books 2007: This is Not Chick Lit, edited by Elizabeth Merrick

[supercheesegirl]

Amy lent me this book. I'm definitely behind the concept of the book--that American women are reading mostly "chick lit" crap, and while it's nice that there's crap marketed specifically for women these days, American women should also know about the really talented women writers doing interesting work that isn't "chick lit". And the stories were all really good, but mostly they just made me sad. Characters who can't connect to other people, characters searching for love, lonely people. And yes, that's real life, I know, but I think most folks who read my journal will have marked by now my decided tendency to read books that are not at all like real life. I mean, I have a real life, and that's why I read books. I don't need books to make me sad, I can manage that myself. Anyway, that's why this book took me so long to read--the stories were really good and well-written, but they made me sad, so I spaced them out over the past month.

I will say, though, that the last story, "Meaning of Ends", by Martha Witt, was absolutely phenomenal. Self-aware, because the story referred to the italian version of itself, and the difficulties of translation, and grammar differences between the languages, in a story that turned out to be about an American woman teaching English in Italy--so the self-aware structure really fed into the plot beautifully. The story was heartbreaking in that way that makes it all okay, really. Loved this story. I'm glad I stuck it out till the end of the book.

::edit:: HEY! Hey, this was book #99 for the year! The next book will be book #100!! I'm in the middle of two books right now, so I'm not sure which it will be, but both are pretty amazing so far and I think either one will be worthy. I'm currently averaging around 11 books a month, which means I should hit 130 for the year if I keep to my current rate. Whee!

Comments

[grass-stained.livejournal.com]

Not terribly related, but I always think the girl in this icon is Kaylee.

[supercheesegirl.livejournal.com]

Aw, I wish it was! Just stock photography, I think. Also, I'm not sure when Kaylee would ever have a nice green field to curl up in with a book. :)

[painkiller.livejournal.com]

Mang, I will never get to 100 books in a year. Well, at least not while I'm still in school. All those short, trashy spy book s I like to read have to set aside when classes are in full swing.

Oh, and hi.

[supercheesegirl.livejournal.com]

Hi! Yeah, it was a lot harder for me to hit 100 books when I was taking two classes and working full time.

[birdmaddgirl.livejournal.com]

holy shit 130 books is a lot woman!

[supercheesegirl.livejournal.com]

Well, that's just the projected total. I haven't gotten there yet. But I am hitting the 100-book mark a lot earlier than I did the last two years.