Kindred by Octavia Butler (1979)

Written in the mid-1970s and set in contemporary times, Kindred is about Dana, a black woman in her 20s who is mysteriously pulled back in time to the antebellum South to keep saving the life of a man she eventually finds out is one of her ancestors.  Dana keeps getting pulled back and forth in time--sometimes alone, sometimes with her white husband--and her life keeps intertwining with that of her ancestor and the slaves he keeps on his plantation. 

Provides a fascinating look at the lives of slaves, as well as life for any black person in the antebellum South.  In addition, it's a very interesting look at the relationship between Dana and her husband and their life in the 1970s.  Although it sounds a bit grueling, it's also compulsively readable and amazingly well told.

In the edition I read, there was a fascinating critical essay by Robert Crossley that provided more context.  Despite being so much of its time period, the novel itself does not seem dated at all.  It's still a fascinating novel with a lot to say.

In the Bag by Kate Klise (2012)

As light and fluffy and delicious as cotton candy, this is a novel told from four perspectives: A mother and daughter traveling to Paris, and a father and son traveling to Madrid to work on an art installation. A glass of spilled wine, and two similar looking bags lead to a note left in a carry-on, mixed up bags, surreptitious email conversations, faking sickness, and planned meetings in Paris and Barcelona.

Dishy and light and fun, with realistic, charming characters.  Klise will definitely be an author I'll keep an eye out for again. 

Wallflower in Bloom by Claire Cook (2012)

A lovely novel--from the author of Must Love Dogs--about a woman who works for her famous guru brother and campaigns to be on Dancing with the Stars instead of him.   She has an extremely close, sometimes uncomfortably so, family and the familial relationships are realistic and touching. I love that she's pretty self-obsessed, which is a fine line to take with a character, and tricky to make a character like that both realistic and likeable, but Cook pulls it off beautifully.

Along with her own personal struggles, this is an interesting exploration of the inner workings of celebrity life (on a number of different levels). I loved this line by her dancing partner, Ilya, who is trying to get her out of her funk:  "He shrugged. 'Whatever comes at you, it's all energy. You have to take it and make it work for you. My best dances come from that place.'"  A great, realistic novel about a woman in transition with just enough humor to make it endearing as well. 

Carry the One by Carol Anshaw (2012)

A strange, meditative, but quite engaging, novel. 

A group of friends and family are involved in a car accident that results in the death of a young girl. This is not a "I Know What You did Last Summer" sort of novel, but more a novel that takes this crucial act as the springboard for following these friends and the paths their lives take after the incident. Explores their work and artistic lives, and their romantic lives as well.

Lovely, with some wonderful writing on life. I loved this quote, as divorced Carmen rejects a man who hasn't even approached her yet:

"The social road ahead looked like a bleak highway, post-apocalyptic, overblown with dust, gray and lifeless except for mutants popping up here and there." 

Code Name Verity by Elizabeth Wein (2012)

Fascinating young adult novel about a young woman working as a secret agent who is captured by the Gestapo in Nazi-occupied France, and her friend, a pilot working with the civilian air force.

Divided into two parts, the first unfolds as a written confession, but all is not as it seems. The second follows the pilot after crash landing in France. Gripping, suspenseful, and chilling, this is a great story of friendship, but also of parts of World War II that we don't necessarily always hear about.

How to Get Divorced by 30 - Sascha Rothchild (2010)

Surprisingly engaging memoir (subtitled My Misguided Attempt at a Starter Marriage). Outlines in chapters the various steps she semi-unwittingly went through to get divorced by 30 (including "Keep Your Belongings Separate", "Include Your Spouse in a Performance Where You Read Off Your List of Sexual Partners", and "Marry an Actor."

Rothchild, a struggling writer living in L.A. who married a struggling actor, has a lovely, dry sense of humor, and a realistic, healthily critical self-image (she includes quotes from her "self-indulgent" diaries).

 What I loved about this book, besides its insightful look at love and romance and what we tell ourselves we want and need, is that I ended up actually wanting to know more about her. Often, with memoirs, I'm like, enough already--I don't need to know any more about your grandmother, your birth or your sixth-grade teacher.  But her home life (as well as her romantic life) is really fascinating, with a strangely detached mother and siblings who we don't get to know well enough. And we only get little glimpses of it, as well as her semi-turbulent childhood. I love leaving a memoir wanting more! Plus, it is really funny.

The Hypnotist's Love Story by Liane Moriarty (2011)

Liane Moriarty is one of those authors that just speak to me.  She has such wonderful insights into character and relationships and builds such compelling, believable characters.

