The Diver’s Clothes Lie Empty by Vendela Vida

This bizarre little novel is the official selection of the Powell’s Indiespensable box for July 2015. The main character escapes to Morocco, after she experiences a painful event in her private life. While she is checking into a Moroccan hotel, her backpack, which contains all of her identifying information, is stolen. There is some sort of mix-up at the police station and she ends up in possession of another woman’s passport and credit cards. The entire episode upsets her, but she also finds it liberating to be someone else for a little bit. She does not correct the mistake immediately and her guilt and worry about being caught causes her [spoiler]to assume even more identities.[/spoiler] What is this woman running from? How long can she keep up the charade and elude her true self?

“There are these periods in evolution when species are in stasis because there’s no need for change. But then, usually because of a change in their environment they have to adapt rapidly. That’s how new species come about.” (Bodyguard with red hair)

There were two unique characteristics I noticed right away. Firstly, it is written in second person narration, meaning you assume the place of the main character. A random paragraph:

Inside the business center, you place the document the police chief gave you in the Xerox machine and make one copy to test it before making more. The paper that comes out is blank; you didn’t place the original facedown. You take the blank piece of paper that the copier slides out of the machine (not unlike the way money slides out of an ATM, you can’t help noticing) and fold it and place it in the pocket of your pleated skirt. You want to hide your mistake from…whom? You start over. You place the police document facedown on the machine, which emits a strange, stovelike smell.

I picked one of the least riveting passages on purpose, because not all of “your” actions are what typically would be considered entertaining! For me, it invoked a sense of dread about what “my” next action would be. When I started reading and saw “you” peppered throughout every single page, I thought there was no way I was going to be able to finish this book! It was really uncomfortable at first, but the story was compelling enough that I quickly assumed the identity of the main character. You can really feel her exhaustion and desperation, especially in the beginning.

Secondly, there are just section breaks rather than chapters. It reads like a really long short story. It actually might have worked even better as a short story. The lack of chapters really lent itself to compulsive reading.

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Instead: There’s a reason that for most of your life you’ve run and swam. There’s a reason why you finally arrived at diving as your competitive sport. With diving your face was virtually unseen. It was all about the shape your body made in the distance as you dropped from a high board and diapered deep into the water. By the time you came up for air, the judges had determined their score. It had nothing to do with your face. (You)

The entire book has a dreamlike or movie-like quality. The main character, who is never officially named, comes across as mentally unstable and paranoid. She makes really rash and irrational decisions and she is constantly trying to convince herself that the right choice is not possible. Of course, that is assuming she is a rational person who wants to set things straight. All of her prevarications and actions point to her subconsciously wanting to separate herself completely from her real identity. [spoiler]When a new identity becomes problematic and her lies become too difficult to conceal, she sheds that identity too. The twin sister added a really interesting element to the novel. The twin sister loves attention and drama, while our main character is content to fade into the background. It was really interesting how the twin sister seemed to be crowding the main character out of her own life.[/spoiler] The story does feel like it is building up to an explosive ending, but it goes out quietly with a somewhat open ending.

This book is more of a thought experiment, than a piece focused on plot and character development. If you had the opportunity to assume a new identity, would you do it? How far would you take it? If you can get past the writing style, don’t mind open endings, and you like books that explore specific concept (identity in this case), this book is for you. If you like this one, The Beautiful Bureaucrat has a similar vibe.

As the van begins its drive out of Meknes, you see an intricate keyhole-shaped arch that leads into the ruins of what was once the royal palace. The arch is decorated with glazed blue, green, and red earthenware mosaics in the form of stars and rosettes. You watch as one woman enters through the arch, and another exits. You snap a photo, the first one of many you will take with this new camera, someone else’s camera.

