Month: April 2015

A Year of Unknown Books: Mrs. Caliban by Rachel Ingalls

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*Project Recap: For one year, I will read one book per month that I know nothing about that was recommended to me by a stranger; friend; family member, or co-worker; and I will write about that experience.  God help us all.

Mrs. CalibanMrs. Caliban
by Rachel Ingalls
Book #6, read during April, 2015

Recommended by my spouse, Mrs. Caliban was the first book that I knew absolutely nothing about.  In all honesty, reading a book that was less than 150 pages with a pile of books on my “to-read” desk was extremely appealing, so here we go book number six.

Mrs. Caliban is at first glance a love story between a lonely housewife and an over six foot amphibious fish/man named Larry.  It’s a simply written and understated story that tugs at any heartstrings susceptible to loneliness, infidelity, love, and childlessness.  This book is said to be science fiction, but for those who clam up in disgust at the mention of the genre, there is a fish/man present, but beyond that you’re safe from conventional sci-fi.

Here’s a little plot rehash: Dorothy Caliban, due to the loss of two children is engaged in a loveless marriage where she and her husband are “too unhappy to get divorced.”  In the first few pages, while rushing around at the demand of her husband to spontaneously make dinner for his business partner, the gigantic amphibious man/creature Larry shows up at her door, recently escaped from an institution where he was tortured by scientists.  Having no idea where this would go, I immediately became immersed in Dorothy’s life and couldn’t wait to know what would happen to Dorothy and Larry, which is a hilarious name for the frog man.  An immediate bond is forged between the two as each one fills the gaps in the others’ life.  The overarching theme of this book is relationships and we are given a more thorough glimpse into Dorothy’s life through her conversations with not only Larry, but with her physically and emotionally absent husband, Fred and with her best friend Estelle, whose 180 degree personality acts as an interesting juxtaposition.  By the end, Ingalls expresses themes of marital love, tenderness, loneliness, betrayal and complacency all through the vehicle of a creature.

The amphibious Larry’s presence in Dorothy’s life can be taken literally or figuratively and can change your interpretation of the ending drastically, though the aforementioned themes remain relatively the same.  If you’re a realist, then the story becomes about coping mechanisms and grief, if you are drawn to more flights of fancy, then Larry the fish/man’s presence facilitates discovery and comfort.  Though published in the early 1980s, the thrust of the story reminded me of The Yellow Wallpaper by Charlotte Perkins Gilman, and The Awakening, by Kate Chopin.  All three stories illustrate that not much has changed in the past 100 plus years concerning such issues as the social stigma concerning women and childbirth and your everyday, plain old gender norms where women are cast as causalities of so many inequities due to socially constructed ideas of what men and women should be, and how that construct keeps women down.

Lucky number six!  This was by far the best book as of yet, and on a personal note, it’s nice to know that my spouse knows me so well after nearly eight years, and that thankfully, we have something else in common besides our love of Indian food and gin.  Ingalls has written a novella with few words, but they’re all the right ones.  Her deft story-writing skills, delivered in the most hard-hitting but simplistic of ways are a breath of fresh air in a time where we are saturated with the concept that more is more in art.  Ingalls reminds us that even with the presence of a nearly seven foot green monster, that sometimes less is indeed more.

A Year of Unknown Books: Dark Currents

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*Project Recap: For one year, I will read one book per month that I know nothing about that was recommended to me by a stranger; friend; family member, or co-worker; and I will write about that experience.  God help us all.

Dark Currents: Agent of Hel     Dark Currents
by Jacqueline Carey
Book #5, read during March, 2015

The fifth month of reading books that someone else recommended to me was the most difficult month.  It was a chore and the first time that I actually considered quitting the year-long project of reading unknown books.  I kept looking through the list of books and when I broke my rule and read their descriptions, every one sounded like pulling teeth.  This is also why I am not part of a book club; I hate to read books that I don’t want to read.  I’ve dropped out of three clubs without even finishing the first books.  With so many wonderful books in the world, why read anything that you don’t want to read?!

I decided to settle on Dark Currents: Agent of Hel (the Norse Goddess, not Hell), sitting in the adult fiction section of the library.  My first impression was that the cover is awful.  It looks like a cheesy teen fantasy book with a toe-headed girl wielding a knife.  One day on the Red Line el I dropped the book and as the person across from me handed it back, I felt completely embarrassed to be seen with it.  The main character’s dialogue often touts such juvenile sentences of the like: “…he’s so hot!” and other very 20-something year old-isms about the plethora of guys turning her on.

After page five, I could not put this book down.  It’s silly, light, and lucky for me, features my love of other worlds, mythological creatures, gods and goddesses and all other sorts of supernatural ilk.  Carey’s construction of this world is akin to Neil Gaiman’s novels (American Gods, Neverwhere, Anansi Boys), where gods and goddesses live amongst humans in hidden form, but from the perspective of a hormone-crazed young woman.

Carey has constructed a book with a well-written, fleshed out story with a good balance of dialogue and description, filling in the holes without being Stephen King wordy (where you know how many calories were in the lunch of a secondary character on a random Tuesday) that makes for an entertaining read without asking too much of your time and concentration.  It’s about 20-something Daisy, who is half human, half succubus aka demon.  She works part-time for the local police department in the small town in which she lives.  This small town, in addition to your random humans, is inhabited by (and somewhat grudgingly tolerated by the the townspeople) a supernatural counter-culture due to the presence of an active underworld, located otherwise in only the select big cities. In this story, a young frat boy goes winds up dead and Daisy is brought in to help investigate as supernatural forces become suspect, including water nymphs, mermaids and Ghouls, creatures who breath and look like humans, ride motorcycles and but feed on human emotions.

Besides the varied other-worldly creatures’ descriptions hooking me, I also, against my will, was drawn in by the tangental love interests.  Werewolf and police officer Cody has been Daisy’s crush since high school, but this new European Ghoul is alluring, and so is this new guy from Jamaica who can see auras!  What’s a girl to do?!  I know, it’s awful and I’m ashamed, but I was blind-sided by these silly sub-plots and I can’t wait to dive into book two (there are three as of this month).

Reading Dark Currents is exactly what I hoped would happen for this project-that I would read a book, completely unknown to me, and love it, which I did. Whenever I had a free moment, I couldn’t wait to get back and find out what was going to happen next, and it made me realize how much of a struggle some of the previous books have been.  I have hated none, struggled throughout many, but always learned something, whether about story or style.  Thankfully, this novel was a breath of fresh air and gave me an airy, romance filled March.