Everyday I Write the Book

Lionel Shriver on the Movie Version of "We Need To Talk About Kevin"

When it comes to books being made into movies, I always have an opinion. And the more I like the book, the stronger the opinion. Sometimes I worry that I liked a book so much that the movie will never compare... such as with The Namesake (loved the book, liked the movie almost as much), or with The Time Traveler's Wife (loved the book, didn't think the movie measured up, though it was a noble effort).

Sometimes I am reluctant to see the movie, either because the book was difficult to read (The Kite Runner - too violent/disturbing) or because I just didn't like the book much at all (Water for Elephants).

I've come across a movie adaptation that I am very scared to see for two reasons - 1) I loved the book and can't imagine a movie doing it justice; and 2) it's the most disturbing book I have ever read and I don't know if I can sit through it, knowing what I know is going to happen. That book, of course, is Lionel Shriver's We Need to Talk About Kevin (reviewed here).

Lionel Shriver was recently interviewed by The Guardian about her own feelings about the movie adaptation of her bestseller. It's a fascinating read - check it out here. I really enjoyed this article. (H/T to TLB for passing it along!)

Will you see "We Need to Talk About Kevin"?

Ann Patchett and Her Aversion To Technology

Interesting article about Ann Patchett in The Washington Post over the weekend about how she can't deal with cell phones and technology and always creates settings in her books where her characters are isolated and don't have access to phones. (Bel Canto, State of Wonder). Patchett hasn't watched TV since junior high school, hates going on her book tours, uses an old flip phone that doesn't text, and is married with no kids. In related news, my audiobook of State of Wonder arrived today - yippee!

"Somebody Else's Daughter" by Elizabeth Brundage

I picked up the audio and paperback of Somebody Else's Daughter, by Elizabeth Brundage, at the library, thinking that it had an interesting premise: a high school teacher who gave up his infant daughter for adoption 16 years earlier decides to take a job at her prep school with the hopes of getting to know her. I thought it would be the type of fiction I'm usually drawn to, focusing on families/relationships/emotional crises in an interesting setting - the Berkshires.

I was wrong.

It turns out that Somebody Else's Daughter, which is really a thriller, is one of the more implausible, cliched, and unconvincing books I've read in a while. It's supposed to be about "the conflicted characters and the fractured landscape of the American psyche" - as evidenced by the perversity, violence, secrets, abuse, infidelity, prostitution and drugs taking place barely under the surface of an idyllic Berkshires prep school.

Here's why I didn't like the book: the relationships were unrealistic; there were way too many coincidences; plots were totally implausible; there were loose ends that were never tied up; and worst of all, there was cruelty against dogs, which I cannot stand. I could get into a lot more detail about the implausibility of Somebody Else's Daughter, but I will leave it at that.

I will say this for the book: I had a hard time putting it down. Despite all of its faults, it was suspenseful.

I listened to about half of it on audio and then finished it in paperback. I wasn't crazy about the narrator. She sounded oddly old-fashioned, and while she did a decent New England accent, I didn't like the way she voiced the men in the book. They all sounded roughly the same, and her dialogue was overly dramatic.

I really don't recommend this book. Even if you like mysteries/thrillers, there must be many out there that are much better than Somebody Else's Daughter. Take a pass on this one.

"Girls in White Dresses" by Jennifer Close

I had the pleasure of hearing Jennifer Close, author of Girls in White Dresses, interviewed at BEA this year, and was also lucky to get a signed ARC of her book while there. It comes out this August.

Girls in White Dresses follows the lives of a group of college friends (all women) after graduation - through jobs, boyfriends, weddings, breakups, showers and babies - until they are in their early 30s. The chapters are almost like short stories, except that characters recur throughout the book, and the narrative is chronological. Each chapter basically checks in the characters at a particular turning point in her life before moving on to someone else.

