Books Read April 2022: 49-73

A gentle reminder that all reviews can still be seen on my Goodreads profile (the review will be with the book; the format will be specified unless it's in print.) And the books with green outlines are my 5-star reads for the month!

49. A Dead Djinn in Cairo by P. Djeli Clark   ⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️
50. Below Zero by Ali Hazelwood, read by Savannah Peachwood ⭐️⭐️⭐️
51. Time is a Mother by Ocean Vuong, read by Ocean Vuong ⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️
52. The Genius Under the Table by Eugene Yelchin   ⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️
53. The Angel of Khan el-Khalili by P. Djeli Clark   ⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️
54. Pandora's Star by Peter F. Hamilton   ⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️
55. The Haunting of Tram Car 015 by P. Djeli Clark, read by Julian Thomas ⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️
56. Woman, Eat Me Whole by Ama Asantewa Diaka   ⭐️⭐️⭐️
57. I Will Die in a Foreign Land by Kalani Pickhart   ⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️
58. By Any Other Name by Lauren Kate   ⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️
59. Thresh & Hold by Marlanda Dekine   ⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️
60. Wildcat by Ameila Morris   ⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️
61. Whatever Happened to Interracial Love? by Kathleen Collins, performed by Nina Collins, Cherise Boothe, Adenrele Ojo, Paula J. Parker, Desean Terry, and Dan Woren ⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️
62. Lord of the Flies by William Golding   ⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️
63. The Path to Kindness by James Crews (ed.)   ⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️
64. The Black Agenda by Anna Gifty Opoku-Agyeman (ed.)⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️
65. End of the World House by Adrienne Celt   ⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️
66. The Memory Librarian and Other Stories of Dirty Computer by Janelle Monae et al   ⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️
67. A Sister's Story by Donatella di Pietrantonio, translated by Ann Goldstein ⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️
68. Deaf Republic by Ilya Kaminsky   ⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️
69. Heartstopper by Alice Oseman   ⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️
70. Lessons in Chemistry by Bonnie Garmus, read by Miranda Raison ⭐️⭐️⭐️
71. Symphony for the City of the Dead: Dmitri Shostakovich and the Siege of Leningrad by M.T. Anderson, read by M.T. Anderson ⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️
72. A Master of Djinn by  P. Djeli Clark   ⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️
73. Red Famine: Stalin's War on Ukraine by Anne Applebaum   ⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️
74. The Stone Collection by Kateri Akiwenzie-Damm   ⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️ 

Books read: 26

Audiobook: 6
Ebook: 11
Print: 9

Library: 6
TBR: 1
Purchased 2022: 5
Review copy: 11
Subscription: 1

1954- Club: 1
Around the World: 11
Booker International Prize: 0
Indigenous Reading Circle: 1
Indigenous Reads otherwise: 0
Melanated Reader's 20 Books by Black Women: 4
Mid-Century Women: 0
Reading Envy Russia: 5
Sword and Laser: 5
Tournament of Books: 0
Women's Prize: 0

Review: Red Famine: Stalin's War on Ukraine

Red Famine: Stalin's War on Ukraine by Anne Applebaum
My rating: 4 of 5 stars

This is a feat of research and writing about Ukraine in the 1930s, and how Stalin's policies intentionally targeted Ukrainians, resulting in widespread famine and what many consider genocide. From collectivization to dekulakization, the author shows how Ukraine was stripped of its resources and culture and then punished further for not being able to provide more. I was shocked this time period is still highly debated/contested - largely by the Russian government - well shocked might be too strong of a word, after all Putin borrows from Stalin in categorizing Ukrainians as Nazis in order to justify his decisions.

For my tastes, there are so many names and so many details that the reading was sometimes a slog. However I don't know how the author could have written it without those details since she has done so well pulling them all together. I just don't read a lot of history.

This is one of the books I selected for the non-fiction quarter of Reading Envy Russia (#readingenvyrussia) - April was month 1 so you can still join in with 2 more months of non-fiction reading to go.

