Review: The Cranes Dance by Meg Howrey

The Cranes Dance made me feel sick, but in the best of ways. The kind of nauseous that makes you stay up until 2am to write a review because if you don't get to talk about this book, you might actually go crazy. The kind of sick that makes you wonder how on earth you're going to find a book that can possibly beat this. I have to be at my desk by 7:20am tomorrow and I'm still going to sit here and ramble about The Cranes Dance for a while until I can calm down a bit and actually sleep. 

Plot summary: So begins the tale of Kate Crane, a soloist in a celebrated New York City ballet company who is struggling to keep her place in a very demanding world. At every turn she is haunted by her close relationship with her younger sister, Gwen, a fellow company dancer whose career quickly surpassed Kate’s, but who has recently suffered a breakdown and returned home. Alone for the first time in her life, Kate is anxious and full of guilt about the role she may have played in her sister’s collapse. As we follow her on an insider tour of rehearsals, performances, and partners onstage and off, she confronts the tangle of love, jealousy, pride, and obsession that are beginning to fracture her own sanity. Funny, dark, intimate, and unflinchingly honest, The Cranes Dance is a book that pulls back the curtains to reveal the private lives of dancers and explores the complicated bond between sisters. 

This is a novel about ballet, about siblings and about that dark voice inside your head. From the beginning we know that Kate and Gwen Crane are ballet dancers with a strong sisterly bond who dance with a prestigious ballet company. Unfortunately Gwen has had to temporarily absent herself from the ballet as Kate has informed their parents of her sister's bouts of (unspecified) severe mental illness. What this entails and how this came about is very slowly unravelled throughout the book, which becomes progressively darker with every page. 

What made this book for me is Kate Crane. She is possibly the most relatable, the most believable and the most real character I have ever read. It was honestly like she was inside my head. She has flaws, but not those exaggerated traits that fictional characters are often given to pad them out a bit. She was so, so real. She was likeable, for the most part, but those parts where she wasn't so perfect just made her relatable. Every other character was a little flat, but perhaps almost purposefully? The point of this book is that we're inside Kate's head and she's so preoccupied with her sister's illness and her own mental state that she doesn't take the opportunity to examine other people. 

What impressed me the most was that the reader somehow knows that Kate feels disregarded and abandoned. Everybody is so preoccupied about Gwen that nobody asks how she's feeling, nobody wonder if it was hard for her to do what was best for Gwen, nobody cares whether it's difficult for her too. The thing is, although she never once shares this, somehow it seeps through. The Cranes Dance is a masterpiece of characterisation and I've really never read anything like it. 

I think you have to have at least a minor interest in the ballet to get on with this book, or at least not be totally opposed to it as a concept. The novels takes place almost entirely between Kate/Gwen's flat and the theatre, and most of the scenes involve some sort of dance. It is accessible though - you won't need any of the terminology or routines to understand what's happening. This is evident from the way Kate explains Swan Lake in the first few pages - she always 'talks' as though she's explaining the plot to a beginner.  

My one criticism would be the ending, which I think was just a little too neat and didn't really answer any of my questions. I can't decide how it should have ended, but I know that I felt just a little unsatisfied. I know this isn't a particularly well-written post, but I just had to write about The Cranes Dance before I went to bed. It isn't a perfect book, but it's one that will stick with me for a long time.
 

Visit Meg Howrey's website here or find her on Twitter.

  

We Have Always Lived in the Castle by Shirley Jackson

I added this to my wishlist right after finishing The Haunting of Hill House earlier this year. I'd link you to a review, but like almost every other book I've read this year, I didn't write one. I chose to learn Russian instead. Yes, I am also a little confused as to why. Anyway, I knew I wanted to read every book she had ever written, and We Have Always Lived in the Castle is the author's most famous work. I now completely understand why and I'm in total agreement. It's amazing and I want to lick it.

Plot summary: Living in the Blackwood family home with only her sister Constance and her Uncle Julian for company, Merricat just wants to preserve their delicate way of life. But ever since Constance was acquitted of murdering the rest of the family, the world isn't leaving the Blackwoods alone. And when Cousin Charles arrives, armed with overtures of friendship and a desperate need to get into the safe, Merricat must do everything in her power to protect the remaining family. 

I was absolutely hooked by the end of the first page. It's narrated by Merricat, or Mary Katherine Blackwood, in a very formal yet oddly chatty tone. She lives with her sister, who was formerly on trial for poisoning the rest of their family, and their Uncle Julian, who somehow managed to survive the whole thing. It's one of those books where the truth is finally unearthed with little hints here and there, dotted in and amongst the narrative of their daily lives.

The trial and the murder aren't the focus of We Have Always Lived in the Castle though, not really. It's more of a background feature to explain why the two women live alone and why the village dislikes their presence to such a vehement extent. The subtlety of it makes it all the more fascinating. The main plot revolves around their Cousin Charles, who suddenly rolls up one day and begins what Merricat refers to as The Change.

As with most of Shirley Jackson's books (from the two I've read and what I've heard of the others), there's a very Gothic, mysterious atmosphere that seems to creep from the very pages. Merricat likes to hide little treasures in the ground of their property, as apparently this will create some kind of ward to protect her and Constance from the outside world. She never quite comes out and says that she believes she has magical powers, but the implication is very much there. 

My name is Mary Katherine Blackwood. I am eighteen years old, and I live with my sister Constance. I have often thought that with any luck at all I could have been born a werewolf, because the two middle fingers on both my hands are the same length, but I have had to be content with what I had. I dislike washing myself, and dogs, and noise. I like my sister Constance, and Richard Plantagenet, and Amanita phalloides, the death-cup mushroom. Everyone else in my family is dead.

There's also a mental illness theme that runs through this book. It seems to be a trademark of Shirley Jackson's to keep the reader on their toes - half the time you're not sure whether the characters have psychological issues or there really is something worrying going on. Aside from Uncle Julian's obvious difficulties, both Constance and Merricat have been affected by the trial and the death of their family, and it shows in their actions. Both are agoraphobic, although to different extents, and both are stuck in the mindset they carried during That Time six years previously. It's very cleverly written. 

I don't feel like this review is really doing any justice at all to the book. It's hard to capture the subtlety and the atmosphere of this book, that is just written so beautifully. Even the ending is perfect, in a lot of different ways. I haven't been able to stop thinking about it since I turned the last page and I would be very surprised if this book didn't make my Top Ten Books of 2015 list. 

