I’ve been remiss in my book reviews. Here are three that I finished reading over the past few weeks – all a bit different.
I read The Singles Game by Lauren Weisberger because I sort of liked the movie version of
The Devil Wears Prada. It’s not my kind of novel but I think it would be enjoyable for those who like a quick, sexy, romantic romp.
After a devastating injury at Wimbledon, tennis pro Charlotte “Charlie” Silver knows she needs a major change if she wants to take her career to the next level. Known for her squeaky-clean and always-polite image, Charlie doesn’t argue when the Wimbledon officials deem her sneakers in violation of their strict uniform standards. At the last minute, she’s forced to scramble and play one of the biggest matches of her life in someone else’s shoes, resulting in a fall that injures both her wrist and her Achilles tendon. As she heals, she knows she’ll have to fire her good friend and sweetheart of a coach, Marcy, and sets her sights on Todd Feltner, a tough men’s coach known for his brash attitude and cultivation of champions.
Todd not only overhauls Charlie’s training and fitness regimen, barking at her if she even glances at a cup of coffee or a simple carbohydrate, but he makes over her image as well. Gone is good-girl Charlie with her bright outfits and ribbon woven through her cheery braid. After all, did she really work her whole life to settle for being “the twenty-third best female tennis player on earth”? s she post-injury? Feltner will use that to gain PR sympathy. Is she too winsome? Feltner will dress her in an all-black athletic costume with a tiara to make her the Warrior Princess. Is she tangled in the sheets with smoking-hot tennis star, Marco Vallejo? Feltner will make them even hotter together.
After Charlotte “Charlie” Silver wipes out atWimbledon, things look bad for the 24-year-old, hard-charging American. She has to recover from a broken wrist and an Achilles tear. But just as she’s finishing rehab, she receives a call from Todd Feltner, famed coach of tennis champions. He has never taken on a female client before, and despite his horrendously rude behavior, Charlie believes that his hard-hitting tactics will help ratchet up her racket strategy.
Is she post-injury? Feltner will use that to gain PR sympathy. Is she too winsome? Feltner will dress her in an all-black athletic costume with a tiara to make her the Warrior Princess. Is she tangled in the sheets with smoking-hot tennis star, Marco Vallejo? Feltner will make them even hotter together.
Soon Charlie starts winning — toss, lob, SLAM! Her dreams are coming true, and with Marco on a similar regime, she has a sexy partner available whenever she needs him. Her stylist for on-court getups starts putting together her off-court outfits, and they’re any princess’s dream, right down to the Louboutins custom-hacked for Charlie’s tennis-player tendons.
She realizes too late that she has ceased asking loved ones about their lives because she’s so caught up in her own. She finds out that in making Marco no promises, he makes none either. And finally, her newfound arrogance forces her to commit an almost-fatal career mistake.
As in The Devil Wears Prada, it’s not failure that changes things, but success. This is kind of fun and a very quick read. I realize it’s almost winter, but this is a great summer beach read. Give it a shot if you like this kind of book.
I read Embassy Wife by Katie Crouch because it looked like a fun novel about the expat life in Africa – Namibia to be exact. I enjoyed it. Crouch does a pretty good – for the most part – send-up of expat life and a pretty good job of describing Nambia – at least the parts the foreigners see.
The story pretty much revolves around Amanda and Persephone who are ‘trailing spouses’ as the spouses of more or less official expats are called, and Mila Shilongo – a Namibian who is the wife of the transport minister in the Namibian government.
Amanda has come to Namibia with her husband, Mark, an unlikely Fulbright scholar studying a subject, the German genocide of the Nama people in the early 1900s, of which he is so clearly ignorant that a reader suspects a ruse — rightly. As it turns out, Mark has unfinished emotional business in Namibia, where he served briefly in the Peace Corps 20 years earlier.
Mark has secrets, as do most of the unworthy, incompetent husbands and cavalierly racist women who populate “Embassy Wife,” Katie Crouch’s sharply observed satire of the white-savior complex and the poisonous legacy of colonialism. The white characters lie to one another and themselves. They insist that their privileges are rights.
Much of the novel revolves around another “trailer,” as the spouses of official-ish expats are called: Persephone, whose purportedly sexy husband, Adam, is a legal counsel for the U.S. Embassy, making Persephone “an—no, the—Embassy Wife.” This in turn makes her a font of knowledge, gossip and opinion about diplomatic etiquette, style and intrigue, which is sometimes interesting, often amusing and occasionally cringe-inducing.
