Tag: library book

Several People Are Typing

~ Wendy-Marie ~ Leave a comment

One day I will learn to NOT try writing reviews while the spouse is on the couch watching videos.

But today isn’t the day.

Today is give commentaries on a let’s play video day.

Which in a way actually works for Calvin Kasulke’s Several People Are Typing. Between the let’s play gamer and the spouse it’s like being trapped in a Slack channel or chat or whatever it’s called (the actual job uses MS Team vs Slack so I’m not exact hip to the lingo). For those even less hip/out of the loop than me, Several People Are Typing is written as various Slack channels at a NYC public relations firm. It works. There are difficult accounts, a PR disaster, interoffice fun and games, a love affair complete with messaging the wrong person and one particular coworker who claims he is stuck in the Slack channels.

If you’ve worked in an office you’ve heard all sorts of reasons why people are calling out/unable to come into the office but stuck in the Slack channels isn’t one I’ve ever heard in all my years as an cube dweller. But Gerald claims he got stuck while browsing his winter coat spreadsheet. The dude made spreadsheet for picking out the perfect winter coat?!?!?! says the person who had a near meltdown trying to find the perfect matchy-matchy athletics leggings and top last month.

Back to Gerald. His coworkers, very skeptical…at first. Honestly, as an essential worker who has to go into the office everyday? I’m quite envious of the remote/hybrid workers. But when you work in an office with a coworker who claims to hear howling everywhere, another coworker is auctioning off a prime desk, and your boss is convinced the custodial staff are messing with his adjustable desk, is saying you’re sucked into the Slack channels really that odd?

I could go on and on about the meaning of technology and how we are losing ourselves to said technology. Are we becoming one with our tech? Can we exist without tech? But I’m not that sort of reviewer.

I’m the sort of reviewer who is going to enjoy peeking into people’s messages, wants to see Gerald’s spreadsheet and I imagine the public relations firm’s NYC office as a cross between a BBC sitcom and the really weird episode of Black Mirror when the game designer gets stuck in his game. I’m the reviewer who counts the pages and wonders how/if Gerald is ever going back into his own body. I’m the reviewer who is going to recommend you hunt down (actually it’s very easily found at Target and major bookstores/a Good Morning America book club selection) Calvin Kasulke’s Several People Are Typing and once you’re done? Order some takeout and watch that episode of Black Mirror.

The Missing Treasures of Amy Ashton

~ Wendy-Marie ~ Leave a comment

Sometimes you finish a book and wonder what the same plot would be in another author’s hands. This can be very interesting but not the most productive thing when midnight isn’t far off, and you have to be at work the next morning at 6 am.

Enter Eleanor Ray’s The Missing Treasures of Amy Ashton. The cover looked interesting, and the inner jacket copy had me tucking it into the library bag. If the first 20 pages didn’t captivate, I could always just not finish it and get a good night’s sleep for once. Imagine that.

Unfortunately for my sleep app, a good solid seven hours of sleep wasn’t in the cards. You meet Amy Ashton at a leaving-do (or if you are an American like me, drinks to celebrate a coworker’s departure). Amy isn’t psyched to be out or knocking back the drinks and within a few paragraphs I’m really liking Amy. I might not tuck an empty green wine bottle into my bag and then have a train full of people thinking I’m a raging drunk but the level of uncomfortable is familiar.

Then the story takes a turn. Amy is broken by something in her past. And her coping/survival mechanism is to retreat into things. She has a house but it’s literally falling apart and trying to get to the upstairs would honestly be excellent training for an Everest expedition. Sure, one neighbor is super annoying, but lady has a point. Someone needs to step in and stop things before someone gets severely injured.

And here is where Eleanor Ray’s genius lies. You could take this same plot, thirtysomething lady with a mystery past and deep personal issues and put in the hands of another author. Let’s say Marian Keyes because yup, I’ve devoured so many Marian Keyes books both good and bad. Marian Keyes isn’t a bad author; she has her strengths and can write a solid book.  

