I noticed this book in the '12 Days of Kindle' sale that Amazon were having for the 2018 winter hols and it made me think of a friend named Hannah who spends most of her work days in a rather mundane looking cupboard (yes, actually in a cupboard), and the title of this book instantly made me think of her. And so, with me being hooked on the title, and also suitably impressed by the cover art, i had a quick look at the reviews and they seemed rather positive as well - and at £1.49 one can't really go wrong. And so, with all four check boxes (cover, title, reviews and price) ticked, i went ahead and bought the book.

Of course, i had to go and tell Hannah about my fiendishly brilliant book purchase, while she was at work, sat in her cupboard. I know, i'm bad, but it put a smile and a giggle on Hannah's face.

So, you're probably wondering, when's he gonna get onto talking about the actual story and doing an actual review? Like, was it any good? Was it worth £1.49? Did it come up to the standard of the cover and the title? Was Hannah's existence, really, 'unfeasibly mundane'?

The answer to all the above, is yes. More than yes, actually.

It was brilliant, it was worth more than £1.49, it surpassed its cover and certainly matched its title, as while Hannah starts out with quite a feasibly mundane existence, of which she wasn't too impressed although she did enjoy some of it, it soon begins to spiral rapidly into complete unfeasibility of mundaneness when Hannah's parents split up and she goes to stay with her granddad for a couple of weeks and the devil himself turns up at granddad's house with an accident imp in tow because... well, you'll just have to read it and find out for yourself.

I know what you're thining. You're thinking it all sounds incredibly silly, 'the devil himself and an accident imp'? But it isn't at all silly, there's a real underlying serious side to this book. It's about the stories of our lives, who gets to write them, who we're in them with and who we write them with - which would be incredibly dull and tedious if you just wrote a philosophy PHD thesis on the topic. But Michael manages to make the points he wants to make while packaging it all up in an a story that is quite giggle-icious.

I would also add that i think it's very suitable for both adults (especially parents) and teens alike and, IMHO, speaks incredibly well to each about the other - something for us all to learn.

So yes, at the end of the tale, i can honestly say that it's a really wonderful book that i'm very glad to have discovered (thank you Hannah and your cupboard ), with a nice easy flowing style that just lets you fall inside the book and enjoy a story about the stories of our lives. ( )

2581

This is an odd book -- ostensibly the adventures of 11 year old Hannah Green, but definitely not aimed at the 11 year old age group. The omniscient narrator works really well. The incredibly horrifying casual violence and destruction of the devil is well, awful, and for all the talk about dark and light coexisting, there's not much to balance out the dark.

In some ways, I'd recommend it for snackulars (best demon name ever) and the squirrel of destiny alone, but I have to admit that's a thin hanger to carry it.

I guess I want it to make more sense -- for the violent episodes to serve some kind of purpose or meaning, for there to be an overarching reason why Hannah is experiencing this, for some kind of moral compass. And the fact that that is not present says something in itself -- that's life, right? But then you have an omniscient narrator talking about story and the structure of story and you have some fairy tale like structures going on and it just seems confusing and sort of pointless.

Advanced reader's copy provided by Edelweiss. ( )

Hannah Green is eleven years old and has recently learned the word ‘mundane’. She learns that it has two meanings: 1) of the earthly world; and 2) tedious, everyday, inconsequential. As the book opens, her life very definitely falls into the latter category. She is an only child whose life follows a comfortable set of patterns: trips with her parents downtown in Santa Cruz; visits to a favourite restaurant in Los Gatos; holidays to a lodge in Big Sur. These things have formed Hannah’s childhood with a reassuring sense of security. But then things start going wrong. Suddenly Hannah’s mum and dad don’t seem happy any more. Then her mum moves out to focus on a big work project in London. Then her dad announces that Hannah is going to stay for her granddad for a couple of weeks. And it’s at this point that things start to become very, very weird, and Hannah begins to realise that perhaps her new life is going to be best defined in the first sense of ‘mundane’. Because, quite frankly, when your granddad turns out to be working for the Devil, and you end up on a road trip with said prince of darkness, ‘tedious’ just doesn’t quite fit the bill...

For the full review, please see my blog:
https://theidlewoman.net/2020/02/14/hannah-green-and-her-unfeasibly-mundane-exis... ( )

https://tamaranth.blogspot.com/2019/12/2019125-hannah-green-and-her-unfeasibly.h... ( )