The Lesser Joke: book reviews and more

TV Review: Marvel’s Iron Fist, season 1

TV #11 of 2017:

Marvel’s Iron Fist, season 1

Iron Fist improved a little bit in the back half of its first season, but it was still pretty bad. The plot meandered all over the place, the writing was awful, and the lead actor was horribly miscast. Even setting aside the fact that an Asian-American Danny Rand would have been a more compelling main character AND the bad scripts that would have plagued any white Danny (not just Finn Jones), he just didn’t do a good job with the admittedly poor material they gave him. The other series regulars were generally able to make interesting character choices to rise above the bad writing, but Jones sunk nearly every scene he was in. If you’re not really a Marvel completionist, I’d recommend giving this show a pass, at least until it’s clear that The Defenders needs it for crucial context.

★★☆☆☆

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Book Review: A Full Life: Reflections at Ninety by Jimmy Carter

Book #67 of 2017:

A Full Life: Reflections at Ninety by Jimmy Carter

Jimmy Carter is not exactly the most impartial narrator of his own career, but this memoir manages to stay fairly apolitical while still recounting his term as our 39th president. Carter also devotes a good portion of this book to his occupations both before and after the White House, and it all adds up to a fascinating picture of his life. In every era and every role of that life, his decency, his deep Christian faith, and his commitment to racial equality shine like a beacon off these pages. He may not have been able to convince the nation of it when he unsuccessfully ran for a second term in 1980, but Americans can be proud of the legacy he’s created.

★★★☆☆

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Book Review: 67 Shots: Kent State and the End of American Innocence by Howard Means

Book #66 of 2017:

67 Shots: Kent State and the End of American Innocence by Howard Means

This began as kind of a frustrating read, in that the author assumed far more initial familiarity with the Kent State shootings than I personally was able to bring to the table. That got better as it went along, but I spent the first half of this book feeling like I was perpetually playing catch-up. Perhaps author Howard Means assumed that this event was so lodged in the American consciousness that it needed no introduction or context, but anything written about a topic nearly half a century after the fact should be more forgiving for readers born in the years since. (His contention that campus protests largely ended after Kent State also shows an author way out of touch with the current zeitgeist.) Still, Means does a good job of weighing the conflicting accounts of May 4th, 1970, and he ably conveys the feeling of the time, especially when chronicling reactions to the violence in the back half of this book. I just wish he had presented the same level of detail in setting up his narrative in the first place.

★★☆☆☆

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Book Review: It Happens All the Time by Amy Hatvany

Book #65 of 2017:

It Happens All the Time by Amy Hatvany

A raw and emotional novel about a rape and its aftermath, told in alternating perspectives of the victim and the friend who assaults her. Author Amy Hatvany presents a compulsively readable narrative of an issue that, as her title suggests, is all too common in today’s society. Yet her characters never feel like flat stereotypes, and she expertly conveys not only Amber’s trauma but also Tyler’s mental state in the days leading up to his crime. Hatvany never once tries to excuse his behavior, but she does show how easy it can be for someone to convince himself that what he is doing isn’t rape. This is a novel that should be read widely, especially by young people who are just starting to navigate the domains of sexuality and consent. It could honestly make a difference.

(Thanks to Atria Books for providing me with an Advance Reader’s Copy of this book for review!)

★★★★☆

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Book Review: From the Mixed-Up Files of Mrs. Basil E. Frankweiler by E. L. Konigsburg

Book #64 of 2017:

From the Mixed-Up Files of Mrs. Basil E. Frankweiler by E. L. Konigsburg

This 1967 story of a brother and sister running away from home to live in a museum – and the old lady chronicling their adventure – is simply darling. Two kids on their own in New York City without their parents’ knowledge would ordinarily be terrifying, but author E. L. Konigsburg strikes a good balance between showcasing the children’s ignorance of possible dangers and shielding them from those dangers herself. (This is also a book aimed at younger readers, who will probably be less concerned about what the parents must be going through when they discover their children missing, even as adult readers find it hard to shake that thought.) The kids feel believable for their age, and their bickering is both adorable and instantly recognizable to anyone who grew up with siblings. A quick, charming read.

