Pages

Thursday, September 30, 2021

Beloved Book Review

 Rawr Reader,

I'm rather curious fellow readers. What kind of music do you listen to? I like a bit of everything, which I know everyone says until you spit every genre of music but the only one they actually listen to, but I consider myself an honorary member of the eclectic music listener club. Latin music? Yeah! Show tunes? Cue De-FYing Gravity! Opera and Kpop? Sure! Rock, country, R&B? I love playlists that mix them altogether like Trail Mix. Scores? AllDayEveryDay. I will say there are a few genres that don't quite fit anywhere in my library: Death Metal and Screamo. This all has nothing to do with the book review but we can depart and if anything, you'd have likely skipped this paragraph by now.

And I didn't plan this but we're reaching the end of National Book Banning Week on October 2, so I'm glad I got to share one of the works of an author prominently and frequently on that list. How books can be banned I'll never understand. Books set us free. 
So even if we don't read the same books, I say enjoy my friends. Read anything and everything.

The synopsis for Beloved by Toni Morrison is provided by Goodreads:


Winner of the Pulitzer Prize, Toni Morrison’s Beloved is a 
spellbinding and dazzlingly innovative portrait of a woman 
haunted by the past.

Sethe was born a slave and escaped to Ohio, but eighteen years later she is still not free. She has borne the unthinkable and not gone mad, yet she is still held captive by memories of Sweet Home, the beautiful farm where so many hideous things happened. Meanwhile Sethe’s house has long been troubled by the angry, destructive ghost of her baby, who died nameless and whose tombstone is engraved with a single word: Beloved.

Sethe works at beating back the past, but it makes itself heard and felt incessantly in her memory and in the lives of those around her. When a mysterious teenage girl arrives, calling herself Beloved, Sethe’s terrible secret explodes into the present.

Combining the visionary power of legend with the 
unassailable truth of history, Morrison’s unforgettable novel
is one of the great and enduring works of American literature.


Reference:
   I read her first novel The Bluest Eye with my sister early last year and wasn't as drawn into the story so much as drawn by her writing. However I loved her voice so much I wanted to give another one of her books a chance. (It tickles me to remember how I used to think a book without plot, even if it has nice writing, wasn't worth reading. Oh how times have changed!) 
   What drew me to reading Beloved now and not adding it to my growing TBR pile with some books remaining untouched for over ten years (eek!) was watching her documentary: Toni Morrison: The Pieces I Am (2019) currently available on Hulu. 
   I humbly ask, please, even if you aren't interested in reading this book, at least give the documentary a watch. It's two hours long but by the end I think you won't be able to resist picking up one of her books.
   Two years since she's passed but it's an honor having lived when she lived. 
R.I.P. Ms. Morrison. 



