"the corrections" by jonathan franzen

i was ready for this book to end around page 300. it's not that i didn't like it, but this novel went in so many directions, that i often got frustrated and fed-up.

at its core, "the corrections" is about the lambert family. there's the neurotic and over-bearing matriarch, enid, and her quickly deteriorating husband, alfred. there's their eldest child, gary; a privileged, yet clinically depressed suburbanite with a beautiful wife and three of his own boys. the middle child, chip, a former university professor fired for having an affair with a student, and denise, the youngest, a chef with her own restaurant and oodles of her own romantic problems. the characters and dynamic reminded me a lot of douglas coupland, though less extreme.

the book mostly consists of very large chunks about each character that often veer off into other large chunks about secondary characters with enough back story to form their own novels. at one point, enid and alfred take a cruise and there's a 20 page account from a women enid meets. at another point, chip goes to lithuania and there's 30 pages of how the country is falling apart and how such-and-such unpronounceable eastern european name is at war with another unpronounceable eastern european name and it became easy to stop paying attention and gloss over the words.

despite my many frustrations with this novel, franzen should be complimented for his vivid and unique descriptions, often hilarious situations and deeply moving account of a dysfunctional family

"the new york trilogy" by paul auster

this book is three short novellas that could be classified as postmodern detective fiction.

the first, city of glass, follows a protagonist writer as he’s mistaken for a detective (named paul auster) and starts an obsessive watch of a recently released criminal. it’s bizarre and absurd and not much happens, but it’s fascinating to read.

the second, ghosts, is the story of blue, who’s hired by white, to watch black. white rents an apartment for blue on orange street where he can see directly in to black's window. black turns out to be quite dull, spending most of his time writing and reading thoreau. it’s bizarre and absurd and not much happens, but it’s fascinating to read.

the third, the locked room, is also the tale of a writer. he’s contacted by his childhood best friend’s wife after the friend disappears. the friend, fanshawe, told his wife, sophie, that if anything should ever happen to him she’s to contact this friend to read over his life’s work and deem if any of it is suitable for publishing. the protagonist writer friend publishes all fanshawe’s work, marries sophie and embarks on writing a biography about fanshawe. it’s bizarre and absurd and there’s much more action and plot than the first two novellas and it's fascinating to read.

there are many similar themes that run through these stories tying them together into a cohesive whole. they’re all meta-fictional with themes of watching/being watched, mistaken identities, existentialism, transformation and intrigue. while i'm not going to rush out to read paul auster's entire oeuvre, i'll definitely keep him in mind for future reading.

"king leary" by paul quarrington

the winner of this year's canada reads, "king leary" is a gem of canadiana that i'm grateful is being rediscovered. of course panelist dave bidini, author of many an ice-sport related book of his own (including a stellar collection of short story hockey erotica), would choose this tale of an aging hockey star as he remembers his days of glory from a small town ontario nursing home.

i couldn't think of anything i'd rather do less than read about hockey, but paul quarrington's storytelling is hilarious and vivid and flows seamlessly from past to present.

percival leary, the "king of the ice", was a hockey great in the early days of professional hockey. now, he shares a room with the cantankerous blue hermann, a former newspaperman who, coincidentally, spent much of his journalistic life, chronicling leary's career. the plot follows the two, along with their bizarre nurse, iain, as they embark on a trip to toronto where leary is to film a commercial for his drink of choice, canada dry ginger ale. however, this plot is secondary to leary's recollections of his career in professional hockey and the zany characters of his past.

a quick and enjoyable read, "king leary" is a wonderful reprieve from the often dire and isolation-themed annals of can lit.

"a tree grows in brooklyn" by betty smith

i took this book on my trip to new york, imagining myself sitting in a quaint cafe in the titular borough with the book on my lap and an americano steaming in front of me. in reality, i made it to brooklyn only once, and that was just to walk back to manhattan over the bridge, and hardly got any reading done.

"a tree grows in brooklyn" is the story of francie nolan as she grows up in poverty in williamsburg, brooklyn during the early twentieth century. she's precocious and curious and resourceful and gives a wonderful perspective to her time and place. betty smith is incredibly sympathetic towards her characters and i found myself really caring about their trials and tribulations.

"a tree grows in brooklyn" is targeted towards the same "girl" demographic as books like "little women", but it's not overly sentimental or saccharine. the book reminded me a lot of gabrielle roy's "the tin flute" with the same time period and similar themes. it's a wonderfully simple, yet moving tale that is sure to remain a classic for many decades to come.