Book a Week 2015 - BW39: book news

[Stacia]

Marco Polo: From Venice to Xanadu

 

I read this quite a few years ago.... Not sure if it's close enough for your "X", but maybe...

 

ETA:

 

For another Russian backup, I'd also highly recommend a lovely book from Archipelago (Eliana & I both read it a year or two ago): A Dream in Polar Fog by Yuri Rytkheu. I loved it & I believe Eliana did too.

[Pam in CT]

Yes, I took you and E up on Polar Fog, and I loved it too...

[Kareni]

 

Kareni, you get a Check Plus if you can uncover a book set in Xanadu....

 

A young adult novel ~  Daughter of Xanadu by Dori Jones Yang

 

Steamy historical fiction ~ Jewel Of Xanadu  by Roxanne Carr

 

Non-fiction ~  In Xanadu by William Dalrymple

 

And, if you're just looking for the title and not a setting ~  Xanadu  by Jane Yolen

 

Regards,

Kareni

[Pam in CT]

You.are.awesome.

 

And, see, doesn't the Dalyrymple look intriguing?  Prime example of BAW broadening my world.

[Stacia]

Yes, I took you and E up on Polar Fog, and I loved it too...

 

Ah! Oops. I had forgotten that you had already read it too.

 

In Xanadu does look good. Thanks, Kareni! (Adding it to my list....)

[JennW in SoCal]

All this talk of Xanadu and no one has yet brought up Olivia Newton John?  Or am I once again showing my age...

 

[idnib]

That's cool & a neat idea. Was it something your library did? How did it go?

 

Yes, the library did it. It didn't work out for us though. By afternoon I realized I am following DS's path and getting sick. I dropped the kids off with a friend and rested for a couple of hours. I don't feel terrible, but didn't want to get anyone sick at the event. 

 

 

I forgot to mention that theoretically I do have an R -- Karamozov -- but I, er, think it might be good if I had a backup...

 

One of my all-time favorites is The Master and Margarita. It's an easier read than Karamazov. Although if you want to be technical it's really a "U" for U.S.S.R. or an "S" for Soviet Union.

[Kareni]

I've now completed the spell your name challenge by reading a book whose title starts with a K ~

 

K --Kissing Under the Mistletoe: A Sullivan Christmas by Bella Andre

A -- Angels Fall  by Nora Roberts

R --A Regency Christmas: Scarlet Ribbons\Christmas Promise\A Little Christmas by Lyn Stone, Carla Kelly, and Gail Ranstrom

E -- Entreat Me by Grace Draven

N -- Not My 1st Rodeo  by Donna Alward, Sarah M. Anderson, and Jenna Bayley-Burke

I --  I Want You to Want Me (A Rock Star Romance) by Erika Kelly

 

 

Bella Andre's Kissing Under the Mistletoe was actually a re-read for me, but I didn't realize that until I was past the Prologue and into the story proper.  Oops!  Nonetheless, I enjoyed reading the book once more.   The author's Sullivan series is quite popular; it's a series of books featuring the romances of eight siblings.  Throughout the series, the mother of those adult children is shown as a widow.  This book tells the story of her romance.

 

"For Mary Sullivan, Christmas is, and always has been, about family. This year is no different. As she awaits the arrival of her eight children and their partners at the cottage in Lake Tahoe, she hangs the ornaments that they have made for her over the years. Each decoration brings with it a tide of memories, all of which she holds dear to her heart. 

But when she comes across the oldest ornament, the one her beloved husband, Jack, gave her on their very first Christmas together, Mary is immediately swept back to the first days of their whirlwind romance, to the love that would be the foundation on which they built the family she is so proud to call her own."

 

 

I've posted this before; one of the Sullivan books is available free to Kindle readers ~  From This Moment On (The Sullivans Book 2) by Bella Andre

 

Another of the author's books is also free to Kindle readers.  Titles under her Lucy Kevin pseudonym are said to be sweet rather than steamy.

Be My Love (A Walker Island Romance Book 1) by Lucy Kevin/Bella Andre

 

Regards,

Kareni

[Robin M]

Under the weather, so spent the time lying about and reading Swann's Way. Finally finished. Now I can say I've read Proust. I think I've had my fill, my curiosity satisfied. And as the raven says. "Nevermore".

[mumto2]

:grouphug: To Robin qnd Idnib, I hope you both feel much better soon.

[Jane in NC]

All together now!  I need the collective good vibes of the BaWers to assist in mentally pushing Joaquin out to sea.  Princess Jane is just not in the mood for a hurricane at the moment.  Further, my world is already squishy--this before the possible five or six inches of rain we could get in the next couple of days. So join me in saying adieu to Joaquin before his outer bands reach these shores.  And let's hope that I don't have to evacuate.  Ugh...

[Onceuponatime]

All together now! I need the collective good vibes of the BaWers to assist in mentally pushing Joaquin out to sea. Princess Jane is just not in the mood for a hurricane at the moment. Further, my world is already squishy--this before the possible five or six inches of rain we could get in the next couple of days. So join me in saying adieu to Joaquin before his outer bands reach these shores. And let's hope that I don't have to evacuate. Ugh...

My daughter, who lives closer to the shore, called me to let me know my grandson wants a hurricane party at my house. I'm further inland and at a higher elevation, so we've had the pleasure of their company during hurricanes before. I suspect that my grandson isn't the only one who wants to go to grandma's. Around here, the biggest issue is falling trees. If a tree falls and doesn't land on a house, we are happy. Then a lucky neighbor will get free firewood.

 

I hope Joaquin is kind to you.

[Pam in CT]

Out of likes this early in the morning??!

 

robin and idnib, hope you're feeling better.

 

idnib, I read Master and Margarita last year -- greatly enjoyed it.

 

Jane, sending forceful mindwaves your way to push Joaquin back to sea.

 

 

 

I just came across this extremely short story by Andy Weir, author of The Martian.  It's a free read.

 

The Egg by Andy Weir

 

This is wonderful!  Thank you!

