Hormones: a themed update
Feb. 11th, 2016 08:29 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
bironic
It is a TMI sort of hormones week, which has manifested in slightly greater irritation/assertiveness and I suspect is at least partly to blame for the crush I've developed on the Jinni in The Golem and the Jinni. Also I blushed twice at work. :/
The assertiveness thing has been beneficial in that it got me a swift orthopedics appointment and two months of comped membership at the gym. My impatience was raised enough and my filters lowered enough that during an exasperating panel tonight I sent a text (containing a message that I wouldn't dare put in a work email) to my coworker who is at home recovering from a concussion and she said it cracked her up.
However, it may have made me do something stupid at work re: voicing displeasure to an HR staffer about an issue that displeased a lot of people but that no one seemed to want to confront the issue-creators (HR) about. We'll see how this shakes out. Ugh, politics. Why can't discussing things directly always be the way to go?
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MEANWHILE, I am about halfway through The Golem and the Jinni and remain in love with it. The prose is a pleasure to read, not in the distracting way that makes you stop to admire how sentences are crafted -- or stop to tell the style to get out of the way -- but in the way where they just flow and describe a vibrant world of place and people and create an atmosphere that you want to wrap around yourself forever. The cover is beautiful with its deep blue and gold. The pages themselves even have a pleasing texture, and the font has this perfect serif that gives the words a Hebraic/Arabic flavor to suit its protagonists and their communities. (The paperback edition does have an issue with format, though, where the outer margins are nice and wide but the inner ones get swallowed by the binding.)
So: The Golem is a wonderful character. It's nice to read again about Eastern European Jewish immigrants in New York City at the turn of the 20th century. The Jinni has well constructed flaws, yet Helene Wecker is so good at writing seduction that I feel as won over as the girls he attracts while I read those scenes. (When I'm done, I've got to see if there are any AO3 stories.) This morning on the bus I enjoyed an argument the Golem and the Jinni had about the pleasures of submission/subservience, followed by the Jinni blowing a Bedouin girl's mind 1,000 years ago re: pansexuality and nonmonogamy.
Magical realism is generally a tough sell for me, but there's none of the Modern Literary Fiction obnoxiousness in the writing here that has put me off other examples. I think there's also something special about this period of city history as depicted in other works I've loved, such as Pete Hamill's book Forever and Gangs of New York and even the beginning of Winter's Tale (book version) before it got unbearable.
tl;dr I think the Jinni is sexy, and everyone who praised this book was right.
.
Figuring out what to read next is not going to be easy. Any advice? I've got a short stack of nonfiction ready to go -- A.O. Scott's new book on criticism; Pawpaw; a medical memoir I've been meaning to read sincelaurashapiro recced it last year; Best American Magazine Writing 2015 -- but another SF/F novel or two would be great for the travel that's coming up next week and the week after. Goblin Emperor? Women authors and/or characters a definite plus.
(I did put in a library request for Captive Prince, given the raptures undergone by seemingly everyone as the trilogy has progressed, but am not sure when that'll be ready.)
The assertiveness thing has been beneficial in that it got me a swift orthopedics appointment and two months of comped membership at the gym. My impatience was raised enough and my filters lowered enough that during an exasperating panel tonight I sent a text (containing a message that I wouldn't dare put in a work email) to my coworker who is at home recovering from a concussion and she said it cracked her up.
However, it may have made me do something stupid at work re: voicing displeasure to an HR staffer about an issue that displeased a lot of people but that no one seemed to want to confront the issue-creators (HR) about. We'll see how this shakes out. Ugh, politics. Why can't discussing things directly always be the way to go?
.
MEANWHILE, I am about halfway through The Golem and the Jinni and remain in love with it. The prose is a pleasure to read, not in the distracting way that makes you stop to admire how sentences are crafted -- or stop to tell the style to get out of the way -- but in the way where they just flow and describe a vibrant world of place and people and create an atmosphere that you want to wrap around yourself forever. The cover is beautiful with its deep blue and gold. The pages themselves even have a pleasing texture, and the font has this perfect serif that gives the words a Hebraic/Arabic flavor to suit its protagonists and their communities. (The paperback edition does have an issue with format, though, where the outer margins are nice and wide but the inner ones get swallowed by the binding.)
