Wednesday 3 September 2014

Book Review: We Are All Completely Beside Ourselves by Karen Joy Fowler

We Are All Completely Beside OurselvesWe Are All Completely Beside Ourselves by Karen Joy Fowler
My rating: 3 of 5 stars

I can honestly say I've never read a book like We Are All Completely Beside Ourselves. The blurb on the back was vague enough to not give anything away while still intrigue me.
I really wanted to read something that was about families, and the relationships within them and this was a perfect 'family study'.
Without giving too much away this book follows Rosemary Cooke. We meet her while she is at university, not sure of which path to take and still struggling with the loss of her brother and sister.
Right from the beginning her sister Fern is mentioned but it's not entirely clear what happened to her. Rosemary starts her story from the middle, so finding out Fern's fate is slowly unravelled. I must admit that's what kept me going through most of the book, the unknown, the mystery.
While I enjoyed Karen Joy Fowler's style of writing, and was easily swept into the story I didn't particularly care for any of the characters. I was inside Rosemary's mind but I didn't feel anything towards her, no sympathy, I didn't feel any fondness towards her brother and I found Harlow to be really irritating.
Once the mystery was revealed I was still interested in Rosemary's story, as, like I said before, I'd never read anything about the subject matter. In all honestly, I wasn't aware that it happened. The way her parents reacted to certain things somewhat surprised me and I can't say I agreed with every decision but I think that's the point. This is the kind of book that's supposed to instigate discussion.
So overall I gave this book a three. Despite some reviews stating that they had great emotional reaction I found the book a bit hollow. But it didn't take me to long to zip through it. I may read some more of Karen Joy Fowler in the future.

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Monday 1 September 2014

9 to 5...

Daily Prompt: In honour of Labour Day in North America, tell us what's the one job you could never imagine yourself doing?

Although I don't celebrate Labour Day this prompt inspired me as deciding on a career has always been difficult for me. I'm a creative person by nature, I love music, art, drama, books and I'd always envisaged a career in one of those fields. However, recently I've discovered a love of working with children and combining my two loves of drama and children together would be perfect for me.
My nightmare job would simply be doing something that involved working in an office, monotony, doing the same thing, day in, day out and with no creativity or inspiration. My greatest fear is working as some kind of office manager, or office anything really, unless that office is covered in art and involves writing and a freedom to use a bit of artistic license.