LITERATURE: The Rule of Four by Ian Caldwell and Dustin Thomason

So the reviews about this book on Amazon (where I went to look up the spelling of the authors' names) were sort of mixed. Some were really good, others really poor. All the good ones, though, seemed to tout this as a purely thriller / actiony novel, a "quick and dirty" read that must, inevitably, I suppose, be compared to Dan Brown's work, since it, like his Da Vinci Code, features a historically-based mystery that gets solved by smart people who happen to know stuff / have the ability to figure out stuff that's eluded the most brilliant of minds for ages.

I have to agree that this was definitely an interesting enough action book -- I sped through it in a matter of a few evenings, and found the pacing very much to my liking for a plot like this--the clues were revealed quickly, and the solutions didn't take forever to puzzle out. I also really did enjoy the unfolding of the double plotlines Caldwell and Thomason developed--the mystery revealed at the center of the historical text that the main characters puzzle out, the Hypnerotomachia, a real text, by the way, and the sort of murder / real life professorial conspiracy that happens in the foreground.

Ultimately, though, what I noticed and liked most about this novel had nothing to do with the mystery (either one). In fact, while I found the murder plot interesting, I found that the Hypnerotomachia mystery fell sort of flat. It was too complex for the average reader (or any reader, for that matter) to puzzle out because it was so intensely ingrained in history; I felt like someone would have had to have read the complete historical, artistic, and literary breadth of 17-18th century Italy to even be able to grasp at straws (which, frankly, may have been totally wrong and unfounded because the keys to the mystery are entirely fictional). This is somewhat different from the Da Vinci Code, which, though fictional, was at least somehow based on artistic / historic fact; the Hypernotomachia, in contrast is unraveled in total unrealism.

But back to what I liked about the book. I found that the biggest success of these two young (at the time) writers, came from their adherence to the age-old adage of writing what they know. Caldwell and Thomason, graduates of Princeton and Harvard (respectively?), detail the Ivy league college experience well. I'm probably totally biased since Princeton is my alma mater, but then again, maybe, on the contrary, I'm a good judge. I felt like they captured both sides of the Ivy league lawn--the rich, traditional side, and the poorer, more down to earth aspect that most people tend to forget. While their characters were a bit caricaturist, I felt like their explanations of Princeton traditions, right down to the eating clubs, danced well along the edge of being good for Princeton grads and non-Princeton grads alike. It was enjoyable regardless of your personal experiences, filled with the kind of interest in the other half that you get from reading F. Scott Fitzgerald. In fact, their details and love of Princeton's Ivy towers filled me with the same kind of pride and obsession that I got from the parts of This Side of Paradise that I read (review to come when I finish it!).

Overall, though there were parts that were fairly trivial, and others that were somewhat pretentious, I thought this was a great combination of action and mystery, in the perfect setting for tradition and discovery. Though I'm not going to pretend that my love of the setting didn't totally tip my enjoyment of the book up.

FINAL VERDICT:
*** and 1/2 out of *****

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LITERATURE: The Year of the Flood by Margaret Atwood

Let me start by saying that this review is probably helplessly biased. Because, in my eyes, when it comes to dystopian novels featuring women, Ms. Atwood is tops.

I mean, The Handmaid's Tale is absolutely a classic, a staple in any dystopia-lovers collection, as necessary, if you ask me, as Brave New World or 1984. It is one of those dystopias that has the society as the perfect backdrop and compliment to the real meat of the story--the individual's life. And, if we thought she'd outdone herself with the Puritanistic society in THT, she blows us (or at least me) totally away with Oryx and Crake, which I've been fervently recommending to people since I read it a few years back. It. Was. Baller.

And not only because I happen to have a fondness for science-fictiony stuff that focuses on great storytelling. The world Atwood created in Oryx and Crake was unbelievably real. Down to the very extinction of animals, and the ability to watch executions online. It was the very picture of what could really happen to our current society with a little ballooning and enough time. That's what I loved most about it--how I could really see what was going on in our society dissolving into her world of fiction based in fact. It was mesmerizing.

But then, when I heard that The Year of the Flood was coming out, I have to admit that I was totally skeptical. Despite absolutely adoring Oryx and Crake, I've seen enough bad sequels to think twice. Even good authors sometimes take a nosedive, and I really wasn't looking forward to slashing and burning what I'd loved about O and C in a sequel.

