The next-to-the-last-one four

I think I might actually make it. 52 books in 52 weeks. I’m on the last one now, and it’s a quickie (you’ll see why shortly). I might even get a head start on 2015, although I don’t think I’ll be trying for a book a week again (more about that later). In the meantime, before the grand finale, here’s a quick rundown of the latest:

#48 My Brilliant Friend, by Elana Ferrante

There’s been a lot of fuss about this book, the first in Ferrante’s Neopolitan trilogy. Critics love the books, which all came out in the US in the last couple of years. Part of the fascination is Ferrante’s anonymity. She uses a pen name, doesn’t give interviews, doesn’t promote her books. There is even some speculation that she’s not a she. The press just eats that up. But the book itself, for me, was not especially gripping. I found the stories of growing up in Naples in the 1950s – still  desperate postwar years in southern Italy – very interesting. But her writing style feels monochromatic, rhythmically bland, and the cast of characters is vast, too vast for me to connect with. She doesn’t give as much flavor or texture to her characters as she does to their living situations, and since I primarily read for interesting character, I found myself not caring a great deal about what happened. I don’t think I will read the second two books in the trilogy, but we’ll see. It’s hard to let go of the story of these two women’s lives when it’s ended so early. I might need to see how things turn out.

#49 The Blue Flower, by Penelope Fitzgerald

Speaking of fuss, Penelope Fitzgerald, an author I never heard of until the last month, has been everywhere lately, even though she died in 2000. In fact, if you type the letters “p-e-n” into Google, she’s the first thing to come up – she's even ahead of Penelope Cruz! That’s some level of fame. It’s mostly due to the new autobiography by Hermione Lee that came out a couple of months ago and received all sorts of plaudits. But there also seems to be a resurgence of respect for an author who didn’t publish her first book until she was nearly 60 and then wrote one acclaimed book after another until she died at the age of 83. The Blue Flower is the fictionalized story of the poet Novalis, set in eighteenth-century Germany, and his love for Sophie, a twelve-year-old girl. He not only adores a child, she's a particularly dull, unattractive little girl. I didn’t find the delight in the story that so many readers and critics have; for me, it was as dull and unappealing as Sophie herself. I don’t think I’ll be visiting more of Ms. Fitzgerald’s work.

#50 The Last Anniversary, by Liane Moriarty

I guess that in addition to vowing to read a book a week, I should have also vowed to read the entire oeuvre of Australia’s Moriarty. Her books are perfect palate-cleansers after something more twisty and dense. This one centers on a long-ago mystery (a particularly easy one to unravel -- if I can solve it, you know it's easy) on a small island off of Sydney, and the family living there. It’s not as much fun as some of her others, but perfectly pleasant, like a nice light salad in between more elaborate feasts. 

#51 The Catcher in the Rye, by J.D. Salinger

Apparently another vow I made this year, unbeknownst to myself, was to re-read the complete works of J.D. Salinger. It was a bit of a rollercoaster ride. Loved some (Franny and Zooey!), liked a few, not crazy about some, bored to tears by one (Seymour, an Introduction). Catcher in the Rye generated a middling response. I can certainly see why it was a groundbreaking novel. And I can also see why I loved it so when I first read it in high school. I remember feeling that Holden spoke for me – all that angst, all that anger, all that disaffection. But reading it again fortysomething years later generates a different reaction. Salinger brilliantly captures the tortured mind of an intelligent adolescent. But it’s so damn hard to hang out in the mind of that adolescent, who is, in addition to being intelligent, insufferable. Holden is me at 16. And maybe I just found out that, at 16, I was a prick.