Reading with Style discussion
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SP 18 Completed Tasks
10.5 Green StoneWith Dance Shoes in Siberian Snows by Sandra Kalniete
128 ratings
+10 Task
+10 Not A Novel (non-fiction)
Task Total: 20
Season Total: 155
20.4 Night WatchBrain on Fire: My Month of Madness by Susannah Cahalan
Review: Cahalan relates her story, put back together piecemeal of her descent into severe mental impairment. As a journalist, she has the skill set to make her narrative very readable and told all from the first person though she was not able to remember her experiences of that time. After increasingly erratic behaviour Cahalan was hospitalized twice and got sicker and sicker until a doctor who had made a recent discovery was able to identify her illness and provide treatment. Her illness, known as NDMA- receptor auto immune encephalitis is both rare and frightening. It essentially shuts down brain function and total cure is uncertain. Much like the Hot Zone by Richard Preston, I found this book very interesting. I learned a lot but the narrative was clear and compelling.
+20 Task published also in Russian
+5 Combo 10.9 Double Trouble - contemporary 31 mystery 22
+10 Review
+10 Not a Novel
Task Total: 45 pts
Grand Total: 290 pts
20.4 Night WatchCollected Stories by Ivan Bunin
I don't know how this author escaped my attention until I recently discovered him on the Western Canon list. He was the first Russian writer to win the Nobel Prize for Literature. This collection of 35 stories certainly is worth reading just for the scenes of country life in Russia evoked in several pieces. Most of the stories deal with difficult relationships between men and women. I think a Freudian would have a field day here. I noticed a pattern of men becoming enamored with women who abandon them for others. I think there is only one story in which the opposite happens. Unfortunately, there are three stories that end in suicide over an affair gone awry (two by train ala Anna K.!) My favorite story is Rusya, about a man and wife traveling on a train and passing a small village depot. Old memories are brought back to the man about his youthful service here as a tutor...and his having fallen in love with a young girl. The men in most of the stories link up with girls or women who present problematic relationships: married women, servants, underage girls, etc.
A very enjoyable read. 4 1/2 stars
Task=20
Comb0=10 (10.5; 20.6)
Review=10
NaN=10
Oldie=5 (1978)
task=55
grand total=475
10.9 Double Trouble (Karen Michele's Task)The Hate U Give by Angie Thomas
Shelved 2,002 times as contemporary and 40 times as cultural.
Young adult book with low lexile score so counting for the task only.
Post total: 10
Season total: 185
15.2 Reading the DecadesSilence: The Power of Quiet in a World Full of Noise by Thich Nhat Hanh
+15 Task ('97)
Post Total: 15
Season Total: 30
20.8 Silent Spring (≤1962 Not-a-Novel)Measure for Measure by William Shakespeare
Review: Back in 2009 I got my first Kindle and loaded it up with as much as I could that was free or cheap in preparation for a trip to England. As a result, I ended up with a version of the Complete Works of Shakespeare that is a) arranged in alphabetical order and b) doesn’t have character lists at the beginning. So, since 2009 I’ve read it in alphabetical order, and the next on the list was Measure for Measure. It’s a play I knew nothing about, and I can’t say it sticks out in my mind now a couple weeks later.
It’s a strange play. Centered around a city-state with a temporary change in leadership and extreme laws surrounding sex and virtue, it isn’t quite a tragedy, but it’s not a comedy either. Most of the story is quite concerning. People are going to be put to death because of sexual indiscretions, women are propositioned by the very officials prosecuting others for the same crime, and prostitution is part of the side plot. Still, by the end everything ties up neatly and mostly happily. The bad guys get their comeuppance and it’s funny in many cases. It’s just… weird.
+20 Task
+10 Combo (20.4, 20.6)
+10 Review
+10 Not-a-Novel
+25 Oldies
Task Total: 75
Grand Total: 250
20.4 Night WatchThree Act Tragedy by Agatha Christie
I felt like curling up with some nice comfort reading so I reread a couple of Agatha Christies. This was the first one. I’ve read them all at least twice in my life, and I usually remember who did it but not always why. They’re easy to confuse because they can be very similar.
At a dinner party in a house high up on coastal cliffs, an unassuming vicar is murdered for no apparent reason. Then there’s a second dinner in another house with some of the same people present, and an identical murder. The two must be connected—and will there be a third?
