Welcome to Litsy!

For US pride month I wanted to share some books with bisexual protagonists that I‘ve loved! As a bisexual woman I see bisexuality erased a lot in discussions about visibility and representation, even in some queer spaces. London‘s LGBT bookshop for example had more books with straight than bi in the title when I was last there. I wish I saw more books with prominent bisexual characters but there are some excellent ones if you look for them!

I ploughed through the last 3/4 of this book, uninterruptedly. I haven't read CMBYN so this was my introduction to Aciman's writing. It took a little getting used too (which might be why the first "story" in this novel didn't do it for me) but then it hits you with its sincerity and crudeness. This is a novel about love and desire and how we repeatedly surrender ourselves to other bodies, other feelings, while haunted by our past experiences.

I liked some of the writing hugely. Some of the chapters that spoke of regret and the past and might have beens. Truly beautiful words and construction.
However, the whole book didn't gel for me. I liked the ending, the final sentence was spot on. But hasn't left a lasting impression.

I've never heard of this or the author, library lend on a total whim!

This book was a rocky takeoff for me, which I think kept me from enjoying it as much as I could have. But once I made it out of the first chapter, I did end up enjoying it and appreciate so much the complexity of exploring love and queerness. #catsoflitsy

Seeing Andre Aciman speak was a very good use of a Monday night! Very excited by the hints he dropped about his next novel.

So excited! Enigma Variations has to be in my top five books I‘ve read this year. I never see portrayals of bisexuality that strike me in my gut like that. I‘m so thrilled to get to see Andre Aciman today

This doesn‘t quite capture love as it does the loss of it. Star Love destroyed me and the end of Abingdon Square ruined me. I wish Aciman would give us a book that has a more hopeful ending 😢 anyway Aciman never disappoints! I really love the idea of tracking someone‘s journey through a series of short stories I would like to read more books like this!

Excuse the mess but our book club was ON FIRE today. Wine + lunch + this book + conversation = pure happiness.

I loved CMBYN, and I loved Enigma Variations even more. It‘s rich and varied, just like the loves we experience in real life, and Aciman gives a man the opportunity to follow his heart and take risks without consequences or restrictive labels. It‘s indulgent and takes place in the “in between” moments of life decisions. It‘s magic.

Take out tonight! Chicken + rice soup and brussels sprouts and fries and dips. I‘m almost finished with this book for Saturday book club and I am really enjoying it. The first story was just beautiful and didn‘t go where I expected it to. A genuine surprise that twisted my heart.

While I was reading this book a phrase kept going round in my head, a friend described another book to me once (a book I haven‘t read) and called it ‘a really beautiful book about very lonely people‘. That‘s just what this one was like. Really beautiful, melancholic and slow. I don‘t think anyone makes you understand passion and regret like Andre Aciman.

I‘m determined to enjoy my lazy Sunday with this amazing book but life is making it very hard for me! I spilled piping hot coffee all down my leg 30 seconds before takin this picture and a guy in the cafe laughed at me and my fave bookshop is closed because of a drainage problem.

This book is everything I need on a day like today tho - so lyrical and the prose just carries me along.

Lunch bowls + book club book! Happy Saturday 💕.

SO excited to be reading my second book by Andre Aciman. I adored Call Me By Your Name so much and even tho I‘m on the first page of this one I already know I‘m gonna love it too. I feel like I‘m gonna end up reading everything he‘s ever written #currentlyreading

Is it spring yet!? Lots of asparagus and tulips 🌷 happening tonight. And getting around to our book club pick for next week!

Another stunning work - 5/5 stars.

Full review: https://reneereadsbooks.wordpress.com/2018/03/19/book-review-enigma-variations-b...

Take out tonight because I‘m sick 😷. Samosa soup + garlicky greens. Probably not going to do much reading tonight, but I am eagerly anticipating my next book club at the end of March to discuss this book!

No one communicates the myriad desires and agonies of the human heart quite like Aciman. This series of five connected stories follows the life and loves of a bisexual man named Paul from adolescence to middle age. Like CMBYN, it's intimate, analytical, sensual and infused with weighty nostalgia. In Aciman's world, sorrow and pain are just as essential to the human experience as love and happiness. There's comfort in this conviction.

