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emma's Reviews > Grand Union
Grand Union
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by
emma's review
bookshelves: diverse, literary-fiction, non-ya, project-genius, 2-stars, reviewed, unpopular-opinion, nope, authors-of-color
Mar 11, 2021
bookshelves: diverse, literary-fiction, non-ya, project-genius, 2-stars, reviewed, unpopular-opinion, nope, authors-of-color
my becoming-a-genius project, part 8!
since you are reading this, it's likely you haven't seen projects 1 through 7 (because you surely would have unfollowed me by now), so here's the deal:
i have decided to become a genius.
to accomplish this, i'm going to work my way through the collected stories of various authors, reading + reviewing 1 story every day until i get bored / lose every single follower / am struck down by a vengeful deity.
i haven't read anything by Zadie Smith, so when i found a pristine (signed!) copy of this in a Goodwill for like $1 it seemed too good to be true. and clearly it was, since it has one of the lowest average ratings i've ever seen.
nevertheless, we persist.
PROJECT 1: THE COMPLETE STORIES BY FLANNERY O'CONNOR
PROJECT 2: HER BODY AND OTHER PARTIES BY CARMEN MARIA MACHADO
PROJECT 3: 18 BEST STORIES BY EDGAR ALLAN POE
PROJECT 4: THE LOTTERY AND OTHER STORIES BY SHIRLEY JACKSON
PROJECT 5: HOW LONG 'TIL BLACK FUTURE MONTH? BY N.K. JEMISIN
PROJECT 6: THE SHORT STORIES OF OSCAR WILDE BY OSCAR WILDE
PROJECT 7: THE BLUE FAIRY BOOK BY ANDREW LANG
PROJECT 8: GRAND UNION: STORIES BY ZADIE SMITH
DAY 1: THE DIALECTIC
i actively hated the way the dialogue was written in this story in a way that i have never experienced, so. that's not boding well.
although all my genius projects thus far have resulted in at least positive-adjacent ratings, which is very off brand for me. might be fun, if torturous, to fix that.
i am very sorry to say that this is something i might have been able to write in the seventh grade, if i were feeling particularly dark and trying too hard.
rating: 1.5
DAY 2: SENTIMENTAL EDUCATION
the protagonist of this story is a college student whose values are law and order and meritocracy to whom the idea of a society that is neither matriarchal nor patriarchal is "disgusting," so needless to say i hate her profoundly.
the writing of this wasn't as personally offensive to me as the first one, but it did have the same feeling of this-has-been-done-before-and-was-kind-of-pointless-the-first-time.
rating: 2
DAY 3: THE LAZY RIVER
fun fact: did you know 2017 was a bad year?
if you already did, this story is not going to have much of note to tell you.
rating: 2.5
DAY 4: WORDS AND MUSIC
immediately i am expecting this to be about a Drew Barrymore / Hugh Grant vehicle i haven't seen. the fun part of that is that because i haven't seen it, i can pretend that it is no matter what.
this felt intentionally confusing and disjointed in a trying-too-hard way, but for all the unconnected nonsense it's the one i like best so far.
rating: 3
DAY 5: JUST RIGHT
i can't even put into words, i think, how much i hated this one - beyond that it has that This Is My First Ever Short Story energy of i will put all my time into descriptions and style and not think about how people actually talk to each other or move through the world or exist in general and that will do the trick just fine.
rating: 1
DAY 6: PARENTS' MORNING EPIPHANY
no human being in global history has ever been sadder or more ill-equipped to deal with sadness than i am, on this momentous day.
this is important information to know because if i was capable of producing passionate emotion, i might have thought this was pretentious, but i am a shell of a person and therefore just think it's kinda nice.
rating: 3.5
DAY 7: DOWNTOWN
brett kavanaugh? i haven't heard that name in years...
just kidding. i do stay semi-updated on the decisions of the highest court in the land that also happens to be just under 25% sex criminal.
anyway. the main point of this is about Privilege, and while it doesn't have anything particularly new to say or a particularly new way of saying it, i like the topic.
rating: 3
DAY 8: MISS ADELE AMIDST THE CORSETS
this one...i don't know. all over the place.
rating: 3
DAY 9: MOOD
since the book is, in a sense, asking - my current mood: bad. i don't like this and it makes me angry to pick it up. but i am stubborn so nevertheless we persist.
i would probably like this more if i really thought about it, but i'm getting a headache so i'll do the thinking later.