Not one of Christie’s best, perhaps, but enjoyable enough. Poirot appears, but not with a central role until the end.
+20 task https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/1...
+10 review
+ 5 combo 10.9 (976 mystery, 13 historical-fiction + 11 historical)
+10 oldies 1934
Post Total: 45
Season Total: 505
20.8 Silent SpringThe Thirteen Problems by Agatha Christie
Thirteen linked stories where a group of people tell real mystery stories in turn to see if anyone present can guess who did it. The group includes Miss Marple, who is only included out of politeness and nobody expects her to guess anything, but of course she gets them all right while everyone else is hopelessly confused :)
The stories include a couple that Agatha Christie later worked up into novellas, including one with what I think of as her favourite plot that she used several times in different ways(view spoiler)
I did a search and found that this book has been accepted as short stories/not a novel in the group before.
+20 task
+ 5 combo 20.4 https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/2...
+10 review
+10 not a novel (short stories)
+10 oldies 1932
Post Total: 55
Season Total: 560
Elizabeth (Alaska) wrote: "Post 219 Heather wrote: "10.9 - history/mysteryThe Stranger Beside Me: Ted Bundy The Shocking Inside Story by Ann Rule
The story of Ted Bundy is a fascinating one, esp..."
If that's the case, can we move it to 15.2? I'm just doing decades for that one so it would work for the 80's. Should bring my total to 260, if I'm doing the math right.
20.3 SanctuaryInterpreter of Maladies by Jhumpa Lahiri
Review: Short story collections are always hit or miss with me, but this one was great. Most of them were portraits of marriage and relationships above all else, but it also hit on culture and the immigrant experience and all the other things Lahiri is known for. Everything I’ve read by her I like – she strikes a good balance between capturing real life and seeking deeper meaning. Most of the stories aren’t completely hopeful or completely depressing – they tend to hit that in between note that really resonates with me as being true. I waited long enough to write this review that the collection has started to merge in my mind, but that’s not a bad thing. I’m left with a feeling that maybe all of the stories exist in the same space and the differences among them aren’t as important as the cohesion of the entire collection.
+20 Task
+10 Combo (10.8 - N America/Asia, 10.9 – cultural/contemporary)
+10 Not-a-Novel
+10 Review
Task Total: 50
Grand Total: 300
20.3 SanctuaryThe Refugees by Viet Thanh Nguyen
The Refugees is a cleanly written and quietly built collection of short stories. Nguyen's combination of smooth prose and choppy emotions proved irresistible, and I read these stories eagerly, despite how they almost palpably ache. His characters are networked in complicated webs of relationships and weaknesses and personal histories. They deal with different facets of disruption, the long-term aftermath of losing something that had been once been considered stable and safe, and then trying to figure out whether there was any solid ground--physically, emotionally--to leave or to land on. I appreciated seeing the variations on some of the themes Nguyen brought to life so elegantly in his novel The Sympathizer: namely, what it's like to be a stranger in your country, in your own family, and even to yourself.
While it's a solid collection, sometimes these stories hit the Literary Short Story beats a little too obviously for my taste. The best of them, however, moved on their own accord. My favorite was "I'd Love You to Want Me," about a woman who learns about her husband's infidelity when he, as he struggles with dementia, starts calling her by another woman's name.
+20 Task
+15 Combo (10.8 -- 25% Asia [Vietnam] & 75% North America [United States]; 10.9 -- Contemporary 64, Cultural > Asia 47; 20.6 -- N)
+10 Not-a-Novel (short story collection)
+10 Review
Task Total: 55
Season Total: 340
10.5 Green Stone Achtung Baby: An American Mom on the German Art of Raising Self-Reliant Children by Sara Zaske
I don't recall where this was recommended to me but I'm glad it was. It's a memoir with a good bit of research embedded - Sara Zaske tells the story of when she, her husband, and young daughter move to Berlin for her husband's job. They stay there for 6 years or so, have a second child, the kids start school, and so on. Each chapter details a different stage of her life as a mom, her kids' lives, and so on, contrasting German parenting with her experience as an American parent. With the caveat that I've read reviews that suggest she is glossing over some big differences by describing "German" habits (versus "Berlin" habits), I enjoyed it a lot. I found it to be thought-provoking and made me reflect a lot about our sometimes-unexamined beliefs that end up influencing a ton of decisions - about children, independence, how we structure our lives, and more.
