Five Stars for One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest by Ken Kesey

One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest by Ken Kesey is a frightening book about alleged insanity and abuse of power. Told by Chief Bromden, the silent Indian in an insanity institution, the reader gets the inside scoop on conman Randall McMurphy and Ice Queen Nurse Ratched. Written in 1859, this book rails against the rules of modern society particularly WASP - White Anglo-Saxon Protestant, or really any kind of institution that cripples the individual. Randall McMurphy is the hero of this book, flawed, yes, and maybe even insane, but his character is so beautifully written one can't help but root for him. However, Nurse Ratched, Big Nurse (Big Brother) is the villain. We are not suppose to root for her, but reading this book for a second time, I found pity for her. She is oppressed by the rules governed by order and routine. She is not an individual but a society stiff in its own oppression. I even found myself not feeling sorry for Mr. McMurphy because part of me found him to be insane and worse in a forever state of despair which is largely worse. In the end, I found Chief Bromden as my personal hero. Yes, great book and one that is not forgotten. 

5 Stars for Don Quixote

I started this book in March and finished it in August. It is indeed a long book, but one that I often put on rewind, because "Knight Errant" Don Quixote and squire Sancho Panza's adventures were an unbelievable buffoonery. I love it! He did what? Quixote thought an inn is a castle and windmills giants. Really? It reminded me of Monty Python's In Search of the Holy Grail. I could not stop laughing and reread much of it just to laugh again at it.

Further, I often tell my students that nothing is original. Everything stems from the Bible, Homer, or Shakespeare, but now I have to include Cervantes. The puns on Panza's parables and general speech were so familiar to me in movies and books I've read. This story generally felt like an old friend and darkly humorous.

After awhile in the book, Panza's buffoonery wore on me and was not as funny, and my feelings of Quixote became admirable because of his intense insane sense of doing right against the wrongs in the world. He was genuinely a good guy despite being crazy. Not to spoil, but I was not happy with the Duke and Duchess. How dare you?

I fell in love with this book and will read it more than once. Yes, it makes fun of knights but it doesn't make fun of what they stand for and it is that irony that makes Cervantes brilliant.

A big thanks to my brother-in-law for this recommendation!

4 Stars for The Power by Naomi Alderman

The Power by Naomi Alderman takes science fiction to a level of realism that looks like a Francis Bacon painting. The particular Bacon painting that comes to mind is "Study after Velázquez's Portrait of Pope Innocent X," painted in 1953. Without the history behind this painting, it is a man who is fading in power. The Power is like that. Men lose their power as women become stronger, shooting lightning with the flick of their fingers. It's beautiful, mesmerizing, but terrifying. I did not see this book as particularly feminist despite the concept, but a book about power and what each individual does with it. I love how Alderman analysis power outside of gender, "The shape of power is always the same: it is infinite, it is complex, it is forever branching." I was also intrigued by the biblical references of the snake(aka skein), the rescue of Israel, and Mother Eve. It definitely makes the reader ponder rooted ideas about the beginnings of power in the same way I did when I read Margaret Atwood's poem, "Quattrocento". Despite, the excellent concept and plot making, I enjoyed Roxy's character the most. She is a Joan Jett bad ass singing Love Hurts through the novel. I greatly appreciated her resilience. Overall, this book was close to a five star review from me, but the beginning dragged with exposition and I did not get into some very onion peeling worth characters until much later. I absolutely recommend this book to men and women because we all need to question what power means to each one of us.

4 Stars for The Cambridge Companion to Margaret Atwood

The Cambridge Companion to Margaret Atwood by Coral Ann Howells was recommended to me by a friend and colleague who teaches Atwood poems to advanced students. I plan to teach The Handmaid's Tale this year and wanted more insight into it. I also want to use more of Atwood's poetry that is not easily accessible with a quick online search. Often students will look up the meaning of a poem or novel and this squashes their initial critical thinking. Generally, I like to read a novel first with only my third eye. 

