Welcome (or welcome back) to my book review column. If you didn’t know, March is National Women’s History Month, and is celebrated in order to honor the contributions of women to culture, society, and history. To recognize this month, I’ll be reading and reviewing a selection of books by female authors that have an emphasis on history. I hope you enjoy and find something worth reading!
PACHINKO by Min Jin Lee
In the early 20th century, a teenaged Suja falls in love with a wealthy stranger near her coastal home of Korea. Her lover promises her anything she can imagine. But then Suja discovers that she is pregnant—and that her lover is already married. Despite her pregnancy, she refuses to be with him. Instead of following her lover, she accepts a marriage proposal from a young, sickly minister. Together, this new couple emigrates to Japan for the minister’s work. Yet Suja’s decision to abandon her lover and choose her own path sets off a dramatic saga that will follow her family for generations to come.
One of, if not the most, brilliant, beautiful, and tragic books I’ve ever read in my entire life. While it may have started off slow, every part of this book was worth the wait. One of my favorite parts of the book is how Lee wrote emotion. I felt each and every feeling in my gut—I cried when the characters did, laughed when they laughed, and jumped for joy at their successes. With her vivid use of feeling, I felt like I was truly another character in the story. I knew each and every character on a personal level, and this was in no small part due to her use of emotion. Not only are the emotions and characters beautiful, but so is Lee’s writing style. Her storytelling and wording also had me drinking in every word.
But that’s not all. If there’s one thing that I should point out about this story, it’s the resilience written into the characters. No matter what tragedy they face, they always manage to push forward. This is especially true for the female characters. Despite the amount of sexism, racism, and classism the women of Pachinko face, they always persevere, forming friendships and remaining strong. These women choose to respond to brutality with kindness rather than bitterness in the toughest of times. And while this may make the harsh realities of Pachinko feel more cruel, it also makes the female characters feel more human. With their choice of compassion in the face of adversity, Lee’s women feel more tangible than any other character I’ve read of.
If you were to ask me to choose a favorite book, I’d never be able to pick just one. But Pachinko is pretty close to a number one read. 10/10
BETTY by Tiffany McDaniel
Born in a bathtub in Arkansas to a Cherokee father and a white mother, Betty Carpenter is the sixth of eight siblings. Her family is wrought with racism, cruelty, poverty, and violence. This pain stems, tragically, from both outside and inside the family. Searching for a better life than what Arkansas provides, the Carpenters set out on the road until they reach the town of Breathed, Ohio. The only place to live they find is a ramshackle farmhouse that the townsfolk claim is cursed. And, since the Carpenters now live there, they decide that the new family must also be cursed. But despite her “curse” and the tragedy around her, Betty is resilient, determined, and fueled with imagination that carries her forward.
This book was raw, intense, and chock-full of emotion. It managed to shatter my heart into a million pieces, and there were many times when it hurt to read. It did so especially through its setting. McDaniel’s way of writing—how she described scenery, characters, and major events—transported me back to the 1950s and 60s. The town where Betty is set (Breathed, Ohio) felt so real because of McDaniel’s incorporation of the problems (and benefits) associated with small town life during this era. There was the rural culture and community that made the location feel real, as well as the common ideologies and issues of the time that made the setting feel accurate. And then there were the characters that truly made the story come to life. Betty and her family made the book feel like history, rather than a work of fiction. They were so human. They used nicknames, had traditions, experienced terrible and wonderful events, and had clear and definite wants and wishes. They were raw and real (maybe too much so at times), but they made the story come to life.
But I feel like I need to say it again. This book was tragic. There were some parts of the book where I had to fully put the book down and step away because it was so painful. By the end, I was heartbroken. Still, if you want something raw and real, Betty might be perfect for you. 7/10
CARRIE SOTO IS BACK by Taylor Jenkins Reid
When Carrie Soto retires from professional tennis, she is the greatest player the world has ever seen. With her father as her coach, she has sacrificed everything in order to break every record and amass a total of twenty grand slam titles. Yet six years into her retirement, Carrie Soto finds herself watching her title be taken by a young, brutal British player named Nicki Chan in the 1994 U.S. Open.
Determined not to let her record fall away, Carrie makes the monumental decision to come out of retirement at thirty-seven years old, with her father returning as her coach. Even if sports media claims they never liked her and she must push her body to the edge in order to reclaim her abilities.
I haven’t finished a book in a day in a very long time, but Carrie Soto is Back had me turning pages so fast that I was done in no time. If anything should speak to how immersed I was in this book, it should be that I’m still a little shocked that none of the characters are real. The impacts of their choices—the arguments they had, words they said, experiences they had—felt like they were hitting me directly. Their relationships and emotions were so strong that I was practically feeling and experiencing each one in real time. Carrie’s love for her dad made me smile, her rivalry with Nicki had me seething, and her romances were fun to read.
While I have many favorite parts of this book, my favorite is Carrie Soto’s persona. She is unforgiving, harsh, and critical. She destroys relationships and makes bad choices. She has very few (if any) redeeming qualities. But this is what made her so intriguing—because while she may have been an imperfect person, she was a perfect character. It’s very unlikely that I get to read about female characters who are horrible to everyone and everything around them. So many female characters in books I’ve read feel as if they must balance their positive and negative traits so as not to overstep in one direction. Yet with Carrie Soto, there was none of that, and this made her feel so refreshed and real.
If you’re looking for a fast-paced page-turner with a perfectly imperfect main character, Carrie Soto is Back might be the book for you. 9/10.
And that concludes this month’s book reviews! I hope you’ve enjoyed reading. If any of these books interest you, I suggest checking out our local or school libraries, or even stopping by a local bookstore.
