Families in literature: The Lisbons in The Virgin Suicides by Jeffrey Eugenides

There is a photo of me at my second Christmas. I am somewhere between a baby and toddler, and still my parents’ only child, a title I would keep for another three precious years. Around me is so much swag that some of it towers above me, while an array of smaller boxes make me a little Godzilla, stomping around my city of gifts. I like to tease my parents about this photo. You ruined me for real life, I tell them. The Lisbon sisters of The Virgin Suicides don’t share this problem. Parental overindulgence is not something Mary, Therese, Bonnie, Cecila and Lux experience in their short lives, which we encounter through lovingly collated pieces of evidence by a group of boys from their suburban Michigan community. Their mother is an unfeeling, stifling disciplinarian, their father is weak and adrift in the sea of women around him. Over the course of a year, the book’s narrator and his friends bear witness as four Lisbon girls attempt to survive the suicide of Cecila, and its effect on the already startlingly spartan rule of their mother. As the girls try to integrate into normal life, the boys collect the pieces of information that will make up a lifelong investigation: reports from the orthodontist that Mary visits in the hope of fixing her teeth, inventories of mysterious feminine toiletries found during reconnaissance, memories of touch and conversation archived like rare historical documents.
The Virgin Suicides cleverly fakes being a book about teen suicide, but its real exploration is into the delicate dynamics that keep a family together. Before Cecilia, the “weird” sister, makes the swan dive into the yard that sparks off the suicides, the Lisbon family is at least a whole unit; their house is odd, ugly, but still functional. After the suicide, the parents lose hold of the children, and the girls lose their small freedoms. Mr Lisbon begins to see children as “only strangers you agreed to live with”, and the family home becomes an extension of its occupants’ relationships, emitting toxic smells, of “bad breath, cheese, milk, tongue film … the singed smell of drilled teeth”, or as one of the boys quips, “the smell of trapped beaver”. Meanwhile, adding a dreamlike, echoing quality to the Lisbon tragedy, the town’s beloved elms become diseased, and men arrive to cut them down. It’s hard not to note the symbolism as tree after tree is decapitated and torn out, infested with the virus from the first sick tree. What’s unclear, in the Lisbons’ case, is who carries the virus first – Cecilia, the mother, or generations of ancestors carrying a gene for depression.
While they live, the Lisbon sisters are observed in lots of ways, all of which reinforce their isolation. They are five copies of the same girl, or living myths, like the Kennedys. Sometimes they are five adjacent solitudes with cartoon-like personal quirks, like a bleak sibling version of the Spice Girls (the pretty one, the smart one, the weird one, the oldest, “mean one, pulling my hair …”). It’s no wonder the girls have no comfort but each other, and in the familiar pattern of their five, then four-starred, constellation. Anyone with siblings will recognise the casual way in which the Lisbons know, irritate and protect each other, and the wordless way in which they communicate. And it’s difficult to begrudge their togetherness in the end, even if we can’t understand their actions.
When my brother and sister arrived, I was humiliated, then suddenly their existence was impossible to live without. When I re-read The Virgin Suicides, as I often do, the thing that comes across is always this idea of sibling love, and the way it can be your source of understanding the generation above you, and the world. My love for my siblings is now bigger than a pile of presents, and more important than the most generous harvest of presents I ever had. I think it’s the thing that keeps me returning to this magical book.

