Miss Iceland
2 journalers for this copy...
Purchased from BWB
After 3 books from this author, I've decided I'm a little in love with her. She's a bit of a genius, and so is the title Miss Iceland.
This was my final book for 2023. I'm talkin' finishing the last page as it struck midnight kind of "final". And I was not liking it throughout but couldn't pinpoint why until I read fellow BCer dacejav's thorough review of Anna Karenina.
This too feels like the main character, the (near) namesake of the book, is peripheral. Hekla here is revealed more by what the others around her say and do, than anything she says/does herself. I wouldn't call her a pushover since she's carved a rather enviable life as a writer of great esteem, but it's done so anonymously. **spoiler alert:
It ends with her using her ex-lover's name in order for her new novel to be published, meanwhile he and his cronies seem like self-aggrandizing artists.**
And all this before we even begin to dissect the ever-changing landscape that is Iceland!
So on principal, I'll have to leave this book unrated. My feelings for it have changed, and continue to change as I'm still thinking about it...
This was my final book for 2023. I'm talkin' finishing the last page as it struck midnight kind of "final". And I was not liking it throughout but couldn't pinpoint why until I read fellow BCer dacejav's thorough review of Anna Karenina.
This too feels like the main character, the (near) namesake of the book, is peripheral. Hekla here is revealed more by what the others around her say and do, than anything she says/does herself. I wouldn't call her a pushover since she's carved a rather enviable life as a writer of great esteem, but it's done so anonymously. **spoiler alert:
It ends with her using her ex-lover's name in order for her new novel to be published, meanwhile he and his cronies seem like self-aggrandizing artists.**
And all this before we even begin to dissect the ever-changing landscape that is Iceland!
So on principal, I'll have to leave this book unrated. My feelings for it have changed, and continue to change as I'm still thinking about it...
Released 8 mos ago (3/14/2024 UTC) at a friend , by hand -- Controlled Releases
CONTROLLED RELEASE NOTES:
Handed to 39301 @Delancey's pizza & wine!
Received this from @echode when we met at Delancey restaurant. Wow was the pizza delicious! I should say this was passed on as part of the Winter bookring.
This election night 2024, I enjoyed wallowing in the unhappy lives of three people living in 1960s Iceland.
Hekla, named after the volcano, endures the lurid behavior and unwanted advances of men at her work by day and writes novels at night; her best friend Ísey, stuck in a lonely marriage to a near illiterate bore, struggles with post partum depression; and her other best friend, Jon, a gay man who suffers from the beatings from other men, dreams of working for a theater and making costumes.
The lives of these three people are interwoven with the ever changing weather of Iceland as well as an active volcano forming new islands of lava and ash. Will Hekla ever find success as a writer? Well, yes, but only if she uses a man's name....
Perhaps this book is a reminder from the author that the progressive Iceland we know today hides another society of the not too distant past that was horrifyingly discriminatory and repressive.
Thanks for sharing this book with me @echode!!
Hekla, named after the volcano, endures the lurid behavior and unwanted advances of men at her work by day and writes novels at night; her best friend Ísey, stuck in a lonely marriage to a near illiterate bore, struggles with post partum depression; and her other best friend, Jon, a gay man who suffers from the beatings from other men, dreams of working for a theater and making costumes.
The lives of these three people are interwoven with the ever changing weather of Iceland as well as an active volcano forming new islands of lava and ash. Will Hekla ever find success as a writer? Well, yes, but only if she uses a man's name....
Perhaps this book is a reminder from the author that the progressive Iceland we know today hides another society of the not too distant past that was horrifyingly discriminatory and repressive.
Thanks for sharing this book with me @echode!!
