annoyedhumanoid's reviews
163 reviews

I Hope This Finds You Well by Natalie Sue

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Did not finish book. Stopped at 16%.
the writing annoyed me, every emotional reaction rooted in some physical sensation. i didn’t find it funny and i wasn’t hooked by the plot. i loved Eleanor Oliphant and see the similarities, but part of what makes her likable is her willingness to see good in people. in other words, she’s not a hater, but Jolene certainly is and that put me off from her narration. and the audiobook was read with forced woefulness that became overwrought quickly.
Three O'Clock in the Morning by Gianrico Carofiglio

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hopeful reflective fast-paced
  • Plot- or character-driven? A mix
  • Strong character development? Yes
  • Loveable characters? Yes
  • Diverse cast of characters? No
  • Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

4.5

short and sweet, i liked its digestible tackling of big conversations, and it was comforting to see a father-son relationship heal 🤍
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The Bell Jar by Sylvia Plath

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dark reflective medium-paced
  • Plot- or character-driven? Character
  • Strong character development? It's complicated
  • Loveable characters? It's complicated
  • Diverse cast of characters? No
  • Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

4.25

the ending was abrupt—if it had to end with our narrator stepping into an unknown future, why couldn't it have been her
leaving the institution for the outside world again
? there was a lot of casual and even some overt racism, which i wanted to believe was an intentional character flaw that readers were meant to disapprove of, but the novel is way too autobiographical for that to be the case.

overall, though, i enjoyed the journey. my overachievement also culminated in a summer spent in new york city for an expenses-paid career incubator program only to realize i'm not cut out for any of it and get rejected for an opportunity i imagined would prove my worth, with incubation becoming intubation in the form of intensive psychiatric care. thank god they don't do electroshock therapy anymore.

I plummeted down past the zigzaggers, the students, the experts, through year after year of doubleness and smiles and compromise, into my own past.

the way the audiobook was divided into forty-minutes chunks as if Sylvia Plath didn't write the book in chapters… and the same haughty piano melody each time… annoying
Beautiful World, Where Are You by Sally Rooney

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emotional reflective medium-paced
  • Plot- or character-driven? Character
  • Strong character development? Yes
  • Loveable characters? It's complicated
  • Diverse cast of characters? No
  • Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

4.0

a man with the name brady regaling you with your flaws.. too real for me

i appreciated the email chapters for the insight into Alice and Eileen's friendship, but not for the philosophical commentary—it came off as lazy writing to explicate the novel's themes. at least it was in conversation, allowing for input and disagreement from another character.
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Unravelings by Sarah Cheshire

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emotional fast-paced

4.5

Doe has “panic attack” in Sylvia Plath section of the college library.

a triumph of narrative nonfiction. the constructed Title IX proceedings excelled as a storytelling device. i was wary of the apparently real screenshots turning this into a youtube video–style call out "(WITH RECEIPTS)"—which the author is certainly entitled to do, but this book didn't feel like the right place given the intention stated in the prologue. however, the screenshots were kept excerpted, contributing to the mood while leaving the desired ambiguity in tact. finally, the lines of verse breaking up the deposition: i didn't like them at first, but i realized they mirror trauma flashbacks—primitive, repetitive, evocative. my only criticism is for at times juvenile prose.

thanks storygraph for the recommendation! (via personalized similar books to The Idiot)

https://archive.org/details/unravelings0000sara
further reading: https://pankmagazine.com/2017/12/28/unraveling-trauma-title-ix-interview-sarah-cheshire/
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Nimona by ND Stevenson

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adventurous emotional hopeful fast-paced
  • Plot- or character-driven? Plot
  • Strong character development? Yes
  • Loveable characters? Yes
  • Diverse cast of characters? No
  • Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

3.0

having watched the movie first, the source material felt less narratively satisfying. the ending was a little weak—what actually changed for Nimona? the art greatly improves after the first few chapters (the inconsistency would bother me if i was the artist but i’m trying to let go of perfectionism).
Giovanni's Room by James Baldwin

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dark reflective medium-paced
  • Plot- or character-driven? Character
  • Loveable characters? No
  • Diverse cast of characters? No
  • Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

4.5

in the last book i read, Greta & Valdin, Valdin is praised for not being "one of those gay men who says awful things about women" and reading that i was like what! which gay men are those, i'll fight them. these are those gay men.

i was expecting a tragedy of forbidden love between expats in Europe, a proto–Call Me By Your Name, but that's not what this is. rather, Giovanni's Room is a character study of two lost men who come to depend on each other for purpose, until their foundations crumble. the pacing was excellent and the journey as bleak as it was for our characters. i was going to make fun of my edition's Tortured Poets Department–ass cover (black-and-white photo of subject posed in almost cartoonish angst), but it's actually quite fitting:
David, our narrator,
is the smallest man who ever lived. they're both terrible misogynists, don't get me wrong, but this one is literally an emotional terrorist (albeit unintentional, i believe).
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Greta & Valdin by Rebecca K Reilly