 

 

 

All this talk of Xanadu and no one has yet brought up Olivia Newton John?  Or am I once again showing my age...

 

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oWeJ9p42ufg

Oh.My.

 

Well, thanks for sharing.  (spitting coffee on the keyboard)

 

So, I am of a... similar vintage... and I vaguely recall the song.  Not among O N-J's stronger efforts, which is, uh, saying something.  

 

But that VIDEO??!  That.is.priceless.  Truly, I believe Mel Brooks may have conceived The Producers in response to this video...

[Chrysalis Academy]

All this talk of Xanadu and no one has yet brought up Olivia Newton John?  Or am I once again showing my age...

 

 

That was my first thought, too!  I grew up on ONJ.

[Pam in CT]

Books...

 

Carrying on my Guatemala reading, I finished From Silence to Memory: Revelations of the Archivo Historico de la Policia Nacional, which draws on a teeny tiny portion of a moldy storage shed worth of yellowing documents and records, which was discovered in 2005 by human rights activists.  The book (recently translated and published under open source copyright by University of Oregon) reads like an interim legal strategy -- it meticulously draws and documents specific linkages and documented cooperation between the police force and the military government in specific places and cases between 1975-85 as if in preparation for subsequent case-building.  A bit deeper into the judiciary grasses than I was really able to follow, but solid work.

 

Havana Dreams: Story of a Cuban Family, by Wendy Gimbel - a sort-of biography of Naty Revuelta, an upper class Havana society woman who had an affair with Fidel before the revolution and who languished unhappily for decades thereafter...  I'm not sure how this book found its way to my shelves, and if it didn't cover C for Cuba on my round-the-world challenge I'm not at all sure I would have pushed through to the finish line... the author is exasperatingly in the story, which added nothing and distracted much...

 

The Breadwinner, by Deborah Ellis (YA) - I read this with my 12 yo --  the first of a trilogy set in Kabul. The 11 year old protagonist's father is "disappeared" by the Taliban, leaving a household of women forbidden to leave their apartment on their own and no way of buying food, let alone earning the money with which to do so.  Parvana is the only family member young enough to pass for a boy, so she shoulders the job.  Nicely done and developmentally appropriate glimpse at some very difficult themes; I expect we'll go on to the others in the trilogy.

 

Tattoos on the Heart: The Power of Boundless Compassion, by Father Gregory Boyle.  A beautiful collection of stories -- they read like parables -- of his work with Latino gangs in Los Angeles.  Grim and Sisyphean work, but he's an open hearted, hard headed and surprisingly funny writer, so it goes down lightly... This is from the intro -- Rosie, it reminded me of you describing reading aloud to your mother:

 

 

God can get tiny, if we’re not careful… we all have an image of God that becomes the touchstone, the one controlling principle, to which we return when we stray…

 

… Years ago (my friend Bill) took a break from his own ministry to care for his father as he died of cancer… In the role reversal common to adult children who care for dying parents, Bill would put his father to bed and then read him to sleep, exactly as his father had done for him in childhood.  Bill would read from some novel, and his father would lie there, staring at his son, smiling. Bill was exhausted from the day’s care and work and would plead with his dad, “Look, here’s the idea. I read to you, you fall asleep.†Bill’s father would impishly apologize and dutifully close his eyes. But this wouldn’t last long.  Soon enough, Bill’s father would pop one eye open and smile at his son.  Bill would catch him and whine, “Now, come on.†The father would, again, oblige, until he couldn’t anymore, and the other eye would open to catch a glimpse at his son. This went on and on, and after his father’s death Bill knew that this evening ritual was really just a story of a father who couldn’t take his eyes off his kid. How much more so God? Anthony de Mello writes, ‘Behold the One beholding you, and smiling.’

 

 

 

[Jane in NC]

But that VIDEO??!  That.is.priceless.  Truly, I believe Mel Brooks may have conceived The Producers in response to this video...

 

Priceless or painful?  Oh my!

 

[Mom-ninja.]

Still reading Mr. Darcy Takes a Wife. I think I will set it aside to read a banned book. I've always wanted to read a Brave New World so this is a good time to do so since it's popular on this thread at the moment. 

 

Read it with my 14 yr old...yes? 

[Chrysalis Academy]

Still reading Mr. Darcy Takes a Wife. I think I will set it aside to read a banned book. I've always wanted to read a Brave New World so this is a good time to do so since it's popular on this thread at the moment. 

 

Read it with my 14 yr old...yes? 

 

I'd say yes, so long as you are reading it together. There is a lot of sex implied, but it's not explicit.  

[Stacia]

:lol:  at the ONJ video. I'd never seen it (but I didn't watch a lot of tv when I was growing up either). But I do remember the song -- I kind of associate it with roller skating rinks. I guess it was a popular song to play there?

 

Robin, :lol:  on your comments on Proust. Hmmm, I keep thinking I need to read him, but you're making me waver. Hope you feel better soon! :grouphug:

 

idnib, hope you feel better soon too! :grouphug:

 

Looking at your recent post, Pam, did you read Waiting for Snow in Havana by Carlos Eire? I think you might enjoy it. And, unrelated... but a HUGE bonus is that if you get the good version of the book, there is a gecko on it! :001_tt2:

 

 

Mom-ninja, I think you will be ok reading Brave New World along w/ your 14yo. Can't wait to get into some discussions on the thread!

 

And, I need to change my reading plans for the next two days. Book club which had been moved out has now been moved forward to an earlier date than the original, meaning I need to read Slaughterhouse-Five in the next two days.

 

Jane, sending you 'hurricane-go-away' vibes! Hang tight!  :grouphug:  And, Onceuponatime, sending 'no falling trees' vibes to you! :grouphug:

 

 

 

[Pam in CT]

:lol:  at the ONJ video. I'd never seen it (but I didn't watch a lot of tv when I was growing up either). But I do remember the song -- I kind of associate it with roller skating rinks. I guess it was a popular song to play there?

 

...

