Staff Review: Feel Free by Zadie Smith

In one of the pieces in novelist Zadie Smith's new essay collection, Feel Free, she writes that knowledgeable people -- educated people who not only pursue a craft or profession, but are also connoisseurs of Baroque music, say, or Renaissance art or French wine -- intimidate her, cause her to feel an almost-existential angst.

This seems odd because the overwhelming impression one has after reading Smith's new collection is "How can one person know so much?" Really. Smith writes (a lot), she travels, she teaches, she gives speeches, she's got a mate and a couple little kids. How does she do it?

What's even more remarkable is that she can write about so many different subjects, highbrow to low, without ever seeming pretentious, condescending, or dull. Rather, she seems down-to-earth, self-deprecating, just plain nice.

The topics of Feel Free's essays, many of which were originally written for New York Review of Book, New Yorker, and Harper's, run the gamut from Brexit to Jay-Z, British artist Lynette Yiadom-Boakye to Justin Bieber, portraitist Bathasar Denner to installation artist Sarah Sze. She writes about Key & Peele, Orson Welles, Billie Holiday, and Mark Zuckerberg. There are also book reviews and essays on joy, despair, optimism, climate change, writing, gentrification, and more.

Smith's a wonderful writer and her essays are engaging and personal because she's passionately engaged with life and acutely worried about the state of the world. If you're like me, reading her collection may make you feel like a bit of an underachiever, but you'll know a lot more when you finish than you did at the start and that's a small achievement in itself, right?

~Ann, Adult Services



 

Bingeworthy TV: Psych

Attention all 80's trivia lovers (children of the 80s, especially)! Psych is a hilarious cozy mystery television show - with wacky high jinks galore and nods to all sorts of popular culture references of the 1980s and beyond.

The show centers on two friends, Shawn Spencer (James Roday) and Burton Guster - known as Gus (Dulé Hill). Shawn has extremely keen observation skills (drilled in him from an early age by his tough-cop father played by Corbin Bernsen). His observations are so good in fact, that in the pilot episode, he finds himself about to be fingered as the criminal - because no one could possibly know all that he knew about the crime unless he was the one who did it. In an act of desperation and self-preservation, Shawn pretends that he knows all about the crime because he is psychic.

Shawn then decides to capitalize on this and his new relationship with the Santa Barbara Police Department by creating a detective agency called "Pysch" and working for the police on the side. He drags his none-too-enthusiastic best friend Gus into the endeavor.

The episodes treat crime in the typically cozy mystery fashion - not much gore, and very lighthearted given the topic. It is very fast-paced and energetic. The fantastic chemistry between Shawn and Gus is electric: the funny lines are flying and there are blink and you miss it moments of subtle hilarity throughout. The rest of the cast are great too, but the heart of the shows lies with Shawn and Gus and their sincere friendship.

There are cameos by a number of familiar faces from the 80s - these are a particular fun treat. Look for their Halloween episodes, which are surprisingly scary and suspenseful, and the fantastic homages to the film Clue (1985) and the TV show Twin Peaks (1990-1991). There are 8 seasons of Psych and 1 musical (yes, a musical!) - all of which are available to check out at Carnegie-Stout Public Library. These two best friends make great detectives and a great show to binge-watch.

~Angie, Adult Services

Staff Review: Since We Fell by Dennis Lehane

Sometimes it’s difficult for me to tell if I’m really enjoying a book while I’m reading it, until weeks later I find the story lingering in my mind. This was the case with Since We Fell, though it has less to do with Dennis Lehane’s writing style than it does with my not frequenting the mystery genre. When you’re trying out something new, there’s a give and take to whether the new stuff sticks or not. Often, the results aren’t settled immediately after finishing the book.

I’ve read a few other reviews of this book online. Some people claim that it took the story a while to get going when compared to other Lehane novels. I certainly didn’t experience that. I had the advanced reader copy on my phone and stayed up late a few nights reading it, ignoring the inconvenience of reading ten lines of text per page and staring into the vortex of the iPhone (sometimes with one eye shut) in the night bedroom. I often forced myself to stay awake to gather the next piece of the puzzle.

The book opens dramatically; our protagonist has a gun in her hand and she’s just shot her husband. She’s grappling to make sense of the discordant feeling of love she has for him. The gun has been used, and now we want to find out why. We jump backward in Rachel Child’s life to figure out how she got into this situation and what could have brought this unassuming girl to such violence.

The book has three sections with separate plot devices pushing the narrative. In the first, we get an overview of our protagonist’s developing years as well as the first intrigue that drives the plot—Rachel’s search for the father whose identity her mother kept secret. Toward the end of the first section, Rachel departs for a career as a reporter. She makes a name for herself covering large-scale events. She is sent to Haiti upon the catastrophic 7.0 magnitude earthquake to cover the devastation and subsequent cholera outbreak. After some extremely traumatic experiences and an emotional outburst on camera, she loses her job.

