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Rules of Civility by Amor Towles

Title: Rules of Civility

Author: Amor Towles

Publisher: Viking 2011

Genre: Historical Fiction

Pages: 335

Rating: 3/5 stars

Reading Challenges: Unread Shelf; Decades - 1930s

On the last night of 1937, twenty-five-year-old Katey Kontent is in a second-rate Greenwich Village jazz bar when Tinker Grey, a handsome banker, happens to sit down at the neighboring table. This chance encounter and its startling consequences propel Katey on a year-long journey into the upper echelons of New York society—where she will have little to rely upon other than a bracing wit and her own brand of cool nerve.

This has been on my shelf for years and yet I kept putting it off. I’ve even read other Towles books before this one. I finally picked it up during my reading retreat and it just didn’t land for me. I was very interested in the time period and entire set up of the book. Unfortunately the best character in this book is the setting. The glimpses we get of NYC in 1937 were dazzling. But there’s where my real enjoyment of this book ended. I couldn’t care about any of the actual characters. I never truly felt like I understood Katey. I really didn’t get her motivations and background. Things that I thought Towles would focus on ended up bing a line here or there. We never really got into the meat of the character. While A Gentleman in Moscow is destined to be one of my favorite books of all time, this one will be quickly forgotten.

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Next up on the TBR pile:

uzumaki.jpg tombs.jpg black paradox.jpg gyo.jpg great big.jpg alley.jpg deserter.jpg book of the most.jpg jujutsu13.jpg jujutsu14.jpg jujutsu15.jpg seoulmates.jpg twisted1.jpg jujutsu16.jpg twisted2.jpg twisted3.jpg twisted4.jpg
tags: Amor Towles, historical fiction, UnRead Shelf Project RC, Book of the Month, Decades, 3 stars
categories: Book Reviews
Saturday 06.22.24
Posted by Tobe Buffenbarger
 

You Have Arrived at Your Destination by Amor Towles

Title: You Have Arrived at Your Destination (Forward #4)

Author: Amor Towles

Publisher: Amazon Original Stories 2019

Genre: Science Fiction

Pages: 54

Rating: 3/5 stars

Reading Challenges: COYER

Nature or nurture? Neither. Discover a bold new way to raise a child in this unsettling story of the near future by the New York Times bestselling author of A Gentleman in Moscow.

When Sam’s wife first tells him about Vitek, a twenty-first-century fertility lab, he sees it as the natural next step in trying to help their future child get a “leg up” in a competitive world. But the more Sam considers the lives that his child could lead, the more he begins to question his own relationships and the choices he has made in his life.

I absolutely adored A Gentleman in Moscow, but this story just didn’t quite intrigue me enough. There is a beginning of a larger story in here along with some interesting background world building. The problem is that it just doesn’t go anywhere for me. Oh well.

Forward

  • #1 Ark by Veronica Roth

  • #2 Summer Frost by Blake Crouch

  • #3 Emergency Skin by NK Jemisin

  • #4 You Have Arrived at Your Destination by Amor Towles

  • #5 The Last Conversation by Paul Tremblay

  • #6 Randomize by Andy Weir

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Next up on the TBR pile:

uzumaki.jpg tombs.jpg black paradox.jpg gyo.jpg great big.jpg alley.jpg deserter.jpg book of the most.jpg jujutsu13.jpg jujutsu14.jpg jujutsu15.jpg seoulmates.jpg twisted1.jpg jujutsu16.jpg twisted2.jpg twisted3.jpg twisted4.jpg
tags: short stories, science fiction, Amor Towles, 3 stars, COYER
categories: Book Reviews
Saturday 11.25.23
Posted by Tobe Buffenbarger
 

The Lincoln Highway by Amor Towles

Title: The Lincoln Highway

Author: Amor Towles

Publisher: Viking 2021

Genre: Historical Fiction

Pages: 576

Rating: 5/5 stars

Reading Challenges: 

In June, 1954, eighteen-year-old Emmett Watson is driven home to Nebraska by the warden of the juvenile work farm where he has just served fifteen months for involuntary manslaughter. His mother long gone, his father recently deceased, and the family farm foreclosed upon by the bank, Emmett's intention is to pick up his eight-year-old brother, Billy, and head to California where they can start their lives anew. But when the warden drives away, Emmett discovers that two friends from the work farm have hidden themselves in the trunk of the warden's car. Together, they have hatched an altogether different plan for Emmett's future, one that will take them all on a fateful journey in the opposite direction—to the City of New York.

