How to Breathe Underwater

How could I have forgotten to talk about perhaps one of the best books of short stories I've read in...well, perhaps ever. How to Breathe Underwater by Julie Orringer is a collection of short stories that all seem to focus on so-called "coming of age" or "growing up". And while there are a few stories that I would just skip, such as "Stations of the Cross" or "Pilgrims", both of which strike a nerve in a not-so-good way, most of the stories are beautifully written and inspire the reader to just...think. Perhaps one of my favorite stories in the entire collection would be "Isabel Fish", which is about a young girls quest to become okay with the water - and her brother - after being involved in a car crash that kills her brothers girlfriend. The story is sad and beautiful and introspective and excellent (there goes that lack of critical insight, yet again).

While I'm usually not a huge fan of short stories - I don't really like the whole disjointed nature of compendiums or collections, and the time needed to individually reflect on each story isn't an investment I'm usually willing to make - these stories were all to absorbing not to love. Orringer crafted 9 stories, and perhaps the biggest complaint were that, towards the end, many of the stories began to run together. This may be due to the fact that I stopped taking so much time to reflect on the stories individually, but is more likely due to the fact that plot point and characteristics began to repeat. I also noticed that many of the characters or situations involved Judiasm or Jewish people. This is neither a good nor a bad thing, just something to notice.

Having finished these reflection-inducing books in such a short amount of time, I'm ready to move on to a new list of summer reading. Special Topics in Calamity Physics is currently on the front burner, but what with a fantastic trip to your local neighborhood library, and borrowing more than a few books from Anna, I now have a fairly impressive list of books to be read before August 11th (the day I leave for KU) including the Interpreter of Maladies, Sex, Drugs, and Cocoa Puffs: A Low Culture Manifesto, Confessions of a Shopaholic, and TWO supposedly-fantastic Johnathon Safron Foer books. I feel myself getting that familiar feeling of book-overwhelming-ness beginning to set in, but I'm pretty sure that as long as I take it one page, one chapter, one book at a time, I'll be more than just fine!