Review:
  Wow.
  It isn't frequent a book takes root in my head. There are layers and layers of depth and patience the author conveys through her characters: Sethe and Paul D and Denver. Firstly I think what struck me most and what hooked me to the story from the first chapter was the fact this novel had magical realism. I didn't expect anything beyond the cadences of mainstream literature and, being set shortly after the Civil War, explicitly social issues. To that I say shame on me because this is one of the few literary award winners that I've read that I actually agree deserved to win. Our Toni Morrison wouldn't make a story that easy to read. She would've wanted us to ache and grieve and hope and forgive and live.
   Now as a fantasy fan I'd like to remark that the magical realism isn't superficial. It's simply another character, one that plays a pivotal role in the novel. Magical realism was the second element that drew and hooked me in after her writing.
   The novel is set in a small town in Ohio, where not only did slaves seek freedom in, but the author herself lived in her youth. She remarks in her documentary, which I mentioned in the Reference section above, that she lived in a town in her youth with as much diversity as the American Melting Pot metaphor implies. Diversity in ethnicity, but with all the complexities seen in novels normally depicted as white people. Morrison had been interviewed and critically reviewed being asked why she focused so much of her narratives through the lens of black people. She phrased it along the lines of being that most narratives in fiction that people read or that people are taught are through the white gaze. She wrote her narratives like many white writers did. Because she wrote the stories she wanted to tell. Because it shouldn't warrant explaining. Her stories revolve around black people; they don't explain them or make them idealized. Her characters feel real because of the attention and devotion Morrison felt toward these people who deserve to have their stories told. A recurring theme: understanding that just because you didn't live it, doesn't mean you can't feel for them and learn to understand their thoughts and emotions. Which are valid. Beautifully. 
   Beloved follows Sethe, a single mother who exists day by day, not living a life worthy of an escaped slave because of the traumas of her past. The owners of Sweet Home, the estate she escaped from, find her and push her to act in one of the most vicious acts committed on earth. Eighteen years after committing the act the past still lingers. In the walls of 124, where Sethe and Denver live alone but not alone. A ghost, manifested. Their isolated life is disrupted when Sweet Home comes calling again, but this time it isn't a slaveowner but a former slave. Paul D, a friend of Sethe from Sweet Home, brings the world back into their lives, beginning a chain of events that will lead them to confront what they've refused to confront. 
   Sethe's fear consumes her and Morrison intricately weaves that fear through the past and present, allowing triumph in despair and redemption in despondency. Sethe's fear transferred to her daughter Denver, who never leaves 124 and is in fact afraid to leave 124 on her own. Denver's reliance on Sethe and dissatisfaction with the arrival of Paul D is an element of dependency Sethe was unconsciously instilling in her daughter. Sethe wanted freedom for her daughter but didn't encourage social interactions or world trekking. She wanted freedom for her daughter but never explained the life altering events eighteen years prior to the beginning of the novel. Denver only had rumors, whispers, and ghosts.
   A mother's love can't be defined. A mother's love is more than what nature instills in human beings. What it dictates should be right and wrong. The violence and extremes a mother takes is something that not every mother can commit, but maybe something every mother can understand because they know what it means to bring a life into this world and be responsible for it, in the baby's life or not. As for the rest of us, what enigmas mothers are. How powerful and intuitive and caring and loving. 
   Word choice should always be deliberate and none more so than when naming characters. At first reading the novel I thought Morrison chose such interesting names, but when I learned how they were given their names, I couldn't believe there was a way of loving Morrison even more. Names are possessions and I never framed it that way before reading this.
   Amy is a character that for some reason reminds me of Tom Bombadil from Tolkien's The Lord of the Rings. She comes out of no where and is unexpectedly not what the reader imagines her to be and is extremely likable. She's the Edna to Sethe and Denver's Incredibles.
   It's challenging describing this book. Is it sad? Yes. But there are so many small droplets of love constantly throughout that you don't realize the tragedies and cruelties of the world because you're in a rain storm of love. It reminds me of how I felt after finishing the novel Moloka'i by Alan Brennert. The beauty of living even when it seems like life is nothing but a never-ending tragedy.
   Beloved has heart and scars. It has soul and speaks loudly in the quietness. 
   After writing my review I feel it unworthy of her novel. I just ask, please take the time to fall in love with Beloved. You'll see.


I give this book 5/5 stars.



Quote:
"Anything dead coming back to life hurts."
Toni Morrison, Beloved



My Goodreads:



Next To Read:
Mexican Gothic by Silvia Moreno-Garcia



Spoilers:
   I will keep my spoilers short because Beloved isn't necessarily a novel focused on plot and action. There isn't an endgame that the characters have to reach. Not externally. Beloved's about forgiveness. About acceptance. Opening up hurts so you can trust again. About loving. Yourself, others, the world.
   My biggest question I never found clarity in was how Sethe left prison after only a short time there. She murdered her daughter, even disregarding the added element of the daughter being considered property in the eyes of the schoolteacher and slave hunter, murder had to have given her more time in prison. Denver was with her mother out of prison going to a school when she was around eight so Sethe was in prison for less than a decade. And why did anyone or Baby Suggs let Sethe take Denver with her to prison in the first place considering she literally tried to kill all of her kids? It just doesn't sit right. Perhaps another reread!
   Nearing the end of the book Morrison becomes experimental which I loved, loved, loved. We jump perspectives between characters almost like a parent winding down a young child at the end of the night with a bedtime story. We have a chapter of Beloved's insightfully unique perspective where one chapter is written without punctuation as if there is no beginning and end in Beloved's eyes. Another chapter where dialogue is written like free verse. 
   Morrison gives us vividly graphic images, two in particular, that gives me goosebumps every time I think about them. A baby breastfeeding with the blood of her murdered sister mixed with the milk. Amy describing the scars on Sethe's back as a chokecherry tree.
   The end where Sethe tries to kill Mr. Bodwin is more of an ambiguous ending to me than Beloved disappearing. I liked that Morrison showed Beloved becoming less vocal, as if all the words were now out and she should return back to the realm she arrived from. Denver getting a job to take care of her mother, learning to grow up even after having little reason to motivate her, making friends with the townspeople, I was just overall very proud of her.
   Excellence in women lifting other women up. I'm all for it.