Read Laura's review of The Haunting of Hill House at Devouring Texts.

The Books That Keep Me Sane

It won't be news to many of you that I have some slight mental health baggage. I'm fairly open about it when I have the anonymity of the Internet to hide behind. I've ranted about the stereotypes of mental illness on here before though, so don't worry, you're safe from me today.

Whilst this will eventually be a book-related post, let me provide a bit of background.

My mother and I started decorating my room quite a while ago now, but due to my starting a demanding new job and subsequent bout of physical illness, it was never finished. There's been 3m of unwallpapered wall for months and it's slowly been driving me crazy. Never mind though, we decided tonight was the night to rectify it.

Thing is, we have an old house and the walls have moved, so the pretty patterned wallpaper doesn't match up as it should, a matter complicated by the awkward dormer windows that basically mean you have to wallpaper part of the ceiling. There are joins in the paper where the flowers don't quite (or at all) line up with the flower stem on the adjoining piece of paper. It doesn't sound like a big deal, but it was (IS) and I basically had a meltdown.

It's been a while since I've had a proper OCD meltdown but it's not pleasant. On one hand, you can feel the mismatched wallpaper watching you and you feel sick and you're hyperventilating and you can't stop crying... but then there's a little detached bit of you watching from afar with disgust that really just wants you to stop being such a freak.

After a little while, I calmed down enough to sit tensely cross-legged on the bed staring at the wall (Ellie, I love you for talking me down), but just not quite enough to recreate the illusion that I'm a rational human being.

Then it came to me. The absolute, complete only thing that could possibly calm me down was A Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy. Nothing else would do. From that point, my mind latched onto the idea and associated Douglas Adams with peacefulness. I was literally desperate to read it.

Why that book? I have no idea. But the more I thought about it (which I did, at length, to distract myself - hey, I even wrote a blog post about it), the more I realised that there are certain books that I turn to when I'm about to have a large scale freak out.

The thing is, I can't really work out what these books have in common. There are books that I love that I wouldn't feel appropriate for this kind of situation (Jane Eyre, Terry Pratchett, 22/11/63...). I just know that the list below makes me feel safe and keeps me sane when I may not be doing such a good impression of it at the time.

Hanna's List of Literary Sanity

The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy

Pride and Prejudice

Persuasion

Lord of the Flies

The Hobbit

84 Charing Cross Road

We Bought A Zoo  

Harry Potter and the... Whatever, Really

A Christmas Carol

To Kill A Mockingbird

The Guernsey Literary and Potato Peel Pie Society

There may be more, but as my brain has clicked on to Hitchhiker's Guide tonight, I can't think what the others might be. I guess I'll find out the next time home decorating goes awry!

Which books do you turn to in times of need?  

Review: The Rosie Project by Graeme Simsion

So I've spent the last three months pretty much solely writing about War & Peace. It's not that I wanted Booking in Heels to become a Tolstoy-only zone, but between starting a new job and desperately trying to get the read-a-long posts up, there wasn't a whole lot of time to talk about other, lighter books.

But now I'm finally freeeeee (if no less tired) and able to talk about books that may actually interest people. Perish the thought.

Plot summary: Don Tillman, professor of genetics, has never been on a second date. He is a man who can count all his friends on the fingers of one hand, whose lifelong difficulty with social rituals has convinced him that he is simply not wired for romance. So when an acquaintance informs him that he would make a “wonderful” husband, his first reaction is shock. Yet he must concede to the statistical probability that there is someone for everyone, and he embarks upon The Wife Project. In the orderly, evidence-based manner with which he approaches all things, Don sets out to find the perfect partner. She will be punctual and logical—most definitely not a barmaid, a smoker, a drinker, or a late-arriver.

Yet Rosie Jarman is all these things. She is also beguiling, fiery, intelligent—and on a quest of her own. She is looking for her biological father, a search that a certain DNA expert might be able to help her with. Don's Wife Project takes a back burner to the Father Project and an unlikely relationship blooms, forcing the scientifically minded geneticist to confront the spontaneous whirlwind that is Rosie—and the realization that love is not always what looks good on paper.

Of course I'm going to restart regular posting by trashing a book everybody loves. Of course. 

Well, no. I wouldn't go so far as to say that I even disliked The Rosie Project really and so I'm not going to 'trash it' as such. It has a unique concept and it's meant to be a light-hearted and fun romance. It's just that for me, it's slightly over-rated and caused me to raise an irritated eyebrow at times.

Graeme Simsion writes quite well - the prose flows well, in a light quirky way, and it's hard to put the book down once you start reading. The plot could be an interesting one too - staid, reserved Professor decides that he can use logic and reasoning to find a partner, only to have his project contradicted when he's confronted with a wild, rebellious woman that rationally shouldn't interest him at all. Sounds great.

The problem is, for such a concept to work you need to invest an awful lot into the characters... and that just doesn't happen here. Let's start with Rosie, because she's easier. And alsoprofoundly average in every way. She is neither boring not interesting, she's just sort of... there. Don't get me wrong, it's a bit of a twist to have the female love interest in a romantic novel be the flat one, but I was thinking maybe at some point we could really push the boat out and have two fleshed out charcters?

Alright, let's get to the real problem. Don Tilman has some sort of mental health issue, and there's a heavy implication that he's on the Autism Spectrum somewhere. I mean, they say that everybody is, but his behaviour is severely impacted. Think of him as Sheldon Cooper-esque.

The message I took from this book is that everybody with Asberger's or High-Functioning Autism or whatever are hilarious. It's okay to laugh at them. Don Tilman is obviously exaggerated to the effect that he's not a believable character at all, but it really does give off a vibe that everybody that suffers from these genuine mental illnesses are clowns.

Oh, but they're also geniuses. Because of Don's mental health, he's wonderful at science but can also instantly teach himself black-belt karate from a book, learn expert high-level bartending in a few hours and can be an expert dancer, again from reading a book. So, to clarify, Asberger's sufferers are basically loveable buffoons who have plugged in to the Matrix. 

Believe it or not, that's not what bothered me. I know, right? And you thought we were done. But no. What really offended me was that, apparently, if you just explain to somebody with Asberger's that what they're doing isn't rational, they can just... stop. Isn't that nice? I can't believe that the mental health teams across the world haven't reached this ground-breaking conclusion yet.

