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« Previous Entries Monday, February 25th, 20082001: A Space Odyssey
Have you ever seen the movie 2001: A Space Odyssey and wondered what the heck was going on? The book by Arthur C. Clarke explains everything. I’m so relieved! I feel so enlightened that I now know what’s happening in the movie. I had to watch it immediately online through Netflix after finishing the book. I love the book, and I love the movie even more now. If you think I’m going to give away the book’s secrets, you’re mistaken. You’ll have to read it and see for yourself. I will say that it has a bit in common with one of my former favorite tv shows, Stargate SG-1. That was surprising, and the only hint I’ll give.
1968, 236 pp.
Rating: 
This was one of only two books I was able to read for Carl’s Sci-Fi Experience. I really wanted to read more, but unexpectedly getting quite a few ARCs from LibraryThing and other sources thwarted my sci-fi plans. I do hope to read more sci-fi this year, and I definitely hope Carl hosts another Experience next year.
Popularity: 23% [?]
Saturday, February 16th, 2008Life & Times of Michael K
The Life & Times of Michael K won the Booker Prize in 1983. Written by Nobel laureate J. M. Coetzee, it is set in South Africa during a civil war. Michael is a gardener in his earlier thirties who has a harelip. He was institutionalized by his mother when he was a child, but at the beginning of the book when she is old and very ill, she calls for him. She would like him to take her to the village where she grew up. Getting the proper paperwork for the train is practically impossible because of the war, so finally they give up on it and try to go there on their own.
Many things happen to Michael on the trip. He is captured and made to work for awhile, and then released. He finds what he thinks is the farm where his mother was raised and makes himself a home (if you can call it that) there. Struggling to survive and evade the government, in the midst of it all he still wants to be a gardener and plants a small pumpkin patch, which he guards and tends with fervor.
The book is told in three parts. Parts I and III describe the storyline from Michael’s perspective. Part II is told in first person by a doctor who tries to understand Michael when he is brought under his care. This was a thought-provoking book and I enjoyed it, though I could have done without some scenes at the end. I’ll definitely read more by Coetzee.
A quote:
I could live here forever, he thought, or till I die. Nothing would happen, every day would be the same as the day before, there would be nothing to say.
1983, 184 pp.
Rating: 
Popularity: 34% [?]
Thursday, January 17th, 2008The Cloud of Unknowing
The Cloud of Unknowing by Thomas H. Cook is a 2007 Publisher’s Weekly Best Mystery. Cook is a favorite author of mine, so I was looking forward to reading this book.
David and Diana are brother and sister whose father had schizophrenia. Diana’s son has recently drowned, and her behavior is becoming more and more erratic. She starts researching about strange ancient murders and starts suspecting her husband in their son’s death. David is worried that she is starting to develop schizophrenia as well. He even begins to wonder if he should put her away for her own good. Was Diana’s son murdered or was it an accident?
I was a little disappointed in this book. My two favorites of his are Breakheart Hill and the Edgar-winning The Chatham School Affair. If you’ve never read Cook before, I suggest you start with one of those two.
2006, 311 pp.
Rating: 
Popularity: 14% [?]
Sunday, December 30th, 2007Mrs. Dalloway/The Hours
Why not do a ‘twin’ review since I read them relatively close together? I had seen both of these movies before I read the books, and I recently re-watched The Hours because it was available for online viewing through Netflix. I’d like to watch Mrs. Dalloway again as well. The movie of the The Hours follows the book very closely-there are a few minor changes. Nicole Kidman does an outstanding job in this film. I was most interested in the Virginia Woolf storyline, so I was happy she was so well portrayed. It’s funny that Meryl Streep ended up playing Clarissa when she (Meryl Streep) is actually talked about in The Hours (the book). I don’t remember the movie Mrs. Dalloway much at all, hence the reason I wish to re-view it.
Well, on to the books. The Hours won the Pulitzer in 1999. It’s a cleverly told story that intersects the 3 women’s lives very well. However, it does change the story of Mrs. Dalloway into homos*xual relationships. It was interesting to see the twist in the storyline, particularly if you know the real one, but I couldn’t help thinking, “Doesn’t Clarissa (in The Hours) know that her life is too coincidental with the characters’ names from Mrs. Dalloway?” To me, it would have been a better story if Cunningham had left out all the references to the actual book itself. The reader knows that’s what it’s about, so why keep referring to it? It makes The Hours too unbelievable. It’s an interesting book, and I’m glad I read it, but I can’t help having mixed feelings about it.
