Clytemnestra by Costanza Casati

Amy   

historical fiction, mythology

In Greek mythology, Clytemnestra was a princess of Sparta. Her sister, Helen, was the beautiful one but Clytemnestra was the strong, brave, and smart one. At the age of 16, she chose to marry a distant king. He traveled home to prepare his kingdom for the arrival of their new queen and their child. But while he was away, Agamemnon journeyed to her city and, because he always wanted what he couldn’t have, he stole her life away to make her his queen. Broken, grieving, and enraged, she promised herself retribution.

I didn’t remember any of these stories from my days of Greek mythology in high school and college. But I did remember a lot of the names. Costanza Cosati did a good job imagining Clytemnestra’s daily life, the personalities of her family members and the other characters, and weaving an engaging tale of a woman who was betrayed multiple times and gets her revenge. I feel the strength of this novel is in the way Cosati pulled together conflicting and limited ancient stories of this heroine and not only filled in the holes but built a compelling story around them to draw a complete picture of Clytemnestra.

I wouldn’t say her story was gripping, but the story provided a good education about the plights of women in ancient Greece and focused on a heroine who was able to eventually make her own way in a man’s world.

The audiobook narrator, Olivia Vinall, did a nice job with this one. She had a limited vocal repertoire but I felt her voice was perfect for this story.  I’ll give her an A-.

Starter Villain by John Scalzi

Lynnie

Amy    

contemporary fiction, science fiction, thriller

 

As the book jacket states, Charlie is not living his best life. Recently divorced, he is working as a substitute teacher and living in his father's home with his cats - the home his siblings would like to sell out from under him, in fact. Charlie's prospects are bleak. That is until his estranged Uncle Jake - billionaire, business mogul, and (surprise, surprise) supervillain - dies and leaves his estate to Charlie. And, as happens in all of my favorite books, shenanigans ensue.

Lynnie's Review

Starter Villain is the second book I've read by John Scalzi & it was wonderful, silly fun.

This book amused me quite a bit and you can tell Scalzi had a wonderful time writing it. You must suspend the realities of normal life to enjoy this book and just go along for the silly, often profane, adventure. It's super quick read at 264 pages, and it was nonstop from start to finish. I enjoyed all the side characters, particularly the other villains and all the animals.

This would be a great book if you just need a quick escape over a long weekend.

Amy's Review

While I found parts of Starter Villain charming, funny, and spirited, a lot of it was slow, far-fetched, and ludicrous. It took me a very long time to get through it because it just didn’t call to me. The belligerent dolphins, who were intended to be highly entertaining by the author, were simply ridiculous to me. In fact, it was about the time the dolphins entered the story that my interest in reading more of the novel began to wane. I felt the already outrageous but cute story had gone too far into the realm of absurdity.

I finished only because my sister was also reading it and I like it when we both read the same novel. But, I’m sorry to say, I likely won’t be reading more John Scalzi.

Emily Wilde's Encyclopaedia of Faeries by Heather Fawcett

Amy  

fantasy

Emily Wilde is a professor of faerie folklore. She also travels the world, identifying and studying faeries, for the purpose of writing her Encyclopaedia of Fairies which would be the first comprehensive publication about all the known faeries of the world. While on a Scandinavian island doing research about the native faeries of that region, her coworker, Bambleby, whom she suspects of being a faerie himself, shows up unexpectedly. Her research trip and field studies are suddenly not entirely in her control.

The story itself is often slow-going due to the nature of “scientific” research and the need for Heather Fawcett to provide a lot of detail in order to bring the reader up to speed on Emily’s interests. The novel is actually the text of Emily’s research notebook so everything is from her perspective. Emily embarks on her systematic study of faeries. She’s not good with people—at all. Thankfully, Bambleby arrives in the story to liven it up a bit. However, even though adventure ensues and there are several scary faerie scenes to add a little excitement, I found myself wishing I had another book to listen to instead. That’s never a good sign. Alas, without another option, I kept listening.  The last fourth of the book is, certainly, the best part.

I kept being reminded of the Veronica Speedwell series because Veronica’s passion is butterflies in a very similar way that Emily’s passion is faeries. It looks like this faerie novel is the first in a series but I’m not interested in hearing more about Emily Wilde. Bambleby turned out to be my favorite character but even he isn’t enough to make me want to read more.

The main narrator, Ell Potter, did a good job. She gave the various characters appropriate accents and inflections and did a nice job voice acting. I’ll give her an A-. Michael Dodds read a few sections which were written by Bambleby within Emily’s notebook. He also did a fine job although his overall participation was very small. I agree with the production decision to have a male voice reading Bambleby's few sections.

The Measure by Nikki Erlick

Amy  

speculative fiction

How would the world react if every person received a mysterious box containing a length of string which indicated the longevity of their lives?

You have to accept an audacious, far-fetched, ridiculous premise at the very beginning of The Measure. It’s a huge ask, honestly. A box arrives for everyone all over the world on the same day? I mean, come on. I hadn’t heard of Nikki Erlick so she hadn’t done anything to earn my trust. Yet, she was asking the readers to just go with her. It’s a big gulp. You have to swallow it whole right at the start to enjoy the novel.

Okay, for book club, I decided to keep reading past the first chapter and take a leap of faith. And I’m so glad I did. We had SO MUCH to talk about at book club!

