What do you mean, funny? Funny how?: Book Review of Spellbound

 

Spellbound: My Life as a Dyslexic Wordsmith by Phil Hanley

Gratitude 

Thank you to Goodreads Giveaways and Henry Holt for the review copy of Spellbound by Phil Hanley on sale March 18, 2025.

Description

Phil’s story is unfortunately like many others in the public school system: he has a learning difference that was not diagnosed until early adolescence and as a result, teachers treated him like he was dumb, lazy, and not trying. The traumas of school, especially disrespectful teachers, followed him long into his adulthood. Spellbound serves as another cautionary tale about the educational system in the United States. 

Having dyslexia also made his experience significantly different after graduating. Instead of college, he pursued modeling for a time and then a long road to being the comic he is today.

The book has its funny moments, but the majority is not laugh out loud funny. This is not to its detriment. It is an interesting window into the worlds of modeling and comedy. It is also a story of perusing a craft: the long, hard, dedicated life of learning and perfecting, the humility of starting at the bottom, and the stumbling climb of getting to know the business side.

It is refreshing to read about a journey that includes both passion, determination, and the honesty of hard knocks and lumps. Hanley's story involves many failures as well as successes, and he seems to learn just as much from the low points as the high. There is honesty about mental health challenges, taking medications, and seeking professional help. Also impressive is the acknowledgment that while he worked harder than your average bear, he had a lot of help along the way: friends, mentors, and family that supported him emotionally, financially, and by helping to make connections.   

Would I Teach This Book?

Would I teach Spellbound? Spellbound could easily be a part of a memoir class, either for writing or reading. The writing style is clean with an eye for detail. More impressive is the seemingly easy way Hanley chooses when to summarize and condense and when to explore and expand a moment.

It’s also a good book to show how to discuss a profession and educate an audience. There is a lot of information both about living with dyslexia and making it as a comic, but the information is not burdensome to the plot. In fact, the educational aspects make the plot even more enjoyable. 

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Who Said Anything about Fair? Book Review of The Perfect Divorce

 

The Perfect Divorce by Jeneva Rose

Gratitude

Thank you to Blackstone Publishing and Goodreads Giveaways for the review copy of The Perfect Divorce by Jeneva Rose, available April 15, 2025.

Description

Bob messed up. He cheated on his wife, Sarah. It was a drunken one-night stand with a woman he had no interest in ever seeing again, but somehow Sarah found out--and she is not one for forgive and forget. After all, Bob knows what happened to her first husband when he cheated. When the woman he slept with goes missing, all fingers are pointed at Bob--except his own. He believes that somehow Sarah is behind this, and if he does not figure out how and save his skin, he will indeed end up like Sarah’s first husband--framed for a crime he didn’t commit.

Meanwhile, new evidence appears in Sarah’s first husband’s case, and suddenly Bob, Sarah, and the current sheriff are all swept into the whirlpool of drama.

The Perfect Divorce is told primarily from three points of view: Bob, Sarah, and the sheriff working both the missing person and the reopened case, Sheriff Hudson.

The plot is pretty juicy from the beginning—it starts off with a transcript from a documentary about Sarah’s former husband, who was tried, convicted, and put to death for the murder of his mistress. Sarah defended him, and by all accounts gave a great performance. The first scene is Bob groveling to get back with Sarah after his infidelity and her giving a hard pass.

For Sheriff Hudson, he has taken the former sheriff in to dry out one too many times--now he has killed a woman while drunk driving. Sheriff Hudson knows that he made a grave error, and that is just the beginning.

There are a lot of surprises in The Perfect Divorce, and Rose’s Sarah Morgan is quite the character. She is cold, calculated, and sure of herself. She suffers no fools, and no betrayals. For her, her primary objective is to care for her daughter, her second to lead her foundation, and finally, to divorce Bob quickly and brutally in order to punish him for his mistake. She is far from admirable and not particularly likable, but her clever and calculated decisions make her interesting.

Would I Teach This Book?

Would I teach The Perfect Divorce? Probably not. I am not in love with the ending, the three perspectives don’t quite hold up, and Sarah is more than a little extra. I have not read the first book in the series, The Perfect Marriage, and perhaps I would feel differently if I had, but there are better books to teach suspense and mysteries. While not perfect, The Perfect Divorce is a decently entertaining read.

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DEI? What's That? Book Review of The Grand Scheme of Things

 

The Grand Scheme of Things by Warona Jay

Gratitude

Thank you GoodReads and Atria for the review copy of The Grand Scheme of Things by Warona Jay, which will be on sale February 25, 2025.

Description

In The Grand Scheme of Things, Naledi, or Eddie as she commonly goes by, has been sending out her play with no bites. Her college mates have all made progress getting their work on stage and Naledi thinks that her play is getting held up by racism--readers see her non-Anglo Saxon name on the cover page and don’t get much further. Her play is being shut out because she is a Black woman, the daughter of Batswana immigrants, and this in the time of Brexit and fear across England.

Tired and frustrated, Eddie comes up with a plan to prove that it is prejudice that is preventing her play from garnering the attention it deserves--with the help of Hugo, that is.

Hugo is a blue blood, White and as privileged as can be. His father is a prominent attorney and since graduating from college, Hugo lives in one of his properties, where he is meant to be getting started on his own law career. But Hugo is not interested in the law, so when Eddie suggests a scheme to expose the prejudice in the theater industry, Hugo is eager to be of service.

The Grand Scheme of Things is told in sections that alternate between Eddie’s first-person narration and Hugo’s. As the play leaves their hands and becomes a thing of the world, so too does the plot line seem to no longer be theirs and certainly not Eddie’s. Eddie and Hugo’s relationship status also brings further complications, as the outside world tries to decipher the connection between them.

While The Grand Scheme of Things is set in Great Britain, all the markers of prejudice could just as easily exist in the United States. With the current ridiculousness of the outlawing of DEI, I could see such a plan to highlight structural racism being implemented. For reference, the Tony Award for Best Play has not gone to a woman in the past ten years, let alone a woman of Color. Racism and sexism are alive and well in the United States theater industry.

 

Would I Teach This Book?

Would I teach The Grand Scheme of Things? The Grand Scheme of Things is an intriguing novel that questions how willing we are to take on the prejudice around us and challenge structural racism. I would hope that many would be moved by Eddie’s story, but I wonder how many are so resistant to seeing the existence of racism and would rather suggest that truly we live in a meritocracy and that it is not prejudice that keeps some away from success but merit--that efforts of inclusion mean that less worthy candidates are chosen. Yes, I would teach this book, and yes I would want to know what students make of it.


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