+10 task (197 ratings)
+10 not-a-novel
+10 review
Task Total: 30
Season Total: 230
Task 10.5 Green StoneIn honor of The Green Stone and The Green Stone read a book with 1000 ratings or fewer.
Revolution: The Year I Fell in Love and Went to Join the War (2011) by Deb Olin Unferth [813.6]
Review:In 1987, Deb Olin Unferth was an 18 year old freshman college student. She fell in love with George, and the two of them went to Central America to help win the “Revolution”. They were there for about a year, bouncing around El Salvador, Nicaragua, and Honduras. The year later, they returned to America and broke up. This book is her account of her time during that year. The book bounces around in time, and is careful to not directly name any individuals (even George’s last name is not revealed). My impression is that she decided to write the book then decided that the anecdotes that would make the book interesting were too personal to reveal, so she didn’t reveal them. She realizes that George and her were tourists -- not revolutionaries. Overall verdict: Disappointing.
+10 Task
+10 Not-a-Novel (non-fiction)
+10 Review
Task Total: 10 + 10 + 10 = 30
Grand Total: 170 + 30 = 200
20.6 Dead SoulsSight by Jessie Greengrass
Review:
I requested this book as I had heard it touted as a potential Man Booker winner. It certainly seems more inclined that way than a (Bailey's) Women's Prize winner, for which it has recently been long-listed.
Other reviewers have described the main premise (woman deciding whether to start a family) but that was not the aspect I will remember. Instead, it was the narrator's experience/thoughts on grieving her mother's death, the separation of child from parent as they grow, and the relationship between the narrator and her partner's mother that felt as though they could have come from my own experience/feelings (if only I was so articulate). So many times my reaction was "yes, that's exactly how it was". If it was my habit to highlight passages in a book for later recall, I would have done so in many places.
However, while I did love certain passages, I didn't love the book as a whole. In parts, it almost stopped feeling like fiction, and felt like a mix of biography and autobiography instead. Some of the "biographical" sections were fascinating (Rontgen, John Hunter, Jan van Rynsdyk) but others left me bored (Sigmund and Anna Freud).
Overall, I'm giving it 4 out of 5 stars, because the parts that were good for me, were really good. I don't often reread books, but this one definitely merits a second slower, more reflective, reading.
+20 Task
+10 Review
+5 Combo (10.5 70 ratings)
Points this post: 35
RwS total: 170
RtD total: -
Season Total: 170
10.5 Green StoneThe Infamous Miss Rodriguez: A Ciudad Real Novella by Lydia San Andres
Review: I’m always on the lookout for romances set in different times and places than Regency England or the contemporary United States, and for books written by people of color. This is that – but it’s also a really cute novella. It is definitely short, which means the romance happens quickly, but reading a historical romance set in the Caribbean (albeit a made up country) was so fun. I also loved that while the characters all have money, they’re not the idle elite – Graciela eventually realizes how much her aunt works, and I kind of just wanted to read more about their perfume factory.
+10 Task
+10 Review
Task Total: 20
Grand Total: 320
20.6 Dead SoulsI Want To Be Yours by D.M. Mortier
Review: I have this horrible habit of continuing books that I kind of despise. In this case, it was short enough that I didn’t feel like I could drop it. But I really hated this book.
I’m okay with fantasy that pushes the envelope and depicts things that I’d never tolerate in real life. I’m okay with alpha males. I’m okay with people in books being turned on by things I don’t find appealing. But this book had so little to redeem itself that I just couldn’t get behind it. The beginning had a small amount of promise. Nico might have been a character I could love. But he just dropped all decency and the entire book seemed to me to be a description of emotional abuse. The sex scenes weren’t sexy, the worldbuilding made little sense… I don’t even think I’ll give the author a second chance, which is a rarity for me.
