My Brilliant Friend
This is the book I was reading when my husband was admitted to the hospital a month ago. Which is how I managed to fall so far behind on this blog. (And I was doing well, too!) But I'm catching up now and hoping I remember enough about these books to write coherent things about them.
I've been half meaning to read My Brilliant Friend since the HBO series came out. It helped that I saw it at the library book sale shortly thereafter. And I guess I don't entirely know what I expected from it, but it wasn't really what I got.
There are some amazing quotes in here. The language is incredible, distilling motives and emotions in that way that the best writers have. I imagine that this is even more true in the original Italian - you always lose a little something in translation.
That said, the book also meanders all over the place. I had a hard time keeping the characters straight, even with the handy cheat sheet in the front of the book. The author goes off on tangents and wanders down rabbit holes before finally returning to her original point dozens of pages later. I think if I'd been able to read it in larger chunks this would have been less of a problem. But dipping in and out, as I often do, made it hard to follow.
But there's a strong narrative voice, which I appreciate. And the friendship at the center of the book reminded me of Cat's Eye. That this story is being told almost as a form of vengeance is interesting, and it almost makes me want to track down the rest of the series. Almost.
I've been half meaning to read My Brilliant Friend since the HBO series came out. It helped that I saw it at the library book sale shortly thereafter. And I guess I don't entirely know what I expected from it, but it wasn't really what I got.
There are some amazing quotes in here. The language is incredible, distilling motives and emotions in that way that the best writers have. I imagine that this is even more true in the original Italian - you always lose a little something in translation.
That said, the book also meanders all over the place. I had a hard time keeping the characters straight, even with the handy cheat sheet in the front of the book. The author goes off on tangents and wanders down rabbit holes before finally returning to her original point dozens of pages later. I think if I'd been able to read it in larger chunks this would have been less of a problem. But dipping in and out, as I often do, made it hard to follow.
But there's a strong narrative voice, which I appreciate. And the friendship at the center of the book reminded me of Cat's Eye. That this story is being told almost as a form of vengeance is interesting, and it almost makes me want to track down the rest of the series. Almost.
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