Welcome to Litsy!

Miranda, an actor turned college theater professor, lives a life consumed by pain. A bad fall has left her with a body she can no longer count on for anything but torment, while those around her question whether it might just be all in her head. Things take a turn when Miranda meets three strangers at a local pub. They offer her a chance to direct the Shakespeare play of her dreams and let the doubters know how real her pain is, but at what cost?

I‘ve felt ambivalent about the 3 Awad books I‘ve read. I appreciate her commitment to truly bonkers plots and skewering of niche subcultures (MFA programs in Bunny, skincare/wellness industry in Rouge, theatre kids & chronic pain in All‘s Well), but the magical realism elements didn‘t work as well in this one. Absolutely love the cover/title, reflecting both the college Shakespeare production & FMC‘s debilitating invisible pain.

I was inspired to read this book bc my friend had just read Bunny, but I picked this one instead bc it‘s Shakespeare related and I‘m pretentious. The first 100 pages of this book I wasn‘t sure if I was even going to finish it bc it does not start off strong. Honestly it‘s hard to read about someone struggling so hard. The rest of the book was more interesting and it had some cool points but mostly not amazing

@Catiewithac

Catie, I just opened your lovely gift. Thank you so much! This book has been on my TBR for a long time, and now I get to read it in 2024! #woohoo! I'm so grateful to have found you through #LitsyLove and look forward to our continue friendship through our letters. Wishing you and Abbey the happiest of holidays in your new home! 💙❄️💙

I didn‘t think I could possibly love another Mona Awad book as much as Bunny but I really did! So much more complex and fascinating than other ‘doing a production of Shakespeare and everything gets weird‘ books - looking at you If We Were Villains. I loved the problem play vibe, the surrealism, the horror, the murkiness and horrible MC. So perfect.

#wintergames #snowangels

Winter games is finally here! I‘m excited for me and all the #snowangels to get a lot of reading in and be cosy and festive! Today I‘m finishing off a couple of non-festive reads then I‘ll be starting on some very Christmassy rom coms.

#wintergames

I am so excited for the first readathon of #wintergames this year! Thank you @Andrew65 for hosting the #20in4 readathon ❄️

My goal is pretty much to read as much as I can and see what I get through. It‘s gonna be a mix of commuting audiobooks, education reports at work and reading for my grad school essay at the weekend - keeping it nice and varied! Tagging team #snowangels down below in case you want to get involved

When #ownitalreadyoctober goes bad, and #nobuynovember goes worse, it's gotta be #dontdoitdecember

😅

BEHOLD MAI TREASURES!!!!!

Supporting Independent book stores! 🥰🥰

Nothing like a good book and a glass of the golden remedy to ease your mind, am I right? If you've read this, you'll know this last phrase is repeated over and over. After a while, I was repeating it to my cats ('That's some yummy food, am I right?'). It's one of many careless phrases uttered by the happy that serve to irritate the miserable in Awad's theater of the absurd. A perfect dark comic meditation on the gulf between sickness and wellness.

#DramaQueen #Titlesandtunes
What a great opportunity for me to read my most anticipated selection from my shelf (I'm weirdly proud I lasted a year for it to 'wait its turn', even though that makes no sense 🤷🏻). After Bunny, I can only assume this story of a director staging All's Well That Ends Well will have some bizarre complications. I think it's 'the drama I've been craving', as Sleater Kinney sing on one of my all-time favorite albums.

⭐️⭐️⭐️ Editing this sucker down might‘ve saved it for me. Idk. Probably not! Giving it three stars because Awad‘s writing is quite good. Too bad this story is excruciatingly boring. I‘m in no great rush to try her again.

I mailed out my #lmpbc to @MaleficentBookDragon yesterday. I enjoyed it I hope you do too! @BookwormAHN @LiteraryinLawrence This group is a lot of fun!

This was a fun, insane book. Miranda suffers from chronic pain that keeps getting worse while trying to put on a performance of Shakespeare's All's Well That Ends Well.
I hope everyone in my #LMPBC group enjoys it 😺
#LMPBC @MaleficentBookDragon @LiteraryinLawrence and @BookishPiper
#BookSpin Mona Awad

Here are my choices for #GroupX
All's Well - the author is Gen X
Dave Grohl - because why not
White Noise - 80s nostalgia
@MaleficentBookDragon @LiteraryinLawrence @BookishPiper #LMPBC

Sooooooooo good. We love the theatre!