Until Next Time,
Nicole Ciel


Tuesday, September 21, 2021

The Fifth Season Book Review

 Rawr Reader,

For the first time in years I feel like we're having a normal Florida summer. Refreshing! Rainy afternoons becoming a daily expectancy makes cozying up in my favorite reading corner and diving head first into the pages of a book and not coming up for air until the last page has turned somewhat . . . achievable . . . What???

Books that win awards for me are usually mine fields. A good portion of books that I pick up with a pretty sticker about winning such and such award usually are the books that I end up disliking. But there are the diamonds in the rough, which is why I still deign to pick them up.

The synopsis of The Fifth Season is provided by Goodreads:

                                                        This is the way the world ends. Again.


                                                      Three terrible things happen in a single day. Essun, a woman living an ordinary life in a small town, comes home to find that her husband has brutally murdered their son and kidnapped their daughter. Meanwhile, mighty Sanze -- the world-spanning empire whose innovations have been civilization's bedrock for a thousand years -- collapses as most of its citizens are murdered to serve a madman's vengeance. And worst of all, across the heart of the vast continent known as the Stillness, a great red rift has been torn into the heart of the earth, spewing ash enough to darken the sky for years. Or centuries.

Now Essun must pursue the wreckage of her family through a deadly, dying land. Without sunlight, clean water, or arable land, and with limited stockpiles of supplies, there will be war all across the Stillness: a battle royale of nations not for power or territory, but simply for the basic resources necessary to get through the long dark night. Essun does not care if the world falls apart around 
                                                     her. She'll break it herself, if she must, to save her daughter.


Reference:
Fun little story. I first learned about N.K. Jemisin in college about seven years ago. I was perusing my local Barnes and Noble's Fantasy section when I browsed over a title. After sliding it from the shelf I fell in love with the cover. Not an hour later I was bringing it home with me after being drawn into the synopsis. The title? The Hundred Thousand Kingdoms. I can't say hand to Bible it was my first fantasy with a main character who wasn't white and wasn't male, but it was the first that made a lasting impression: recognizing how few POC leads we see in the genre. Thankfully in the past seven years that has changed and it's made goliaths like The Fifth Season get the recognition and acclaim it deserves. 
BUT I'm getting ahead of myself, let's review!


Review:
   N.K. Jemisin is a writer I wish more people outside of the book world knew about. She has this otherworldly talent of creating worlds dipped with so much culture and energy that matches the pace of our world, with all the buckets full of complexities called human emotions which is flooded in regular fiction but rarely given its due in fantasy. Reports say she is in the works of producing her trilogy to film/television and it's hard for me to resist imagining how amazing this tale will be in that format. To be fair, every time they announce a new fantasy show I go crazy for even a teaser trailer.
   The Fifth Season follows three perspectives: Damaya, our youngest recruit into the Fulcrum's fold learning to become an orogene; Syenite, an established but not yet independent adult orogene; and Essun, a weathered orogene who has suffered the worst tragedies a mother could experience. 
   Over the course of the novel we learn about orogenes, people with the ability to feel and control seismic vibrations and earthly substances; and second-rate citizens in the nation called the Stillness. Their powers are leashed by overseers known as Guardians, who show very early on in a young orogene's education the lengths they will go to maintain control over them. They are not alone, this world has other creatures who are as mystifying and powerful as orogenes and Guardians with their own enigmatic culture.
   It helps when I write down names for novels with large casts, and while this one has a lot, I felt like the players came and left reminiscent of actors on stage. In general, I particularly like when we meet new people late in the novel or when people who appear once in the beginning still have significance by the end even if they aren't mentioned for hundreds of pages. It's part plot structuring, part realism, part fluid storytelling. Jemisin isn't a newbie writer, her command of the skin and muscle of this world made stepping into it navigable. With the assistance of a glossary and appendix at the end, it reminded me of The Hundred Thousand Kingdoms, and like then was much appreciated because large casts are one thing to handle, new vocabulary and slang is another.
   The three protagonists are burdened with more than their uneasy pasts, they represent generations stuck in a world where their very futures are set out to fail them. It's easy to slide into the shoes of Damaya, Syenite, and Essun as we navigate the Stillness through the eyes of those limited in their power because culturally and physically their hands are bound. Their anger, frustration, and feelings of injustice becomes ours. Because how can someone with so much power be put to heel? Usually it is the very display and demonstration of power that makes these sorts of people in fantasy rule over others. But in the Stillness, they are Othered, they are not respected. People fear what they do not understand and fear what they do not wish to understand. Fantasy is our world through another lens. 
   Nearly every chapter ends with verses from an implied religious text, lyrics from songs, lines from poems, and excerpts from history textbooks. Remember the culture and energy I mentioned before? I adored these inclusions because it wasn't necessarily tied with anything specific in the narrative. Appearing over our heads maybe. It's just a part of this world like ours has its own written and oral compositions. The language felt organic and sacred.
   Stories, and most all fantasy, focus on relationships. Relationships between characters, relationships between nature and characters, and in fantasy we usually find the plot is pulled forward by its supernatural elements. You can't just have magic happening without people or creatures to control said magic. I can't even think of a fantasy where that happens. But the magic within the Stillness, the orogeny possessed by a select, special, random few is as much a presence because of its mammoth potential. Controlling the elements as a superpower is a dime a dozen (not that that's bad—it's visually stunning and tangible, which translates easily either reading or watching on film), however it is how Jemisin handles this power of controlling the earth that is uniquely impressive. Not only is the militarily-enforced restraint of power an interesting dynamic to have within the confines of an unbalanced place, but on a grander scale the great power propels greater consequences: the fifth seasons. Lasting months to decades, the fifth seasons are extended winters due to the manipulation people have placed on the earth. The earth responds to what is done to it. Fantasy is our world through another lens.
   Of course I'm focusing on the themes which stood out the most to me, but maybe I've gone too below the surface. What about the skin, the perfumes, the dressing of this novel? Jemisin (*I'm hoping*) isn't trying to fool the reader but as you approach the end you realize what she has been doing structuring this novel the way she has. Spoilers of course, but the positioning of the story blocks and as you follow them one by one, you begin to put together that those blocks had in actuality been steps and those steps were leading you to the top of a view that leaves you breathless and prepared to dive into the next novel with a greater perspective of your surroundings. 
   The Fifth Season is a world with many creatures. I mention the orogenes but there are others that reveal themselves and maybe (hopefully) others that haven't been brought to light yet but that we'll meet in future books. The enigmatic nature and actions of one of these creatures is one of the brightest feathers on this parrot. As readers we want answers to many if not all our questions, however the fact that the peoples of the Stillness know so little about this certain race of creature (which I'll divulge has to do with stones) makes their presence and prevalence less of an accessory standing beside orogenes and more of a novelty. There is more to be learned and more to surprise us. Not all the mysteries of the world can be explained. And while I have my next few reads for Spooktober already chosen, I can't wait to return to the Stillness.

