Salisbury.Fake book review

The Sun Also Rises By Ernest Hemingway

This is my first experience with Hemingway, unless I read one of his short stories in college. I have to say, while I’m not enamored, I felt something about this book. Hemingway is either non-descriptive, or too specifically descriptive. He’s dialogue heavy. His characters are allegedly boring, and yet there’s something of the melancholic hopeful throughout this. It’s very easy, to me, to see Hemingway’s mental state in the pages.

From page 42: It is awfully easy to be hard-boiled about everything in the daytime, but at night it is another thing.

From page 152: Enjoying living was learning to get your money’s worth and knowing when you had it. You could get your money’s worth. The world was a good place to buy in…. Perhaps it wasn’t true, though. Perhaps as you went along, you did learn something. I did not care what it was all about. All I wanted was to know how to live in it.

There are several small moments like that through the whole book. Snippets of a glimpse into someone trying to live the life he thinks he’s supposed to, but not seeing the point of much of it.

I’ve noticed with the classic authors, male in particular, they have a peculiar way of approaching love in their stories. Hemingway’s character Brett (Lady Brett Ashley) is known for her “flighty” ways between men of the story. She has had affairs with just about all of the main circle. He never explicitly says this is a problem, but for the time this book was written, I’m not sure if he was trying to make her out to be as lost as the rest of them, or if he was trying to make a comment on women in general.

Brett is quick to fall in love, and there’s a part of me that wonders if maybe that’s more her way of trying to find a connection that makes her feel “right.” She’s very much a flash in the pan type character, where her whimsy takes flight about as frequently as it lands, and I think she’s a strong character in many ways.

This is the kind of book that I’d write a whole paper over. Not just a review. There are several layers to it, where we can go into why Hemingway was so focused on the bull-fights in the second half of the book, and what he was going for with the descriptions of the fiesta. The motivations of characters like Robert Cohn, who is a very weepy man in love with Brett and despondent he can’t be with her. Or Bill, who hides his pain in his humor. Mike, who drinks to excess because he can’t face his fiancee is unfaithful, but tries to put on a good show for the others about it.

And then there’s Jake. The journalist who’s just trying to find his place in the world, as with all the others. It’s a thought provoking book in many ways, and I think it was a good Hemingway to read. There are several of his technical elements that made me pause, especially where it seems he has descriptions that appear redundant, but maybe that was the way in his time.

Overall, I would say this was a good book to start my Book Bingo Board with, and I give this 7/10 stars.

Until next time, friends.

Salisbury.Fake book review, Weekly Update

Books of the Year 2025 Edition

Hello! Good morning. It’s still morning, I think? Yes. 10:37 a.m. as of this very moment. Hi! Welcome. So, this is my list of books I liked a whole lot this year. One or two of them on this list I’ve already done full posts on so I won’t go too deeply into them, but I’ll still give them the “heyo” on the list they deserve.

And so! In no particular order of importance, I give you my books of the year for 2025.

Solaris by Stanislaw Lem

This book gave me a ton of questions to ponder after I finished reading it. Very heavily themed on how psychology affects science, and whether or not we can find answers without it. Or that’s how I took it. I think I could have taken it a different way than intended, but there’s something one of the characters says that makes me feel like I’m a bit on the right path. Well, a few things said, but one in particular.

“But what’s its name? We have named all the stars and all the planets, even though they might already have had names of their own. What a nerve!”

This small moment really stabbed me right in the brain and it made me think of how we give words to things that may already have words of their own. But do those words exist if they aren’t spoken? See, this is one of those books that sent me on several different thought spirals. I really enjoyed the pondering it gave me. My main question at the end of the book (I actually wrote in pencil at the very end) was, “does compassion exist in science outside the realm of psychology or does it exist to temper curiosity?” I recommend this book if you want to think too much about a planet that doesn’t exist. I gave this book 8/10 stars.

Once There Were Wolves by Charlotte McConaghy

I don’t really have much to say about this one other than I thoroughly enjoyed it. Might be because I read it while camping, so sitting by the fire in one of my blankets and reading in the quiet of an autumn morning. But this book is a fantastic juxtaposition of murder mystery with wolves and their importance to conservation efforts. I really liked that aspect, too. It’s not preachy. It’s a genuine scientific approach to conservation that isn’t just “the trees are the only thing that are keeping us alive!” I liked how the mystery fit into the plot. I didn’t read it as a mystery so much as a book about wolves and there happens to be some murder. It’s also a book about sisters and the loss of a solid familial foundation. I wholeheartedly recommend this one. This book got 8/10 stars.

