Book Reviews of 2024: part one

Hello it’s been awhile since I have written a post, but I have some new book reviews to share. 

Book List:

Well this is exhausting by Sophia Benoit

The Happy Place by Emily Henry 

The Life of Pi by Yann Martel

Never Enough by Jennifer Breheny Wallace

The Courage to be Disliked by Fumitake Koga and Ichiro Kishimi 

Comments:

Some of these books I enjoyed more than others, and some of these books I had difficulty reading while subbing. There were also some books I didn’t enjoy reading because of the writing style and themes. There were also some books I enjoyed a lot, and will spend more time discussing them than the ones I didn’t enjoy.  

Moving into the book list, I enjoyed reading parts of “Well this is Exhausting” by Sophia Beniot. The book itself is a creative nonfiction essay collection with themes of growing up, adulting, being from Saint Louis, Missouri, and struggling with adult feelings about identity, career, and love. She touches on some essays about her relationships with her mom, aunts, and sisters but there isn’t a strong focus on the relationships. Rather, the book has many essays that detail personal stories and her own individual thoughts and feelings towards her personal situations. She explains that her parents divorced at a young age, and she also explains that there is social awareness of her family and her weight from a younger age than most. 

There were some essays that resonated with me such as, ”Bless You, Brendan Fraser” and “Exactly the Woman I Thought I’d Be When I Grew Up”. I really enjoyed her essay about Kirkwood Missouri and the racial divide and tensions she has experienced in her lifetime. She touches on the fact that there are social political terms to describe the racial and socioeconomic divides in the city, and that she is privileged enough as a cis white female to be able to talk openly about these divides. She explains that she is concerned that capitalism seems to be a major issue in the divide in the city, and there is a lack of open conversation and initiative to unify the city while keeping its culture. I wish she had written more about the plans for the city because it seemed from a reader’s standpoint she seemed frustrated with the situation. It's also interesting that she included this essay in her book because most of the book is about growing up, family life, and young adulthood. I’ve never been to Missouri, but I am hoping for the best for the future of the city. 

Most of her essays she discusses her younger years and awkwardness of growing up. She writes essays that are dedicated to the perspective of things she wishes she would have told her younger sisters, satirical “how to’ articles on how to get ready for parties, and items that she has found that have made her twenties easier. Her lifestyle seems more wild than most with the essays she has written about partying, growing up, and her family. There seems to be universal adulting moments that she mentions in her essays that makes the book enjoyable. At times the essays seem dramatic and over the top which makes me question how realistic her essays are compared to her real life, but the book sometimes seems more geared towards entertainment rather than a honest narrative. 

However, I believe that most of her essays are pretty accurate with their descriptions, conversations with the reader, and plots. It can be difficult to judge creative nonfiction essays. In my college writing class my professor spoke about the “Truthiness” of a creative nonfiction essay, and that sometimes authors add events, characters, and details that weren’t true in real life, but add literary elements to a story to enhance an essay’s dramatic tone or help the essay sound more interesting to a reader. I’m pretty sure that Sophia Beniot’s essays are truthful, but sometimes the structure of the essays can be a lot. There are parts in the book where I wished the author gave the reader her honest reflection of the event or situation she is describing. Her book could be more moving towards the younger generation of women, and more of a strong feminist read if it had more reflection rather than trying to be entertaining and crowd shocking. I appreciate her honesty in her book, and the dramatic parts are probably interesting for someone who grew up in a city or who enjoys dry humor. However, the book is still missing a reflection piece for some of her essays, and I would have appreciated more reflection. It’s slightly difficult to judge creative nonfiction because I haven’t found enough books to compare her book to other works.   

The next book, “The Happy Place” by Emily Henry I didn’t finish reading it because the main character, Harriet seemed to be confused about her own motives during the book. It reminded me of myself in high school. Considering that I am trying to fully get own adult life together at this point in time I did not want to read about a main character who is pretending to still be in a relationship with her ex boyfriend because her adult friend is marrying her boyfriend at her dad’s cottage. It just seemed like a lot of drama, and I don’t think anyone’s friends would be that upset if the main character told the truth to them about the break up. I didn’t like how her ex boyfriend, Wyn seemed conceited. He had his own issues he needed to handle before being in a relationship. Which is another reason I don’t like the main character. It would have been better if she found someone else. Harriet is described as a perfectionist and has an extremely demanding job as a doctor. The relationship seemed as though it was a conversation between high school students not a doctor and her ex boyfriend who is described as a class clown. I am confused on whether or not the main character has a strong sense of self because it seems weird that she would be okay getting back together with an ex to please her friends. Also Wyn didn’t even apologize for breaking up with her, so I’m not sure why she thought he would have her best interest at heart when he seemed immature.  

It’s harmful for Harriet to be in a situation where she is being emotionally available for her ex boyfriend. He doesn’t care enough about her or her feelings to be with her in an actual relationship with her or to be honest with their friend group about the break up. There were also adult scenes in the book which I wasn’t completely aware of, and I was trying to read this book while subbing. So anyway after trying to understand why Harriet wasn’t being honest with herself and her feelings, I gave up reading the book. It seemed like a lot of the book was conflicts with characters, without having an actual plot. I think I would have liked the book better if Harriet had a better sense of herself and her age, if there was a more eventful plot, and if there were less racy scenes. The racy scenes started quickly- which is another reason I couldn’t find myself enjoying the book. 

The next book is “The Life of Pi” by Yann Martel, and I had difficulty reading this book because of the author’s writing style and cadence in sentence structure. The wording of the book made the main character and the themes sound like that of an old man, and I wasn’t interested in the plot of the book. The book itself is descriptive of the settings and the stories that the main character, Pi is facing, but it’s not something I would read myself unless I was in a reading club or if it was for class. The first part of the novel is describing Pi's life, and it was difficult to read because the novel itself seemed to focus just on one main character, without any other characters in the plot (other than significantly minor ones). The writing style and cadence was superfluous at times and mundane at others. I am hoping to return to this book when I have time to understand and appreciate the author's writing style. 

Thank you for reading; I’ll be back with part two soon! I'm hoping to update my blog in the next couple of weeks!