Thoughts on The Time Traveler's Wife

Our book club pick for November was this novel by Audrey Niffeneger and it made for a very lively discussion. We may not have "fallen in love" with any particular character, but we thought it was an extremely imaginative and complex novel.
Personally, I got a bit too emotionally involved in feeling Henry's pain and fear. I have trouble separating myself from fictional characters sometimes- my own boundary issue, I guess. But that was the most interesting part of this book to me- the view of time travel as being something dangerous and frightening rather than being a positive experience. A quote I've often heard, "Your mind is a dangerous place, don't go in there alone" could have been Henry's theme. When he traveled, he could take nothing with him, and I mean NOTHING- not clothes, not food, not the basic means for survival. He was completely, utterly vulnerable. He couldn't chose where or when he went or who he met there. There was a pervasive, underlying melancholy and sense of doom because of this vulnerability.
I thought the premise- that Henry has a genetic disorder that causes random time travel and that he represents an evolution of the human species- was very plausible. Some reviewers don't think this premise was necessary and think that it even detracted from the story. I respectfully disagree. I think the premise is the thread that weaves the the story together and makes it an almost believable science fiction. I can think of ways that we "time travel" in our heads- for example, when we see, smell, touch, or taste something that reminds us of our past. The sense leads us back to a specific time and place, a specific memory. Another example is when we have an anxiety or panic attack or feel overwhelming fear- these are emotions that are generated by past traumas and return to haunt us in the present moment.
Henry's travels were life threatening. If he had time traveled for no apparent reason, I don't think I could have continued through to the final page of the book.
I can't say that I enjoyed this book because I felt overpowered by the bleakness that permeated the story, but it was an eye-opening experience and I would definitely recommend it for book clubs.

Thoughts on The Glass Castle

My book club discussed our December pick, "The Glass Castle" by Jeanette Walls. We were excited to read this memoir, expecting great things based on all of the glowing reviews. We were bitterly disappointed. To me, this book read like a litany of immature actions by incredibly dysfunctional (sick is more like it, actually) parents. And even worse, throughout the entire book there was a sense of resigned acceptance- not the positive kind, in my opinion. More like: "my alcoholic father brought me to a bar and prostituted me, but that's okay because that's how he is." There was no sense of indignation and no affect whatsoever from the author. There was definitely no sense healing, of recovery. It was empty. I think we all agreed on that. I suspect we are all going to purge this one from our libraries ASAP.

Onto a different topic: I'm working on a list of my ten favorite thumping good reads. There are so many that I'm having a tough time narrowing my favorites down to just ten. I will post them as a list in the next couple of days and write mini-reviews of each one in the coming weeks.