August's book choice is Heartburn by Nora Ephron. It's a semi-biographical novel about the break up of her second marriage. It's a fairly quick read, funny, sad and thought provoking.
As usual I'll post some questions on or around the 20th.
Just discovered I can get this as an e-book from our library and as I'm between books right now, this seems like a good time to read it! I will join the discussion.
@stetson I only learnt about the movie when I looked up info on the book. I will try and see if I can watch it somewhere. I like most of Ephron's movies that I have seen, except I really disliked John Travolta as the angel in 'Michael'. Although doing some more googling I realise I sometimes get that movie mixed up with 'City of Angels', which I like even less.
I watched the movie last night. It was fun, though I thought the book was better. I also think Jack Nicholson was a bit miscast, thought Meryl Streep was about right. I'd forgotten what she looked like when she was young.
@stetson I only learnt about the movie when I looked up info on the book. I will try and see if I can watch it somewhere. I like most of Ephron's movies that I have seen, except I really disliked John Travolta as the angel in 'Michael'. Although doing some more googling I realise I sometimes get that movie mixed up with 'City of Angels', which I like even less.
I liked Michael, and I'm not usually fond of mystical whimsy. One thing I thought was amusing about it was that the reporters are tabloid writers, and had no hesitancy about accepting Michael was an angel. Whereas in a world where angels were so easily accepted as a fact of life, tabloids likely wouldn't report on them as they do now.
I have finished the book and decided to watch the movie - I was able to rent it from Youtube. I enjoyed both, but agree that Jack Nicholson is not quite right for playing Mark. I thought he was a bit too old and not charming or good looking enough. Though I first saw Nicholson in his terrifying role of the Joker, so find it hard to see him as anything but a villain. Meryl Streep was much more like I imagined Rachel in the novel.
...I first saw Nicholson in his terrifying role of the Joker, so find it hard to see him as anything but a villain.
In The King Of Marvin Gardens he's anything but a terrifying villain; he plays a nerdy public-radio host. Also, see his pre-transformation scenes in Wolf. Not to mention The Pledge, though there he's at least a cop, so a slight association with violence.
It's the 20th, so a few questions to get you started. Fell free to add your own.
1.Did you warm to the main character or did you think she was annoying or overreacting? 2. Did you enjoy the recipes, or did they detract from the story for you? 3. Any bits you particularly enjoyed, didn't like, or think didn't work? 4. I found the end rather sad, but a friend found it positive and uplifting. What do you think? 5. Have you read any other books that are semi-autobiographical. Does it work at a genre? 6. To me it felt very much of its time. Would Rachel make different choices about her life if this story was set in the 2020s?
As for Jack Nicholson I first saw him in Easy Rider, where he totally stole every scene he was in. I remember going home and telling my mum what an amazing actor he was.
1. Didn’t warm to Rachel at all: a self-indulgent NYC princess with the mothering skills of an ostrich.
2. Recipes frankly boring and oh-so 80s
3. Key lime pie episode predictable but enjoyment was transient
4. Neither sad nor uplifting: what does one expect when married to someone who “ would have sex with a venetian blind” ( still can’t imagine this 40 years later)
5. Probably yes but can’t remember after 60 years and a nice bottle of red
6. Hard to know; in my experience serial marriers don’t tend to learn from their mistakes.
1.Did you warm to the main character or did you think she was annoying or overreacting?
Rachel's life experiences are very different than mine and also her attitudes to men and marriage are different, given the time the book was set. However, I still felt empathy for her being cheated on while pregnant and mothering a small child. It was hard to relate to the idea she and her husband were struggling financially given their family wealth and professions. Quite laughable at a time when myself and many others cannot afford to buy one place to live in.
I remember thinking in the 80s and 90s that it was so odd that so many people in movies and books set in New York of the time went to therapy, despite not having diagnosed mental health conditions. Now it is a much more common situation to get therapy for lower level mental health concerns. I also understand more about how the Holocaust had an influence on the development of therapy and on the uptake of therapy and psychoanalysis for Jewish people who could afford it.
2. Did you enjoy the recipes, or did they detract from the story for you?
It was interesting to be reminded of the popular recipes of the time. I am the same age as the author's children and remember some of those foods being popular in my childhood, either from eating them or seeing them in popular culture and recipe books of the time. I know I bring up my taste synesthesia a lot (if I read about food I can taste it or what I imagine it would taste like), but it does add to the experience of reading books with food in them. I got a real craving for potatoes at one point and am tempted to try out some of the recipes I am unfamiliar with, just to see what they taste like.