I enjoyed the essay, Blindness and survival in Margaret Atwood's major novels, by Sharon R. Wilson. Wilson illustrated an insightful approach to novels like Oryx and Crake and Cat's Eye. I will have to read Oryx and Crake now, but I still did not connect with Cat's Eye. I really didn't like the narrator, Elaine, despite the interesting survival journey Atwood presented. I just don't like an emotionless character, even when the writer picked a palette of greys that lead to a marble in a red pocketbook, an insufficient ending. Offred in Handmaid's Tale also seemed void of emotion, but the situation made her character work for me rather than Elaine's. Offred had a reason to become indifferent. Her choices were eliminated. Elaine seemed to have too much choice. 

Novels aside, I also enjoyed Branko Gorjup's Margaret Atwood's poetry and poetics. I adore Atwood's poem, Quattrocento. The line, "The kingdom of god is within you/because you ate it." Gorjup says, "Eve is metamorphosed into a true protean self as the whole of a diverse creation disappears into her and she is a free agent now, alive with possibility."

Eve as a free agent is fantastical. 

I ended up with a four star rating for this, because some of it I did not understand as well as I would have liked on a first read, but I've only read three Atwood novels and a few poems. I will have to change that. 

5 Stars for All the Rage #4 Repairman Jack by F. Paul Wilson

All the Rage #4 Repairman Jack by F. Paul Wilson is not a new generation thing, but more of a catchy title for a new gym filled with psycho steroid driven folks. So far, in the series, Repairman Jack has faced mythical monsters, the otherness, medical miracles, but this 4th book leads Jack to face a new beast - much closer to him. Top five reasons you should read All the Rage:

5. This book is All the Rage and you really can't fully experience it without the other 3 books preceding this one. But, it seriously can be read as a stand alone.
4. Ironic tire in the sky killing.
3. The Ozymandias Prather Oddity Emporium2. There is a Dragon-ovic.1. Loki and shapeshifting

Just Jack, gotta love him! 

4 Stars for Bunny by Mona Awad

Bunny by Mona Awad felt like a ride in Alice's Wonderland except one bunny was a collective whole of a group of privileged paper doll cutouts of girls writing at a school Fitzgerald worthy. Sam, the main character, stands out not like Gatsby more a mirror meditating on the opposite wall gazing at the bunny deciding whether or not to follow it(them) down the hole of truth. A definite plot in this story is deliberately ignored, because where Sam ends up and what she wants is unclear. This is a journey in the mind of a writer and you have to decipher the real from the unreal, characters from real people. This story turns dark with shimmers of light on short blades of grass. The writing is beautiful and very Atwood, so I love it. I enjoyed the odyssey because the writing often made very mundane daily observations amazing. My four star review came from not liking the ending. It felt cliche' in a book that took risk in being anything but.

4 Stars for The Testaments

The Testaments is not The Handmaid's Tale, but it is well-written and has an Aunt Lydia. The Testaments is told in three perspectives, two teenage girls and Aunt Lydia. Aunt Lydia stole the spotlight in this book. Her perspective made her human, and demanded respect. She was a manipulative, clever witch who created her own broomstick from a strand of straw. She is the reason for my four star rating. One star is subtracted for the two teenage girls. The one girl, no names, who grew up in Canada, came across as a spoiled brat who never seemed to understand the lack of freedom the other girl faced. Aunt Lydia, a true survivor of the times, understood all of it. I started out hating Aunt Lydia, and then my hatred grew to indifference out of pity. Aunt Lydia was a victim not just at the beginning, but throughout her life She constantly had to look over her shoulder for the choices she made. She was a much more complicated villain than the cold heated witch I first pegged her for. The  Testaments is pretty predictable, but who cares, after The Handmaid's Tale I needed something hopeful and a little less dark. I needed the good guys to have some leverage. After watching the show, and reading The Handmaid's Tale I needed a branch to pull me out of my quick sand funk. The Testaments is that branch. I highly recommend reading it!