saintmaud's reviews
320 reviews

Ough... A good book. Couldn't stop thinking of tragedies while reading this, about how "a tragedy is the story of a human growing into his death mask. What has been done is too total to be undone, or even regretted; it defines the doer once and for all and renders the future impossible." You know from the first page what is going to happen, you see the people's actions and decisions throughout the story and can guess how the story will end and that made it so much devastating to read. Rachel Heng did a good job of setting out the end in the very beginning but still keeping me hooked for another 500 pages. There was much i liked about characterisation and the plot and also some parts i did not about pacing and the use of magic realism but ultimately very pleased with this.

 miller is so good at writing prettily but ultimately her view of women is very clear in this book. circe as a character is bland and defanged, written for a very particular group that loves a very particular brand of feminism, which is crazy because the circe of the original myths was much more interesting and to present such a washed out retelling was… a choice. no more madeline miller for me thank u. 

All the different books you read—
You were searching
For the one Book.
All the poems you read
And what you really sought
Was the one poem.
And when you found it
Weren’t you lifted up?
Didn’t you become lighter?
Transparent even, so that
someone looking at you
Could see the world,
Could see the world inside you?

very strange collection, not an off-putting strange more of a "double life of veronique" strange. maybe my feelings are coloured by the warmth of the cover art, the fact that everything in my life was orange black the week i read this, or Tomalin saying the book is of a world that does not exist anymore, but every story was perfect for a winter evening, even the one's that took place on a hot day in the new zealand outback. mansfield is an expert at showcasing the rich and tumultuous inner lives of women and so many stories have a quiet glow to them. 
favourites: the tiredness of rosabel, the swing of the pendulum, bliss, the daughters of the late colonel 

edmund de waal's writing is steady and solid but still punctuated with empathy, that only another artist could write about. i wonder what it is like to have a family so famous, so connected, to actually have traces and records to look at, even after the days of glory are gone long past. 

emma is so beautiful, so sensuous, so hungry, so french..  flaubert's writing is wondrous, almost cinematic; his use of different techniques in the narrative was so marvelous to read, i need more.

insane ..