The Book Addict Reviews: The Help by Kathryn Stockett

Genre:  Historical Fiction, Women's Fiction, Southern Fiction, Audiobook
Order Online: Amazon.com  
Author Info: Goodreads | Website
Rating: 3 stars   
Borrowed this book from the library.  

In A Nutshell:  
Kathryn Stockett did a wonderful job putting together a story filled with intriguing characters and unexpected surprises.  I am pretty sure I will never look at chocolate pie the same way again.  In fact, I am not sure I will look at many stories about the South, about Jim Crow laws, or about civil rights the same way again.  But I did have some issues with the story--in particular some questions come off as being one dimensional.  However, these issues did not take away from a story that left me laughing and crying over and over again. 

Review:  
After my last couple of experiences with audiobooks I was beginning to question my appreciation for audiobooks--until I found this book. The Help capitalized on the opportunity to utilize multiple narrators in order accentuate Kathryn Stockett's use of multiple narrators to tell her story.  It was very easy to keep the different narrators separate in my mind because they literally had different voices.  My one complaint was that the narrator chosen to read for Aibileen sounded younger than the narrator chosen to read for Minny so I kept forgetting that Aibileen was really the older of the two characters. 

The Help capitalized on the opportunity to tell the story that brought a time and a place I did not personally experience to life for me.  I do not think I will ever think of Jim Crow laws or the civil rights movement or Mississippi without thinking of Aibileen, Minny, and the other maids telling their stories or Hilly talking about her Home Help Sanitation Initiative or Elizabeth's approach and treatment of her children.

But in some respects I felt some of the characters were a little over simplified (or maybe one-dimensional is a better way to describe it).  They seemed to lack some balance of good and bad traits.  For instance, I know that Aibileen commented that Hilly was a good mother to her kids--but otherwise I do not think she had a single redeeming quality.  And if she is really that bad then how could Skeeter (who is very much portrayed as a good virtuous person) remain close friends for her so long.  In some respects, I could attribute it to Skeeter not wanting to incur Hilly's wrath--but their friendship seems to go beyond the bounds of friendship for politeness.  They were college roommates.  They were in bridge club together (at least for a while).  These were closer bonds than many people in the town could boast with Hilly.  So did Hilly have redeeming qualities that were not shown to the reader or did Skeeter make a mistake being such a close friend with Hilly for so many years?

Overall though, the book left a good impression on me.  It gave me insight into the way that people in the South related to each other.  For someone who grew up well after the civil rights movement, there were some aspects of that culture that I could not appreciate as much before reading this book.  The feelings that are described by the narrators who had to hide they were friends because a real threat of retaliation touched me in ways I had not expected when I started this story. 
 
Recommendations:
I have been putting off watching the movie until I had a chance to read the book--now I cannot wait to watch the movie!

The Book Addict Reviews: The Invention of Hugo Cabret by Brian Selznick

Genre: Young Adult, Middle Grade, Historical Fiction, Mysteries & Detectives, Family Life
Order Online: Amazon.com
Author Info: Goodreads | Website
Rating: 4 stars
Borrowed this book from the library. 

In A Nutshell:
When I first heard about this book, I was not sure what to expect.  Would it feel too much like a picture book to hold the attention of an adult?  But I kept hearing people talk about it so I took the plunge.  This book is not like any picture book I have ever read before.  Yes, some elements of the story only come out in the illustrations, but the story that Brian Selznick weaves is much more complicated and full of intrigue than any other picture book I have ever read.

Review:
Hugo has been left alone in the train station where his uncle (who was serving as his reluctant guardian) serviced all of the clocks.  Afraid of what could happen to him if the officials at the train station learn he is alone, Hugo has taken over servicing all of the clocks hoping that no one notices him.  As this story unfolded, I really felt terrible on Hugo's behalf.  He went from a very loving and caring household with his father, to feeling like a nuisance and an inconvenience.

This loss of the connection he felt with his father led Hugo to fixate on the one physical thing that he still has to connect to his father.  And through the illustrations, we are able to capture some of the nuances and impact of Hugo's feelings and reactions more realistically than I imagine we would in a written text.  We see his face and how his expressions change the same way we would an acquaintance or a friend.  And that is the progression that Hugo made for me over the course of the story--he went from being an acquaintance I wanted to understand to a friend I valued.

