Starlight Book Review – Emma Straub’s Modern Lovers

Cover of Modern Lovers by Emma Straub centered on a medium light red-orange background with Starry Night Elf avatar in lower right hand corner | Cover Image Source: Goodreads

Back in the Day Stellar Reading Challenge – 2010s

Published 2016

Trigger Warnings – Smoking/ Drinking/ Death and Suicide/ Sexual Content

3.75/5 When I planned for my reading for the 2010s in the Back in the Day Stellar Reading Challenge (SRC), my original choice ultimately did not meet this SRC’s criteria. Click here for details on this SRC. As 2022 neared its end, I considered myself fortunate that my book club chose to read Emma Straub’s Modern Lovers, a book published in 2016.

* I read Modern Lovers prior to the hubbub with author Straub and a Houston area school district. Any comments on this event with Straub will not be posted.

“Friends and former college bandmates Elizabeth and Andrew and Zoe have watched one another marry, buy real estate, and start businesses and families, all while trying to hold on to the identities of their youth. But nothing ages them like having to suddenly pass the torch (of sexuality, independence, and the ineffable alchemy of cool) to their own offspring… Back in the band’s heyday, Elizabeth put on a snarl over her Midwestern smile, Andrew let his unwashed hair grow past his chin, and Zoe was the lesbian all the straight women wanted to sleep with. Now nearing fifty, they all live within shouting distance in the same neighborhood deep in gentrified Brooklyn, and the trappings of the adult world seem to have arrived with ease. But the summer that their children reach maturity (and start sleeping together), the fabric of the adults’ lives suddenly begins to unravel, and the secrets and revelations that are finally let loose—about themselves, and about the famous fourth band member who soared and fell without them—can never be reclaimed… Straub packs wisdom and insight and humor together in a satisfying book about neighbors and nosiness, ambition and pleasure, the excitement of youth, the shock of middle age, and the fact that our passions—be they food, or friendship, or music—never go away, they just evolve and grow along with us.”

Modern Lovers seemed a great choice for the Back in the Day SRC. Straub wrote a book about characters looking both back in the past and forward to the future. At moments in my reading, I wondered how Straub managed to write a book on the precipice of time. The characters, Andrew in particular, irritated me. Sometimes, I didn’t care much about anyone in the book and that’s reflected in my rating. I would probably pick up another Straub book but there are other authors I want to read first.

Quotes come from book flaps/cover and are featured on color blocks.

Starlight Book Review – John Green’s Looking for Alaska

Cover of Looking For Alaska by John Green centered on a dark red background with Starry Night Elf avatar in lower right hand corner | Cover Image Source: Goodreads

Back in the Day Stellar Reading Challenge – 2000s

Published 2006

Trigger Warnings – Smoking/ Drinking/ Death and Suicide References/ Sexual Content

4/5 John Green wrote one of my favorite novels — An Abundance of Katherines which I read in the late Aughts. I also picked up The Fault in Our Stars around the time of the screen adaptations release. Yet, I never read Green’s first novel, Looking for Alaska until 2022 for the Back in the Day Stellar Reading Challenge (SRC). Click here for details on this SRC. I read Looking for Alaska with my ears, read by the incomparable Wil Wheaton.

“Before. Miles “Pudge” Halter is done with his safe life at home. His whole life has been one big non-event, and his obsession with famous last words has only made him crave “the Great Perhaps” even more (Francois Rabelais, poet). He heads off to the sometimes crazy and anything-but-boring world of Culver Creek Boarding School, and his life becomes the opposite of safe. Because down the hall is Alaska Young. The gorgeous, clever, funny, sexy, self-destructive, screwed up, and utterly fascinating Alaska Young. She is an event unto herself. She pulls Pudge into her world, launches him into the Great Perhaps, and steals his heart. Then. . . .
After. Nothing is ever the same.” 

The fact that I read An Abundance of Katherines years ago aside, I soon recognized Green’s writing style. I considered Looking for Alaska the older brother of An Abundance of Katherines. I cared about Miles Halter A.K.A. Pudge and his friends, felt concern for Alaska Young in particular. As someone maybe a decade older than these kids at Culver Creek Boarding School, I recognized the elements of dorm living and even the pranks. This seemed late Nineties, early Aughts. Pay phone usage by characters brought bake what all people had to do to reach someone; this predated cell phone ubiquity. Yet, the teens feeling invincible among other attitudes seemed timeless, as though this book might take place in any decade since 1900. Overall, I found Looking for Alaska to be well written and true to life. The Before/After, made for emotionally tough reading for me. Also, not to blame Green or this work, I stopped and started reading Looking for Alaska more than once due to a waiting list for this book. Yet, I recommend Looking for Alaska to any reader seeking something of a bygone era.

