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: Legally Blonde Ambition

Melting Pot of Words....Beach Music****

By "Daisy Duke"

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First & foremost, I ask that every one of you takes a moment to think about what this day means & the ultimate sacrifice thousands of American's made in New York, Pennsylvania, and at the Pentagon in 2001. I am sure we all have our own memories, none pleasant, but let us never forget both the horror & the aftermath of that Tuesday morning.

Um. Sort of hard to transition away from that one without feeling, well, a little icky.

But, as promised I must post the reader-reviews of Beach Music. And, for all those who have something to say but are not done or did not have time to write something up, I solemnly promise if you send me a review I will add it & repost this post. *** Which has already started, so be sure to check back.

We are going to start with Grace's post because her's made me laugh the most & we will end with April becuase she picked the next book. Which, incidentally I just finished and I really enjoyed it. And I can't wait to write a post about my awesome super-powers.

So, take it away Grace:

From the moment I picked the book up, I was hooked. I loved it. I sent Daisy multiple text messages saying things like "OMG I F******* love this book!"

I told all my friends about it. I promised my copy to at least three people as soon as I was done reading it. (Ultimately my mom got it. She buys me furniture and stuff)

Now, about 2 weeks after having finished it, I don't really know what exactly it was I loved about it.

I dated this girl once. She was super hot. And really smart. She actually was a former Rose Bowl Princess. We only dated for about 2 months. And everything about that 2 months was awesome. And as soon as it was over, it was like it never even happened. I didn't miss her. I didn't think about her, and now, I don't even remember her name.

Beach Music, for me, was like the Rose Princess. Amazing while I was into it, but left absolutely no impression.*

I think ultimately there were too many characters and too many plot points which therefore, by necessity, required too many speedy (and implausible) resolutions.

Jack had conflicts with nearly every single person in the book with the exception of Leah and Jordan. And every single conflict was resolved without anything actually being done to resolve it, except more of the story being told. Jack goes from never wanting to see his brothers or his mother or his inlaws ever again, to loving them and needing them etc... without any of the characters ever evolving or anything changing. I don't know if that makes sense. It makes sense in my head.

And I thought that the characters of the brothers could have been more fully developed, with the exception of the schizophrenic, who was really interesting.

Basically there were a lot of stories going on, and I wanted to know more about all of them. That's what was good about the book. It kept me completely engaged, but at the end, I felt like a knew a little bit about a bunch of stuff that I wished I knew more about.

The Holocaust stories were haunting.
The schizophrenic brother was funny and sad, and awkward.
I thought the Ledare romance was kind of lame.
I wanted to know more about Shyla.
Leah's age seemed to fluctuate between 4 and 14.

The book seemed to be about forgiveness. And loyalty. And family. And love. And mental illness. And turtles. And deception. And childhood friends. And loss. And the Holocaust.

And I just don't think they tied it all in together very well.

But I still loved reading it.

Writing reviews is hard.

*Lame analogy used as a mechanism for letting everyone know I dated a Rose Princess.

Mackinak (just kidding!) Melissa was early-bird on sending her review in. Bonus points Melissa!

I was duly impressed by this book. I have to be honest; when I considered his previous novels (Prince of Tides) I was a bit wary. Typically, I don?t read books like this.

However, I really enjoyed the vivid descriptions of Jack McCall?s life, both in Italy & South Carolina.

I found myself moving quickly through the novel up until the Holocaust section and then with the mock trial. I really felt as though those sections slowed down the pace and made it a bit of a struggle to get to the end.

All in all, I think it was very successful first book club choice.

Followed by The Errant Yachtsman:

This is my first venture into the book club thing, I'm going to try really hard to keep my distance from Oprah, her book club, and everything else I hate about her (namely, everything), but I really, really, really liked this book. Upon reading the back of it, yes, I do judge books by their cover, I wasn't too excited. With mentions of romance, death, WW2, Vietnam, etc., I felt like this book could be really jumpy and move all over the place. However, I was extremely surprised by how digestible and flowing the book was.