 

Looking at your recent post, Pam, did you read Waiting for Snow in Havana by Carlos Eire? I think you might enjoy it. And, unrelated... but a HUGE bonus is that if you get the good version of the book, there is a gecko on it! :001_tt2:

 

 

 

Yes, I did read this a few years ago, and enjoyed it very much... was hoping for something more along these lines.  I see Eire has a subsequent memoir that picks up where Snow left off, Learning to Die in Miami.  Hmmm.

[Robin M]

Banned book news:

 

http://www.theguardian.com/world/2015/sep/07/new-zealand-bans-into-the-river-teenage-novel-outcry-christian-group

[Guest]

Gaah!  Pam, I typed out a mile long list with annotations, but then got an error message when I tried to post it.

 

I will try to recreate the list, but don't think I'll be able to make as many notes right now. (sorry!)

 

 

 

Well, except two more quick requests.  It has recently come to my attention that I am failing even more miserably than usual in meeting my so-called annual goals, particularly Reading Around the World:  

 

Looking for fiction set in Australia, and

 

Looking for fiction or non-fiction on countries beginning with: E,F,J,R,V,W, X (???! what was I thinking?) and Y.

 

Australia:  

 

  Conversations at Curlew Creek (+ other Australian set Maloufs)

  And All the Stars by Andrea Host (I can lend you my Kindle copy, if you are ever interested)

 currently reading: True History of the Kelly Gang & Voss

 

E:

  Egypt: Beer in the Snooker Club

  Egypt: Before the Throne (the classic Mahfouz choice would be the Cairo Trilogy)

  England: Arcadia (play)

  England: The Expensive Halo (a mix of LM Alcott & Nancy Mitford)

  England: Green Grows the City

  England: Nightmare Abbey (hilarious, even more so if you either are up on your English Romantic folks - or look up the correspondences (I assume they're online somewhere)

  Estonia: Purge

  Estonia: Wandering Border

  

 

 

F:

 

  Faroe Islands: The Old Man and His Sons

  Fiji: Men From Under the Sky: The Arrival of Westerners in Fiji

  Finland: The Brothers

  France: Train in Winter

  France: Shadows of a Childhood

  France:  Silence of the Sea

  France: Travels of Daniel Ascher

 

J:

 

 Jamaica: Omeros

 Jamaica: It A Come (poetry)

 Japan: The Old Capital

 Japan: Tale of the Heike

 Japan: Pillow Book 

 

R:

 

 Romania: Demon in Brackets (poetry)

 Romania: Under a Red Sky

 Rwanada: Our Lady of the Nile

 Russia: A Country Doctor's Notebook

  

 

V:

 

  Vietnam: The Sorrow of War

 Vietnam: When Heaven and Earth Changed Places

 Vietnam: Spring Essence: The Poetry of Ho Xuan Huong

  Vietnam: Catfish and Mandala

 Vietnam: Sacred Willow

 on my TBR list:

  Venezuela: Dona Barbara

  Venezuela: Comandante: Hugo Chavez's Venezuela

  Vietnam: Tale of Kieu

  Vietnam: Last Night I Dreamed of Peace

 

W:

 

 Wales: The Corn is Green (play)

 Wales: How Green Was My Valley

 Wales: The Englishman Who Went up a Hill but Came Down a Mountain

 Wales: The Mabinogion (I have a couple of books my eldest appreciated reading along with this, let me know if you want the titles)

on my TBR lists:

 Wales:Ash on a Young Man's Sleeve

 Wales: Resistance

 Wales: Portrait of the Artist as a Young Dog

 

X:

 Xanadu:The Way to Xanadu

 Xhosa: To My Children's Children (she has a novel that I'm not sure I could take, but that looks equally interesting)

 

 

 

Y:

 

 Yemen: Intolerable: A Memoir of Extremes 

 Yoruba: Death and the King's Horseman

 Yoruba: Yoruba: Nine Centuries of African Art and Thought

 

 

...that will have to do. I tried to think of a range of things, and ones you might not have run into frequently already...

[idnib]

I've now completed the spell your name challenge by reading a book whose title starts with a K ~

 

:hurray:

 

Under the weather, so spent the time lying about and reading Swann's Way. Finally finished. Now I can say I've read Proust. I think I've had my fill, my curiosity satisfied. And as the raven says. "Nevermore".

 

Having never read Proust, I still have an unsatisfied curiosity. Maybe someday!

[Robin M]

Stacia, - here are a couple examples:

 

 

I would stop by the table, where the kitchen-maid had shelled them, to inspect the platoons of peas, drawn up in ranks and numbered, like little green marbles, ready for a game; but what fascinated me would be the asparagus, tinged with ultramarine and rosy pink which ran from their heads, finely stippled in mauve and azure, through a series of imperceptible changes to their white feet, still stained a little by the soil of their garden-bed: a rainbow-loveliness that was not of this world. I felt that these celestial hues indicated the presence of exquisite creatures who had been pleased to assume vegetable form, who, through the disguise which covered their firm and earliest dawn, these hinted rainbows, these blue evening shades, that precious quality which I should recognise again when, all night long after a dinner at which I had partaken of them, they played (lyrical and coarse in their jesting as the fairies in Shakespeare's Dream ) at transforming my humble chamber into a bower of aromatic perfume.

 

 

 

 

 

Only the day before he had asked my parents to send me to dine with him on this same Sunday evening. "Come and bear your aged friend company," he had said to me. "Like the nosegay which a traveller sends us from some land to which we shall never go again, come and let me breathe from the far country of your adolescence the scent of those flowers of spring among which I also used to wander, many years ago. Come with the primrose, with the canon's beard, with the gold-cup; come with the stone-crop, whereof are posies made, pledges of love, in the Balzacian flora, come with that flower of the Resurrection morning, the Easter daisy, come with the snowballs of the guelder-rose, which begin to embalm with their fragrance the alleys of your great-aunt's garden ere the last snows of Lent are melted from its soil. Come with the glorious silken raiment of the lily, apparel fit for Solomon, and with the many-coloured enamel of the pansies, but come, above all, with the spring breeze, still cooled by the last frosts of wirier, wafting apart, for the two butterflies' sake, that have waited outside all morning, the closed portals of the first Jerusalem rose."