Atonement by Ian McEwan

This is one I already did a post on, so I won’t blather on too long about it here. This is a beautiful book about being a kid trying to understand what the adults are doing and why they do what they do. I just went on a skim through some sections and reminded myself why I loved the book so much. It’s truly stunning, in my mind. I don’t remember what I gave this, so hang on while I go look at my own self. 9/10 stars

Logos by Nicholas Nikita

Another one I already did a post on, the first book I read this year, actually. And we are at the end of it where I’m still thinking about it. That’s pretty powerful stuff, yo. I don’t own this one, so it isn’t in the photo, but that doesn’t mean it’s less important. It’s an interesting look at the beginning of civilization and how people view and hold power. I gave it 8/10 stars.

Blood of Hercules by Jasmine Mas

Listen. I’m not about to claim this as groundbreaking literature. There are several elements of this that are … disliked, shall we say, by a lot of people. I loved this book. It’s hilarious. You have to have a certain kind of humor for some of the stuff in this book to be funny. I don’t care that there’s modern slang tucked in with a plethora of what we’d assume Greek mythological characters would be like. I legit just enjoyed this book. It’s not for everyone, but it brought me laughter and I will always adore something that makes me laugh. I give this 8/10 stars.

Everything is Tuberculosis by John Green

I’m not overly fond of John Green’s fiction, but his non-fiction? Absolutely my jam. My vibe. My “thanks, give me another.” In this book he discusses the fact that there is still a tuberculosis epidemic when in the USA, we’ve all but eradicated it. It all boils down to what the pharmaceutical companies would describe as “cost-effectiveness.” I recommend this book if you want to have a quick look into the world outside the US at a disease that rampages through other communities. I give this book a 9/10 stars.

The Poisonwood Bible by Barbara Kingsolver

This book sat on my shelf for over a decade. I returned it to a donate pile, and then I happened upon it again in the wild, and decided to buy it once more just in case I felt like I could read it.

Well, I did. And it broke my heart. But not like… broken broke. It showed the struggle of a white family with a pastor patriarch living in the Congo in 1959. This is a fictionalized version of history, but that history was still happening. The Congo fought for its independence, and that fight trickled into the rural areas, and dangers of many kinds came for the Price family. I don’t have many more words past this is such a harrowing look at how religion can hold onto a person in face of perils, and how family can fracture in the wake of those perils. It has tragedy. It has love. It has tension. I gave this 9/10 stars.

Slonim Woods 9 by Daniel Barban Levin

What a powerful piece of writing, my goodness. This memoir follows the journey of one of the members of the students at Sarah Lawrence who formed a miniature cult under the charisma of Larry Ray. There is a lot of heft in this. Details of mental, physical, and sexual abuse that is often rampant within cults. Not all cults, but most of them. Daniel is a poet, and that shows very beautifully throughout this book. It’s not one I would say read if you’re in a weird mind space because it is so heavy. I’d heard about this whole thing before, but it was when I watched a video essay about the events that led to Larry’s arrest that I found Daniel’s book. I waited a bit to read it, because I knew it was going to be a lot, but I felt like I owed Daniel somehow. I learned about Larry, but I wanted to give more of my attention to his victims. I don’t know if the others in the house/apartment have written anything (something a quick search would reveal, obviously), but it’s a fascinating situation. How one man had so much control over a group of students. I gave this book 8/10 stars

Quicksilver by Callie Hart

Yes, another romantasy book, hush. No, it’s not groundbreaking. But I liked the fact the FMC is an alchemist, and I liked how she had to use her intelligence to solve problems instead of just be an angry Chosen one the whole time. There are things I don’t like about romantasy tropes, and this book does have a few of those, but it’s one I found interesting enough in spite of the tropes to want to read the sequel. I just need it in paperback. I gave this book 7.5/10 stars.

The Witchstone by Henry H. Neff

From my goodreads review: “absolute banger of a book. It’s not a new story, but it’s certainly a fun take on the hero’s journey. Truly enjoyed this read.”