4. I found the end rather sad, but a friend found it positive and uplifting. What do you think?
While divorce is always sad, I don't think the marriage was salvageable and it felt positive that Rachel was able to move on with her life. Given this was based on Nora Ephron's actual marriage and divorce, we know the aftermath of the marriage was painful for her and her ex-husband was very angry about her dealing with her pain by writing this novel. It makes me question if writing the novel was healing for Ephron, a way to get back at her husband and feel some justice for his actions or both.
5. Have you read any other books that are semi-autobiographical. Does it work at a genre?
I have read other books that are semi-autobiographical (including some recent book club selections) and believe most novels take elements from the authors' own lives or the people they know. A lot of women authors get criticised as using their own life experiences too much, while there is a myth that male novelists base their novels on original ideas outside of their experience and that makes their writing superior. However I don't think it makes a difference to the quality of writing if the story is based on the authors' experiences.
I always wonder if published writers have to have a thick skin to share so much of themselves with the world - I considered writing fiction at one time, but as well as doubts about my writing ability it also felt like selling my soul to share publicly anything too personal. Then there are the ethical concerns about putting other people in your novels. It seems somehow vampiric to feed your fiction with the life experiences of people you know. It doesn't stop me reading lots of fiction though!
1.Did you warm to the main character or did you think she was annoying or overreacting?
I couldn't relate to her in any way, but I did like reading about her. Lots of things about her life are unrelatable or frustrating to me, but she's got a great, distinctive narrative voice that kept me engaged.
2. Did you enjoy the recipes, or did they detract from the story for you?
They didn't detract at all, but they did feel a little odd, as I don't normally expect recipes in a novel. None of them stand out in my memory a couple of weeks after reading the book.
3. Any bits you particularly enjoyed, didn't like, or think didn't work?
I think what I really liked was the writing -- the voice, the humour. The humour didn't always completely work for me, but overall it was engaging. Much like @Mili said above, the financial lifestyle of the characters was extremely unrelatable to me, and I find books about the follies of rich people (especially if they don't think of themselves as rich!) very annoying. But what I did find important and interesting was the reminder of how very different things were for women 60 years ago. The idea that even as a smart, well-off, educated woman, Rachel is expected to make marriage and motherhood her main focus, is quite sad.
4. I found the end rather sad, but a friend found it positive and uplifting. What do you think?
Much like the recipes, the ending didn't really linger with me. It seemed inevitable that the marriage would end and was not salvageable, and I hoped there was something better ahead for Rachel.
5. Have you read any other books that are semi-autobiographical. Does it work at a genre?
Oh, tons. It's a very common trope (not always true of course) that everyone's first novel is a thinly-veiled autobiography. I do wonder about what makes people decide to write something close to their real-life experience as a novel rather than as a memoir. Maybe just deniability? Though apparently Carl Bernstein was as angry about this as if it HAD been a memoir.
6. To me it felt very much of its time. Would Rachel make different choices about her life if this story was set in the 2020s?
I don't think the marital infidelity would be any different, but hopefully she would not have faced as much overt sexism in her career (still plenty of covert sexism, of course!) and she might have had a stronger identity in her own right rather than feeling so defined by marriage.
in my experience serial marriers don’t tend to learn from their mistakes.
I tend to have that reaction also when I hear someone, especially a celebrity, is embarking on their third marriage (even though I know third marriages that have worked well!) -- there's a little bit of a sense that, well, maybe this is just not going to work out. And Rachel in this novel certainly comes off as a person who, despite individual and group therapy, is not very self-reflective about herself and her choices, so you could imagine her stumbling into a third unsuccessful marriage.
But it is interesting to note that while Ephron's first marriage lasted 9 years and her second marriage (the one this novel is based on) only lasted 4 years, her third marriage lasted 25 years, until her death. So in this case a "serial marrier" did have an apparently quite successful third marriage and, hopefully, something of a happily-ever-after ending.
1.Did you warm to the main character or did you think she was annoying or overreacting?
I don't think she's someone I'd want as a friend but I was interested in what happened to her. I thought she was remarkably calm about being held up at gunpoint.
2. Did you enjoy the recipes, or did they detract from the story for you?
It took a bit of getting used to having them scattered in detail throughout the book and as I don't like cooking I wasn't particularly interested in them. But I do know people who will interrupt conversations with uninvited detail about something they've done, or a hobby they enjoy, so it kind of rang true.
3. Any bits you particularly enjoyed, didn't like, or think didn't work?
I liked the humour and her narrative voice kept me engaged.
