Coming Soon: The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo

Alright, alright! I know that some of you loyal followers out there (I'm looking at you, Sarah) are insisting that my BOW reading list has been a little heavy of late. Not to fear! Thankfully, the wonderful Mom Squad recently shipped yours truly a dynamite care package including Hannaford honey mustard (btdubs, in case you didn't know this is the very best mustard in the entire universe, bar none--just ask my man V., who would be totally happy bathing in it), New York bridal magazines, and--drum roll please--next week's Book of the Week: Stieg Larsson's bestselling The Girl With the Dragon Tattoo!

I know that plenty of you out there have already read this posthumously-published Swedish mystery, so I look forward to hearing ya'll weigh in two weekends from now! And if you have been planning on taking it on, well then now's the time! I have been a little hesitant about taking TGWTDT on for two primary reasons: first and foremost, it is longer than the usual BOW, but the moms has assured me it is riveting and straightforward enough that I should be able to power through and meet the deadline; secondly, it is the first of a trilogy, and I know that if this book is as compelling as everyone suggests, I'll want to read them all! But we'll just tackle that book bridge when we come to it, right?

Sunday Funday

Hello there, everybody! My Sunday has been off to a fantastic start: hanging out with my pal Sarah, enjoying a delicious brunch at Mamma's Boy (FYI- if you visit me here in A-town you can pretty much guarantee I'll be taking you to this affordable and funky southern-style breakfast joint), and now watching some football...utterly delightful!

One of my favorite things to do on days like this--rainy, relaxing days without any real agenda--is sit on the couch and browse through the stack of magazines V. and I collect. So today, in the true spirit of a Sunday Funday, I thought I'd share what that stack includes at the moment:

Fast Company

This is a V. subscription, but one that I try to sneak from him as much as possible. Who would have thought this business-y sounding mag would include so much great information on design? In fact, this month's issue (and every October) is devoted entirely to that subject so near and dear to my heart, featuring articles on McDonald's major interior makeover, Italian furniture design, and the re-visioning of America's public spaces. Now, if you are currently glued to the couch and don't have this magazine at an arm's length, I recommend clickin' on over to Fast Company's design page, where you'll discover fun topics like Ikea's new cookbook and my personal favorite feature: infographic of the day! Don't you just love that people make these kinds of things?

Interior Design

The title pretty much says it all, but what I (and most likely my fellow SCAD id-ers) like best about this publication is that is presents the kind of design I'm interested in: innovative offices, healing medical facilities, cutting-edge retail outlets. Sure, an occasional house here or there, too, but the focus is really on presenting innovative, one-of-a-kind projects by the best firms in the world. Another nice feature is the inclusion of floor plans--sounds straightforward enough, but it's amazing how many design publications don't provide you with this orienting visual when presenting projects.

Martha Stewart Weddings

Okay, okay...as much as I'd like to pretend I haven't caught wedding fever, I totally have, and these days I'm absolutely loving Miss Martha's bridal publication for its plethora of DIY ideas, fashion trends, and big day advice. Even if there isn't a wedding in your near future, this is a great rainy day read, and all of those crafts could totally translate to other types of festivities; those white dresses, on the other hand, might not fare so well at a b-day party or holiday fete! And again, if you're looking for some web-friendly wedding inspiration, check out the lovely 100 Layer Cake--it's tres adorable.

BOW: Man Walks Into a Room

I just don't even know where to begin with this lovely, maddening, unsettling, poignant, lonely little book! Man Walks Into a Room is an incredible first novel, exploring issues like memory, solitude and intimacy, identity's mutability, and the power of personal history.

