The Cormoran Strike Series by Robert Galbraith
Robert Galbraith is J.K. Rowling’s pen name. I read all five (so far) of Rowling’s private detective series this year. Cormoran Strike is a war veteran-turned-private detective. His assistant (and eventual business partner) Robin is introduced in the first scene, arriving at Strike’s office for an interview just as an ex-girlfriend is fleeing down the stairs. It’s quite dramatic.
Each novel contains a great story and a complicated mystery. As much as I love Cormoran and Robin, the best character in each book is the city of London, which is brought to life just like Hogwarts was in the Harry Potter novels. I bought my mom the first novel for Christmas. She’s a crime novel buff who always figures out whodunnit. (When I was growing up, she had worn paperback copy of P.D. James’ novel, An Unsuitable Job for a Woman on her bookshelf. You can’t imagine how disappointed I was when it didn’t turn out to be the lurid story I had imagined.)
Other five-star reads: Long Bright River by Liz Moore, East of Eden by John Steinbeck, Emma by Jane Austen, Persuasion by Jane Austen, Dominicana by Angie Cruz, North and South by Elizabeth Gaskell, The Cactus by Sarah Haywood, The New Wilderness by Diane Cook
The Classics
“‘Classic’ – a book which people praise and don’t read.” – Mark Twain
I read several classics and quasi-classics this year, including two novels by Somerset Maugham, the aforementioned Austen novels, Steinbeck’s masterpiece, East of Eden, and Elizabeth Gaskell’s marvelous saga, North and South. I also read John Updike’s grim but perfect executed Rabbit, Run, Haruki Murakami’s sixties-period novel, Norwegian Wood, Dodie Smith’s charming I Capture the Castle, and L.M. Montgomery’s disappointing The Blue Castle. In late fall, I read the truly terrible The Tenant of Wildfell Hall by Anne Bronte. (Readers are meant to sympathize with the character Helen, who flees with her young son to begin a new life away from her drunken, abusive husband. I consider myself a feminist, and it pains me to say this, but if I’d been married to Helen, I probably would’ve taken to drink, too. She is insufferable.)
I only read a handful of nonfiction, which is typical of me. They included a memoir by Jane Goodall and one from Buffalo singer/songwriter Ani DiFranco, the best-selling personal narrative Hillbilly Elegy (which I found underwhelming), and The Season of the Witch, a fascinating history of San Francisco in the sixties and seventies. I read Wave, a heartbreaking memoir from a Sri Lankan woman who was the only member of her family to survive the 2004 tsunami. And finally, I read Jesus Land, a memoir from a girl whose parents sent her and her adopted brother to an unregulated reform school in the Dominican Republic. Things were rough there.
Additional Observations
I read a lot more female authors than male authors. This, apparently, is a normal phenomenon. Male readers tend to read male authors and women readers tend to read women authors. This year, I'm going to make a concerted effort to read more male authors. I’m also going to drop a lot of the “chick lit.” A couple of my chick lit choices contained inventive stories. I enjoyed The Flatshare by Beth O’Leary, whose main character was sorting through some PTSD symptoms after breaking up with a verbally abusive and manipulative ex. I had fun reading K.A. Tucker’s Alaskan-based “Wild” series. (Mostly because it was based in Alaska.) But the rest of the “chick lit” was subpar. By subpar, I mean forgettable drivel.
I’m also going to try and read more nonfiction and more world fiction.
In 2021, I’m challenging myself to read:
10 general nonfiction books
10 books by authors from 10 different countries
Five books by the same author (author TBD)
Five short-story collections.
Five biographies
10 classics
5+ “free choice” books
That should come to 50. If it doesn’t, what can I say. I’m bad at math.
Goodbye Goodreads, Hello The Storygraph
I’m leaving Goodreads, which has an outdated platform and a flawed rating system. I saved all my Festivus airing of the grievances for Goodreads.
Hey Goodreads. I’ve got a lot of problems with you.
Your algorithms are poorly conceived, your interface is difficult to navigate, and your search tool is not intuitive. I shouldn’t have to do a Google search of the book I want to read before I search for it on Goodreads. You all should KNOW how to spell an author’s last name. Unfortunately, because you are powered by Amazon, you have an astronomically large database that none of your competitors will ever be able to match.
Goodreads is owned and operated by Amazon and is basically a shill for its parent company. It exists to get people to buy their books from Amazon. The thing I like least about Goodreads is that it doesn’t value its most important asset: its authors. Anonymous non-readers have the capability of tanking a book BEFORE IT’S EVEN PUBLISHED with unkind comments and fake reviews. Trolls have unimpeded ability to create multiple accounts under assumed names (often names of living authors) to increase their number of fake reviews. Rotten Tomatoes and Wikipedia faced similar issues, and each took steps to curtail spammers and false identities. Amazon refuses to address the problem.
Goodreads is the kind of website Trump would use if he were a reader.
A second major concern: If you’re an indie publishing firm or an independent author, it’s nearly impossible to market your book through the site’s expensive promotion system. If authors want their book found, they have to shell out hundreds of dollars. Most authors are not Tom Clancy and J.K. Rowling. Most authors make little money. Amazon is one of the most profitable companies in the world. Goodreads doesn’t value creativity. They value profit. And before you call me a Red Leader, I’m perfectly okay with companies wanting to make a profit. But come on. Bring your website into the 21st century and show some compassion for the little guy.
To be completely transparent: I buy from Amazon as much as the next person. I purchase books for my Kindle and the occasional new release. I complain about the demise of malls and the closing of bookstores, but the ease of clicking on a product and having it arrive on my doorstep two days later is really hard to resist. I am a hypocrite. But I’m making an effort to change my ways. For Christmas, I purchased all of the books I gifted from Barnes and Noble. Most of the books I bought myself this past year came from used book stores and thrift shops. I’m trying.