I get that it wants to end on a happy note; that Rosie is good for Don and brings him back to Earth, I do. And I'm sure that, for some sufferers, the right person can help stabilise their mental health. It just doesn't work the way that The Rosie Project implies.

I know a lot of you will think I'm over-reacting and that's fine. This is a light-hearted, fun book that I understand wasn't intended to be a wider analysis of mental health issues. But I'm sensitive to stereotypes of OCD, Asberger's, Bipolar Disorder, etc, and books like this, fun though they may be, really don't help.

Climbing down from my soapbox and putting aside the above issues, I still don't really understand the hype surrounding The Rosie Project. It didn't make a lasting impression as the ending is very rushed and weak, so as a result I feel profoundly 'meh' about this book and won't be reading the sequel.   

Read a more balanced review of The Rosie Project at Devouring Texts.

Review: The Perks of Being A Wallflower by Stephen Chbosky

I'm simply horrendous at reading books when they're actually relevant - either when they're first released, when the movie version comes out or when my friends are reading and loving it. It usually takes a random flash of inspiration to remind me that a book exists and then maybe I'll finally, finally read it. Or more often, not.

Plot summary:  Charlie is a freshman. And while he's not the biggest geek in the school, he is by no means popular. Shy, introspective, intelligent beyond his years yet socially awkward, he is a wallflower, caught between trying to live his life and trying to run from it. Charlie is attempting to navigate his way through uncharted territory: the world of first dates and mixed tapes, family dramas and new friends; the world of sex, drugs, and The Rocky Horror Picture Show, when all one requires is that perfect song on that perfect drive to feel infinite. But Charlie can't stay on the sideline forever. Standing on the fringes of life offers a unique perspective. But there comes a time to see what it looks like from the dance floor.

As it turns out, I had absolutely no idea what this book was actually about. I think I had a vague idea about a coming-of-age novel, something to do with a quiet teenager who finds new friends? While I wasn't strictly wrong (not that I'd ever admit to it if I was), there's a lot more to The Perks of Being A Wallflower than I expected.

Charlie is a slightly odd, quiet teenager who writes long letters detailing his life to the friend of a schoolmate, who he once heard was a decent person. He uses this as a sort-of journal and so we get to hear about the minor dramas that make up Charlie's life. I would have loved to learn more about the recipient of these letters - it's hardly the point of the story, but I do think that perhaps one letter in response would have tied the whole book up nicely.

It actually works really well. I wouldn't go so far as to say that it's 'moving,' but there's a certain twist to Charlie's tone that lets you know that there's something undernearth the surface. I think I twigged fairly early on that he has some sort of mental illness, but then I do have a penchant for this kind of book. I loved that it never really felt the need to tell the reader exactly what Charlie has, thus avoiding the labels of 'mental health book.' This way Perks gets to remain a simple coming-of-age novel that's read and loved almost universally.

Charlie is perfect. Slightly naive to the point where you just can't help but want to help him out. I also think he represents a lot of our own teenage anxieties - not necessarily the drama present in his life, but the usual concerns about whether your friends actually like having you around and your parents discovering exactly how much you drank last weekend.

I had a harder time relating to some of the other characters, who don't really seem to be believable teenagers. I accept that they're two years older than Charlie, but they're so... liberal (diplomacy at its best) that it seems like they're already at college. No live-at-home teenager has that much freedom or quite as philosophical a world view.

Sam occasionally irritated me as I think she may be the least developed character, which is odd considering she's probably the second-most important. She reads more like a caricature of a person than any believable approximation, having very lofty ideals towards the end and it did feel like she took advantage of Charlie somewhat, which doesn't fit with everything else we'd been told about her values.

I did not see that ending coming and hadn't even been a little bit spoilered. While I didn't hate it and I don't object to it, I'm still not sure that it was strictly necessary especially as the narrative goes out of its way to state that It wasn't responsible for Charlie's difficulties. It does seem as if the purpose was primarily shock value and that does tend to irritate me.

Spoilery about the ending: 

I do feel that it may trivialise and over-simplify sexual abuse a little. 'Oh, I was sexually abused and so now I sexually abuse other people.'
Well, no. It doesn't always work like that, but it was presented as if this was a perfectly natural and understandable development.

Aaaaaaaaand I'm done.

I do think there's something here for everyone - every teenager who feels a little isolated from their peers, but also every adult who feels grateful that they never have to go through that awkward stage again! The Perks of Being A Wallflower deals with mental illness, sexual awakenings, anxiety, homosexuality, teenage relationships and probably a lot more. There's an awful lot packed into this seemingly simple book and, while it has its faults, I recommend it very highly.

Read Ellie's review of the book and movie here.   

Review: It's Kind of a Funny Story by Ned Vizzini

I'm not technically due to review this for another month or so, but I'm desperate to talk about it RIGHT NOW so you get a frantic blabbery review at a stupid time in the morning. Lucky you. I've already harrassed Ellie via Twitter and Facebook (several times, but she's ignoring me - how rude) and posted a Facebook status for any bookish offline friends (there aren't many). Pleeeeeease read this.

Warning: complete and total lack of coherent review ahead.

Plot summary:  Ambitious New York City teenager Craig Gilner is determined to succeed at life - which means getting into the right high school to get into the right job. But once Craig aces his way into Manhattan's Executive Pre-Professional High School, the pressure becomes unbearable. He stops eating and sleeping until, one night, he nearly kills himself.

Craig's suicidal episode gets him checked into a mental hospital, where his new neighbors include a transsexual sex addict, a girl who has scarred her own face with scissors, and the self-elected President Armelio. There, Craig is finally able to confront the sources of his anxiety.

Ned Vizzini, who himself spent time in a psychiatric hospital, has created a remarkably moving tale about the sometimes unexpected road to happiness.

AARRRRRRRRRRGH. I swear I don't know whether to laugh, cry or throw up. This book is unbelievable.

Let me start by saying that I really hate (fictional) depressed teenagers. I have the utmost respect and sympathy for the real-life ones, but I find the ones in books to be melodramatic, attention-seeking, petty and have delusions of grandeur. I wanted to feed Sloane to the zombies myself and got three pages into Forgive Me, Leonard Peacock before I hurled it across the room. With some experience of mental health issues myself (although nowhere similar to this level) it can be a touchy subject.