Above the Waterfall by Ron Rash

One story my grandfather told me about his days as a sandhog had seemed a tall tale, even to a kid, but later I’d found out it was true. In the years before electricity, what light burned inside the underwater caissons came from candles. At the greatest depths, the pressure was such that the candles wouldn’t blow out. The flame would sail off the wick, ricochet around the metal, then resettle on the wick. What my grandfather hadn’t told me was that sometimes cables broke and a man would be trapped down there. He’d know the candle was burning up oxygen, and he’d know the flame would not go out, but he’d keep blowing anyway, even with his last breaths, still hoping against hope that, somehow, it might. (Les)

I received this uncorrected proof as part of Powell’s Indiespensable box this quarter. The story alternates between the perspectives of Les, a retiring sheriff, and his on-and-off-again lady friend Becky, a park superintendent with a dark past. Les has a few loose ends to tie up in the last couple of weeks before his retirement. The mystery of a poisoned trout stream is the case that dominates most of his remaining time. It is a complicated case for Les because the main suspect is Gerald, an elderly man with whom Becky has a deep bond.

This is a quiet, slow-moving novel, that suddenly picks up the pace in the second half. The first part of the book is more of a character story, but it becomes a standard whodunit halfway through when the river is poisoned. I greatly preferred Les’s chapters over Becky’s. Most of her chapters are poetic nature descriptions or flashbacks into her traumatic past. I never really felt like I got a full grasp of her character. The character background stories (Becky with the school shooting and ecoterrorist ex-boyfriend and Les’s depressed ex-wife) were threads that weren’t completely weaved in and it left me wanting more or even less. I know that the ecoterrorist boyfriend was meant to make the reader and Les doubt Becky as a great judge of character, but I didn’t fully get the school shooting connection. It explained her eccentricities, but her strangeness wasn’t really integral to the story.

I didn’t fully grasp the deep connection between Gerald and Becky. I think he may have reminded her of her grandparents, which made her feel a sense of duty towards him. I don’t think it was really fully explored or connected. We only see Gerald through the eyes of Les and Becky, but I think he was really well-drawn as as strong, stoic man who has watched the world leave him behind.

“That gun was aimed at you a full minute,” Jarvis told me later. Your life flashes before you, I’ve always heard, but it hadn’t for me. It was as if I stood in the corner, not so much observing as performing a methodical self-autopsy, not of my body but of my life. I had not been frightened. Instead, I’d felt a calm clarity. Everything inside me, including my heart, seemed suspended, except one thought. What will you miss? A full minute and I’d had no answer. Then the gun was lowered, and I slowly, reluctantly, came back into myself. (Les)

Prevention viagra generic wholesale here is better than cure, and it’s better to look out for certain warning signs in order to decide the necessary procedures to shape a medical course of action. These complaints comprise: o low sperm count, which involves very few or no sperm presence in semen o low sperm motility, i.e. sperm that doesn acquisition de viagra t run as it has to be o abnormality of the sperm cells that are under lessons. Neo40 utilises the many levitra properien health benefits that have been mentioned below. Vardenafil is contraindicated in men for whom sexual intercourse is inadvisable due to cardiovascular risk factors o Severe liver damage o Severe impairment in renal function o Low blood pressure o Recent stroke or heart assault Hereditary degenerative retinal issue Regular symptoms incorporate wheezing, migraine, flushing, dyspepsia, delayed erections, palpitations and photophobia. viagra wholesale uk Les is a conflicted, flawed person and I felt that he was more well-developed than Becky. Les’s main motivation is to set things right before his retirement and to finally be able to answer the question “In the very core of my being, who am I?” in a satisfactory way.

Like the pot bribes, Jarvis was letting me know things would be different with him in charge. That was a good thing, but he would learn in time that a sheriff could bend the law for no other reason than what was law and what was right sometimes differed. (Les)

The writing itself is very lovely to read. I think it is a credit to the author that I didn’t think “Wait, what is this even about?”, until I suddenly noticed half of the pages were in my left hand! I really liked the bleak setting and Ron Rash is truly a master at creating the atmosphere of Appalachia. I liked the contrast of the ugliness of man against the serene beauty of nature. The parts about methheads and the river poisoning were the strongest parts for me. The mystery elements were tied up in a satisfying way.

I loved the writing and the setting, so I would definitely read another book by this author! I did like this one, it just isn’t one of my favorites.