+20 Task
+10 Combo (10.5, 10.7)
+10 Review
Task Total: 40
Grand Total: 360
10.4 Book Riot House Made of Dawn by N. Scott Momaday
Review: This book took me two weeks to finish. That’s a long time in my world. I didn’t hate it, but I just couldn’t find it within me to care enough to understand what was going on. The story changes perspectives a couple times, so I had a hard time understanding who was who and what was going on. At least, I thought I had a hard time until I went and looked at Wikipedia. It turns out I did understand most of it – it just wasn’t exactly riveting. I will say that the perspective is one I don’t often read, and some of the descriptions of the environment and culture were interesting. Also, it almost made me cry when an older woman (don’t ask me who she was in relation to the protagonist) realizes her guinea pig has died. Still, the writing was so dense, and not in a good way, that the book was kind of a dud in my mind.
+10 Task
+10 Combo (20.3, 20.6)
+5 Oldies (1967)
+10 Review
Task Total: 35
Grand Total: 395
20.2 The Blazing WorldThe Story of a New Name by Elena Ferrante
When I read My Brilliant Friend, I enjoyed it and rated it 4 stars, but I had gone into it with high expectations and when I finished I wasn’t quite sure what all the fuss was about. I wasn’t even sure if I would continue the series, but due to a challenge task for books set in Italy (Reading with Style), I decided to try book 2. I was drawn into The Story of a New Name from the beginning. The characters seemed more real and although it was painful to read of an abusive relationship, the story kept me engaged. I am intrigued by the evolution of male and female roles and places in society across time and culture. I think of myself as a feminist, but have lately realized how many societal norms I grew up accepting as “just the way it was” for women. The book brought some of those conflicts to light along with the extreme abuses of women central to the plot. There is also something about the quality of the writing itself that I enjoy. It is straightforward in style, but manages to convey emotional impact as well as would a more poetic telling. Although this book was better than the first, I still gave it 4 stars because now I definitely plan to finish the series and have great expectations!
+20 Task: 47 shelvings - article of support
https://www.newyorker.com/culture/cul...
"She has two subjects, basically. The first is women. This is the most thoroughgoing feminist novel I have ever read. (I will call the four books one novel."
+15 Combo: 10.2 Ravioli / 10.9 Double Trouble (historical and cultural) / 20.4 Night Watch
+10 Review
Task Total: 45
Season Total: 385
20.6 Dead SoulsThe Transmigration of Bodies by Yuri Herrera
I read The Transmigration of Bodies just after Daniel Defoe’s A Journal of the Plague Year and I think reading them close together enhanced my enjoyment of Herrera’s dystopian plague story. As told, the plague unleashed in the book was believable and frightening, but picturing some aspects of the real plague made it even more realistic. What made the book fascinating was the retelling of Romeo and Juliet (Baby Girl) in this setting. You are not hit over the head with another story centering around romance, but focused on the gangster families, so it is an obvious but still “sneaky” approach to some aspects (but not all) of the Shakespeare play. It’s a short page turner and worth every minute. The brutality of modern Mexico is brilliantly portrayed and the focus on two mobster families lets the reader know that it is just one look into the country, and not a portrayal of the whole picture of the country.
+20 Task
+10 Review
Task Total: 30
Season Total: 415
Post 261 Ed wrote: "20.4 Night WatchCollected Stories by Ivan Bunin
I don't know how this author escaped my attention until I recently discovered him on the Western Canon list. He w..."
Ed, I think the original pub date is incorrect, by GR standards. The pub date should be the date of the last story published. While I haven't researched the stories in this collection and therefore changed the GR pub date, we will be carrying this as published synonymous with the author's date of death (1953), until I can spend more time with it. Long story longer, combo with 20.8.
Elizabeth (Alaska) wrote: "Post 261 Ed wrote: "20.4 Night WatchCollected Stories by Ivan Bunin
I don't know how this author escaped my attention until I recently discovered him on the West..."
Thanks...I was wondering about that.
Post 273 Cory Day wrote: "10.5 Green StoneThe Infamous Miss Rodriguez: A Ciudad Real Novella by Lydia San Andres
Review: I’m always on the lookout for romances set in different times and..."
This author is alphabetized as San Andres, Lydia, so she qualifies for 20.6 for the N.
20.2 The Blazing WorldWomen & Power: A Manifesto by Mary Beard
My review:
This short book is based on two lectures the author delivered in 2014 and 2017. I enjoyed reading it, but felt it was much too short and didn’t really discuss the subject in the detail that it deserves.
