Lucky You by Erika Carter

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If you did not read Lucky You by Erika Carter, nor did you select it as part of your Book of the Month Club box, of which it was selected in January 2017, then lucky you.

I've managed to read about three Book of the Month Club picks over the years, mainly due to finding them at second-hand book stores, and they have all been very strange; like the Book Pickers are trying to prove to the world their maudlin intellect. Well Carter's debut novel, Lucky You, is not only a waste of a BOTM selection, but a waste of paper and a waste of time.

Rachel, Ellie, and Chloe are frenemies, each stuck in their own cycles of self-destruction; you know the drill: sex, bad relationships, too much booze. Then Rachel up and moves deep into the Ozark mountains with a man who is sure that he can change the world by learning, and writing about, and thus teaching, how to live off-grid and on the land. Ellie and Chloe are eventually convinced to join the couple at their remote house and work on The Project. What is an otherwise interesting and intriguing concept, not only fell short but will live forever in my mind as one of the worst books I've ever read. Not only do these insipid characters with a proclivity for claiming Chinese proverbs as their own, not "solve the conundrum of being alive," they struggle with getting their would-be cult off the ground in favor of depressive loafing.

The writing is slow and dispiriting, and grey and frigid, despite writing scenes that supposedly take place in intense heat. "She had to pee. Then she flushed," is the sort of riveting storyline that you can expect from this droll, much more lame, non-serial-killer, version of Emma Cline's The Girls. Lucky You is one big bad mood that is so nicely summed up by one paragraph: "they traded turns talking in stream of conscious monologues. After a while, they weren't even listening to each other, it was more about just filling the air with the comfortable lilts and turns of story." Lucky You is like reading Carter's disoriented, rough-draft of her own personal journal. There is no real point, prompting me to wonder, Why am I reading this book? Many books of this similar genre are bound to be far better, can I even give this one star?

Good Morning, Midnight by Lily Brooks-Dalton

During these often bleak and always confusing times, it feels crass to theme-read. Then again, it is at precisely these moments when we can really benefit from the empathetic value of reading someone else's story, fictional or not. Reading others' situations or perspectives can help us better understand our own situations and perspectives, which is why I was particularly drawn to Lily Brooks-Dalton's short novel, Good Morning, Midnight. In all the bibliophilic blaspheme, I picked up the book solely based on the cover, but the synopsis is what made me plunk down the money and buy it.

Dedicated researcher, Augustine, is nearing the end of his work and the end of his life when he decides to ignore evacuation orders from the Arctic due to some cataclysmic event in the developed world. Knowing he will die there, alone, he is wrapping up his work when he discovers a little girl named Iris among the gear, and suddenly his perspective is shifted. 

Sully - short for Sullivan - is aboard the first space mission to Jupiter and, with her crew, is headed home to an Earth they haven't received communication from in over year. What unfolds is a melodic, profound, existential look into the personal lives we lead and how an uncertain crisis can help us better understand ourselves, for better or worse.

If you're looking for a fast-paced read, or think it will be based on the synopsis, then this is not the book for you. It is a slow-moving 252-page story that - had it been any longer - I probably would have abandoned. The writing is dramatic and meant to be absorbed rather than glossed over, with the main focal points of the story being on how our perspectives are altered in spite of - or because of - even the best-laid plans. Though the story is slow, it is beautiful and lyrical and unexpectedly engrossing, and the crystal-clear imagery both paints the timeless beauty of each different, yet inherently similar, landscape, and is a haunting parallel to each characters' self-imposed isolation.

Although the "cataclysmic event" is rumored to have something to do with war, it is difficult not to draw immediate similarities to what is going on in our current world. Brooks-Dalton perfectly encapsulates the fear and confusion and hope and unexplainable calm yet deep uncertainty that we are all currently grappling with during our own self-imposed isolation. In another way, it is also a good example of the struggles we are having with solitary as well as group isolation. And Good Morning, Midnight really makes the effort to underscore the reasons we feel the need to complain about our current circumstances, both in the importance of having a task to perform, work to do - as in Sully's case - as well as having something or someone besides ourselves to take care of - as in Augustine's.

Good Morning, Midnight really is a great book, though the reflection of current events might not be some readers' cup up tea. And while I am glad the book isn't any longer, there is a particular aspect of the ending that some readers may find frustrating, though this book is most definitely not supposed to be centered around the apocalypse. ⭐⭐⭐⭐/5 on goodreads.