 

 

 

I don't remember if you like wading through long run on sentences and stream of consciousness prose, and lots of narrative interspersed with little dialogue. It's amusing at times, drudgery at others.

[Kareni]

I re-read an old favorite and enjoyed it once again.

 

Stacia, if you're ever looking for a historical romance, you might enjoy this one.  I love (look that word slipped out, and as I've said before I don't tend to use it when discussing books!) the letters that are exchanged between the main characters.

 

My Dearest Enemy by Connie Brockway

 

"Breathtakingly romantic, startlingly original, Connie Brockway's novels have captured the hearts of readers and the raves of critics everywhere.  Now she brings you a unique and unforgettable love story that begins with a series of letters between a world-weary adventurer and the woman whose love brings him home.

Dear Mr.  Thorne,

        I give you fair warning.  I intend to do whatever I must to abide by your late uncle's will and win Mill House.  Though I know he never expected me to succeed, and for whatever reasons is using me to shame you, I accept his challenge.  For the next five years, I will profitably manage this estate.  I will deliver to you an allowance and I will prove that women are just as capable as men.  And at the end, I shall accept Mill House as my reward.

Sincerely,
Lillian Bede

My Dear Miss Bede,

        Forgive me if I fail to shudder.  Pray, do whatever you bloody well want, can, or must.  I shall look forward to making your acquaintance in my lawyer's office five years hence, when I take possession of Mill House.

Avery Thorne"

 

 

Here's a good review if you'd like more detail.

 

Regards,

Kareni

[Pam in CT]

Gaah!  Pam, I typed out a mile long list with annotations, but then got an error message when I tried to post it.

 

I will try to recreate the list, but don't think I'll be able to make as many notes right now. (sorry!)

 

 

 

 

Australia:  

 

  Conversations at Curlew Creek (+ other Australian set Maloufs)

  And All the Stars by Andrea Host (I can lend you my Kindle copy, if you are ever interested)

 currently reading: True History of the Kelly Gang & Voss

 

E:

  Egypt: Beer in the Snooker Club

  Egypt: Before the Throne (the classic Mahfouz choice would be the Cairo Trilogy)

  England: Arcadia (play)

  England: The Expensive Halo (a mix of LM Alcott & Nancy Mitford)

  England: Green Grows the City

  England: Nightmare Abbey (hilarious, even more so if you either are up on your English Romantic folks - or look up the correspondences (I assume they're online somewhere)

  Estonia: Purge

  Estonia: Wandering Border

  

 

 

F:

 

  Faroe Islands: The Old Man and His Sons

  Fiji: Men From Under the Sky: The Arrival of Westerners in Fiji

  Finland: The Brothers

  France: Train in Winter

  France: Shadows of a Childhood

  France:  Silence of the Sea

  France: Travels of Daniel Ascher

 

J:

 

 Jamaica: Omeros

 Jamaica: It A Come (poetry)

 Japan: The Old Capital

 Japan: Tale of the Heike

 Japan: Pillow Book 

 

R:

 

 Romania: Demon in Brackets (poetry)

 Romania: Under a Red Sky

 Rwanada: Our Lady of the Nile

 Russia: A Country Doctor's Notebook

  

 

V:

 

  Vietnam: The Sorrow of War

 Vietnam: When Heaven and Earth Changed Places

 Vietnam: Spring Essence: The Poetry of Ho Xuan Huong

  Vietnam: Catfish and Mandala

 Vietnam: Sacred Willow

 on my TBR list:

  Venezuela: Dona Barbara

  Venezuela: Comandante: Hugo Chavez's Venezuela

  Vietnam: Tale of Kieu

  Vietnam: Last Night I Dreamed of Peace

 

W:

 

 Wales: The Corn is Green (play)

 Wales: How Green Was My Valley

 Wales: The Englishman Who Went up a Hill but Came Down a Mountain

 Wales: The Mabinogion (I have a couple of books my eldest appreciated reading along with this, let me know if you want the titles)

on my TBR lists:

 Wales:Ash on a Young Man's Sleeve

 Wales: Resistance

 Wales: Portrait of the Artist as a Young Dog

 

X:

 Xanadu:The Way to Xanadu

 Xhosa: To My Children's Children (she has a novel that I'm not sure I could take, but that looks equally interesting)

 

 

 

Y:

 

 Yemen: Intolerable: A Memoir of Extremes 

 Yoruba: Death and the King's Horseman

 Yoruba: Yoruba: Nine Centuries of African Art and Thought

 

 

...that will have to do. I tried to think of a range of things, and ones you might not have run into frequently already...

 

:svengo: That will do very nicely, thank you... I'll be looking up links for a while, now!

[Stacia]

Btw, happy October 1 from my house to yours!

 

 

I love this season. And, Robin, I'm wearing my Poe/Lovecraft Vampire Eradication t-shirt today! Lol.

 

 

Stacia, if you're ever looking for a historical romance, you might enjoy this one.  I love (look that word slipped out, and as I've said before I don't tend to use it when discussing books!) the letters that are exchanged between the main characters.

 

My Dearest Enemy by Connie Brockway

 

That looks really fun. Thanks for the rec! Will be looking this one up....

 

Stacia, - here are a couple examples:
 

<snip>

I don't remember if you like wading through long run on sentences and stream of consciousness prose, and lots of narrative interspersed with little dialogue. It's amusing at times, drudgery at others.

 

It depends. I'm not a fan of Dickens (writer of long run on sentences & too much description imo), but am sometimes fine with others who write lengthy sentences. (I even have a book, Zone, on my shelves that is one long sentence. I haven't tackled it yet, but plan to.) Generally, I enjoy stream of consciousness writing. Otoh, I love Hemingway's brevity. I think it depends on the writer, the book, the moment in time when I'm reading,....

 

Gaah!  Pam, I typed out a mile long list with annotations, but then got an error message when I tried to post it.

 

I will try to recreate the list, but don't think I'll be able to make as many notes right now. (sorry!)