So: The Golem is a wonderful character. It's nice to read again about Eastern European Jewish immigrants in New York City at the turn of the 20th century. The Jinni has well constructed flaws, yet Helene Wecker is so good at writing seduction that I feel as won over as the girls he attracts while I read those scenes. (When I'm done, I've got to see if there are any AO3 stories.) This morning on the bus I enjoyed an argument the Golem and the Jinni had about the pleasures of submission/subservience, followed by the Jinni blowing a Bedouin girl's mind 1,000 years ago re: pansexuality and nonmonogamy.
Magical realism is generally a tough sell for me, but there's none of the Modern Literary Fiction obnoxiousness in the writing here that has put me off other examples. I think there's also something special about this period of city history as depicted in other works I've loved, such as Pete Hamill's book Forever and Gangs of New York and even the beginning of Winter's Tale (book version) before it got unbearable.
tl;dr I think the Jinni is sexy, and everyone who praised this book was right.
.
Figuring out what to read next is not going to be easy. Any advice? I've got a short stack of nonfiction ready to go -- A.O. Scott's new book on criticism; Pawpaw; a medical memoir I've been meaning to read since
laurashapiro recced it last year; Best American Magazine Writing 2015 -- but another SF/F novel or two would be great for the travel that's coming up next week and the week after. Goblin Emperor? Women authors and/or characters a definite plus. (I did put in a library request for Captive Prince, given the raptures undergone by seemingly everyone as the trilogy has progressed, but am not sure when that'll be ready.)
no subject
Date: Feb. 12th, 2016 07:20 am (UTC)Witches on the Road Tonight, by Sheri Holman. I remember I really enjoyed this -- kid grows up in Depression-era South, ends up hosting a cheapo TV show that broadcasts horror movies, comes to realize his mother was probably a real, live witch.
And (you may already have read this one) Life After Life, by Kate Atkinson. The lead (female) character is born and Atkinson follows her through many different possible lives.
So! Two recs. :D
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Date: Feb. 12th, 2016 09:31 am (UTC)no subject
Date: Feb. 12th, 2016 01:17 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: Feb. 12th, 2016 02:03 pm (UTC)(I did pick up the paperback version of Get in Trouble the other day, btw. ♥)
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Date: Feb. 12th, 2016 02:03 pm (UTC)If you ever need my email again, it's in my DW/LJ profile. ♥
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Date: Feb. 12th, 2016 02:08 pm (UTC)I haven't read (or actually heard of) the Craft Sequence. Just took a peek at Goodreads and it looks like it could be interesting. Thanks for the tip!
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Date: Feb. 12th, 2016 02:44 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: Feb. 12th, 2016 06:48 pm (UTC)Either way, happy to hear that you enjoyed it too! I wondered if you had read it and what you might have thought about some of the descriptions of the Jewish neighborhood and its inhabitants as Chava and the various other characters experience them.
no subject
Date: Feb. 12th, 2016 06:49 pm (UTC)If it wouldn't be work to reply, are there other books off the top of your head that were enjoyable in similar ways to this one? Or, hm, maybe I should try something entirely different for the next novel, since it'll be hard to follow this one.
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Date: Feb. 13th, 2016 01:01 am (UTC)I've also recently enjoyed Marissa Meyer's Lunar Chronicles books.
Have you read the Lynes/Mathey books by Melissa Scott and Amy Griswold?
*
One of the things I remember particularly liking about The Golem and the Jinni is the glimpses it gave me of turn-of-the-century NY. I felt as though it showed me some things I hadn't seen before, which takes some doing when it comes to Jewish immigrant stories. :-)
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Date: Feb. 13th, 2016 02:03 am (UTC)I haven't read any of those others, no. Some of the authors sound vaguely familiar as maybe pen names of fan peeps? I never seem to be in on the secrets. Anyway, will look into them. Seems like I have got a good list to start with now.
no subject
Date: Feb. 13th, 2016 02:04 am (UTC)no subject
Date: Feb. 13th, 2016 02:45 pm (UTC)I'm going to have to try The Golem and the Jinni now; thank you for mentioning it.