Books

Shadow is a man with a past. But now he wants nothing more than to live a quiet life with his wife and stay out of trouble. Until he learns that she's been killed in a terrible accident.

Flying home for the funeral, as a violent storm rocks the plane, a strange man in the seat next to him intoduces himself. The man calls himself Mr. Wednesday, and he knows more about Shadow than is possible.

He warns Shadow that a far bigger storm is coming. And from that moment on, nothing will ever be the same...

A man who goes by the name Shadow gets released from prison and before he even makes it home his entire world is turned upside down. He is engaged in conversation by another man who knows an uncomfortable amount about him and tells Shadow he needs his help. After their conversation the story seemingly followed Alice down the proverbial rabbit hole.

The book follows Shadow to hell and back, almost literally. He encounters many Gods from probably every region of the world and from every era. The research was definitely thorough, though almost too much so. There may have been a few too many references to Gods that have been long-forgotten. But that is often a complaint of sci-fi/fantasy books, in how they can be too detailed and descriptive.

I cannot rave enough about how much I love this plot. The Gods of old, which were brought to the US by whomever, however devout, are facing a great paradigm shift. The old Gods are being edged out in the US by new Gods who represent more commercialized, Capitalistic and technological ideals. Shadow chose sides with the old Gods, but he has no idea if he made the right choice. But he knows all he can do now is see the coming storm through to the end.

This book took forever to read, was very bizarre in many parts, and the ending was almost anti-climactic. And I still really enjoyed it. Call me crazy I guess.

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What are you going to do when it doesn't matter what you say?

Interpreter of Maladies by Jhumpa Lahiri

Winner of the 2000 Pulitzer Prize for fiction, this stunning debut collection unerringly charts the emotional journeys of characters seeking love beyond the barriers of nations and generations. "A writer of uncommon sensitivity and restraint...Ms. Lahiri expertly captures the out-of-context lives of immigrants, expatriates, and first-generation Americans" (Wall Street Journal). In stories that travel from India to America and back again, Lahiri speaks with universal eloquence to everyone who has ever felt like a foreigner. Honored as "Debut of the Year" by The New Yorker and winner of the PEN/Hemingway Award, Interpreter of Maladies introduces a young writer of astonishing maturity and insight who "breathes unpredictable life into the page" (New York Times).

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A vision in pink and lace came down the steps from the gym floor and sat down beside me. Melba June Monroe, an eleventh grader, looked me over. She was a pretty girl. I had always liked her. "Hi, Sonny," she cooed. "Boy is my date boring. I don't even know where he is. Why is a tough little rocket boy going stag to the formal? Do you wanta dance?" I wanted to dance, and I wanted to take her home in Roy Lee's backseat afterward. Did both, as it turned out. Rocket-boy fame.

Summer, 1954.

U.S. Marshal Teddy Daniels has come to Shutter Island, home of Ashecliffe Hospital for the Criminally Insane. Along with his partner, Chuck Aule, he sets out to find an escaped patient, a murderess named Rachel Solando, as a hurricane bears down upon them.

But nothing at Ashecliffe Hospital is what it seems.

And neither is Teddy Daniels.

Is he there to find a missing patient? Or has he been sent to look into rumors of Ashecliffe's radical approach to psychiatry? An approach that may include drug experimentation, hideous surgical trials, and lethal countermoves in the shadow war against Soviet brainwashing...

Or is there another, more personal reason why he has come there?

As the investigation deepens, the questions only mount:

How has a barefoot woman escaped the island from a locked room?
Who is leaving clues in the form of cryptic codes?
Why is there no record of a patient committed there just one year before?
What really goes on in Ward C?
Why is an empty lighthouse surrounded by an electrified fence and armed guards?

The closer Teddy and Chuck get to the truth, the more elusive it becomes, and the more they begin to believe that they may never leave Shutter Island.

Because someone is trying to drive them insane...

Shutter Island's only inhabitants are the patients in a mental institution and the instution's employees, and Federal Marshal Teddy Daniels was sent to the island to investigate the highly unlikely disappearance of a patient. While on the island Teddy cannot tell if the puzzles he encounters are clues to solving the case or if they are all an elaborate setup to keep him from ever leaving.

For a long time I read nothing but mystery/suspense novels because it was only within their pages that...well it was only these books that could challenge me. Some authors in the genre are so good that the books become almost interactive. As the main character tries to sift through the case, I am a puppet on a string. There is nothing better than a good thriller that makes you sit up in bed and talk to yourself while you read. This was that type of book.

Dennis Lehane's Mystic River was a pretty good book, but I would not really compare the two. Shutter Island was much more intense and in my humble opinion, a much better book.

The book is short and a lightning fast read and my recommendation to you is to read it in as few sittings as possible. Lehane weaves a web of intricate and minute details and fewer sittings will hopefully allow you to enjoy seeing how each detail is important. If you have to, or even prefer to, read the book more slowly, the overall thrill of the book should not be lost on you at all. I really liked this book and I hope someone out there has some suggestions of books like it for me to read.

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Because it's the midwest, no one really glitters because no one has to, it's more a dull shine, like frequently used silverware. We were all presentable enough, but almost no one was making any kind of statement. Out here in Michigan, the real style is too difficult to maintain; the styles are all convenient and secondhand. We're all hand-me-down personalities. But that's liberating: it frees you up for other matters of greater importance, the great themes, the sordid passions.