Talk Back

[ADORKABLE GRRL]

It took me much longer to read this book than I anticipated. My boyfriend gave it to me in the first couple of weeks we were dating (we met in March) stating that he thought I would "really enjoy it"... and, after I finished Chelsea Horror Hotel I picked it right up with the intention of reading it over a weekend.

Of course, then my life got insane (work, relationships, stuff) and I was hardly able to read a chapter before I put it back down again on my bedside table.

Boo.

And, as I really DID enjoy the first chapter of this book (its visuals were astonishingly vivid) I was determined not to let another book fall by the wayside. So, I did not do my normal "Kate Thing" and skip ahead to another, sexier, cooler book in my stack of books when I felt like I had lost my connection with this one... no, I went back and re-read (about five times, as I kept getting distracted) the chapters I'd already read so that I would be current in the narrative each time I tried to read further.

And, last night I finished it. It only took me three months to do so.

Anyhow. This is Jennifer Egan's (no relation to David Egan) first novel. It is a journey story - the journey of Phoebe, an 18-year-old girl obsessed with her dead older sister, Faith - Phoebe's journey into adulthood and across Europe to find out the truth of how her sister died eight years previous when she was 10.

The thing I liked about this book was the imagery. The places described and the feelings the protagonist has coursing through her on this journey are all very, very vivid - electrically so. The book is set in San Francisco (where I live) and Europe in the late 1970's and the theme is the lost innocence of the late 1960's and early 1970's. I found that the actual places in San Francisco which are described are very accurate. This pleased me, as I am not a fan of people writing in depth of places they’ve never been.

I do not know if the Europe locals are accurate - as I've never been to them.

One of my favorite parts of the book is the inner narration of Phoebe as she trips on LSD for the first time in Paris. It is humorous, sad and very accurate to having a bad trip (or, so I hear... I know NOTHING of those things.) My other favorite thing being the pervasiveness of the antagonist (the ghost of her sister Faith) haunting Phoebe clearly - as we all know that lost loves or loved ones can do - no matter where her journey took her.

I have to also say that though the end of the book was somewhat predictable - I thought it was appropriate. There are some books that you just know cannot end anyway but the way which one expects in their mind.

I found this book to be an intelligent and haunting exploration of the emotional growth and awakening of a child to a woman. Though I have never had a sibling die mysteriously in a foreign country, I can 100% identify with the struggle Phoebe went through to find herself and a peaceful resolution and way to lay her sister to rest.

Next Book: Good in Bed by Jennifer Weiner

(This should be a quick read - as a.) I'm on vacation, and b.) It looks like a fluff book... god love the beach book!)

-Kate
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HER ROYAL KATENESS, QUEEN OF ALL SHE SURVEYS