Book Review #10 - Where You'd Go, Bernadette?

I saw this in paperback at Sam's Club the other day and realized it must have become an "it" book. I remembered that I loved it and that, so far, almost no one that I know that has read it since has liked it nearly as well as I did and so I wanted to come back and defend or at least explain my "it was amazing" rating.

I think every once in a while, a book comes a long that just resonates with certain readers. Maybe it's the message that rings true or a character that helps us understand ourselves or someone else a little better. Whatever it is, there was a connection between myself and this book and an almost electric current ran between my hands and its pages while I read.

I think it likely due to the fact that this woman, Bernadette, saw the ridiculous all around her. Sure, a cheery person will see Bernadette's point of view as critical and unhelpful, but I felt myself nodding and laughing when she described the overzealousness and competitiveness of school mom volunteers, the futility of cooking and shopping, the absurdity of living in Seattle - from its weather, streets, architecture, hair care, language, diet, style and recreation , the prejudice of loving your own child above all the rest and the simultaneously hilarious and depressing awareness of knowing you are the biggest problem of all.

As far as plots go...whatever. I didn't read this to find out what happened to Bernadette the day her husband staged an intervention to commit her to a mental hospital and she disappeared. The plausibility of sneaking onto ships in Antarctica and a fifteen year old solving it all isn't very likely. As far as uplifting material goes...I get that it's dark. Bernadette really is suffering and it's undoubtedly unfair to laugh at/with a woman who on good days hides dirty dishes in drawers and on bad days causes full on mudslides which result in the destruction of her annoying neighbor's house.

In spite of my awareness that this book won't be everybody's cup of delicious hot cocoa, I found the satire, writing, pacing, morale, and, above all, character of Bernadette to be the most fun I've read in a while. Maria Semple - I think you get me. I'm glad I'm not nearly as crazy as Bernadette but I'm so glad I got to vent a little bit through her. No worries though, if this isn't your thing. You you read this, you'll see the humor in that last sentence. Ha ha ha ha ha ha ha.