But what Atwood does (serves me right for ever doubting her!) is incredible. Both from a fiction-writing standpoint and from a series standpoint. The Year of the Flood is neither a sequel nor a prequel. It's a simultane-quel, a retelling of an already incredible story, but the retelling happens in such a way that makes it unlike anything else I've ever read. Specifically, The Year of the Flood happens not to the main characters from Oryx and Crake, but nor does it happen to completely unrelated individuals. The focus of this new novel are characters who are exactly one step removed from the people in Oryx and Crake--friends of friends, almost--which makes them perfect story-bearers who know enough of the conspiracy but who also have their own lives and own problems.

Even without reading Oryx and Crake (it's been a real while since I read it, so most of the details had faded away, sadly), The Year of the Flood still makes perfect sense and is a novel that can stand alone in its own right. And, even better (?) it offers the same kind of world-building satisfaction that Atwood accomplishes in the first novel. The facets of this new, futuristic world are developed further, and we even get to experience aspects of the society that we'd never seen before. All in all, it makes perfect sense that Atwood wrote this second novel--she obviously had more story left to tell in this incredibly developed world that she invented, and who wants to leave when they're only half-finished?

I also loved that Atwood's focus here was on two main women -- Toby and Ren, who live together in this religious commune known as the Gardeners. They are both strong characters, both real in different ways, earthy and relatable and modern all at once. They exemplify what Atwood does best in my eyes; no matter what her story or plot, she always remembers that it's characters and people that move things forward. And, no matter if it's the past of the future, people's fundamental issues and insecurities will always make them relateable. After all, we're only human.

My one fairly infinitesimal gripe (and the reason I lowered the score by half a star) was that the plot seemed sort of slow to start and get going; though the found the second half utterly tantalizing, I found the beginning of Oryx and Crake to be better, somehow, at drawing you in and keeping up the pace. Either way, fantastic read. Highly recommended.

FINAL VERDICT:
**** and 1/2 out of *****

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LITERATURE: The Lovely Bones by Alice Sebold

I found The Lovely Bones to be, in a word, delovely. And delightful. And delicious. It was heartbreaking and beautiful, with flowing, wonderful prose and meaningful, thoughtful characters.

I don't mean to keep littering it with praise like every other review has, but it's been a while since I read something that was simultaneously a can't-put-this-down mystery / thriller / murder book, and a book that made me think profoundly about death, love, and what it means to live.

Death is always a touchy, strange sort of thing in literature. When you see it happen via murder or old age, see the burial, see the aftermath, it is always from a third-person sort of view. Once the character in question is gone, everything about them ceases; the light goes out. Their consciousness is gone.

In The Lovely Bones, that problem of discontinuity, that missing hole in the plot, is eliminated because Susie Salmon starts from and continues to speak from beyond the grave, after her rape and murder by her neighbor.

Susie is the perfect narrator; her age is ideal--she's at the prime of life, not quite a child, but not as jaded as an adult. She is on the brink of everything and here, in the worst kind of tragedy, her life is taken. I've already said it, but I'll say it again: heartbreaking. And that's not what surprised me most about a novel that I half-thought would have been an over-hyped bestseller like The Lost Symbol. It's not only the narrator that's great--it's the whole construct of the plot. The very first thing that happens is the worst one, and yet the novel is totally wrought with suspense, the whole way through. And yet the suspense doesn't get in the way of the plot, of the beautiful developments of the still-living characters--of Susie's family, her love interest, the oddball friend, Ruth.

Susie's vision of heaven, even, is simultaneously stunning and eerie, strange and lovely without being overly perfect or filled with sunshiney clouds. It reminded me a lot of the heaven in one of my favorite movies-- What Dreams May Come. And yet perhaps the most beautiful part of the whole thing is that Sebold manages to really give her not only a heaven, but also a final taste of earth, a first taste of the love, the sex, and the adulthood that Susie spends the whole novel dreaming of--all without being overthetop, or cheesy, or unbelieveable. It is the cherry on top of a well-envisioned world; it makes perfect sense. As much as I wanted to be like GAH! That's awful stupid happy ending blah blah blah, I couldn't. Because it was just right.

It fit perfectly, all the pieces together, even the way in which the family breaks and then reassembles. Some people, my friend Michelle, for instance, take some issue with it, the way the mother left and then was able to reconcile. But I thought it was more believable than if they'd all just managed to adjust. People experience horror, and then break, but then survive. And in Sebold's world, I truly believe the way in which it happens.

It's an achievement. I loved it.

FINAL VERDICT
***** out of *****

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