MasterAndMargareadalong Post III: Don't dream of any apartments in Moscow

It's Monday so it's another #MasterAndMargareadalong post (chapters 17-22), wherein we try to make sense of this fever dream. Or at least use a lot of gifs. Thank you, Alice, because there is no way I could have got through this without readalong support.

We are now more than 60% through this book. And are things making any more sense?

But I do believe this is a truly biting satire for anyone with an understanding of Soviet Moscow during this time. Really, housing sounds terrible and I understand the pain of trying to get an apartment in a city.

All of the money that the devil & co. rained from the sky during the magic show keeps turning into scraps of paper, which is causing chaos in the wider city as all these cab drivers and other merchants are getting paid in what appears to be money, but turns out to be trash. The only guy left running the theater is the bookkeeper* cos everyone else has been disappeared in one way or another. He's trying to report what happened to someone important, so he goes to visit Petrovich except instead of it being a guy, it's just his suit. Sitting at his desk, conducting business as usual.

Not wanting to file his complaint with a sentient suit, Vasily (bookkeeper) goes to another office but everyone there keeps bursting into song. In between verses they try to explain to Vasily that they can't help themselves and the choirmaster has done this to them. Everyone is taken to Homeless's hospital because I do seriously think everyone will end up there. And then Vasily is arrested cos his money from the theater show turns into foreign money and of course. Everyone is either arrested or ends up in the hospital. Or Yalta.

Berlioz's (guy who got his head cut off) uncle gets a telegram from Berlioz announcing his own funeral. Which is odd but his uncle is ALL ABOUT getting his hands on a sweet Moscow apartment and I get it, but man, we are beating a dead horse over this Moscow housing thing. He doesn't get the apartment, however, because instead one of the devil's cronies beats him with a roast chicken.

Part of me wants to know what the satirical significance of that is and another part of me wants to never find out a deeper meaning and just enjoy the Boston Market Beatdown for what it is.

Another guy, the bartender from the theater, is at the apartment to ask Woland what is up with the fake money. The devil is instead concerned with the fact that the bartender was serving rotten food during the show and hey, fair point. Feta cheese should NOT be green. So then the giant cat beats him up, sans-poultry.

We then FINALLY meet Margarita. I mean, we somewhat met her before, in the Master's stupid story, though we never technically got her name. But now we know and she is far better than the Master made her out to be. She's still super in love with him and sad that he's gone and makes a pact with the devil (or really, one of the devil's friends, the one who administers chicken beatings), to rub this mysterious cream all over her body. She knows she's walking into something dangerous but doesn't care.

She rubs the cream on her as instructed and it turns her into a 20 year old and also gives her the power of flight and makes her invisible. So that's neat. Before she becomes invisible her housekeeper(?) Natasha sees her and is pretty impressed that she looks so good and also I think a little cos she's naked and OH MAN,

this is already a way better relationship than between the Master and Margarita.

Margarita flies off on a broom and decides to go fuck things up for one of the critics that was mean to the Masters (terrible, terrible) book. He's not home, since he's at Berlioz's funeral, so she smashes her way in through one of the windows, destroys everything with a hammer and then floods not only his apartments but the ones below too.

After she's done with her destruction who shows up but Natasha, also naked and flying on a pig who was actually some guy who really would rather be a person and not a flying pig. Natasha and Margarita have a good laugh and think how awesome it is that they're witches now and then Natasha flies off while Margarita follows Azazello's instructions. She lands and then is picked up by a rook driving a car and is driven to a party.

Back at that Moscow apartment everyone wants their hands on, the devil is having a little get together and needs a female hostess, hence Margarita's transformation. The cat is cheating at a game of chess, while the vampire woman Hella rubs some sort of fire and brimstone salve on the devil's knee. He's looking at a globe which is actually the real globe and Margarita is intrigued because let's face it, that's pretty neat. Then Natasha and her flying pig show up, and please, let's just have Natasha and Margarita get together, hmmm?

So yeah, Margarita is pretty cool and not the subservient wilting flower Master described. I guess that's the cream's doing but I'd like to think it was there all along. At the same time, she is sort of a dick, destroying that guy's apartment cos he, a critic, criticized the Master's book. But still, she's at least interesting to read now, especially that I've given up trying to make heads or tales of things. A bird driving a car while a witch flies a pig? Of course!

I can't begin to predict what will happen next week since I hardly know what's happened up to this point. I'm sure it will be bonkers.

