mariball's reviews
65 reviews

Neighbors and Other Stories by Diane Oliver

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adventurous challenging emotional reflective sad tense medium-paced
  • Plot- or character-driven? A mix
  • Strong character development? It's complicated
  • Loveable characters? It's complicated
  • Diverse cast of characters? Yes
  • Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

5.0

An astounding collection of short stories from an author cruelly taken away before she even had the chance to grow into the literary sensation she would have become. Vivid with simple prose, tenderly written characters, and dilemmas so astutely observed it reads fresh decades later. 
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Self Portrait in Green by Marie NDiaye

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challenging mysterious reflective fast-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? It's complicated

3.0

Interesting premise, but I fear that the book is too experimental and abstract- or I’m just too dumb to fully get it. 
Grief Is for People by Sloane Crosley

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dark emotional funny reflective sad fast-paced

3.75

A quick, introspective read about her friend’s suicide and the impact it has on her and her worldview. The theft of her jewelry a month before ties into the event as if it was predestined, a somewhat tenuous link that veers into a mystery short story all on its own but nevertheless an absorbing subplot. There’s no grand revelations on grief here but it’s still a tenderly acute portrayal of a person grappling with the aftermath, making sense of the unsensible. 
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Your Utopia: Stories by Bora Chung

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

5.0

A much stronger story collection than Cursed Bunny, Your Utopia is filled with stories that focuses on technology, dystopia, immortality, and humanity with the absurdity, humor, and strangely emotional brevity Bora Chung expertly entwines. You will get emotional about lonely robots, hold your breath as a linguistics specialist fights off a horde of space cannibals, and contemplate on the nature of humanity and what it means to achieve it. 
The End of the Voyage, Maria Gratia Plena, Your Utopia, and To Meet Her are my personal favorites, but no story falls short here, each so engaging I wish there was more. 
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Piglet by Lottie Hazell

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Did not finish book. Stopped at 24%.
The food descriptions were lovely to read (I’ll let Piglet cook me a meal, that’s for sure), but I just did not click with any of the characters, especially Piglet. I know the themes of the novel is an emotional reckoning with one’s familial roots and commentary of class in present-day Britain, but I found her so mean and childish with how she treats her family and friends because they are simpletons who eat Pizza Hut and casseroles instead of daily three course meals of lamb stew (to be fair, an attitude she picked up when she got with her fiancé). I’m a sucker for great unlikable characters but Piglet ended up being pretty one-dimensional, a character that lacked a certain kind of depth that’s important when you want to center the story around a more morally grey character. I found myself skipping ahead to the last 15 pages just to see how the story ends, and the payoff wasn’t there. 
Photography, A Feminist History by Chronicle Books

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challenging emotional hopeful informative inspiring reflective fast-paced

4.0

Biography of X by Catherine Lacey

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challenging dark emotional informative mysterious reflective sad tense medium-paced
  • Plot- or character-driven? A mix
  • Strong character development? It's complicated
  • Loveable characters? No
  • Diverse cast of characters? Yes
  • Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

4.25

Boy Parts by Eliza Clark

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

5.0

Irina Sturges, a character that really personifies “female rage“ and more. I hate her for the things she’s done-
murder (both human and animal), spiteful cruelty to her friends and acquaintances, exploitation in the name of art
- yet also pity her because of the horrible circumstances she endured as she grew up. Clark’s prose is so strong, assured, and darkly humorous that you feel like you’re in the novel, watching Irina descend into unfathomable darkness again and again, at some points holding your breath in shock, fear, and disgust. 
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Girls Against God by Jenny Hval

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

2.5

“Strangely, it gives me hope, hope that it’s possible to make art primitively, in a way that isn’t steeped in professionalism and compromise. Art that still hates. I remember how much hope there is in hatred.“
This was one of the most surreal books I’ve read in some time, maybe ever. If you’re looking for a traditional story format with plot, you’re not going to get it here. This is an experimental treatise that focuses on art, Black Metal music, magic, witchcraft, religion, nonconformity, and writing. The prose is powerful, direct, gross, and, well, hateful. It’s my favorite aspect of this book.
However, I think this book is too experimental for my tastes. There are some scenes where I question the necessity of its inclusion (besides shock). I feel that at least 50 or so pages could have been shaven off and nothing major would have been lost. I’m also deeply disappointed
that the adventure of the murderous subject of Edvard Munch’s Puberty and her mission to kill him didn’t pan out as a subplot like the blurb implied
. And while I appreciated the narrator’s unique voice, at the same time it also borderlined on angsty edgy teen cursing the world- which made sense in some passages talking about her youth but when you’re an adult and still acting like that it will induce some eye rolls.
In the end, my expectations were too high.

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Witchcraft: A History in Thirteen Trials by Marion Gibson

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Did not finish book. Stopped at 33%.
What I loved and appreciated about the book is the exploration of lesser known witch trials- I greatly enjoyed learning about the ones I managed to read before I stopped, such as Helena Scheuberin and Joan Wright. I would have loved to continue on learning more if it wasn’t for the constant repetition of her argument, as if the author doubts that the reader would make the connections between these trials (misogyny, racism, politics, religion) if she doesn’t consistently mention it. The book definitely would have benefited with more editing and streamlining, especially omitting the needless comparison statements including “Just like so and so,” “Like this trial”- it got annoying really fast.