But Marian Keyes’ Amy Ashton? The book would have been at least twice as long, we would know exactly who Amy and Chantel would be listening to while doing their makeup and watering down Toyah’s liquor cabinet. Also, I have the suspicion the Marian Keys’ Amy would have boinked the baddie and hoarded fancy handbags too.

Laurie Notaro could have done a lovely job, but her Amy would also have a crippling eBay/vintage collection to tuck into any corners not crammed with the local newspapers/bottles/broken pots/cups plus a few adorable elder dogs.

Never ever let me be the Plot Fairy doling out plots to authors.

My point is Eleanor Ray keeps the plot lean. That leanness helps disguise who the baddie is. He seemed to be engaged and wanting to help. And I like that Amy doesn’t magically get better once the main mystery is solved. She is still a hot mess, and she has a hard road ahead even if you can now see the floor of her front hall. And we leave her at the start of her journey. Anything can happen now. Any wonder why I didn’t stop reading even when the spouse wandered into the bedroom for his nasal spray and asked why I was still awake. Sometimes you must finish that book.

Crying in H Mart: A Memoir

~ Wendy-Marie ~ Leave a comment

Some of the best emails are the ones from the library letting you know a hold is in. You give a tiny squeal of glee and once the workday is over you are free to zip to the library, march up to the circulation desk and claim your quarry. The hard part is finding the time/a quiet place to actually read the chosen book. This can also be a bit hard when you’re on a budget and that particular book is just ready to leap off the shelf at Target and come home with you, even if you’ve just spent the bulk of your bank account on prescriptions. And other people are posting about it on Goodreads and Instagram.

Crying in H Mart was certainly on my list. Confession I have never been to a H Mart. K-mart yes. A few local Japanese and pan-Asian markets to get my Japanese Green Tea Kit Kat fix and a crack at the full Lee Kum Kee range for my pitiful attempts at amazing recipes online. I saw H Mart, memoir and was in.

Last week I got the happy email and finally had Crying in H Mart in my little undead racoon paws. Now I’m An Old who spent an entire day playing the newest Duran Duran and New Order singles back-to-back on Spotify. I recently figured out Nicki Minaj sings the song with the “twinkle twinkle little star” refrain. Insert my brother laughing himself into a choking fit over my LIKED SONGS Spotify playlist. Pitbull’s Hotel Room Service is perfect escape music no matter what Andy says. So safe to say I’ve never heard a single Japanese Breakfast song or even read Michelle Zauner’s New Yorker essay which spawned Crying in H Mart.

I’m a genius like that.

Book looks good put it in the library bag/wish list.

Trader Joes frozen food item looks good? Stick in it the cart.

Brain cells and sodium levels be damned.

I do wish I had probed a bit deeper into Crying in H Mart before reading. I spent more time trying to track down soup soy sauce this summer before my blood pressure hit GIRL YOU ARE GOING TO HAVE A DAMN STROKE LEVELS. I think TRIGGER WARNING is what people use on places like Reddit. Yeah, I’m a Redditor. Because certain material hit me in a deep, still unhealed corner of my soul after over twenty years.

I lost my mother to cancer and while the time between her final diagnosis to her death was very brief it was still searing. She died at home. I can tell you when her death rattles first started, what I was reading and what it felt like to wake up hours later to learn she was gone. I know what it’s like to frantically try and find something anything your loved one can choke down, the almost unicorn hunt and making something to have it rejected barely touched. Michelle Zauner had a much more prolonged road to travel.

Crying in H Mart is good solid memoir of growing up between two cultures and the struggles of mothers and daughters. The scenes in Korea are my favorites and I would love a Lisa See level deeper dive into the family past. Michelle’s father is a character and could have a whole book devoted just to him but the tiny details of her maternal family are the real draw. I want to know more about the older generations, especially her aunts.

Would I recommend Crying at H Mart? Yes, with a big trigger warning. Her mother’s death is brutal and if I had not had a similar experience at about the same age I would have stopped reading right then and there.

You might be stronger.

But it’s something to consider.

Crying in H Mart isn’t all sadness and death. There is joy and strong family ties even if an ocean separates people. Give it a read.