Above me that night tiny lights brightened and dimmed, brightened and dimmed. Photinus carolinus. Fireflies synchronized to make a single meadow-wide flash, then all dark between. Like being inside the earth’s pulsing heart. I’d slowed my blood-beat to that rhythm. So much in the world that night. (Becky)

Go Set a Watchman by Harper Lee

Blind, that’s what I am. I never opened my eyes. I never thought to look into people’s hearts, I looked only in their faces. Stone blind . . . Mr. Stone. Mr. Stone set a watchman in church yesterday. He should have provided me with one. I need a watchman to lead me around and declare what he seeth every hour on the hour. I need a watchman to tell me this is what a man says but this is what he means, to draw a line down the middle and say here is this justice and there is that justice and make me understand the difference. I need a watchman to go forth and proclaim to them all that twenty-six years is too long to play a joke on anybody, no matter how funny it is.

I am really nostalgic about To Kill a Mockingbird, because it was one of the first books that made me think about issues larger than myself. I was really interested when I heard about this early draft being published, but I started to approach it with more unease as more information came out [spoiler](i.e. Jem’s death, Atticus’s racism, odd publishing circumstances).[spoiler]

Twenty-six year old Jean Louise Finch (Scout) returns to Maycomb, Alabama for her annual trip home. A few days into her trip, she discovers a racist pamphlet mixed in with her dad’s belongings and finds him and her devoted suitor Henry Clinton attending a meeting where a man is giving a vitriolic racist speech. She also sees many other men she respected there and quickly realizes that her home is not the idyllic town she remembers from childhood. Jean Louise is physically ill at the thought of her father having bigoted views and struggles to reconcile the idealized version of the father with the man he is today.

It is easy to see why the publisher suggested that Harper Lee rewrite the book to focus on Scout’s childhood. Some of my favorite sections of GSAW were the flashbacks that showcase Scout’s relationships with Atticus, Jem and Calpurnia. Dill even makes a brief flashback appearance! The flashbacks sometimes ran a little too long, but it is nice to read about the Scout’s childhood again.

She did not stand alone, but what stood behind her, the most potent moral force in her life, was the love of her father. She never questioned it, never thought about it, never even realized that before she made any decision of importance the reflex, “What would Atticus do?” passed through her unconscious; she never realized what made her dig in her feet and stand firm whenever she did was her father; that whatever was decent and of good report in her character was put there by her father; she did not know that she worshiped him.

I do not think that GSAW would have the same emotional impact, without the previous reading of TKAM. Since I also had an idealized view of Atticus, I was able to completely empathize with Jean Louise’s disillusionment. It is deeply upsetting to find out someone you looked up to is not who you thought they were. I thought that I would be able to keep the Atticus of TKAM and the Atticus of GSAW separate in my mind, but I easily merged the two. He was still a man who loved his children and believed in the law. He does not see himself in the same light as Mr. O’Hanlon, who is ranting and raving early on in the book. His racism comes from a place of (deeply flawed) logic and he hides behind states’ rights when confronted about his views on segregation. If his actions in the previous book came from a place of paternalism, which recent criticism suggests, the more extreme viewpoint of elderly Atticus is not that much of a leap. I have known good people that I would have never suspected of bigotry, until society went “too far” and crossed a line in their minds. For Atticus Finch that line is Brown vs. Board of Education and desegregation, which he sees as a Supreme Court overreach. A complicated man may be more realistic and the story it is really relatable, but it is still deeply unsettling. I was shocked how much this realization about a fictional character felt like a punch in the gut. It makes me a little sad that future readers will not be able to see him without this dark cloud. [spoiler]Advance reviews did prepare me for the change in Atticus, but I was absolutely not prepared for the heartbreaking scene when Scout visits Calpurnia.[/spoiler] I really felt for Jean Louise as she began to feel that her whole life was a lie. I also really related to the Coffee scene. I liked how when Jean Louise entered these social situations she just kind of heard the awful highlights. It was a really accurate way to display the whirlwind of shock she was going through.

“What was this blight that had come down over the people she loved? Did she see it in stark relief because she had been away from it? Had it percolated gradually through the years until now? Had it always been under her nose for her to see if she had only looked? No, not the last. What turned ordinary men into screaming dirt at the top of their voices, what made her kind of people harden and say “nigger” when the word had never crossed their lips before?”
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“Why doesn’t their flesh creep? How can they devoutly believe everything they hear in church and then say the things they do and listen to the things they hear without throwing up? I thought I was a Christian but I’m not. I’m something else and I don’t know what. Everything I have ever taken for right and wrong these people have taught me—these same, these very people. So it’s me, it’s not them. Something has happened to me.”

