Migrations, by Charlotte McConaghy is one of those books that really takes you to another place, which
was a real pleasure as I am currently Sheltering In Place with beloved husband. Who is great but for some reason just won't or can't fill the dishwasher per my specifications? Franny, in Migrations, doesn't stew over tedious and unimportant things like whether it's important for bowls to be placed a certain way on the bottom shelf, although it is, it is important, no! She's hitching a ride on a fishing vessel chasing the last of the worlds terns on their back and forth journey from North pole to South and back again. "There's a compus in my heart that leads me not to true north but to true sea." Ugh. Could you die? What kind of romantic-ass notion is that? Fucking romantic, that's what it is. Devastating, exhilarating, thoughtful and heartbreaking, Migrations is beautiful. "Mam always said it was only a fool who didn't fear the sea, and I've tried to live by that. But there's no way to conjure fear if it doesn't exist. And here is the undeniable truth: I have never feared the sea. I have loved it with every breath of me, every beat of me."
MEANWHILE, what else comes out during this shit-show of a year but another book by Emily St. John Mandel - The Glass Hotel. Maybe it's because I read them on top of each other, but these books felt like sisters to me. Mandel, with her always perfect, exquisite words were a finely matched by McConaghy's prose - the main characters were two independent women that easily travelled the world and were drawn to dangerous ships. Based loosely on Bernie Madoff and his infamous Ponzi Scheme, The Glass Hotel is not precisely uplifting material for this lowly time either, but it could be worse than getting lost in Mandel's world.
was a real pleasure as I am currently Sheltering In Place with beloved husband. Who is great but for some reason just won't or can't fill the dishwasher per my specifications? Franny, in Migrations, doesn't stew over tedious and unimportant things like whether it's important for bowls to be placed a certain way on the bottom shelf, although it is, it is important, no! She's hitching a ride on a fishing vessel chasing the last of the worlds terns on their back and forth journey from North pole to South and back again. "There's a compus in my heart that leads me not to true north but to true sea." Ugh. Could you die? What kind of romantic-ass notion is that? Fucking romantic, that's what it is. Devastating, exhilarating, thoughtful and heartbreaking, Migrations is beautiful. "Mam always said it was only a fool who didn't fear the sea, and I've tried to live by that. But there's no way to conjure fear if it doesn't exist. And here is the undeniable truth: I have never feared the sea. I have loved it with every breath of me, every beat of me."
MEANWHILE, what else comes out during this shit-show of a year but another book by Emily St. John Mandel - The Glass Hotel. Maybe it's because I read them on top of each other, but these books felt like sisters to me. Mandel, with her always perfect, exquisite words were a finely matched by McConaghy's prose - the main characters were two independent women that easily travelled the world and were drawn to dangerous ships. Based loosely on Bernie Madoff and his infamous Ponzi Scheme, The Glass Hotel is not precisely uplifting material for this lowly time either, but it could be worse than getting lost in Mandel's world.
