Mini-Review: Vinegar Girl by Anne Tyler

Vinegar Girl by Anne Tyler

Read by Kirsten Potter

5 hours, 57 minutes

Published June 2016 by Hogarth Shakespeare Series

Publisher's Summary: 

Kate Battista feels stuck. How did she end up running house and home for her eccentric scientist father and uppity, pretty younger sister Bunny? Plus, she's always in trouble at work - her pre-school charges adore her, but their parents don't always appreciate her unusual opinions and forthright manner.

Dr. Battista has other problems. After years out in the academic wilderness, he is on the verge of a breakthrough. His research could help millions. There's only one problem: his brilliant young lab assistant, Pyotr, is about to be deported. And without Pyotr, all would be lost.

When Dr. Battista cooks up an outrageous plan that will enable Pyotr to stay in the country, he's relying - as usual - on Kate to help him. Kate is furious: this time he's really asking too much. But will she be able to resist the two men's touchingly ludicrous campaign to bring her around?

My Thoughts: 

Vinegar Girl is the third book in Random House's Hogarth Shakespeare project, with contemporary writers retelling Shakespeare plays. Vinegar Girl is very loosely based on Shakespeare's The Taming of the Shrew. 

Here Kate is less a shrew and  more of a woman trapped by circumstances. While she is by no means a willing participant in her father's plot to find a wife for Pyotr to keep him from being deported, she's lured by the idea of a way out of her father's house, out of having to mother her fifteen-year-old sister. Truly, her father is something of a mad scientist, who has the family eating a hash meal every evening, who has no idea how to take care of himself or his youngest, who relies entirely on Kate to keep the household afloat. Can she be abrupt and a little too honest some of the time? Yes, she certainly can. But who can blame her? And Pyotr, while under the impression that he'll be the boss in the marriage, is also quite a nice guy when it comes right down to it. In this version of The Taming of the Shrew, Kate isn't so much broken, as she is presented with an opportunity that allows her to become a better version of her natural self. 

It's a little on the light side; but, overall, I enjoyed it. Now that I've finally gotten around to this one, I'll be looking for others in the series. 

The other books in the project are: 

Hag-Seed by Margaret Atwood, a retelling of The Tempest

Dunbar by Edward St. Aubyn, a retelling of King Lear

The Gap of Time by Jeanette Winterson, a retelling of The Winter's Tale

Shylock Is My Name by Howard Jacobson, a retelling of The Merchant of Venice

New Boy by Tracy Chevalier, a retelling of Othello

Macbeth by Jo Nesbo

Macbeth by Jo Nesbo
Published April 2018 by Crown/Archetype as part of the Hogarth Shakespeare Series
Source: my ecopy courtesy of the publisher, through Netgalley, in exchange for an honest review

Publisher's Summary:
Set in the 1970s in a run-down, rainy industrial town, Jo Nesbo's Macbeth centers around a police force struggling to shed an incessant drug problem. Duncan, chief of police, is idealistic and visionary, a dream to the townspeople but a nightmare for criminals. The drug trade is ruled by two drug lords, one of whom—a master of manipulation named Hecate—has connections with the highest in power, and plans to use them to get his way.

Hecate’s plot hinges on steadily, insidiously manipulating Inspector Macbeth: the head of SWAT and a man already susceptible to violent and paranoid tendencies. What follows is an unputdownable story of love and guilt, political ambition, and greed for more, exploring the darkest corners of human nature, and the aspirations of the criminal mind.


My Thoughts:
Confession: I was well into this book before I realized this was a modern retelling of Shakespeare's play. Yes, yes, I know the name of the book, and title character, are a dead giveaway. As is the fact that Macbeth's lady love is, in fact, called Lady. And it's only been a year since I've seen the play! Which may account for why it was the secondary character's names that started to ring a bell with me.    No need to shame me; I'm already hanging my head in shame.

Here's my only excuse: for the first 75 pages or so, this was just the wrong book at the wrong time. My mind was just not engaged. Until the little light bulb went off in my head. As soon as I wised up to the fact that this was a modern retelling of one of Shakespeare's greatest plays, I was hooked.

The mood is dark, the action is nonstop, and Nesbo has done an impressive job moving the story into a 1970's, post-industrial country. And an even more impressive job of keeping the reader sucked in to a story when the outcome is a given.

Have you ever read or seen the play and felt sorry for the Macbeths? No, I'm sure your answer is no. Because as brilliant as Shakespeare's play is, the Bard gave us zero information on their histories. Nesbo takes advantage of his longer medium, giving his characters backstories that make readers, if not care for them, at least understand their motivations. The payoff is that it's even harder to watch so many of them die. Because they are going to die. We know that going in (well, at least those who aren't me and know that this is the Macbeth).

If you're a fan of Nesbo, you will not be disappointed. If you're a fan of Shakespeare, you will not be disappointed. I accepted this book for review simply because it was time for me to read something by Nesbo. Count me now as one of his fans.