 

Fabulous list, Eliana. Thanks! Even though I'm not Pam, I'll be stealing plenty of ideas from it.

 

Banned book news:

http://www.theguardian.com/world/2015/sep/07/new-zealand-bans-into-the-river-teenage-novel-outcry-christian-group

 

:sad:  First & only book banned in 20 years!!! Looked it up, my libraries don't have it, used copies on amazon are pricey (maybe since it's a NZ book, it hasn't really been released in the US), but the kindle version is just $12.83. May have to try this one myself.

 

Often, ironically, I think banning books increases book sales.

 

ETA: The article says owning the book (I guess in NZ) is not illegal, but you can only use the copy for yourself. You cannot lend it to friends. In the meantime, it is now being pulled from libraries, bookstores, etc.... Lots of legal ramifications, esp. about the part of personal copies being shared.

 

Yes, I did read this a few years ago, and enjoyed it very much... was hoping for something more along these lines.  I see Eire has a subsequent memoir that picks up where Snow left off, Learning to Die in Miami.  Hmmm.

 

I've been meaning to try the follow-up. Let me know if you read it & what your thoughts are.

 

I've now completed the spell your name challenge by reading a book whose title starts with a K ~

 

That's cool. Congrats! I completely dropped the ball on that challenge, lol! But, if I look back through titles I've read, I can cobble together my name (if I discount 'the' in the titles) from this year's reading...

 

S: The Story of My Teeth

T: The Travels of Marco Polo

A: Akata Witch

C: Cat Out of Hell

I: In the Footsteps of Marco Polo

A: The Affinity Bridge

 

Sat down to a late lunch & am now about a third of the way through Slaughterhouse-Five. I just so love this book. If I could have only five books, this one most-assuredly would have a secure spot on my shelf.

[Violet Crown]

I haven't been posting because I haven't been reading. Because dh is out of town for a week and I'm an exhausted lonely mess by evening, capable only of binge-watching awful brain-deadening things on Netflix until I fall asleep in the empty bed.

 

So instead of a book excerpt, an excerpt from the comic book-inspired cliché-fest Gotham. Here the recently orphaned Bruce Wayne is being taken back to school by his butler, Alfred, who seems to be James Bond and cusses a lot:

 

-Come now, Master Bruce. Had to happen sooner or later.

-Is this really necessary? Homeschooling is just as effective. I can show you the data.

-You need to be around children your own age.

-Why?

-Because you do.

-You know I despise that sort of answer.

-Don't you want to be like a normal kid?

-I'm not sure. Define "normal" and make a good case for it.

-You're going to bloody school.

[Guest]

 

All the Shah's Men - 4 Stars - My dad has been telling me stories of the 1953 coup in Iran for years. At the time, he was in his early 20s and a student in Tehran University.

 

 

Thank you for the review (and overview!)  This has been on my TBR list, but I wasn't sure how it got there or if it should stay... and now I am eager to read it!

 

 

 

 

Robin--From the banned/challenged in Oregon list, I noted that Shirley Jackson's story The Lottery has been challenged.  This was required reading in my 9th or 10th grade English class.  I truly understand why one may not care for the story.  But banning it?

 

 

It is a powerful, and very disturbing story...and I can see that someone might feel that his/her child isn't ready for it in 9th or 10th grade (two of mine fell into that category), but trying to get it banned bewilders me.

 

I do wish these lists were more clear about what type of 'banning' is being discussed.  I think there is an enormous difference between trying to remove something from a public library and trying to alter which books are on a school's reading list.  (with questions about what belongs in a middle school library falling in between).  

 

If I were involved with a school, I can very much see myself having strong opinions on the reading list (entirely separate from what I think my children are ready to read).  I would object strongly if a school my kids were in was switching from a classics-based to reading list to a popular YA novels reading list... but I think it would be unfair to categorize such a protest as 'banning'.  

 

 

 

 

I just put Slaughterhouse-Five on hold too.  My book group is reading A Handful of Dust by Evelyn Waugh next.  Somebody say something good about it? I'm not that excited, the only EW I've read is Vile Bodies which I thoroughly disliked.

 

 

A Handful of Dust is one of Waugh's earlier satirical works that includes Scoop (something I enjoyed) as well as Vile Bodies (which you did not). I have not read your book club selection but have a feeling that this may not be your cuppa. Perhaps Eliana will offer some hope.

 

It has been at least a decade (possibly two) since I read Handful of Dust, but I do remember it as one of his (often darkly) comical/satirical novels.  I know I had to be in the right mood to love some of them, but my appreciation of humor is fairly narrow (I don't love Pratchett, frex).  There's a sharp edge to some of his satire that can be delightful or uncomfortable, depending on my mood.  (Scoop is a little later (I think?) and I don't remember having the same issues with it, nor with Put Out More Flags).  I think Handful of Dust falls a little closer to Scoop than Vile Bodies in its tone... now I want to pull it out and revisit it.

 

Do you like Mitford's earlier works?  They have a similar tone (and a similar tendency to poke fun at thinly veiled caricatures of friends and acquaintances.

 

 

 

I loved Piers Anthony as a kid.  I read his books until the covers fell off.  I recently reread one as an adult and I remember still seeing the charm in it but I noticed other things that I didn't as a kid.  Report back on what you think. 

 

 

 

Will do. Back in the late 70's and 80's I went through a sci fi/fantasy craze and read quite a few of his books.   Think I quit the Xanth series around #10 or so. I just looked and he's up to 39.  Amazing.  Just noticed there are 3 more books in the incarnations of immortality I haven't read.  The man's a prolific writer.  I must have quit reading his stuff around the end of the 80's.  I reread On a Pale Horse last year and thoroughly enjoyed it.  Maybe I'll pull out the first book in xanth and see what my kiddo thinks of it.    :laugh:

 

I read reams of Anthony in early high school, but wince now when I've tried to revisit it.  ..and Xanth I wanted to throw across the room.  The voyeurism, the groping, the objectification, the rape-iness...  Perhaps I was in an oversensitive space when I tried to pick up a few of them, but I felt ill after trying.  (I winced a lot with the other Anthony's I tried, but didn't have the visceral disgust and shock I felt with Xanth... ymmv.)