The greatest strength of the book, in my opinion, is illustrating that the silencing and exclusion of women from positions of power has a long history. Throughout the book there are numerous examples from the Classical world of women being silenced, such as in The Odyssey where Penelope is told by her son Telemachus to “go back into the house” and leave public speaking to the men.
Interestingly, there are also examples of women being permitted to speak if they focused only on women’s interests. Somehow that reminds me of those people today who agree women’s representation is important, but only to make sure issues like childcare or maternity leave are discussed, not because women have something useful to say about issues affecting society as a whole.
A very interesting book, but I wish it had been several hundred pages longer so that the very interesting ideas it touched on could be discussed in more depth.
+20 task
+10 not a novel (nonfiction)
+10 review
Post total: 40
Season total: 225
20.6 Dead soulsHellstrom's Hive by Frank Herbert
+20 Task RR
+5 Combo 10.7
+5 Oldies (published 1973)
Post Total: 30
Season Total: 805
15.1 - Reading the DecadesThe Seven Dials Mystery (Superintendent Battle #2) by Agatha Christie
+15 Task (published 29)
Post Total: 15
Season Total: 290
20.2 - The Blazing WorldMrs. Caliban by Rachel Ingalls
This is a weird book for me to review. Part of that is because frankly, it's a weird book. A six foot seven lizard man shows up in Dorothy's life, sweeps her off her feet, and... things... start to happen.
The writing itself is wonderful. You can get a feel for Ingalls' satire and wit from the very first lines:
Fred forgot three things in a row before he reached the front door on his way to work... She told him the answers to all his questions and slipped in several more of her own: would he need the umbrella if he had the car, did he really think it felt like rain? If his car had that funny noise, couldn't he take the bus instead, and had he found the other umbrella yet?
The first half, with the surreal meeting of housewife and lizard man, went down easy. The second half, on the other hand, made me uneasy. Prior events are called into question and you're left wondering what to believe. That's fine, but either way it doesn't change my perceptions about the characters much. So let's chalk Mrs. Caliban up as a "...huh."
+20 task (approved in thread)
+10 review
+5 oldie
Task total: 35 points
Grand total: 300 points
15.2 - Reading the DecadesThe Virgin and the Gypsy by D.H. Lawrence
+15 Task (published 30)
Post Total: 15
Season Total: 305
20.4 The Passage by Justin Cronin
This book was kind of difficult for me to get into, not going to lie. The first chapter was really rough but I toughed that out and continued to read. Up until the main plot picked up, it was exceedingly slow but I’m glad I hung in there. Once that started, it picked up and ran, turning into something that felt, to me at least, like a cross between The Strain and The Stand. There ARE parts of the book that feel almost ridiculous – like I’m reading a walkthrough of someone’s game of Fallout. Also, the religious symbolism is pretty heavy handed but it still makes for a good story. I’ll probably pick up the second book here shortly.
+20 task
+15 combo (20.5, 20.6, 20.9)
+10 jumbo (766 pgs.)
+10 review
task total: 55
Grand total: 315
20.8 Silent Spring (Ed's Task)The Changeling by Thomas Middleton
Another old, old tragedy in which hardly anything promising a glimmer of human kindness is reflected. As I was reading this, I realized that the plot was so over the top, that a set of comedians could act it out...without changing a word to hilarious effect. Not much overacting would be required...perhaps just continual eyerolls.
Here, Beatrice, is engaged to a man she doesn't love while loving another. One of her father's servants hopes to win her love by killing her fiancee...only to be mistaken...and this sets off a series of unfortunate events.
Oh, I forgot, there is an attempt at humor while two other men who are in love with a different woman, Isabella, pretend to be a fool and a knave respectively in order to be close to her. For me, no comedy ensues. Just more carnage. All the action takes place in Spain.
2 stars.
Task=20
Review=10
NaN=10
Oldie=20 (1622)
task total= 60
grand total=540
20.4 Night WatchRobinson Crusoe by Daniel Defoe
I love the narration of Simon Vance and found that my library had that audio version available, so I knew that was the way to go for this castaway story and listening certainly enhanced the book and kept it from bogging down in the slower parts. Robinson Crusoe was a re-read for me, but it has been at least 40 years between reads, so it was almost like a new experience. I liked it quite a bit and found it overall to be more engaging than A Journal of the Plague Year by Defoe which I recently finished. There is more personal connection to be made with the narrator in this adventure tale also told in journal style and the stories have more life to them, pulling the reader into the story. The acceptance of slavery as matter of course always makes a classic read a bit more difficult to take, but is also informative as to how entrenched these attitudes were in the time and how difficult they have been to overcome. Crusoe’s treatment of Friday and Defoe’s portrayal of him are hard to take from a 21st Century point of view, but the book can still be enjoyed as a classic of the adventure genre.
