Monday, March 1, 2010

Weekends

So this weekend was much quieter than last weekend, thank God. My kid is fine, totally fine. She's back to fighting with her brother, so she must be fine, AMIRITE?

Has anyone else discovered Dan Chaon's novels? I read You Remind Me of Me last weekend and Await Your Reply this weekend. I checked them out of the library, but then I found a copy of You Remind Me of Me at the used bookstore for $5 on Friday evening! Score! They're both very good, but Await Your Reply is stellar. It's a Chinese box, MC Escher drawing, interlocking puzzle of a novel. It focuses on identity theft, and I swear, it made me want to stop direct deposit on my paycheck, close my bank account, put all my money in a shoebox under my bed and crawl in there after it. And never touch the Internet again. Oh, and burn my credit cards. And I am not the paranoid member of my household. I want Rock to read it, except that I'm afraid that if he does, we'll be living in a hole in the ground, eating food we raise, and I'll never get a computer or Internet access at home. (the amount that I'm kidding in that sentence is lower than you think.) But the characters! Oh my God, you guys, the characters! And the plot twists! And that's about all I can say without giving anything away except OMG, SO GOOD. Chaon has a way of crafting novels around a theme without being obvious and a hand so deft with plot twists that you will be blind-sided. They're both excellent, but Await Your Reply is phenomenal.

4 comments:

Surely said...

Going to Amazon right now!!!!

(ps: thanks for stopping by :-)

Shelly said...

Hey Firegirl and welcome! I hope you love the books!

You're welcome! Thank you for stopping by!

Alice said...

oh god, i have to make sure my dad never reads that book. he ALREADY won't use direct deposit or any ATM that is not physically inside a bank. my sister got him a special thingy to swipe his CC through that attaches to his computer so it encodes the info AGAIN before the website can see it. he's.. um.. sliiiightly nervous about identity theft.

Shelly said...

Alice - Well, I did ask Rock to read it, so we'll see how he reacts. He'll probably surprise me and think the whole thing is totally far-fetched. But, for my money, I would keep your dad FAR FAR away from this novel. You, on the other hand, I think would love it. 'Course, I may get home tonight and be greeted by a plan to move to Utah and live in a ditch, so who knows!