The American Suzuki Institute is almost here! We have several book talks and signings organized during institute. They are open for anyone–you don’t have to be attending institute to come.
We will be in the Noel Fine Arts Center at UWSP, room 201 (Stevens Point, Wisconsin)
Monday and Thursday, Aug 1 and 5, at 11:00am
Monday and Thursday, Aug 9 and 11, at 11:00am
We hope to see you there!
I’m not a book snob. I like to read just about every genre and I can enjoy sleazy romances as much as great literature as much as wacky sci-fi. Even with the books I don’t enjoy, I can usually find things good about them and understand why others would want to read them.
These qualities make me, I think, a good book reviewer. I review books for the Historical Novels Society. I’ve enjoyed reading many of the books I’ve been sent; others I didn’t really like myself, but it was easy to see the qualities that others would enjoy and write about those aspects. In fact, a book I didn’t like very much was recently given a starred review by HNR because I was so positive about certain aspects of the book.
I hate writing bad reviews. I think that there is a reader for every book, and my review should clearly explain who would enjoy the book, and (perhaps less clearly) who would not enjoy the book. Also, I hate to hurt a person’s feelings. Every author spent a lot of hard work creating his/her story, and I want to be able to applaud some aspect of the writing.
That said, I’m blogging today because I finished a book this morning that I think is irredeemably bad. And I’m SO ANGRY about it. There is nothing good about this book. The writing is clunky and awkward and repetitive and awful. The characters are flat and unrealistic and unlikeable. It’s supposed to be a romance, but there is practically no romance and when romance does happen it is embarrassing. It’s also a war story, but there is little to no action.
I’ll admit the plot was a good idea–I asked to review the book based on the storyline, so perhaps this is an audience appeal. But I can’t imagine anyone reading beyond that first chapter. I had to, because I had to review it. What I really can’t understand is how this got published.
How?
Again, I’m not a book snob. I like almost everything. But this book was garbage. Utterly bad.
How?
You have two options for buying The Stolen Goldin Violin online:
Jim Laabs Music, a Stevens Point music store, has made The Stolen Goldin Violin available from its website. Laabs offers world-wide shipping and credit card payment. Here’s the link:
Jim Laab’s Music, The Stolen Goldin Violin
The Aber Suzuki Center at UWSP will accept payment by check. Print the order form below and mail it with your check to the address on the form.
About ten years ago I read Girl with a Pearl Earring, a beautifully crafted, brilliant book by Tracy Chevalier. After reading it, I wanted to be a writer again. I was inspired to sit down and write, to mould a story, invent and develop characters. It took me three years, but I finished Charlotte’s Inheritance. It is not yet published, but I now consider myself a writer.
Last week I started reading A.S. Byatt’s The Children’s Book. It is an incredible novel, with a host of amazing characters, and so much information about the turn of the twentieth century. She writes so skillfully, and I learn so much without feeling like I’m being lectured at. While writing Charlotte’s Inheritance, I read other works by Byatt, and I feel like her “instructional” prose influenced that story. However, I do not feel inspired by The Children’s Book. Instead, I feel disheartened, unworthy, incapable of creating anything worthwhile. Her standard is so high, and my ability so low, why do I bother?
Intellectually, I’ve been wondering why those two responses? The Girl with the Pearl Earring remains one of my favorite books. Byatt’s new novel has not set a standard that Chevalier did not reach. Why does one incredible book inspire and another incredible book deflate?
Is it my own mood? The book I’m currenly writing isn’t progressing well. I am having trouble making myself work on it, and it isn’t growing at the rate it should. When I’m reading Byatt, I’m neglecting Olivia. Is that it? Is it something else?
As a reader, I’ve always been focused on story and character. I don’t need to be kept breathless with constant action and excitement because an exceptional, complex character will keep me engaged. However, books that have long passages devoted to setting and other descriptive narrative not directly related to character or story bore me. I discovered a few years ago that as a reader I actually just skim through these sections. I don’t read them with my full attention. I don’t care what kind of dresses people are wearing or what sort of furniture is in the room; I don’t care about the no-name people walking down the street and what they are doing; I want to find out what will happen to the real characters.
When I became a writer I discovered (no surprise) that I had trouble writing good description. Although I don’t like to read it, setting is important and needs to be handled, whether in short concise sentences or long detailed paragraphs. This is especially true in historical fiction because the reader needs to understand and connect with the environment of the story. Having skimmed this kind of narrative for so many years, I now give it my full attention.
And now that I’m doing it, I can’t help but wonder: how much of this does the reading public want? Some writers do it, in my opinion, exceptionally well: Tracy Chevalier, Philippa Gregory, Markus Zusak. Their writing is poetic, descriptive and concise. I don’t even realize I am reading setting, or if I do, it is so well written and fascinating that it works for me. I never feel the need to skim with these authors. Other extremely successful historical novelists put so much into their settings that the setting becomes a character in the novel. I admire their ability to do this, and yet the setting is not a character I care about. Although I love Claire and Jamie and their story, I stopped reading the Outlander series because I was so tired of wading through material I didn’t care about.
I find this true of modern short stories as well. I feel like I’m missing something. Most short stories I have read recently (in the New Yorker or in published collections) leave me thinking: Huh? They seem to have very little story and fairly boring characters. I don’t mean to seem anti-intellectual or uncultured. I’m hoping to have a conversation about this with people who do get it and can explain to me why they love the modern short story or Gabaldon’s lengthy narrative.
So, comment please!
Here are my best books from 2009. They are in alphabetical order because I could not possibly rank them. They are all excellent.