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Review: Symphony for the City of the Dead: Dmitri Shostakovich and the Siege of Leningrad

Symphony for the City of the Dead: Dmitri Shostakovich and the Siege of Leningrad by M.T. Anderson
My rating: 5 of 5 stars

If you're like me and struggle to read history, make it a cultural history like this one, where the history is told sideways through the life and work of an artist, in this case the composer Dmitri Shostakovich and his hometown of Leningrad, up until and during the Siege itself. The publisher is also YA and while this book is considered YA, I didn't find it overly simplified in its discussion of the music or the history. The author does a fantastic job narrating his own work, bringing a vibrance to the political and musical worlds of Shostakovich.

One of my goals this year was to better understand how Russia moved from WWI into the 1950s and still remain a powerhouse despite - or as I'm learning on top of - the devastation to the country and its people. The background of this story displays many of the missteps made by the Soviet government - really mostly Stalin - on the German front in particular, but also in dealing with their own citizens. One somewhat sordid argument this author uncovers is that it was Stalin's history of food deprivation that may have trained the citizens of Leningrad to survive what should have been an impossible solution. I don't want to give him that much credit, but it was an interesting tangent.

And who will now go on a Shostakovich listening spree? It's me!


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Reading Envy 246: Unsettling Endings with Yanira

Yanira shares why she deleted Goodreads and how it's improved her reading life, and we talk about rereading books before we dig into books we've read and liked lately.

Download or listen via this link:
Reading Envy 246: Unsettling Endings

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Or listen via Stitcher
Or listen through Spotify 
Or listen through Google Podcasts

Books discussed:

 

Very Cold People by Sarah Manguso
End of the World House by Adrienne Celt
A Very Nice Girl by Imogen Crimp
The Memory Librarian and Other Stories of Dirty Computer by Janelle Monáe, Yohanca Delgado, Eve L. Ewing, Alaya Dawn Johnson, Danny Lore, and Sheree Renee Thomas
Joan is Okay by Weike Wang

Other mentions: 

A House of My Own: Stories from My Life by Sandra Cisneros
The Great Gatsby by F. Scott Fitzgerald
The Hating Game by Sally Thorne
The Hating Game (film)
Normal People by Sally Rooney
Conversations with Friends (tv adaptation)
Bridgerton (Netflix)
Leave the World Behind by Rumaan Alam
The Queue by Basma Abdel Aziz, translated by Elisabeth Jaquette
The Summer Prince by Alaya Dawn Johnson
Dirty Computer (album)
Dirty Computer [Emotion Picture]
Chemistry by Weike Wang
Either/Or by Elif Batuman
The Idiot by Elif Batuman
The Possessed by Elif Batuman
Lessons in Chemistry by Bonnie Garmus, read by Miranda Raison

Related episodes: 

Episode 070 - Words Like Weapons with Yanira Ramirez
Episode 096 - Not Without Hope with Yanira Ramirez
Episode 108 - Venn Diagram with Yanira Ramirez  
Episode 141 - Profound and Tedious Work with Yanira Ramirez
Episode 181 - An Awkward Woman with Yanira Ramirez

Stalk us online:

Jenny at Goodreads
Jenny on Twitter
Jenny is @readingenvy on Instagram and Litsy


All links to books are through Bookshop.org, where I am an affiliate. I wanted more money to go to the actual publishers and authors. I link to Amazon when a book is not listed with Bookshop.

Reading Envy 245: Looking Back at the Russian Novel

At the end of March, a handful of us gathered to discuss what we had read for the Russian novel quarter of Reading Envy Russia. We also discuss the works we abandoned, some dips into Ukrainian literature, and talked more about what makes a novel quintessentially Russian. Thanks to all who joined in during this chat, in Goodreads, and in social media!