*FUN FACT totally unrelated to this book at all, but every time I see the word "bookkeeper" it reminds me of an Encyclopedia Brown story where they had to come up with a word that had 3 double letters in a row and they came up with this one and somehow that blew the case wide open. That is all. Back to the Russian fever dream.

Title quote from page 200

Bulgakov, Mikhail. trans. Richard Pevear and Larissa Volokhonsky. The Master and Margarita. Penguin Classics, 1997. Originally published 1966.

Don't make me undone by loving you

I received a copy of Difficult Women from NetGalley in exchange for a review and after reading her collection of essays Bad Feminist I was pretty excited for this one. Where Bad Feminist had a mixture of tackling tough issues and more light-hearted fare, this one was a punch in the gut. But in a good way.

Difficult Women is aptly named as it gives vignettes about a bunch of difficult women. Either women put in difficult situations, or complicated women, or a mix of both. There are few what I would consider stories, but it's more a glimpse into the lives of many different women. There are a few themes throughout the work. There's a lot of sex (I think in every story). Many of the stories deal with rape and there are a few stories about child abuse (so quick warnings to people who may want to pick this up. Nothing is too explicit and it doesn't feel gratuitous but it is rough). There are unhealthy relationships. A number of the stories take place in Michigan. There's a few about professors. Siblings and especially twins come up a few times.

There's not much in the way of plot in any of the stories. Nothing necessarily happens. Mostly it's a quick look at the lives these women lead. My favorite story, "Difficult Women", is even more a collection of vignettes of different types of women. Loose Women and Frigid Women and Crazy Women, what they do and how they act and why they are.

I loved "Florida" too, which followed "Difficult Women" and again, gives us vignettes about a number of different people although instead of female archetypes its different people in and around a gated community in Florida. Some are the wealthy women who have lived within the community for years, others are newcomers trying to figure out where or if they fit in here, and others are women who interact with the women of this community but are on the outside. This also included one of my favorite parts in the collection

"Por favor, Caridad," they said, "no mas." The ladies in her classes loved to speak to Caridad in broken Spanish, to show her they were comfortable with her ethnicity despite the paleness of their skin and the wealth of their husbands. Each morning before work, Caridad stared at her reflection in the mirror and practiced not rolling her eyes so she could smile politely at the ladies in her classes.

The story "North Country" is probably the most like an actual full short story. A woman has recently gotten a position at an engineering college in the Upper Peninsula and she's trying to find her place both in this new landscape as well as in a department where she is not only the sole woman but the only black person (everyone assumes she's from Detroit). She meets a lumberjack but has trouble opening herself up to a relationship, sabotaging things at every possible step.

There are a few stories that are on the stranger side of things, like the woman who is married to a man who is an identical twin and the men switch places every once in awhile. There's another story of a woman married to a sweet man who loves her but she also has a boyfriend (that the husband knows about) who physically abuses her. Someone she stays with because she feels she deserves the punishment.

A couple other quotes I highlighted

We were young once and then we weren't. 

She tries to walk not too fast and not too slow. She doesn't want to attract any attention. She pretends she doesn't hear the whistles and catcalls and lewd comments. Sometimes she forgets and leaves her house in a skirt or a tank top because its a warm day and she wants to feel warm air on her bare skin. Before long, she remembers. 

Parker stared at his plate, cleared his throat softly, wondered when he became the kind of man who looked down instead of standing up.

This is not necessarily a collection I will find myself returning too. The stories have a beauty to them and writing is wonderful, but they can also be difficult to face.

Gif rating:

Also totally unrelated to the book, but if you do not follow Roxane Gay on Twitter, especially when she's live tweeting House Hunters, you are missing out.

Title quote from location 2430

Gay, Roxane. Difficult Women. Grove Press, 2017. NetGalley.

MasterAndMargareadalong Post II: Congrats, citizens, you done lied!

Another Monday, so another #MasterAndMargareadalong post! Thank you, Alice, for making us read this book we've all been holding on to.

This week covers chapters 9-16 so we're almost 50% through this book and I still have only the vaguest sense of what's going on. But according to my friend who lent me the book, that's pretty much exactly how you should be going through a first reading of the book so WELL DONE, US! So, let's see if we can make heads or tales of things.

When last we posted, the devil and his cronies had disappeared this guy Styopa to Yalta, which is quite far from Moscow, so they could take over his apartment. I wonder what the devil wants with this crappy apartment. But he wants it. Except now the landlord is asking questions so they frame him for insider trading or something so another problem disappeared. I dunno, I thought the devil would be more creative but I guess making people suddenly disappear is sort of a Soviet thing.