Mrs. Dalloway. I must be too dense in the literary sense, because I just don’t get this book at all. I had to stop reading it every half hour because it was just too much otherwise. I felt a similar way this year when I read Inheritance of Loss. I just don’t enjoy a book when I have to read it that way. I don’t get into planning parties or the minute details of such. In fact, I avoid that like the plague. I’m not into social scenes, either. In this book, everyone loves Clarissa, but isn’t she the most shallow character in it? I don’t get it. I would like to re-read it again in a few years to see if I feel any differently. At least I feel more enlightened that I have finally read Woolf. I’d actually like to read more about her than by her.
For The Hours:
1998, 226 pp.
Rating: 3.5
Pulitzer, 1999
For Mrs. Dalloway:
1925, 194 pp.
Rating: 3
Popularity: 35% [?]
Saturday, November 3rd, 2007Veronika Decides to Die
This is my second book by Paulo Coelho, the first being The Alchemist, which I loved. I love Coelho’s writing, and I’ll definitely be reading even more of his works.
Someone in my family is going to shoot me for this (you know who you are), but I really loved this book. Very similar to The Alchemist, it’s about finding out who you are, what you want to do, and then doing it. Veronika is a 24 year-old Slovenian who has decided to commit suicide, but she fails and is sent to a mental institution. While there, along with her fellow “crazies,” she discovers that maybe she isn’t so crazy after all.
Look at me; I was beginning to enjoy the sun again, the mountains, even life’s problems, I was beginning to accept that the meaninglessness of life was no one’s fault but mine. I wanted to see the main square in Ljubljana again, to feel hatred and love, despair and tedium–all those simple, foolish things that make up everyday life, but that give pleasure to your existence. If one day I could get out of here, I would allow myself to be crazy. Everyone is indeed crazy, but the craziest are the ones who don’t know they’re crazy; they just keep repeating what others tell them to.
Apparently Coelho wrote this in part as a reflection upon his own experience in his youth when his parents sent him to a mental institution. All because he wanted to be an artist. Whoa. He does say that later they very much regretted what they had done, and I believe he wrote this book only after they had both died.
Caution: I could have done without the e*plicit *ex situation. I would have rated this a ‘5′ otherwise.
1998, 210 pp.
Rating: 4.5
Popularity: 19% [?]
Saturday, September 15th, 2007Bud, not Buddy
I listened to this Newbery winner by Christopher Paul Curtis with my son on the road trip to our new home. We both enjoyed it very much.
When we meet Bud Caldwell, he is living in an orphanage in Flint, Michigan. Soon, though, we find him “on the lam” and in search of his father whom he has never met. He always carries his few belongings in a suitcase, and in the suitcase are clues his dead mother left behind about his father. Set during the Great Depression, this book is excellent for its historical value for children. Recommended.
1999, 245 pp.
Newbery
Rating: 4
Popularity: 23% [?]
Saturday, September 15th, 2007O Pioneers!
I’ve wanted to read one of Cather’s books for a long time. I grew up on a farm in the plains of Colorado and I readily looked forward to her description of the plains and farm life in Nebraska. I was excited I could use this as an “O” title and a 1910’s title as well.
I was a little disappointed in the book, though. It started off very slowly for me, but by the second chapter I was enjoying it. It is the story of the Bergson family and their struggles to make their farm successful. Alexandra Bergson (the oldest daughter) does a very good job managing the farm and they succeed when other people are selling the land. She and her brothers have different ideas about the farm, though, and split the land equally thereafter. When Alexandra’s land flourishes, her brothers still think they have a say in it and in her personal life. Thankfully, she is a strong woman and stands up to them.
I really enjoyed the basic story and the description of the Nebraska plains. I just felt, though, that the story was a bit incomplete. In the middle of the book it skips over several years and I would have liked to have read about them. In addition, I thought the ending was a little weak. Not in what happens, but in the writing of the ending. It just left me a little unsatisfied. I guess I wanted the story to continue. Still, it deserves its classic status, and I look forward to reading more of Cather’s work.
1913, 176 pp.
Rating: 4
Popularity: 14% [?]