So eloquent. But in all seriousness, this book is truly a fun jaunt into a different kind of take on the hero’s journey. It follows a demon who’s been rather lax in his maintaining of a family’s curse, and chaos ensues when he goes to the surface to get things moving properly along. He forms an unlikely alliance with the eldest child of the family as she attempts to “break” the curse, not knowing the demon wasn’t telling the truth when he said there was a possibility of breaking it. There’s banter, there’s weighty moments, there’s family. Gumption and spirit, pluck and defeat all feature in this book and I recommend it. There are some elements that were not popular with some readers, but that gets into spoiler territory and I don’t want to ruin the mood. I gave this book 8.5/10 stars.

And that’s all I have for today, friends. My plan for next year reading-wise is to do a Book Bingo board, and I’ll be doing a post/photo for each book I finish. So, look forward to that, I guess!

Thank you for reading my posts this year. I think I did better about posting, and I plan to continue that next year. If this year was rough for you, I hope you’re able to see through the rough to find the helpful. You made it through, and you get to keep striving forward. Thank you for being here. Thank you for trying even when you don’t want to. I promise it’s worth it. Might not feel like it ever, but I refuse to believe we’re meant to suffer our whole consciousness.

Until next time, friends. ❤

    Salisbury.Fake Weekly Update, writing

    How Do People Do This?

    I received the author copies of Daisy I ordered, and I opened the box a little too enthusiastically. Holding copies of my books in my hands is such a strange feeling. Strange because I think it might be pride, and I’ve never really allowed myself to feel that before. I did just find a typo in it, but ya know what? I don’t give a fuck. This book I put together entirely by myself, and I’m not perfect.

    When I was first working on Fulcrum, I didn’t have a printer that functioned, so I asked my mother if I could use hers. She agreed, and I printed out around 70 pages of the first “real” draft of Fulcrum I felt was actually going somewhere. I was holding it in my hands, staring down at the words, and I kind of said to myself, “I wrote this.” Then, I smiled and I looked up at her and I said a little louder, “I wrote this!”

    “And I printed it!”

    Instant deflation. I couldn’t have one thing for myself. One of the few times I allowed myself to feel pride, and she ripped it away from me.

    Not anymore, though. I’m trying to give myself the gift of being proud of myself for the things I accomplish, and typos or not, I am proud of Daisy. I know I wrote about how it was a struggle to get this one done, and I’m not trying to say it wasn’t, that the end product is overwriting (hah, get it?) the struggle to get here. But I think I figured out why it was such a challenge for me to finish this one.

    Ellie’s story is deeply personal to me. Author inserts and all, setting that aside, I understood her character in a way I don’t understand the others I love dearly. I’ll never be a chosen one, bound by destiny to save the world like Frankie, but I have been an abused child. I still have this lingering feeling of “don’t tell people, they don’t need to know. Don’t tell them so they know what she’s really like. Let them love her as she wants to be seen.”

    I still love my mom. I love her painfully. It’s painful because I see mothers behaving and being the way I wish mine had. I accept her as she is, I accept that we will never have what I need from her. But no one can ever say I don’t love her.

    Maybe it’s because this is exactly a year after the last big holiday I saw her that I’m feeling really sentimental, and seeing a finished book about a character I actually was is unleashing grief I refuse to feel. Or maybe it’s the insomnia that’s got me by the balls, leaving me overly sensitive to big feelings because of sleep deprivation. I don’t know.

    But what I do know is how very proud of myself I am for telling Ellie’s story, and giving her a place to exist in the world. I don’t ever promote my shit, much to the befuddlement of others, but I’m of the mind that my words will find those they’re meant to. Ellie is probably the truest character to my heart, and I feel kind of like a parent watching her kid go to school on the first day of kindergarten. Out into the world to become herself. Be what she wants to be.

    I’m rambling. I’m tired. It’s a holiday, and I am grateful for you. Thank you for reading my wombles. Thank you for being part of the world at the same time as me, because you make it just as neato as I do.

    Until next time, friends.

    Salisbury.Fake Weekly Update, writing

    Writing Journal #15

    Another short update this week.

    I’ve released Daisy into the wild. It’s listed on my publications page if you wanna see the final cover and stuff. I’m very much a minimalist when it comes to cover design, and this one is definitely minimal. There’s no summary on the back, and the front is just a flower and the words “a novel” centered on it. The title and my name are on the spine, so it’s not like… a complete mystery. But yeah. Daisy is done.