This novel is about Ellen O'Farrell, a hypnotherapist in her mid-30s, who just met a promising new man.  Things are going well until he tells her that he has a stalker--a woman he broke up with three years ago.  The story is told in alternating sections from Ellen's (3rd person) POV and Saskia's 1st person POV (the stalker).  Slightly quirky and very endearing, I think Liane Moriarty is a great readalike for Maeve Binchy.  Just change the setting from Ireland to Australia!  But keep the compelling characters and relationships and satisfying plots.

"I was stunned.  I'm not sure why.  I think I just never expected him to be important enough to make any significant changes in his life, but of course, he doesn't know that he's only a minor character in my life.  He's the star of his own life and I'm the minor character.  And fair enough too."

See also:  What Alice Forgot and Three Wishes.

Gone Girl by Gillian Flynn (2012)

I adore Gillian Flynn and I loved this book.  Her third novel, and an immediate bestseller, lived up to all of the hype, and to my fond memories of reading her other two books. 

The story is told by a husband whose wife goes missing, and also through journal entries of the wife previous to the disappearance.  And yet we don't know the whole story.  Chilling and surprising, and includes some really great, insightful and often funny writing.  See below:

"I am not interested in being set up.  I need to be ambushed, caught unawares, like some sort of feral love-jackal.  I'm too self-conscious otherwise.  I feel myself trying to be charming, and then I try to be even more charming to make up for the fake charm, and then I've basically turned into Liza Minnelli: I'm dancing in tights and sequins, begging you to love me.  There's a bowler and jazz hands and lots of teeth."

"Mainly, I will admit, I smile because he's gorgeous.  Distractingly gorgeous, the kind of looks that make your eyes pinwheel, that make you want to just address the elephant--'You know you're gorgeous, right?'--and move on with the conversation.  I bet dudes hate him:  He looks like the rich-boy villain in an 80s teen movie--the one who bullies the sensitive misfit, the one who will end up with a pie in the puss, the whipped cream wilting his upturned collar as everyone in the cafeteria cheers."

 A page-turning novel that absolutely refuses to get off the bestseller lists.  Good for Flynn!  Write more books!

I Want My MTV by Craig Marks and Rob Tennenbaum (2011)

Just like a great documentary, there's something so satisfying about a really well-written, perfectly edited oral history.  I Want My MTV: The Uncensored History of the Music Video Revolution is a perfect example, since the people interviewed are outspoken, honest and often hilarious. My copy of this is stuffed with post-it notes marking hilarious quotes from various performers. It's really well done. My only complaint is that there are so few photos--I'd like to see a few more photos of the people behind the scenes at MTV and the VJs, who were the face of MTV. Definitely inspired me to go to YouTube and look up videos, including the ones commonly described as the best (A-ha's Take On Me) and the worst (Billy Squier's Rock Me Tonite -- sorry, Billy.  No one can deny you still looked good even in a pink tank top.)  Fun and dishy.

And so many fantastic quotes (a totally random sampling):

Stewart Copeland: "We would tease Stingo that he couldn't walk past a mirror without primping. And he would say, 'Fuck off, it's my job. And yours, too, by the way.'"


Billy Gibbons: "I still sign autographs for girls who say, 'I was just thirteen and I couldn't wait to dress up like the girl in "Legs.'"  (So me.  That outfit was awesome.)

Joe Elliot: "When we were kids growing up in Sheffield, there were only two types of clothing shops--men's and women's. And you were never going to find stage wear in a men's shop. So nearly everything we wore, from the waist up, was female. Blouses and T-shirts with loud patterns, designed for big ladies."

John Landis: "One of my guilty pleasures is that when I see a group of people try to do the 'Thriller' dance using the record, they have to wander around like zombies waiting for the goddamn music to start, because the recorded version begins with all these sound effects that aren't in the video."

Lionel Richie: "The funniest story about 'Hello' is that I kept going back to Bob over and over again, saying, 'Bob, that bust of me does not look like me.' 'Bob, the bust does not look like me.' Finally, Bob came over to me and said, 'Lionel, she's blind.'"

Stewart Copeland: "I grew to understand that videos were mainly about getting our singer's face out there. Because it was so pretty. That's the way it goes. Drummers learn that lesson pretty early in life. Guitarists never quite learn that lesson. Drummers and bass players, we're over it."

Sebastian Bach: "Dude, when they talk about 'hair metal', whose hair do you think they're talking about? I've still got it. I'm looking at it right now. And it's so flaxen!"

Awesome and deliciously fun for anyone who grew up on MTV (or Friday Night Videos, for that matter).

What I Hate from A to Z by Roz Chast (2011)

I adore Roz Chast's drawings, and I adore a good rant and this book brings both of those things together in one.  Although, as Chast explains in the introduction, it's really less things she hates than things that make her anxious. But that's not as snappy of a title. One of my favorites is her entry on balloons: "When I look at a balloon, all I see is an imminent explosion. Where's the fun in that?"  Amen.