before we were yours

If you haven’t read more of my blogs, you won’t know I’ve been a foster parent for over a decade. So I tend to try and avoid books like Before We Were Yours since they can feel either (1) really personally devastating or (2) overly saccharine with a false happy ending.

Stories need a bad guy. And books about foster care and adoption, I find, have to pick a bad guy, too, and it’s usually the sexually abusive foster parents. Not saying it doesn’t happen (of course it does) but that is not something I like to read for fun. Of course, historically, a lot of people want the bad guy to be the birth parents which is often unfair, too. Again, not saying it doesn’t happen (of course it does) but let’s not just jump to conclusions that all kids in the system have terrible birth parents — because they don’t.

I didn’t LOVE this book, but I can see why a lot of people did. It presents the truth/horror of what Georgia Tann did, but allows you a believably pleasant ending by making the HEA primarily about the next generation.

For a book with a lot of historical value, there’s a bit too much cloak-and-dagger mystery with the modern storyline of a grandchild (or IS she?!) trying to figure out her family’s sordid (or SWEET?!) past. I do appreciate that the author was trying to get people to read a fictionalized book on a tough topic, and I’ll grant this flourish of mystery was probably a marketable way to do it.

The book asks some important questions about healing from trauma, foster care, adoption, and poverty. Not many books about adoption and foster care present the good, the bad, and the ugly, and this one does.

The truth is, every adoption breaks up one family—even as it forms another. It’s always bittersweet.

Worth the read, even if I won’t ever rave about it. Too close to home for me to consider much on this topic “entertainment",” but this story still has merit and should be told.

book review: the winners

I didn’t know the Beartown story was continuing until I saw this book on my sister-in-law’s coffee table and promptly stole it. She’s lucky she’d already finished it…

I loved Beartown. Still one of my favorite books of all time. My review here. I did not love its sequel Us Against You (because it undoes much of Beartown’s positive message by excusing an abuse of power through its promotion of a relationship between a teacher and a student).

I wasn’t sure what to expect with the third book, especially since it’s MASSIVE in length compared to the first two. What am I getting myself into? I wondered.

The Winners introduces so many new characters, but it brings back your old friends. It’s like a homecoming reunion.

Spoilers for Beartown and Us Against You below, but no spoilers for this book.

The best part of Backman is the way you deeply know a character after just a few sentences. This man is the master of the short glimpse. The three-page intro to Hannah and John (and the way he flips your perceptions on their head) is probably the best example of his genius in this series. He somehow captures someone’s essence so quickly.

It’s interesting how some books will tell you all about a character’s hair color, height, eye color (and breast size if it’s a male author writing a female character) but leave out their actual personality. Backman is the opposite. You’ll know their deepest fears, their greatest strength, their desperation, and the depth of their moods even if you don’t remember what they look like. He actually does you a favor but not giving all the characters names - some people stay as “the editor-in-chief” or “the colleague” all the way through the book so you don’t have to keep as many small-town-inhabitants straight in your mind.

His commentary on marriage is so deep:

The hard part of a marriage isn't that I have to live seeing all your faults, but that you have to live with me seeing them.

I think, just due to its length, there were a few parts I skimmed. There are some bits that get preachy, where I think the author is probably trying to undo what some readers may have perceived as his overly rose-colored-glasses view of what happens when you report an assault. (Beartown has a huge up-hill battle but ultimately most people believe the victim. It seems the author is trying to say with this book that he understands that is not always the case.) There’s also a more explicit description of an assault than I remember from Beartown, which I did not wish to dwell on.

The Winners was worth the time investment, and more. You’re looking for heroes, and you find them. You’re looking for villains, too, but you mostly find deep sadness, guilt, confusion, insanity, a history of abuse, and a lot of conflicting feelings of judgment that make you think. Makes you worry. Makes you want to talk to your kids more about difficult topics.

The ending of this trilogy is so satisfying. Backman gives you glimpses into the future of every character so you know how their stories end — even minor characters get the full-future treatment so you can really imagine the generations to come. It’s magic. There’s 300 books, at least, in this novel — a Backman paragraph is better than a novel from a lot of other authors.

This book has the best final two lines, I think, of any novel I can recall reading. I want to tell you but I promised no spoilers.

Grr. I want to tell you though. It’s just so good.

Go read the book.

