It’s Monday, What Are You Reading? 10-18-21 #IMWAYR #ripxvi

Currently Reading

The Book of Accidents (Del Rey, 2021) by Chuck Wendig

NATIONAL BESTSELLER • A family returns to their hometown—and to the dark past that haunts them still—in this masterpiece of literary horror by the New York Times bestselling author of Wanderers – from the publisher

This is an ebook loan from the library that I postponed delivery of in order to read it for the annual RIP (Read in Peril) challenge. The Book of Accidents (Del Rey, 2021) by Chuck Wendig reminds me of classic Stephen King horror but without the folksy/hokey references (to ad jingles, etc.). I told a friend at work that I didn’t read it the night before because I was home alone, and she immediately placed a library hold on it.

Speaking of the RIP challenge…I borrowed a print copy of the group read – The Sundial by Shirley Jackson – but haven’t even opened it yet.

Cloud Cuckoo Land (Scribner, Sept. 2021) by Anthony Doerr

I finally started reading my NetGalley advance copy of Cloud Cuckoo Land by Anthony Doerr, but since the book is already out, I think I’ll buy my own copy and finish reading it in print.

I’ve been reading a chapter or so in the mornings and am beginning to see how the tenuously connected story threads and wide-ranging settings are all connected. (Plus, looking for the cover image on the Simon & Schuster website, I caught an accidental glimpse of the publisher’s blurb which gives it all away in the first sentence, anyway.)

Many (most?) readers will be looking for this because of how much they/we loved All the Light We Cannot See; I wonder how this stylistically different book by the same author will be received.

Recently Read

Libertie (Algonquin, 2021) by Kaitlyn Greenidge

Inspired by the life of one of the first Black female doctors in the United States and rich with historical detail, Kaitlyn Greenidge’s new and immersive novel will resonate with readers eager to understand our present through a deep, moving, and lyrical dive into our past. – From the Publisher

Libertie by Kaitlyn Greenidge sparked a good discussion in our book club meeting last week. Everyone was intrigued by the unusual mother-daughter bond between Libertie and her mother.

Some readers wished the book had been written as more traditional historical fiction because they wanted more detail about the settings (pre- and post-Civil War in Brooklyn, New York and Haiti) but Libertie was primarily the story of a young woman’s life and her efforts to uncover and live out her own dreams – not just fulfill dreams that others (parents, husband, community, etc.) had for her.

The author touched on the subject of what genre Libertie would fall under in a Rumpus interview last April:

Rumpus: Publishers Weekly’s starred review calls Libertie and your first novel, We Love You, Charlie Freeman, “genius work[s] of radical historical fiction.” How would you personally categorize Libertie’s genre?

Greenidge: Labels and categories are so difficult because I know people feel very strongly about them and like to hold onto them. I don’t understand labeling books that take place in the past as historical fiction because to me that denotes a really specific type of novel. But then I think, too, Hilary Mantel is historical fiction technically, but people still find resonance with her work. I don’t know, I think it’s probably myself, my own insecurities, putting something onto the idea of historical fiction. Of course, probably when I say this a bunch of people are going to try to cancel me over saying I hate historical fiction because I don’t actually! I really love reading novels set in the past, but I’m thinking about it a lot right now.

Currently Listening To

Number9Dream (Recorded Books, 2013) by David Mitchell

Trying to catch up on books by David Mitchell that I’ve missed, I’m listening to Number9Dream from 2013. Read by William Rycroft, this audiobook plummets the listener into the life of a young man from the countryside in Tokyo for the first time on a quest to find and confront the father who abandoned him.

But what is real and what is fantasy? What is remembered and what are false memories? That we don’t know, and the narrator himself doesn’t seem know either, at this point.

Recently Listened To

Motherland: A Memoir of Love, Loathing, and Longing (Random House, 2019) by Elissa Altman

“Rarely has a mother-daughter relationship been excavated with such honesty. Elissa Altman is a beautiful, big-hearted writer who mines her most central subject: her gorgeous, tempestuous, difficult mother, and the terrain of their shared life. The result is a testament to the power of love and family.” — Dani Shapiro, author of Inheritance

In the audio edition read by the author, Elissa Altman’s memoir Motherland reveals shockingly tone-deaf parenting and the narcissistic personality traits of her beautiful bombshell of a mother, but, the book, over all, seems to have been conceived from love and a desire to understand the woman the writer is so close to but utterly different from.

The Final Girl Support Group by Grady Hendrix

I posted last week about The Final Girl Support Group (Penguin Audio, 2021) by Grady Hendrix, narrated by Adrienne King.

This is my first completed book for the RIP (Read in Peril) Challenge — which is almost over!

This post is linked to “It’s Monday! What Are You Reading?” hosted by Kathryn at The Book Date. Check out the link-up party there for more reading suggestions!

Also linking this post up to Readers Imbibing Peril on Twitter.