But Brian Selznick did not just create one endearing character, he created a whole cast of them.  From the Station Inspector Hugo is constantly hiding from to the Etienne the friend who starts the chain reaction that brings Rene Tabard to Georges Melies' door, there is so much complexity and intrigue that I did not want the story to end.  Even now I want to know what happened after--what adventures did Isabel and Hugo go on after the final scene? 

Recommendations:
I just saw that Brian Selznick has another book out--and now I have to read it!

The Book Addict Reviews: Outlander by Diana Gabaldon

Genre: Time Travel, Science Fiction, Historical
Order Online: Amazon.com
Author Info: Website | Goodreads
Rating: 4 stars
Borrowed this book from the library.

In A Nutshell:
I was not sure what to expect when I started it.  The size of the book and the amount of CDs in the case worried me--would I be able to keep it all straight?  Yes because Diana Gabaldon does a masterful job of creating the story and keeping it compelling and easy to follow.  I loved this book! 

Review:
I admit it--I judged Outlander by the cover; or more accurately I judged it by the size of its cover.  The book looked so huge and unwielding that I was afraid to start it.  But so many people kept recommending the book to me that I gave in.  And I am so glad that I did.

Diana Gabaldon has mastered the details.  Outlander is packed full of details about what people in 1743 Scotland ate, wore, practiced religion, traveled, interacted within the clan organization, practiced religion and even decorated their homes.  At every turn of the story, I felt like I was there in the story.

Diana Gabaldon has mastered characters.  My friends are starting to make fun of me because I have been talking about Jamie Fraser incessantly.  He was the kind of character that stuck with me.  I wanted to meet him--and I most definitely wanted to see him in his kilt!

But even more than that, I wanted to meet Gellie.  Since we hear Claire's story, we know a lot about her 1945 life and her 1743 life.  But Gellie is an intriguing mystery to me.  What did she leave behind in 1967?  Why didn't she try to return?  I wholeheartedly wish that Claire had seen the small pox vaccination scar earlier; early enough to have some long conversations with her.

Recommendations:
I already have the next book in the series and I cannot wait to start it and find out what happens to Claire, Jamie, and all the other characters that Diana Gabaldon created that I love:

The Book Addict Reviews: Revolution by Jennifer Donnelly

Genre: Young Adult, Historical Fiction
Order Online: Amazon.com
Author Info: Website | Goodreads
Rating: 4 stars
Borrowed from the library.

In A Nutshell:
I cannot remember who told me about this book, and I wish I did because I would love to give that person credit.  This book is one of the best I books I have read--probably ever.  I have a new favorite author and I have not been able to stop talking about this book since I started it.  And now that I am done, I want to crank up the Beethoven while reading more about the French Revolution--I am not ready to let go my connection to these characters yet!

Review:
Andy's life has been overwhelmed by a tragedy.  A tragedy that has sent her mom hiding within herself.  A tragedy that has sent her father away to his dream job in another state.  A tragedy that has sent her to a shrink who has prescribed some pretty powerful drugs.  And yet on a daily basis Andy is still fighting with the demon inside herself--the one that threatens to take over, the one that tells her that it would all be easier if she took one more step off the rooftop and ended all of her pain.

I admit it is deep, it is depressing, but it is Andy's life.  From page one, Jennifer Donnelly has the reader living Andy's life.  It is not easy, but it is real.  And in the end it has a lasting effect, I wanted to remember Andy; I wanted her to make a lasting impression on me.  

But Jennifer Donnelly's magic was not limited to her griping portray of Andy, in Revolution Jennifer Donnelly weaves in the story of Alex, a young girl living in France during the French Revolution.    She makes a big mistake that ends up hurting her charge, a boy she had grown to love like a little brother, and by the time she realizes her mistake she cannot fix it.  But that does not stop her from trying.  She does the only thing she could think of to make a stand--try to bring the boy a little joy while he is living in captivity.

I remember studying the French Revolution in history class.  The terror expressed in the number of deaths.  The chaos expressed in drawings and illustrations.  But the way Jennifer Donnelly presents the story stuck with me--the way she shows the reader what it may have been like for one common person during the Revolution.  I cared about Alex and what happened to her.  I cared about what happened to France because of her.  And I was hungry to learn more, to do more research on the topic.  Jennifer Donnelly sparked an interest in me that I had never experienced about the French Revolution from any of my history classes.