The last two sentences are bliss.

book review: leonard and hungry paul

A note: Why is he called Hungry Paul? Well, read the book and you still won’t know. It is never explained. This is infuriating, as I feel like I’m best friends with all the characters now and they haven’t let me in on their inside joke. This is 100% not ok.

Leonard and Hungry Paul was such a sweet book. Nothing whatsoever happened but also the people lived very dear, normal, kind lives. In some stories, I find myself worn out because there’s no one to root for. I need at least one person who isn’t making terrible choices to make their life worse.

Somehow in this book, I was rooting for everyone. Leonard, Shelley & Patrick, Hungry Paul, Peter & Helen, Grace & Andrew, Mrs. Hawthorn & Barbara. I’m sad I didn’t get to meet Leonard’s mother; I obviously would have liked her. I read a review that called this “a coming of age story for the already aged” and that is a perfect summary.

The ending was so sweet. I know I used that word twice, but it really was just the gentlest and most unexpectedly endearing turn of events. I am delighted. Also this book had so many genuinely funny moments that felt so normal to life. My own extended family is full of energy and life and laughter. The sewing kit, the mime interview… these things just felt so hysterically believable to me.

You may wish to note the above.

book review: the muse of nightmares

After Strange the Dreamer comes The Muse of Nightmares. First, I respect Laini Taylor because there are so many stories that could be told in this world, but she kept it at two so the story stays strong and doesn’t continue it endlessly, watering it down until people who liked the originals are wondering why they’re still here. I hate that about book series.

The Muse of Nightmares picks up immediately but also introduces some deep new characters. (Once again, content warning as the sexual violence in this series remains, albeit generally implied, but a central theme, and many characters are handling their trauma with varying degrees of anger, peace, desires for revenge, and more.)

With the introduction of other worlds, much backstory is added to explain the breadth of the evil that surrounds Weep. And if you didn’t already hate the bad guys, you get a longer list of reasons to hate them.

Neither of these books could be considered “happy” or having an HEA, but they do offer at least a realistic sigh of relief when some of the violence of war ends.

book review: strange the dreamer

Strange the Dreamer gives us a lowly librarian who dreams of more, then gets more than he bargained for.

As opposed to the other book featuring a blue-skinned female lead that I read and did not love, this one I enjoyed. It was fast paced and surprising a few times, and I really enjoyed the portrayal of dreams which are, no surprise based on the title, a very relevant part of the book. Also, this story alone didn’t feel entirely incomplete even though it starts a two-part series.

(Content warning: there is a fair bit of sexual violence which is not explicit but a very weighty overarching theme of the abuses of power that are the central conflict in this story.)

This is a fantasy world with gods (well, slain gods, thanks to the godslayer, the saddest guy you’ve ever met) and — oops, there’s someone in there — their half-human children that live in a massively immoveable behemoth hovering over the city of Weep. It’s an interesting setup as the reader moves between the settings and understands the terror each feels for the other. There’s a huge element of prejudice to be overcome, and a large skills gap of magic to be overcome and explained.

Memorably, a totally maniacally crazy girl that is generally pretty freaky. Also a spoiled brat man-child and some metal animal giants.

The names in this duology irritated me a lot at first — oh, really, the weird guy’s name is Strange, mmhmm — but they kind of grow on you. The town where all the terrible and sad things have happened is called Weep, and you just sort of get immersed with that as part of the world.

book review: hidden figures

Yes, I know I’m years behind on reading this, but there’s only so many hours in the day — and there are a LOT of pages out there. Hidden Figures was absolute perfection. What an uplifting and exciting true sweeping account of black women in the sciences. Wow.

People told me this book was about Katherine Goble Johnson and the other black female mathematicians who helped win the Space Race. They’re not wrong, but they’re also not really right. It’s so very much more than that.

This nonfiction piece read like fiction. It was just so exciting. Dozens of characters can be a little difficult to keep track of, but you quickly realize who the main names are and the rest can become a beautiful buzz of “everything else that was also happening.”

I, being the Trekkie I am, knew all about Dr. King’s contribution to the final frontier, but the way that Shetterly basically uses it as the final story to ice the cake… [air kiss] sheer perfection.

Side note, I watched the movie right after. Mistake. I knew it, and I did it anyway. I hate to be the person who says the book was better (even though it always is), but in this case, the book was so so so much infinitely better. And it wasn’t even a bad movie. The book was just that good.