Thursday, March 02, 2017

2017 book 39

Heather O'Neill's The Lonely Hearts Hotel
I am a fan of O'Neill's from way back (Lullabies for Little Criminals was great) and was excited that this book was getting a lot of buzz, being compared to The Night Circus, etc. I guess it is Night-Circus-y, in that there is a circus and a tiny bit of magic, but it's way more depressing and less epic? There is a lot of physical and sexual abuse of children and all sorts of things I found really hard to read. I mean, it's just relentlessly cruel/weird/unpleasant/frustrating/obsessed with sex. ( I am all in favor of sex-positivity but there is a REALLY odd focus on sex here.) I mean, I cared enough to keep reading, just to see what would happen, but I was just left feeling puzzled and sad for most of the book. I did kind of love the very end though. B?

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