At the risk of seeming scatterbrained, I'm just going to mention the points that still stick out in mind, having finished the book a week or two ago. To start, the scene where Conroy describes how Jack and Shyla fell in love in a house about to fall into the sea. I don't remember reading anything so descriptive in my life, and I felt like a fly on the wall and had a perfect image in my head of what Conroy was trying to convey.

The other huge image in my head, and one that kept me reading until 4 AM, was George Fox's epic retelling of the horrors of his Holocaust experience. At the outset of this chapter, I really despised George Fox and kept thinking "why the hell is he telling me this?" but towards the end, after being mentally exhausted from reading all that horrible stuff, understood when Conroy revealed to the reader that George has hated Jack all these years because Leah reminds him of his first wife, Sonia(?). After hearing the story of George, Sonia, that evil Nazi who takes Sonia as his whore, etc., it all makes sense and you begin to feel deep sympathy for him.

What I really appreciated about this book is that it did not become a romance novel. While from the outset I could see Jack and Ledare winding up together, and wanted them to after I learned more about them, I did not want to read about their romantic trials and tribulations, and follow them from reunion to wedding, but rather with the limited information given, it made me want to know more.

Next up, Beth from West Virginia:

I hadn't read Conroy previously and his writing style commanded my attention from the first page. At first I found the dialogue a little overwrought and asked myself, "Do people really talk like this?" The further I progressed, though, I realized that yes, particularly in that corner of the South, people do have a fondness for idiom, insult and strange similes not found elsewhere. Conroy captured this fondness for evocative, down-home speech well without contriving or pandering, I thought.

Neither had I previously encountered an author who juxtaposed the Holocaust with the happy-go-lucky South out of which beach music as a genre sprang. I think that only because of their exposure to these two extremes could each character could feel such extreme conflict as they did during the Vietnam era. This opposition was also the only way that their lives' passions, both positive (cooking, waterskiing) and negative (contempt toward family and friends) could run so deeply and so strong for so many decades, requiring, effectively, a judicial hearing for resolution. Again, that resolution didn't seem contrived, because Conroy's characters are not a caricature - people exposed to such conflict really do, I believe, carry it very firmly ingrained within them. Also the play of these opposites in each character gave each one a good side and a dark side. That type of character (also notable in HBO's The Wire) is my favorite type.

Finally, I'm interested to hear what others thought about the loggerhead turtles as a symbol. Obviously they represent the life cycle, particularly in the custody of young Leah and dying Lucy, but it seems that they may symbolize something more. I couldn't pinpoint it and I'm wondering if anyone else did.

Anonymoust Hottie had things to say too:

So, Beach Music. Things I liked:

* the underlying stories connecting all of the town together

* the turtles

Things I disliked:

* the use of metaphors and similes in every freaking sentence

* the dialogue - none of it was remotely believable

* the characters. from the slimy ones like Capers, to the ultimately weak ones, like Jack, who succumbed to all of his "friends'" whims. Seriously, why would he help them out? And the little girl? Just, no. No child speaks like that, I don't care how precocious she was.

* the suicide note. You don't get to kill yourself and then reserve everyone around you for later. No.

Thing I hated the most:

* the big trial at the end. Puh-leaze. I am so sure groups of friends get together and have faux trials, in theaters!, to resolve their differences. Hmm, on second thought, maybe we should start doing that . . .

Ultimately, I liked the stories that all came together and explained the eccentricities of the town - they held my attention, were outrageous and extreme but still plausible, and could have made for some interesting characters. But the style of writing was just not my thing. The book could easily have been 300 pages shorter and told the same story. And as I mentioned, I hated the way the characters interacted. NO ONE talks like that, and it made it hard to believe the characters, or to care about them - I usually rolled my eyes during extended "conversations". And I am not from the south, so I suppose I could be wrong, but I really don't think it is possible for an entire geographical region to be so fucking tragic all of the time. Also, if my friends sucked as much as that Mike dude, we simply wouldn't be friends, I don't care how much "history" we shared. It wasn't my least favorite book of all time (hellooooo Sound and the Fury), but I won't be reading any more books by Pat Conroy, either. On to the superhero book!!!

