It's been a while

I took a year (or two) off. I finished my thesis and third year, now I'm months away from being a real doctor and I want to get these books done, darnit!
I did finish Tears of the Cheetah and I loved it. I gave it to a fellow grad student to read. Unfortunately, I don't remember much else about it at this point. But hey, I'd recommend it if you're a science nerd.

I also just finished The Amateur Marriage by Anne Tyler, selected with the random number generator and finished in under three days. Huzzah for a Dermatology rotation!
I do love Anne Tyler's writing. I can't really say why. I could use words like "rich" and "clear," but I'm not entirely sure what those words actually mean. Book critics throw them around a lot, it seems. I can only say that I find her books engrossing, even when I find the characters infuriating.  This book, like most of her others, tells a story about dysfunctional people. In this case, two dysfunctional people married to each other. The book spans 60 years of time, from Pearl Harbor Day in 1941 to the same day in 2001. It follows a couple and the family they create, and it lurches perspectives from each parent to the children and back. The characters are not particularly sympathetic, and the father, Michael Anton, is a stoic, micromanaging, stick-in-the-mud. His wife, Pauline, is neurotic to be sure, but he treats her with contempt and I can't help but come down on her side of the dividing line. Their children end up being a little thinly drawn characters as adults: the runaway, the businessman and the "lawyer for the homeless."  Honestly, I almost feel like the book tried to cover too much ground. I love a good generational saga, but this felt rushed. Just when I wanted to see the repercussions from some major fight or learn more about the children's characters, the book would lurch ahead 5 or 10 years and I would be left wondering. Perhaps that is a stylistic choice, but I enjoyed the previous Anne Tyler book I read more, because it felt more closely observed and seemed a bit kinder to its dysfunctional inhabitants.  I give this a 7 out of 10.

Next up: #28 Summer by Edith Wharton