You may wonder why I even read this. And that's an excellent question. To which I have no clue of an answer. C'est la vie.

It takes a few chapters for It's Kind of a Funny Story to really find itself. Craig himself is a reasonably likeable character, even from the beginning, but I just couldn't deal with some of the 'literative devices' used, particularly this one:

'Hey, you want some of this?" Aaron was like.

"Okay?" my Dad was like.

No no no no no no no. Not a thing. Absolutely not a thing. It was almost a deal-breaker. Thankfully it only happens two or three times towards the beginning of the book, but... nope. Cannot and will not deal with that.

Good. We've got literally the only bad thing about this book out of the way. Now let's snuggle down and listen to Aunty Hanna ramble about a YA novel with a suicidal protagonist. I know, right? I may be an imposter.

It's Kind of a Funny Story has some of the best, most accurate descriptions of depression that I have ever read. It makes sense, considering Ned Vizzini spent five days in a psychiatric hospital himself and eventually killed himself seven years after the release of this novel, but it's almost haunting. Craig never whines about how terrible his parents are or how girls don't like him - he has low self-esteem, sure, but he can't work out why he feels so low. He understands (from a distance) how awesome his life should be, yet just can't seem to feel it.

That's the thing. Big neon arrows pointing to this, please. That's what none of the other books seem to get - depression has no logical cause, even to the person on the inside. Because of that, you start to wonder if maybe you're not ill at all. There's nothing wrong with you - stop being so weak and grow up. And this is you talking to yourself. Which naturally makes you feel worse, so you beat yourself up more... ad infinitum.

   This was all an excuse, I think. I was doing fine. I had a 93 average and I was holding my head above water. I had good friends and a loving family. And because I needed to be the centre of attention, because I needed something more, I ended up here, wallowing in myself. trying to convince everybody around me that I have some kind of... disease.
   I don't have any disease. I keep pacing. Depression isn't a disease. It's a pretext for being a prima donna. Everybody knows that. My friends know it; my principal knows it. The sweating has started again. I can feel the Cycling starting up in my brain. I haven't done anything right.

I spent a lot of this book rather shellshocked. It's astounding how well the author managed the transfer all these thoughts to paper. The funny thing is, it's not even a depressing book... nor is it lecturing. It has quite a light tone, even though it's a first person narrative of a suicidal teenager. It's quite chatty and accessible, although it obviously discusses some quite serious subjects.

Some comic relief is added by the other inmates of the psychiatric hospital. They're quite obviously there to lighten the tone and to help Craig understand what has made his life so unbearable. That said, their conditions are never belittled or laughed at - they are funny, but their illnesses are not, and that's quite clear. 

It's somehow uplifting. That has nothing to do with the ending, but it makes you feel that maybe everything will be alright. If people can end up in hospitals because they burned out with too much pressure and extracurricular activities, yet somehow still make it... maybe there's hope for everybody. 

I cried like a child when I'd finished this book. I don't know if you need to have had mental health issues to enjoy/respect this book... maybe. It's not something I've really struggled with myself for a long time, but it still resonated with me. Even if you haven't, it's still a great story in itself and you might just learn something.

This book was:

• The Book I Recommended To The Most People in 2014
  

Other amazing mental health novels include The Shock of the Fall and We Need To Talk About Kevin (kind of). 

Review: A Mango-Shaped Space by Wendy Mass

A Mango-Shaped Space was the first of four full books I read over the Dewey's 24 Hour Read-a-thon period. I almost always try and use events like these to get through some of the older books on my TBR pile and this was no exception. In fact, the receipt tucked inside my copy tells me that I've owned this book since March 2012... well, I won't be owning it for much longer, that's safe to say.

Plot summary: Mia Winchell has synesthesia, the mingling of perceptions whereby a person can see sounds, smell colors, and taste shapes. Forced to reveal her condition, she must look to herself to develop an understanding and appreciation of her gift in this coming-of-age novel.

Good thing that's not a vague blurb or anything... But yes, basically, Mia has synesthesia, a condition thought to include Van Vogh and David Hockney as sufferors (and also allegedly Kanye West, but never mind that). I can sort of understand this as, while I don't see colours, I do associate them with certain things/people and can get quite stressed out when real life doesn't always conform. But I'll leave this train of thought here before I get angry comments telling me that OCD isn't the same as synesthesia (a fact of which I am very aware). 

I do have a soft spot for novels about mental health. The Shock of the Fall was one of the best books I've read all year and I completely fell in love with The Silver Linings Playbook. However, you'll note that both those books are aimed at adult readers and A Mango-Shaped Space most definitely is not. The language is very simple, but that's fine as it's aimed at younger readers and I got used to that after a few pages anyway.

The problem is how easy the whole thing is. Mia decides for no apparent reason to mention her difficulties to her parents after thirteen years of not doing so and then has a diagnosis within three days? Yeeeeeah, I don't think so. I understand that middle-grade books are always going to have simpler plots than adult novels and that it's trying to reinforce talking to your parents about your struggles... but I feel it's setting children up to believe that mental health diagnoses are instant. I just don't want children to feel that its all in their heads etc. when they're told that there's nothing wrong with them (which they invariably will be). 

*breathes* Issues? Who, me? 

The other slightly role-modely issue with A Mango-Shaped Space is that I'm preeeeeeeetty (read: absolutely and completely) sure that synesthesia doesn't allow sufferors to guess people's moods or tell whether people are lying. Wow, that's insulting. I was flabberghasted and I don't even have it. I mean, what is this book aiming for? 'Oh, I thought I had this because I can see music and taste sounds... but oh no, I can't have. I'm not additionally and randomly psychic, so there goes that idea.'

I can't wait to tell them about the acupuncture, which, cool as it was, did get to be pretty distracting. But if my abilities had been stronger tonight, I would have been able to see exactly what Adam was feeling when he kissed me. That could have been useful.

ARGH. Even if I agree to let the use of the word 'abilities' go, you would not have been able to see how he felt, regardless of how strong your symptoms are. You have an illness; you are not one of the X-Men.