★★★★☆

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Book Review: We Have Always Lived in the Castle by Shirley Jackson

Book #63 of 2017:

We Have Always Lived in the Castle by Shirley Jackson

Years ago, the aristocratic Blackwood family sat down to dinner at their New England estate, but poison in the dishes left only three survivors. Now Merricat, her sister, and her uncle live on in the home where the rest of their family died, trying to avoid the suspicious neighbors in the nearby village and each dealing with the trauma in their own way. For Merricat, that way involves a compulsive ordering of her world according to private magical rules (reminiscent of Auri in The Slow Regard of Silent Things, although that story was written long after), and her rules are tested to the utmost as outsiders try to intrude on the life of the surviving Blackwoods. Merricat’s narration makes this short novel feel like a fairy tale in the making, and no matter their possible crimes, it’s hard not to empathize with these characters who just want to be left in peace.

★★★★☆

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Book Review: The Regulators by Richard Bachman

Book #62 of 2017:

The Regulators by Richard Bachman

This pseudonymous Stephen King novel has too many characters with not enough characterization, which makes it hard to keep track of them or even care when they kept getting gunned down. It doesn’t help that most of the characters share names – but not much else – with people in the author’s other book Desperation, which theoretically tells a parallel story but is largely independent. As a result, this novel felt more like King was playing with action figures than using characters to drive a cohesive story (which is ironically appropriate, I suppose). His depiction of a character with autism was also wildly unrealistic and offensive, in a way that suggests the author did no research on the subject before writing. So really, not much to recommend here at all.

★☆☆☆☆

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Book Review: Touch by Claire North

Book #61 of 2017:

Touch by Claire North

A neat spy thriller about a character who can flit from body to body through skin contact, temporarily taking over other people’s lives while they black out. The entity known as Kepler has lived for hundreds of years that way, ever since discovering the power when facing her original body’s death. But now, someone seems to be hunting down and killing Kepler’s kind, and this deadly threat brings her face-to-face with certain ghosts from her past. The resulting story offers the usual fun of the body-swap genre, but in a taut narrative with some interesting reflections on identity and the meaning of life.

★★★★☆

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Book Review: The Happiness Project: Or Why I Spent a Year Trying to Sing in the Morning, Clean My Closets, Fight Right, Read Aristotle, and Generally Have More Fun by Gretchen Rubin

Book #60 of 2017:

The Happiness Project: Or Why I Spent a Year Trying to Sing in the Morning, Clean My Closets, Fight Right, Read Aristotle, and Generally Have More Fun by Gretchen Rubin

Early on in Gretchen Rubin’s year spent practicing habits aimed at her own happiness (and writing about it), an acquaintance tells her, “I just don’t think you’re going to have insights that other people would find useful.” The author’s response is essentially that she thinks people can learn a lot from the examples of others, and she carries on with her project. Ultimately, though, her book about the experience falls somewhere in between these two viewpoints, a strange blend of self-help book and memoir. I think I liked it, but I often found myself struggling to apply Rubin’s conclusions to my own life.

★★★☆☆

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Book Review: A People’s History of the United States by Howard Zinn

Book #59 of 2017:

A People’s History of the United States by Howard Zinn

A People’s History of the United States is really two books, and one of them is significantly better than the other. Author Howard Zinn’s thesis is that any telling of history is inherently political, and his stated goal is to present perspectives on American history that have often been left out of our popular narratives. And in pursuing that goal, this book is both educational and necessary, focusing on the Native Americans, African Americans, women, and others who were abused in the name of American progress as well as the popular movements that have striven to make our country live more fully by its ideals.

Unfortunately, Zinn’s dedication to that mission falters around the time his retelling reaches World War I, and the last century or so of his history is concerned less with presenting forgotten people and events and more with arguing for a leftist, socialist agenda. Even for a reader who largely agrees with Zinn’s politics, this section of the book was tiresome and unconvincing. I respect the author’s goal in crafting a people’s history, but I wish he had followed through on that goal for the entire volume instead of branching off into a Bernie Sanders campaign speech at the end.

★★★☆☆

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