4. I found the end rather sad, but a friend found it positive and uplifting. What do you think?
I was relieved she was freeing herself and like @Trudy hope there are better things ahead for her.
5. Have you read any other books that are semi-autobiographical. Does it work at a genre?
I'm sure I have but am struggling to recall them.
6. To me it felt very much of its time. Would Rachel make different choices about her life if this story was set in the 2020s?
I guess she put up with Mark's infidelity because of the expectations of the time, but I couldn't believe she did put up with it for so long and felt quite irritated by that.
2. Did you enjoy the recipes, or did they detract from the story for you?
I'll just note at this point that Ephron also wrote and directed the film Julie & Julia, about an early 2000s blogger who tries to cook every recipe in Julia Child's cookbook.
1.Did you warm to the main character or did you think she was annoying or overreacting?
I thought the book was a product of its time and place. I thought she was caught in a cycle of behaviour of her social group and class. The gunpoint scene, her reaction and that of others, was completely unrealistic.
2. Did you enjoy the recipes, or did they detract from the story for you?
The recipes were just annoying yet reflective of her life and vocation.
3. I found the end rather sad, but a friend found it positive and uplifting. What do you think?
I was glad she left her husband yet afraid she would repeat the pattern by running into another relationship.
4. Any bits you particularly enjoyed, didn't like, or think didn't work?
Thought the robbery scene lacked realism.
6. To me it felt very much of its time. Would Rachel make different choices about her life if this story was set in the 2020s?
It was very much of its time. The 20s would have placed it at least one generation removed from when it actually happened. All characters would have experienced a different socialization.
1.Did you warm to the main character or did you think she was annoying or overreacting?
I liked Rachel, and thought she'd be fun to go out for a drink with. She's not someone I'd particularly want as a close friend as I don't think I'd trust her not to turn anything I told her into a story.
2. Did you enjoy the recipes, or did they detract from the story for you?
I didn't pay them much attention as most were not the sort of things I'd eat anyway.
3. Any bits you particularly enjoyed, didn't like, or think didn't work?
I read it a few months ago and bits are becoming hazy. I too think the hold up in the therapy group didn't work, mainly because, as Ephron says in the introduction to the edition I have, that it was something that happened to someone she knew, rather than to herself.
4. I found the end rather sad, but a friend found it positive and uplifting. What do you think?
I think it was the bit about the Petunia song I found sad, that Rachel could remember the good times and realise that her husband had moved on and that loving him wasn't going to be enough to keep them together.
5. Have you read any other books that are semi-autobiographical. Does it work at a genre?
I was thinking of Frost in May which we read recently. That seemed far more a memoir than this, that was trying to make a story about the break-up of a marriage rather than a series of incidents in someone's life. I think anyone that writes fiction uses things they have come across in their stories. I really don't enjoy fiction where it feels like the author isn't really grounded in what they are writing about even if the story is sci-fi or fantasy.
6. To me it felt very much of its time. Would Rachel make different choices about her life if this story was set in the 2020s?
I was hoping that nowadays she might not feel she 'had' to be married. I did wonder if Rachel was going to end up married to Richard as soon as her divorce from Mark had come through.
Comments
You know there is a movie of Heartburn?
I'm also a fan of some of Ephron's stuff. I think the only person who liked Lucky Numbers.
I liked Michael, and I'm not usually fond of mystical whimsy. One thing I thought was amusing about it was that the reporters are tabloid writers, and had no hesitancy about accepting Michael was an angel. Whereas in a world where angels were so easily accepted as a fact of life, tabloids likely wouldn't report on them as they do now.
In The King Of Marvin Gardens he's anything but a terrifying villain; he plays a nerdy public-radio host. Also, see his pre-transformation scenes in Wolf. Not to mention The Pledge, though there he's at least a cop, so a slight association with violence.
1.Did you warm to the main character or did you think she was annoying or overreacting?
2. Did you enjoy the recipes, or did they detract from the story for you?
3. Any bits you particularly enjoyed, didn't like, or think didn't work?
4. I found the end rather sad, but a friend found it positive and uplifting. What do you think?
5. Have you read any other books that are semi-autobiographical. Does it work at a genre?
6. To me it felt very much of its time. Would Rachel make different choices about her life if this story was set in the 2020s?
As for Jack Nicholson I first saw him in Easy Rider, where he totally stole every scene he was in. I remember going home and telling my mum what an amazing actor he was.