During her BEA interview, Close talked about how she had been a bridesmaid in many friends' weddings, and that she thought of her 20s as a time when she felt pressure to keep up with her friends who were reaching milestones like weddings and babies, perhaps earlier than she had. I remember that feeling so well - the sense that I was "behind" because I wasn't engaged like so many of my friends were. It felt like a horserace back then, with the goal to make it around the track at least somewhere in the middle of the pack. I, too, was a bridesmaid many times over and can remember the complicated feelings those events often conjured in me, always reflecting my then-current situation and how satisfied I was with it.

Looking back now, of course, all the pressure and anxiety seems so silly. Why didn't I just enjoy those years?

Anyway. I really liked Girls in White Dresses - I think Close very accurately captures those confusing, sometimes isolating 20s. I heard her compare her writing style to that of Melissa Bank in The Girls' Guide to Hunting and Fishing, and I totally agree. Her writing is spare, to the point that her characters seem almost unemotional. And there is a lot that goes unsaid and unexplained in the book. The chapters are vignettes, so whole swaths of time are skipped. But I still found this to be a pretty satisying read. I occasionally had trouble remembering which character was which when a chapter opened, but ultimately it didn't really matter. The themes of friendship, figuring out who you are, and the pursuit of a suitable mate are amply explored here, and I laughed in recognition (and sympathy) many times.

Girls in White Dresses comes out on August 9. It's so rare that I actually read a review copy this long before the book comes out - this may be a first! If you are interested in reading it, leave me a comment here and I will try to remember to email you when it hits shelves!

"The Kids Grow Up" Documentary on HBO

I attended the Mom 2.0 blogging conference earlier this year, where I had the pleasure of meeting Doug Block, a documentary filmmaker whose recent movie, The Kids Grow Up, is about his teenage daughter Lucy's last year at home. From his website: "Moving seamlessly between past, present, and the fast-approaching future, Block has not only crafted a loving portrait of a girl transitioning into womanhood, but also a deeply poignant look at parenting and what it means to let go."

I can relate to Block's sadness about the speed with which his daughter Lucy has grown up, and at the same time, I can understand her desire for privacy and independence. It's the age-old dilemma that parents face: we spend so much time, care and love bringing up our kids, only to have to let them go.

It was fitting that Doug chose to attend Mom 2.0, a conference where a perennial topic is how parenting bloggers can keep blogging about your kids, even as they're getting older and want more privacy. 

The Kids Grow Up debuts on HBO this Sunday, June 19 at 5:15 PM (Father's Day, fittingly), and will be available on DVD on July 19th. I really recommend it - it's moving, honest, and quite touching. Here's the trailer:

 

 

6 Books To Add To Your Summer Reading List

I have a Parentables post up today recommending six novels for summer reads that you won't be embarrassed to take to the beach. (I've only read one (What Alice Forgot) - the rest are on my list!)

Blogger Trip to Congress Hall

As I mentioned in my last post, I spent two days last week in Cape May, NJ on a trip with a group of bloggers from the NY/Philly/DC area. The trip was sponsored by Congress Hall, an absolutely lovely resort hotel in Cape May. Congress Hall bills itself as "the oldest resort hotel on the East Coast", but it has been renovated and is full of modern amenities. It's right on the beach (one road separates it from the ocean), and has a lovely pool, a spa, and a big lawn (a wedding was taking place there while we were there). The rooms are big and comfortable, and the hotel restaurant, The Blue Pig Tavern, is amazing. We had a great time relaxing, exploring Cape May, and discovering what Congress Hall has to offer. Both the town and the hotel are steeped in history - you can learn a lot just by looking at the photos that line the walls of Congress Hall and its many gathering areas.

If you are within driving distance of Cape May, I highly recommend it as a destination for a weekend away, with or without kids. There is a lot to do - cute shops, the beach, great restaurants. Perfect for a few days of reading. The town is full of old Victorian homes that look out onto the ocean, and as I checked out all of the porches and balconies, I kept imagining sitting outside on a summer day with a book and a glass of lemonade, reading the hours away.