And so did BISMOW/The Wayward Esquire (mostly becuase I told him he had to make his own dinner if he didn't write something):

Ok, so here. I think I have to first make the comment that I really did enjoy reading this book. And a good portion of that sentiment is that this is not something I would have ever picked up on my own. I just wouldn't have. But I would have missed out if I hadn't read it.

I think one of the more realistic themes in all of this is the family angst. This is something that everyone experiences to some degree or another and it can be handled in many different ways. Right or wrong, the way it was addressed in the book was unimportant. The issue itself added a certain realism to the plot line and forced the reader to relate to some of the emotions the characters felt.

I was also a fan of the way the protagonist forced himself to change as the book went on. I'm not sure I'm a strong enough or introspective enough person to do the same, but I admire that willingness to put oneself in less than favorable situations or change positions because it would be "better" as an end result. That said, there were some definite moments where I likely would have told the characters around me to "Eff off" and gone back to being a relative hermit.

Those are my initial comments. I'll try to chime in with my observations towards other people's thoughts as well...

Eddie of course, was very verbose. I think it is because he is British.

This was the first Pat Conroy book that I had read, and it is clear that he has a "larger-than-life" way of describing his characters, as well as pretty much everything else he chooses to describe. It's a writing style which I must admit that I struggle with; I felt quite overwhelmed by the sheer number of similes and analogies that were contained in the prologue - almost every other line was pushing some form of literary rhetoric, and I must admit that I almost gave up with the book at that early stage. But I convinced myself that it might just be his prologue style, and once the story began, they would dissipate somewhat. Thankfully this was the case - not gone for good, but dramatically reduced in frequency.

The overall story that Conroy weaved was an interesting one, but again I felt that certain areas were lost in his eagerness to be verbose at every opportunity. I don't think the story moved well between the many decades it was covering, although I can accept that it's not the easiest of tasks. When there is so much wandering between decades, though, I think it's important to keep the plot as tight as possible; my early attention was drawn towards Martha, Shyla's sister, who plays quite an instrumental role early in the book, only to never be heard of again - maybe it was just my mind expecting her to be mentioned, or to show up as the story progressed, but it did seem a little odd that she vanished from the plot. I also found Jack's motives to be off kilter throughout the book - for a steadfast and stubborn man, turning his back on his roots for the sake of his daughter, moving to Italy, basically cutting all ties to his previous life, he does seem to be rapidly convinced to allow Martha to see Leah, as well as numerous other plot turns that open the door to his return.

I also found some sections of the story to be a little too cliche, or just really unnecessary - the time spent lost at sea didn't really advance any of the story in my mind, and some of the Vietnam and protesting sections just seemed quite tiresome in their stereotyping. I didn't find many of the characters to be at all likable, or maybe I didn't find them believable, and I found Shyla's letter at the end to be a shallow attempt to tug at the reader's emotional strings. And it might just be me, but I found Leah to be plain weird - I'm sure there are little kids with more maturity and a better vocabulary than every adult around them, but it just seemed to be a little creepy at times. By the end of the book, I was hoping that the loggerhead turtles would come back and take her away to be their turtle princess. But that didn't happen - maybe in Beach Music 2?

So, I obviously didn't enjoy the book, but I would say that I think it's more Conroy's style that I don't enjoy - I do see how people do love this sort of novel though - its "larger-than-life" style does make the characters and the story jump out at you, and for many people it has the power of pulling them more into the story, but for me it just tends to push me away. That's just down to my personal preference in writing style, and knowing that many people in this little book club will have adored this book, and the fact that random people came up to me when I was reading the book to tell me that it is their "favourite. book. ever.", it just goes to show how different people are pulled in different literary directions, and emphasizes what a great idea it is to have such a book club as this, where we can examine such directions, and see what makes each of us tick!"