    My November Writing Thing is currently at …. some number of words. I’m 293 away from my goal for this week. I’m contemplating letting myself miss goal since I was working on getting Daisy finished up. I can make it up easily, too. I’m a little less than halfway through to my final word count goal, and I don’t know where I’m trying to go with it entirely. But that’s the beauty of storytelling. It gets figured out along the way.

    I’ve decided after I finish writing this piece (currently titled Simon Says), I’m going to gently encourage myself to take a break from writing. I don’t know how well that will go because I must always be giving the world words, but as I’ve finished up my Daisy work, I’ve come to realize I devote a lot of physical energy to a book and I don’t really ever tell myself to slow down.

    I have a folder of short story ideas that I’m looking forward to getting into for next year, and then of course there’s the third book of the Maker series, Lazarus Rising. That’s going to be a fun time. I mean that. I kind of went through the first draft a bit, about halfway through for some random edits, and I genuinely enjoy being in that story. It’s a home I created for myself, I think. If I could live in Lazarus, my goodness. It’s one of those situations I wish I could link up my brain to a visualizer and show you what it looks like in each of the cities so you could see it the way I do.

    But therein lies the other joy of storytelling. I get to show you with my words.

    I had something else to talk about, but I’m currently working on typing something up for a friend, and my wrists are a little sore–OH! Instead of writing the rest of the year, I’m going to be reading. I have two books I want to finish before the end of the year, and then whatever else I happen to come across on my shelves will be a delight. I don’t remember what my current total read is for the moment, but I’ll do a “books of the year” post either at the end of December or the beginning of January.

    So, this isn’t a short update, but I got a little sentimental, I suppose. I was thinking about how I made a promise to myself to utilize this website more and I think I’ve done so. It’s been nice to put my thoughts somewhere I know someone might see them. I appreciate the readers I have, and I appreciate the consistency in which y’all see the innards of me noggin.

    And with that, I sign off for now. It’s not the end of the posts for this year, but it might be the end of the posts for November. We’ll find out! I hope you’re well. I hope your words taste good, and I hope you remember it’s never too late to tell a story.

    Until next time, friends.

    Salisbury.Fake Weekly Update, writing

    Writing Journal #12

    Mornin’, folks.

    I’ve been, as I told a friend, almost neurotic in trying to get this book done. I finished marking up the manuscript a… day ago, and I’m already on chapter eleven (this morning) with going through to fix things. If all writing were this fast, I would get more done, I think. I did spend about an hour and a half last night before bed reading through Lazarus Rising.

    That one I’m pumped to get back into. I forgot how dastardly Mr. Fogg is, and as I was reading through his sections, I kind of forgot I wrote him and just “man, this guy.” So that was fun.

    I’m possibly going to have my summer project, aka Daisy, ready by the end of the month, and I wasn’t going to do a big release of it, but I think I might just announce the completion and be all “hey, here it is.” I’m only going to do a print version of it, I think.

    I wrote out a list of the front matter I need for this one (the bits in front of the book, for those who don’t know the lingo I didn’t know until I finished Fulcrum), and I definitely think I’ll put a content warning in. It’s not smut on the romantasy level, but there are some descriptive moments. It’s one of those things where I kind of … It’s necessary for character development in this case, like, very necessary, which is the only reason it’s been put in. And the descriptions are there for the characters and how they’re feeling/experiencing things. I hope I did it well. I am going to take one scene out because it is gratuitous, and I think that’s very editorial of me, haha.

    I’ve had Daisy in my head since high school, and I never really thought I’d finish it because it just kind of sat for a few decades. It’s got many, many iterations. I’m pretty sure this final content version is in the teens in terms of drafts for it. But that’s the beauty of being a writer. You grow and life experiences color and graft onto your writing style. What I knew in high school is useful, but I’m able to parse through the stuff in my brain far better. Well, maybe. That’s a different story for a different page.

    At the end of the day, I’m proud of this book and the story within it, even if I felt like it was an undertaking now in my thirties versus my late teens, early twenties. Maybe my thoughts about love are a bit different, too. Actually, no maybe about that one. I joked around with some friends that I hate love, and then said I don’t, and one of them said back “don’t lie to my face.” I don’t hate it, I just don’t think it fits me right now. I love it for other people, though. Which I think is why this project has kind of been a lot for me to work on.