+20 Task
+10 Review
+20 Oldies (1719)
Task Total: 50
Season Total: 465
20.4 Night WatchThe Life-Changing Magic of Tidying Up: The Japanese Art of Decluttering and Organizing by Marie Kondō
A very fast read with really only three basic ideas - declutter by type of item not room by room, keep only what you love, and fold clothes and store things in a certain way. I liked these three ideas and they resonate better with me than other decluttering rules like keep a certain number of items or keep only what you've used in the last x months, which have never grabbed me.
My biggest question is what happens when I don't love something that I need and can't afford to replace, like a bed or a sofa. She doesn't cover this at all. Even minor items would add up. As I put down the book and looked around the room, the first thing that caught my eye was my boring black umbrella. It doesn't spark joy, but it works perfectly well. Must I throw it out? While a new umbrella wouldn't break the bank, if that's followed by almost all of my shoes, my bathmat, and all of my towels - to name a few unloved things that immediately spring to mind - I will struggle to afford this "tidying."
Still, I do intend to give this a try, with the caveat that I may keep a few unloved but functional things for financial reasons. Will the life-changing magic still work? Watch this space.
+20 task https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/3...
+10 review
+10 not a novel
Post Total: 40
Season Total: 600
20.4 Night WatchThe Labors of Hercules by Agatha Christie
Hercule Poirot is planning to retire and grow vegetable marrows . . . again . . . but this time he really means it. But first he’s just going to do one more thing – or twelve more things. He’s going to take some carefully-selected (and providentially-provided) cases that will reflect the twelve Labours of Hercules – the monsters the classical hero had to defeat.
It’s a clever idea and it mostly comes off. The stories are named after the classical monsters – e.g. the first is called The Nemean Lion, and it’s about a kidnapped Pekinese dog; The Arcadian Deer is about a dancer, and so on. As always, I enjoyed some stories more than others, but there’s plenty of variety and plenty of Poirot.
+20 task https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/1...
+ 5 combo 20.8 short stories (has been claimed for "not a novel" in the group before)
+10 review
+10 not a novel
+ 5 oldies (1947)
Post Total: 50
Season Total: 650
20.9 Jumbo (Kate S's task)The Portable Nineteenth-Century African American Women Writers edited by Henry Louis Gates Jr. & Hollis Robbins
African American women writers of the 19th century were running schools, publishing newspapers and authoring editorials, writing poetry and plays, penning all manners of memoirs and stories and novels and cookbooks, delivering lectures and sermons, and doing activist work of all kinds. This book did not lack in quality writing that still reads as engaging (and often enraging) today.
What impressed me most about this collection was the range of voices, concerns, and approaches depicted. I sometimes wished for a little more biographical information or context in the editorial introductions (for example, I wanted to immediately know about the performances of Pauline Hopkins' musical!), I understood why they were so brief, and yes, I'm capable of searching the Internet for more information myself. I just would have loved more and more info, really.
The selections in this anthology offer not only insight into what these generations of women saw as their battlefields and as their strategies and tactics, and not only insight into their creative, intellectual, and political lives, but also show the vibrant communities of African American women who wrote for each other and to each other. The collection has a fitting end in Lucy Wilmot Smith's 1889 essay, "Women as Journalists: Portraits and Sketches of a Few of the Women Journalists of the Race."
+20 Task -- 656 pages
+10 Combo (10.5 -- 13 ratings; 20.2 -- feminism MPG, approved in task thread)
+10 Not-a-Novel
+10 Review
+5 Jumbo
Task Total: 55
Season Total: 395
10.3 SeriesMaddAddam by Margaret Atwood
It has been a loong time since I read The Year of the Flood and even longer since I read Oryx and Crake but I almost think this could be a circular series where it doesn't matter where you start. Because each book has stories that happen at the same time or previous to the other books. And each book fills in some part of the other books and leaves the reader with a few mysteries.