Styopa tries to get in touch with some colleagues to tell them where he is but since they had just talked to him that morning before the disappearing thing, they are skeptical, despite being sent a ton of telegrams (why not just one, sir?) saying where he is. The devil breaks from his normal way of dealing with people he wants to silence (predicting a gruesome death or disappearing them far away) to just straight jumping the guy, and again, this seems like way below the devil. This is not the poetically ironic punishment I have come to expect from the devil, nor is it the ridiculously over-the-top torture I thought demons would dole out.

Then we go to the theater where Woland and his buddies actually do perform some magic, which I had assumed was just some lie they were telling to take Styopa's apartment. They do some card tricks, rain money down, and then give a bunch of clothes away. At this point, they're basically the show from Now You See Me. The MC for the event keeps explaining the tricks (kind of) which is kind of a dick move and everyone is getting annoyed at him. So annoyed that someone in the crowd yells "Off with his head" and Behemoth the cat takes it literally and, well, takes off his head. Don't worry though, when the audience freaks out at this he puts it back and apparently the guy is fine.

Back at the hospital with the Poet/Ivan/Homeless we finally meet someone that I think is the titular "Master" though who knows really. This guy stole some keys off of one of the nurses but instead of using the doors he goes through the balcony and the hospital rooms have balconies? That's fancy. He tells some story about falling in love with a lady with yellow flowers (and apparently carrying ugly yellow flowers is a sign for him to follow her?)

and how they're secretly married except she's already married and I dunno. He was writing some novel about Pilate but it's terrible and a bunch of negative criticism drives him insane, hence why he's now at the hospital.

Lots of people end up at this hospital, like Nikanor, the guy framed by the devil. At some point, you'd think enough people at the hospital are going to have stories about run-ins with the same guys and someone is going to put two and two together. 

We then get another Waynes World flashback to Jesus days, where we see Jesus being hanged on the cross. Matthew Levi had tried to kill Jesus before he could suffer but didn't manage that. Instead one of the guards watching the prisoners gives them each some water and then stabs them in the heart to end things quicker. I don't have much to say here except at one point the book says "the back of his white shirt dark with sweat" and all I could think is white clothes get transparent with sweat and that was a stupid moment to pull me out of the story, but given I still have only the vaguest idea of what is happening or who anyone is, I guess it's not too surprising.

What will happen next week? Legit no idea. Maybe a few other people will end up at the hospital? A few more people will get disappeared to far away locations? The cat will rip off a few other heads and limbs? WHO KNOWS! Not me.

Title quote from page 123

Bulgakov, Mikhail. trans. Richard Pevear and Larissa Volokhonsky. The Master and Margarita. Penguin Classics, 1997. Originally published 1966.

Q3 Infographic Time!

Another quarter has closed so it's time for another fancy infographic to see how things are shaping up.

Past infographics
Q2 2016 Reading Stats
Q1 2016 Reading Stats
2015 Reading Stats

September Reading Wrap Up

Fall is here FOR REAL now. September didn't quite do it, because so much of the month was still so hot but now it is cool and I am having my first pumpkin spice latte of the season so things are good.

Of course September had it's good stuff to. For example, I got to meet bookernet friend Tika in person and she is SWELL! I realized I wasn't doing too shabby with the whole "diversify your reading" goal. I read less in September, but I read some fun things, so I'm pretty happy with that. And I am looking forward to October with The Master and Margarita readalong (even if I have noooo idea what's going on) so that will be great fun.

Now, let's see how September went

Total books read
3
What If?: Serious Scientific Answers to Absurd Hypothetical Questions by Randall Munroe (4 stars)
Secondhand Souls by Christopher Moore (4 stars)
You Can't Touch My Hair by Phoebe Robinson (4 stars)

Total pages
1,012

Fiction
33%

Female authors
33%

White authors
67%

US authors
100%

Book format
ebook - 67%
paperback - 33%

Where'd I get the book
indie - 33%
Kindle - 33%
Netgalley - 33%

Rereads
0%

Review books
33%

Readalong/Bookclub
0%

Blogger reco
0%

Translation
0%

Books by decade
2010s - 100%

Books by genre
Humor - 67% (but also more than JUST humor for both books)
Science - 33% (but also humor)
(man, genres is HARD)

Resolution books
33% - Not a huge amount BUT STILL
You Can't Touch My Hair is by a POC. I mean, that's the only book that meets the criteria, and only one criterion* is met but still!