I also loved learning about music--seeing the power of music through Andy's eyes (or maybe ears would be more accurate?).  I played instruments through high school--I know how hard it is to describe music in words.  Jennifer Donnelly does it in such a way that I got it and I think other people could get it too.  They could understand Andy's passion, her talent, and her desire to make her passion for music her profession.  As I was listening to the book I wished that there were samples of the music referenced because I found myself appreciating the classics (for instance, Bach and Beethoven) in ways I had never appreciated them before.  Jennifer Donnelly was able to get me interested in a way that many of my past music teachers were never able to do.   

I have read some reviews that were critical of the way Jennifer Donnelly handled the father/daughter relationship, but I did not see the relationship between Andy and her father as the central theme in this book.  It felt that her relationship with Alex was more important.  However as I thought about it, I do think that Jennifer Donnelly handled the father/daughter relationship well based on the constraints of this story.  There was not going to be a happily ever after resolution for Andy and her father.  There had been too much pain, too many hurt feelings.  But at the end, I felt they understood themselves and each other better than they had before.  Maybe with more time they will be closer--or maybe not.  But either way, they are both in a better place emotionally and mentally than they were at the beginning of the book.  They were on the road to healing.

Recommendations:
I cannot wait to read and/or listen to another one of Jennifer Donnelly's books. 

This book also reminded me of a book I remember reading in college and want to read again as soon as I can.

Series in Review: The Steampunk Chronicles by Kady Cross

Series are a tricky thing. I have series that I love as a whole, but an individual book within the series did not impress me.  So I am not always sure that reviewing the individual books is fair to the author's vision. However, I do not want to postpone all of my reviews of the books within a series until the end. With those thoughts in mind I decided to start Series In Review. In these postings, I will be looking at more than one book in the series or if possible the entire series at one time.
_____________________________________________________
**This review may contain spoilers for some of the books in the series**

I was not sure if I should put this down as a Series in Review, but I read the prequel as well as the recently released book and I found that my opinion of both were affected by the fact that I had read the other.

Genre: Young Adult, Historical Fiction, Steampunk, Science Fiction
Books Released in Series: The Strange Case of Finley Jayne and The Girl in the Steel Corset
Author Info: Website | Goodreads
Rating: 3 Stars
Downloaded The Strange Case of Finley Jayne from Amazon and The Girl in the Steel Corset picked up in Paperbackswap games.

In A Nutshell:
I read The Strange Case of Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde earlier this year, so I was excited when I learned about  The Strange Case of Finley Jayne and eagerly awaited the release of The Girl with the Steel Corset. I would love to say that the wait and the anticipation were worth it, but after finishing both books, I was underwhelmed and even a little frustrated.

Review:
My first frustration with the series is that the prequel, The Strange Case of Finley Jayne, seemed irrelevant. Finley Jayne was in the exact same position in the beginning of the prequel as she was in the beginning of The Girl with the Steel Corset--leaving a recent employment after one of the males in the household made unwanted advances to her. Did the people she worked with in the prequel do nothing to help her find employment after she successfully assisted them? And if we (the readers) were going to learn many of the same things about Finley, her situation, and the reasons she has so much trouble keeping employment in the first few chapters of The Girl with the Steel Corset, why have the prequel at all?

My second frustration with the story was that I found most of the characters flat and I did not think they developed much over the course of the story. Emily was the smart one who is physically weak. Sam was the strong one who is easily duped. Griffin is the rich one who everyone looks to for leadership. I saw those characteristics fairly strongly upon first meeting these characters--and very little about my impressions of them changed at the very end of the story.

As the story progressed I expected to see remarkable changes in Finley Jayne considering that she was supposedly integrating her two opposite personality halves into a cohesive whole. Shouldn’t a transformation like that have made a marked change in her personality and character development? But other than a few comments that Finley thought to herself that indicated she was gaining control over her darker half, I did not see that her personality, her conduct, or her character had changed that much after Griffin and she had worked on integrating her two separate halves.

I did love some of the steampunk elements of the story. I love imagining Victorian England with steam-powered vehicles and robots. I cannot even imagine what the world would be like today if they had really made those advances then?

Recommendations:
I will probably read the next book in the series when it comes out, but I do not think I will rush out to get it immediately.  However, since my favorite parts of this series were the Steampunk elements, I would recommend another Steampunk series (note: these books are not young adult!):

And if you are looking for more books about split personality, I recommend the classic.  I loved it!