Ebooks can tell which novels you didn't finish

The Goldfinch may have won Donna Tartt the Pulitzer, praised by judges as a novel which “stimulates the mind and touches the heart”, but the acclaimed title’s 800-odd pages appear to have intimidated British readers, with less than half of those who downloaded it from e-bookseller Kobo making it to the end.
New data from Kobo shows that, although The Goldfinch was the 37th bestselling ebook of the year for the retailer, it was completed by just 44.4% of Kobo’s British readers. Kobo speculated that it “likely proved daunting for some due to the length of the novel”.
Twelve Years a Slave, Solomon Northup’s account from 1853 of how he was kidnapped and sold into slavery – “I sighed for liberty; but the bondsman’s chain was round me, and could not be shaken off” – was, according to Kobo, similarly overwhelming. Ninth on their British bestseller list, following the hugely successful film adaptation, the book was completed by just 28.2% of British readers.
The onset of digital reading means that Kobo – and other ebook retailers – are able to tell more than ever before about how readers engage with books: which they leave unopened, which they read to the end, and how quickly they finish.
Earlier this year, the American mathematician Jordan Ellenberg proposed the so-called “Hawking Index” in a blog for the Wall Street Journal, using Amazon’s “Popular Highlights” feature in an attempt to pinpoint how far into novels readers were actually getting, but retailers have been reluctant to share the data they are harvesting themselves. Kobo’s first analysis of trends in e-reading, released on Wednesday, reveal an unexpected divide between bestsellers, and the books that readers actually complete.
After collecting data between January and November 2014 from more than 21m users, in countries including Canada, the US, the UK, France, Italy and the Netherlands, Kobo found that its most completed book of 2014 in the UK was not a Man Booker or Baileys prize winner. Instead, readers were most keen to finish Casey Kelleher’s self-published thriller Rotten to the Core, which doesn’t even feature on the overall bestseller list – although Kelleher has gone on to win a book deal with Amazon’s UK publishing imprint Thomas & Mercer after selling nearly 150,000 copies of her three self-published novels.
“Rotten to The Core by Casey Kelleher was the most completed book in the UK, with 83% of people reading it cover to cover,” said Kobo, “whereas the number one bestselling ebook in the UK, One Cold Night by Katia Lief [also a thriller] was only completed by 69% of those who read it.”
Kobo’s UK ebook bestseller list also features novels by major names including Gillian Flynn, John Green, James Patterson and Robert Galbraith, while its “most completed” list mixes romance, thrillers and erotica by the likes of Sylvia Day, Stella Rimington, Nora Roberts and Lynda La Plante. Kobo said that thriller powerhouse Patterson “was the most completed author in the UK for his entire portfolio of books”.
“A book’s position on the bestseller list may indicate it’s bought, but that isn’t the same as it being read or finished,” said Michael Tamblyn, president and chief content officer at Kobo. “A lot of readers have multiple novels on the go at any given time, which means they may not always read one book from start to finish before jumping into the next great story. People may wait days, months, or even until the following year to finish certain titles. And many exercise that inalienable reader’s right to set down a book if it doesn’t hold their interest.”
Kobo also revealed that the people of Britain were most likely to finish a romance novel, with 62% completion, followed by crime and thrillers (61%) and fantasy (60%). Italians were also most engaged by romance (74% completion), while the French preferred mysteries, with 70% completion.
Kobo’s UK Bestseller List
1.One Cold Night – Katia Lief
2. Gone Again – Doug Johnstone
3. Gone Girl – Gillian Flynn
4. The Fault in Our Stars – John Green
5. My Sister’s Keeper – Bill Benners
6. The Husband’s Secret – Liane Moriarty
7. The Cuckoo’s Calling – Robert Galbraith
8. Her Last Letter – Nancy C. Johnson
9. Twelve Years a Slave – Solomon Northup
10. Bloody Valentine – James Patterson
Kobo’s most completed books of 2014
1. Rotten to the Core - Casey Kelleher
2. The Tycoon’s Vacation – Melody Anne
3. The Traitor – Kimberley Chambers
4. Concealed in Death – JD Robb
5. Wrongful Death - Lynda La Plante
6. All Revved Up - Sylvia Day
7. Present Danger - Stella Rimington
8. The Empty Cradle - Rosie Goodwin
9. The Witness - Nora Roberts
10. The Promise (Fallen Star Series, Book 4) – Jessica Sorensen

Reading the Guardian first book award longlist: rewards and revelations

For the readers’ group helping to assess the 2014 contenders, it’s been a sometimes arduous but always enjoyable journey

'Vigorous debate' ...the first book award longlist. Photograph: Graham Turner for the Guardian
We started with Fiona McFarlane’s tiger on the coast of New South Wales and we finished eight weeks later in the company of the volatile “young skins” of Glanbeigh, having travelled to Colin Barrett’s fictional west of Ireland town via the new China with Evan Osnos, and from Kabul to London via Oxford, New York and Islamabad with Zia Haider Rahman. On the way we followed Gruff Rhys as he traced his farmhand ancestor’s search for a fabled tribe of Welsh-speaking Native Americans and we spent time with Marion Coutts, sharing her pain, frustration and love as her husband, the art critic Tom Lubbock, experienced the debilitating effects of a brain tumour.
The brain and its workings returned several times: Henry Marsh showed us what it was like to operate on its “soft white substance … moving through thought itself” while Matthew Thomas in his novel We Are Not Ourselves presented us with a closely observed study of what happens when Marsh’s “jelly” falls victim to dementia. We learnt new ways of interpreting architecture from Tom Wilkinson’s Bricks and Mortals, and encountered brilliant new approaches to the short story in May-Lan Tan’s Things To Make and Break, which made it to the longlist as the Guardian readers’ choice.

