Reviews and Comments

I first read this book about 3 years ago, but remember absolutely nothing about it, except for the first story, Love is Not a Pie. Somehow that story - about a child discovering her mum was in what we would, in 2018, call a polyamorous relationship with a family friend. I think love is not a pie is a fantastic expression that clarified the point of polyamory for me at an unconscious level, without the need for preaches. I'm not even sure it's how Amy Bloom meant it: on this second read, she seems to be saying that we can love different person differently, rather than that we can share love endlessly.

At any rate, it's a mystery how I completely removed all the other stories, only retaining a vague sense that I 'enjoyed' them. Enjoying is also a misleading word: each one is portraying a problematic relationship, without sensationalism but also without excessive romanticism. A step mother giving in to her son's avances, a young woman tending to her 60-something dying lover, a wife's betrayal of her devoted husband. I particularly enjoyed the two set of stories called 'Three Stories' - each generation of characters is so vivid.

I picked it up after enjoying White Houses, which Tascha gave to me as a present because, apparently, Come To Me is the first book she borrowed from me. As a result, I had in my mind there would be a Lesbian theme to many stories, which is not the case.

An American Marriage feels very much like a book of its time, that is, a book of our times. To be specific, a book from and for the US of 2018. Roy, an African American man on his way to success, or at least to middle-class comfort, is wrongfully convicted of raping a white woman. His wife Celeste finds herself bound to him, having to choose between loyalty and not only happiness, but really freedom: to have her own life, to define herself as something else than the wife of an imprisoned black man. It is not the most subtle of books: what is wants to say is, I think, very much all there on the page. But in return is compelling and not banal. I especially liked that the main characters are neither saints nor passive victims, but they have faults and desires and conflicts. Nor are there really evil enemies, as much as a faceless system that, in the best case scenario, doesn't care. I also thought it was an interesting, well-accomplished choice to omit any white character: no racist bastards, no hypocrite neighbours, not principled white-flies heroes, leaving centre stage to the protagonists.

Ursula and I have a complicated relationship. I never love her books as much as I wish I did, but they grow on me after I finished reading, and I think of them frequently. As I was immersed in A Wizard of Earthsea, I appreciated that it was an actual fantasy book, easy to read, no stress no headaches, just adventure after adventure. Yet, I didn't think it was amazing or ground-breaking. It was reading the author note at the end that I started to notice all the subtle ways in which the plot deviates from the classic, without breaking with the genre. Most famously, most characters, are not white, though the theme of race is never made explicit, it just happens to be that way, a detail that could escape readers in a rush. Perhaps more importantly, there are no wars or bad guys - the protagonist is on a quest to regain control of the creature he himself liberated, which can only be won by learning its name - that's a classy twist! The parallels with Harry Potter are clear but superficial: both boy wizards, both haunted by an evil creature, both scarred, both attending magician school...But Ursula's worlds are filled with less details (no quidditch, no lively description of the school, not fanthom platforms) and more poetry and philosophy: names have power, and spells have consequences beyond the wizard's control.

I read this book in the belief it was non-fiction, and felt real pain for the grandma of the narrator, a Russian lady living in the centre of Moscow, hit by dementia and gentrification. Her nephew is the son of Russian emigrants to the States (like the author), and moves in her apartment to take care of her whilst applying for an academic job in Russian literature. He is self-deprecating and disillusioned about academia, full of conflicting emotions about Russia and Moscow, and the best way to act as a decent, political human being. The city is another character: inhospitable, but how to dismiss it when one has not manage to get to know her and make oneself acceptable? I related to those bits a lot, thinking of Hong Kong and a bit of Santiago...everything is harder than it should, but isn't it really my fault? The ending is a bit disheartening: the protagonist gives in on his ideals, the granny is moved to a cheaper flat and the attention if a carer, and the machine of Russian corrupted, violent neoliberalism triumphes.

To put things into context, let me explain HOW I came to enjoy this book. I started from zero knowledge of Norse Mythology (though way too many hours of education in Greek/Roman mythology as a teenager). I downloaded the e-book version, read by the author, as a single mp3 - running time: 6 hours. And seeing that my mp3 player is old and makes the process of rewinding and forwarding a track a real pain, I just listened on and on and on. For three days, my commutes and lunch breaks were animated by tales of all-too-human gods tricking and slaying each other. By the end, it all felt a bit surreal, characters were melting into each others, giant wolves visiting my brain even when the mp3 was off. ...and yet: it is a great book. The myths are easy to follow, even if they are all intertwined and linked to one another. And Gaiman's voice is so soothing, you could listen to it for hours on end. Six, to be precise.