1. Didn’t warm to Rachel at all: a self-indulgent NYC princess with the mothering skills of an ostrich.
2. Recipes frankly boring and oh-so 80s
3. Key lime pie episode predictable but enjoyment was transient
4. Neither sad nor uplifting: what does one expect when married to someone who “ would have sex with a venetian blind” ( still can’t imagine this 40 years later)
5. Probably yes but can’t remember after 60 years and a nice bottle of red
6. Hard to know; in my experience serial marriers don’t tend to learn from their mistakes.
I've been thinking about the film and I think Hugh Grant in full Daniel Cleaver mode would have made a better Mark.
1.Did you warm to the main character or did you think she was annoying or overreacting?
Rachel's life experiences are very different than mine and also her attitudes to men and marriage are different, given the time the book was set. However, I still felt empathy for her being cheated on while pregnant and mothering a small child. It was hard to relate to the idea she and her husband were struggling financially given their family wealth and professions. Quite laughable at a time when myself and many others cannot afford to buy one place to live in.
I remember thinking in the 80s and 90s that it was so odd that so many people in movies and books set in New York of the time went to therapy, despite not having diagnosed mental health conditions. Now it is a much more common situation to get therapy for lower level mental health concerns. I also understand more about how the Holocaust had an influence on the development of therapy and on the uptake of therapy and psychoanalysis for Jewish people who could afford it.
2. Did you enjoy the recipes, or did they detract from the story for you?
It was interesting to be reminded of the popular recipes of the time. I am the same age as the author's children and remember some of those foods being popular in my childhood, either from eating them or seeing them in popular culture and recipe books of the time. I know I bring up my taste synesthesia a lot (if I read about food I can taste it or what I imagine it would taste like), but it does add to the experience of reading books with food in them. I got a real craving for potatoes at one point and am tempted to try out some of the recipes I am unfamiliar with, just to see what they taste like.
4. I found the end rather sad, but a friend found it positive and uplifting. What do you think?
While divorce is always sad, I don't think the marriage was salvageable and it felt positive that Rachel was able to move on with her life. Given this was based on Nora Ephron's actual marriage and divorce, we know the aftermath of the marriage was painful for her and her ex-husband was very angry about her dealing with her pain by writing this novel. It makes me question if writing the novel was healing for Ephron, a way to get back at her husband and feel some justice for his actions or both.
5. Have you read any other books that are semi-autobiographical. Does it work at a genre?
I have read other books that are semi-autobiographical (including some recent book club selections) and believe most novels take elements from the authors' own lives or the people they know. A lot of women authors get criticised as using their own life experiences too much, while there is a myth that male novelists base their novels on original ideas outside of their experience and that makes their writing superior. However I don't think it makes a difference to the quality of writing if the story is based on the authors' experiences.
I always wonder if published writers have to have a thick skin to share so much of themselves with the world - I considered writing fiction at one time, but as well as doubts about my writing ability it also felt like selling my soul to share publicly anything too personal. Then there are the ethical concerns about putting other people in your novels. It seems somehow vampiric to feed your fiction with the life experiences of people you know. It doesn't stop me reading lots of fiction though!
I couldn't relate to her in any way, but I did like reading about her. Lots of things about her life are unrelatable or frustrating to me, but she's got a great, distinctive narrative voice that kept me engaged.
2. Did you enjoy the recipes, or did they detract from the story for you?
They didn't detract at all, but they did feel a little odd, as I don't normally expect recipes in a novel. None of them stand out in my memory a couple of weeks after reading the book.
3. Any bits you particularly enjoyed, didn't like, or think didn't work?
I think what I really liked was the writing -- the voice, the humour. The humour didn't always completely work for me, but overall it was engaging. Much like @Mili said above, the financial lifestyle of the characters was extremely unrelatable to me, and I find books about the follies of rich people (especially if they don't think of themselves as rich!) very annoying. But what I did find important and interesting was the reminder of how very different things were for women 60 years ago. The idea that even as a smart, well-off, educated woman, Rachel is expected to make marriage and motherhood her main focus, is quite sad.
4. I found the end rather sad, but a friend found it positive and uplifting. What do you think?
Much like the recipes, the ending didn't really linger with me. It seemed inevitable that the marriage would end and was not salvageable, and I hoped there was something better ahead for Rachel.
5. Have you read any other books that are semi-autobiographical. Does it work at a genre?
Oh, tons. It's a very common trope (not always true of course) that everyone's first novel is a thinly-veiled autobiography. I do wonder about what makes people decide to write something close to their real-life experience as a novel rather than as a memoir. Maybe just deniability? Though apparently Carl Bernstein was as angry about this as if it HAD been a memoir.