    Good news for me, though, because once I finish this, I’ll never write a designated romance novel again in my life, haha. I will leave that to the professionals, and if there’s romance in my other stories, it won’t be the focus. It’ll be a side quest.

    That’s all the shoes on this rack, kids. I hope you have a lovely weekend and I hope the fall air is crisp in ya lungs as you go about your day.

    Until next time, friends.

    Salisbury.Fake Weekly Update, writing

    Writing Journal #10

    A list:

    • On chapter 18? 19… of my Summer Project (It’s called Daisy, but I keep referring to it as my Summer Project to … appear more mysterious? I don’t know)
    • Gathered a list of short stories that I think I could possibly put together in a collection
    • Went through a few chapters of Lazarus Rising’s first draft (Fogg is so fun to read and write)

    I spent yesterday reading 2.5 books, and both were disappointing. I don’t know why I keep expecting romantasy to be good. It’s all miscommunication tropes that make me want to slam my face in a blender. And if it’s not that, it’s the main couple arguing about their relationship. It’s so frustrating that the plot is non-existent in a lot of these. But if the people want the fuckin’, I guess they’ll get the fuckin’.

    I’m going to spend some time typing up a bit of the first scribbles I made of The Dust Chronicles. A story I keep drifting to in my heart. It might be a duology. It also might just be a single novel. But a fuckin’ big one. That’s the next project after the Maker Series.

    That’s all the snow on this mountain. I hope you are doing well. I hope the summer has been kind to you, even if it’s been hot as balls.

    Salisbury.Fake book review

    Blood Meridian by Cormac McCarthy

    “If God meant to interfere in the degeneracy of mankind would he not have done so by now? Wolves cull themselves, man. What other creature could? And is the race of man not more predacious yet?”

    I was 102 pages in when the violence finally made me pause. It was a long pause. I don’t usually annotate books I read, but this one I started underlining and writing in margins (in pencil, as I’m not an entire heathen). My note on page 102-103 is, “this is the first instance where the violence struck me. Up until now, it’s almost been a desensitization, but the nonchalance of Glanton and the visceral description of the woman’s death is such a stark interjection within the sleepy atmosphere.”

    Glanton, the person I’d consider the main antagonist of this book (although others would call the Judge the antagonist, but we’ll get to him), kills this old woman by pointing one direction, and once her head’s turned, he shoots her point blank. Before this moment there are dozens of descriptions of violence, but it is the taciturn way in which Glanton takes this life that caught me so abruptly I had to step out of the story for a few days.

    I read this whole thing slowly.

    I needed to take my time with it because of a few things, but the biggest reason is how comfortable with the violence I got while reading. It’s a morbid lullaby, the way it weaves in and out of the ride through the untamed West. It seeps into your bones as you read, reminding you that you are part of it.

    It brought me back to how I felt about Tender is the Flesh last year, where I felt like I’d been the one to do the killing.

    Page 142: “The leaves shifted in a million spangles down the pale corridors and Glanton took one and turned it like a tiny fan by its stem and held it and let it fall and its perfection was not lost on him.”

    My note: “Glanton noting the perfection of a leaf is such a stark contrast to him killing the old woman a few chapters ago.”

    That is where I decided Glanton was the villain of this book. A man without true empathy wouldn’t be able to recognize the absurdity of pondering the machinations of a leaf while having spilling innocent blood.

    Page 184: “They passed through small villages doffing their hats to folk whom they would murder before the month was out.”

    My note: “How many people were killed during this time? How many forgotten because no one was left to remember them?”

    McCarthy is an acquired taste. He’s known for his rambling passages and infatuation with leaving punctuation out of his life. He has wisdom in his words, but sometimes it’s so buried within the mire of his writing style that one has to attempt multiple readings.

    This is not a book to read twice. It left me feeling heavy and empty at the end of it. All the violence, for what? To prove he could get away with it under the guise of literature? It’s very much a book that people say they love because it makes them sound and feel edgy. Like they’ve seen some things, man.

    Not everything needs to be a contest of sufferings.

    There’s such an absence of emotion from most of the characters as they go around killing for their government. Getting rid of the people there before them. It leaves a sour taste all through my digestive system as I try to empathize with any of the riders in Glanton’s crew. The one I could not find any sort of understanding for was the Judge.