⭐️⭐️⭐️

OMG, what did I just read and why did I finish it??
2 ⭐ for the Shakespeare parts.

@NataliePatalie

I thought “Bunny” was darkly weird, but this is more so! Exhausting, intense, darkly funny, and I read it with horror, too. All‘s Well has a clever connection with a couple of Shakespeare‘s plays. It‘s a poke at the perception of chronic pain, and of the health care industry. There‘s a good dose of the supernatural (or is it painkillers?) at play, that left me confused in parts. I think this makes a good book club read-lots to discuss. Quite ⬇️

Recent acquisitions

Overall an okay reading month. Nothing I read this month blew me away except for All's Well which I highly recommend to everyone! I managed to finish my #bookspin and #doublespin, though, so I'm taking the win!

@TheAromaofBooks

March wrap-up! I finished 10 books, but unfortunately several were disappointments. Still found some good ones, though!
🥇All's Well
🥈Assembly
🥉All of Us Villains

Book 48🎧 5⭐️
Another amazing book by Awad! Includes an ode to Bunny too🐰💕
This was so good! I love the “is/about” Shakespeare stories (10 things I hate about you/The taming of the shrew) and this was a fantastic version of Alls well that ends well!

With Awads classic dark humour and satirical writing, you really feel what it‘s like to live as someone with chronic pain, see how they are treated. I appreciated her showing this raw side of pain.

Creepy!!!! I realize that if I knew enough Shakespeare I would recognize all the references, but I think Stephen King also influenced the writing. I thought of Thinner as I listened. And if I hear, "Am I right?" I may just lose my head as Ms. Fitch seems to on opening night. How annoying.

This #ToB22 book has elements of All's Well That Ends Well and Macbeth mixed into a wonderfully crazy story about a high-school drama teacher suffering from chronic pain. Miranda tells her students that Shakespeare's play is both a tragedy and a comedy, and one can say the same of this version of All's Well.

I wouldn't recommend this novel to everyone, but I really loved it myself.

#BookSpinBingo @TheAromaofBooks

Just in time before this book is up against The Trees in the #Tob22 I finished it. And I like it a lot more than I thought I would. Miranda is a theater director who suffers chronic pains and lives on painkillers. When she meets three weird men in a bar, all‘s well. No, not really. The book becomes a mess after that but I liked it.
No match for The Trees though, if you‘d ask me!

#Tob22 #pop22 #MisleadingTitle

March TBR, Part 2! A few days into the month & I keep adding books to my monthly TBR. I'll have to see how realistic or unrealistic it is in my monthly wrap-up 📚

After hating Bunny, I had no intention of reading this book but did so for TOB completeness. I hated the first part with it‘s tedious, one-dimensional characters but pushed forward since I knew it would change. I actually found that I enjoyed parts of it and wanted to keep going, though the weirdest sections didn‘t work for me. On no planet should this ever best Percival Everett‘s masterful The Trees.

First third is scary good full of overwhelming physical pain and it was almost more than I could bear. And then it almost became deliciously fun in contrast, exploring the reverse. Yowza this is darkly comic and manic. The ending is supposed to be unsure and unresolved, so that fits. 🥴 I liked it getting there, so it gets a pick. 🌹🥀
#tob2022

I really enjoyed this exploration of chronic illness and how we deal with it, the callous tyranny of "mind over matter," the deals we attempt to make with ourselves and the world, and the ways that we support others (or not). There's some Shakespeare, too, but at the level that I appreciate it (I like the themes and I like the use of language/wordplay, but the plays don't usually engage me for the duration of a performance). #ToB2022

Here's Silo wondering if he should be familiar with the Shakespeare play to fully appreciate the tagged book or if having elaborate whiskers and a regal profile is sufficient.

