Sara's reading log

I am a book hoarder and reader. My main genre is SF, but I also love magic realism, fantasy and general fiction. Favorite authors are Iain M. Banks, Ursula K. LeGuin, Haruki Murakami, José Saramago, Isaac Asimov, Ben Aaronovitch and more. My rating system is based on five stars. I rate books based on my expectations and what a books aims to be. This means that the brilliant 'Fahrenheit 451' gets five stars because I thought it would be good, people said it was good, and it was good, but 'A Closed and Common Orbit' also gets five stars because in its series, in its style, I really enjoyed it and was not disappointed.

Blanche en Marie by Per Olov Enquist

  • Started on: 2011-05-18
  • Finished on: 2011-05-19
  • Read in: Dutch
  • Rating: ****-
  • Genre(s): Historical Fiction

I picked up this book because it is on a few ‘must read’ lists and I was intrigued by the subject matter. The book is, as the title says, the story of Blanche and Marie. But the Marie we are talking about here is Marie Curie and her research assistant Blanche Wittmann.
The book is not a straight forward story but it are the observations of the writer as he is going through three notebooks of Blanche. The writing alternates between his take on things and the history he is telling us about. The fact that the book is about characters who have all lived in the real world, but the book is classified as fiction makes it a bit harder for me to determine what is real. But that’s not the point. In the end this story is about love, the meaning of love, the essence of love and what love does to you. Impressive.

  • Started on: 2011-05-18
  • Finished on: 2011-05-19
  • Read in: Dutch
  • Rating: ****-
  • Genre(s): Historical Fiction

I picked up this book because it is on a few ‘must read’ lists and I was intrigued by the subject matter. The book is, as the title says, the story of Blanche and Marie. But the Marie we are talking about here is Marie Curie and her research assistant Blanche Wittmann.
The book is not a straight forward story but it are the observations of the writer as he is going through three notebooks of Blanche. The writing alternates between his take on things and the history he is telling us about. The fact that the book is about characters who have all lived in the real world, but the book is classified as fiction makes it a bit harder for me to determine what is real. But that’s not the point. In the end this story is about love, the meaning of love, the essence of love and what love does to you. Impressive.