And then there’s Mila Shilongo, wife of the minister of transportation, who appears to Amanda like this: “This goddess was half a foot taller than either her or Persephone; every limb seemed to stream from her body, graceful as water. Her skin was dark, polished, and poreless; her face, a masterpiece of planes and curves, centered by long-lashed eyes the color of maple syrup.”
Mila’s daughter, nine-year old Taimi becomes friends with Amanda’s daughter, Meg as they both attend the International School which most expat children as well as children of high-ranking Nambians also attend.
Like many idle wives before her, Amanda wants to do something to “make a difference.” Yet her fantasies, like those of many white foreigners intent on “helping” Africans, are fatally misaligned with those of the people they dream of helping. (With some derision, another embassy wife observes that Namibians “want to do things their way.”)
Hijinks ensue, and schemes within schemes — including a rhino-saving project that somehow involves Persephone babysitting a rhino overnight; a sub-rosa jewel-trading venture; and some silly CIA business. With a lot of overlap, it’s hard to say what’s comical and what’s in earnest.
The descriptions of Namibia are spot on and the book pokes considerable fun at our former President. While the descriptions of Namibia are good, it’s clear that Crouch has little idea what actually goes on at an embassy.
I enjoyed the book; parts of it are quite funny and Crouch wraps it all up in a nice package. Give it a try – I think most of you would enjoy it.
I really enjoyed Weiden’s first novel – Winter Counts and apparently many others did too. The book was an Anthony Award winner for best first novel, Thriller Award winner for best first novel, Edgar Award Nominee for best first novel and a ‘Best Book of 2020’ by NPR, Publisher’s Weekly, Literary Journal and many others.
Weiden’s flawed hero – Virgil Wounded Horse – is a vigilante enforcer on the Rosebud Indian Reservation in South Dakota. Because the local reservation police lack the authority to prosecute felonies and because the Federal Government chooses not to prosecute many reservation crimes, folks hire Virgil to exact some form of justice. “It was open season for raping any Native woman, so long as the rape occurred on Indian land.” Virgil especially likes beating up men who hurt women and children. “I never felt so alive as when I was administering some righteousness.”
The Rosebud Indian Reservation is some 200 miles south of Mount Rushmore and there is only one scene there but it captures some of the contradiction and ambivalence that Virgil feels. Virgil observes tourists in the Black Hills and thinks “few of these people knew they were traveling on sacred ground, lands that had been promised by treaty to the Lakota people forever but were stolen after gold was discovered in the 1860s. Adding insult to injury, Mount Rushmore had been carved out of the holy mountain previously known as Six Grandfathers as a giant screw-you to the Lakotas.” Later, Virgil, who’s been called “half-breed” and “halfie,” thinks, “What did I care about some rocks and valleys?”
The betrayal of Native Americans and the issue of native identity are the backbone of this passionately told tale that hits the sweet spot between crime fiction and social novel. Weiden, an enrolled citizen of the Sicangu Lakota Nation, spent time on the Rosebud Reservation growing up and writes with raw honesty about life there.
Virgil’s vigilantism helps him forget the markings on his winter counts – the kind of calendar system used by the Lakota. His winter counts mark sad reminders of the loss of his parents and the death of his beloved sister in a head-on collision. Virgil is now the legal guardian of his 14-year-old nephew, Nathan, whose future Virgil obsesses about.
When Nathan is arrested for selling drugs (a set-up) Virgil goes all in to save his nephew and stop the selling of drugs on the reservation. The feds persuade Nathan to participate in a sting operation which naturally goes sideways and Virgil has to get back in touch with his native identity. He also uncovers the theft of tribal money that involves the father of his girl-friend, Marie Short Bear.
History, betrayal and heartbreak are out front in this novel, but it’s also an action-packed tale bursting with criminals, pursuits, fights and standoffs. It’s sure to please the most seasoned thriller fans. Weiden applies all the standard crime novel tropes, but compelling characters and the reservation setting make everything fresh.
Weiden leavens the dark elements with humor and snark. When Virgil’s friend Tommy talks about a lawsuit that could return vast lands to the Lakotas, he asks Tommy where all the White people will go. “The Lakota government will set up reservations for the wasicus, give ’em commodity foods and open boarding schools for the little kids,” Tommy says. “. . . I almost busted a gut! Taste of their own medicine!”
I really enjoyed this book. If you at all like thrillers and have any interest in Native American culture, give it a try. it’s a fast read and very well written.
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