Monday, July 2nd, 2007Wild Swans by Jung Chang
Wild Swans:
Three Daughters of China
by Jung Chang
1992, 508 pp.
Rating: 4.5
1994 British Book of the Year
This is a long, fascinating book that I’m really glad I finished. I got this after reading Snow Flower and the Secret Fan, which I absolutely loved. I didn’t know it was non-fiction until it came in the mail. I saw that it was a banned book, so I used it for the Banned Book Challenge as well as the Chunkster Challenge.
The book tells the life stories of Jung and her mother and grandmother. Along the way I learned quite a bit about China under Mao as well. I love history when it is presented this way. I’ve always felt that history was more about how people’s lives were affected by their rulers than just names, dates, and events that occurred.
The book is told chronologically. The first story is about how Jung’s grandmother had no choice in being a concubine to a Chinese general. The “marriage” was arranged so that her grandmother’s father would have more privileges of his own. Jung’s mother was born from this union.
Next, we learn of her mother’s life growing up under Japanese occupation in Manchuria, and then after the Japanese surrender, the fight between the Kuomintang and the Communists for power in China. Jung’s parents become Communist officials who very much believe in the Communist ideals. Their “faith” is eventually shattered by Mao’s thirst for power and his “Cultural Revolution.”
Although her parents were still receiving their salaries from the government, they were also being detained or being made to go to denunciation meetings where they were yelled at and/or beaten. The Red Guard and the Rebels were encouraged to rise up against the old Communist officials and take control. Even young children were encouraged to beat up their teachers. School days consisted of reading Mao’s works, punishing anyone who was a “class enemy”, and tearing up the grass and flowers in the courtyards as they were too “decadent.”
As Jung grows up, she is at first enamored with Mao, but is eventually disillusioned with what has happened to her family and to herself. She is a bright young woman who is required several times to be “reeducated” by the peasants or factory workers. After Mao dies, eventually China changes for the better. She is able to go to the West and study, but she never permanently returns to China.
I highly recommend this book if you are interested in history in general or Chinese culture. It is also a “wake-up” call to us softies in the West. Books like these really make me appreciate American freedom!
- 1. Wendy - July 3, 2007
- I have this one on my wish list, Michelle. Thanks for another great review!!!
- 2. raidergirl3 - July 3, 2007
- I have this on my list for the nonfiction challenge, but it looks so huge! It sounds good though; thanks for the review.
- 3. Nyssaneala - July 3, 2007
- Wild Swans is a great book! You might also like The Sacred Willow by Duong van mai elliott. It’s about 4 generations of her vietnamese family, starting in the late nineteenth century, and continues up until the 1990’s. It is also non-fiction, but told in a narrative style, with a lot of it reading like a novel.
Popularity: 21% [?]
Wednesday, June 20th, 2007Jonathan Strange & Mr. Norrell
Jonathan Strange & Mr. Norrell
by Susanna Clarke
2004, 782 pp.
2005 Hugo Award
2005 World Fantasy Award
Rating: 4.5
I chose this book as one of my 5 Once Upon a Time Challenge books because I also had it on my TBR Challenge and my Chunkster Challenge list. Because the hardback is almost 800 pages, I think it qualifies for 3 challenges! I thought surely I would be able to complete the book if it were on *3* of my lists. When I started it, I honestly didn’t like it much at first. It took about 80 pages before I was “into it”, and then I was hooked. The next 700+ pages were very easy to read.
Jonathan Strange and Mr. Norrell are two English magicians who collaborate at first but then find they have very different philosophies of how magic should be viewed and performed. Mr. Norrell wants to be the foremost authority of magic and keep Strange under his tutelage. Jonathan Strange realizes he is just as good a magician as Norrell and is much more open to teaching anyone his art. This battle of wills frames the story, but there is also romance, a tiny bit of comedy, and history interwoven into the story as well. Napolean, Duke Wellington, and Lord Byron make small appearances as do a gentleman with thistle-down hair and a magician called The Raven King. I won’t tell much of the plot here because I wouldn’t want to spoil the story for those who haven’t read it yet! I will say that the ending hints that there might be more books to follow.