The basic plot goes something like this: this super-smart young professor, Samson Greene, wakes up one day in the desert, without a single memory from his life after the age of twelve (aka childhood) thanks to a gigantic but benign brain tumor. Interestingly, though he returns to his old life in New York City--including his lovely wife Anna, he no longer possesses any attachment to those things that used to define him; instead he is captivated by the emptiness and possibility his illness has brought. Feeling like he has nothing to lose, our hero is lured back to the desert by a super-charismatic doctor to participate in radical and hands-on neurological research. Adventure, philosophy, grief, longing, friendship, and loneliness all ensue. This is certainly a novel of ideas more than story, though, and while I absolutely adored it, sometimes I got the feeling that Krauss was trying to put in everything--so many wonderful thoughts, but maybe not all of them necessary; additionally, sometimes she gets lost in her own poetry. In other words, it's definitely a first novel, but such an incredible one!

Something kind of delightful did happen to me while reading this book (besides just the story), so I thought I'd share. Remember a couple weeks ago when I was talking about The World to Come, and this idea that angels erase our memories before we leave that waiting ground? Well, this week's BOW mentioned something similar, but referenced the Talmud. Since, sad to say, I am not at all well-versed in this central Jewish text, I did a little research on the interweb, and discovered that the Talmud (as well as the Midrash) reference the legend of the angel's slap! Furthermore, "illuim" are those individuals who found a way to evade the slap, thereby retaining the lessons learned in their mother's womb; these folks grow up to be Talmudic geniuses. Anyway, I thought that was kind of neat to learn, although also whatever Dara Horn you totally stole that idea for your book and didn't mention the Talmud at all so it kind of feels like plagiarism!

Another fun fact: Nicole Krauss actually has a background in poetry, and perhaps that is part of what makes Man Walks Into a Room as well as her second novel, History of Love, so appealing to me: sentences are strung together like pearls; ideas are expressed so vividly, words are chosen so very carefully. I actually found a poem of hers online to share, just so you could see what I'm talking about:

Becoming Domestic

A hundred million migrants roam the planet.
They kick up a soft dust, from space they appear
To be weather, a little storm the wind faithfully carries.

When it rains they lift their bowls to the sky.
They sleep with a rock under their heads.
At dawn they are the first to break the photographic stillness.

They have lost all sense of distance. A sort of arrival—late,
Under darkening skies, the smell of miles on your clothes—
A sort of arrival is needed to say how far you've traveled.

The crunch of gravel in the neighbor's driveway.
He will join the road with those other sedentary dreamers,
The unnumbered who've found a home just to leave it.

There is no good reason why night after night
I sleep here with you.
Only that the roof over our heads has not yet fallen.

Okay, that's it for this one, although I feel like there are lots of other issues here to chat about, so if you've by chance read the book, let me know, because I'd love to hear from you. Also, equal parts loyal and lovely readers, please remember that this week's BOW is J.M. Coetzee's Waiting for the Barbarians and check in over the next couple days for next week's BOW! I am off to enjoy a lovely weekend with dear Sarah from The World Is My Oyster, and of course Clair, the lovely TWIMO mascot!

Top Three Books about Driving

I apologize for being MIA this week; I had to go to North Carolina for my new job, which was a great experience but rather exhausting. Interestingly, those hours (and hours) of driving got me thinking about the myriad of books that revolve around being on the road, so I decided this week's top three would be dedicated to such works--restless and wild and searching works that use the road as a metaphor.

1. On the Road, Jack Kerouac

I know, beyond obvious, but I also don't think there is any way to not include this beat generation classic. Like many dreamy high schoolers who yearn but don't yet know what for, I fell in love with this book's rhythm, the wild aching pulse that propelled Kerouac's words into some strange mix of story and sound. Certain lines still stay with me today when I get in the car, like: "What is that feeling when you're driving away from people and they recede on the plain till you see their specks dispersing?--it's the too-huge world vaulting us, and it's good-by. But we lean forward to the next crazy venture beneath the skies."

2. Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas, Hunter S. Thompson

'Solace in excess' ala The Great Gatsby. Not going to say I loved it, and not going to say I read it twice (I actually prefer Thompson's Rum Diaries), but again this book uses driving as a way to move away from the present so that we might see it better--from afar.

