Another non-biz book: The River King by Alice Hoffman

The River King by Alice Hoffman

My review

rating: 4 of 5 stars
I've been a fan of Alice Hoffman's mysterious, magical fiction since high school when I read Turtle Moon - borrowed from my sister's library.

The River King didn't disappoint. Hoffman's lyrical prose drew me in to a story about an enchanted Massachusetts boarding school and the suspicious death of an outcast student in the nearby river.

The appearance of watery ghosts, charmed fish and vengeful black cats were not surprising, given Hoffman's penchant for bringing the otherworldly into the everyday.

But also this is a love story, and not just of one couple. An engaged teacher and a lonely cop get together and sparks fly. A beguiling swimmer and a boy from the wrong side of the tracks. Passion triumphs over reason.

A good read. I plowed through the last half of the book in one night. This book missed a fifth star because I was disappointed with how tidily and hastily the book ended. I would've liked to learn more about the lovers, the townsfolk, the dead boy's final resting place.


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Blogging about why there aren't any new blogs...

While I'm not so sure that anyone ever reads this blog (except Evan and Diane who, bless you, posted comments), I wanted to explain that I was recently away for 9 blissful days of NOT reading anything ... or going near a computer or even a pen. (I brought several books with me to my lake getaway but never quite got past the 1st page of the 1st one...)

So if you're here and are actually looking for new posts (I still doubt you exist. Post a comment and prove me wrong!), please visit again soon. I've ordered a slate of new biz books and have a shelf full of new fiction at home waiting for me.

A reminder to "choose your own story"

Life of Pi by Yann Martel

My review

rating: 3 of 5 stars
(this review contains spoilers, but doesn't reveal all of this books twists...)

The first part of this book made me want to stop the tape (my version was a 7-tape audiobook selected for a 5-hour drive) but, as I was stuck in construction traffic, I decided to bear with it. Slowgoing for probably the first third of the novel, with a surprise and rather odd turn into the merits of the christian, islam and hindu religions, altogether, the enthralling part of the book starts with the progragonist, Pi, nearly drowning in a shipwreck while on his way from Pondicherry, a small nation near India, to a new home with his family in Canada. (Wow, that was quite a run-on sentence).



Pi, 16, is marooned on a 26-foot lifeboat with a 450-pound Bengal tiger, no less. How they could sustain themselves without killing each other or succumbing to death for the better part of a year is nothing less than riveting. When their travels bring them to a carniverous floating algae island inhabited by meerkats...well, that's where I started to doubt the reliability of the narrator. But, what imagination!



It was a letdown when Pi finally came aground in Mexico, with the tiger presumably running off into the wilds never to be seen again. He is debriefed by some foreign visitors who want to know why the ship sank, and they simply don't believe his tale. So he gives them another, sadder yet more plausible version. And suddenly the sea doesn't seem so pure and blue anymore.



So now I'm puzzling over how this book is supposed to affirm one's belief in God. Because Pi could survive at sea, presumably alone, for 7 months, and retain his wits for the most part, and later find love and have kids and a normal life?



It's a worthwhile tale, though I'm not sure now having read it through how enjoyable it was. I really dig the cover art, though...


View all my reviews.