The Shadow Land by Elizabeth KostovaMy rating: 5 of 5 stars
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This book was supposed to be a Sister Senia Book Club selection, but Senia gave up on it, sadly. She bought it from Fry’s. I didn’t even know that Fry’s sold books. I thought they only sold food. According to my Goodreads profile, I started reading this book June 7, 2021 at 9:59 p.m. Then I stopped making progress June 30 at 4:32 p.m. I made it to chapter 11 (11% done). I stopped reading because Senia did and I wanted to read something else anyway (The Quiet Girl). So it was Senia’s birthday a few days ago and I asked if I could borrow her copy of The Shadow Land and she said yeah. I don’t think she intended to finish it because it’s like 500 pages long. But she got a cute bookmark with it. I plan to loan an Eaudiobook of this book and read it for that time period or longer.
* Checked Out Eaudiobook: Monday, August 16, 2021
* Due: Monday, September 6, 2021
83 chapter
21 days
83÷21=3.95238095238 (Read 4 chps./day)
* I finished this book Thursday, September 16, 2021 at about 1:00 p.m. I didn’t look at the clock right when I finished, so 1:00 p.m. is an estimate, but I’m pretty sure it was before or after 1:00 p.m.
* I listened to the audiobook on Libby and they call my reading statistics my “Reading Journey” and I thought that was so cute!
♥ My Reading Journey According to Libby:
* Starting 16 Aug, 2021
I picked up audiobook 41 times
* Total Reading Time: 21 hours, 51 minutes
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My Personal Opinion: It was like a big adrenaline, a somber one. I loved all the main characters. I’d give it a 5 stars. The only thing I didn’t like was the narrator who voiced the old lady. Her voice was painfully annoying. I especially loved the ending.
Summary: Young American woman, Alexandra Boyd in Sofia, Bulgaria to teach English. Cab driver drops at wrong hotel, encounter old couple and holds urn containing bag accidentally. It has the remains of Stoyan Lazarov. Bobby takes her to police and they continue to search for Stoyan’s relatives. Piece together story of Stoyan Lazarov’s life. Gifted violinist whose career cut short by communist oppression.
- Extra Note: I checked my goodreads activity and saw that I really started reading about August 18, 2021 - 9/16/21, so I would say I finished this book in 29 days or 4 weeks and 1 day.
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| Senia gave me this book with a cute bookmark. She got it from Fry's for herself, but she gave to me for some reason. I think we were gonna do a sister book club with just her and myself, but she couldn't. |
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| All my notes and highlights are in my reading journal and will get transferred into my reading blog at some point. I didn't have a blog when I wrote in this journal, hence why they're in here. |
“...she began to cry not because she was afraid of human remains but because it was just too much, the last straw” (16).
Why did that hit me to my core?
“A couple of kittens and a mangy cat scattered as the taxi halted at the curb” (16).
I saw some kittens when I came home today. They were so cute! It’s such a coincidence that the chapter I read today mentioned Alexandra seeing kittens.
“She looked at him harder, too, because he was so close to her. In that moment, she saw him for the first time not in his commercial function, her ride to a hostel, but as a person, a man not much older than she—maybe twenty-nine, or at most in his early thirties. She saw again that he had a square pale face and that his light hair fell forward to obscure it when he bent over. His eyes were indeed blue, true blue, not blue-green. He was not large, and there was a grace to his movements, his thin hands” (17).
Omg I imagined a romance with these two because he was so close to her.
“She felt tears prick again” (17).
“In the midst of her misery, she liked the way his thin, nicely shaped lips found the words” (18).
“One of them was pouring hot water from an electric kettle into a cup” (32).
