Wild Dark Shore by Charlotte McConaghy

2/5 stars

How’d I find it? The reliable East City Bookshop recommended McConagy’s first novel Migrations, a book I devoured in record time, so I am always excited to see this Australian author’s name on a new cover.

Why not 3 or more stars? How I wanted to love Wild Dark Shore. I find mesmerizing the powerful and complicated women of McConagy’s novels, as well as the sensuality of her writing. The scaffolding simply shows too much in this one, and the unconvincing shifts in voice, chapter breaks, and melodramatic schlock (“it doesn’t matter where I end and she begins”) kept my eyes rolling.

The Midnight Shift by Cheon Seon-Ran, translated by Gene Png

2/5 stars

How’d I find it? Aside from the hot pink cover, I was drawn to the prospect of a vampire tale and the hospital as hunting ground.

Why not 3 or more stars? Detective Su-Yeon investigates a spree of suicides among a hospital’s older patients and encounters Violette, a vampire-hunter who suspects foul play. The Midnight Shift toggles between Su-Yeon’s story and the struggles of one of the hospital’s nurses, while doling out Violette’s back story in fragments. Though entertaining, the novel lacks in vampire lore to round out the narrative, and our characters remain one-dimensional to a conclusion befitting of the CW.

The Suicides by Antonio Di Benedetto, translated by Esther Allen

2/5 stars

How’d I find it? I mention the NYRB Classics Book Club enough for it to be the obvious source.

Why not 3 or more stars? A reporter investigates a story on the nature of suicide, haunted by the realization that he’s approaching the same age at which his father took his own life. Written in 1969, this circular and dark novel proves to be a tough read thanks to the narrator’s constant mistreatment of women and generally obnoxious company. Photographer Marcela offers an interesting foil, and I would have preferred to read a whole book about her.

The Rest Is Silence by Augusto Monterroso, translated by Aaron Kerner

2/5 stars

How’d I find it? The NYRB Classics Book Club, of course.

Why not 3 or more stars? This takedown of Mexico’s literary elite comes in the form of a collection of ephemera about the self-important (and fictional) critic Eduardo Torres, darling of the town of San Blas. The book’s wry humor (including excerpts from Torres’ vacuous writing) excels, but the gag tires out early.

Free Food for Millionaires by Min Jin Lee

2/5 stars

How’d I find it? I had the pleasure of hearing Min Jin Lee speak at an AWP panel back in 2018 and was inspired to pick up a copy of her work.

Why not 3 or more stars? In Free Food for Millionaires, Lee’s debut novel, Casey Han, a new Princeton graduate with a penchant for luxury goods and no idea what to do with her life, is forced into momentum when she becomes estranged from her parents and her boyfriend on the same night. This coming-of-age novel examines the pressure of becoming and the dynamic between expectation and desire, but doesn’t deliver beyond a well-written story, despite touching on religion, diasporas, late nineties’ culture, life in New York, and consumerism. Oh, and there’s something about millinery.

Underground by Haruki Murakami, translated by Alfred Birnbaum and Philip Gabriel

2/5 stars

How’d I find it? My spouse and I spent our honeymoon in Japan, and I borrowed this book from one of his stacks. I am new to Murakami, having only read Norwegian Wood.

Why not 3 or more stars? Murakami compiles interviews with survivors and witnesses of the sarin gas attack on several Tokyo subway trains in March 1995, contrasting them with views from individuals linked to Aum Shinrikyo, the cult that perpetrated the terrorist act. Murakami gestures at the social and cultural context of modern Japan which made the tragedy possible, but a more profound excavation fails to materialize in this journalistic endeavor.

The Hidden Lives of Owls by Leigh Calvez

2/5 stars

How’d I find it? You know how you find books on your shelves and have no idea how they got there? The Hidden Lives of Owls was one of those.

Why not 3 or more stars? This sweet and cozy read resembles many of its fellows in the light nature category: lots of gratitude, reflections on motherhood, and marveling at non-human residents of the planet. It’s all very nice. This reader simply wants a book that’s more…robust.

Painting Time by Maylis de Kerangal

2/5 stars

How’d I find it? This Electric Lit list of books curated by Camille Bordas, who wrote The Material, drew me to Maylis de Kerangal.

Why not 3 or more stars? Bordas was right to put Painting Time on a list about obsession. De Kerangal clearly did her research for this novel about the art of trompe-l’œil painting and couldn’t help sharing what she learned. The world she crafts is immersive but claustrophobically small. I kept wanting to peek behind the details—someone’s eyeshadow color, the way they looked while sleeping—to understand who the characters were as people. I settled on interpreting the deluge of minutiae as the development of Paula’s vision as a painter. Regardless, it’s tedious.

To the Lake by Kapka Kassabova

2/5 stars

How’d I find it? I loved being a member of the Graywolf Galley Club, receiving advance copies like this (plus swag).

Why not 3 or more stars? Kassabova steeps herself in the history and culture of Lake Ohrid and Lake Prespa in the southern Balkans, her grandmother’s homeland, and learns how the region has shaped her own identity. The book’s languid and circuitous meandering failed to hold my interest despite the poetic voice at play in the writing. Nearly four hundred pages of examples of the area’s complexities return the reader to the premise of the introduction. Yes, yes, war and history shape people, but where might this journey have led with a more innovative approach?

The Chimney Sweeper's Boy by Barbara Vine

2/5 stars

How’d I find it? A relative who loves a good thriller passed this one along.

Why not 3 or more stars? After novelist Gerald Candless dies suddenly, his daughter Sarah takes on a project to write a memoir about her beloved dad and uncovers a tangle of secrets that puts everything into question, even his identity. While Ruth Rendell/Barbara Vine sure can string together a charming sentence, the mystery doesn’t earn the sweet time it takes to unravel.