Title: Shopgirl
Author: Steve Martin
Genre: Fiction
This is the second time I’ve read Shopgirl so even though it’s not a new book to me I’m still counting it in my reading list count for 2007. I simply adore this little book. It’s one of the very few books I’ve ever read where I don’t have even a hint of a wish for a single thing to be different in it. Steve Martin’s writing style is quietly observant and insightful. His descriptions of the relationship between young artist Mirabelle and older wealthy Ray Porter are brilliantly nuanced without being cliched, too simple or overly grandiose. The book is a touch bittersweet, a big melancholy and a bit happy fairy tale all in one. I can’t thing of three better things for a book to be all at the same time.

Title: The Emperor’s Children
Author: Claire Messud
Genre: Fiction
I can’t decide whether I’m pleased that this was the first book I read in 2007 or not. I enjoyed reading the book but I do not like the book. Does that make sense? For something so decidedly high brow it employed far too many soap opera plot lines for my taste. The soap opera plot lines were very, very well written but they were still not what I was wanting in this book. I expected a deeper look into the main characters instead of just an acknowledgment of their faults by other characters, and at least some resolution to the major fallout that was hinted at throughout, instead of bringing it to the breaking point and then letting it drift off. The author is clearly a brilliant writer, I found her prose very engaging and I read the 430 page book quite quickly. I just wish she’d trimmed 75 pages and left the soap opera stuff to All My Children.