3. You Shall Know Our Velocity, Dave Eggers

I know what you're thinking: Eggers was on last week's top three list! But he's just great, so here we go again. Strictly speaking, this isn't just a road trip book, but it is about two young men who set out on a round-the-world odyssey to give away $80,000 through ridiculous means, and cars are occasionally involved. Uncertainty, loss, confusion--all major themes in this books, and so well represented through travel.

Coming Soon: Waiting for the Barbarians

I'm going to just blurt it out, without any excuses or sugarcoating: I have never read any J.M. Coetzee. The first man to ever win the Booker Prize twice, the man whose novel has inspired a Philip Glass opera, the man who is pretty much widely regarded as a bad ass in the contemporary literature world...Never read him. Oops! So when I was browsing my bookshelves the morning, looking for the perfect B.O.W. for next week (without going to the bookstore and dropping some nonexistent dollar dollar bills), my eyes were immediately drawn to the slim black spine snuggled in between Susanna Clarke's Jonathan Strange & Mr. Norrell and William Congreve's The Way of the World.

Now, I vaguely remember purchasing Coetzee's Waiting for the Barbarians several years ago while at one of my favorite Charlottesville used bookstores, motivated I'm sure by one of my you-were-an-English-major-for-pete's-sake-and-look-it's-only-three-dollars-buy-it-and-buy-it-now feelings. Since that initial impulse, however, the book has inexplicably gone unread--collecting dust and rubbing covers with Clarke and Congreve--that is until next week! I am really excited about diving into this allegorical volume, which it seems has some parallels to Conrad's Heart of Darkness: issues of colonialism, narrator naiveté, crises of conscience, etc. In fact, I'm curious to know whether my brother Brian has read this one, since he commented in one of last week's posts that HoD made his top three list. Either way, check in two Saturdays from today for a review on this little guy!

B.O.W.: On Beauty

Is the suspense killing you? So sorry about having to delay this week as we reschedule our BOWs to Saturdays, but I think this is going to ensure more thorough posts in the future (and, of course, that I actually have time to finish the book!).

But enough excuses, let's get to it: On Beauty, by Zadie Smith, was quite the paradox for me. On one hand, I loved, loved, loved reading it--the plot moved swiftly, the characters were compelling and witty, the writing was fantastic; on the other hand, when I finished it, I didn't quite know what to make of it. Do you ever have that feeling of ambiguity-bordering-a-little-bit-on-letdown at the end of a book? It's like, you know the ending was right, that in its lack of resolution you can actually believe that the characters still have a chance to change and grow and connect, but you just don't get that kind of closure for which you were hoping...you are saying goodbye to characters without knowing for sure they're going to be okay (I get this feeling in movies quite frequently--In the Air comes to mind). Sorry if I'm being vague, but in case you are planning on reading On Beauty--which I highly recommend, btdubs!--I don't want to spoil it for you by disclosing too many specifics about the ending.

So what can I tell you? Well, one important thing to know about the book is that it's based on E.M. Forster's 1910 novel, Howard's End, a truly wonderful story that I happened to read in one of my favorite classes EVER at UVA: The Victorian Heroine at the Edge of Modernity (as some of you might be able to attest, I can wax on and on about that class: it happens to be where I first encountered Middlemarch, one of the most incredible books ever. Period.) But back to the point! For those of you who haven't read Howard's End, it revolves largely around two families clashing and the ensuing cultural issues--class, nationality, socioeconomic status. Its most famous line goes:

Only connect! That was the whole of her sermon. Only connect the prose and the passion and both will be exalted, and human love will be seen at its height. Live in fragments no longer.

Timely words then, at the precipice of WWI, and timely words again now, as another century commences. Smith re-imagines this collision of two families and a parallel pursuit of connectedness with her own wry British sensibility, probing the bubble of New England academia in tones both sensitive and sardonic in order to explore larger issues of family, gender, race, ideology, etc. In summary, I think this is a book you can read on multiple levels: you can view it as an homage to the brilliantly talented Forster and look for the parallels and divergences between on On Beauty and Howard's End; you can enjoy the multifaceted plot and the way it bifurcates then reconnects; and you can examine how beauty with a capital B is a kind of antidote to the daily small-scale dramas that permeate the book.