It's time, @BooksForEmpathy

My salad is called The Vegan Hippy and it is delicious 🥗🥑🍠! Finished my book club book this morning and hopeful to start this one in a few hours. I wish my tulips had opened up because they match the cover so well 💕. Also, I can‘t stop staring at the illustration on the top half...

"But had I not eventually learned about the ways of physical love through gossip, hearsay, and foul words, God knows what I would have invented once seized by the urge to touch another human being."

Five of the books I'm most looking forward to reading this year. Thanks for the tag, @ErickaS_Flyleafunfurled ! #5in2018

Staggeringly real. This is composed of a group of novellas, and every story made my heart ache, made me take deep, stressed-out breaths in consternation. But I eagerly winded along the paths of these explorative, fascinating characters.

Also, it's sexy.

Incredible book. Five stars!

There's a life that takes place in ordinary time, and another that bursts in but just as suddenly fizzles out. And then there's the life we never may reach but that could so easily be ours if only we knew how to find it.

"Wherever I go, everyone I see and crave is ultimately measured by the glow of your light."

This book is giving me life so far.

This novel in stories from one man's point of view is about romantic relationships (and more subtly the meaning of life). It is beautifully written and painfully perceptive. There were some slow moments, but they only added to the intense closeness of the narrator's perspective.

Slightly longer review: https://www.goodreads.com/review/show/1897604434?book_show_action=false&from_rev...

It took me a while to get used to the intense introspection in this novel, but it's so astute and raw and somehow lovely that I was entangled by the end of the first portion.

Pictured is the opening paragraph of the second chapter/story—how painfully relatable.

Thanks for recommending this, @ReadingEnvy !

Beautiful book. It isn't about the plot so much as the way Aciman writes relationships & dissects human connection. In 5 parts that could be read separately as short stories, he explores different facets of love, from betrayal, longing, beginning & ending relationships, & exploring sexual orientation. He writes in gorgeous prose that makes you want to linger on each word & shows deep empathy for his characters. My first Aciman but not my last. 💞

Snuggling and reading with my buddy. It's cold and snowy out, so we're huddled under the heated blanket. 🐻

I'm loving Enigma Variations so far. This is the first time I've read Aciman but if it continues like this, I'll be going through his backlist. His prose is beautiful! He's also great at setting atmosphere and drawing out characters. I feel like I'm there with them.

#thebookishferrets

Told in five extremely passionate and raw stories, Enigma Variations shines light on love's power. We are given a character who shows and holds onto love as an all-consuming warmth and coldness through several lovers from adolescence to adulthood. If you're not familiar with Aciman's ability to demonstrate an intense passion through the human psyche then you're in for an intimate and powerful ride with language that is almost lyrical, and raw.

Okay, so I'm cheating a little because I didn't quite make it to the end, but holy cow, I just couldn't slog through anymore!!! The main character raises navel-gazing to an art form! Pages and pages of fantasizing about the minutiae of romances and relationships that never happened, may happen, will definitely never happen, and on and on. The first section was very good, and that's the reason it doesn't get a pan. 😕

A cool possibility and also terrifying...

School is starting entirely too soon so I am trying to get a little ahead in my Goodreads reading challenge by reading two books at once!

My other baby, my Zen girl, Luna. Love her to the moon and back, no pun intended (really!!) 😻

So this hold came in today at the library. Perdido Street Station will have to wait a bit. Maddie showing that she is incapable of being cooperative even for 10 seconds. Display of fangs was accidental (I think). 😼#catsoflitsy

I have a book-stacking problem, and you're all enablers. #cantstopwontstop #icanquitanytimebutwhywouldiwantto
#lastbookstacked
#seasonsreadings2016

@RealLifeReading

Astounding, one of the best books I read in 2016, so much truth about love and relationships. Comes out January 3. Includes some LGBT stories if you are trying to #readdiversebooks more!

Healthy choices, or justifying a future brownie? Loved the first story in this collection but had to go listen to the classical work too.