Omg I was just doing that a few moments ago lol
“Later that night, in the second bedroom in my mother’s apartment, I drew a kitchen knife slowly over the inside of my upper left arm, hard enough to give the skin a deep furrow of red. The pain I’d longed for brought me no relief, except that it jolted me to my senses: the ugliness, the cliché. It took time to clean up the blood, and the thought that I might have to call for help made me light-headed with shame. But I managed to stop the flow, binding my arm tightly for a night. I didn’t do it again, and I always wore sleeves after that; even my parents never saw. Light as it was, the scar weighed and tingled on my arm. Strangely, it also made me stop writing, as if the stories and poems I’d tried my hand at for years had trickled out and been lost” (36).
I wonder why she chose her upper arm of all the places on her body.
* 8/16/21: Chapter 11, 1:33:29 (7 minutes)
* 8/18/21: Chapter 15, 2:28:53 (55 minutes)
“In the taxi’s side mirror, she got a glimpse of her familiar self, the freckled pale oval of her face, the serious green gaze and thin mouth, her father’s rusty eyelashes and eyebrows, her fierce obsidian earrings. It was like encountering an old friend in an unexpected setting” (51).
“Her most recent life—four years at a good college, and then a few years of shelving books—had given her a vague sense of freedom with no disorder attached, apart from her inner misery” (61).
* 8/23/21: Chapter 20, 3:33:11 (65 minutes)
* 8/24/21: Chapter 24, 4:48:07 (75 minutes)
“She knew she should feel relieved of a burden, but there was an empty place in her chest that the sunlight couldn’t reach” (130).
* 8/25/21: Chapter 27, 6:26:18 (86 minutes)
“She gestured with long bent hands, drawing the hairs. ‘But you are quite right. Most of us could not travel. I knew people who dreamed all the time about going somewhere else, and they let that ruin their lives. When you are not allowed to do something, it often becomes very important’” (154).
“I do not have a gift for you better than the one I will give you now, although it is not bought with money and it is not something to wear or keep in your pocket. I hope you will keep it in your heart” (161).
* 8/27/21: Chapter 31, 7:41:23 (75 minutes)
I was thinking of reading 2 chapters a day so it won’t be too intimidating and so I can have more time for the rest of the things that I have to do on my “Daily To Do List”. If I do read 2 chapters a day instead of 4 I can hopefully renew my loan for the Eaudiobook. And if I have time, I can read more than 2 chapters a day.
* 8/31/21: Chapter 34, 8:28:49 (47 minutes)
This is the first day that I am reading 2 chapters a day. It seems that reading 2 chapters a day takes more than 30 minutes. Hopefully, it’s like that for every time I read 2 chapters.
“Maybe he was one of those people who just can’t bear a mess, or a job not finished. Besides, there are things you have to do for yourself, even if everyone else thinks you’re crazy” (208).
“Before she could wander down the path of this new anxiety, she grew warmer and sleep took her away” (219).
* 9/5/21: Chapter 35, 9:07:29 (39 minutes)
* 9/6/21: Chapter 37, 9:51:33 (44 minutes)
I read two chapters for this session, but I read the first chapter last night like I said I wanted to under my reading light. It was a short chapter. The last part of the second chapter I read was quite sad. That old man’s voice was strangely comforting to me. I’m almost at the half-way point in the book!
* 9/7/21: Book 3: Chapter 41, 10:28:45 (37 minutes)
I might read more today. So there are 478 pages in the book and I thought that half of 478 was 278, but I put 478÷2 in my phone calculator and it gave me 239. The last page I read was 268, so that means that I am more than halfway done with the book! I just have to read 10 more pages to get to 278. The next chapter goes over that and that’s so cool. The story is nice and it’s getting quite interesting so far. I really like Bobby and Alexandra’s relationship. They’re cool characters.
* 9/7/21 - 9/8/21: Book 3: Chapter 41, 11:04:56 (36 minutes)
I read over the period of two days because yesterday I was reading but then I had to go pick up Ale. Then I didn’t read again until this morning. But I finally made it to page 283. I am now absolutely more than halfway done with the book. And I just checked my goodreads page to update my progress and I just realized that this will be the 12th book that I’ve read this year and I will have met my goal! I was gonna read 2 more chapters, but I have other stuff to do today. So until next time.
