The Nickel Boys - Colson Whitehead ----------- 3 Stars

A few years ago, I read The Underground Railroad by the impressive and well-regarded Colson Whitehead. While he's written a number of other books, I thought I'd give The Nickel Boys a try, as it too was a Pulitzer Prize wining novel. While not as engaging and interesting a read as The Underground Railroad (my review here), I did it enjoy it.

The Nickel Boys is actually loosely based on a real life reform school in Florida that was open for over a century. This story centers on Elwood Curtis, who is unfairly sentenced to this juvenile reform school. While a bright teen on a fairly straight path in life, his experience totally changes upon his arrival and time at this school. He learns a lot about friendship, the unfairness of life (especially for people of color), and survival. Changing timelines from his current life back to his experiences at Nickel Academy, the book has a nicely moving plot.

As you could assume from the Pulitzer earned, the writing is fantastic. Whitehead has a way, not just with words, but with character development and adroit details, leading to memorable descriptions of people and places. Relatedly, the main character is beautifully described and easy to root for. While many aspects of the novel are difficult to read (violence against young black boys, overt racism, etc.), Elwood consistently delivers as the moral heart of the story. He's easy to root for as the clear hero of the story.

On a whole, the book has a nice pace, and I never found myself bored. Nonetheless, it didn't excite me to pick it up as much as other books. The rising action is limited and usually small in scope (until the ending, which was an interesting surprise). There are also stretches of menial plot and character development, that also were not the most enjoyable.

It's also always hard to read about the history of racism in this country and all the ways it has hurt people (and continues to do so). While the book doesn't ever read like a textbook or news article (in the best of ways), you can't help but think often about the systems of historical racism in our country.

Which, in some ways, did make me appreciate the real historical roots of this story. The Dozier School, which opened on the first day of the past century, is the school that Whitehead based his work. I urge you to learn more about it (and others). For me, as this was was a new piece of information about historical racism at work, and I think others might also appreciate knowing more too. 

The Nineties: A Book - Chuck Klosterman ----------------- 3 Stars

This book seemed like a natural for me. I spent my formative years in the 1990s and I really enjoy Chuck Klosterman's writing style (last year's review of the much more enjoyable But What If We're Wrong?). So, I thought I'd give this a try and, for the most part, enjoyed it.

The Nineties: A Book, is Klosterman's deep dive into the important events, pop culture highlights, and overall ethos of the 1990s. What was so interesting to me about reading this book, was how much I could easily remember and how much was actually new to me. As I literally was between 10 and 20 years old for all of the 90s, my different understanding of things are so significant based to my age. For example, the '92 election of Ross Perot was mostly a memory for me of SNL skits and caricatures of him. Where in this book, he goes in a real depth about him as a candidate, which I felt like I had no understanding of in a real way. Then, of course, was Clinton's Lewinsky scandal in '98, which I remember much more fully and vividly.

The book has a lot more than politics, however. It has some important news items, but also covers a ton of pop culture, which was really my favorite parts. The music, the sports, and even the feeling that the 90s ended up being attributed to it (which he clearly described the feeling of apathy at the core of the 90s - at least historically).

A bit longer than I expected it to be, with far more detail and depth than I could remember, it was still a fun read. Of course, I love the way Klosterman writes, especially his fun use of footnotes (he and Foster Wallace are the best ever imo!). I certainly recommend this book if you're a child of the 90s or we're just like a fun way of recalling some of the key events, figures, and new stories. Of course, you have to be ok with with way Klosterman writes, which, besides being very wordy on many occasions, does make me feel like an idiot on some occasions too. He's a really smart writer, which always makes it so funny that he's writing about things that are not always important.