    He and Glanton are made for each other in their insensate glorification of the blood they spatter. The Judge is the metaphor for the Devil, I assume, although I would say he’s the one who acts on behalf of the Devil, who as I said before is Glanton. But the darkness inside the Judge is a level that had me react physically to several of the lines he said.

    Page 207: “Whatever exists, he said. Whatever in creation exists without my knowledge exists without my consent.”

    And shortly after on page 208: “The freedom of birds is an insult to me. I’d have them all in zoos.”

    In all the books I’ve read in my life, there are two villains I’ve come across: the broken and the batshit. The broken ones, I’d toss Glanton in that category. He’s got a smidgeon of humanity in him because even though he doesn’t care what happens to the men on his crew, they are his crew and he treats them with a modicum of respect.

    The judge is the one I’d put in the batshit category. He says some of the most unhinged garbage I’ve ever read, and he says it with such an authority behind it. Like he knows that someday someone will find what he’s spoken and will choose to live by it. He believes himself invincible. One has to be crazy to truly believe that, right?

    There is a plot to this book, somewhere. What it is, I don’t know that I could say it’s linear. It’s more of a character study, where the Kid is placed in unbearable circumstances right from the beginning. It’s a test of who we really are at the end of whatever day. Do we stand by and allow ourselves to be swept into the current of hell racing toward us? Or do we fight that flushing of refuse and black bile back? Do we dig our feet into the earth and demand that darkness do its worst?

    We do not have to be heroes, but we have to be able to look at ourselves at the end of this romp through the meadows of life and say we were our truest selves. That no one ever made us compromise on who we are for safety. For the luxury of silence.

    7.5/10

    *******I read the 1992 First Vintage International edition*******

    Salisbury.Fake Weekly Update, writing

    Writing Journal #5

    I don’t necessarily have writer’s block, I have lack of interest in writing at the moment. I’m still trying to write, though, and so some of the stuff that comes out is useable and other bits are more scrappable.

    I am not discouraged by this, though! Sometimes taking breaks is necessary. Give a brain a bit of a rest. I’m doing some reading, though. Currently I’m reading Blood Meridian by Cormac McCarthy, and The Temptation to Exist by E.M. Cioran. I may review one or both of those! May also just read them, haha.

    I considered doing a game review of a game I recently watched a playthrough of, but I sometimes feel like a poser when I try to talk about video games. I’m not skilled in the slightest at playing them, so I usually watch games (without commentary). Big, big space horror fan.

    Back to writing: I’ve done a few things with the language I made up for the Maker series, like named a metal and started … doodling? I guess would be the word for it, but seeing how sentence structure would work. Different cities would have different structure sometimes, I think, as a way to differentiate their cultures/accents/etc.

    I think that’s about all I have in terms of an update for now. Until next time, friends.

    Salisbury.Fake book review

    Atonement by Ian McEwan

    “It wasn’t only wickedness and scheming that made people unhappy, it was confusion and misunderstanding; above all, it was the failure to grasp the simple truth that other people are as real as you.”

    I had this book sitting on my “I’ve read this” shelf and recently went looking for something else when I spotted it. It sat on my “I haven’t read this” shelf for a while because I knew the story already. I’m a big, big fan of the film adaptation of this book, and from the synopsis, it followed the story pretty accurately.

    I was not prepared for how deeply beautiful this book is. In the beginning, it’s told from the perspective of a thirteen-year-old girl who misunderstands something she sees out a window. A few more things happen within the space of an afternoon and evening, and as a result of her incorrect assumptions, lives are shifted into irreversible directions.

    The film follows the book nearly scene for scene, which I felt incredibly kind of Hollywood. The story is rather important in all its moving parts, as most are, but with something so delicately perched on the bevel of catastrophe, anything left out would render the whole thing meaningless.

    In reading some of the reviews, there were several people bothered by the fact the main character, Briony, doesn’t seem to “grow up” over the course of the book. This mainly stems from how she interrupts the rape of her cousin, and because of her false accusations sends an innocent family friend to prison.

    The book stays mainly in Briony’s perspective, so we see her grow into a young adult at the precipice of a country at war. She doesn’t take her place at Cambridge, and goes into nursing–like the sister who fled the family on the arrest of the family friend. Briony comments on knowing she was wrong in her youth, and several of the reviewers were upset the rape isn’t discussed past a certain point.