We were the six readers who made up this year’s Lewes readers’ group for the Guardian first book award. We’d been invited to take part in judging this year’s competition early in September, after applying to our local Waterstones, and for eight weeks the pile of 11 hardbacks we’d been presented with after joining the group dominated our reading lives. We’d read whenever and wherever we could, particularly in week four, when Lucie from Waterstones paired the dark novel After Me Comes the Flood with the emotionally draining memoir The Iceberg, and in Week six, when the 620 pages of We Are Not Ourselves tested our endurance while at the same time filling us with admiration for the skilled way in which Matthew Thomas steered us through his central characters’ experiences of marriage, ambition and loss.

The knowledge that the writers of these books had lots weighing on our choices meant that we took each book extremely seriously. There’s a £10,000 award for the winner, and all of the writers can be assured that as readers we held each book up to the light and discussed its strengths and weaknesses in full.

There were vigorous good-humoured debates about each of the 11 books on the longlist. We finished by ranking them at a meeting in the shop, watched over as we did so by less distinguished titles such as Dogs in Cars. We judged the books ultimately on how they had ranked as reading experiences. Style mattered, as did story; the fiction titles had to make us care about their characters and believe in the worlds they created, whilst the non-fiction ones needed to have a shape which gave coherence to their interests and concerns and make those concerns engage our attention and interest.

Some needed a little more editorial discipline in order to reign in their enthusiasm for lengthy footnotes or tortuous sub-plots. Strangely, given the rich variety of fiction and non-fiction we had to choose from, we didn’t disagree by much and our choices were satisfyingly mirrored in the shortlist published last Saturday. The shortlisted books don’t tell the whole story, however; no one reading In The Light of What We Know, with its epic coverage of nations breaking up and its searching exploration of love, science, faith and war, could feel that they were experiencing anything less than the arrival of a major new literary talent, and likewise the bizarre and mysterious world created by Sarah Perry in After Me Comes the Flood makes for a highly original and disturbing experience.

All that’s left for us now is to attend Wednesday’s award ceremony in London. We’ll enjoy being there and we’re all looking forward to a chance to meet the authors and find out who our fellow readers were. We know who we think deserves to win, and we’ll be glad to share in the celebrations, but we’ll miss our weekly meetings and we’ll miss the challenges that come with reading so many books in such a short time.

Watch out forthe result: the winner will have come through a really tough and demanding judging process and the first book award will be just one of many still to come!

• The winner is announced at 8pm. Peter Shears was part of the Lewes Waterstones reading group. With thanks to Lucie, Bridget, Anna, Barbara, Ian and Tessa

A List Of The Best Children's Books 2012

In keeping with the CAPC tradition of year-end lists of our favorite things, I've been reviewing my reading of the past year. 2012 provided an array of delightful children's books. I tried my best to narrow them down to a Top 5, but ended up with 6. In any case, I noticed as I was compiling my list that each of them can in some way be classified as a meta-narrative—a story about stories.

 1. The Adventures of Little Nutbrown Hare by Sam McBranty

Probably most famous for Guess How Much I Love You, McBranty reintroduces Little Nutbrown Hare and Big Nutbrown Hare in this collection of new stories. With the same playful interactions, the two hares weave a wider story, one that goes beyond their love for each other and stretches into the world around them. Just as the title suggests, these tales focus on Little Nutbrown Hare's explorations of the world, and yet his story still returns to the same familiar, loving arms. Together, these two hares tell their story about a love that keeps them rooted at home as they branch into the wild world around them.

2. Bear Has a Story to Tell by Philip Stead and Erin Stead

Brought to you by the same author and illustrator of A Sick Day for Amos McGee, Bear Has a Story to Tell offers the same gentle, warm friendship as that excellent story. Bear prepares for winter along with his friends, but instead of actually telling the tale, he assists each of them and moves on because they are too busy to listen. Ever patient, Bear waits all winter, hibernating along with his story, but discovers in springtime that he has forgotten it. Winter, it seems, lasts longer than a bear's memory. But his friends step in, reminding his that his story starts, and continues, in the same gentle way he's lived it all along.