Mia's also kind of a cowbag. While I did want her to get better, I liked her in absolutely no way at all. She's a horrible little primadonna. At one point she goes all mental about the fact that she boiled some pasta to go with some salad her mother made, and nobody thanked her for the salad. Really!? Did you thank your Mum for making the salad? Did you thank her the 56,000 times she's made you pasta!? And just like that I've realised why I rarely read contemporary YA- because I almost always side with the parents.

I appreciate what this book is trying to do, kind of. Synesthesia is rarely heard of and it must be comforting for children to have a novel they can read for reassurance that they're not crazy. The problem is a) it's more about a girl who happens to have synesthesia while she grieves over her deceased grandfather, and b) I really feel like it might give them the wrong end of the stick. Synesthesia makes you a mind-reader, remember?

Read a more positive review of A Mango-Shaped Space at Hearts At Play - this review also explains how synesthesia works much better than I did!

Review: The Reason I Jump by Naoki Higashida

I think it was Ellie who first introduced me to The Reason I Jump during one of our shopping trips. I nodded, agreed that the concept sounded vaguely interesting and then moved on. However in April I suddenly began to desperately want this book, so I ran out, bought it, and read it the very next day.

Summary: Written by Naoki Higashida when he was only thirteen, this remarkable book provides a rare insight into the often baffling behaviour of autistic children. Using a question and answer format, Naoki explains things like why he talks loudly or repeats the same questions, what causes him to have panic attacks, and why he likes to jump. He also shows the way he thinks and feels about his world - other people, nature, time and beauty, and himself. Abundantly proving that people with autism do possess imagination, humour and empathy, he also makes clear how badly they need our compassion, patience and understanding.

Please keep in mind that I'm reviewing this from the perspective of an average reader, just as I would any other book.  

This book came about through David Mitchell, the award-winning author of Cloud Atlas and other novels. His wife, Keiko Yoshida, came across the Japanese edition while searching for help relating to their autistic son and then worked on an English translation in order to help others. While it's interesting to know the background, I couldn't help but feel that the introduction cheapened the book a little - I didn't need David Mitchell to tell me how autistic children are people too and how much they struggle. Naoki Higashida did that well enough on his own and it felt like Mr Mitchell was stood behind him patting him condescendingly on the head.

Anyway. The Reason I Jump isn't a memoir or an autobiography, which I think is what I was (unfairly) expecting. Instead it's actually a FAQ about living with autism, answered by a thirteen year old Japanese boy. There are 58 questions and the answers are approximately a page each in quite large font. Interspersed are four short stories written by the author himself.

The benefit of this is the perspective of a sufferor themselves - not their parent or a psychologist and what can be more accurate than a person telling you how they are feeling. The downside is that it's not all that enlightening. Essentially, it's:

Q: Why do you... (ignore us, echo questions, etc)

A: Because we do. We can't help it.

x 58.

This was interesting at first but because it doesn't really expand beyond the above, it got a little repetitive and I lost interest. I think I unfairly expected The Reason I Jump to be moving when it's written as more of a manual to understanding autism and the related symptoms. It's a list of things to do and not do when interacting with an autistic child:

Please never laugh at us, even when we're doing a less than great job.

Please don't judge us from the outside only.

Please try to understand what we're going through.

Please don't tell us off.

x58.

However, there were some questions that resonated with me. It's difficult to explain which parts I found interesting and which I didn't, but I realised that some actions towards an autistic person might affect them in a way I had never considered:

Q16: Is it true that you hate being touched?
   ...for a person with autism, being touched by someone else means that the toucher is exercising control over a body, which even its owner can't properly control. It's as if we lose who we are. Think about it - that's terrifying!

I feel bad even thinking this, but I actually felt a little bit patronised. It seemed as though I was being looked down on for being healthy... or gently chided, anyway. 

   I think it's very difficult for you to to properly get your heads around just how hard it is for us to express what we're feeling. For us, dealing with the pain by treating it as if it's already gone is actually easier than letting other people know we are in pain.
   Normal people think we're highly dependant and can't live without ongoing support, but in fact there are times when we're stoic heroes.

I think this may have been one of the parts heavily edited by David Mitchell and his wife. Read this article for a thorough background, but basically his wife translated the original and then David Mitchell altered the prose. How much is left of Naoki Higashida's work? Instinct says not a lot. The prose alternates between lecturing and rambling quite philosophically, alternating between a very adult tone and an almost childish one. I'd be interested to read a different (direct and accurate) translation of the same work.

The other issue is the large amount of sweeping statements about what all children with autism do, because of course there isn't any such thing. The effects of autism differs hugely from person to person, and I'd have thought that Naoki (of all people) would have known that. It doesn't really discuss the spectrum; here, all autistic people are the same, with the same behavioural characteristics. This is concerning because it occasionally states that you should absolutely never do a certain thing that I know has helped people in my life with autism (like the use of schedules). Perhaps another thing that was confused during translation?

The last thing I want to do is take away what Naoki Higashida has achieved just by putting this book together. It's a huge accomplishment and the painstaking effort that must have gone into The Reason I Jump is almost incomprehensible. I believe that my issue with it relates to the translation which seems to have taken advantage - David Mitchell's name on the cover is the same size as Naoki's, after all. 

There were some very interesting questions that provided insight in a way that had never even occurred to me, but on the whole it's a fairly repetetive manual that I have difficulty believing is anything like the original.

Again, this is my opinion on a book that I read out of interest, as a standard reader. If you have a go at me, I will delete your comment.

Review: The Shock of the Fall by Nathan Filer

I barely know where to start with The Shock of the Fall. I bought it on a whim from ASDA and began it simply because it was close at hand. I had a vague idea of the subject matter, but no more than that. Perhaps it was due to my low expectations, but this book completely blew me away. The second I'd finished, I texted Ellie to let her know that she really must read this... and I've recommended it to almost everybody else I know now too. 

Summary: 'I'll tell you what happened because it will be a good way to introduce my brother. His name's Simon. I think you're going to like him. I really do. But in a couple of pages he'll be dead. And he was never the same after that.'

That's a rubbish blurb, so let me embellish it a tad. So, we have Matthew, who we know is writing his story down on a computer he uses at some kind of care centre. We know he had a brother, Simon, once and we also know that Matthew has been institutionalised at some point in the past. The rest of the novel focuses on what happened to Simon and Matthew's subsequent interpretation, as well as his journey through the mental health system to present day.

