Welcome to Litsy!

This has been on my TBR shelf for quite some time and I‘m excited to finally read !

#bookspin #tbrtakedown #reading1001, #bingo #doublespin

#bookspinMarch #reading1001

This was my December #bookspin which I was in the process of reading since 2018. Glad that I got that out of the way.
This was complicated, sometimes interesting, but also difficult to read at times.
TBR since July 8th. 2018; 261 pages.
@TheAromaofBooks

A very difficult book to read, both in content and style. If you like a linear telling of a story this isn‘t for you.
I appreciated the style eventually, you just had to get used to the constant jumping about and the story was sad and heartfelt.
And I love the cover ♥️
Thanks Kate.

#birthdaybooks
Thank you Barbara, Leah (more in a minute 😁), Kate and Helen.
Helen- in some sort of a miracle I don‘t have any of the books I‘ve been brought and no one brought the same ones. A birthday miracle.

Books like this amazing book account for my obsession with reading. It‘s a book about all of the hidden truths in life that we do not want to acknowledge; truths about human nature, the toxicity of relationships, individual emotional struggles, family dysfunction and on and on. She speaks eloquently about these issues up to the very last page. It‘s added to the list of books I will never forget. ⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️

This book called to me off one of my bookshelves. I‘m not even sure why I got it and did know I had it. It is certainly is one of my favorite kind of books to read, about families and their secrets. I get so happy and excited about these finds.

I picked this up second hand months ago and finally got around to reading it. A few pages in and I realized I had read it before years ago. But it was worth a second read as I am a little bit older. It's a beautiful story about processing grief, and I think with age, each successive read could be more meaningful.

I‘ve wanted to read Anne Enright forever and can‘t believe I waited so long. This book was dark and sad and beautiful. A perfect slow spiral of a story. And her writing is impeccable - dry and wry and measured.

I disconnected at a yurt in the middle of nowhere for the long weekend and it was glorious. 🛖 ❤️

Confused and not sure what to make of this book: writing is extraordinary and when the author does dive into the depths of emotions, it is haunting and moving. I cannot say that I disliked the story but found it confusing, at times annoying. I don't fully understand the constant back and forth (from the narrator's grief to her family to memories of her childhood to her grandmother's story, partly made up by the narrator...). ... ?

Did we post our pic from this weekend? I didn‘t see it so I‘m sharing. Nice to meet everyone and hope to get together again soon! #ctlitsymeetup

If you want a bleak autumnal read, look no further! On the occasion of her alcoholic brother's suicide, occasionally witty but predominantly bitter Veronica seeks to discover/ remember what happened as kids to make Liam what he was. Her imagination invents, prevaricates and cycles around the theme of desire and male libido (too many penis references for my liking!) until she's confronted by the truth and the absence of any wanting in her own life.

It‘s going to be hard to review this book! Veronica, one of 12 siblings (9 living), must bring her brother Liam‘s body home to be buried. She must face long-buried, festering secrets. She must face losing her closest sibling. I wouldn‘t say I enjoyed this book, but I felt this book. Enright writes in a way that evokes emotions. What shapes us? Our experiences? Our family? Both? What a jarring, lovely, painful, relatable book. 137/1,001 #1001Books

It‘s FINALLY nice enough here in Nebraska to sit outside, chug iced tea and READ! ❤️ It‘s a good thing too because this book has me hooked!

I am the Watcher , willed the unit.

I chose this book because it's about the past, present, future.

#Thefinalcountdown is on. I have less than 40 minutes left in this audiobook and then I'll have completed the Litsy Reading Challenge! Woohoo! 🎉🎉
This book (The Man Booker winner for 2007) is beautifully written but so, SO sad, just seep-into-the-bones, life is lonely and hard, ongoing, pervasive sad. That grey fog on the cover is appropriate. I will need something lighter next.
@Cinfhen @BarbaraBB #rocktober

Veronica's brother has died and she must fetch his body back to Ireland as the family gathers for his wake. This is my first Anne Enright and man, can she write a gut punching sentence! You're in Veronica's head where stories and memories intertwine. She's dealing with grief, but this isn't a beautiful soft sadness, it's grief with teeth, a mess of guilt and betrayals and maybe some madness. Thought provoking and confronting.

#guilty makes me think of The Plea, a clever, pacy legal thriller. Or the famous scene in The Heart of Darkness ... but perhaps most interesting is The Gathering by Anne Enright: sibling + Irish Catholic guilt. 😉#Fallintobooks Day 13

So strong yet so melancholy. 39-year-old Veronica, one of 12 kids (and there were 7 miscarriages too), mulls over her childhood, grandparents, siblings, husband, kids, after she travels to England to arrange for her brother Liam's body to be shipped home. #bookerprize #192019challenge #2007 #1001books

Next up for fiction! It seems I have never read anything by Anne Enright, which strikes me as odd lol. #1001books #192019 #2007 #bookerprize

Beautiful writing about experiences and feelings that are not beautiful. Enright explores grief and memory with a quiet, raw vengeance. She excels at examining the small moments -- tearing them apart in precise pieces -- and then weaving them back in as the big moments hit. I thought this was outstanding.

It is a lovely thing when, just a few pages in, you realize that the writing sings to you.

#Irishauthors #marchintoreading I've read the bottom three but not the top three (need to pick up Tana French again!)

I think I'm going to give this one a go and wait to pick up people of fire sometime after the new year, maybe when my thesis is closer to being complete and I feel like I have time to commit to such a long book. I've had this for ages, picked up because of my love of Ireland.

Wanted to love this since it won the Man Booker Prize some years back. It had an interesting premise of an Irish woman from a family of 12 kids trying to process the death of one of her brothers. However, despite some beautiful writing, it had very little plot and jumped around in time too much. Only 3.5/5 for this one. 📚📚📚

I was behind the counter at the bookshop once not long after this book came out and a woman came in complaining about how much her book club had hated it. I took it kind of personally. Anne Enright's best. And that's saying something. This book is a journey through grief. It's stunning. One of my all time favorites.