Book Group: March book. Then by Julie Myerson.

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Bazoaxe Mar 2015 12:04pm, 19 Mar 2015 8,160 posts	0 Bazoaxe I have a backlog of about 20 books to catch up on plus loads more I would like, I dont often read books twice
Yorkshire Pie Mar 2015 12:08pm, 19 Mar 2015 12,552 posts	0 Yorkshire Pie I do think it would benefit from a re-reading, but I doubt that I will. I don't mind the disjointed style but it would be nice to revisit the first half with more of an idea what's going on rather than just being confused by the whole thing.
Night-owl Mar 2015 3:35pm, 19 Mar 2015 19,100 posts	0 Night-owl Probably will benefit from a re-reading but not yet I have a reading list to get through and am a bit behind
Columba Mar 2015 10:16pm, 20 Mar 2015 6,265 posts	0 Columba I found a re-reading essential, though the second reading was more of a skim.
westmoors Mar 2015 7:14pm, 22 Mar 2015 513 posts	0 westmoors Read this really quite quickly. Not sure if that was because it was a small book (I had kindle version so no idea how many pages) or just easy to read. Found the lack of quotation marks frustrating. Didn't read any of the blurb so had no idea what the book was going to be about. Still not sure if I know what it was about. Not sure if I enjoyed it or not, so leaving my rating as a 6. Will now read back through this thread to see what others thought, then may comment further.
westmoors Mar 2015 7:28pm, 22 Mar 2015 514 posts	0 westmoors Columba, thanks for your synopsis. Makes a bit more sense to me. Its interesting how many of you think it needs reading at least twice. I only re-read a book if it ranks as a favourite and then only after a long gap!
Columba Mar 2015 8:45pm, 22 Mar 2015 6,291 posts	0 Columba I had to read it the second time to make sense of it. Insofar as I could make sense of it at all.
LindsD Mar 2015 9:27am, 23 Mar 2015 4,518 posts	0 LindsD Yes, me too.
Caprica Vix (RotJ) Mar 2015 12:33pm, 23 Mar 2015 2,552 posts	0 Caprica Vix (RotJ) I finished this a few days ago and here is my interpretation. I think its about grief and guilt, and the ways in which we torture ourselves with memory. It occurred to me that the story goes in a full loop and Izzy is taken back to the significant locations by the people she loved. She starts in the building where child Matthew says he bought her, she finds her children who take her back to the house, she leaves the house where Matthew finds her and takes her to the building... I can only assume that this cycle in ongoing and I think that its all in her head which is why other less significant people pop up, she associates them with Matthew (the babysitter they bumped into together, his colleague, his nephew) but in a non-linear chronology, possibly because she is confused/dying by the blood loss. She is remembering the child Matthew who she didn't really like and the horrible way she treated him but she is remembering him a building important to them as adults, possibly because they had a special moment there but also more likely, guilt, as that is where she left him just before his suicide. When child Matthew grows up (and so does she) she remembers her children who then take her to her house where she relives the guilt of breaking up her family and the deaths of her children. I did like it, but I dont think Id stretch to say I enjoyed it as it was really, really bleak so I absolutely wont be re-reading it.
Columba Mar 2015 12:58pm, 23 Mar 2015 6,296 posts	0 Columba That's rather how I felt, Caprica. What about the Big Freeze and breakdown of civilisation? Did you think that was "real", or no more than part of her mental torment?