(note from the future: i decided not to think more about it for my personal well-being so middle of the road it is.)
rating: 2.5
DAY 10: ESCAPE FROM NEW YORK
i missed a day yesterday, i think for the first time with this book so far, which is pretty miraculous when you consider both how low my overall well-being is and how little i'm enjoying this. so today (day 11) is a catch-up day.
this story manages to do something truly incredible and vintage in that there is a character who NOT ONLY has a single personality trait, which is being fat, but it's also one of the only things the story manages to describe consistently.
it sucks ass. it's disturbing and gross. i am hating this collection immensely.
rating: 1
DAY 11: BIG WEEK
caught up. hurray. double helping of this book, lucky me, et cetera. and both stories mention Twinkies - how very Americana.
this is set in Boston, so it's populated with very Irish people with very Irish names, and Red Sox caps and Guinness and casual racism and Catholicism and pill-into-heroin addictions, so as you might guess i'm so overwhelmed by the creativity i could burst.
i know i'm being mean but wow this is getting exhausting, folks.
rating: 2
DAY 12: MEET THE PRESIDENT!
the sad thing about the stories in this book that require more attention than others is that i don't care enough to give it to them.
i liked the ending of this one, though.
rating: 3
DAY 13: TWO MEN ARRIVE IN A VILLAGE
i've started doing this earlier and earlier in my day in order to minimize the amount of time it's looming over me + my organized daily to-do list.
if i had read this story earlier in this collection, at a time when i was young and optimistic and full of life and a certain generosity of spirit, i might have had the compassion it would take to read it analytically, and then maybe i would've really liked it.
instead, i am exhausted. and mean.
rating: 3
DAY 14: KELSO DECONSTRUCTED
not going to lie, i thought this was going to be to That '70s Show what Law & Order: SVU was to Especially Heinous in Her Body & Other Parties.
could be important to note that i've never really seen That '70s Show, so it's technically possible it is.
conditions are deteriorating between me and this book, as i contemplate using eyelash wishes and 11:11s to beg the universe for shorter stories / to mercifully end my suffering.
this story is supposedly set in 1959, but at one point our protagonist receives a prescription that is formatted like "an email from one author to another," so who the hell knows.
rating: 2.5
DAY 15: BLOCKED
the universe has heeded my suffering and given me a teeny one.
as per the New Normal this was mostly in one ear and out the other with me, although i do find the idea of what is Real and what is Created interesting. this just wasn't an interesting way to look at it, in my opinion. obviously. because it's in this book, my arch enemy.
rating: 3
DAY 16: THE CANKER
skipped a day again. now that i'm finally so close to the wonderful, glorious end, my hubris is showing. the icarus of goodreads over here.
except instead of my comeuppance being a brutal, painful death by burning, i have to read two stories from this in one day. which is far worse.
this reminded me of a story from the NK Jemisin collection i read in project 5, but way worse.
rating: 2
DAY 17: FOR THE KING
i was automatically disposed to like this one more - because it's set in Paris, one of my favorite things for a story to be - but then for some reason we had to spend the whole great metaphor of the ending comparing a person with mental illness to an animal, and a child to be tolerated and condescended to.
two more days and counting.
rating: 2
DAY 18: NOW MORE THAN EVER
now more than ever, i am skipping days left and right because this book is driving me to lose my absolute mind.
well, this book alongside other things.
i hate almost anything that mentions cancel culture immediately. it's like those two words kill a writer's ability to be unique and interesting (although that ability hasn't exactly been on showcase at any other point in this book, so why start now).
rating: 1.5
DAY 19: GRAND UNION
OH MY GOD OH MY GOD OH MY GOD IT'S THE TITULAR STORY.
do you know what this means????
we're done! finally, thankfully finished!
this story impacted me exactly zero, minus filling me with relief.
OVERALL
i suppose it was only a matter of time, examining my track record, that one of these genius projects would go horrifically awry and you would all have to painfully observe in the way of witnessing a nightmarish traffic accident, but i didn't really consider it.
eventually i'll try a zadie smith novel, because it seems no one liked this collection much - but years from now, decades even, when the name "grand union" only puts me in the mind of a historic train station or an oldies album i haven't heard of, rather than unrelenting suffering.
for reasons of fairness.
rating: 2
since you are reading this, it's likely you haven't seen projects 1 through 7 (because you surely would have unfollowed me by now), so here's the deal:
i have decided to become a genius.
to accomplish this, i'm going to work my way through the collected stories of various authors, reading + reviewing 1 story every day until i get bored / lose every single follower / am struck down by a vengeful deity.
i haven't read anything by Zadie Smith, so when i found a pristine (signed!) copy of this in a Goodwill for like $1 it seemed too good to be true. and clearly it was, since it has one of the lowest average ratings i've ever seen.
nevertheless, we persist.
