You know, I always think I should like Francesca Lia Block, that I do like her, and then I read her stuff and am reminded that, no, she's not particularly my cup of tea. She does a lot of interesting things with her narrative structure and the way she tells her story, but 1) I don't think her flights of structural fancy always help her tell her story better (which in my mind should be a requirement), 2) they often add an offputting distance between the reader and the characters, and 3) I don't t...

Weird. The writing though was so surreal, had me in a trance until the book got over and I was like "What the hell did I just read"

Personal Response:Wasteland by Francesca Lia Block was a confusing book. At first the novel seemed like it would be good because the story took place inside someone’s mind, which was interesting. One issue that became apparent was the fact that the characters were not defined at all. Also it was very difficult to determine who was the narrator and understand the gender of Marina’s brother, Lex. Another problem was that the novel switched between past and present tenses often, or so it seemed. Th...

Like most Francesca Lia Block books, I can see why people enjoy it and love it and want to get deep into it. And like most Francesca Lia Block books, this just goes straight over my head.It's beautiful, yes, and it approaches incest in such a delicate way it could almost be seen as not being incest. Everything between Marina and Lex is unsaid. The only time incest is mentioned is when one girl constantly taunts the mourning Marina by saying 'incest is best.'It's a very small book, my copy only 1...

Very short novel! This is another YA novel that deals with a heavy theme. In this case, incest between a sister and brother!Now that I've got your attention, I'll start by saying this is first time reading novel by the author. Apparently Block's works are supposed to be very lyrical, emotional and cool.I read it free on a site; if I'd paid for this short novella, I wouldn't have been satisfied or pleased. It was an ok book and the theme of incest was handled sensitively, but it was too quick and...

i was gonna say i should probably start reading the backs of books before i start reading them but all this said was "i'll be inside the one who holds you and then i won't be" im crying I WASNT EXPECTING THAT !!

[3rd Reading] Breaks my heart every time in the most beautiful way. [2nd reading] One of the most exquisitely painful stories I've had the pleasure of reading. The word that best describes Wasteland is: aching. The perils of forbidden love mingle with the more resonant pangs of a soulful bond stronger than love or lust...that is necessary. What becomes of an individual when someone else becomes "necessary"? Bronte attempts to answer that between Catherine and Heathcliff, Leroux between Christine...

To some people this writing style might be genius- to me it was just unnecessarily confusing with an author screaming "Look at me, I write differently!" The story itself was okay once i finally actually understood what was going on by page 100 (of 150). It would be much easier to read if you went through and actually wrote quotation marks where people were talking.

Marina's relationship with her brother Lex has always been different than that of normal siblings. Therefore, it’s not a shock to anyone when she takes his apparent suicide so hard. But there’s more to the story than anyone knows. At least, so she thinks.As Marina delves deeper into the mystery, struggling to understand what happened to her brother, hidden truths come to light. But none so large as those learned when she takes off to visit her father.This is a story of love: how it can raise you...

This was short, strange and beautiful.

For such a small book, this took me a while to finish. Shifting perspectives between three different points of view, the book reads like a dizzy, drunken dream. Images pop out and then vanish, scenes happen with minimal connection to what came before. As Marina grapples with the loss that is driving her mad, the story comes into focus.Like most of Block's writing, this is as much an exercise in style as it is in story. If you want a great story, this isn't really it. If you like stretching bound...

It took me quite a while to finish this book because, honestly, I never wanted to pick it up.The book is written in a beautiful and poetic manner, and for a lot of people, I'm sure that's what they enjoy about the book. But for me, it was like the author was trying way too hard to make every. little. thing sound poetic that she fell short on creating plot and character depth. I mean seriously, the only things I caught from the book were the poetic writing and a very vague sad story of incest. Se...

This is one of the most beautiful and hauntingly sad love stories I've ever read. I have read it over fifteen times and still, I get the urge to pick it up and read all over again every day. It tells the story of Lex and Marina, a brother and sister with a deep bond that is both beautiful and frightening. Early on the reader can see that the bond proves to be harder and harder for Lex to deal with. Marina's world is turned upside down when her brother commits suicide. The bulk of the story revol...

This book was so gorgeous that it broke my heart. "You were just a boy on a bed in a room, like a kaleidoscope is a tube full of bits of broken glass. But the way I saw you was pieces refracting the light, shifting into an infinite universe of flowers and rainbows and insects and planets, magical dividing cells, pictures no one else knew ... Your whole life you can be told something is wrong and so you believe it."-Wasteland

I can't begin to describe how much i adore this book. The language is so delicate and descriptive, i find it utterly absorbing. There's something really haunting in the combination of the controversial theme, (incest), and the way Francesca Lia Block writes. Which i find strangely childlike, yet so vivid and intricate. The sentances all weave into each other. Perfect. Parts of it just read like a song to me. The ending completely broke my heart too'You were just a boy on a bed in a room, like a

When I first picked up this book from the library I thought that it would be somewhat like a trashy love story between a brother and sister. But after reading it, it changed into something not quite like anything I've ever read. Beautifully written with poetry that grips you, I actually had to read this book twice. Its a short story with a lot of impact but switches between characters and half way through the story I realized that there were 3 characters actions I needed to account for, not just...

5 stars for writing / 3 stars for plotI've always had a fascination with incest as a forbidden love plot. I know that some people find it disturbing (disgusting, even). As far as I'm concerned, I'm fascinated because I think incest probably is the most forbidden form of relationship there is. And you know my love of all things forbidden ;)Wasteland meets most of the criteria for a good forbidden romance (what makes a forbidden romance a good forbidden romance in my opinion anyway).You can feel h...

"We keep burning in the brown smog pit. The girls swarm in their black moth dresses. Their scalps are shaved like concentration camp ladies. Rats click my head. Everything broken.".This is how Wasteland begins. This is why I love love Francesca so much. She uses words good. When I'm particularly down, I can pick up any of FLB's books and feel light again. Sometimes, that makes me feel icky and not so sure of my mental well being, seeing that her stories usually involve some sort of abuse, wheth...

Personal Response:I thought that this book was very weird and it was definitely a lot different than any of the other books I’ve read in the past. Some parts in the book were somewhat challenging to understand because it would switch from when the character was alive to when he was dead. I really liked how this book made me think about things that can happen in other peoples lives. Plot summary: Wasteland by Francesca Lia Block started out with the main character, Marina, as a young child rememb...

book review: Franceca Lia Block, Wasteland(2003) Genre: YAIs it the main pairing: YesIs it canon: YesIs it explicit: NoIs it endgame: Ahahaha no he’s dead from the get-go the book is about her processing her griefIs it shippable: Depends on your tolerance for angst — mine is high so yesY’all can safely ignore the publisher’s summary which makes it sounds like this is a book about her falling in love with some other guy, how he helps her “put the pieces back together” and “face the past that is