Quotes come from book flaps/cover and are featured on color blocks.

Starlight Book Review – Rebecca Wells’ Divine Secrets of the Ya-Ya Sisterhood

Cover of Divine Secrets of the Ya-Ya Sisterhood by Rebecca Wells centered on a light medium green background with Starry Night Elf avatar in lower right hand corner | Cover Image Source: Goodreads

Back in the Day Stellar Reading Challenge – 1990s

Published 1996

Trigger Warnings – abuse/child neglect/ racism/sexism/ substance abuse/ violence

4.2/5 I remember my mom taking me to see Divine Secrets of the Ya-Ya Sisterhood (2002) when the film hit screens during a summer break from college. Mom also read the book by Rebecca Wells which inspired the movie of the same name. Yet, I probably did not mentally slide Wells’ Divine Secrets of the Ya-Ya Sisterhood until I read Malcolm Gladwell’s The Tipping Point… Still, I never made my way back to this book until last month when I sought out literature published in the 1990s for the Back in the Day Stellar Reading Challenge (SRC). Click here for details on this SRC. I wanted a book closer to my typical reading but not in a genre I recently read in the latter part of 2022. It pleased me that I located a copy of Divine Secrets of the Ya-Ya Sisterhood to read.

“When Siddalee Walker, oldest daughter of Vivi Abbott Walker, Ya-Ya extraordinaire, is interviewed in the New York Times about a hit play she’s directed, her mother gets described as a “tap-dancing child abuser.” Enraged, Vivi disowns Sidda. Devastated, Sidda begs forgiveness, and postpones her upcoming wedding. All looks bleak until the Ya-Yas step in and convince Vivi to send Sidda a scrapbook of their girlhood mementos, called “Divine Secrets of the Ya-Ya Sisterhood.” As Sidda struggles to analyze her mother, she comes face to face with the tangled beauty of imperfect love, and the fact that forgiveness, more than understanding, is often what the heart longs for.”

Since growing up in Houston, not two hundred miles from Louisiana, and being close to my mom, Divine Secrets of the Ya-Ya Sisterhood seemed both familiar and redolent with home and family. I marveled at the bond between Ya-Yas Vivi, Caro, Teensy, and Necie. I appreciated how this book plunged back in time to the 1930s and the beginnings of the Ya-Ya Sisterhood as well as points in Siddalee’s 1993. I found the correspondence between characters dynamic. Some points I set aside the book at some of the abuse, neglect, and racial statements made me uncomfortable. Yet, I must add that I found that Wells related the tale, warts and all, rather than endorsed these thoughts or behaviors.

Quotes come from book flaps/cover and are featured on color blocks.

Starlight Book Review – Stephen Hawking’s A Brief History of Time

Cover of A Brief History of Time by Stephen Hawking centered on a light blue background with Starry Night Elf avatar in lower right hand corner | Cover Image Source: Goodreads

Back in the Day Stellar Reading Challenge – 1980s

Published 1988

4.20/5 I wanted something different for my 1980s entry for the Back in the Day Stellar Reading Challenge (SRC). Then, I realized I had yet to read nonfiction for this particular SRC. That helped me narrow down my selection to Stephen Hawking’s A Brief History of Time.

“Stephen Hawking, one of the most brilliant theoretical physicists in history, wrote the modern classic A Brief History of Time to help non-scientists understand fundamental questions of physics and our existence: where did the universe come from? How and why did it begin? Will it come to an end, and if so, how?… Hawking attempts to deal with these questions (and where we might look for answers) using a minimum of technical jargon. Among the topics gracefully covered are gravity, black holes, the Big Bang, the nature of time and physicists’ search for a grand unifying theory… This is deep science; the concepts are so vast (or so tiny) that they cause mental vertigo while reading, and one can’t help but marvel at Hawking’s ability to synthesize this difficult subject for people not used to thinking about things like alternate dimensions. The journey is certainly worth taking for as Hawking says, the reward of understanding the universe may be a glimpse of “the mind of God”.
(From Hawking “dot” org “dot” uk)… A Brief History of Time, published in 1988, was a landmark volume in science writing and in world-wide acclaim and popularity, with more than 9 million copies in print globally. The original edition was on the cutting edge of what was then known about the origins and nature of the universe. But the ensuing years have seen extraordinary advances in the technology of observing both the micro- and the macrocosmic world—observations that have confirmed many of Hawking’s theoretical predictions in the first edition of his book. Now a decade later, this edition updates the chapters throughout to document those advances, and also includes an entirely new chapter on Wormholes and Time Travel and a new introduction. It makes vividly clear why A Brief History of Time has transformed our view of the universe. (Refers to later editions)”

