1.
China Miéville: The City & The City - 9/10
At first I was a bit reluctant to read this book because the main focus of the plot revolved around a detective solving a murder, and in general I do not read crime fiction and detective novels, but I love surrealism and alternative realities so I was really intrigued by the concept of these two different cities coexisisting within the same location.
Over all I really enjoyed this book, though I do have some mixed feelings about certain aspects of it. On the one hand I found the realistic approach the author took to the concept was an interesting one, and the way in which it was an examination of urban life, society, politics, and so forth. On the other hand I have to admit a part of me was hoping for a bit more "fantastic" moments and perhaps hoping that it would bend the bonds of reality even further than it did.
2.
H.G. Wells: The Time Machine - 9/10
Generally I am not really into sci-fi but I figured Wells is a classic, so I should give him a try and all in all I ended up quite enjoying this book. I did find that it was a bit slow at the start, but once he actually began to travel back into time and was telling of his adventures it really picked up. I have always liked those kind of adventure stories which involve traveling to strange new places and encounters with strange and new creatures/people.
3.
Theodore Dreiser: Sister Carrie -10/10
I was a bit daunted by the size of this book but once I started reading it, it actually went by rather quickly. I found it to be quite an interesting story and I really enjoyed reading it. I really liked Dreiser's style of writing and the complexity of his characters. This really makes me want to read an American Tragedy now.
4.
Nevil Shute: A Town Like Alice -9/10
Since I have posted an official review for this one I will try not to repeat myself too much again here. Only say that this book took me by surprise. I liked it a good deal more than I thought I would. I loved the narrative style and I found the story engaging to read and I loved the characters.
5.
David Mitchell: The Thousand Autumns of Jacob de Zoet -8/10
It starts out really slowly, though I did enjoy the history of the book as it is about the Dutch Trading company in Japan, which was quite interesting, because of the isolation laws of Japan there was this man made island built called Dejima which is where the traders were housed because they were not allowed to enter the country. But the first half of the book was a bit tedious to read, but it did begin to really pick up once you got into and the story took off and overall I quite enjoyed it.
6.
Marguerite Duras: The Ravishing of Lol Stein-9/10
This is a beautifully lyrical, haunting and somewhat bizarre little book which really does provide the reader with a very unique reading experince. I was spellbound by the story as it started to unweave itself.
7.
Hillary Mantel: Wolf Hall-8/10
I love historical fiction, and only recently started really getting into Tudor history and this book was all the rave and very hyped up. I have to say I have rather mixed feelings about it. I was not quite as blown away by it as I would have expected from everything I heard, yet I cannot say that I found it to be a disappointment either. It did have its interesting points and I liked the perspective for the story, telling it from Cromwell's point of view which I thought was quite a unique way to approach the story. But I did not altogether agree with the way in which she went about trying to portray Cromwell as a sympathetic character, as I think there was a heavy author bias in the story. Also I did not care that much for the narration style of the book which at times was difficult to follow, confusing, and for me failed to truly explore the depths of the characters so that I never really got completely drawn into the story.
8.
Michel Faber: The Crimson Petal and the White -8/10
An exploration behind the veneer of the Victorian age, and most particularly focuses upon the issue of prostitution of that time, and with the freedom of the modern age explores into the subject of the sexual oppression which bred hypocrisies and depravity and addresses the way in which in many ways both men and women were victims of the age.
9.
Michelle Moran: Madame Tussuad: A Novel of the French Revolution-9/10
I have always been interested in the French Revolution but never had the chance to read anything about it within the realm of historical fiction so I was very interested in this novel. I really enjoyed it I thought it was a well crafted story that moved along quickly and was engaging from the start.
10.
Ian McEwan: On Chesil Beach-9/10
This is a book which I never would have thought to read on my own. As I know they say don't judge a book by its cover, but based upon the cover of the book, the title, and the person who wrote it I would have presumed it to be some romance story, and though one could argue it is a romance, it was not some insufferable, sappy, sentimental romance. But my mom read this book and told me she thought I might like it, actually the way she put it was, this books was kind of weird so you would probably enjoy it. We have very different reading tastes but she knows what I don't like so I trusted it would not be some eye rolling love story. And I ended up enjoying the book a lot more than I would have guessed and I was surprised by the beauty of the writing itself.
Originally Posted by IceM
Reply With Quote
