oIt will come as no surprise that this is not a light read, but this reflection on antisemitism is both interesting and informative. I particularly appreciated how it is gives context to some of the commentary that I commonly hear from Jewish friends and read by Jewish authors. One thing that stood out to me in particular is the way in which many  progressive Pro-Palestine movements' boycotts of Israeli companies is perceived as antisemitic even as many leaders of those boycotts reiterate that they distinguish between the State of Israel and Jewish people.  The explanation in this book is really compelling and also reminds us how close in time we are to the time before the Holocaust when Germans were encouraged not to buy from Jewish stores. Her writing is both so well researched and so emotionally compelling that I found myself leaving each section with more compassion for and understanding of why somethings are perceived as antisemitic even when non-Jews might resist that description. 

It took me a while to finish this book, so was reading it about six weeks ago when the lethal bombing attack at the protest in Boulder occurred and I was impressed by how it shifted how much it impacted how I thought about the aftermath of that incident.  The core idea in the book that hate crimes against Jews are only given attention to the extent that the narrative can be used for a purpose that distracts from the horror of antisemitic violence to the benefit of others played out in real time as I was watching.  Almost as soon as the news broke, the immigrant accused of the bombing was arrested and charged, but rather than using the moment to focus on hate crimes and violence, the federal government arrested and deported his  wife and children, bypassing due process, thus shifting the focus from his Jewish victims and instead to using the event for political gain just in exactly the manner the book describes.  You have to love when a book provides such relevant insight and analysis even it was published a few years ago.

Recommend.

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This book has a combination of things I usually do not like. 
 
First, I am not a fan at all of the social media influencer memoir.  I think somewhere fairly early in the pandemic, I overdosed on crappy ones that I got for free or that were recommended to me and I have not gotten over that.  They tend to have a number of features I do not like, such as referring back to what they posted, quoting those posts, and bragging about how early an adopter they were of a specific platform and how the fame they got and the money they made from said platform saved or ruined (or both) their lives. Many of these books are often compilations of blog posts that do not transcend mediums well when they get put into a book without a good editor. They are often repetitive in a way that reminds me of people who just tell the same few stories over and over again. 
 
Second, I tend not to love the writings of standup comics, especially ones who have a chaotic style of raunchy standup. I can take that in very small doses, but an entire 8 hour book is just too much.  The writing here felt a bit like Jenny Lawson (Let's Pretend This Never Happened), which I kind of just despised. 
 
Third, I usually do not like books read by the author. I often think they should have hired a professional with a voice I actually want to listen to, which I know might sound harsh, but I really love a good narrator and one way to tell a really good narrator is when you speed it up (which I virtually always do), you can still understand them clearly and their voice still conveys the emotion. This is not true of mediocre narrators and author are usually mediocre or worse, in my opinion.
 
While there were spots where she fell into the annoying "this is what I posted when I was an early adopter of instagram" context, it was short-lived.  She definitely had places that were slightly repetitive and other places where she went on too long about details that felt show-off-y to me without advancing the story which caused the narrative to lag a little. It felt like she really needed a more heavy handed editor.
 
That said, this book was, for the most part, an outlier on all fronts. It is very difficult to write trauma comedy, either for stand-up or in book form, and this is really trauma comedy at its best.  The places where she veers away from the style are the places that should have been cut. I particularly loved how she situated her complex relationship between humor and tragedy in the context of her cultural and familiar history. The intergenerational way in which her family used humor and laughter to survivor horrible things was so richly described here. She didn't have to directly talk about "rape jokes" to be talking about rape jokes told by survivors in her family.  It wasn't just that she decided one day to make comedy about trauma, she explains how this was passed down as a way to survive. I found it insightful, poignant, and (yes, even) funny. Through the bets parts, I found myself on the verge of both laughing and crying and in a place of acceptance that this was ok and maybe could even be healing  It reminded me of Hannah Gadsby in this respect.
 
Recommend. But maybe skim through the parts in the middle about buying the expensive purses and the celebrity name dropping parts.
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A Holocaust novel, this book reminded me so much of the more well-known novel The Book Thief that I actually had to make sure that I wasn't misremembering that it was the same book--or at least the same author.  While The Book Thief was narrated by Death, The Little Liar was narrated by Truth.  The story is, of course, both incredibly depressing while also being a story of resilience for those who survived and it does a good job of highlighting the different ways the characters survived and what it cost them. I found the respect for the disparate impacts of trauma on different people to be relatively sophisticate and interesting. Some of the plot twists felt farfetched and the over-done theme of the non-Jews who, out of no where, stepped in to help was trite. The use of Truth as the narrator felt a bit gimmicky.  I had some sympathy for this, since it must be difficult to find a fresh way to engage with material this dark that will find an audience and yet I just found the narration scheme to be distracting.  I am likely in the minority in this respect, though, since I had a similar reaction to The Book Thief.  
 