3. Extra Yarn by Mac Barnett and Jon Klassen

Playing with the yarn reference in the title, Barnett spins a tale of magic, mystery, courage, and a very determined knitter. The brave Annabelle brightens and warms her town with her handmade creations and her generosity of spirit. Klassen provides muted and expressive illustrations for the same quirky feel as his laugh-out-loud funny book I Want My Hat Back. Yet while that book is a dry and precocious story of theft and revenge, Annabelle's yarn illustrates the way love and kindness are gifts that keep on giving.

4. The Fantastic Flying Books of Mr. Morris Lessmore by William Joyce and Joe Bluhm

Mr. Morris Lessmore is a bibliophile to rival all bibliophiles, and his story mirrors the story so many of us find ourselves in. Each day, he writes in his book until a vague sorrow leads him to a building full of books that require his care. He tends to the books, caring for them and continuing to craft his own story, until one day, he flies off like his beloved books. Mr. Morris Lessmore's immediate story of grief is gone—until a little girl comes to read the words he has left behind. The images move from big picture to the pages of the books within the book, providing depth and perspective along with the message that everyone's story matters.

5. Otto the Book Bear by Kate Cleminson

Otto is a storybook character who lives in a storybook. He lives to be read, until his book is left behind. Fortunately, Otto finds the perfect home, and a cast of storybook friends, in a public library. As part of the library system, Otto gets read more frequently and also gets to share in the delights of reading others. A charming book about sharing the joy and wonder of stories, I only wish it came in a scratch-and-sniff edition that smelled like rows upon rows of old books.

6. Virginia Wolf by Kyo Maclear

Based loosely on the lives of Virginia Woolf and her sister, an artist named Vanessa, the vivid and fantastical illustrations in this text almost elide the story's central darkness. Almost. But this is a story of depression, as Virginia sinks into despair, only to be rescued by the unfailing love and loyalty of her sister Vanessa. A powerful, moving tale, Maclear manifests the wolfishness in all of us, along with our need for redemption from the darkest recesses of ourselves. Like all great stories, Maclear's reminds us that stories can heal, and, as Sam Gamgee says, remind us how much of life and love are worth fighting for.

Some Advices On Running A Good Bookshop Online

My teachers loved telling me that all business is local, but as we've moved into a world defined by e-retail and digital distribution local has become a matter of sociology rather than geography. I had the pleasure of listening to a speech by Amazon.co.uk's head of Print on Demand, and he had some good insights into which criteria you need to focus on to run a good bookshop online.

Selection

As opposed to a brick and mortar shop, a webshop has the option to have a near unlimited selection of books at the customers beck and call. Now, there are some crucial elements to selection that borders into availability and information. If a book is out of print or in some other way unavailable the customer needs to be aware of this. Optimally these books should then be made available through Print On Demand(POD) or rerouted to other print versions of the same book to increase the selection available in the webshop.

Price

Customers are price sensitive, even more so in deflationary periods. If a customer can get the product cheaper elsewhere you might find yourself with less customers than your site should be able to attract. This is especially true online, as getting hold of comparative prices on the web is way easier than in the physical world.

Availability

If a product is available NOW is has an increased sales potential as opposed to being available later. In the case of e-books, the books are always available right away if the book is available at all. The only thing standing in the way of physical books having the same instant gratification is the lack of a major POD database with local outlets. Both of which should pose no problems with further market penetration from the Espresso Book machine.

Convenience

People lead busy lives, and often don’t have the time to browse through a brick and mortar book store. The convenience of getting a book delivered directly to your door as opposed to slogging through the rain and hail is not to be underestimated. The webshop has to have a good distribution system in place to handle customers all over the world to capitalize on its potential. A good case in point here is the book depository, which was just bought by Amazon.

Information

Information is crucial to a sale, and web based shops are at an advantage here as opposed to brick and mortar shops. The more information that is available, the better the chance of a product being sold. After all, if a customer can't figure out what a product is, he's less likely to make a purchase. The information has to be organized in such a fashion that it triggers the optimal amount of sales, so remember to experiment with different options to find the golden spot.

Discovery

By leading customers toward products they didn't know existed, Amazon has created a sense of discovery (in essence "customers who bought this, also looked at/bought these books") Any bookstore would be foolish not to integrate such features.