I give this book 4.5/5 stars.



Quote:
"Some say the Earth is angry
Because he wants no company;
I say the Earth is angry
Because he lives alone.
                                            Ancient (pre-Imperial) folk song"
-N.K. Jemisin, The Fifth Season



My Goodreads:



Next To Read:
Beloved by Toni Morrison



Spoilers:
   Is it funny to anyone else how the premise of the book is sort of never actualized? Being that this is a trilogy I guess it goes without saying that one of the major plots would continue to be addressed in the following installments, however we spent more time with one of her deceased children than the one we're chasing after, not to mention the youngest, Uche, who was killed before the beginning of the book. I don't want to say this is misleading, but it's definitely one of the heaviest failures I found for the book, which by my review, doesn't have many at all.
   Are there any Hoa fans out there? I tried to keep my raving of him in my review to a minimum but my goodness, learning Essun's chapters were actually from his perspective made my jaw drop. He is certainly more than he's made himself out to be, and I can't wait to see him and Essun team up with Alabaster in the next book.
   The open relationship between Syen, Alabaster, and Innon was beautifully choreographed. The insecurities and power-plays in an individual level were expanded on in a relationship platform that worked well because of who the players were. All three are orogenes, all three powerful and with something to offer each other. Physical or emotional support, I loved their dynamic and how they each respected one another. Alabaster being the most powerful of the three yet being the most vulnerable and insecure made him quirky and relatable despite his first impressions. But the exchanges between himself and Syen, how they maintained their friendship and respected one another was one of the greatest achievements on a character level. They were creatures assigned to one another to breed but they in their own way successfully came to an understanding. Surviving the lesser passionate elements of marriage, they came to rely and depend on one another in a way more admirable than other thrilling narratives of a traditional relationship.
   I would be remiss if I didn't share my thoughts on the whole three people are actually one twist. We learn who they are a little over 100 pages from the end and come on, it was unexpected (at least for me!) because it was revealed so fluidly. It totally gave me Netflix's The Witcher vibes. Or even 2016's Arrival.  We think we're following a traditional narrative only to discover time is subjective and it takes going through the hurdles to find at the end we've come full circle. Beginnings, ends, the story can have more than one of each. It all depends on the perspective.
   Fantasy is our world through another lens.
   

Until Next Time,
Nicole Ciel