As a person who usually prefers reading more about history and art, I approached A Brief History of Time with trepidation. Yet, I found A Brief History of Time a simple but not condescending take on astronomy. Hawking’s sharp, humorous tone throughout the work made the knowledge he shared attainable. As an armchair historian, I appreciated most the parts that served as biographies of various scientists. I admit, though, some of the more mathematical and scientific passages seemed drier to me. Regardless, I preferred reading A Brief History of Time to various other science books required in my “science for nonmajors” courses in undergrad.

Quotes come from book flaps/cover and are featured on color blocks.

Starlight Book Review – Stephen King’s The Shining

Cover of The Shining by Stephen King centered on a dark blue-green background | Cover Image Source: Goodreads

Back in the Day Stellar Reading Challenge – 1970s

Published 1977

4.25/5 I determined to return to adult literature for my 1970s entry for the Back in the Day Stellar Reading Challenge (SRC). Still, I wanted to read something a little different from my usual fare and I chose a book from the Horror genre. While I have read several books by Stephan King, a few of his Horror books even, I had yet to read The Shining.

“Jack Torrance’s new job at the Overlook Hotel is the perfect chance for a fresh start. As the off-season caretaker at the atmospheric old hotel, he’ll have plenty of time to spend reconnecting with his family and working on his writing. But as the harsh winter weather sets in, the idyllic location feels ever more remote…and more sinister. And the only one to notice the strange and terrible forces gathering around the Overlook is Danny Torrance, a uniquely gifted five-year-old.”

I must note that one reason it took me several months to read The Shining was that I had to check in the book several times. Another would be that it was scary enough that I restricted my reading to certain times of day. King’s an amazing writer, providing evocative descriptions of characters and settings. I especially liked Dick Hallorann and I greatly cared about what happened to Danny Torrance. Several other characters were empathetic, too. I took off a partial star, though, for some of the rough parts, (yes, I know that this is definitely Horror) and an abundance of gratuitous details (again, I know). Will I read Doctor Sleep, the next in the series? Maybe after I read some lighter, cozier books. Still, I get why Stephen King reigns supreme. Also, I appreciated being able to step out of my reading comfort zone for this SRC.

Quotes come from book flaps/cover and are featured on color blocks.

Starlight Book Review – E.L. Konigsburg’s From the Mixed-Up Files of Mrs. Basil E. Frankweiler

Cover of From the Mixed-Up Files of Mrs. Basil E. Frankweiler by E.L. Konigsburg on a purple background | Cover Image Source: Goodreads

Back in the Day Stellar Reading Challenge – 1960s

Published 1967

4.15/5 I enjoyed reading a work of Children’s Literature so much for the previous decade in the Back in the Day Stellar Reading Challenge (SRC), I decided to continue in this fashion for the Turbulent Sixties. One of my colleagues recommended E.L. Konigsburg’s From the Mixed-Up Files of Mrs. Basil E. Frankweiler as my 1960s read for this SRC. While I watched a screen adaptation, I never read this book and decided to change that.

“When Claudia decided to run away, she planned very carefully. She would be gone just long enough to teach her parents a lesson in Claudia appreciation. And she would go in comfort-she would live at the Metropolitan Museum of Art. She saved her money, and she invited her brother Jamie to go, mostly because be was a miser and would have money. Claudia was a good organizer and Jamie bad some ideas, too; so the two took up residence at the museum right on schedule. But once the fun of settling in was over, Claudia had two unexpected problems: She felt just the same, and she wanted to feel different; and she found a statue at the Museum so beautiful she could not go home until she bad discovered its maker, a question that baffled the experts, too…The former owner of the statue was Mrs. Basil E. Frankweiler. Without her-well, without her, Claudia might never have found a way to go home.”