This novel takes a shocking, widespread experience and imagines human reactions to it. Erlick seemingly considers every angle in terms of how human nature would handle the arrival of the boxes and the fallout from their related discoveries. Of course, there are the nay-sayers and disbelievers. But how can they keep arguing when the materials of the box and string are not even known? How can they keep arguing when scientists have proven that the strings really do indicate the length of the owner’s life? Many analogies could be drawn between the extreme situation in the book and other surprising, shocking experiences in real life like the COVID-19 pandemic or a divisive US President who champions “otherizing” groups of people and fomenting hate. These experiences cause the world to stand up, take notice, reflect, and act.

This the second book I’ve read recently about people being faced with the idea of their own imminent death. This one, while having a much less believable premise, was so much better in terms of the crafting of the storyline and the depth of the situation. Having multiple viewpoints really worked to describe the issues facing the world in light of the boxes’ arrival from multiple perspectives and personalities. Erlick wrote about their different opinions, behaviors, and personal directives. She smartly started with only two character viewpoints and then slowly added more. She then proceeded to cover all sorts of issues like acceptance and grief, re-evaluation of life, privacy, discrimination of “short stringers”, politics/regulations/protests/the need to vote, how schools approached the subject of the strings, strained friendships and romantic relationships, art, culture, and religion. If you knew your life was going to end in the not-too-distant future, how would you change your lifestyle? Would you keep your job? Would you continue to live in the same place? Would you start new adventures? Or would you strike out against enemies, become hostile and jealous, and act out violently? Or, would you not look at your string and remain as ignorant about your lifespan as you were before the strings arrived?

It was my son, when I was telling him about the book’s premise, who caught the fact that Erlick likely chose strings as the box contents due to the fact that The Fates of Greek mythology would cut a thread to determine when someone would die. And then I realized that the box itself is analogous to Pandora’s Box as well. Once you open your box, you can’t put the knowledge about your lifespan back.

Erlick created an unbelievable situation so that she could create a novel around it. But she did an amazing job of thinking about that situation from every angle and plausibly, authentically touching on all the thoughts and issues that would have arisen from different perspectives if that situation did happen. The Measure is mostly about the choices you can make that are within your control and letting things go that are not within your control. It’s thought provoking and a good read overall.

The audiobook narrator, Julia Whelan, was absolutely incredible in this one! I’ve heard her narrate about a dozen audiobooks and she always does a terrific job but I usually have some minor complaint and withhold my highest grade of A+. But this is the second book in a row she’s narrated where she truly earned the A+. For The Measure, I’m giving her a special shout out for her fantastic old man voice!

   

Tired Ladies Take a Stand by Gretchen Anthony

Lynnie

contemporary fiction

In Tired Ladies Take a Stand, we follow four best friends as they navigate their 40s and the stress that comes with the expectations of women over time. I enjoyed Gretchen Anthony's characters, but I also found them so similar on the page that it took me about half the book to remember which friend she was writing about. Their voices - and in many ways their lives - were so similar that it often felt like they were interchangeable. Don't get me wrong, she does differentiate between the women, but unless they are talking about one of those differences, they generally speak with the same voice.

Still, as a woman of a certain age, I related to Emma, Fern, Carolina and Andi and how they managed (or didn't) their children, spouses - both current and former - jobs, and each other. I enjoyed seeing how they were there for each other and how their lives and friendships didn't fall apart when they didn't agree. I was disappointed by each of the women at some point or another in the book, but that's life, isn't it? Ultimately, I enjoyed eavesdropping on seven months of these friends' lives.

All the Broken Places (The Boy in the Striped Pyjamas #2) by John Boyne

Amy  

historical fiction

Gretel, a German girl whose father was a leader in Hitler’s regime, suffered for her father’s crimes and had a difficult young adulthood. She is now an old woman living in England. But her past still haunts her. She has been carrying guilt for over 80 years.

I had not read the first novel in this series, The Boy in the Striped Pyjamas, but All the Broken Places was selected for one of my book clubs. I read it even though I normally prefer to read all the books in a series in the order in which they were written. Thankfully, this novel was terrific even without reading the prequel.

John Boyne is a marvelous writer. This is the third novel of his that I’ve read and I’ve loved them all. He is able to relay the essence of his characters and their time in history perfectly. He has a sense of humor (which isn’t so prevalent in this novel but is still there) and characters who aren’t good or bad but somewhere inbetween. Gretel’s choices, deceits, shining moments, and shames all felt very authentic. The story was so compelling and even had a pleasant surprise near the end that wasn’t necessary but was extremely satisfying. (I’m not talking about the climax at the end, but the simple, heartwarming fact which was divulged to the reader about one of Gretel’s choices.)

Gretel’s story is told alternatingly between her past and her present, in the first person always. This was a very effective way of keeping the momentum going. The audiobook employed two narrators to voice these different times of Gretel’s life. Young Gretel was voiced by Kristin Atherton and old Gretel was Helen Lloyd. They both were perfectly cast for their roles.  Young Gretel required a larger voice repertoire including many different accents. Atherton did a great job with all the voices including male voices! I see she’s an actress with a minor role in one of the few TV series I watch (based on a beloved book series—Outlander) and I will certainly pay more attention to her on screen in the future.  I’m not sure when I last gave an ensemble an A+ but Atherton and Lloyd did an amazing job with this novel and deserve it!