Why yes, that is rather vague but so is the book. I know a lot of other readers figured out what happened almost immediately, but I just... didn't. I was trying to interpret it with some kind of Adam-and-Eve theme due to the titular 'fall' and the tree on the cover. Yeah, sometimes you can over-analyse. This way though, my understanding developed along with Matthew's and it was a wonderful journey.

I think it suits the book better if you go into it without knowing too much, so excuse me for not bringing up the details. I was lucky enough to go into it almost blind and so The Shock of the Fall surprised and moved me the way it was meant to. Apparently Nathan Filer is a psychiatric nurse with a degree in Mental Health Nursing, so he understands better than most how symptoms of mental illness can exhibit themselves. 

It's a mixture of Matthew typing away at his computer in the present day and his reminisces of his previous experiences, but there are also medical reports, family trees and official letters. In certain novels this can seem gimmicky, but here it's infrequent and subtle enough to work. It helps that all the inserted media looks like it could be real - a lot of effort has gone in to creating logos, typeface, etc and so it seemed to demonstrate how chaotic Matthew's world feels to him.

What particularly impressed me was that the book didn't seem to set out to make you pity Matthew or his family. It's more of an explanation - why Matthew acts the way he does and what might be going through the head of somebody like him. It doesn't always make for attractive reading as he's very difficult to like, but at the same time I found myself caring so very deeply for him.

The Shock of the Fall is a masterpiece of characterisation - Matthew and his family seem so damn real that I keep expecting to run into them when I go in to our local care facility for meetings. I'd guess that they're drawn from Mr Filer's real-life experience of patients and their parents as nobody's imagination is that good! 

This book really got to me. I sat there with an anxious, tight feeling in my stomach throughout and it persisted long after I'd finished. I really cared what happened to Simon, what was going to happen to Matthew and if the situation was ever going to resolve itself. This is easily, easily going to be one of my best books of 2014. 

Visit Nathan Filer's website or find him on Twitter. 

Obsessive Compulsive Disorder: A Gif-filled Explanation of Why It's Actually Not All That Funny

The following phrases have the potential to turn me into a ball of snarling indignation:

"Haha, I'm so OCD about that!"

"God, my pens have to be straight - it's like I'm OCD, haha!"

And that is why we're here today, ladies and gentlemen. I am so so sick of people treating Obsessive Compulsive Order as if it were some kind of casual joke, something to be thrown out there like the idea of it being an actual mental illness is hilarious. 

So you like your pens to be straight, good for you. It bothers you when your nails are dirty, fair enough. It does not make you OCD and claiming that it does (jokingly or otherwise, I've seen both) demonstrates your sheer lack of understanding about what this disorder actually entails and actually makes you seem kind of (read: incredibly) dismissive.

Actually, the sterotypical OCD traits (cleanliness, germs, order, etc) can be the least invasive and aren't as common as you'd think. They've only become so prevalent because they're the ones people make jokes about. See above for my thoughts on how simply hilarious that is.

I don't have that kind of Obsessive Compulsive Disorder, although some people do and it's still dehabilitating. I do like clean bed sheets and I don't like my food to touch other food when it's on my plate, but those are just my preferences. That's the key word here - preference, not compulsion.

Anybody who has experienced an actual compulsion can't fail to recognise it for what it is. They're not always all physical - thinking in a certain way or about certain things can be a compulsion. For example, I have always had an obsession about death ever since an inappropriately young age. I obsess over the fact that my parents, friends and cat will die some day and therefore I compulsively store memories and photographs so I don't regret missing time with them.

This sounds like it might actually be quite nice - savouring every moment, etc. Except it means that I can't stroke my cat without remembering how he's going to die one day, how he might die and what that might look like. Same with my Mum - every time I get out of her car, I have to tell her that I love her in case she dies before I see her again.

  
I have an odd set of compulsions regarding my Mum, actually. You know in Ella Enchanted, where Ella has to follow every instruction given to her or it makes her physically ill? That. If my Mum makes me a packed lunch, I have to eat every single part of it, no matter how ill I might feel, or I get such severe feelings of guilt as I obsessively picture an uneaten sandwich rotting in the bin that I end up with wracking stomach ache.

Today I rang her because I had a three hour gap in between meetings and I was bored. She suggested I go to Waterstones and we had a short conversation about how she (jokingingly) had no doubt I could spend three hours in a bookshop. I decided to go to the office where I volunteer instead - I could make myself a free cup of tea and have a chat with the friends I work with. Except I found myself getting more and more tense, more nauseous, more twitchy and I kept picturing Waterstones and replaying the conversation with my Mum. By the time I left the office I was practically jogging down the street to get to Waterstones so the pressure on my shoulders would dissipate.

I should add that my Mum knows about none of the above. She'd be absolutely horrified at the amount of power she has over me and I'm not particularly fond of it myself. I was never particularly a Mama's Girl and I wasn't coddled. That's just the way my hilarious illness has chosen to show itself, based on nothing.

What shall we talk about now? Oh, I know. A few weeks ago my Mum tidied my bedroom, to be nice and helpful because it was a mess. Except I broke down and cried hysterically for about three days. And I do mean hysterically. Sobbing in a ball on the floor until I choked. It felt like everything in the room had eyes and it was malevolently watching me. Then I spent hours rearranging everything to exactly how it was before she came in - to be just as messy as before. I don't need things to be tidy and clean, I just need them to be where I put them. Then I tidied my bedroom anyway because hey, I preferred it tidy. But I'd tidied it.

However, since then, I've had paralysing guilt about what an ungrateful wretch I was. Every time I think about it I get that sharp pain in my stomach and a pressure in between my shoulders. I replay it in my head constantly and I just feel so ashamed. 

I'm nearly done. Just one more example of the true hilarity that is OCD. Sometimes, I have compulsions that I can't act on and I only feel compelled to do them because I can't act on them. For example, when I was about twelve I was taken along to sit quietly at the back of an AGM meeting for the club that my Dad was Chairman of. At some point he asked if everybody was happy with the current newsletter editor and I had a desperate and absolute compulsion to stand on my chair and announce that I was going to be the new editor.

I didn't want to be editor. I couldn't have been editor. But that was the entire point - announcing this would have been such an inappropriate and humilating thing to do, that every fibre of my being wanted to do it. This happens fairly often and it's worse because you can't give in to it. You have to sit on your hands, count to one hundred and focus on a stationery spot on the floor while your stomach is twisting and your brain is telling you to just give in, just do it, you know you need to!

