I finished reading The Rosie Project several weeks ago, and I was just kind of neutral about it. I wouldn't necessarily recommend it, but it wasn't one of my worst reading experiences. Have I convinced you to read it?! :) Don't worry, I'm not trying to! The plot line was just so predictable, and I'm one who likes some twists and turns in my stories. This was very much your typical romantic / comedic structure (boy meets girl, they seem like an unlikely match, they start to fall for each other, conflict happens and they stop talking, they reconcile...you know the drill). My philosophy is that any time spent reading at all is time well spent, so I guess I should just chalk it up to being a step closer to my 2014 reading goal.
The book I'm currently reading is called My Notorious Life by Kate Manning. I hadn't heard of this book or author, but it was a Kindle Daily Deal a few weeks ago and it got lots of high ratings, so I thought I'd try it out. I don't usually pick up historical fiction, but that's the genre of this book. It's set in the Civil War-era New York City. The main character, Axie Muldoon (is that a great name or what?!), is the child of impoverished Irish immigrants. The Goodreads summary says that "she grows up to become one of the wealthiest and most controversial women of her day," while advocating for women's reproductive rights (a very controversial topic during that time). In fact, the book is "inspired by the true history of an infamous female physician who was once called the 'wickedest woman in New York.'" I've honestly never read a book like this before. Axie is a little spitfire of a girl, which I like because she is so feisty and independent, and since the story is told in first-person point of view, I feel like I am really getting to know Axie. I'm about 50 percent of the way through the book, and while it started slowly, I'm now fully engaged and can't wait to find out what happens to make her such a hated figure in New York.
One of the reasons it took me a while to "get used to" this book, I guess you could say, is the way the dialogue is formatted. It's not in quotation marks, like dialogue is supposed to be written. Here is an excerpt from the book that shows you both the dialect and the formatting of the dialogue:
-For faith they've their home here. It's not no castle, sure, but it's ours.
-The best of all asylums for the child of unhappy fortune is the farmer's home.
-I lived in a farmer's home all me life and it's just why we emigrated.
-Madam, it is your duty to get these children away to kind Christian families in the country, where they will be better off.
It took me a long time to get used to this formatting, but now, it doesn't really bother me. I hope to finish the book within the next week...but with grading creative non-fiction projects, this may not be a realistic goal! We shall see!
Have you ever read a book that used some kind of strange formatting that made it difficult for you to read at first? What was it?
Happy reading!
Hi Mrs. Bross. I read the Percy Jackson books and they were all written from Percy's perspective (that was to be expected because of the name of the series). Then the new series came out that kept going with the story of Percy and some new characters. The book swichted from person to person and what they were doing. This was frustrating at first because I would want more on one charcter or another. In the end, the books were really good and I always buy the next one when it comes out.
ReplyDeleteI think I tend to read books with the strangest formats. It seems that I am never able to pick a "normal" book (is there even such a thing?). One of the most interesting books I read was called Sharkgirl, and it was set up in stanzas. It wasn't set up like a typical poem though. It was told as a story, just broken up into smaller pieces.
ReplyDeleteI read a book once like this, although I forget the name. It was about a cowboy and how he found a pile of cash (I wish I found that!). Anyways, the author formatted the dialogue without quotations and barely any tags at all! It took awhile to figure it out but the dialogue was very well done! I'm anxious to read on about My Notorious Life!
ReplyDeleteI can't say that I've ever read a book with as crazy of a set up as that. It kind of reminds me of the setup of a play's script. But I have read a book with hardly any dialogue. Or you could say started... I found it was really boring and much less interesting to read because as you said in class the other day, when you turn the page and see a page with only long paragraphs and no dialogue, you groan a little bit internally. Now imagine that throughout an entire book!
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