PROJECT 1: THE COMPLETE STORIES BY FLANNERY O'CONNOR
PROJECT 2: HER BODY AND OTHER PARTIES BY CARMEN MARIA MACHADO
PROJECT 3: 18 BEST STORIES BY EDGAR ALLAN POE
PROJECT 4: THE LOTTERY AND OTHER STORIES BY SHIRLEY JACKSON
PROJECT 5: HOW LONG 'TIL BLACK FUTURE MONTH? BY N.K. JEMISIN
PROJECT 6: THE SHORT STORIES OF OSCAR WILDE BY OSCAR WILDE
PROJECT 7: THE BLUE FAIRY BOOK BY ANDREW LANG
PROJECT 8: GRAND UNION: STORIES BY ZADIE SMITH
DAY 1: THE DIALECTIC
i actively hated the way the dialogue was written in this story in a way that i have never experienced, so. that's not boding well.
although all my genius projects thus far have resulted in at least positive-adjacent ratings, which is very off brand for me. might be fun, if torturous, to fix that.
i am very sorry to say that this is something i might have been able to write in the seventh grade, if i were feeling particularly dark and trying too hard.
rating: 1.5
DAY 2: SENTIMENTAL EDUCATION
the protagonist of this story is a college student whose values are law and order and meritocracy to whom the idea of a society that is neither matriarchal nor patriarchal is "disgusting," so needless to say i hate her profoundly.
the writing of this wasn't as personally offensive to me as the first one, but it did have the same feeling of this-has-been-done-before-and-was-kind-of-pointless-the-first-time.
rating: 2
DAY 3: THE LAZY RIVER
fun fact: did you know 2017 was a bad year?
if you already did, this story is not going to have much of note to tell you.
rating: 2.5
DAY 4: WORDS AND MUSIC
immediately i am expecting this to be about a Drew Barrymore / Hugh Grant vehicle i haven't seen. the fun part of that is that because i haven't seen it, i can pretend that it is no matter what.
this felt intentionally confusing and disjointed in a trying-too-hard way, but for all the unconnected nonsense it's the one i like best so far.
rating: 3
DAY 5: JUST RIGHT
i can't even put into words, i think, how much i hated this one - beyond that it has that This Is My First Ever Short Story energy of i will put all my time into descriptions and style and not think about how people actually talk to each other or move through the world or exist in general and that will do the trick just fine.
rating: 1
DAY 6: PARENTS' MORNING EPIPHANY
no human being in global history has ever been sadder or more ill-equipped to deal with sadness than i am, on this momentous day.
this is important information to know because if i was capable of producing passionate emotion, i might have thought this was pretentious, but i am a shell of a person and therefore just think it's kinda nice.
rating: 3.5
DAY 7: DOWNTOWN
brett kavanaugh? i haven't heard that name in years...
just kidding. i do stay semi-updated on the decisions of the highest court in the land that also happens to be just under 25% sex criminal.
anyway. the main point of this is about Privilege, and while it doesn't have anything particularly new to say or a particularly new way of saying it, i like the topic.
rating: 3
DAY 8: MISS ADELE AMIDST THE CORSETS
this one...i don't know. all over the place.
rating: 3
DAY 9: MOOD
since the book is, in a sense, asking - my current mood: bad. i don't like this and it makes me angry to pick it up. but i am stubborn so nevertheless we persist.
i would probably like this more if i really thought about it, but i'm getting a headache so i'll do the thinking later.
(note from the future: i decided not to think more about it for my personal well-being so middle of the road it is.)
rating: 2.5
DAY 10: ESCAPE FROM NEW YORK
i missed a day yesterday, i think for the first time with this book so far, which is pretty miraculous when you consider both how low my overall well-being is and how little i'm enjoying this. so today (day 11) is a catch-up day.
this story manages to do something truly incredible and vintage in that there is a character who NOT ONLY has a single personality trait, which is being fat, but it's also one of the only things the story manages to describe consistently.
it sucks ass. it's disturbing and gross. i am hating this collection immensely.
rating: 1
DAY 11: BIG WEEK
caught up. hurray. double helping of this book, lucky me, et cetera. and both stories mention Twinkies - how very Americana.
this is set in Boston, so it's populated with very Irish people with very Irish names, and Red Sox caps and Guinness and casual racism and Catholicism and pill-into-heroin addictions, so as you might guess i'm so overwhelmed by the creativity i could burst.
i know i'm being mean but wow this is getting exhausting, folks.
rating: 2
DAY 12: MEET THE PRESIDENT!
the sad thing about the stories in this book that require more attention than others is that i don't care enough to give it to them.
i liked the ending of this one, though.
rating: 3
DAY 13: TWO MEN ARRIVE IN A VILLAGE
i've started doing this earlier and earlier in my day in order to minimize the amount of time it's looming over me + my organized daily to-do list.
if i had read this story earlier in this collection, at a time when i was young and optimistic and full of life and a certain generosity of spirit, i might have had the compassion it would take to read it analytically, and then maybe i would've really liked it.
instead, i am exhausted. and mean.