 

Don't think I'm not aware how crazy I sound in this post. But that's kind of the point - this is what actually goes on in my head, not just a mild desire to straighten the table mat. This isn't a pity party and I am actually a contributing member of society - I have a good job, I have friends and I'm reasonably pleasant to talk to (I hope). 

OCD isn't just people who like clean things. And even if somebody does have compulsions about cleanliness, it's a serious issue that can be completely dehabilitating. You don't know what's going on behind the scenes and assuming that you do, and assuming that it's some kind of joke, is just offensive.

Review: The Marriage Plot by Jeffrey Eugenides

When I read the blurb of The Marriage Plot in The Works, I knew I just couldn't resist it, despite never having read Middlesex or The Virgin Suicides. A book based around the dissection of my favourite author's works? Yes please.

Plot summary: Brown University, 1982. Madeleine Hanna, dutiful English student and incurable romantic, is writing her thesis on Jane Austen and George Eliot – authors of the great marriage plots. As Madeleine studies the age-old motivations of the human heart, real life, in the form of two very different men, intervenes.
Leonard Bankhead, brilliant scientist and charismatic loner, attracts Madeleine with an intensity that she seems powerless to resist. Meanwhile her old friend Mitchell Grammaticus, a theology student searching for some kind of truth in life, is certain of at least one thing – that he and Madeleine are destined to be together.
But as all three leave college, they will have to figure out how they want their own marriage plot to end.

While this is very much a book about books, Madeleine's thesis about Austen and Eliot doesn't actually feature much. There isn't really an over-arching plot at all - instead it's about people, finding religion, literature, bad decisions, mental illness and a whole host of other issues. Not a whole lot actually happens as such, but it's worth reading just for the lovely prose and detailed conversations about books.

Not that I've read any of them. It's mostly about incredibly obscure philosophical 'greats,' which can make it a little difficult to follow at first. This didn't affect my enjoyment though - I'm happy to sit back and 'listen' to people who love literature as much as I do, even if it's about unfamiliar works.

She'd become an English major for the purest and dullest of reasons: because she loved to read. The university's "British and American Literature Course Catalog" was, for Madeleine, what its Bergdorf equivalent was for her roommates. A course listing like "English 274: Lyly's Euphes" excited Madeleine the way a pair of Fiorucci cowboy boots did Abby.
... the magesterial presence of all those potentially readable words stopped her in her tracks. She could scan book spines for as long as an hour. Her cataloging of the family's holdings rivaled the Dewey decimal system in its comprehensiveness.

Sound familiar to anybody? The Marriage Plot could only be written by somebody with an intense love of books. There's a lot to relate to in here.

Books aside, the remainder of the plot focuses on relationships. Madeleine, for reasons completely absurd to me, is drawn to Leonard... who doesn't really care about anything, too busy with his manic depression. He's a very unlikeable character who causes no end of problems, but I assume that's kind of the point. Mitchell, Madeleine's friend, is desperately in love with her and so runs off travelling to avoid his problems. If I were her I'd stick with my books, I think. 

The story loosely relates to the title, but only vaguely. Mitchell wants to marry Madeliene, who wants to marry Leonard, who isn't marriage material. Straight out of an Austen book, only with more sex. Unless you're Longbourn, anyway. It's kind of... real, though. The characters are all flawed and not exactly likeable, but somehow that adds to the appeal. It seems like this actually could happen, and to real people.

Like I said though, it almost doesn't matter. The writing is too great. It has a slightly formal style and passes on a lot of academic knowledge, so it does require your full attention but is worth every minute. It feels natural, somehow.

He'd turned eighteen in August and the Disease, as though waiting for him to reach legal drinking age, began to flood him with intoxicants. Two things mania did were to keep you up all night and to enable nonstop sex: pretty much the definition of college. Leonard studied at the Rockefeller Library every night until midnight, like a yeshiva student davening over the Torah. At the stroke of twelve he headed back to West Quad, where there was always a party going on, usually in his room.

The ending isn't very good at all though, which is probably the only fault of The Marriage Plot. It tries to be clever and tie in with the title but it's overly twee and incredibly unsatisfying. It's too flat. It actually took the rating down a whole star - what can I say, endings are important.

To conclude, Jeffrey Eugenides is a hugely talented author. The prose flows beautifully and he manages to get inside the head of a bookish 20-something woman perfectly - and I'm a damn expert. Read this for the experience, but don't expect to be blown away by the story.

Read Laura's review of The Marriage Plot over at Devouring Texts.

Review: Let's Pretend This Never Happened by Jenny Lawson

So I'm not really much of a book-laugher, or a laugher-at-books if you prefer. I'm more of a snuffler - when something amuses me, I make a noise that's kind of a hybrid between a tiger that's pleased to see you and Muttley. Jenny Lawson, however, made me laugh out loud until I cried, both with her debut book and with her blog, The Bloggess.

Summary - Every teenager wants to fit in and be just like everybody else. So imagine how hard that is when your father runs a taxidermy business out of the family home, your mother runs the student cafeteria, and your sister has just been elected high school mascot, which means she walks the halls in a giant bird costume. But as Jenny Lawson grows up, falls in love, gets engaged - in a way that is as disastrous as it is romantic - and starts a family of her own, she learns that life's most absurd and humiliating moments, the ones we wish we could pretend had never happened, are the very same moments that make us who we are.

I actually picked up Let's Pretend This Never Happened before I knew anything about Jenny Lawson or her blog. It was part of the 'Staff Picks' stand at Waterstones and I figured I'd give it a go, intrigued by the costumed mouse on the cover. Only later, after I'd read the blurb properly, did I finally click onto The Bloggess. And then, approximately five hours later, I temporarily stopped reading it. 

It was almost inevitable that this book would be compared to Caitlin Moran's How To Be A Woman - the cover is unnecessarily similar and the chatty, informal writing style is great in both. However, although both are autobiographical to a certain extent, How To Be A Woman deals with the sub-issue of feminism while this book spends more time with mental illness and anxiety. When you also take in the difference in countries, upbringings and employment, you actually have two quite different books.