 

[Guest]

:svengo: That will do very nicely, thank you... I'll be looking up links for a while, now!

 

Sorry about the lost annotations.

 

 

I mused a bit about my rule breaking when doing country challenges.  ...which is how Xhosa and Yoruba ended up on this list.  (and how are England, Wales, and Scotland categorized?  technically aren't they all parts of the United Kingdom?)

 

I have especially strong feelings when it comes to Africa - where the country divisions were almost all imposed from the outside and don't reflect the groupings that have existed since long before then....

 

I found similar feelings in myself around Native literatures - and counted Mapuche, Inuit, and Chukota as their own categories.  Ymmv.  :)

 

The Rwandan title is (another) amazing Archipelago Press book (recommended here by Jane  - thank you again, Jane!).

 

The Estonian novel Purge deserves a caveat empor: It deals with some intense, horrific things while being very immersive and compulsively readable.  This is the book I had to hide from myself while I was deciding if I could handle continuing.  (This one is also Jane's "fault".  She mentioned it here and linked a review.  I read the review and decided I shouldn't read it... but then I read the excerpt at the end of the review and went to the library to get the book.  Jane read it shortly thereafter and, as I recall, also found it harrowing, but felt, as I did, that it was important to have read it.  ymmv, and enter with care.)

 

Andrea Host is an Australian YA SFF author.  I've burbled about here before, but wanted to mention again: Host's stories feel very YA, even J at times, but I find them refreshing... they engage with challenges without ever losing an optimism and faith in the goodness of humanity that resonates strongly for me.  This one is the only one that fairly counts as 'set' in Australia (though Stray starts there). It is also the first one I read and, I think, my favorite.  

 

If you have questions about any of the titles, let me know.  I own most of them and tried to indicate the ones that are TBRs rather than already reads, but I probably missed one or more...  

 

As I said in the vanished post: now I need to step slowly away from the keyboard and stop indulging myself... 

[Stacia]

So, I did just go ahead & buy the banned NZ book (in kindle form). Looked & (of course?) there is not the option to lend it to others....

 

Hope it doesn't mysteriously disappear like the amazon/Nineteen Eighty-Four Big Brother brouhaha a few years ago.

[Violet Crown]

and how are England, Wales, and Scotland categorized? technically aren't they all parts of the United Kingdom?)

 

Wales and Scotland, as the Welsh and Scots will zealously inform you, are countries which, with England and Northern Ireland, make up the sovereign state of the United Kingdom.

[Guest]

Wales and Scotland, as the Welsh and Scots will zealously inform you, are countries which, with England and Northern Ireland, make up the sovereign state of the United Kingdom.

 

That's how I always thought of it, but when I was doing my first country challenge, I saw that none of the three (Wales, Scotland, or England) appear on the countries of the world lists (here's one and here's a longer one which includes the "West Bank".)

 

So I was wondering how those list would categorize Wales, for example, and how that would compare to the Basque region or the Xhosa people or other groupings which are identifiable, but don't have UN status or some other official 'country-ness' marker.  (or Quebec.... which makes me think of the former Yugoslavia... when does country-ness get retroactively removed?  ...or the USSR... )

[Maela]

I just finished book #21 - We Were Liars by E. Lockhart.  I didn't think much of it at the beginning but started liking it more and more the further in I got.  

 

 

Still working on La Casa de los Espíritus!  Someday I'll actually finish it...

[Mom-ninja.]

I haven't been posting because I haven't been reading. Because dh is out of town for a week and I'm an exhausted lonely mess by evening, capable only of binge-watching awful brain-deadening things on Netflix until I fall asleep in the empty bed.

 

 

 

I do that too when dh is out of town. I usually have Ben & Jerry's in my grasp as well. Or potato chips. 

 

 

 

 

Stacia, my kids decorated the house today too. I also allowed them to finally open the bag of candy corn. It's been teasing them in the pantry. I love that candle in the pic. 

[Chrysalis Academy]

I haven't been posting because I haven't been reading. Because dh is out of town for a week and I'm an exhausted lonely mess by evening, capable only of binge-watching awful brain-deadening things on Netflix until I fall asleep in the empty bed.

 

 

 

Aww, now I want to come over and give you a hug!

[Jane in NC]

I haven't been posting because I haven't been reading. Because dh is out of town for a week and I'm an exhausted lonely mess by evening, capable only of binge-watching awful brain-deadening things on Netflix until I fall asleep in the empty bed.

 

 

Had I only known!  My husband returns later this evening--just a one-nighter out of town. We could have kept each other company via phone or Skype last night.

 

I was thinking about you today, VC. As you may be aware, I am addicted to BBC Radio dramas. Looking over the lists today, I saw author Catherine Czerkawska.  Instant draw for me.  Turns out she is Scottish!  The dramatization of her novel The Curiosity Cabinet is currently available on BBC Radio 4 Ex.  And of course my library has none of her stuff. 

 

Good news, people.  We'll keep watching Joaquin but it appears that we might spared in the Carolinas. 

[Butter]

I finished Maze Runner.  I liked it.  I liked it a lot more than I liked the movie and I liked the movie, too.  It's pretty simple even for a YA book.  The excessive use of fake curse words got annoying.  Some of them rhymed and one was explicitly explained as to what it meant.  It got stupid more than annoying, honestly.

[Robin M]

I read reams of Anthony in early high school, but wince now when I've tried to revisit it. ..and Xanth I wanted to throw across the room. The voyeurism, the groping, the objectification, the rape-iness... Perhaps I was in an oversensitive space when I tried to pick up a few of them, but I felt ill after trying. (I winced a lot with the other Anthony's I tried, but didn't have the visceral disgust and shock I felt with Xanth... ymmv.)

