bookbug book club ⤴
august 2024
pnin - vladimir nabokov
date started: aug 14, 2024
date completed:
before reading
i know the author wrote lolita which is very well-regarded, and that this book is more on the light-hearted side. hopefully i'll enjoy this one!
during reading
chapter 4 (38%) - 08/29
ack yikes, i started this book late so i'm not sure i'll be able to finish by the end of the month ... i'm having a great time reading this though, i'll probably continue the next month as well. the book currently winning seems like a long read, not sure if i'll feel up for it...
july 2024
to the lighthouse - virginia woolf
date started: N/A
date completed: DNF
before reading
not sure what to think about this book ... storygraph says it's very reflective and quite challenging which scares me!! the synopsis doesn't really give me much but it seems to be a very deep story. hopefully i can enjoy this
comments
yeaaah i couldn't even start this book. i tried, saw the block of text and was like "fuck no" and forgot about it for basically the rest of the month. been busy with other stuff!
june 2024
strangers on a train - patricia highsmith
date started: jun 02, 2024
date completed: jun 17, 2024
before reading
this was the book i was hoping would be chosen! the premise seemed pretty interesting to me but as usual i don't have particularly in-depth thoughts about this
during reading
chapter 9 (18%)
i've been enjoying this book so far! the writing style isn't too dense or complicated, and the characters are easy to find interest in. bruno saying "cheeses" is particularly funny to me
after reading
holy fuck, that sure was a book! i'm currently writing this right after reading (june 17), so my thoughts are a little messy.
everything happened so fast at the end – i didn't expect bruno dying, for sure. the ending also left me wondering what happened to guy afterward. it was a hard-hitting ending, for sure, but i do crave more closure.
this was an easy book to read. the writing style feels sophisticated for lack of a better word, yet it's not too dense or complex. i really really liked guy and bruno as the protagonists. while they're flawed, i saw myself rooting for them as you do any book protagonist. i found them charming too, in a weird way
there were definitely some vaguely gay undertones, but i see guy and charley's relationship more like a fucked-up brotherly love
update jun 30: i also wanted to add how i love the use of repetition throughout the book – such as with the line "Twelve steps up, skip seven… . You can remember it, it’s got a syncopated rhythm." really helps tie different parts together
quotes
Who would accept such fantasy? The letter, the map, the gun—They seemed like props of a play, objects arranged to give a verisimilitude to a story that wasn't real and never could be real.
It was the night that took up the body of his thoughts and distorted it, he felt, the night and the darkness and the sleeplessness. Yet the night had its truth also. In the night, one approached truth merely at a certain slant, but all truth was the same.
He hadn't told Anne about the hospital, he remembered suddenly, that was why it seemed unreal. She was his glass of reality, not his work.
april 2024
notes from (the) underground - fyodor dostoevsky
date started: apr 03, 2024
date completed: DNF
before reading
honestly i don't really understand the synopsis on storygraph (and i'm too scared of spoilers to look elsewhere online). i wonder if the narrator will be telling a story about himself, or if he's making his own story? or some combination, or maybe it's less of a story and more of like... just his thoughts (since the description references him writing a "narrative" and i'm not really sure what that entails)
looks like an intruiging book, i think it'll be interesting to see how this pans out since the narrator is isolated and so the book will probably be less about his interactions and experiences (?) and more about what's going on in his head
comments
so i was... barely able to start this book honestly. the writing wasn't as wordy as TLHoD, but it still had huge text blocks that were difficult to read, and the premise just wasn't super interesting to me, unfortunately.
march 2024
the left hand of
darkness - ursula k. le guin
date started: march 05, 2024
date completed: march 31, 2024
before reading
i haven't actually heard of this book before (the books for this book club seem quite different from what i generally read, which is one of the reasons i joined), but i have enjoyed science fiction before, so hopefully i'll enjoy this as well
during reading
chapter 1 (9%)
it's a bit hard to follow so far, especially since the author just throws a bunch of proper nouns at you – but it should make sense in due time. the plot seems a bit interesting, but the book hasn't really captivated me yet. it feels kind of dense, which impacts readability a little for me.
chapter 9 (41%)
this book hasn't really been able to captivate me – i don't really feel strongly about it one way or another at the moment. i'm not sure if i'll be able to finish this book by the end of the month, which is a shame because it really does seem interesting. i've had to look at litcharts to be able to follow the story – i did hear that this book is a hard read, and i'm inexperienced with this sort of writing, so i guess it's to be expected.
in terms of my actual thoughts on the story, i do like genly's interactions with other characters. his thoughts on gethen as an outsider are interesting, and i do like the worldbuilding even if i can't understand it all.
i'm hoping to be able to finish the rest of the book this month, but i won't push myself if i can't. if i'm still interested in it, maybe i'll continue reading next month?
after reading
finished this book on the last day of the month aw yeah !!!
i wasn't super into this book at the start but i got really invested around halfway through.
i really liked genly's relationship with estraven and their interactions. estraven was cheering genly on from the start but he didn't trust him until the end. and then he loses him. auhg. auhgshg
i liked the worldbuilding, some stuff was confusing but the author really does well in making us feel like we're reading a story from another planet because. we are
genly's changing attitude and understanding towards the people of gethen throughout the book was interesting; i personally didn't really get most of the politics stuff (which i KNOW i'm missing out on but i've never had a good understanding of politics) but genly's changing thoughts on gethenian gender i especially liked. i heard ursula k. le guin talked about regretting the use of he/him for gethenians, but i think it makes sense since genly comes from a world with binary genders so it'd feel more natural for him to do that. also love the part where he finally gets a good understanding of gethenian gender and then turns around and describes women in the most misogynistic way
the ending. holy fuck the ending. tragic. i don't have the words to describe how i feel but auhghg
quotes
all of these are from the second half
“Yet you are. It is strange. I am the only man in all Gethen that has trusted you entirely, and I am the only man in Gethen that you have refused to trust.”
“The fact is,” I said, “that you’re unable, or unwilling, to I believe in the fact that I believe in you.”
Warm through, benevolent, I said, “The best food I’ve eaten on Gethen has always been in your company, Estraven.”
“Good night, Ai,” said the alien, and the other alien said, “Good night, Harth."