I enjoyed From the Mixed-Up Files of Mrs. Basil E. Frankweiler. The whole situation seems rooted in a bygone era. In fact, the copy I read provided Konigsburg’s note upon the anniversary edition of the book. She stated that the Kincaid siblings could have pulled this off in 1967, a time not only before 9/11 but also before the World Trade Center itself. I appreciated the kids’ sense of wonder and felt Konigsburg understood the stark, black and white views of children. I questioned the point of view and sometimes the author talked down in a condescending way about Claudia and Jamie, coming off as didactic. My rating reflects that yet I appreciated reading From the Mixed-Up Files of Mrs. Basil E. Frankweiler at this time for this SRC.

Quotes come from book flaps/cover and are featured on color blocks.

Starlight Book Review – Dodie Smith’s The Hundred and One Dalmatians

Cover of The Hundred and One Dalmatians by Dodie Smith on a gray background |
Cover Image Source: Goodreads

Back in the Day Stellar Reading Challenge – 1950s

Published 1956

4.1/5 After some serious, thought-provoking reads for the Back in the Day Stellar Reading Challenge (SRC), I determined I wanted lighter fare. I discovered that Dodie Smith’s The Hundred and One Dalmatians hit shelves in the 1950s. I saw a Disney adaptation of The Hundred and One Dalmatians as a child but had yet to read the book. I determined to remedy that by reading Smith’s book to satisfy my Back in the 1950s entry for this SRC.

“When Missis and Pongo’s puppies go missing, the two Dalmatian parents know the scary Cruella de Vil has had something to do with it. After all, she adores furs, and the Dalmatians have such beautiful coats… The dogs’ pets, Mr and Mrs Dearly, don’t understand them, so it is up to Pongo and Missis to rescue their pups.”

I consider The Hundred and One Dalmatians a charming delight. I imagine readers in the 1950s loved the whimsy of dogs possessing fantastic infrastructures and humans lacking. I enjoyed how The Hundred and One Dalmatians resolved, too. Cruella de Vil dazzled in a deliciously wicked way as the demented villain of this piece. If Smith wrote this book in the 2020s rather than the 1950s, I think she might approach some of how Pongo’s talk and address of Missis in a different way. I deducted a partial star for some parts that took the “scenic route” through this canine caper fantasy but regard this a a worthwhile classic to read in the Twenty-first Century.

Quotes come from book flaps/cover and are featured on color blocks.

Starlight Book Review – Justin Deabler’s Lone Stars

Cover of Lone Stars by Justin Deabler on a medium blue background | Cover Image Source: Goodreads

4/5 When Gulf Coast Reads (GCR) announced they selected Justin Deabler’s Lone Stars as their 2022 book, I imagined I might read this novel. The GCR designation led Lone Stars to becoming the book club read for October. The title tipped me off that this book likely took place mostly in Texas. While I decided against counting this towards any of my Stellar Reading Challenges (SRC) this year, this book works well as parts take place in the latter part of the Twentieth Century as well as the 2000s. So if you’re seeking something for the Set in the Day SRC, you might want to check this out, Gnomies.

Learn more about GCR by clicking here.

Click here to check out more on the Set in the Day SRC.

“Lone Stars follows the arc of four generations of a Texan family in a changing America. Julian Warner, a father at last, wrestles with a question his husband posed: what will you tell our son about the people you came from, now that they’re gone? Finding the answers takes Julian back in time to Eisenhower’s immigration border raids, an epistolary love affair during the Vietnam War, crumbling marriages, queer migrations to Cambridge and New York, up to the disorienting polarization of Obama’s second term. And in these answers lies a hope: that by uncloseting ourselves–as immigrants, smart women, gay people–we find power in empathy.”

I knew early on in my reading of Lone Stars that Deabler and his main character, Julian Warner, were around my age and that his parents, Lacy and Aaron, were contemporary to my own mom and dad. I found this both a realistic and relatable read. A few things threw me, such as name changes for the bedroom community where Julian grew up and not being informed of when certain events took place. In some ways, things seemed neatly tied up while others loosely dangled to the point of wondering about a sequel. I liked the family saga and the genealogical bents of Lone Stars but I wanted Julian to learn a little more about his roots.

Quotes come from book flaps/cover and are featured on color blocks.

Starlight Book Review – Ernest Hemingway’s For Whom the Bell Tolls

Cover of For Whom the Bell Tolls by Ernest Hemingway on a light blue background |
Cover Image Source: Goodreads

Back in the Day Stellar Reading Challenge – 1940s

Published 1940

3.65/5 A few years back, I found myself on a massive “literary/classic kick.” Among the writers on this bookshelf of mine happened to be the incomparable Ernest Hemingway. His sparse, nearly taciturn prose dazzled me. During this kick, I acquired a copy of For Whom the Bell Tolls and said copy hung out on my To Be Read (TBR) Shelf for various reasons. I noticed that this book hit shelves in 1940 and picked it up again for the Back in the Day Stellar Reading Challenge (SRC). Also, I thought a pre-World War II (WWII) work might diversify my reading for this SRC.

