The Skinny: March Reads
Happy Saturday! I can't believe we're already two weeks into March. Confession: I didn't end up going into DC for Museum Live! today. My friend asked if I'd like to go hiking with her and some other friends at Billy Goat Trail in Potomac, MD today and I couldn't turn it down. The weather has been fabulous lately and today was the perfect day for a nice hike through the park.
The photo makes it look more bleak than it really was - there were a few clouds, a light breeze, and a ton of rock-scrambling! We managed to hike the first part of the trail in about three hours (the entire loop was about 6 mi). We stopped atop a rock for luncha nd explored a little island of rocks halfway through the hike - that's actually where the panoramic photo was taken from :)
Highlights of this past week include an intense salsa practice, awesome mussels at Mon Ami Gabi, book club meeting to discuss Fates & Furies, and grabbing an authentic slice at Crust in Tysons. Our book club had a really wonderful discussion about Fates & Furies. The book was a hefty (and long) one, so I just started working on This is How You Lose Her by Junot Diaz at the end of this week. With that being said, Fates & Furies packs a lot of punch - despite its shortcomings, it's my must-read for March (if only because so many people have unpacked and picked apart its contents).
Fates and Furies Lauren Groff, 400 pages
The novel is split into two sections: Fates (told from the view of Lotto Satterwhite, the husband in the novel) and Furies (told form the view of Mathilde Yoder, the wife in the novel). The first section moves slowly - its narration shifts between being dull and overly scholastic. The second section moves quickly - its narration is fragmented, rushed, and loaded with one sordid secret after another. The novel was, as a whole, completely scandalous. Whereas many books use life to showcase a story about marriage, Groff's is clearly a novel that uses marriage to showcase a story about life. Moreso, the book is about how traumatic events in your childhood can ultimately shape your relationships into adulthood.
Some members of my book club found the first section of the novel a drag and had to actively stop themselves from putting the book down. While I agree that the tempo wasn't nearly as exciting as the latter half, I have to believe that Groff did this deliberately. The stark contrast between the pace, tone, and content of the two sections make the novel seem less like a retelling of events from two different points of view and more like two entirely different sets of events. With finesse and tenacity, Groff attacks marriage from this perspective - the secrets kept, the carefully pruned personality that one reveals to his/her spouse, and how the fury of one spouse can utlimately dictate the fates of both people.
The book was, at points, a bit too dramatic for my personal liking. In particular, the events of the latter half seemed a bit outlandish and therefore, ultimately, inauthentic. But overall, I think Groff does something magical - her intentionality is clear only at the novel's end and, even then, you have a lingering feeling that the more you know about Lotto and Mathilde, the more you don't know. It takes a special type of author to do this, and it takes a special story to stir that uncomfortable feeling in your gut.
So what's on the docket for next week? St. Patty's Day brunch at work, a Go Ape adventure, and a career development event at Busboys & Poets hosted by my alumni organization! The event will feature Alison Cardy, whose new book Career Grease: How to Get Unstuck & Pivot Your Career, will be launching the same day of the event! She'll be talking about how (and why) people make career changes, as well as speak to the common places where people often get stuck in the career change process. Hoping to gain some insight into how I can gain momentum and make progress when I start my career this summer/fall!
