Happy Tuesday.

It's weird but we're all still here.

Hi, all. The world has continued to spin on its axis despite the best efforts of the goons in charge, and that is something to celebrate.

What I Finished Reading Last Week:

Well, it really wasn’t my cup of tea. It was a book called The Way Up Is Death, and I do not want to talk shit about a guy who’s done the (impossible) work of writing, editing, and publishing a novel. I’m sure the author is lovely, and as Conan O’Brien always says, when you see a movie that turned out shitty, remember that a bunch of really smart, talented people worked on it and tried to make it great; it’s just really hard to make something excellent. But…

The conceit is fun — a mysterious tower appears in the sky over England, the government tries to shoot it down, nothing happens, people get used to it. Then, one day, 13 random people within a few miles of the tower get sucked up into it and basically have to complete a series of escape rooms without dying. (I do not like escape rooms. Puzzles are enjoyable because there are rules and expectations of how to solve them. If you do not know THE RULES, it is not enjoyable and it actually feels like a terrible job that you are bad at doing but can’t quit.) Could this book have been enjoyable? Absolutely. Was I the target audience? Clearly not. Read if you like escape rooms (ugh), allegories, aliens, and action.

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What You Should Read: Give Me More Tana French Edition

First of all, I am going to make a bold statement: Tana French is one of my favorite alive writers (the other is my boy Kazuo Ishiguro).

Yes, she writes “crime” fiction, historically regarded as inferior to “serious” books about things like the Spanish Civil War and men’s thoughts. And yes, a lot of crime fiction is like junk food — delicious but not nutritious. ¹

Tana French does not write junk food, though; she writes fucking feasts, perfect and lush feasts. The books are all about murders, but the murders are just a convenient inroad into the lives of the characters, who are complicated, relatable, interesting, vivid, and human. The prose? 10/10. The plots? 47/10. I’ve read every French book there is, and the only one I didn’t like (The Likeness) is still so much better than what any of her peers are doing. I am OBSESSED. (My favorites: In the Woods, The Searcher, and The Hunter.)

Alas, Tana French is but one mortal woman, and I cannot expect her to publish rapidly enough to meet my insatiable hunger for more. Ergo, allow me to recommend some books that scratch the Tana itch — they’re nominally about crime and have great plot, so they’re fun enough to read on vacation, but they’re really just stellar works of literature wrapped up in bloody packages.

First up, Rachel Kushner’s brilliant The Mars Room.

From the publisher: “It’s 2003 and Romy Hall, named after a German actress, is at the start of two consecutive life sentences at Stanville Women’s Correctional Facility, deep in California’s Central Valley. Outside is the world from which she has been severed: her young son, Jackson, and the San Francisco of her youth. Inside is a new reality: thousands of women hustling for the bare essentials needed to survive; the bluffing and pageantry and casual acts of violence by guards and prisoners alike; and the deadpan absurdities of institutional living, portrayed with great humor and precision.”

The Mars Room is not a light read — I think any book about an imprisoned mother desperate to reunite with her son is probably on the gnarlier side. But it’s so worth the heartache. The prose is stunning and atmospheric, I desperately wanted to know what was going to happen next, and I felt Romy’s anguish and rage. Also, lots of fun stuff about California! (NB: Kushner’s latest book got a lot of good press, which I…do not understand. If anyone has read Creation Lake and wants to chat, hit me up.)

Next: The Boy in the Field by Margot Livesey.

From the NYT:

“In the broadest sense, Margot Livesey’s exquisite novel is a whodunit. Who attacked this boy in the middle of the day and left him for dead in a field? What would have happened if three unsuspecting siblings walking home from school hadn’t caught a glimpse of his red sock from the road? Why this boy? Was there something suspicious about the blue car with the dented bumper that didn’t stop to help? But the real mysteries lie elsewhere, specifically and most compellingly with the characters who are witnesses to the crime. When Hugo Price, the lead detective assigned to the attack (with a wedding ring and a close shave, he defies all stereotypes of the hard-boiled sleuth), meets with one of the siblings who discovered the boy, he summarizes the book’s thrust: ‘You’re wrestling with the problem of evil,’ Price tells the teenage Matthew. ‘I’m twice your age, and I’m still wrestling with it. Nothing prepares one for the discovery that there are people who have no conscience.’”

Inexplicable violence, siblings wrestling with adulthood and identity, a bucolic English setting? Yes, please. The language in this book is lovely and subtle, as are the characterizations. A total stunner.

And finally, I submit to you Snap, by Belinda Bauer, the crime-iest book of the three.

From Bauer’s website: “Jack’s in charge, said his mother as she disappeared up the road to get help. I won’t be long. Now eleven-year-old Jack and his two sisters wait on the hard shoulder in their stifling, broken-down car, bickering and whining and playing I-Spy until she comes back. But their mother doesn’t come back. She never comes back. And after that long, hot summer’s day, nothing will ever be the same again.Three years later, Jack’s fifteen now and still in charge . . . alone in the house. Meanwhile across town, a young woman called Catherine While wakes to find a knife beside her bed, and a note reading I could of killed you. The police are tracking a mysterious burglar they call Goldilocks, for his habit of sleeping in the beds of the houses he robs, but Catherine doesn’t see the point of involving the police. And Jack, very suddenly, may be on the verge of finding out who killed his mother.”

