nomadreader

Dear Ruth Emmie Lang, I'm sorry it took me so long to read Beasts of Extraordinary Circumstance, but I'm so glad I finally did so I can tell the world how much I loved it. I've had it on my shelf since October 2017, when Steph Opitz picked it for Book of the Month . It wasn't a book I would picked without Steph's recommendation. It didn't sound like something I would like. I don't usually like magical realism. I don't really animals or nature very much (I know, I know.) But Steph introduced me to Taylor Jenkins Reid with The Seven Husbands of Evelyn Hugo , so I vowed to always choose her picks when she was a Book of the Month judge. But on my shelf it sat, unread. Then I signed up for the sixth  Litsy Markup Postal Book Club , and I thought, why not use one of the (many) Book of the Month books sitting on my shelf unread? So I picked six and had my group pick, and they all picked Beasts of Extraordinary Circumstance . The choice was made for me: I ...

The backstory: Just Wanna Testify  is the sixth novel in Pearl Cleage's West End series (my reviews of  Some Things I Never Thought I'd Do ,  Babylon Sisters ,  Baby Brother's Blues ,   Seen It All and Done the Rest , and Til You Hear From Me .) The basics: As always, Cleage combines a mix of familiar West End faces with new characters. In this case, the Too Fine Five, a group of tall, skinny supermodels seek Blue Hamilton's blessing to do business in the West End neighborhood this week. Note: this review contains spoilers of the plot and the ending. Proceed at your own risk. My thoughts: When I sat down to read the last West End novel, I was filled with happiness and sadness. I've re-read and read all of Pearl Cleage's novels in 2012. I sought the comfort of the familiar: characters, social justice, and people working to change the world. I got that, but I also got something I absolutely didn't expect: vampires. I appreciated Regina's pondering...

Translated from the Spanish by Carol and Thomas Christensen. The backstory:  Like Water for Chocolate , Laura Esquivel's first novel, is one of the 1001 Books to Read Before You Die . The basics: Told in monthly installments interspersed with recipes, Like Water for Chocolate , is the story of the De la Garza family in the Mexican revolution and filled with magical realism of love and cooking. The narrator is the great-niece of Tita, and the novel's focus is the life of Tita, the family's youngest daughter. My thoughts: I first read Like Water for Chocolate  in high school and utterly adored it. Re-reading it fifteen years later, I still enjoyed it, but the magical realism of love's positive and negative effects lacked the dramatic resonance it held for me as a teenager. It is the tradition of Tita's family that the youngest daughter may not marry and must spend her life serving her mother. Tita is enraged, angry and in utter agony when she learns her fate wil...