The second section attempts to restore some normalcy to Rachel’s life. She’s suffering severe panic attacks and stays mostly within the confines of her apartment, but she has a seemingly comfortable relationship with her new husband. He’s supportive of her fragile mental state and they share a strong connection. They get each other’s sense of humor, share the same friends, and catch each other’s pop-culture references. Toward the end of this section, as Rachel starts to work up the courage to leave their apartment, we begin to suspect that either her husband is leading a double life or Rachel’s paranoia is pulling her further from stability. This triggers the next mystery that continues through the third section.

The third section is the most action-packed and climactic of the book. Rachel is pulled into a dangerous world beyond anything the first part has set up. Murder, more mind games, and two ruthless men with guns keep this section moving along.

Since We Fell was a fast read, with a storyline full of intrigue and suspense and tied to relevant world events from the year 2000 on. Lehane’s characters share a sarcastic sense of humor and refer to pop culture from their formative years on (Radiohead, Tom Waits, Beyoncé). My only gripe is, for all the background provided and events that happen to them, the characters lack depth. They’re written as if Lehane’s more concerned with making them hip than relatable. Rachel has suffered traumatic events, but panic attacks aside, we don’t sense any complex emotions. The characters tend most often to sarcasm and cultural allusion, which makes the dark story more fun, but leaves the characters themselves rather like clichés. The book could be taken to another level with a marriage of its wit to more complex psychology. That would make it another kind of novel though. What we have is still an expertly crafted, hip, and suspenseful storyline sure to be fun for fans of the genre.

~Ben, Adult Services

#ComicsWednesday: The Wicked + The Divine by Kieron Gillen, Jamie McKelvie, and Matthew Wilson

Gear up, folks, for a #TagTeamComicsWednesday review!

This week Libby and Sarah team up to gush about one of their favorite comic series: The Wicked + The Divine by writer Kieron Gillen, artist Jamie Mckelvie, and colorist Matthew Wilson (plus some notable guest artists along the way).

PLOT SUMMARY

Twelve gods are incarnated as humans every ninety years. They become famous for what they are, treated like the ultimate celebrities. Within two years, all twelve of them are dead. We follow teen and ultimate fangirl Laura as she is given the chance to meet her heroes. Upfront warning: there is violence, death, sex, drug use, and all sorts of things that make this comic very much for adults.

If you’re waiting for the American Gods television series to premiere at the end of this month, The Wicked + The Divine might help tide you over. Likewise, if you’re waiting for The Wicked + The Divine Vol. 5 to hit the library shelves in June, check out American Gods by Neil Gaiman (if you haven't already).

OUR THOUGHTS

Okay, I'm just going to state right up front that avoiding spoilers is going to be SO HARD. But for any readers who have managed to exist on the internet without encountering major spoilers for this series, I do not want to ruin the experience for you. Even though I'm pretty sure Libby and I could fill this entire post with our favorite fan theories and unanswered questions.

SO MANY QUESTIONS. SO FEW ANSWERS. It's one of the best and most frustrating things about this series. If you're a fan of cliffhangers, TW+TD has you covered.

But oh boy, do tiny, cryptic references pay off BIG later on down the line.

Yeah, like “I hope you were paying attention to that random one-liner in the first issue because THAT MEANS EVERYTHING NOW AND NOTHING WILL EVER BE OKAY AGAIN.” I mean, that might be an exaggeration, but that’s how it makes me feel.

Haha. No. You were right: nothing WILL ever be okay again. Don’t get too attached to anyone. This is some Game of Thrones level of say goodbye to your favorites...

Best idea: don’t pick favorites. Easier said than done, but it’s the only way to escape emotional trauma. But before the reader gets the wrong idea, this series is 100% worth the emotional trauma. I think one of my favorite things about this series is the worldbuilding

The worldbuilding starts subtle. This feels like a very contemporary England, with fairly regular people, but they gradually add in the history and depth through bits and pieces and cryptic hints until before you know it you’re signed up for a fictional character’s mailing list.

I knew I wasn’t the only one who signed up for that list. I also learned more about gods and goddesses than I ever thought I would, and I went through a mythology phase as a child, so...

That mythology phase must be a librarian thing ;) But this is some Advanced Level mythology. Some of these gods and goddesses were totally new to me.

The array of gods and goddesses from different cultures, as well as how they interact, is fascinating. UGH, there is so much I want to type in all caps here, but there is only so much flailing we can put on the official library blog.

Okay, sure, but. The characters. How can I not flail when there are such dimensional, human, fallible yet lovable characters? EVEN MIRROR FACE THE AWFUL. Even him. A little.

Daft Punk Is Playing At My Pantheon? I KNOW. I can’t even pick a favorite character to talk about. They are all so realistic while somehow still being otherworldly. I think we have to at least talk about Laura, our POV character.

Laura is right up there in my genuine favs. Not just because she’s the regular human fangirl view to this whole supernatural circus that we’re MEANT to identify with as readers completely new to this universe, but because she has a self-awareness and is just so totally herself.

We identify with Laura right away, but her growth through the series is why I love her so much. She starts out as a fangirl, blogging and tweeting about this Pantheon, but when she meets them, they’re much more human than she expected.

And she handles that, both the excitement of meeting her heroes and the disappointment of their not being quite the people she imagined, so very well. So much better than I would’ve at 18.

This comic is, in a word, intense.