Amazingly, this book was longlisted for the Booker Prize in 2018, which is shocking because it’s not boring or fussy at all. I could not read this book fast enough — it was tense and gripping. She’s got a new one coming out in April called The Impossible Thing, and I’m already on the Libby waitlist.

Honorable mentions to other books that I think French fans will enjoy: Jane Harper’s The Dry, Donna Tartt’s The Little Friend (am I the only person who wasn’t disappointed with this book? I still think about it all the time), and The Snowman’s Children by Glen Hirshberg (my sister’s high school English teacher!).

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Candy News:

My dear husband brought me home the Reese’s Take 5 this weekend, and I was truly pleased.

Now, I feel pretty strongly about the classic peanut butter cup. First of all, don’t fuck around with the Trader Joe’s version, especially not if it’s dark chocolate. Second, the peanut butter cup is probably one of the greatest candies ever invented. Third, and this is the real surprise, I prefer the original to the Halloween mini version. As a rule, I pick miniature things (horses, food products, humans) over full-sized things.

However, I VASTLY prefer the ratio of chocolate to peanut butter in the classic cup as compared to the fun size. I’ll still fuck with the fun size, obviously, but nothing compares to the original. Furthermore, while I enjoy Reese’s Pieces, I can only eat half a handful before they get cloying, and I feel betrayed by a candy that doesn’t allow me to eat it all in one go.

The Reese’s Take 5 is a wide, flattish candy bar stuffed with chocolate, peanuts, peanut butter, caramel, and pretzels. YES, PRETZELS!!!!!!!!!! More things should have pretzels in them.

Is the Take 5 going to dethrone my beloved cups? Never in a million years. But I love the salty crunch, and I like that it comes in packs of three so I can have exactly 1.5, which is the perfect amount, and then I can share the rest with my husband because I am a deeply magnanimous woman.

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Pop Culture Moment I’m Thinking About:

This is one of those things that has been knocking around in my head for TWENTY-FIVE years. Literally. At the peak of her fame, Jewel, the folk singer, released a collection of poetry. I LOVED Jewel’s first album and listened to it nonstop when it came out. However, there is a difference between being a good songwriter and being a good poet (ugh, remember when fucking Bob Dylan won a NOBEL PRIZE for literature? I’m sorry, Bob, I just don’t get it). Poetry may seem easy to write, but it is really not. It’s actually very hard. Regardless, good for Jewel that she tried something, and good for her for making poetry appealing to her fans. I really mean that.

Her book was called A Night Without Armor, and I am here to report that puns aren’t my favorite in poetry collections. Anyway, she did an interview with Kurt Loder in which he completely dunked on her because she used the word “casualty” incorrectly. She thought it meant the act of being casual, which…it doesn’t. Anyway, I think it is the responsibility of the writer and her editor and whoever else is involved to make sure the words written down are correct. That is literally the whole point of a poem — to communicate with words.

Anyway. Was it sexist and condescending of Kurt, an older man in a position of authority, to point out an error in her book in an interview? Yes, probably. Was it funny? Definitely. Also, I like to think that if Enrique Iglesias or Michael Bolton released a poetry collection, Kurt Loder would also point out whatever dumb shit they said, too.

Bottom line: everyone should write poetry if they feel called to, but not everyone should share it with the world. I rap a lot in my car, but I am not out here trying to get a record deal (although, if you are a record producer and want to get me in the studio, I am 100% available).

If you want to read an actually good poem, here’s one of my all-time favorites, by my queen Adrienne Rich.

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What I’m Excited About:

Freakslaw by Jane Flett.

From the publisher:

“It’s the summer of ’97 and the Scottish town of Pitlaw is itching for change. Enter the Freakslaw – a travelling funfair populated by deviant queers, a contortionist witch, the most powerful fortune teller, and other architects of mayhem. It doesn’t take long for the Freakslaw folk to infiltrate Pitlaw’s grey world, where the town’s teenagers – none more so than Ruth and Derek – are seduced by neon charms and the possibility of escape. But beneath it all, these newcomers are harbouring a darker desire: revenge.
And as tensions reach fever pitch between the stoic locals and the dazzling intruders, a violence that’s been simmering for centuries is about to be unleashed…”

The title alone sold me, obviously, but more importantly, two different blurbs compare this book to Katherine Dunn’s Geek Love, which is in my top 3 novels of all time. (In case you were wondering, in no particular order: Geek Love, Remains of the Day, The Sun Also Rises.) We’ve established that I’m a sucker for Scotland/Ireland/England, I like simmering violence, and I really like creepy circuses! Will report back after reading.

See you next week!

1. Not all food has to be nutritious. Food can also just be fun and comforting. That’s why I write about candy every week.