    My response to that is why would Briony talk about something that didn’t happen to her? I don’t mean that to sound callous, but as someone who’s experienced sexual violence, I don’t really find it pleasant to discuss. I don’t think the few people who know the situation sit around and talk about it amongst themselves either, so placing a responsibility on the main character to go into such an experience feels a little beside the point. She does eventually attend her cousin’s wedding, and it’s revealed her cousin marries the man who raped her (very much not the family friend). That and a few things Briony says at the end of the book are the only time it’s really mentioned again.

    I don’t find it her responsibility to process such an event. McEwan could have written Lola’s perspective into the book, but she wasn’t a main character, and so having her show up to think/talk about her experience would have disjointed the story entirely.

    The other thing people commented on was how the whole situation wasn’t important enough for a book. To that, I say, they missed the point. No one wants to read about a wealthy family crumbling because of misplaced accusations and a war. Not truly. But the depth of perspective we get from Briony shows us how penance cannot be achieved perfectly. By the end of the book, she is an old woman and discussing her regrets, so to speak, and what I love so much about it is the vast scope of her understanding, and the pain she has at not having her sister in her life.

    I know my opinions are not the right ones. But they are mine, and I see Briony as faulted, someone who caused tragedy and bore the weight of that tragedy the rest of her life. Some would say rightfully so, but I feel like those people forget what it was to be thirteen and not understand the world the way we see it as an adult. We know right from wrong, but if we don’t know the reason or the why for something, it’s hard to articulate the responsibility.

    9/10 stars

    *******I read the First Anchor Books 2003 paperback edition*******

    Salisbury.Fake book review

    Logos by Nicholas Nikita

    Image taken from Amazon.com e-Book

    First read of the year and it’s a dang doozy. I found this while browsing the genres in Kindle Unlimited and the premise intrigued me enough to pop it in my library. It was a quick read in that I was able to read it in a few hours. The time it took me to read it should not detract from the quality of the story being told.

    Logos follows an unnamed boy for the majority of the book as he survives a primal land. He loses his parents to the night-beasts, and saves his newborn brother. The first part of the book covers the brothers purely surviving the harsh landscape as they travel to the mountains, where the eldest believes their parents are waiting with the sun god, Aeos. It shows the desperation of people simply trying to live, where water and food are dangerously scarce. The boys are attacked by men and beasts over the course of their journey, and when they finally reach the mountains, the boys are old enough to be considered young adults (or that’s how I read them to be). Lightning strikes a tree and starts a fire. This fascinates the boys and they cultivate the fire, feeding it so it stays alive. The youngest convinces his brother to keep it large enough to be a signal to others in the vicinity, hoping their curiosity about the light and smoke will bring people to them.

    The rise of this community is such a fascinating look at how socialization works. The boys are considered gods because they can hold the fire (on a stick, without burning their hands), and they can carry the fire. This sets up a dichotomy between them where the eldest becomes the more determined to build solidarity, to have sameness. Make sure people can speak the same language, ignoring the fact he’s bulldozing over other languages and practices in favor of his own creation. The boys are given names, Leos (the younger) who wears the skull and fur of a lion he killed, and Ra who wears the skull of an eagle (or some other large bird) he battled.

    There is an inevitability toward the end I won’t spoil, but what I liked so much about this was how clear the progression of understanding and coherent thought became as the story went on. The boys grew into men and their minds became their own, and that strong characterization showed how even when the world is full of unknown dangers and death, the more their minds worked, the more the world made sense.

    I don’t feel as though I’m properly explaining myself because it felt like recognizing something from before, like there’s an inherent desire to be. The brothers went in different directions with their curiosities and understandings of the same world they were presented. The eldest had far more experience in the danger than the younger, and so his was caution until it became maniacal. The youngest had the innocence of curiosity unfiltered by those experiences.

    I think this was a solid book to start the year off with, and I recommend it. It is rather dark and depraved in places, but I found that added to the primitive nature of the world in which the brothers lived. When one exhibits too radical a deviation from the comfort of routine, the other offers a balance and a command to return to familiarity. By the end, it’s a book about a boy trying to do the best he can for his little brother. It’s a deeply thought provoking book. I give this 8/10 stars.