The Book Thief
by Markus Zusak
Death is the narrator, and a sympathetic one too. World War II is a busy time for Death, but he several times encounters a young German girl (the Book Thief) and is entranced by her story, which he tells to us, the readers. I would kill to write like Zusak. OK, so not really, but his writing is poetry: thoughtful, fresh and brilliant. I read some passages over and over because I loved the imagery. Some readers, I know, find this distracting. Marketed as a YA novel, many of those readers might not drool over the language (as I did), but the story is strong as well. Everyone I know who read it loved it.
The Guernsey Literary and Potato Peel Pie Society
by Mary Ann Schaffer and Annie Barrows
It’s great to see an epistolary novel do so well; I’m not alone in raving about this story. It is a collection of (fictional) letters written just after World War II, focusing on what happened to people who lived on Guernsey during the war. Sad and funny, hopeful and tragic. A great read.
Mistress of the Sun
by Sandra Gulland
The Sun is, of course, the Sun King, Louis XIV of France. The mistress is Louise de la Valliere. Gulland masterfully blends fact and fiction, love and treachery, magic and mystery. I read it almost a year ago, so it is hard to relay details, but I remember that it was excellent.
The Name of the Wind
by Patrick Rothfuss
This was a re-read. It is the first of a fantasy trilogy and brilliantly written. Whether you are an avid fantasy reader or not, the story of Kvothe and his search for self and truth will pull you in. It’s much more than just a fantasy novel. Pat has won lots of awards for this book and he deserves every single one of them. I’m impatiently waiting for the next installment.
Outlander
by Diana Gabaldon
This book had a slow start for me, but so many people have raved about it, I pushed through. Since it is on this list, you can bet I’m glad I did. Claire Randall, a field nurse from World War II is getting re-acquainted with her husband on a trip to Scotland when she is magically transported back 200 years. Claire’s desire to return to her own time becomes complicated by her love for Jamie Fraser. 1740s Scotland is a dangerous time, and Claire, knowing history, knows exactly how dangerous. I think I read the last 200 pages without breathing. It is the first in a series and I’ll be picking up the next at the library as soon as some unknown, damned slow, reader can return it.
A Thousand Splendid Suns
by Khaled Hosseini
I enjoyed this more than Hosseini’s The Kite Runner, probably because A Thousand Splendid Suns focuses on female characters. His writing is clean and clear and his characters alive. It is a painful yet hopeful story, focused on the lives of Mariam and Laila, two Afghan women, before, during, and after the Taliban.
The Time Traveler’s Wife
by Audrey Niffenegger
This book has become one of my all time favorites. Henry time travels, although he doesn’t want to. He cannot take anything with him, so ends up naked and penniless in a time he doesn’t belong. Clare has known Henry since she was six, because he often travels to her. The first time he meets her, she has known him for nearly fourteen years. With the exception of Henry, this book is rooted in real-life, late-twentieth century America. Henry and Clare’s love story is deep and moving and has haunted me every day since I first finished this book. I’m reading it for the third time. I refuse to go see the movie because I can’t see how this book could be turned into a movie and I don’t want any aspect of the book ruined.
Transgression
by James Nichol
The story of a love affair between a French girl and a German soldier during World War II is alternated with the story of a Canadian sheriff searching for a dead body and then the identity of the body and its murderer. This novel is brilliantly constructed, with the love story moving quickly until it catches up to the Canadian story and the characters find themselves in Canada: who is the murderer and who is the murdered? Nichol’s writing is clean and tight. You won’t be able to put this down until you are done, and then you’ll be disappointed there isn’t more to read.
I’m not sure why there are so many World War II two books in here; it isn’t a time period that normally interests me. Still, a great book is a great book. Deliver your own book suggestions in the comments below.
I’m collecting names. I have two perfect names so far, and I’d love to get more. The two I have are both baseball players:
Felipe Lopez
Aramis Ramirez
Aren’t they great? The assonance and alliteration and overall rhythm of each is spectacular. If you know of any other great names, post them here!
1 September 2009
I got the most amazing rejection letter yesterday. It actually made me feel good. I will copy it here so everyone can read it:
Dear Elizabeth,
I enjoyed reading these pages of Syncopation. You’ve chosen a good subject: a recognizable name who hasn’t been overdone and who has an intriguing back story. There’s also some beautiful writing here. I love the opening piece about the pulse of the universe. You’re also trying some more unconventional devices with the names and the back-and-forth between time periods/narration. I’m not sure these are entirely successful, but I may not be the best judge. I tend to prefer more straightforward narrative. The unconventional elements make this more appropriate for a more literary list than mine.
I’ve enjoyed seeing your work. I wish you the best of luck in finding a home for it.
Sincerely,
[Editor’s name withheld]
Isn’t that a great rejection? Makes me feel so literary and hopeful!
4 August 2009
I learned at the Historical Novels Conference this June that successful authors must have blogs. I cringe a little at this idea, as I am fairly appalled at the amount of personal information published on the web. It seems to me an intimation of bad taste. Would Jane Austen blog to her readers, describing every detail of Harris Bigg-Wither’s marriage proposal? Would she, in her next blog, explain that Bigg-Wither is, in truth, a cad whom she cannot possibly marry, with illustrations of his poor character? I think not.
Nevertheless, I desperately want to be a successful author—the term “successful” here being defined as “published.” So, here is my blog. In entries to come, you will hear about my life as a writer and reader, and as a teacher of writing. In proper good taste, you will learn little about my arousing, arresting, bracing, electrifying, exhilarant, eye-popping, far-out, hair-raising, heady, impelling, racy, rip-roaring, rousing, spine-tingling, , titillating, zestful, and oh-so-mysterious personal life.
(The author would like to thank thesaurus.com for sections of today’s blog.)
Elizabeth Caulfield Felt 