Oh my this was another winner from Amor Towles! I didn’t quite know what I was going to think of it when we first met the characters. Emmett seems like a likable guy, but Duchess and Wooley are hard to like at first. I was concerned that we would be leaning on white America tropes (and we are a bit), but it’s more of a story of journey for two brothers and their adopted family. We get to see Emmett and Billy try to make sense of a world after losing their parents and facing prejudice from the inhabitants of their hometown. They attempt to strike out for a new life and encounter a variety of obstacles. I loved how Towles weaved the narratives of multiple side characters into the story of the brothers. I ended up really caring for all the characters we encounter (even the pretty vile Pastor John). Towles has a way of really diving into the lives of characters and showing you as the reader their humanity. In many ways this is a quiet book, but the plot keeps us moving from day to day until we reach the closing on chapter for Emmett and Billy and an opening of another. Delightful!

Next up on the TBR pile:

uzumaki.jpg tombs.jpg black paradox.jpg gyo.jpg great big.jpg alley.jpg deserter.jpg book of the most.jpg jujutsu13.jpg jujutsu14.jpg jujutsu15.jpg seoulmates.jpg twisted1.jpg jujutsu16.jpg twisted2.jpg twisted3.jpg twisted4.jpg
tags: Amor Towles, historical fiction, 5 stars
categories: Book Reviews
Friday 08.12.22
Posted by Tobe Buffenbarger
 

A Gentleman in Moscow by Amor Towles

Title: A Gentleman in Moscow

Author: Amor Towles

Publisher: Penguin 2019

Genre: Historical Fiction

Pages: 462

Rating: 5/5 stars

Reading Challenges: Unread Shelf; Unread Shelf RC - January (Putting Off Reading)

In 1922, Count Alexander Rostov is deemed an unrepentant aristocrat by a Bolshevik tribunal, and is sentenced to house arrest in the Metropol, a grand hotel across the street from the Kremlin. Rostov, an indomitable man of erudition and wit, has never worked a day in his life, and must now live in an attic room while some of the most tumultuous decades in Russian history are unfolding outside the hotel’s doors. Unexpectedly, his reduced circumstances provide him entry into a much larger world of emotional discovery.

Brimming with humor, a glittering cast of characters, and one beautifully rendered scene after another, this singular novel casts a spell as it relates the count’s endeavor to gain a deeper understanding of what it means to be a man of purpose.

I waited so long to read this! Already this is going onto my Top 10 of 2022 list at the end of the year, it’s that good! Towles has crafted a beautiful story of love, loss, human connection, and change. We get to journey with the Count through 30 years of his life under hotel arrest. We see him share in the joy and pain of others he encounters. We see him develop strong bonds with many others. We see him notate the changes happening in his beloved home country all while not being to experience them outside of the building. Within the plot, Towles sprinkles passages of philosophy and culture and life lessons. I have marked so many passages in my book that it just looks silly. I found myself rereading certain passages over and over again, committing them to memory (the coffee making paragraph is a particular favorite). I was so incredibly sad when I reached the last page, but also so glad that I was able to spend so much time with a wonderful and interesting human being.

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Next up on the TBR pile:

uzumaki.jpg tombs.jpg black paradox.jpg gyo.jpg great big.jpg alley.jpg deserter.jpg book of the most.jpg jujutsu13.jpg jujutsu14.jpg jujutsu15.jpg seoulmates.jpg twisted1.jpg jujutsu16.jpg twisted2.jpg twisted3.jpg twisted4.jpg
tags: Amor Towles, historical fiction, Currently Reading Podcast, UnRead Shelf, Unread Shelf Project, UnRead Shelf Project RC, 5 stars
categories: Book Reviews
Sunday 01.30.22
Posted by Tobe Buffenbarger
 

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