* 9/8/21: Chapter 43, 11:35:06 (31 minutes)
I read these 2 chapters last night under my reading light.
“A huge desire to weep rose in my chest and throat” (293).
* 9/9/21: Chapter 47, 12:33:20 (58 minutes)
I am going to start reading 4 chapters again because the chapters are starting to be shorter again. I might even read 4 chapters at night on the same day. We shall see.
“Then, as if to change the subject for a minute, she asked Alexandra where she came from in the United States and whether there were discos in her town. Alexandra, who spent most of her time at the library or in the mountains, had to think hard. ‘Yes, there is one. I’m not sure what it’s like’” (314).
lol that’s me right there, Alexandra.
* 9/10/21: Chapter 52, 13:24:11 (51 minutes)
I have to say that this book and the music of Tchaikovsky really remind me of the show called “Maigret” that starred Rowan Atkinson. It has that French detective vibe to me. I also want to note that it saddens me to read of Stoyan’s time in the prison camp. It almost brings tears to my eyes. I can imagine everything as Kostova writes it. It reminds me of the Jew camps from the Holocaust, although the Holocaust was far more brutal. What Stoyan describes has that similar experience from history.
* 9/11/21: Chapter 56, 14:05:13 (41 minutes)
I found that the way Stoyan lived in his head while he worked was what I did when I worked at Amazon.
* 9/11/21: Chapter 59, 14:57:41 (52 minutes)
I read 4 chapters last night under my reading light. I did it! Finally! I love reading this book.
“She was thinking about something else, too: a young brother and littler sister, lying under the dining room table at the farmhouse, their parents’ LP of The Four Seasons revolving on an already dated stereo with a diamond needle.
…
Alexandra liked to listen to ‘Spring,’ which made her think of fountains and gazelles. Jack preferred ‘Autumn,’ which he said sounded like tornadoes, and she, too, could see the red leaves caught up in a whirlwind” (379).
I was listening to “Spring” and “Autumn” and I can agree with what the music made them think of. “Spring” is that one song the movies use in the fancy scenes. I did hear the one part of “Autumn” that sounded like tornadoes.
“She sat looking at him, feeling her cheeks stiff with salt, her eyes gumming shut. Then she slowly rolled up the sleeve of her cotton blouse. The long scar was pale now, not the pink it had been for months after, although there was still a jagged place where she’d lost courage for a moment. Without comment, she held her arm up under his gaze. He bent down suddenly and kissed the scar, and her eyes spilled over.
‘What does that make us?’ Her voice felt thick.
Bobby took her wrist and lowered the arm gently, as if it were broken. ‘Blood brothers,’ he said.
Leaning forward, she hugged her taxi driver fiercely. Then she rubbed her other sleeve over her face. There was something she must do now, even if she could never save Jack. It had been at the edge of her mind before she’d fainted.
‘Vivaldi—we didn’t find any,’ she said.
‘What?’ He turned back to the music and looked around, but absently, as if still gripped by her pain. ‘That’s right. No Vivaldi’” (380-381).
I loved this scene when Bobby kissed Alexandra’s scar. Even though they’ve known each other for only six days, it seems as though they are really good friends. I also wanted to add that I wasn’t expecting Bobby to be gay. It just wasn’t on my radar. But I’m just so glad that Alexandra found Bobby because he is such a great guy.
* 9/12/21: Chapter 64, 15:36:03 (39 minutes)
* 9/13/21: Chapter 68, 15:56:21 (20 minutes)
“I considered praying to Sveta Bogoroditsa that I would not wake up in the morning, not survive after all, and then I asked the angel to forgive me for this thought” (405-406).
* 9/14/21: Chapter 72, 16:14:36 (18 minutes)
I read these four chapters really late last night. They were very short.
* 9/14/21: Chapter 76, 16:47:35 (33 minutes)
I read this morning after I woke up. I read it in the hour before I had to go pick up Ale from school.
