Just let me know in the comments below to not enter your name into the drawing.

Your Activity: Our final Orange January giveaway! In the comments below, tell us how many Orange books you read and which one was your favorite.

Giveaway ends at 9pm Eastern tonight. Enjoy the last day of January!

Congratulations! Please email me your mailing address: jillceleste AT hotmail DOT com.

I hope you all had a great Sunday! Our last giveaway will be January 31. See you then!

GIVEAWAY CLOSED

Up for Grabs: Untold Story by Monica Ali

Orange Connection: Monica Ali has been nominated for the Orange Prize before with Brick Lane (2004 Long List). We’ll see if Untold Story gets nominated this year!

Who’s Eligible to Win?: Anyone participating in Orange January – no matter where you live or if you’ve won a giveaway already this month. You’re also welcome to participate in the activity, even if you don’t want the book. Just let me know in the comments below to not enter your name into the drawing.

Your Activity: Untold Story is about the late Princess Diana. Who are some of your favorite “royals” depicted in fiction?

Giveaway ends at 9pm Eastern tonight. Have an enjoyable Sunday!

Congratulations! Please email me your mailing address: jillceleste AT hotmail DOT com. I will mail your book out in early February!

I am glad to read that many of you share my “Toni Morrison” intimidation! =)