rating: 3
DAY 14: KELSO DECONSTRUCTED
not going to lie, i thought this was going to be to That '70s Show what Law & Order: SVU was to Especially Heinous in Her Body & Other Parties.
could be important to note that i've never really seen That '70s Show, so it's technically possible it is.
conditions are deteriorating between me and this book, as i contemplate using eyelash wishes and 11:11s to beg the universe for shorter stories / to mercifully end my suffering.
this story is supposedly set in 1959, but at one point our protagonist receives a prescription that is formatted like "an email from one author to another," so who the hell knows.
rating: 2.5
DAY 15: BLOCKED
the universe has heeded my suffering and given me a teeny one.
as per the New Normal this was mostly in one ear and out the other with me, although i do find the idea of what is Real and what is Created interesting. this just wasn't an interesting way to look at it, in my opinion. obviously. because it's in this book, my arch enemy.
rating: 3
DAY 16: THE CANKER
skipped a day again. now that i'm finally so close to the wonderful, glorious end, my hubris is showing. the icarus of goodreads over here.
except instead of my comeuppance being a brutal, painful death by burning, i have to read two stories from this in one day. which is far worse.
this reminded me of a story from the NK Jemisin collection i read in project 5, but way worse.
rating: 2
DAY 17: FOR THE KING
i was automatically disposed to like this one more - because it's set in Paris, one of my favorite things for a story to be - but then for some reason we had to spend the whole great metaphor of the ending comparing a person with mental illness to an animal, and a child to be tolerated and condescended to.
two more days and counting.
rating: 2
DAY 18: NOW MORE THAN EVER
now more than ever, i am skipping days left and right because this book is driving me to lose my absolute mind.
well, this book alongside other things.
i hate almost anything that mentions cancel culture immediately. it's like those two words kill a writer's ability to be unique and interesting (although that ability hasn't exactly been on showcase at any other point in this book, so why start now).
rating: 1.5
DAY 19: GRAND UNION
OH MY GOD OH MY GOD OH MY GOD IT'S THE TITULAR STORY.
do you know what this means????
we're done! finally, thankfully finished!
this story impacted me exactly zero, minus filling me with relief.
OVERALL
i suppose it was only a matter of time, examining my track record, that one of these genius projects would go horrifically awry and you would all have to painfully observe in the way of witnessing a nightmarish traffic accident, but i didn't really consider it.
eventually i'll try a zadie smith novel, because it seems no one liked this collection much - but years from now, decades even, when the name "grand union" only puts me in the mind of a historic train station or an oldies album i haven't heard of, rather than unrelenting suffering.
for reasons of fairness.
rating: 2
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Reading Progress
February 3, 2021
– Shelved
March 11, 2021
–
Started Reading
March 29, 2021
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Finished Reading
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message 1:
by
Grace
(new)
Mar 16, 2021 01:25PM
I feel like you gotta be a genius by now. Edison only had to read half as many short stories to invent the lightbulb.
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Grace wrote: "I feel like you gotta be a genius by now. Edison only had to read half as many short stories to invent the lightbulb."i could definitely steal a world-changing idea from some interns at this point
That is disappointing as I loved White Teeth. I can think of a couple of the Supreme Court sex criminals but am drawing a blank on the third. I would watch that Barrymore-Grant flick and hope it would be more Notting Hill and less Nine Months.
Aisling wrote: "Shots fired"always
Daniel wrote: "That is disappointing as I loved White Teeth. I can think of a couple of the Supreme Court sex criminals but am drawing a blank on the third. I would watch that Barrymore-Grant flick and hope it wo..."meant to say under 25 not over! classic typo. i think this is universally thought to be worse than zadie smith's usual so it's really my silly choice in picking it up. also, google "music and lyrics"
There’s a purple Jeep in the parking lot of my school that is very beat up and there’s a giant sticker on the back that says in a very fancy font that says ‘Nevertheless, She Persisted’ and I’m pretty sure you need it
i see your suffering on my page every day and i just emotionally pour one out for you. how many stories are in this????????
Your whole page is a book in itself.. or should be!
Thank you! It seems like a fun movie. I know it is little consolation but as a casual observer there is much entertainment in your eviscerating this collection. As a man of girth, I get offended when foreigners act like Americans like Twinkies. If I am going to indulge in a Hostess snack it is Ding Dongs or HoHos.
LMAO... destiny made it so you could read this <3
ahh the infantilization of mentally ill characters is NOT coolAnyway, this book sounds awful, I wish you luck
You need to watch That '70's Show. That's it. That's the comment.
Emma all I can say is ditto
I really want u to know that, for me, the final push to making an account here, was to tell you how much I dislike your review. Not because the book is any good (it is not), but because how unlikeable and annoying your impression of it is for me. I just *need* you to know it.
Did you wake up one day and decide to be a troll or are you actually some sort of child genius who understood dialectics in year 7?