*Resolution criteria includes:
POC author
Non-US author
Translation
Published before 2000

MasterAndMargareadalong Post I: "Scat!" the cat barked, suddenly

It's October which seems to be readalong season. The perfect method to get through something that you want to read, but you need some support to get through. And today we have the first post of #TheMasterAndMargareadalong (100 points for that hashtag.)

I've had The Master and the Margarita sitting on my bookshelf for a few years now. Ever since I mentioned I was totally going to read it to fulfill a reading challenge and a friend lent me his copy. And then instead of reading it, I didn't.

So when our fearless leader Alice announced it for a readalong I was excited to finally defeat this book and give my friend back his book.

I pick up my copy and make it through the first sentence when I see a superscript 1. I glance down at the bottom of the page, but there's nothing there. And then I realize: Motherfuckin' endnotes. Well, I will surely miss out on some very interesting details cos there's no way I'm going to be flipping back and forth the whole time. Fellow readalongers, I hope your copy is set up differently and you can fill in those gaps. Though when I did read the notes it said stuff like "Several characters are named after composers. But there's no actual meaning to this." So...thanks?

For this first post we're to read chapters 1-8. Which I did. But

We established during sign up that there are no ships, there are no margaritas (at least not the tequila kind), there's a crazy cat and according to the cover I have, some giant fish and swords. Reading the first fifth of the book has yet to explain any of the cover. There have been zero masters and zero margaritas introduced. 

Let's see what there has been.

Two men, an editor for a literary magazine (Mikhail Berlioz) and a poet (Ivan Ponyrev aka Homeless), are discussing a recent poem that's been commissioned, which was supposed to deny that Jesus existed. Which, sure, whatever you wanna write. Then some foreigner that speaks perfect Russian (so then why is he so foreign?) sits down right in between them, like a creep, starts talking to them about atheism and then predicts Berlioz is going to be decapitated before the day ends.

The correct response

This creepy stranger is the Devil. I mean, right? I realize they haven't officially said that yet, but the back cover says the Devil shows up in Moscow. And also people start talking about the Devil A LOT right when he shows up. So yeah.

We then get a Wayne's World-esque flashback where the Devil/Professor Woland starts telling the story of Jesus and Pontius Pilate. This chapter made slightly more sense than the others in this section, though there were some odd moments. At one point Yeshua correctly identifies that Hegemon is sad and just wants to be with his dog and you'd think this would be because of some divine insight. Except when asked how he knew this, the response is

"It's very simple," the prisoner replied in Latin. "You were moving your hand in the air" - and the prisoner repeated Pilate's gesture - "as if you wanted to stroke something"

Elementary, my dear Pilate

We go back to Moscow where Professor Woland is telling them he was there so Berlioz and Homeless decide to call the authorities on him when SURPRISE, Berlioz slips on some oil and falls onto some train tracks and his head does get cut off and it's crazy. Homeless believes the guy is responsible for this and starts chasing him and then, OK this is roughly where I stopped being able to follow what's happening, and we're only in chapter 3 so shit. But this is already pretty long so how about some bullets for the rest?

• A cat tries to ride the tram, AND even goes to pay the fare, but gets kicked off. Cos cat.
• Ivan breaks into some random woman's apartment and watches her shower, thinking he'll find Woland there (he does not).
• Then he decides Woland must be in the water for some reason and his clothes get stolen so he has to wander around in his undies.
• Ivan then shows up (still in his undies) to the literary society that Berlioz headed (HA) and tells people that Berlioz is dead and a crazy man made it happen. He is taken away to an insane asylum
• Ivan continues to rant that a man who witnessed Pilate and Jesus killed Berlioz. No one believes him.
• Berlioz's roommate (Styopa, they live in a communal apartment deal with lots of bedrooms and shared bath/kitchen) wakes up to Woland sitting in his bedroom, telling him they have a contract for Woland to perform...something.
• Then Woland's buddies plus the cat show up and kick Styopa out of his room and teleports him to Yalta, which distancecalculator.net tells me is over 900 miles away from Moscow.

I look forward to reading everyone's posts and seeing if you guys could make sense of things.

Title quote from page 84. I picked it cos it made me laugh when I read it. Of course, I read that part while on the way home from the bar, so that is probably related.

Bulgakov, Mikhail. trans. Richard Pevear and Larissa Volokhonsky. The Master and Margarita. Penguin Classics, 1997. Originally published 1966.