(Photos courtesy of Holly Rosen Fink, aka @theculturemom)

If you want to check out Congress Hall, I have a special offer for EDIWTB readers. To get a $100 credit to use toward a room, meal, spa treatment, etc., use the code MOMBLOG. Reservations must be made online before July 31, 2011, for a stay in 2011. Discount will be applied at checkout.

Thank you to Congress Hall for a very lovely weekend away with a great group of women. I will be back!

"Water for Elephants" by Sara Gruen

I have been in paradise, also known as Cape May, NJ, since yesterday. I was very lucky to be invited to a blogger trip to a lovely hotel here called Congress Hall. I've had a few hours here and there to myself, which of course I spent reading.

This afternoon, I finished Water for Elephants, which I had been listening to on audio but finished in paperback. I picked up Water for Elephants because I thought I might want to see the movie, and I wanted to read the book before I saw the movie (my preferred order). I was late to the party on this one too - I think everyone else in the world has read it already.

And... I have to say, I really didn't like it. The book is about Jacob Jankowski, a young man who ends up working for a second-rate circus during Depression-era America. It is mostly told though the eyes of young Jacob, with some interspersed chapters narrated by a 90 year-old Jacob.

I thought that Water for Elephants read like a screenplay. The dialogue was both predictable and unnatural, and the love story at the core of the book was entirely unconvincing. The history of the circus and its role in that period of American history was interesting, yes. But otherwise, I didn't find much that was compelling about the book. There's a lot of cruelty to animals - not to mention people. And the plot was thin.

Part of the problem may have been the audiobook. I *hated* the narration of the young Jacob chapters. The narrator's voice was overly dramatic, and and the modulation of his tone to reflect different emotions (love, anger, tenderness) was so extreme that it was distracting. I have read a few positive reviews of the audiobook for Water for Elephants, which really surprised me. (I did switch to the paperback about 2/3 of the way through, and it didn't redeem the book for me. So it can't all be blamed on the narration.)

I am going to add Water for Elephants to the list of bestsellers that just didn't do it for me. I can't recommend this one.

If you liked Water for Elephants, tell me why. What did I miss here?

"What Alice Forgot" by Liane Moriarty

When I read the synopsis for What Alice Forgot by Liane Moriarty a few weeks ago, I took up Penguin's offer of a review copy. It's about Alice Love, a wife and mother in Sydney who faints during her spin class at the gym and wakes up thinking it's ten years earlier. In reality, she's 39, mother to three kids, and going through an ugly divorce. But her amnesiac mind believes she's 29, deeply in love, and pregnant with her first child. Interesting premise, huh?

I thought this might be a light read, and for the most part, it was. There are definitely some passages that seemed to have been lifted from the screenplay of a romantic comedy, especially when Alice spends time with the boyfriend she was dating before she had her accident, and when she "meets" her kids for the first time. But this was also a surprisingly satisfying book on some deeper levels. I found the unpeeling of the story of why Alice's marriage had fallen apart to be pretty compelling. Moriarty deftly depicted the shades of gray in Alice's marriage to her husband Nick, as well as in her relationships with her sister and children. As a result, the Alice that emerges at the end of the book is neither the naive, insecure 29 year-old Alice, nor the bitter, uber-efficient 39 year-old Alice, but a more interesting, nuanced, and likable person.

Ultimately, this book is about who we think we are going to be, and how we live with the person we really end up being.

I really appreciated Moriarty's very realistic depiction of the challenges of infertility and IVF, which Alice's sister Elisabeth has been dealing with for seven years when the book opens. That part really hit home for me, and I laughed (wryly) out loud in recognition several times.

What Alice Forgot may be billed as a beach read, and it was certainly a pleasurable, relatively quick book. And, as I noted above, some of Moriarty's characters bordered on caricatures. But I also found the book to be deeply resonant and compelling. If the premise sounds interesting to you, I'd recommend checking this one out.

(Hi FTC! Yep, it was a review copy. And yes, this is a good review. Sometimes that just happens.)