Before I put this one down, I want to leave you with a small sample of Smith's writing. In the following passage, the three Belsey siblings are enjoying a serendipitous rendezvous, and eldest brother Jerome reflects on the deep connection they share:

Looking at them both now, Jerome found himself in their finger joints and neat conch ears, in their long legs and wild curls. He heard himself in their partial lisps caused by puffy tongues vibrating against slightly noticeable buckteeth. He did not consider if or how or why he loved them. They were just love; they were the first evidence he ever had of love, and they would be the last confirmation of love when everything else fell away."

Maybe it's just because I have two brothers who I love and respect and miss these days very dearly, but there was something about the way Smith so sensitively and accurately describes the indescribable--that intrinsic and irrevocable connection of family--that just made me melt. L-O-V-E loved it.

Now it's time to move on to this week's BOW: Man Walks into a Room, by Nicole Krauss. As I mentioned last week, Krauss penned one of my favorite books ever (The History of Love), so I am beyond thrilled to share my reviews with you on this one Saturday next. Also, look forward to getting next week's BOW revealed in the next day or so!

News Flash

Happy Hump Day, Friends! I just wanted to let you all know that we are having a slight change of schedule on the blog: now that I'm a workin' woman, I've decided to move books of the week (BOWs) to Saturdays, so that I may continue to write healthy reviews that provide you with all the info you need! And starting next week, top three lists will appear on Wednesdays.

So, consider this week's postponement like a rain delay, but instead it's a holy-smokes-I'm-not-used-to-working-full-time-and-wow-that's-a-long-commute-let's-figure-this-all-out-delay. Will you forgive me and check back in soon? I promise I'll make it worth your while!

PS-Don't forget that this week's BOW is On Beauty, by Zadie Smith...I will be sharing my opinion with ya'll Saturday!

Manic Monday

Sorry I'm posting on the late side today, but it turns out the commute from Alpharetta to Athens is no joke, especially during rush hour (who knew?). Anyway, I just wanted to check in with all you lovelies out there, and of course give a special shout-out to my brother, Brian, and my dear friend, Sarah, for their absolutely fantastic contributions to Friday's post. If you haven't already, take a look at their own "top three..." lists, and feel free to add your own unique favs!

So, as many of you know, my schedule has gone from 0 to 60 in no time flat, which is thrilling and scary all at once. Whenever I get overwhelmed, I tend to want to organize, just so that I can regain a sense of control (imaginary as it may be). What better tool for feigning organization with panache than a lovely day planner? As a way to combat my manic monday feelings, I thought I'd share a few of my personal favorite agendas from some ab-fab national stationers:

Cavallini's Moderno Daily Planner: The mom-squad uses this posh and cheery option.

Paper Source's Gold Saffian Pocket Date Book: How can any day be ordinary with this kind of pocket-sized pizzazz?

Kate Spade's Canvas Anne Pocket Organizer: I am totally digging this preppy chic design, and love that it's refillable.

Top Three Back To School Books (Please Contribute!)

Ah, September! While in good ol' Georgia the only real indicators of the month are an influx of school buses and an appreciated drop in the humidity, as a New Yorker by birth, September still makes me think of fall (my very favorite season, btdubs): cool nights, light jackets, leaves just starting to change into a fiery ochre palette...and let's not forget, preparing for "back to school." Oh the everlovin' excitement of going to the Paper Cutter in Clifton Park and carefully choosing the perfect daily planner, coaxing my mom into a bigger set of crayola products (because of course I needed the classic and tropical palettes to truly reach my potential in the classroom), and angsting over the exact right Lisa Frank folders to start the year off with a bang.

Even just typing about it makes me wistful! That's why I thought I'd make today's Top Three List about back-to-school books. I know, I know, yet another rather vague topic, but what I mean by this is those books that practically everyone had assigned to them at one point or another while in school, those books that perennially popped up on the Read-Ten-Of-These-While-On-Summer-Vacation-Or-Else-Your-Brain-Might-Melt-And-You-Won't-Pass-Tenth-Grade-Lists, those books that some individuals still claim are their favorites, making you wonder whether it is true (because the books really are that good!) or if they hadn't read anything since 11th grade (sadly, a real possibility).