I was happy that there was still a spark of “juvenile desperado, hell-raiser extraordinary” in Jean Louise. She gets the town talking pretty much the moment she enters it! She is more progressive than Atticus and she has good intentions, but she certainly is a person of her time and is racist herself (“But, Uncle Jack, I don’t especially want to run out and marry a Negro or something.” “They are simple people, most of them, but that doesn’t make them subhuman.”). The narrative is a little scattered and meanders between childhood flashbacks, Jean Louise’s verbal sparring matches with her aunt, flirtation between Jean Louise and Henry and Jean Louise’s psychological turmoil. It is written in third person, but there are some jarring transitions into first when we hear some of Jean Louise’s thoughts. The dialogue towards the end got really preachy and there was a lot of “mansplaining.” [spoiler]At one point, an uncle LITERALLY slaps some “sense” into Jean Louise.[/spoiler]

(referring to Civil War) As it rolled by, Jean Louise made a frantic dive for her uncle’s trolley: “That’s been over for a—nearly a hundred years, sir.” Dr. Finch grinned. “Has it really? It depends how you look at it. If you were sitting on the sidewalk in Paris, you’d say certainly. But look again. The remnants of that little army had children—God, how they multiplied—the South went through the Reconstruction with only one permanent political change: there was no more slavery. The people became no less than what they were to begin with—in some cases they became horrifyingly more. They were never destroyed. They were ground into the dirt and up they popped. (This part and the passages about collective conscious made me think of The Buried Giant).

The book is about a young woman recognizing that her dad is a human and not a god and learning that she has her own conscience separate from her father’s. It is about how people are complicated and that a person is more than just their bad aspects. It is about empathy for everyone, even those we disagree with. It is about standing for up for what you believe and not running away when things get tough. As Dr. Finch said: “The time your friends need you is when they’re wrong, Jean Louise. They don’t need you when they’re right—”.

I am most interested in this book as insight into the creative process that led to TKAM. My 3-Star rating is based on the fact that this is a mostly untouched draft, not character viewpoints. I know it is impossible now, but I would have liked to see how it turned out if it had maintained its basic structure during the editing process instead of turning into TKAM. This book is really relevant today, especially in context of the Supreme Court’s gay marriage decision and the Confederate flag controversy. The viewpoint Atticus expresses in this book sounds outdated at first glance, but I have heard Atticus’s argument very recently in relation to local school board drama. It may not be a must-read for fans of TKAM, but it is definitely interesting and memorable in its own right.

I did not want my world disturbed, but I wanted to crush the man who’s trying to preserve it for me. I wanted to stamp out all the people like him. I guess it’s like an airplane: they’re the drag and we’re the thrust, together we make the thing fly. Too much of us and we’re nose-heavy, too much of them and we’re tail-heavy—it’s a matter of balance. I can’t beat him, and I can’t join him—

In the Language of Miracles by Rajia Hassib

…Khaled remembered what he had originally intended to tell his father, what he had hoped his father would recognize: the fascinating possibility of finding the way back to a home that one has never known. No one knew how the second- or third- generation monarchs found their way back north when they had never been there before. Even now, when he was too old to believe in any of Ehsan’s fables, Khaled would sometimes remember her stories of lost boys following unseen clues home and imagine that the butterflies, like those boys, had an inner compass that directed them to where they were supposed to be, and the idea of a home that one carried within filled him with hope and peace.

Touching, beautifully written debut novel about an Egyptian-American family trying to work through shock and grief, after the oldest son Hosaam kills himself and his neighbor/girlfriend. The story takes place one year after the murders, in post-9/11 New Jersey. After a short lull, tensions begin to escalate again when flyers for the young murdered woman’s memorial are taped up all over town. Samir, who has a history of making situations worse, wants to make amends by speaking at the memorial, but his family doesn’t think that is a great idea.

