The Monsters of Templeton

I judge books by their covers.  Who doesn’t?

If a cover manages to effectively use the colours red and black in a vine-like appearance, I will automatically pick it up.  I have no idea why, but I like these designs, and I like them a lot.

Exhibit A: Monsters of Templeton.

It meets all of the criteria, and to top it off it had an interesting story to tell.  It has been on my “to-read” list for a few years now – I got distracted by other books – but finally its time had come.  I am very particular when it comes to what book I read next, if it doesn’t fit my current state of mind than it won’t be a very good read; this is possibly what happened with my previous two reads.  And although it didn’t quite live up to the expectations its description gave me, it redeemed itself at the end.

The Monsters of Templeton is Lauren Groff’s first novel. It spends half the time in the present and half in the past, spanning 200 years, as the main character, Willie Upton, delves into her ancestry to discover who her father is.   Willie comes back to her hometown of Templeton pregnant, alone and going through a quarter-life crisis after a disastrous affair with her graduate professor, which ended with her trying to run over his wife.   Her previously “flower child” mother is now a recent convert to the Christian faith, dating a minister and trying to amend for her previous sins, including lying to Willie about her father.  Willie grew up believing her father was one of two men her mother slept with while living in a commune, the truth, however, is that her father lives in Templeton.  Like Willie, he is a distant relative of Marmaduke Temple, the founder of Templeton, so to escape her present, Willie turns to her past to find her father and discovers on the way the many skeletons her ancestors kept hidden in the closet.

Willie was not my favourite character in the world – she played into the damsel-in-distress stereotype far too much – but I enjoyed tagging along in her quest to find her father.  Through her research, a lot of interesting characters were introduced into the novel with every other chapter devoted to an entirely new family member told through their own voice.  A lot of them were legitimately crazy – such as believing they could start fires with their mind – which kept it interesting.  Groff tried to incorporate folk lore in her novel as a metaphor for Willie’s own self-discovery, which was played up a lot in the description of the book, but kind of fell flat in the actual novel.  A large sea monster washes up on shore just as Willie comes back home, and it haunts Willie throughout her entire search, but it just kind of made random appearances and didn’t help the novel, it became more of a fun fact than anything else.

But overall, i enjoyed this book.  The many different character voices made this novel unique and interesting to read.

Another classic example of my favourite book design: The Book of Lost Things.

Beautiful and one of my favourites!  See here for a description.

13 Reasons Why

My first book of 2010!  And not really the greatest book to start my year with.

Unfortunately, I rang in the New Year a little under the weather – most unfortunate as I was visiting my friend who had just come back from England for the holidays.  In the first five minutes of our visit, I had to ask her to pullover so I could –most gracefully, of course– throw up on the side of the road.  I spent three days recovering in bed and reading a book about suicide, not exactly the best cure.

13 Reasons Why is the debut novel of Jay Asher, a newcomer to young adult fiction who has spent most of his working life in bookstores – there is hope for me yet!

The book is cleverly written and designed, but lacks depth: it felt like nothing more than high school drama.  It chronicles a teenage girls choice to commit suicide.  Before her death, Hannah Baker made and mailed several tapes where she recorded the 13 reasons why she committed suicide.  Each chapter is one side of a tape and is dedicated to one person who negatively, or sometimes positively, affected her life.  In turn, each person named will receive the tapes and when finished with them, must mail it to the next person on the list or a copy of the tapes will become public, and everyone’s part in her death will be revealed.

The novel begins with the protagonist, Clay Jensen, emotionally and physically exhausted mailing the tapes to the next victim.  He had just spent the entire evening listening to the voice of his ex-crush chronicle the worse moments of her life, which starred his fellow classmates.  With the tapes he received a map outlining the location of these moments so he not only listened but saw what she saw as well.  On his journey he meets past and future recipients of the tapes and knows that nothing will ever be the same.

I’m not sure if it’s because my teen years are well behind me or if it is the novel itself, but I could not empathize or relate to the characters as much as I wanted to.  Clay was trying to hard to grieve and comprehend the death of his classmate, and his reactions to the tapes seemed contrived and melodramatic.   Hannah’s reasons were too shallow.  Some of them were horrifying, but most seemed almost run-of-the-mill high school experiences: bullies exist, rumours are abundant and guys can be jerks.   A bigger, better person would have been able to take these experiences and do the right thing, while Hannah just wallowed in self-pity.  I kept expecting a reason why she was wallowing but it never came, and after the thirteenth reason instead of sympathizing with Clay and Hannah, I was annoyed.   Perhaps, I just wasn’t in the mood to be sympathetic towards others.

Asher is a good writer and has a great voice in his novel, he just needs to develop more substance behind his characters and their plots.  Suicide is such a complex and deeply emotional topic that his novel paled in comparison.

If anyone has read this novel I would love to hear their opinions.  I want to know if I missed something.  I wanted to love this book because of its unique set-up – a chapter per tape, and a dust jacket with a detailed map on the inside, my favourite! – but I just couldn’t.