6. To me it felt very much of its time. Would Rachel make different choices about her life if this story was set in the 2020s?
I don't think the marital infidelity would be any different, but hopefully she would not have faced as much overt sexism in her career (still plenty of covert sexism, of course!) and she might have had a stronger identity in her own right rather than feeling so defined by marriage.
Interesting comment from @Sojourner above that:
I tend to have that reaction also when I hear someone, especially a celebrity, is embarking on their third marriage (even though I know third marriages that have worked well!) -- there's a little bit of a sense that, well, maybe this is just not going to work out. And Rachel in this novel certainly comes off as a person who, despite individual and group therapy, is not very self-reflective about herself and her choices, so you could imagine her stumbling into a third unsuccessful marriage.
But it is interesting to note that while Ephron's first marriage lasted 9 years and her second marriage (the one this novel is based on) only lasted 4 years, her third marriage lasted 25 years, until her death. So in this case a "serial marrier" did have an apparently quite successful third marriage and, hopefully, something of a happily-ever-after ending.
I don't think she's someone I'd want as a friend but I was interested in what happened to her. I thought she was remarkably calm about being held up at gunpoint.
2. Did you enjoy the recipes, or did they detract from the story for you?
It took a bit of getting used to having them scattered in detail throughout the book and as I don't like cooking I wasn't particularly interested in them. But I do know people who will interrupt conversations with uninvited detail about something they've done, or a hobby they enjoy, so it kind of rang true.
3. Any bits you particularly enjoyed, didn't like, or think didn't work?
I liked the humour and her narrative voice kept me engaged.
4. I found the end rather sad, but a friend found it positive and uplifting. What do you think?
I was relieved she was freeing herself and like @Trudy hope there are better things ahead for her.
5. Have you read any other books that are semi-autobiographical. Does it work at a genre?
I'm sure I have but am struggling to recall them.
6. To me it felt very much of its time. Would Rachel make different choices about her life if this story was set in the 2020s?
I guess she put up with Mark's infidelity because of the expectations of the time, but I couldn't believe she did put up with it for so long and felt quite irritated by that.
To old D.H. Lawrence...
I'll just note at this point that Ephron also wrote and directed the film Julie & Julia, about an early 2000s blogger who tries to cook every recipe in Julia Child's cookbook.
I thought the book was a product of its time and place. I thought she was caught in a cycle of behaviour of her social group and class. The gunpoint scene, her reaction and that of others, was completely unrealistic.
2. Did you enjoy the recipes, or did they detract from the story for you?
The recipes were just annoying yet reflective of her life and vocation.
3. I found the end rather sad, but a friend found it positive and uplifting. What do you think?
I was glad she left her husband yet afraid she would repeat the pattern by running into another relationship.
4. Any bits you particularly enjoyed, didn't like, or think didn't work?
Thought the robbery scene lacked realism.
6. To me it felt very much of its time. Would Rachel make different choices about her life if this story was set in the 2020s?
It was very much of its time. The 20s would have placed it at least one generation removed from when it actually happened. All characters would have experienced a different socialization.
I liked Rachel, and thought she'd be fun to go out for a drink with. She's not someone I'd particularly want as a close friend as I don't think I'd trust her not to turn anything I told her into a story.
2. Did you enjoy the recipes, or did they detract from the story for you?
I didn't pay them much attention as most were not the sort of things I'd eat anyway.
3. Any bits you particularly enjoyed, didn't like, or think didn't work?
I read it a few months ago and bits are becoming hazy. I too think the hold up in the therapy group didn't work, mainly because, as Ephron says in the introduction to the edition I have, that it was something that happened to someone she knew, rather than to herself.
4. I found the end rather sad, but a friend found it positive and uplifting. What do you think?
I think it was the bit about the Petunia song I found sad, that Rachel could remember the good times and realise that her husband had moved on and that loving him wasn't going to be enough to keep them together.
5. Have you read any other books that are semi-autobiographical. Does it work at a genre?
I was thinking of Frost in May which we read recently. That seemed far more a memoir than this, that was trying to make a story about the break-up of a marriage rather than a series of incidents in someone's life. I think anyone that writes fiction uses things they have come across in their stories. I really don't enjoy fiction where it feels like the author isn't really grounded in what they are writing about even if the story is sci-fi or fantasy.
6. To me it felt very much of its time. Would Rachel make different choices about her life if this story was set in the 2020s?
I was hoping that nowadays she might not feel she 'had' to be married. I did wonder if Rachel was going to end up married to Richard as soon as her divorce from Mark had come through.