Download or listen via this link:
Reading Envy 245: Looking Back at the Russian Novel 

Subscribe to the podcast via this link: Feedburner
Or subscribe via Apple Podcasts by clicking: Subscribe
Or listen through TuneIn
Or listen on Google Play
Or listen via Stitcher
Or listen through Spotify 
Or listen through Google Podcasts

Books discussed:

The Possessed: Adventures with Russian Books and the People who Read Them by Elif Batuman
The Anna Karenina Fix by Viv Groskop
Dead Souls by Nikolai Gogol, translated by Richard Pevear and Larissa Volkhonsky
A Hero of Our Time by Mikhail Lermontov, translated by Paul Foote
The Aviator by Eugene Vodolazkin, translated by Lisa C. Hayden
Laurus by Eugene Vodolazkin
Flowers for Algernon by Daniel Keyes
The Mountain and the Wall by Alisa Ganieva, translated by Carol Apollonio
The Hall of the Singing Caryatids by Victor Pelevin, translated by Andrew Bromfield
War and Peace by Leo Tolstoy
The Kingdom of God is Within You by Leo Tolstoy
Pale Fire by Vladimir Nabokov
Lolita by Vladimir Nabokov
Infinite Jest by David Foster Wallace
Zuleikha by Guzel Yakhina, translated by Lisa C. Hayden
I Will Die in a Foreign Land by Kalani Pickhart
Brisbane by Eugene Vodolazkin, translated by Marian Schwarz
The Orphanage by Serhiy Zhadan, translated by Reilly Costigan-Humes and Isaac Stackhouse Wheeler
Lucky Breaks by Yevgenia Belorusets, translated by Eugene Ostahevsky
Life Went on Anyway: Stories by Oleg Sentsov, translated by Uilleam Blacker


Other mentions:

Ted Chiang
Ken Liu
Hanya Yanagihara
"Men Who Explain Lolita to Me" by Rebecca Solnit on LitHub
"Dead Soul" by Masha Gessen in Vanity Fair
St. Michael's bells ringing in 2013

Related episodes:

Episode 237 - Reading Goals 2022
Episode 241 - Feral Pigeons with Laurie
Episode 243 - Russian Novel Speed Date 

Stalk us online:

Reading Envy Readers on Goodreads (home of Reading Envy Russia)
Jenny at Goodreads
Jenny on Twitter
Jenny is @readingenvy on Instagram and Litsy

All links to books are through Bookshop.org, where I am an affiliate. I wanted more money to go to the actual publishers and authors. You can see the full collection for Reading Envy Russia 2022 on Bookshop.org.

#1954Club - Lord of the Flies by William Golding

A year or so ago, I happened across the 'club' year posts from Simon (Stuck in a Book) and Karen (Kaggsy's Bookish Ramblings), where they pick a random year in history and everyone who wants to reads a book (or several books) originally published in that year and posts about it. I've participated twice so far, when I read Nightwood by Djuna Barnes for 1936Club last April and Meridian by Alice Walker for 1976Club in October.

1954 is an interesting year for books, and also is the right timing for one of my reading goals for the year that I've not really done well - to read books by mid-century women. My first selection for the club this year still doesn't meet that goal since it's a male author, but perhaps I'll find another that will before the end of the week. I'd previously read The Story of O by Pauline Reage, translated by Sabine d'Estree, A Horse and His Boy by C.S. Lewis (probably not since I was a child,) and Who Was Changed and Who Was Dead by Barbara Comyns, in a delightful edition from Dorothy Publishing.

I have a copy of Lucky Jim on my shelves, a 1954 novel I purchased for a classics challenge to fulfill the category of a comic novel. I never read it, just went a different direction, but the academia angle is always compelling. But I went first with Lord of the Flies. A few months ago, our foster son at the time wanted to read it and I decided I should read it first, since he was 9. I wasn't sure it was age appropriate. I only knew vaguely it was about boys who need to survive on an island and turn to their animal natures, and that since the novel was published a lot of other books and TV shows have been roughly based on the premise (the most recent I saw was The Wilds, a 2020 TV show about a bunch of teenage girls that are dumped on an island for some kind of experiment for which they are uninformed.)

I understand some people read Lord of the Flies in school and while I had a very intensive English literature year in high school, Golding was not included for whatever reason. I found it interesting how many ways the novel is portrayed in the cover art - the bloodthirsty open mouth of the most recent, the calmer jungle type images, several pig-themed covers, a cover with glasses that is more reminiscent of Harry Potter, and a bizarre giant fly with a little boy. 