Atwood does a masterful job of weaving together Zeb's, Toby's and Blackbeard's stories and points of view and revealing more of the history of Zeb and Adam One and other characters.
I got a little tired of Toby's insecurity.
I will have to go back and read the previous two books again.
+10 task
+10 review
+5 combo (20.4)
Task total: 25
Season total: 225
15.3 Reading the DecadesThe Cat Who Saw Red by Lilian Jackson Braun (186 p.)
+15 task ('86)
Season total: 45
20.4- Night Watchnumber9dream by David Mitchell
Russian Edition : Сон №9
Task +10
Combo: +10 (10.9- Contemporary, Cultural; 20.9- Jumbo)
Post: 20
Season total 280
20.4- Night WatchThe Black Count: Glory, Revolution, Betrayal and the Real Count of Monte Cristo by Tom Reiss
Russian edition: Подлинная история графа Монте-Кристо. Жизнь и приключения генерала Тома-Александра Дюма
Task: 10
Combo: 5 10.9- Historical, Cultural
Not-A- novel: 10
Post 25
Season total: 305
20.2 The Blazing WorldIndiana by George Sand
The Goodreads description suggests this is a feminist novel. We have moved so far from the context in which this could be considered such that it is hard to see it. However, there is one strong scene in which Indiana tells her despotic husband that he cannot tell her how or what to think. Such a radical position in 1832!
M. Delmare is not the most despicable of the male characters. That position must be reserved for Raymon de Ramiere.
It was not the first time that Raymon saw a woman take love seriously, although, fortunately for society, such cases are rare; but he knew that promises of love are not binding on a man’s honour, again fortunately for society. Sometimes, too, the woman who had demanded these solemn pledges from him was the first to break them.I don't think this was intended to be funny (!), but I couldn't help but laugh. There were other passages of his wooing Indiana that were just over the top.
I did enjoy this, but perhaps the best of it, for me, was the introduction where Naomi Schor helped me clearly understand the literary period.
Sand came to writing at the very moment when, under the joint impetus of Stendhal and Balzac, the literary movement that has come to be known as realism was rising to the dominant position it was soon to achieve. Seeking to obtain the literary legitimation that being a realist writer bestows, Sand’s first edition of and first preface to Indiana are replete with protestations of her allegiance to the familiar ideology of realism, namely that it has no ideology: it is pure reproduction, a mirror without a curve, a machine that merely registers material phenomena and events without distorting them. ‘The writer is only a mirror which reflects them [society’s inequalities and fate’s whims], a machine which traces their outline, and he has nothing for which to apologize if the impressions are correct and the reflection is faithful.’As a fan of both Balzac and Stendahl (and I hope to get to each of them this challenge season), I was very glad to read this section. Indiana, Sand's first novel, comes in at the bottom of my 4-star group, and I might be a tad generous at that.
+20 Task
+15 Combo (10.6, 20.4, 20.10)
+5 Review
+15 Oldies (1832)
Task Total = 60
Season total = 255
10.2 RavioliLavinia by Ursula K. Le Guin
I only vaguely remember having read The Aeneid back in my college days and certainly don't remember the story of Lavinia being in it. Apparently, despite the fact that she was Aeneas's third and final wife and with whom he establishes an empire, she doesn't speak a word and is only minimally mentioned.
This book gives Lavinia her voice.
I loved the rich writing, the clear and strong characters, but mostly the story construct. Time is never quite linear, bouncing back and forth between past, present, and future (I'd noticed that it was tagged as "Historical Fiction/Sci Fi/Social Science" in my library's audio book and was a little confused how "Sci Fi" fit in there--I think it was referring to the twisted timeline). She meets the "wraith" of Virgil, a man on his deathbed who, in his own era, is struggling to finish writing his last and finest historical epic. He apologizes to her that he has misrepresented her, that he'd imagined her so much differently. He tells her the history that he has penned--her future that she is yet to live.
I love that this strong, powerful, devoted woman has finally been given the voice she was denied by the first writer of her story.
