cyphomandra: fractured brooding landscape (hare by durer)
[personal profile] cyphomandra
I had a tiny moment of rage on visiting the library to find that the young adults’ fiction section has two display stands, one marked “Girls’ books” and one marked “Boys’ books”. I did wonder if they were intentionally problematising this on the boys’ side by having Tanith Lee’s Piratica II and an Alex Sanchez about gay Christians (first two chapters like being hit over the head with a well-meaning brick, so I put it back), but all the girls’ titles suggested a distinct lack of irony. It occurs to me now that I should have put up my own selections, but at the time my inner seething got mixed up with embarrassment at having to pay my overdue fines with a credit card (internet banking timing problem). Maybe I'll sneak back.

Bil Wright, When the black girl sings. Lahni, the black (adopted) daughter of two white parents who are in the process of splitting up, is nominated to compete in a singing competition at her private school. About finding your own voice, in other words, but lightly drawn enough to avoid the brick effect of the Alex Sanchez, and there’s also an interesting subplot with a white boy from the neighbouring boys’ school who pretends to be black and is interested in Lahni, where “interested” balances on a delicate and believable edge between teenage boy incapable of appreciating social nuances and stalker. The church choir where Lahni gets singing tuition from is a little too convenient, especially Marcus (organist/accompanist/singing teacher, who I found difficult to get an age on) and Lahni’s competition less than subtle (as one of the characters themselves says, “One black girl, one Korean girl and one all-American white girl!”) but again, it’s all low-key enough to not throw you out at the time.


Lee Child, Bad luck and trouble. This starts strong – I suddenly realised that I was 122 pages through it and, just possibly, going to be late back from lunch – and then all the tension goes out of it, around about the time they end up in Vegas, and I just kind of meandered on towards the end, no longer convinced that anything particularly important might happen. It has Reacher catching up with the other special investigators from his army days, and although there are tensions between them they’re not extreme, and they fade with prolonged exposure; in the meantime, the external threat never really seems as impressive as its projected body count suggests. It does, however, have some of the feel of a transitional book in terms of what Reacher wants; if the next book goes somewhere with that it could be interesting.


Haruki Murakami, After Dark. This does an amazing job of getting across the grainy, fluorescent-lit atmosphere of a city overnight; diners, hotels, private residences and the gaps between. I thought I’d get annoyed with the lack of resolution, but instead the bits of storyline intersected to just the right amount, all the characters vivid and the events distinct and weighted with meaning (the abandoned phone ringing in the combini, for example). I am currently strongly tempted by Murakami’s What I talk about when I talk about running, which I’ve read two extracts from, and I may have to succumb.

Profile

cyphomandra: fractured brooding landscape (Default)
cyphomandra

May 2025

S M T W T F S
    123
45678910
1112131415 1617
181920 21222324
252627 28293031

Most Popular Tags

Style Credit

Expand Cut Tags

No cut tags
Page generated Jul. 8th, 2025 11:37 am
Powered by Dreamwidth Studios