pickBrought this after @squirrelbrain review and then bumped it up the list after @BarbaraBB review this week.
Thoughtful, reflective, detailed musings on life,death and poetry after an emergency medical event. Beautifully written.
pickThe narrator is hospitalized with a rare vascular condition. For days he‘s at ICU, not really knowing what‘s happening, though he knows it‘s serious.
Each medical detail is described, as is the narrator‘s view on life, his past and future.
And it‘s 2020 and COVID is everywhere. In the hospital, in people‘s attitude, in the protests in the streets. It took me back to those days and although it frightened me I loved this about the book. Very good!
Misty!!! What an amazing box of Happy to return home to after a looong week!! I adore everything so much and I can‘t tell you how much I‘m looking forward to reading “The Women!!!” Thank you for being the sweetest man ever, wonderful Friend that you are! Love you!
#Litsylove #BookLovers #HappyMail
@Alwaysbeenaloverofbooks
I finished 13 books in March. Lots of middle grade and graphic novels, because that‘s all I could mentally handle. The Spear Cuts Through Water was my favorite, even though it took me two months to read. It was so worth the effort. Both of the Swifts books by Beth Lincoln were delightful. #marchwrapup
I‘m really hoping that the #bookspin gods are kind to me and pick books that are already on my March TBR. Between library books with due dates that can‘t be extended, books clubs/buddy reads, NetGalley books that publish this month, and my library system‘s annual Community Reads program, my schedule is already packed. In fact, looking at this makes me so stressed, I may bail on everything and just watch Netflix. 😂
pickThings I love:
-The pacing leaves plenty of room for emotions to develop.
-The perspective shows both the frustration of the US medical system and the wonder we can access when knocked out of our unconscious narratives.
-The writing, beautiful without being sappy.
Things that don't quite work:
-The extended treatises on poetry and music go on too long for my taste.
-The meticulous detail, which gets tedious.
Soft pick for a #tob25 longlist title
This is the start of Small Rain. It‘s something, I think, anyone who has been to a US ER with chronic illness/pain would recognize. I was just there going through this the week before Christmas.
so-soThere‘s something stingy and mean in this collection, characters putting up barriers in self-preservation mode. But a few lovely ones: tender tourist in Hyderabad, urban tent housing vs. luxury safari tents, sentimental AI in Mall of America, Paul Yoon‘s mini-epic “Valley of the Moon,” Lori Ostlund‘s bubble family in “Just Another Family.” Preferred 2023 collection edited by Min Jin Lee. 2024
