I have a criteria for historical novels (and also for answering the question in which period of time I would like to live), and that is I only like stories from times people brushed their teeth, and the year 1974 fits that one criteria. Still, there are other menaces and unpleasant things in San Francisco back in the day. Like how a nineteen-year-old Celia Dent is orphaned and hastily married to Drew, a manipulative and controlling asshole of a man, and packed into a job she doesn't quite like. So while she spends her days as a phone agent, telling people that their line will be cut off if they don't pay their bill, she tells herself she's lucky to have this job and has no other options - at least, she thinks she doesn't. It might not be her dream job, but at least her workplace is not boring: a colleague is murdered by her husband when he found her in bed with her lover... who also works at the phone company! While this incident occupies Celia's mind a lot, she also muses a lot about passion, death, love and living one's life, and starts acting on it - going for drinks with the girls from work, fantasizing about offing Drew... And one night she goes too far.
I really liked Celia as a character, her arc was relatable, likable and her story was kind of comedic, kind of sad, but always enthralling. Surprisingly delightful, I love me a feminist noir!
Backstabbers by Eliza Jabore
Although I'm not a huge fan of survival thrillers, Backstabbers really got me hooked insanely with a very twisty plot, and of course, it gets all saucy when friendship and betrayal gets involved.
Three friends, Jade, Stef and Zoe decide to go hiking in Washington on a trail where supposedly a serial killer has been at work. To make their hike a little less boring, they are listening to a true crime
podcast about the very serial killer. When Stef twists her ankle and they need medical help, they find a remote cabin, just the kind where a serial killer would live in, and the owner seems helpful.What none of them knows is that appearances are deceiving, and that includes the intentions of the friends. One of them has a secret agenda and yeah, get ready to meet one of the most disgusting characters in terms of personality. May this kind of friendship never find me.
Honey by Imani Thompson
Honey is the story of
Yrsa, a PhD student who somewhat impulsively throws a bee into a university professor's drink and experiences a surge of power and control over her boring life when this man (against whom she has every reason to be resentful) turns out allergic and dies.
So she repeats it. She goes on apps and meets loads of men, who honestly are disgusting and misogynistic, whom she then kills. But is all of this sustainable?
For me, this was a hard book to go through, but it was so for all the right reasons - the pacing, in accordance with Yrsa's boring life, is slow in the first half. Lots of stuff happens off page and Yrsa is not the most likable or interesting unhinged female lead. There also might be a marketing failure or just my personal failure of vibing with British humor, because I didn't find this book "Comic, sexy, addictive" as the cover promises. I did find many of the discussions revolving around Afro-pessimism, misogyny, and the general life of a young adult today interesting. It just wasn't my book, maybe? Der Fall Teo Macamo (Morduntersuchungskommission #1) by Max Annas
Max Annas, the most political of all German crime fiction writers, dips his toes into the obscure world of Nazis in former East Germany, GDR.
Although it is widely believed that all communists went to East Germany after the Second World War and all Nazis stayed in the West, and although the GDR was in principal an antifascist state, the superficial "Entnazifizierung" processes and integration programs speak another language. Annas' book focuses on the murder of a young contract worker from Mozambique who was found on train tracks, thrown from a train in such a country which vehemently denies the existence of Nazis within their borders. We follow Lieutenant Otto Castorp and his fight against the windmills to restore some accountability under such circumstances.
The book is enraging and reminds me of the case of Oury Jalloh who was found burned in a police station after being taken into custody after a drunken night out. The court ruled that he burned himself, although he was gagged and his hands tied. I'm surprised people concentrate so much on what is happening in the USA with ICE violence and all, meanwhile all these things have been happening here for a long time, there's a German tradition, if you want to. We can only hope for days where it is widely accepted that each human life is of value and human dignity counts for everybody. But yeah the book was great, would definitely recommend.
Comments
Post a Comment