+10 Task (set in ancient Italy)
+10 Review
+15 Combo (10.6; 20.4; 20.7--she was daughter, husband, and mother to kings, a queen in her own right)
Task total: 35
Season total: 310
20.4 Night WatchThe Double by Fyodor Dostoyevsky
+20 - Task
+10 - Combo (20.1,20.6)
+15 - Oldies (1846)
Task Total - 45 pts
Season Total - 180 Pts
20.6 Dead SoulsLila by Marilynne Robinson
This is the final book of Marilynne Robinson’s trilogy ‘Gilead’. I feel that I need to tell you, my RwS reading pals, that I am actually educated, literate, and at times articulate. The reason for that need is my feeling of utter incompetence at trying to review this book.
I will come out and say it – I am a Robinson ‘fangirl’. Robinson is one of the few writers that I say (to anyone who may be interested) – “if she writes a grocery list you should read it”.
This series is about faith in general. I’m an atheist. ‘Gilead’ has some of the most beautiful writing I’ve ever read in my life. ‘Home’ is a more straightforward, but extremely moving story. And now, ‘Lila”……..
This story is powerful and moving. I often found myself teary eyed and blowing my nose. It’s intense and real and beautiful. I didn’t want it to end, and (for me) read it slowly.
I think you need to read this series in order to experience the full impact. I said this a few (?) seasons ago about ‘Gilead’ and it’s worth saying again: ‘it’s not often that you get to read a book by a writer at full command of her craft’. 5*
20 task
20 combo 10.3, 10.6, 10.9, 20.3
10 review
_____
50
Running total: 380
10.3 SeriesDeath Masks by Jim Butcher
+10 Task #5 in the Dresden files series
Post Total: 10
Season Total: 815
Task 15.3 Reading the DecadesYear: 1994
The Waterworks (1994) by E.L. Doctorow
+15 Task
Task Total: 15
Grand Total: 200 + 15 = 215
20.2 - listed as feminist 27 times, feminism 24 timesWho Fears Death by Nnedi Okorafor
+20 task
+20 combo (10.6 per the question thread, 20.1 - twins are a peripheral plot point, 20.5 - magical ability through bloodlines, 20.6)
Task total: 40
Grand total: 370
20.4 Night WatchFire and Fury: Inside the Trump White House by Michael Wolff
I had to wait a long time to get this from my library...but it finally arrived. There isn't much more to learn here that hasn't been available for the discerning citizen...BUT... it is satisfying to read an account with all the chaos displayed succinctly. For those who don't know, this is an account of the chaos and madness in the first year of the Trump White House. Steve Bannon is credited with being the source for much of the account...but it seems fairly certain that he is also the source for much of the unattributed accounts as well. There are/were at minimum, two feuding sides in the White House with Steve Bannon leading one side and Jarvanka, Jared and Ivanka leading the other with other personalities sometimes taking independent crazy positions. Somehow I agreed with everybody's criticism of everybody else. They are, and I can't think of any exceptions, all disgusting odious people. Not important literature...but a satisfying read...at least to someone of my political persuasion.
Task =20 - https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/3...
Review=10
NaN=10
task total=30
grand total= 570
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The Life of My Choice by Wilfred Thesiger
Being an explorer in uncharted territories where no man has gone before is a dream for many but only a few dare to achieve that dream. One of the last greatest explorers of lands which hitherto had been impossible to penetrate was Sir Wilfred Thesiger.
It always seemed reading his autobiography The Life of My Choice, that he never once held a real job but was always doing something for the people around him who lived the harshest of lives – in the Abyssinian plains and the deserts of Sahara. Living with savage tribes with some barbaric practices, he sympathized with them the most, so much so that he fought on their side against the Italians in the war. To him, they were his people – people he lived with, people he travelled with and people he shared food and home with. “Harder the life, finer the man” he said and what a fine man he was! On several of his explorations he had to go without water and food for days but the more he went on such journeys, the more he craved them. “In the desert,” he wrote, “I found a freedom unattainable in civilisation; a life unhampered by possessions.”
The book is a wonderful account of his travels, his observations of the local populace, his increased dislike for modernity- Many a time he expressed his disdain for motor vehicles, preferring camels for traversing across the sand dunes and his everlasting admiration and friendship with emperor Haile Selassie. He was fortunate to live a life of exploration and we are fortunate to live these lands through his eyes.
+10 task
+10 Review
+10 Not a Novel
+ 5 Combo (Double Continent - 80% set in Africa and snippets of life in England shown)
+5 Oldies
Task Total: 40
Grand Total: 130+40 = 170