Personally, I had a ridiculously hard time getting the list down to three, because so many more books came to mind! I mean, I thought I could be Matilda except for the whole cruel and neglectful parents thing; we all remember being equal parts bemused and horrified by the tragic tenderness of Of Mice and Men; and let's not even get started on that crazy 1968 Romeo & Juliet film we all saw after reading the play. Eek! So how to decide? Well, I thought I'd break my list down by doing one book per class range, and just stick to the novels for simplicity's sake. Still, it was a total challenge and this list is by no means the rule. In fact, I would REALLY love it if you readers would contribute your own top three back to school favs in the comments section! But now without further ado, my top three:

1. The Giver, Lois Lowry (Elementary School)

Probably the very first challenging book I read in terms of content. Lowry presents us with a seemingly idyllic world that seduces us--that is until we start to see what is sacrificed at the altar of "sameness." Also, the very first book I read with an ambiguous ending: do Jonas and baby Gabriel actually make it to physical shelter, or are they simply remembering warmth, love, family? And could those be more powerful vehicles for survival? Would we even want to survive without such things?

2. To Kill A Mockingbird, Harper Lee (Junior High)

I mean, do I even need to say anything else? This is a perfect example of a book that if right now you were to say it's your favorite ever, I would totally not assume that means you haven't read anything worthwhile since the eighth grade. Oh Atticus Finch, oh Scout, and oh Boo Radley, too. Who could imagine a world without these characters and the lessons they teach?

3. The Great Gatsby, F. Scott Fitzgerald (High School)

This one was the hardest for me to choose, just because--thanks to a pretty awesome assortment of English classes at my high school--I got to read a great range of seminal works in grades 10-12, some expected and others less so: The Awakening, The Fountainhead, Of Human Bondage, A Prayer For Owen Meany, Pride and Prejudice, The Plague, Siddhartha, Their Eyes Were Watching God...the list goes on.

In the end though, I tried to stay true to the idea of a book practically all of us have been assigned to read and that made a profound impact. This was the novel that taught me superficiality in characters could be redeemed by substantive writing...in fact, I remember my teacher assigning us to read just the first page one night for homework, but to read it as many times as we could to really digest everything encapsulated in those powerful words. So good.

*Remember people, I'd love to see what books make your top three list!

Book of the Week: The Brief Wondrous Life of Oscar Wao

It's that time of the week again, folks! To be honest with you, this is the very first time where reading the B.O.W. actually took the whole week, and I was scrambling this morning to get through the last 85 pages or so. I would like to think that this lag has something to do with either the sudden flurry of activity in my life now that I have a job starting Monday, or perhaps the general day-behindedness I've been feeling the whole week, but it's definitely possible that the book itself was a large part of the issue...

The Brief Wondrous Life of Oscar Wao, Junot Diaz's first novel, is vibrant and raw and cacophonous, much like the Dominican Republic the book portrays. Through the narrator's strange mixture of rough candor and brilliant rhetoric, we come to know not just Oscar's brief and wondrous life, but the life of his ancestors, a slice of history in the DR, and a new lens for understanding America's heterogeneity today. While I did deeply love these aspects of the book, it was not an easy one for me to get through--perhaps because of its grittiness, or because of its thick references to Dominican dictators and cult fantasy characters. Of course prevalent use of the Spanish language didn't help much either (I studied German in high school and college, so am completely clueless when it comes to the romance languages). This story was also challenging in its intimate portrayal of tragedy, as it unflinchingly traces through the particulars of a multigenerational family curse ("fuku").