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challenging emotional funny hopeful medium-paced
  • Plot- or character-driven? Character
  • Strong character development? It's complicated
  • Loveable characters? Yes
  • Diverse cast of characters? Yes
  • Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

3.75

get ready to draw a family tree. Greta & Valdin acknowledges the complexity of its cast by prefacing with a character list, but even that's not enough to fully understand all the relationships.

i enjoyed the story lines of Greta and Valdin (the main characters). we're all such lovers, like truly what could be more important. despite complaining about its complexity, i admit to also liking the family drama. it felt like a telenovela but not tele, so just a novella, except it's a full-length novel, so really never mind. i feel the same about this book as i did with Disorientation by Elaine Hsieh Chou: the execution was imperfect but the premise was so interesting and the atmosphere so unique that i will be on the lookout for similar books.

i didn't enjoy, though, how
Valdin could spend so much time away from his sister (and the rest of his family) without ever, in the text, thinking of her (or them) or offering a reason for ghosting. and then he comes back already like "I’m trying to be more responsible. I’m realising that just as many people rely on me as I rely on them" ("Mint")
. it was unrealistic and felt like asking for forgiveness from the reader without having earned it. i was also uncomfortable with just how quickly time passes (several weeks between chapters). what happened in the interim? surely at least one noteworthy interaction—what am i missing out on??
Either/Or by Elif Batuman

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dark funny reflective medium-paced
  • Plot- or character-driven? Character
  • Strong character development? No
  • Loveable characters? Yes
  • Diverse cast of characters? Yes
  • Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

4.25

this felt tedious at times, more so than The Idiot, but also funnier at others. it took a step back from the college aspect, which i had found so intoxicating in the first book. after the
S&M
-themed party, it veered into depressing, from the recitation of “The Rules” straight out of the 1800s to the consecutive
unpleasant, even non-consensual, sexual encounters
. reading these parts brought me less joy than those that preceded it, but it felt realistic and even relatable to my own experiences and remains important to portray.

finally, the ending was abrupt—does it even complete the academic year? surely Selin would return to Harvard in the autumn, presumably where a hypothetical sequel would begin, like its two predecessors, but then we would be missing her time in Russia. it feels disorganized for the series and like there was a deadline to meet.

gripes aside, the majority of this was a pleasure to read. i laughed out loud at work while listening to the audiobook. having read Either/Or immediately after The Idiot, the two felt like one continuous narrative, one stream of consciousness, split into two volumes—which i’m okay with! if they had been together, big book fear probably would have prevented me from experiencing this wonderful series altogether. this unbroken stream of consciousness never felt like being inundated with a self-important person’s world view: our narrator doesn’t have the answers and knows it, creating a feeling of learning and a conversation with the reader. it’s a conversation i want to keep having.

but Selin needs to stop sending her emails prematurely or to the wrong recipient. i can’t handle that trope.

further reading: Let’s Go: Greece & Turkey, 1998, with contributors including Elif Batuman. https://archive.org/details/letsgogreeceturk0000unse
The Idiot by Elif Batuman

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adventurous funny reflective slow-paced
  • Plot- or character-driven? Character
  • Strong character development? No
  • Loveable characters? Yes
  • Diverse cast of characters? Yes
  • Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

4.5

the worst man you know, and you’re stuck in his orbit.


at first, this book was such a refreshing view of the first-year college experience that i was disappointed when it got caught up in a man. but at the halfway point i began to appreciate it showing just how insufferable he is, that worst man you know, and how foolish you were to go back to what hurt you every time.

until: his charm worked on me too. i wanted more of him, more than even Selin did. what starts by holding up a mirror to your stupidity then gently redirects your gaze to the huge world behind your reflection, beyond the endless, ruinous chase for love.

but it also shows you, in that huge world, a whole throng of people who all want to love and be loved, like you. or, one other person who does. but if we aren’t the only one in something, mustn’t there be countless more? i’ve constructed playlists comprising dozens of songs written by hundreds of people that collectively capture to a tee how i feel, but never have i felt more solidarity in those feelings than i have from this one book.

“I’m not Turkish, I don’t have a Serbian best friend, I’m not in love with a Hungarian, I don’t go to Harvard. Or do I?”

“Long after I finished The Idiot, I looked at every lanky girl with her nose in a book on the subway and thought: Selin.”

we’re all the idiot.

or, at least, i don’t think i’m the only one.