Not recommended. 
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As played out in this unexpected of a novel, a nix the thing you love the most is the thing that will hurt you the most. The concept is cleverly weaved into the story in a multitude of ways as a complex plot unfolds in multiple time periods and from multiple narrators.  It does not start out in the same place it ends up.  By that, I mean, it starts out seeming like it is going to be a tired old narrative about the burned out college professor, as odds with his students and grumpy about life.  But, it turns into not that at all and before long it is a story about a complex mother-son relationship, with secrets and heartbreaks. 
There were parts of the plot, especially in the later parts where it veers into legal drama territory, where parts of the story were unrealistic enough that it was hard to ignore some of the liberties take with basic legal process, and these were enough for me to say the book isn't on my recommendation list, but it is really close, primarily because I did really like how the title played into a multi-layered plot with unusually  complicated interpersonal dynamics. 
Overall, I have landed on a Not Not recommended.
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Another murder mystery, of which I seem to have had a lot more this year than usual, there is a lot to like in this story.  Set in a remote location at the destination of a successful tv star and a magazine editor, the story is told from multiple pointsof view, which narrators being more and less reliable, revealing all the hidden motives and guarded secrets they have in small bits as the story unfolds.  These back stories set the stage for the conflicts that arise, but the biggest secrets are held back and keep you guessing as more and more people have reason to murder others at the party and you don't know until the end who is murdered, let alone who did it. I really liked the story and thought it was cleverly written and the unusual format which could have felt gimmicky actually flowed really well. I will say that there was one too many backstories and as the last one played out, my willingness suspension of disbelief was pushed a little too far. It just felt too unlikely that the person with the least connect to the main circle of people just happened to have had motive to kill one of the other guests because of a connection that neither was aware of and that unfolds with way too much coincidence.  It did add a layer of extra cleverness and it was woven into the story early on in a way that made it all make sense when it came together, but really it just seemed so unlikely to have been possible that it distracted from an otherwise really tightly plotted story. Even with that, I am giving it a soft recommendation.
Recommend
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I understand that this nearly 1,000 page book is revered as brilliant and that the author has received the Nobel Prize for Literature for another novel.  I know that many intelligent people think the book is amazing. I, however, feel like it was pretty much lost on me.  I found it a slog, pedantic, male-centric, and frankly boring.  Yes, some of the historical pieces were mildly interesting, but I have decided that I do not find 18th century Poland particularly enthralling.  Sometimes, it felt like the descriptions would never end and that the plot was a very long ways away from the words I was reading.  Other times, some of the narrative would pull me in, particularly the portions that compared the Jewish protagonist's exploration of other communities. But, those parts were short lived and almost as soon as I realized I was engaged, the moment would be gone and I would return to feeling that this book was just too heady for me.


Do not recommend.

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This is a fabulous murder mystery that I can't stop thinking about.  It is so well written, the characters are so richly developed, and the plot is delightfully complicated that I am seriously contemplating reading it a second time.  Set across time from 1961 to 1975 as they investigate an old murder and a new disappearance, the complexity of interpersonal dynamics and histories just pulled me in, all the time being filled with red herrings and twists, as the investigation proceeds. The standout character is the young woman detective no one takes seriously and the ending just reinforced how much I loved her.  I found the portrayal of sexism and elitism to be well portrayed, ever present, without having it be the sole focus of the story--reminding me of how even during my younger years it was so pervasive we often accepted it without noticing at all. Did I mention the ending of this book was so good? So often these complex stories have predictable, unrealistic, or just stupid endings that don't hold together, but this one was right on point.
Highly recommend.

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I am so enthralled with the very concept of this book in which the author uses her obsession with sea creatures as the basis of these fabulous life stories that use the sea creatures as complex allegories for her life. Even the title, referring to the point in an ocean where the light can no longer penetrate, relates to moments in her life.  As a memoir, it is insightful and tells the story of a unique life of Queerness and mixed-race identity.

I particularly appreciated how the author's experience of trauma and sexual assault were presented in such an unusual and poignant way.  All of this was done in the midst of providing rich details about marine ecosystems and creatures, some of which (like the octopus), we often hear about in other contexts, but some  of which I knew nothing about and found fascinating.  This is just such an unusual set-up and read. 

I highly recommend it.

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This is the first Brian Sanderson book that I have read that I did not hate.  I was fully prepared not to like it, but it turns out that it was pretty clever.  The fantasy world was fascinating, with the ocean of something-not-water, the talking rat, and the hexes. The main character, a young woman, is constantly underestimated by everyone ,including herself, and my favorite plot twist was a brilliant strategy she came up with to out-maneuver another character and foil their evil plot.  I didn't see the twist coming and I was just so impressed with how she turned the situation on its head, all while realistically suffering from imposer syndrome and working her way up from the very lowest position on a boat of pirates.  Despite my traditional dislike of the Sanderson books, I am going to give this one a recommend.

Recommend.
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I really enjoyed Beyond the Cerulian Sea and so I was disappointed that I did not love this book.  I really don't like being spoon fed morality in my novels and this one left nothing up to interpretation.  The metaphors and symbology were just too obvious and the pionts felt like they were being rammed down my throat at some points.  I obviously think that having trans representation in fiction is important and powerful, but my underlying take away from this book was that only magical beings (read Queer) can take care of magical kids and magical beings can only depend and trust magical beings. I can understand where this mentality comes from, but I just think that there is a lot more nuance than what this books allows for.  I found it pretty depressing, rather than inspiring, and a letdown.  The first book took quite a while to grow on me, but once it did, I was all in.  This one had the benefit of my coming in really excited for it and just progressively getting more and more let down as it went on.

Do not recommend.

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