I read the edition with an introduction by E.M. Forster. I very brilliantly waited until finishing the novel to read his introduction, which would have spoiled practically every significant plot point besides suggesting broader themes that I'm not sure I agree with. I expected there to be memorable characters and there are - Simon, Ralph, Piggy, Roger, etc. - I don't think I expected some of the ethereal writing that I encountered. It made me wish I was reading the same author on different content!

Here is the first paragraph and a few more lines from Chapter 4:

"The first rhythm that they became used to was the slow swing from dawn to quick dusk. They accepted the pleasures of morning, the bright sun, the whelming sea and sweet air, as a time when play was good and life so full that hope was not necessary and therefore forgotten. Toward noon, as the floods of light fell more nearly to the perpendicular, the stark colors of the morning were smoothed in pearl and opalescence; and the heat - as though the impending sun's height gave it momentum - became a blow that they ducked, running to the shade and lying there, perhaps even sleeping.

Strange things happened at midday. The glittering sea rose up, moved apart in planes of blatant impossibility; the coral reef and the few stunted palms that clung to the more elevated parts would float up into the sky, would quiver, be plucked apart, run like raindrops on a wire or be repeated as in an odd succession of mirrors...."

Beautiful, dangerous, foreboding, yet somehow familiar. I know how this feeling he describes feels. I am like the kids, I identify with them, at least in some of these early moments, and then of course they do some terrible things, so of course the author wants the reader to ask what would you do? Would you try for democracy or anarchy? Fruit or meat? Mountain or beach? Survival is one of the quickest scenarios to see a person's true colors. Do we know this for sure or do we know this because of this book? It feels very much a part of the fabric of our culture, so when I realized it was one of the books on the Modern Library's 100 Best Novels list, one of those silly lists I still would like to check off eventually, it made sense to me that it would be included, even if we never talk about any of the other works by this author.

Stay tuned if I read any more books from 1954. And thanks to Karen and Simon for hosting a fun challenge.

Review: I Will Die in a Foreign Land

I Will Die in a Foreign Land by Kalani Pickhart
My rating: 5 of 5 stars

I'm one of many people who felt drawn to reading more about Ukraine. This novel was already on my radar so I purchased it from Two Dollar Radio.

Publisher summary excerpt:
"[This novel] follows four individuals over the course of a volatile Ukrainian winter, as their lives are forever changed by the Euromaidan protests. Katya is a Ukrainian-American doctor stationed at a makeshift medical clinic in St. Michael’s Monastery; Misha is an engineer originally from Pripyat, who has lived in Kyiv since his wife’s death; Slava is a fiery young activist whose past hardships steel her determination in the face of persecution; and Aleksandr Ivanovich, a former KGB agent, climbs atop a burned-out police bus at Independence Square and plays the piano."

Set in 2013-14 but also rooted in the complexities of the past (from the mythical Rus to Cossacks to Chernobyl), alternating viewpoints include the four characters plus news articles, cassette recordings, songs, and more. It's very readable and brings the reader into the intimacy of the recent past for Ukraine. Honestly I was trying to read non-fiction about Stalin's war on Ukraine and was drawn back into fiction instead.

The author is not Ukrainian but is donating all proceeds of the book to relief orgs benefitting Ukrainian people at the time of this review.

One friend said they couldn't tell if I liked the book and my feelings are mixed - it has many techniques I like, the rotating perspectives, the various format types, the short chapters, the tidbits that send me off on research projects, for instance listening to the bells of St. Michaels in 2013 on YouTube (only the second time they were played as part of a conflict, the previous time was with the Mongols!) But it feels weird to say I liked a novel about a previous conflict when the country it's about it in such turmoil now with people dead in the street. It even took me a while to read because I struggled to return to a setting that doesn't even exist as it's described because of the Russian invasion, and the book is set only 8 years in the past. I can be quite the emotional reader sometimes.

This book has come up a few times on the Reading Envy podcast this year, and will also be mentioned on episode 245.

The author is not from Ukraine but is a bit of a subject matter expert, and also published this list of suggested books to read to learn more.

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