Ape House

Favorite books:

Fall on Your Knees (Anne-Marie MacDonald)

(I love her other books too. She must be due for a new one, isn't she?)

TheTime Traveller's Wife (Audrey Niffenegger)

Middlesex (Jeffrey Eugenides)

(his new book, The Marriage Plot, comes out next month. Can't wait!)

Juliet, Naked (Nick Hornby)

(again - love most of his books.But I think this one is my favorite.)

John Irving (I can't pick just one. There are so many.)

Water for Elephants (Sara Gruen)

and now, adding to the list:

Ape House by Sara Gruen

This is a great story.

It's well-written

Fantastic characters

and she doesn't take the easy route with those characters.

I loved Water for Elephants. So much that I was nervous about reading this book.

How could it compare?

It's different but it's just as good.
Water for Elephants is a longer, more involved story but it sucks you in
and you can disappear when you read it.
It's just that amazing.

I polished this baby off in a few days.

The Time Traveller's Wife is one of my top five favorites.
I've read it multiple times, which is rare
(I tend to read a book and then never revisit it. That doesn't mean that I don't love it, it just means that I don't want to spoil the experience I had of reading it for the first time.)
When Audrey Niffenegger's second book came out (Her Fearful Symmetry)
 I counted down the days until it was released.

And I was epically disappointed.

I just didn't buy the story.

I don't believe in ghosts
but I don't believe in time travel either
and in The Time Traveller's Wife - she made me believe that it is entirely possible. Probable even.

Not so much with the ghosts.
I just couldn't buy into it.
So Audrey disappointed me.

This is why I hesitated with Sara Gruen's other books.
But it was worth the risk.
It's on the list.


Up next:
Revolutionary Road by Richard Yates

I bought it for 25 cents at the 200 mile yard sale

so if I don't like it, there will be no great investment lost.
I started it this morning on the subway
and so far I'm hooked.