Worked on my February #BookSpinBingo list. Giving two slots each to my remaining #TOB2022 titles. Finished Intimacies this morning, watched some 🏈 (Congrats to Cinci), and now starting All‘s Well. It‘s due at the library on 2/2 😬
I did manage both the January Spin and the Double! I did not hit any bingos. And yet, I read 12 books! 🤔🤷🏻‍♀️

My #tob22 picks in order thus far:

1. The Trees
2. Klara and the Sun
3. The Sentence
4. All‘s Well
5. The Book of Form and Emptiness
6. The Echo Wife
7. Intimacies
8. Beautiful World, Where are you
9. In Concrete
10. When We Cease to Understand the World.

Where am I wrong? I can take it. 😂

Matrix and Nervous System are in progress. If I finish everything including the remaining play-ins, I‘ll give No One is Talking another go. 🙂

This is a tough one to rate, really wavering between so-so and pick so going with a low pick. Totally bizarre with lots of smart Shakespearean references and other devices that were mostly over my head. The portrayal of chronic pain was fascinating and terrifying, and gave me the humbling feeling that fiction isn‘t so far from reality for many. Book 7 down #TOB22

The surrealism in this #tobshortlist novel is what I would imagine coming down from a bad high feels like. Certain aspects are expertly done. Awad really captures the experience of being a chronic pain sufferer, the misogyny that still exists when trying to seek treatment, and the disbelief by friends and family faced by many with chronic pain. The first 100 pages was fantastic. Then the book became a bit unmoored, in a WTF did I read kinda way.

I had to sit with this for a bit to really decide how I felt.

The main character annoyed me and I had a hard time even caring about her pain. I do appreciate the author addressing chronic pain and how doctors often dismiss a person's complaints. Also, the clever connection to Shakespeare saved a lot of this story for me.

I'm giving this a pick for its creativity, and I enjoyed most of it, but I didn't love it like I had hoped. #ToB2022 #ToB22

This book is a bit bonkers. Usually I love the weird stories, but I am really struggling here. I‘m definitely getting deep into the surreal section, and I don‘t like it.

Can someone tell me if it just keeps going down a rabbit hole? Miranda has turned into a major asshole. I‘m going to finish, because it‘s a #tobshortlist book that also fills a lot of prompts. But I may start skimming.

Although All's Well is well-written and Miranda is certainly a vivid character, I mostly found the book an exercise in frustration. I found Miranda‘s complaints about her disappointments in life grating, and although I could sympathize with her chronic pain (and her truly terrible doctors), I found it hard to sympathize with her disdain for her students. And while the book is clearly intended to be humorous, I didn‘t think it was all that funny.

Well, I did not end up reading next to the cats earlier today, but now I am settled in to my favorite chair next to the fireplace, with my new cozy sweater and favorite socks!

About 100 pages into this one and still on the fence about how I feel. As someone who dealt with chronic pain from endometriosis for years, I hope this book does justice to the subject of the obstacles chronic pain sufferers face.

#tob #tobshortlist

Another twisty novel from Awad. If you like weird, this one is for you. A former actress with a crippling chronic illness is trying to stage All‘s Well That Ends Well at the university where she works, but the mutinous students are dead-set on doing Macbeth instead. She makes a deal with a trio of strange men she meets in a local pub and it looks like things might be going her way for a change - or are they?

Although I‘m not quite sure what happened at the end (🤷🏻‍♀️), I really liked this dark and sinister tale of the female experience with pain and the value placed on youthful beauty. I didn‘t read Bunny, but now I‘m going to have to check it out. #ToB2022

There is such daring to Awad's writing I cant help but admire it. Because this novel (like Bunny) is unapologetically nuts. Painridden drama professor Miranda, makes a proverbial deal with the devil, not unlike a certain doomed Scottish king. And then strange things begin to happen. Playing with fantasy lets Awad explore how crazy pain can make us and the lengths we would go to avoid it. Tying it all to Shakespeare is just plain clever. As 👇

I wasn‘t sure what to expect with this book. It did get weird. No doubt. But I really enjoyed the writing and the twists and turns. The descriptions of chronic pain and useless treatments were particularly visceral. And it made me want to read Shakespeare. A win for me.

#tob #tob2022 #tob22

01. All‘s Well; Libertie
02. All‘s Well
03. New books coming from Hanya Yanagihara and Emily St. John Mandel

#weekendreads @rachelsbrittain

How I'm spending the evening. Happy New Year everyone! 🥂🎉🎊 Wishing us all lots of peace, joy, and good books in 2022!