Now, not to be a spoiler here, but as you can guess from seeing the title (or reading more than 10 pages of the book), Oscar Wao doesn't make it to old-agedom. Interestingly, this sense of mortality, of a finite timeline, made me connect even more with the hapless hero, rooting for him to get up, start living, gain experiences while he could. This clever device, combined with the narrator's achingly honest portrait of Oscar as "a sweet but disastrously overweight, lovesick Dominican ghetto nerd" make for a story that is at once high-energy and intimately emotive. While not an easy read, this one is definitely worth the struggle!

As an interesting foil to The Brief Wondrous Life..., this week's B.O.W. is On Beauty, by Zadie Smith. It is also about cultural collisions, family dynamics, and generational gaps, but having read Ms. Smith previously, I can guarantee that this novel is definitely going to have a distinctly different lilt to it than Diaz's work!

Also, the following week's B.O.W. will be: Man Walks into a Room, by Nicole Krauss. Now, for all of you out there who have previously considered participating in the BOW challenge, THIS is the one! It's relatively short, written by one of my very favorite contemporary authors, and (as if that weren't already enough!), has a superbly bizarre plot: it is the story of a brilliant professor who suffers from amnesia, forgetting every memory beyond the age of 12. "Here is the story of a strikingly intelligent, sensitive man returned to a world in which everything is strange and new. An emigrant in his own life, set free from everything and everyone who once defined him..." I think it is going to be wonderful, and I really do hope you'll join me! PS-Don't you just love the cover? Delish!

Holiday Monday Edition: My Latest Crush

Happy Labor Day, friends; I hope you are enjoying the last few weeks of summer bliss! While I had to work a few hours at my part-time job (the new gig doesn't start for another week), I did get a chance to cook some great meals, watch a couple awesome movies, and go for a few long walks with my honey. Speaking of my honey, I thought I'd totally deviate from the whole general theme of my website to talk about a different kind of novel--as in innovative. That's right, people! My latest "celebrity" crush is none other than the super creative, undeniably innovative, and by the way did I mention he was British knight, Sir James Dyson, aka inventor of some outrageous vacuums and fans. How cool is it that he just completely questions the status quo when it comes to everyday appliances? Vacuums are rad, but why do they need all this bag junk? And why can't they swivel? Oh, and fans, they're totally cool, but uh...blades? Lame! Let's just multiply some air through a crazy vortex instead! Genius, genius, genius!

Anyway, as a kind of ode to my newest celebrity crush, I thought I'd feature a super awesome book regarding the design of ordinary objects: Super Normal, by designers Jasper Morrison and Naoto Fukasawa. This compendium of 204 everyday objects offers readers the chance to stop and think about the utterly simple, yet totally right product designs that punctuate our lives everyday. Like a breath of fresh air, this book provides an opportunity to reflect on those objects and what it means to be super normal. Is the title an oxymoron or a superlative--you decide!

Top Three Memoirs by Authors (and not about famous people's experiences being famous)

I thought I'd continue my one-day-behind lag and shift my Top Three list to Saturday this week. The humidity has finally subsided here in sunny Georgia, and something in the crisp air today reminds me of autumn, which of course makes me feel paradoxically melancholy and hopeful...emotions that are also conjured up by some of my favorite memoirs. Admittedly, I am not a huge nonfiction reader, but there are a few fabulous memoirs out there written by talented authors (rather than celebs plus ghost writers--yucko), which are incredibly stirring in their honesty, humor, and poignancy. The following three books all find a way to blend tragedy and jubilation--much like autumn does, don't you think?

1. The Year of Magical Thinking, Joan Didion

This restrained and diamond-sharp memoir chronicles the year after Didion loses her husband of 40 years, as her daughter lays unconscious in a hospital. This double-loss propels Didion into a "year of magical thinking," in which she moves through the traditional steps of mourning with a kind of hyper-awareness and detachment created by grief. Especially captivating is her discussions of marriage, as she ponders what it means to be married, and what it means to no longer be a part.

