New Release: The Dinner

Over the course of one meal, two families must struggle to make the hardest decision of their lives. It starts as a polite conversation while eating at a expensive restaurant. Two brothers, Paul and Serge, and their wives speak of trivial matters while having dinner. They discuss work, vacations, and the new Woody Allen movie, but the conversations become increasingly stressed when secrets start to come up. The book them transforms into a political thriller when the real reason for their meeting emerges. Each brother has a 15 year old son who were caught together committing an unspeakable act. They have not yet been identified, but the video is circulating T.V and YouTube and the brothers argue over what they will do to protect their sons. The book is full of twists and turns which reveal the depths of the characters and dark pasts they are hiding. Serge is a political figure and you see what he is willing to do to keep the privileged life he leads.

This is described as a chilling look at madness, class, and the ugliness of keeping up appearances. 

The Casual Vacancy by J.K Rowling

I finally completed The Casual Vacancy. It reminded me a bit of The Pilot's Wife in the sense that I found the book long and uneventful but with a good strong ending that brought all of the events together. It was one of those books that make you think once you have finished it. The ending was good but that doesn't mean that I liked the book as a whole. Reading is an experience to me, and if I don't enjoy every moment of the book and have a "I cant put it down" moments at least once, no matter how much it makes you reflect after its done, a good ending does not make up for my lack of interest while I was reading it.

This book just did not grab my attention from the beginning. I found that there were way to many characters all introduced at once. It took me almost the entire novel to figure out who was who and how they all seemed to be related. Most of the characters were unlikeable. The only characters that I liked were Krystal and Andrew. Both were kids who had hard childhoods but dealt with their troubles the best they could. All of the adults in the town were rude and gossiped about each other. They never had anything nice to say about their fellow neighbours and it made reading very negative. I want to read a book that makes me feel happy, excited, intrigued, scared even, but a book that makes me annoyed isn't something I want to waste my free time reading.

No matter how well written the book was I would not recommend it to anyone. I prefer to read a badly written book with a good story. (That comment was directed at those who did not enjoy The Night Circus and Fifty Shades of Grey)