This woman is hilarious - reading her blog is at the top of my 4am activity list (What? You don't have one of those!? You're missing out!) and I nearly always end up literally crying with laughter. I was reading Let's Pretend This Never Happened on the train, tried to stifle my laughter and ended up choking. Like I said way up top, I am a snuffler, not a laugher, so this is one pretty damn special book.

   It was at this exact moment that the 'dead' rattlesnake suddenly started angrilily striking at Victor's leg. Uncoincidently, it was also the exact same moment that I ducked back into the truck, taking the spotlight with me and leaving Victor in the pitch-black darkness on an abandoned road, as the angry rattlesnake he was holding tried to murder him.
   "BRING BACK THE LIGHT," he screamed.
   "I TOLD YOU NOT TO GO OUT THERE!" I yelled angrily, as I quickly locked the doors (for some reason) and rolled up all the windows. I was worried about him and wanted to help him, but I couldn't help but think that he had brought this on himself.
    "BRING BACK THE LIGHT OR I WILL THROW THIS DAMN SNAKE IN THE CAR WITH YOU," he screamed, which was surprising, both because he sounded very vital for someone dying of snakebite, and also because he'd wrongly assumed that I hadn't automatically locked all the doors. He knows so little about me,  I thought to myself.
...
   After a minute to slow his breathing, Victor's voice was only vaguely controlled. "You left me alone. In the dark. With a live rattlesnake."
   "No. You left me alone. In the car. For a live rattlesnake," I countered. "So I guess that makes us even." There was a long pause as he stared at me. "But I forgive you?" I said. 

There are one or two parts that I recognise from my avid trawlings of Jenny Lawson's blog, but not many. I suppose it's almost inevitable though - she's only led one life, after all, there's bound to be a little cross-over.

I have to admit that the book did go downhill a little bit towards the end. It started to get less funny and more about her anxiety disorder. It's obviously a very important part of her life, but it was a bit repetitive. Also, the ending itself disintegrates into a generic, soppy memoir and it did make me lose interest a little. I was reading this for amusement, not pseudo-poignant musings on memories and reputation.

That said, I still loved this book - I can't really explain how funny it is without you reading it yourself (which I highly recommend doing). It was difficult to not just post quote after quote for this review, because that's pretty much all my notebook page for this review consists of. Just buy this - I dare you not to snuffle.

Visit The Bloggess, or find Jenny Lawson on Twitter. 

Review: The Psychopath Test

Sometimes it surprises me how the books popular in the blogosphere aren't always the same ones as in the real world. I've only ever seen The Psychopath Test on one blog (Katie's Book Blog - click here for her review) but when I went into the library the other day, they had seven shiny new copies on the New Release shelf. Not only that, but they were one-week-loan only, presumably because they're just that in demand. I reserved my copy because I didn't realise just how many would be in stock!

What if society wasn’t fundamentally rational, but was motivated by insanity? This thought sets Jon Ronson on an utterly compelling adventure into the world of madness. Along the way, Jon meets psychopaths, those whose lives have been touched by madness and those whose job it is to diagnose it, including the influential psychologist who developed the Psychopath Test, from whom Jon learns the art of psychopath-spotting. A skill which seemingly reveals that madness could indeed be at the heart of everything . . . Combining Jon’s trademark humour, charm and investigative incision, The Psychopath Test is both entertaining and honest, unearthing dangerous truths and asking serious questions about how we define normality in a world where we are increasingly judged by our maddest edges. 

Everybody's heard the term psychopath before, but how many of us actually know what it means? Therein lies the premise of Jon Ronson's book - what is a psychopath and why do so many influential businessmen display the symptoms? Prompted by a mysterious package sent to many leading academics, Mr. Ronson eventually tracks down the man responsible and is intrigued by his odd mannerisms. This leads to a deep investigation of psychopathy and those who suffer from it - a mature, intriguing look at aspects of the mental health regulations worldwide.

The actual Psychopath Test is a checklist devised by Bob Hare, used by medical institutions worldwide in an attempt to discover whether an individual is genuinely a psychopath. It includes symptoms such as pathological lying, lack of remorse and irresponsibility and is said to be the fool-proof method of detection. Jon Ronson meets with Mr. Hare to discuss various consequences of the existence of such a test. For example, the author frequently found himself quietly diagnosing his friends and relatives with psychopathy - like he was actually looking for reasons to deem them a psychopath.

I can sympathise. I've spent the week since I read The Psychopath Test informing The Boy that he is, in fact, a psychopath. I've even blu-tacked a list entitled 'Why Lewis is a Psychopath' to the radiator and I update it periodically. When he gets annoyed, I tell him that it's because he has a grandiose sense of self-worth - as befits a true psychopath.

It can actually have more serious consequences than infuriating your loved one, however. The author meets with Toby, an inmate at Broadmoor who pretended to be a psychopath to avoid a prison sentence. Now, years after his sentence would have ended, the authorities refuse to release him because they still believe in his psychopathy despite his confession. Similarly, an experiment was conducted a few years ago where eight 'normal' people were told to complain that they heard a voice saying three words, but otherwise act completely normal. Each of those people was incarcerated and struggled to convince doctors of their sanity. Later, the head of the experiment told the mental hospitals that more individuals were about to carry out the same concept. A month later, the authorities proudly announced they'd caught forty imposters. How many had actually been sent in? None.

So obviously the Test isn't infallible, and that's what Jon Ronson sets out to investigate. On the way, he discusses the views of different organisations on the psychological profession, a number of conspiracy theories and speaks with a few successful business men suspected of psychopathy. It's not always strictly on topic, but then at least it's never repetetive.

It has a very conversational tone - almost as if Mr. Ronson was sat across from you in a coffee shop, casually discussing psychopathy. As you do, obviously. He rambles sometimes and then suddenly realises and jumps back on track, but I like that. It never comes across as pretentious or preachy... Instead it's informal and friendly. 

A quote on the cover proclaims how gloriously funny it is, but I didn't really see it that way. I mean, I really enjoyed it and I loved Mr. Ronson's 'voice,' but it's not a funny book. But hey, I think that added to my enjoyment. I'd have respected The Psychopath Test a lot less if it trivialised psychopathy or tried to joke about the consequences.

Long story short, I really enjoyed this book. It's a very, very accessible piece of non-fiction, but without talking down to the audience. I'll definitely be seeking out Jon Ronson's other work- The Men Who Stare At Goats in particular.