Now onto "Soon I Will Be Invincible"

My take on the whole dang book:

Well, um I did in fact pick this book. Mostly because I read it and I loved it. As Scarlett (who incidentally, promised to write something and did not...slacker) said in a text to me:"Ahh- "I gave her the city of Charleston, as a gift." - Swoon!!"

I could go on and on but I think my favorite part of the book was the love story between Jack & Shlya. The opening scene and the description of their time in Italy made me hope for having such passion and romance in my life. (You got that BISMOW?) I also loved his descriptions of food- truffles, pasta sauce, fresh crabmeat, mmmmmmm. And I did, like many people, really enjoy the storyline about the turtles.

Don't forget Freefaller:

So I still haven't "technically" finished the book (and by technically, I mean I'm about 2/3 of the way through it) but after reading the other reviews (by the way, I think a little "spoiler alert!" would be helpful for some of them) I felt inspired. Plus I really don't want to render any more elevations for at least 10 minutes. My mouse hand hurts.

So far, I can't decide if I like the book. I find myself not able to put it down because I want to see what happens (and because I insist at only stopping at chapter ends, and Conroy's chapter's are like ridiculously long), but also not always wanting to pick it back up again. I think I agree with a lot of other people's opinions that his writing style is just not right. The dialogue is a little tricky to get into because, honestly, who talks like that? The only person who's character is fully developed enough to imagine them talking the way Conroy writes, is Lucy. No 4, 6, 8, 14 or however old she is speaks like Leah speaks. They just don't. Not even geniuses. It's not believable.

My other big problem with the book is that there's just too much going on. I was trying to explain the plot to a coworker the other day, and I found myslef telling 5 different stories, but not able to put them all together. The part where Mike wants to produce a movie about their families and their lives is clearly the reason that Jack tells/finds out all this history, but I think Conroy needs to either write a history book, or write a book about long-lost friends. Because they don't go together well at all.

However, with all the different plot lines, I do think that I enjoy most of them. I enjoy hearing about the history and the trials and tribulations of the wars, the liked reading about Jack's time in Italy, and what girl doesn't love a good love story? I just think that I would have enjoyed them all separately.

And finally, April:

I haven't done a book review since high school English! Saying "OMG, awesome book" doesn't seem quite right for a book club review, but all the same...OMG, awesome book! I found myself getting so drawn into the story that I didn't want to put it down, even at 1am, fighting to keep my eyes open from a long day. I spent just about every spare moment in the car, at home, getting my pedicure, wherever reading. I knew about the Holocaust from history class, but this book gave such a personal feel, my heart broke as I read. Throughout the book I found my brain jumping ahead...I wonder if Jack and Ledare will end up together, what about Jordan...he has to get closure. I tried to fight it because I find myself creating an ending that sometimes disappoints. I also found myself wanting it to turn into some sort of mystery in that it was just a dream and at some point Jack would wake up and Shyla would be there. I wanted more of her character. While she wasn't "there" she added so much to the story. I was hoping that Lucy wouldn't die...I wanted her to have some miraculous recovery, the same with the Judge...I was hoping that he would be there for Jack & Ledare's wedding, all cleaned up. I want to read it again...I'm sure there's so much that I missed because I read it so fast trying to find out what happened next. I'm passing it on to my mom. Since I was reading it while I should have been socializing with her or swimming in the lake this past weekend, she wants to read it.

I can tell how much I enjoy and get into a book by how much I remember afterwards, then entire story seems so vivid in my mind. There isn't a piece that I can't remember the details to.

Oh, and admittedly, I cried when I read the letter from Shyla and the conversation that followed.

Ok so there we have it- start commenting!!!

Full post as published by Legally Blonde Ambition on September 11, 2008 (boomark / email).

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