For Book about Books,
I read Judging a Book By Its Lover by Lauren Leto. This review will be kind of
long as I have a few bones to pick with Miss Leto.
I loved the sound of
this book. As a bibliophile, it seemed like a really fun read. I expected
someone who loved books in all incarnations. Instead I got someone who either
ignored or bashed most of what I like to read.
I strongly suspect
Leto is a genre snob. Classic and contemporary literature are ubiquitous but
everything else gets a quick nod or is skipped entirely. She mentions romances
to mock them, mysteries never, and only classic sci-fi (Clarke, Heinlein,
Asimov, etc). If there was any mention of contemporary genre or speculative
fiction, I missed it.
Leto claims to love
memoirs by celebrity relatives but you wouldn’t know it from the way she talks
about them. Most of what she said about memoirs and essays lead me to believe
she’s annoyed by their existence. If she hadn’t outright said she loved them,
I’d have never known.
The how-to-fake-it
section was interesting, helpful, and introduced me to some books I want to
read. It started fun then dragged then stopped being compelling and just
something to get through.
It either needed to
be broken up or some authors should have been cut. I have never had to fake
having read Zadie Smith among many
others. And for all the authors included, Jane Austen was omitted.
I know Leto hates
chick lit but most women and some men have had to fake having read something by
Austen at some point. I’ve read a lot of articles touting the reasons why Jane
Austen should be considered classic literature instead of highbrow chick lit. I
suspect Leto omitted Austen because it’s not literati cannon and is therefore
beneath her.
I wasn’t nuts about
the narrative structure either. The book was split between Leto’s life and bits
from her blog. If it had been all of one or the other or divided so it was read
that way, it would have better flow. This just felt disjointed and cobbled
together.
Leto had plenty of
interesting things to say, especially in the final chapter. She has talent and
I would love to see it somewhere else. Parts were fun but as a whole? I give it
an unenthused meh.
1) Fiction
2) Nonfiction – The
Man Who Loved Books Too Much by Allison Hoover Bartlett
3) Sci-Fi – Redshirts
by John Scalzi
4) Fantasy
5) Mystery
6) Horror
7)
Memoir/Biography – Data, A Love Story by Amy Webb
8) Chick Lit – Me
and Mr. Darcy by Alexandra Potter
9) Feminist
10) Teen
11) Holiday
12) Essays – What
Was I Thinking? ed. by Barbara Davilman & Liz Dubelman
13) Short
Stories
14) Library
15) Animal
16) Book about
Books – Judging a Book By Its Lover by Lauren Leto
17) New – Pitch
Perfect by Mickey Rapkin
18) Old – Dark
and Stormy Knights edited by P. N. Elrod
19) Pop Science
20) Near
21) Far
22) Graphic Novel –
Love and Capes: Do You Want to Know a Secret? by Thomas F. Zahler
23) Reread – Ready
Player One by Ernest Cline
24) Wild Card
25) Otherworldly
Creature
26) Free – Point
Your Face at This by Demetri Martin
27) Noteworthy
28) Bestseller
29) Themed
Anthology
30) Steampunk
31) Movie-Book
32) Media
33) Travel
34) Food
35) Classic
36) Humor
37) Poetry
38) Past – Stasiland
by Anna Funder
39) Future
40)
Dystopia/Post-Apocalyptic
41) Zombie
42) Sports
Music: She Don’t Like
Firefly by Mikey Mason