“Without looking at her, he said, ‘My English is not very good.’
‘It’s fine,’ she told him quickly.
‘Not fine. It is rough. Not—organized. I am ashamed to say—I wanted to go to English-language high school, but they would not let me in. Because of my father. I studied a lot with my friends who went to there, and a lot of the movies. And music.’ He frowned down at her, dissatisfied with his own efforts.
‘I don’t mind,’ Alexandra said. ‘And we can ask Bobby for help if we need it.’ For the first time since shaking his hand in the café, she did touch him, surreptitiously—the cuff of his warm smooth shirtsleeve” (428).
- I was thinking as I read this passage that Alexandra could teach Neven English, if things turn out smoothly in the end! That would be so romantic! Lol XD <3
- I like that underlined quote within the passage. That’s how I feel when I try to talk to anybody in Spanish. I am not even 100% fluent in Spanish! English is my first language and Spanish would be considered my second language.
- Surreptitiously = secretively
“He leaned forward, as if listening to the river, and then pulled a blade of grass expertly from its sheath. ‘Sometimes—sometimes we know a person who is a very bad man but who thinks he is a good man. Maybe that is even more bad. Even worse. Worse, because the bad man who thinks he is good thinks that he can do anything to anybody. But sometimes a man who is very good thinks, I am very bad, and it—destructs his life, everything. Because he does not believe that he has any right to do something, so he does less and less. This has happened with my father. He was always thinking, Je n’ai pas le droit’” (429).
♥️
- I love this quote because this is how I feel about myself and can understand why Neven’s father, Stoyan Lazarov, feels this way. I wonder why Neven spoke that last sentence in French.
- Je n’ai pas le droit = I do not have the right
- I also want to note that the way that Neven speaks is how I write. In simple English.
“Neven turned his head away. He reminded her of the way male lions look sad, as if their nobility is a terrible weight” (429).
Nobility = honor
“Their fingers lay entwined on the warm grass. She wondered if Bobby would disapprove; when she looked up, she saw him watching—listening hard, she knew, but tactful, ready at any minute to translate for her, or to rescue her” (431).
I thought this was so sweet! Bobby ready to help and protect his new friend, Alexandra.
* 9/15/21: Chapter 80, 17:59:28 (72 minutes)
I don’t want Bobby to die! No! :’(
* 9/16/21: Author’s Note, 18:36:23 (38 minutes)
& Chapter 83
“Then she understood that Stoycho was really gone, and why” (464).
I feel like this was right because Stoycho killed Stoyan’s devil, Momo. I understand why too, Alexandra.
“Neven nodded. ‘My parents can’t travel so far,’ he said softly. ‘They know that they cannot manage this. But I am thinking about it—I mean to say, I could go. If you would not mind to come with me’” (467).
OMG So sweet! So romantic! Alexandra and Neven going to Venice together! Agh! I thought it was so nice that Alexandra would offer a trip to Venice to fulfill Stoyan’s dying wish.
“‘Nothing in particular.’ The young man’s eyes gleam” (468).
I have to say that this narrator’s voice, Fred Berman, sounds like the actor who played Aladdin, the original cartoon Disney movie. Plus, he sounds handsome. A little twinge of Alan Palomo in his voice too. <3 *heart eyes*
I’ve heard his Bulgarian accent this whole time hoping to hear his regular voice and here it is! I love his Bulgarian accent and I could hear a hard American “r” in there when he spoke. <3
But regarding the quote, I thought that Fred, the narrator, sounded like Alan and a 90’s cartoon!! XD LOL!!
Audiobook Time-Code: 18:12:12
I was thinking of doing a comparison video with the Annie music video where Alan is being interrogated about Annie’s disappearance.
“She wore Bobby’s necklace of brass and carnelian over her blouse, worrying it with one hand from time to time; it would be years, and several repairs—and a whole future life of writing and motherhood and teaching—before she stopped wearing it every day” (472).
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