“In 1937 Ernest Hemingway traveled to Spain to cover the civil war there for the North American Newspaper Alliance. Three years later he completed the greatest novel to emerge from “the good fight,” For Whom the Bell Tolls. The story of Robert Jordan, a young American in the International Brigades attached to an antifascist guerilla unit in the mountains of Spain, it tells of loyalty and courage, love and defeat, and the tragic death of an ideal. In his portrayal of Jordan’s love for the beautiful Maria and his superb account of El Sordo’s last stand, in his brilliant travesty of La Pasionaria and his unwillingness to believe in blind faith, Hemingway surpasses his achievement in The Sun Also Rises and A Farewell to Arms to create a work at once rare and beautiful, strong and brutal, compassionate, moving and wise. “If the function of a writer is to reveal reality,” Maxwell Perkins wrote to Hemingway after reading the manuscript, “no one ever so completely performed it.” Greater in power, broader in scope, and more intensely emotional than any of the author’s previous works, it stands as one of the best war novels of all time.” 

A Gnomie reviewed For Whom the Bell Tolls on Goodreads, wishing she could rate it with 3.5/5 Stars. I admit, for the most part, I agree with her. I believe this may be the longest Hemingway work I have read! I didn’t much care for Robert Jordan, particularly in the beginning, but I discovered a bit of sympathy for the character alongside Pilar and Maria. The Old English writing style (thee, thou, thy, etc) threw me off at the beginning of my read, this seemed so distant and long ago. I reminded myself throughout that this book was written in less equitable times as well. Yet, I understand that these characters spoke in Catalan. One nod I loved though was a passing mention of Corpus Christi, Texas, the hometown of some of my grandparents and great grandparents.

Quotes come from book flaps/cover and are featured on color blocks.

Starlight Book Review – Isabel Allende’s In the Midst of Winter

Cover of In the Midst of Winter by Isabel Allende | Cover Image Source: Goodreads

4/5 I read my first Isabel Allende book between undergraduate and grad school. Allende’s style appealed to me — the great storytelling with the spice of magical realism — to the point in which I continued checking out her books from my local library. In fact, I even read In the Midst of Winter twice now. Originally, I read In the Midst of Winter in 2017, discovering both its relevant story and lighter dashes of magical realism. More recently, I read this Allende work again for my monthly book club.

“New York Times and worldwide bestselling “dazzling storyteller” (Associated Press) Isabel Allende returns with a sweeping novel about three very different people who are brought together in a mesmerizing story that journeys from present-day Brooklyn to Guatemala in the recent past to 1970s Chile and Brazil… In the Midst of Winter begins with a minor traffic accident—which becomes the catalyst for an unexpected and moving love story between two people who thought they were deep into the winter of their lives. Richard Bowmaster—a 60-year-old human rights scholar—hits the car of Evelyn Ortega—a young, undocumented immigrant from Guatemala—in the middle of a snowstorm in Brooklyn. What at first seems just a small inconvenience takes an unforeseen and far more serious turn when Evelyn turns up at the professor’s house seeking help. At a loss, the professor asks his tenant Lucia Maraz—a 62-year-old lecturer from Chile—for her advice. These three very different people are brought together in a mesmerizing story that moves from present-day Brooklyn to Guatemala in the recent past to 1970s Chile and Brazil, sparking the beginning of a long overdue love story between Richard and Lucia.”

I appreciated In the Midst of Winter both times I read it. During that nearly five year gap between my two readings of In the Midst of Winter, I read other stories about plights similar to Evelyn’s. While reading In the Midst of Winter back in 2017, I wondered if Allende was trying her hand at writing a mystery as well as a memoir. Still and all, she worked her enchantment in this book. Evelyn and Lucia won my sympathy early on but I came around to rooting for (shipping even) Lucia and Richard. While well written and clear to read, some of the subject matter greatly troubled me. Readers seeking magical realism might want to give Allende’s earliest works a try. Yet, I recommend at least one reading of In the Midst of Winter to anyone who seeks to understand contemporary critical issues.

Quotes come from book flaps/cover and are featured on color blocks.