The book is written in the style of a Victorian novel. There is no bad language and not much, though a little, violence. The violence that is present reminded me a little of Edgar Allen Poe’s stories. I was worried about what the book would contain when I started it, but the content was mostly accepable to me. I’m a little more conservative than most readers, so this concerned me a little. The only objection I do have is that there are a few places in the book that are a bit condescending to the Church and religion. It wasn’t enough for me to downgrade the book’s rating, though, and I’m very glad I read it. It looks like there will be a movie in 2008, and I will really look forward to seeing that as well.
- 1. Rhinoa - June 23, 2007
- I have this on my challenge list for the Book Awards one that you are hosting and am very much looking forward to reading it.
Popularity: 16% [?]
Wednesday, February 28th, 2007Heart of Darkness - Joseph Conrad
I will be reading more of Joseph Conrad’s work. English was his third language after Polish and French, and his writing is superb.
Heart of Darkness tells a story about colonialism in the Congo, but it is so much more than that. It is more about men’s ‘hearts of darkness’ and what they become after they leave ‘civilization’. Marlow is a steamship captain in search of Kurtz, who is one of the best ivory traders The Company has. It is said that Kurtz has become ill and The Company does not want to lose him because of his high productivity in obtaining ivory. But just how does Kurtz maintain his high productivity?
Kurtz isn’t the only one to leave his morals behind when he leaves ‘civilization’. The actions of The Company Men leave moral questions as well. Is it only the ladies, as Marlowe states, who try to uphold society’s mores, or are they just deluded in thinking society, left to itself, has any morals?
It’s queer how out of touch with truth women are. They live in a world of their own, and there had never been anything like it, and never can be. It is too beautiful altogether, and if they were to set it up it would go to pieces before the first sunset.
This book is short but very complex. It is one that I’ll definitely read again at some point to try to understand it a bit better. I’m still trying to figure out “The horror! The horror!”
Some interesting passages:
I let him run on, this papier-mache Mephistopheles, and it seemed to me that if I tried I could poke my forefinger through him, and would find nothing inside but a little loose dirt, maybe.No, I don’t like work. I had rather laze about and think of all the fine things that can be done. I don’t like work — no man does — but I like what is in the work — the chance to find yourself. Your own reality — for yourself, not for others — what no other man can ever know. They can only see the mere show, and never can tell what it really means.
The mind of man is capable of anything – because everything is in it, all the past as well as all the future. What was there after all? Joy, fear, sorrow, devotion, valour, rage – who can tell? – but truth – truth stripped of its cloak of time. Let the fool gape and shudder – the man knows, and can look on without a wink.
I assure you to leave off reading was like tearing myself away from the shelter of an old and solid friendship.
The point was in his being a gifted creature, and that of all his gifts the one that stood out preeminently, that carried with it a sense of real presence, was his ability to talk, his words — the gift of expression, the bewildering, the illuminating, the most exalted and the most contemptible, the pulsating stream of light, or the deceitful flow from the heart of an impenetrable darkness.
When they are gone you must fall back upon your own innate strength, upon your own capacity for faithfulness. Of course you may be too much of a fool to go wrong — too dull even to know you are being assulted by the powers of darkness. I take it, no fool ever made a bargain for his soul with the devil; the fool is too much of a fool, or the devil too much of a devil — I don’t know which. Or you may be such a thunderingly exalted creature as to be altogether deaf and blind to anything but heavenly sights and sounds. Then the earth for you is only a standing place — and whether to be like this is your loss or your gain I won’t pretend to say. But most of us are neither one nor the other.
Whether he knew of his deficiency himself I can’t say. I think the knowledge came to him at last — only at the very last. But the wilderness had found him out early, and had taken on him a terrible vegeance for the fantastic invasion. I think it had whispered to him things about himself which he did not know, things of which he had no conception till he took counsel with this great solitude — and the whisper had proved irresistibly fascinating. It echoed loudly within him because he was hollow at the core….
But his soul was mad. Being alone in the wilderness, it had looked within itself, and, by heavens! I tell you, it had gone mad. I had — for my sins, I suppose — to go through the ordeal of looking into it myself. No eloquence could have been so withering to one’s belief in mankind as his final burst of sincerity. He struggled with himself, too. I saw it — I heard it. I saw the inconceivable mystery of a soul that knew no restraint, no faith, and no fear, yet struggling blindly with itself.
1902, 80 pp.
Rating: 5
Popularity: 26% [?]
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