Good Books

 

I enjoyed reading the novel Eleanor Oliphant is completely fine. It was a top bestseller in 2018 when it was published. Along with several other books, it’s been on my list for a long time. I thought that the author, Gail Honeyman, did a good job of building a character who had been very damaged as a child by neglect and uncaring authorities who were responsible for her welfare. The first-person narrative works very effectively at portraying a person who doesn’t have a good grip on what really happened, but who learns to be more and more honest in attempting to attain insights — one might almost say enlightenment — about her experiences. 

The word FINE is used throughout the book as a kind of touchstone about Eleanor’s experiences. She always says she is fine. A search discloses use of the word over 80 times in the text. At the end, she points out that saying she is fine was always the only way she was allowed to describe her condition. And thus she was never allowed to develop any insight into what was being done to her or how she authentically felt. My summary sounds trite, but her way of using the word “fine” is much more nuanced.

Near the end of the book, she finally grasps the significance of her childhood and also her adult isolation:

“I woke again. I had not closed the curtains and light was coming in, moonlight. The word connotes romance. I took one of my hands in the other, tried to imagine what it would feel like if it was another person's hand holding mine. There have been times when I felt that I might die of loneliness. People sometimes say they might die of boredom, that they're dying for a cup of tea, but for me, dying of loneliness is not hyperbole. When I feel like that, my head drops and my shoulders slump and I ache, I physically ache, for human contact—I truly feel that I might tumble to the ground and pass away if someone doesn't hold me, touch me. I don't mean a lover — his recent madness aside, I had long since given up on any notion that another person might love me that way — but simply as a human being. The scalp massage at the hair-dressers, the flu jab I had last winter— the only time I experience touch is from people whom I am paying, and they are almost always wearing disposable gloves at the time. I'm merely stating the facts.

“People don't like these facts, but I can't help that. If someone asks you how you are, you are meant to say FINE. You are not meant to say that you cried yourself to sleep last night because you hadn't spoken to another person for two consecutive days. FINE is what you say.” (p. 393)

I also loved the book Remarkably Bright Creatures by Shelby Van Pelt, which was also a bestseller. after its publication in 2022. The center of this book is an octopus named Marcellus, who lives in a display tank in an aquarium. Marcellus narrates some of the chapters of the book, and he has an incredible grasp of what he has seen, with uncanny insights into the people who maintain and visit the aquarium. However, the author doesn’t overdo the insightful narrative of this remarkable invertebrate creature — most of the book is narrated from a conventional omniscient point of view.

Here are a few of the words of wisdom from Marcellus:

“IF THERE IS ONE TOPIC OF CONVERSATION HUMANS never exhaust, it is the status of their outdoor environment. And for as much as they discuss it, their incredulity is ... well, incredible. That preposterous phrase: Can you believe this weather we're having?

“How many times have I heard it? One thousand, nine hundred and ten, to be exact. One and a half times a day, on average. Tell me again about the intelligence of humans. They cannot even manage to comprehend predictable meteorological events.

“Imagine if I were to stride over to my neighbors, the sea jellies, and, while shaking my mantle with disbelief, make a comment such as: Can you believe these bubbles these tanks are putting out today?

Preposterous.

“(Of course, this would also be preposterous because the jellies would not answer. They cannot communicate on that level. And they cannot be taught. Believe me, I have tried.)”  (p. 149)

More of the wisdom of Marcellus:

“I have observed humans at every life stage, and they are, at all times, undeniably human. Even though the human baby is helpless and must be carried by its parent, no one could mistake it for anything else. Humans grow from small to large and then sometimes recede again as they approach the end of their life span, but they always have four limbs, twenty digits, two eyes on the front of their heads.

“Their dependence upon their parents is unusually prolonged. Certainly it makes sense that the smallest children require assistance with the most basic of tasks: eating, drinking, urinating, defecating. Their short stature and clumsy limbs make these activities difficult. But as they gain physical independence, oddly, their struggle continues. They summon mother or father at the slightest need: an untied shoelace, a sealed juice box, a minor conflict with another child.

Young humans would fail abysmally in the sea.“ (p. 117)

I enjoyed Remarkably Bright Creatures, both for the wonderful creation of Marcellus, the sentient octopus, and for the human story that’s partly observed by Marcellus.

I mentioned in an earlier post that I was in the middle of reading Bluebird, Bluebird by Attica Locke, and I have finished reading it. The suspense and the tightly-wound plot all are sustained until the end. This author is really adept at creating complicated characters!

Here’s an example that shows the author’s portrayal of a character — and also shows the way Locke uses food scenes:

“By the time he pulled into the parking lot at Geneva's, the sun was setting. Randie left the truck first, lifting the bottle of bourbon from the backseat and walking it into the cafe.

“She chased it with sips of ice-cold Dr Pepper, kept a sweating bottle of it at her side as they waited for their food. Thin slices of pork, ringed in fat crisped in its own grease in the pan, dirty rice, and grilled onions, with pickled cabbage and sliced tomatoes on the side.

“The first two drinks went down on an empty stomach, and Randie grew strangely quiet, her fingertips grazing the tabletop in time to the slide guitar coming from the jukebox.” (p. 339)

Unfortunately, drinking and overeating don’t agree with Randie! Sometimes there’s an overdose of realism in this book. 

Reviews © 2025 mae sander