A Month's Worth of Books, pt. 3

And now the American edition...

First up, Serena, by Ron Rash. This was one I had picked up a long time ago from the library. I don't remember why; I think maybe I just saw it when I was looking for something else on a nearby shelf, and something about the spine caught my eye. It was a while ago, but I still remember it more or less. It was interesting. A solid, unusual premise - stone-cold WITCH (and I'm not being coy, she's not just a b*tch, she's scary mean) and husband in a ye-olde-timey logging camp down south. She, Serena, is definitely a unique character, and there several other characters that stand out or are appealing. The ending felt like it was out of character with the rest of the book, though, and I particularly didn't like the way the second main character, her husband, was developed...it was both predictable and a bit of a let-down. It was worth reading though; I'd be interested in learning what other people think about it.

Then I read The Girl Who Fell From the Sky, by Heidi W. Durrow. And it was GREAT. SO great. Just beautifully, gorgeously written. I'm loathe to refer to a book as "lyrical" because it sounds so unreasonably cheesy, but this book actually is. It's also sweet, funny, smart... Ha, I sound like I have a crush on the book! Let's see, how do I dial back the lovin' on the book...well, it's also terrifying in places. Except that it's terrifying when describing with admirable clarity what awful things people can do from and for love. So...yep, I would consider dating this book :)
Technically I suppose this is a coming-of-age story, and also about race, but both of those things inform the book, and lend it gravitas, without taking it over or getting predictable/stereotypical. The main character is a young half-Black, half-White girl, new to America (the child of a European woman and an African-American soldier stationed abroad) who is badly injured and loses most of her family in a horrific incident, and goes to live with her paternal grandmother. The story traces her twisting path to near-adulthood, as she tries to figure out if she's Black, and what that means, and how to process the tragedy she has barely survived, physically and emotionally. All of the main characters, and there are several, are fully-drawn and compelling. Durrow has a keen eye for just how to describe someone, and make a character come to life, and has her creations act in ways that feel completely true. She doesn't shy away from the negative or harder-to-accept aspects of her characters, but she approaches all of them with enough compassion that the reader always feels a respect for the character (well, not all of them, but a few of the minor characters do NOT deserve our respect). I wish I hadn't had to return the book today, because there is so much more I could say, and I had marked a bunch of passages that were just so fantastic I remember thinking at the time I wanted to post about them... Oh well, the only think I can really say about the book, the only thing that matters, is READ IT.

Another coming of age story, this one partially about race, is The Improper Life of Bezellia Grove, by Susan Gregg Gilmore. So, this one is definitely one that I grabbed off the shelf while looking for another book, because the title just sounded funny. And of course it's library-bound, so it's not like I could read the back or anything, so it's been on my shelves at home for months now, and I had no idea what it was about, so then I started getting nervous that it might suck, and never read it. And, I'll be honest, I was on such a high after The Girl Who Fell From the Sky that I almost didn't want to read it because I was worried I would be let down. To my surprise, I wasn't. I mean, it wasn't a fantastic book by any means, but it ended up being a lot better than I expected.
The main character needs to grow up  in the 60s and 70s with her dysfunctional on the inside, but ever so proper upper-class Southern family, while figuring out what she needs, and along the way falls in love with the African-American son of her family's driver (I'm not giving anything away - that part was pretty predictable). At first the book just seemed kind of fluffy, and after The Girl Who Fell From the Sky, I just wasn't feeling that. But I ended up getting drawn in the the story, and attached to some of the main characters (the ones you should be, anyways), and enjoyed it, and it even gave me a little to think about. I thought the ending was particularly good, in so far as it was satisfyingly unsatisfying - we don't know exactly what happens, we don't even know if it's a happy ending or a tragic ending. Especially for a book that in many ways is just a good old-fashioned story, it was a bold choice on the author's part.