2. The Glass Castle, Jeannette Wells

Another rough one at times, but totally worth it! This is one of those can't-believe-it's-really-true-holy-smokes kind of stories, about an intelligent girl whose parents choose a beyond-laissez faire approach to child rearing, eventually ending up homeless and on the streets. The children's impressive stories of survival--and the parents' unbelievable mixture of adventure and self-absorption--make for a compelling read. I think you'll appreciate the way Wells talks about her experiences, with honesty and even empathy, rather than blame.

3. A Heartbreaking Work of Staggering Genius, Dave Eggers

Oh delight! While there is a layer of tragedy in the story (young Dave becomes his 8-year-old brother's guardian when their parents die of cancer within a 6-month period), this memoir is definitely more rollicking than the other two books in the list. In typical Eggers fashion and as the title suggests, AHWOSG resounds with irony and self-consciousness; it's laugh-out-loud funny and sincere, too.

Book of the Week: The World To Come

Sorry that this week's book is being discussed on Thursday rather than the typical Wednesday, but as I mentioned earlier, I was in the ATL for a job interview--which, you'll be pleased to hear--I just found out I got!!! So three cheers to me for being newly employed at a dream job that involves designing interiors for hotels around the country. Huzzah!

But back to why you're tuning in: the book of the week. I know at least one of my loyal followers joined me in reading The World To Come, by Dara Horn, and I look forward to hearing from her as well as anyone else who has tackled this magical work. So, you might be asking, what did I think? Well, that's a tricky one. On one hand, I felt that certain images were a little too heavy-handed, certain references too redundant, and certain plot lines too neatly packaged. But on the other hand, what a brilliant, bittersweet examination of life and how we choose to live it, and even how we might enter in and out of it.

So let me break down these juxtaposing critiques of the book. First, the aspects that didn't thrill me: sometimes I think artists can be a little too forceful with their images, wanting to make sure the reader sees the symbolism they've worked so hard to create. While I appreciate their support, sometimes it's nice to feel like you, the reader, have made these connections on your own, that you are getting the author's point rather than having him or her hand it to you on a platter. Perhaps the best example I can give is in the book's suggestion that the little dimple above our lips is from angels: the story goes that right before we are born, an angel presses the spot above our lips like a secret to wipe away all memories of the "world to come," that is, the world we exist in before and after death. Beautiful image, don't you think? I certainly did the first time I read it, but the problem becomes that Horn continues to reference this spot--every story embedded within the novel mentions it, every character's little lip dimple is accounted for, even drops of paint splatter onto portraits of people right in that very spot above the lip and below the nose. So much for subtlety. Sigh.

In spite of this lack of nuance, there was a lot to love about The World To Come, including the title's reference. What is the world to come? Well as Dara Horn discusses in an interview, it can mean a lot of different things to different people: "To one person, it might mean a life after death; to another, it implies an age of redemption; to someone else, it's simply the future in everyday life. This book suggests that all of those possibilities are actually more similar to one another than one might imagine." Mmm, I love that. I think that--especially towards the end of the book--we start to see all these different interpretations of the world to come and how they might interrelate in a very rich and meaningful way. The parts of the novel that take place in the world to come are hands-down my favorite, but then again I'm a big fan of that mixture of magic and wonder with the everyday.

Speaking of that mixture, this book was interesting to compare to other works by young Jewish fiction writers, including Jonathan Safran Foer's Everything is Illuminated, and Nicole Krauss' History of Love.

All three of the above works have a sort of magic to them, they all blend lesser-known historical tragedies with modern day events, and they tend to have a nesting doll quality to them, where stories reside within each other, opening up to reveal new secrets and new understanding. To be honest, while I felt like Horn did a great job here constructing a meaningful network of stories, for me this book didn't have quite the same ease and grace that EII and HOL had. In summary, if you did enjoy this book, then you should definitely check out Foer and Krauss, because they are absolutely incredible!

Finally, don't forget that this week's BOW is The Brief Wondrous Life of Oscar Wao, by Junot Diaz. Also, I have selected Zadie Smith's On Beauty for the following week, which I really hope you will enjoy; it's a "transatlantic comic saga" based loosely on E.M. Forster's Howard's End, an absolutely marvelous book in its own right.