His new Facebook page contained a picture of him in profile, the sun shining so brightly in the background his face was visible only as a dark silhouette, the shade of his skin undecipherable, his features one dark mass. Those whom he befriended on Facebook could see a couple of other pictures in which he was recognizable but his surroundings were not: self-portraits of him out on his hikes, with backdrops of trees and open meadows. His face, a dark tan that could have easily passed for any ethnicity, from mixed to Hispanic, was not antagonistic. People did not object to his face, he learned, as much as they objected to his name. And his initials, though they were still his, could imply any name. Karlos Aguilar, with roots both in Puerto Rico and the Dominican Republic. Khristos Agathangelos, standing in the front yard of his Mediterranean villa in the Greek isles. Or, his favorite, Kevin Anderson.

The Al-Menshawys have been accepted members of their Somerset community for two decades, but their idyllic, suburban town quickly turns on them when the tragedy strikes. The family experience bigotry and public shaming, as they and their entire culture get blamed for the singular actions of their son. The family becomes isolated from the community and each other. Samir, Nagla, Khaled and Fatima all live under the same roof, but they are each carrying the burden of the tragedy on their own. Samir, who has always desperately wanted his family to blend in and belong, has to cope with his family being ostracized. Nagla struggles with both the grief of losing her son and the anger at his actions, while also blaming herself for ignoring the past hints that now seem like obvious clues of what was to come. Khaled worries about living in the shadow of his brother and starts to pull away from his culture, while his sister Fatima begins to embrace it. Their grandmother Ehsan is visiting from Egypt to help the family during their time of grief. Ehsan’s “old ways” and superstitions sometimes frustrate and embarrass the Al-Menshaways in their modern environment, but she is the common thread that binds them all together.

Again one of Nagla’s convictions was confirmed: A lifetime of watching American movies had not taught her mother anything about American social norms. Yet every single breach of American notions of etiquette that Nagla witnessed her mother commit resulted in a connection with someone, a momentary intersection between her mother’s life and a stranger’s that, paradoxically, Nagla could not find fault with, perhaps even envied.

Kidney has many blood vessels which help remove buy cialis canada waste product from the body. As these issues purchasing this sildenafil 100mg viagra are very delicate for men, they should do proper research before finalising a good hospital as well as urologist for themselves. Before super viagra anything else, read on the information provided here- Manufacturing of a tablet- Different tablets for erectile dysfunction are always under the risk of performing below average during sexual intercourse. Avoiding these issues might be very dangerous for your health and identifying hidden risk purchasing this levitra on line factors before they manifest into more serious conditions including high blood pressure, hardening of the arteries, or diabetes. Each chapter begins with an epigraph of a saying in both its Arabic and English(when applicable) renditions. It is interesting to read how similar sentiments translate in two very different cultures. It serves as a reminder of the basic values we all share, despite cultural differences. The narrative is very focused and there aren’t any unnecessary side plots. It is a simple, yet complex, story about a family dealing with tragedy. The author is able to seamlessly integrate many important issues in a natural and compelling way: coping with grief, being the family member of the perpetrator of a violent crime, the cultural conflicts between the older and younger generation, the role of culture in grounding a person, the role of the Internet and social media (which in this novel provides a fertile ground for mob cruelty, as well as comforting anonymity), and being a Muslim immigrant in the United States after 9/11. Rajia Hassib’s writing flows so beautifully that this quiet book becomes a page-turner, even though it is not one in the traditional sense. The characters don’t always make the best choices, but it is easy to understand their motivations. The family is so well-drawn, that the reader desperately wants the family to find peace and acceptance.

My only disappointment is that this is a debut novel, so I can’t seek out the author’s other books yet! I recommend this work for fans of Everything I Never Told You, and to a lesser extent, The Book of Unknown Americans.

Khaled wished he could tell his father what he had only now realized: that they were all trying to undo something that Hosaam did, hoping that, by their hands or by God’s, fate would change course and all would be well again. But they were damned no matter what they did, not by God, but by a nineteen-year-old boy who had lost the will to live, and, perhaps, by their own failure to see it coming, to prevent disaster rather than scramble in a futile attempt to change the past. First surrender. And then learn to fly.