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Force of Nature by Jane Harper

"Five women go on a hike.

Only four return."

And marked down 75-percent off at Barnes and Noble, how could I not? Unsurprisingly, though, the hiking bits are the most interesting and entertaining, and it reminded me why reading the words, "When Detective/Investigator So-And-So.." on the book jacket is an instant book-boner downer and makes me return it to its rightful place on the shelf: police novels are DULL. In Jane Harper's Force of Nature, the investigative routine makes up about 70-percent of the story, but the rest is a grave disappointment.

Five women on a company-mandated retreat - Bree, her twin sister Beth, Jill, Lauren, and Alice - set out on a three-day supposed team-building hike through the Australian bushland. Personalities and pay-grades clash from the start, and - as Lauren states, "It was a hundred things that went wrong." Chief among them, Senior Level Alice, goes missing, a woman who has been working with Financial Crimes investigator, Aaron Falk and his partner, Carmen, to bring down the very company she works for. Everyone has a motive to get rid of her, including Alice for choosing to walk away from the group on her own, one of the many possibilities, and everyone has a reason to lie.

I didn't read the first of the Falk series, The Dry, so maybe that is why I find Falk and Carmen to be the most uninteresting characters ever. The switching back and forth between the groups each chapter makes it difficult to focus, and the chapter with a hint of sexual tension is ultimately fruitless and mostly uninteresting (although I'm sensing this will gradually change with future Falk novels). Harper adds a lot of mysterious elements, which gives the reader too many options instead of surprises. And although those elements are what propel the story forward, their contribution to the overall plot is minimal; by the time I finished skimming the last 40-pages, I felt like I had just watched a very long episode of CSI: Miami. *puts on sunglasses*

Force of Nature is written well, the premise is intriguing, though weakly executed, and the ending is a disappointment, and just a tiny bit sexist. I don't find anything glaringly wrong with the book, a la Lauren, "It was a hundred things that went wrong." ⭐⭐/5 on goodreads.

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I Am Behind You by John Ajvide Lindqvist

What, in the name of all that is Holy, did I just fucking read?

And so begins a long line of similar sentiments on the goodreads review board for John Ajvide Lindqvist's I Am Behind You, a title - much like the book - that is completely pointless and devoid of meaning and ultimately stupid. Apparently, this WTF-factor is not unfamiliar to readers of Lindqvist's previous books, but it will most likely be the reason that I never read - much less pay any more library late-fees for - one of his books again.

Waking up one morning in a Swedish campsite (not unlike many you find in America), a group of adults, two young children, a dog, and a cat find that everything has disappeared; no additional campers besides them, no additional caravans, no trees, no roads, no water, and no sun. Just blue sky and a grass that doesn't grow. What starts out as intensely creepy, gradually turns into the story with no ending; just one, long, constant stream of consciousness, like the ramblings of an old man who had the weirdest dream and remembers every last detail. But, not only does it get hard to focus, keep names and places straight, and is inherently meaningless, it is also gross, disturbing, and something you're just better off not knowing.

It is written well enough, capturing the spirit - the essence - of each character in a way that is expressly unique to them; and oftentimes profound, offering up several quotes that resonated with me, personally. But as the pages reach the end, the book goes from being a cross between The Shining, LOST, The Langoliers, and every horror movie you've ever seen involving creepy children, to a hodgepodge of lack-luster horror that even the characters aren't afraid of anymore. It goes the way of Nick Cutter's The Deep in that there comes a point when Lindqvist is just trying too hard to be controversial, and the payoff is nil. There is no happy ending, no conclusive ending - also like The Deep, the story just...stops. There is, literally, no ending, which means I could have stopped reading this book about 200-pages - or three weeks - ago, and now it is one of the few that I won't remember much of but when I see it or am reminded of it, will make me scrunch my nose in disgust.

Dubbed "the Stephen King of Sweden," and even though I find King to be exhausting on a whole other level, you're better off just reading a Stephen King novel. Like I Am Behind You, any of his books might also give you nightmares, but they will at least be nightmares that make sense. This book was definitely not worth the time, effort, or library late fees. ⭐/5 on goodreads.com.