 

Scratching my head, wondering if we are talking about the same books. I'm having a brain fart because all I remember is that it was a silly, but weird off beat series. So I did a bit of Internet browsing and found this

 

http://www.avclub.com/article/revisiting-the-sad-misogynistic-fantasy-of-xanth-104382

 

Understand now. That's what comes from reading so many books. Some are best forgotten. Maybe that is why I stopped reading after a while. And here I thought it was that I got bored with the series.

[idnib]

I haven't been posting because I haven't been reading. Because dh is out of town for a week and I'm an exhausted lonely mess by evening, capable only of binge-watching awful brain-deadening things on Netflix until I fall asleep in the empty bed.

 

Awww. When will your DH be back?

[Kareni]

Some Kindle bargains ~

 

FREE:  The Light Princess (Illustrated) by George MacDonald

 

 

 

NOT FREE, but priced at $1.99:

 

The Hero and the Crown by Robin McKinley

 

Sunshine by Robin McKinley

 

The Outlaws of Sherwood by Robin McKinley

 

Rose Daughter by Robin McKinley

 

Regards,

Kareni

[Robin M]

I haven't been posting because I haven't been reading. Because dh is out of town for a week and I'm an exhausted lonely mess by evening, capable only of binge-watching awful brain-deadening things on Netflix until I fall asleep

 

Totally understand. I can't sleep when hubby is gone and usually end up,watching TV or reading until almost dawn. Then I'm a Grouchy, sleepy mama for the day.

[Pam in CT]

Sorry about the lost annotations.

 

 

I mused a bit about my rule breaking when doing country challenges.  ...which is how Xhosa and Yoruba ended up on this list.  (and how are England, Wales, and Scotland categorized?  technically aren't they all parts of the United Kingdom?)

 

I have especially strong feelings when it comes to Africa - where the country divisions were almost all imposed from the outside and don't reflect the groupings that have existed since long before then....

 

I found similar feelings in myself around Native literatures - and counted Mapuche, Inuit, and Chukota as their own categories.  Ymmv.   :)

 

_________

 

 

The Rwandan title is (another) amazing Archipelago Press book (recommended here by Jane  - thank you again, Jane!).

 

The Estonian novel Purge deserves a caveat empor: It deals with some intense, horrific things while being very immersive and compulsively readable.  This is the book I had to hide from myself while I was deciding if I could handle continuing.  (This one is also Jane's "fault".  She mentioned it here and linked a review.  I read the review and decided I shouldn't read it... but then I read the excerpt at the end of the review and went to the library to get the book.  Jane read it shortly thereafter and, as I recall, also found it harrowing, but felt, as I did, that it was important to have read it.  ymmv, and enter with care.)

 

Andrea Host is an Australian YA SFF author.  I've burbled about here before, but wanted to mention again: Host's stories feel very YA, even J at times, but I find them refreshing... they engage with challenges without ever losing an optimism and faith in the goodness of humanity that resonates strongly for me.  This one is the only one that fairly counts as 'set' in Australia (though Stray starts there). It is also the first one I read and, I think, my favorite.  

 

If you have questions about any of the titles, let me know.  I own most of them and tried to indicate the ones that are TBRs rather than already reads, but I probably missed one or more...  

 

As I said in the vanished post: now I need to step slowly away from the keyboard and stop indulging myself... 

 

Interesting idea, that some of the "country" delineations are more autonomously based vs. colonially imposed... of course to try an A-Z round the world is so artificial in the first place... so many M's, so few Y's... yet I'm enjoying the prod to go to places like Yemen, that I might not otherwise get around to exploring.  Perhaps another year I might try indigenous groups A-Z and see where that might lead (I expect a great deal more choice in the Q's, for example...)

 

I'm still working my way through your list, but if I cant get to the Karamazov finish line, Our Lady of the Nile may be the one.  I've never read anything set in Rwanda.  Jane, what did you think of it?

 

And Purge, I already sent to the Kindle.  The Baltics are calling me, these days.  Although now you're scaring me a bit...

 

Re: Andrea Host - at some point during the summer when I was trying to read off the things piled onto my Kindle, I came across Stray.  I assumed one of my kids had put it on -- we all share an account and I give them "budgets before trips so they can load whatever they want -- but they all denied it.  I read it anyway, staying up late into the night, and the next morning got the other two in the series and read them straight through as well... upon returning, I relayed this and Kareni sleuthed you down as Reader Zero!  :laugh:

[Jane in NC]

I'm still working my way through your list, but if I cant get to the Karamazov finish line, Our Lady of the Nile may be the one.  I've never read anything set in Rwanda.  Jane, what did you think of it?

 

And Purge, I already sent to the Kindle.  The Baltics are calling me, these days.  Although now you're scaring me a bit...

 

I searched my old posts for comments on the above.

 

For Our Lady of the Nile, the quote that I thought summed up the book is "It's not lies, it's politics."  This is probably your speed, Pam. It is a look at Rwanda a decade and a half before the genocide when a group of school girls anticipate the forthcoming racial tensions. The author won a major French literary prize for the novel.

 

There is something about Purge that continues to haunt me.  Last year I wrote:

 

 

Surviving in a Dystopia is a popular theme in the modern novel. Sofi Oksanen's Purge is the story of women of different generations who are attempting to survive the 20th century brutalities of war and political violence as well as the cruelty perpetrated upon women. This is a very disturbing and difficult book to read, one that I cannot recommend to all, but one that reminds us (since apparently we as humanity need to be repeatedly reminded) that human beings deserve dignity. Apparently the novel grew from a play of the same title. I cannot imagine... (And when I use the term Dystopian, I do not mean an invented vision but the very real one that occurred in modern day Estonia.)

Unfortunately books like Purge continue to be necessary. It is heartbreaking...

[Chrysalis Academy]

 

 

 

It has been at least a decade (possibly two) since I read Handful of Dust, but I do remember it as one of his (often darkly) comical/satirical novels.  I know I had to be in the right mood to love some of them, but my appreciation of humor is fairly narrow (I don't love Pratchett, frex).  There's a sharp edge to some of his satire that can be delightful or uncomfortable, depending on my mood.  (Scoop is a little later (I think?) and I don't remember having the same issues with it, nor with Put Out More Flags).  I think Handful of Dust falls a little closer to Scoop than Vile Bodies in its tone... now I want to pull it out and revisit it.

 

 

 

 

 

My  copy of Handful of Dust arrived and I started it.  It actually seems pretty funny, satirical, and interesting so far, I think I'm going to give it a go.  I don't even remember what I disliked so much about Vile Bodies - I think I just found all the characters totally morally reprehensible and unsympathetic, but I don't even really remember the story.  But this one has been quite cleverly satirical so far, so we'll see how it goes.

 

And, the Chameleon book and the Teeth book both came in today, too!  Which do I read first??? What a dilemma!!!

[Stacia]

And, the Chameleon book and the Teeth book both came in today, too!  Which do I read first??? What a dilemma!!!

 

What a wonderful dilemma to have! (Imo.)

 

<rubs hands gleefully>

 

[idnib]

I swore I wasn't going to re-start House of Leaves until DH came back from his trip but I figured I've read the first part before and I could get that done at least. It's even better than I remember.

[Stacia]

Banned book news:

 

http://www.theguardian.com/world/2015/sep/07/new-zealand-bans-into-the-river-teenage-novel-outcry-christian-group

 

 Can you pick the quotes from Ted Dawe's banned novel Into the River?

 

The article posts sets of two quotes, one from Dawe's book & (a similar) one from a different/famous book still available in NZ (things like Lord of the Flies, The Catcher in the Rye, Forever, The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night-time, etc...).

 

I don't really like taking quotes out of context of books, but the article is an interesting exercise, I think.

[Kareni]

Yet another CURRENTLY free Kindle book.  I've read other books by this author and enjoyed them.

 

David: Lord of Honor (The Lonely Lords Book 9) by Grace Burrowes (this is a historical romance)

 

***

 

plus an Edgar award winning mystery ~

 

The Junkyard Dog (Jimmy Flannery Mysteries Book 1) by Robert Campbell

 

 

Regards,

Kareni

[Guest]

How does that even happen??? I do not understand. This does not compute for me.  :confused:  :tongue_smilie:  If you're reading something that makes you go :eek: , how do you fall asleep during that?!

 

(In reality, I'm a terrible sleeper & wish I could fall asleep easily or while reading or something....)

 

**************

 

 

I guess I can say I stretched myself a few weeks ago when I delved into those romance books I had on my kindle. Lol. (Btw, I looked through various additional books I had on there, skimmed some, etc.... I've decided that what probably makes a contemporary romance work for me is a couple that is equal intellectually/professionally & that the relationship occurs under an umbrella of mutual fun/attraction with neither having other commitments or relationships going on with someone else. What I did *not* like in some of the ones I skimmed were unequal couples [rich boy/poor girl/etc], relationships undertaken for revenge or for personal gain at the cost of another, people who get drunk/trashed often in the story, etc.... So, I think I have narrowed the window of what I enjoy within the 'contemporary romance' category. Probably summed up as mutual fun/attraction/love between equals.)

 

I can fall asleep while reading, if I'm exhausted enough, but I don't necessarily *stay* asleep, or sleep well.  ...so you aren't missing out on much!

 

********************************

 

I've been thinking more about romance as a genre and trying to figure out why I tend not to enjoy it when I so often love romance as an element in the stories I read.  it isn't the R rated-ness, I've tossed aside a number of very G rated romances and enjoyed a few where I had to skip a lot... 

 

I think it is that I have a low tolerance for the plot devices that stretch out the time between meeting/attraction/connection and resolution.  When there are other things happening, things that feel as if they have a purpose beyond the contrived, and there are other interesting characters and/or an intriguing setting, I settle down and enjoy it... but the contrived misunderstandings, etc just annoy me.  (Which is probably unfair, because I often tolerate equally contrived other plot devices, if the story/character/tone appeals.)

 

 

 

 

I finished D.E. Stevenson's Miss Buncle Married (1936) and found it to be not as good as the preceding Miss Buncle's Book (1934), but that is often the case with sequels.  My Flufferton Abbey friends will greatly enjoy Miss Buncle's Book.

 

 

I felt they decreased in quality as the series proceeded.  Miss Buncle's Book was delightful, Miss Buncle Married was enjoyable, and I ended up setting The Two Miss Abbots aside and never coming back to it.  (There's the Four Graces which is billed in the reissues as the 4th Miss Buncle book, and has a few overlapping characters, but didn't seem to me to really be a continuation... in any case, I glanced at it a bit and never started it.)

 

 

 

I enjoyed your comments on In the Footsteps of Marco Polo. I do think these guys did link into Marco Polo, but I think the effect of thinking they didn't (or that it was weak) was a result of the choppy text. What a grand adventure, what amazing photos, really what a feat they did.

 

I will look up the Saramago one. I read his book All the Names quite a few years ago & really enjoyed it. I've been meaning to visit some more of his work at some point.

 

They mentioned MP a lot, and some of those mentions were interesting, but I felt they kept overstating their case - the names on the doors, frex, was fascinating, but it doesn't show MP actually was there... but, yes, the choppiness didn't help.  ...and I still loved the book! 

 

re: The Saramago: It is a tiny book - more a short story than even a novella, and I don't know how well it represents his work... but I've had him on my 'ought to read' list for a very long time and haven't been sure I wanted to really, but I found this delightful and intriguing and want to see what he does with a larger canvas. I think the the only one I own is a nonfiction book about Portugal, so it might have to wait.

 

 

Hmm, I'm inspired by Eliana's post to read some more Saramago.  My BIL turned me on to Blindness a few years ago, and I thought it was brilliant.  I see there is a followup to it, called Seeing.  I'm thinking that The Gospel According to Jesus Christ is something I will enjoy.  Death with Interruptions and The Stone Raft look interesting too.

 

Blindness and History of the Siege of Lisbon are the two on my tentative list.... I was leaning more toward the latter because apocalyptic type novels often make me stressed (and blindness scares me much more than zombies ever could.), but Blindness seems the more compelling story, from the little I've seen.