Biography, Autobiography, Memoir discussion

Reading any good books that don't fall into the Biography, Autobiography, Memoir category? Please share!

I bought Ripley's Believe It Or Not! Unlock The Weird! for school library.
It's got all weird stuff in it, so if Louis Theroux runs out of weird people to interview, he can always look in this book and find more.

I’m reading Middlemarch by George Elliot

Selina that sounds interesting. I love Louis Theroux’s interviews !

I got onto this one
Laura Ingalls Is Ruining My Life by Shelley Tougas

Of course having now read almost all of Laura Ingalls Wilder books, I quite enjoyed reading about a mother who's a writer and wants to channel Laura's spirit and her children being totally embarassed by this as they move to Walnut Grove.

I'm reading two memoirs right now.

1. Beautiful Country, by Qian Julie Wang

2. By Canoe and Dog Train: The Adventures of Sharing the Gospel with Canadian Indians, by Egerton Ryerson Young

Land: How the Hunger for Ownership Shaped the Modern World by Simon Winchester

Simon Wincheser starts with a question, and then does some investigating to find out the answers to those questions through uncovering history. I enjoyed reading and thinking about what land ownership means. I don't think he ever got to the bottom of it but he made a fair stab at it round different areas of the globe (NZ is included). I'd say it is a bit of a potted history..and a bit euro-centric. He very much avoided singling out the elephant in the room - The British Empire. But then there have been other empires at various times too with an expansionist agenda.

He didn't really cover inheritance though. I'm quite interested in that. Or covenants.

The Abortion
Richard Brautigan
4/5 stars
This is the story of a young man who runs an unusual library where the patrons bring books that they wrote to be added to the library. One day he meets Vida, a young woman who writes poetry and has a book to add to the library. They fall in love and she becomes pregnant leading them to go to Tijuana for an abortion. This was quite an unusual book but very intriguing.

Julie wrote: "
The Abortion
Richard Brautigan
4/5 stars
This is the story of a young man who runs an unusual library where the patrons bring books that..."

I love anything this guy writes. The first haiku I ever remember reading was his "Haiku Ambulance:"

A green pea rolled off
the wooden salad bowl.
So what?

At the moment I am reading My Heart Is a Chainsaw and Le Morte d'Arthur: King Arthur and the Legends of the Round Table.

The Raupo Phrasebook of Modern Maori by Scotty Morrison

Included 3 new chapters of updates (covid 19, tik tok, instagram) to speak Maori today. Time to learn some new kupu (words!)

I am also colouring in this book...
Colour by Numbers Birds & Butterflies

though I haven't yet finished this one Collins Easy Learning Mandarin Chinese Characters: Trusted support for learning

Adult picture books --- well they are big and heavy and in the 'art' section mostly. I read this one 'Private Gardens of Aotearoa'.

This one made me think of all the people that have swimming pools AND tennis courts. They just employ gardeners rather than do it themselves. Impressive, but half the time they aren't even at home as they have five other properties and are always jetsetting to other places.

Selina: do males in NZ often get nicknames by adding a y or an o onto the end like in Australia? Like Scotty?

Selina: is that Private Gardens of NZ(with part of NZ)? I couldn’t find PG of Aotearoa.
Is an adult picture book a coffee table book?

The Mediterranean is a really great - I think I would say - picture book. By Armin Greder.

Kit wrote: "Selina: do males in NZ often get nicknames by adding a y or an o onto the end like in Australia? Like Scotty?"

Not really, not as much as Aussies do.
I found out recently that instead of calling us 'NewZeas' or 'Newzies' Australians called us Kiwis because of THEIR brand name boot polish during world war 1. It's only secondary that we are named after the bird.

Kit wrote: "Selina: is that Private Gardens of NZ(with part of NZ)? I couldn’t find PG of Aotearoa.
Is an adult picture book a coffee table book?

The Mediterranean is a really great - I think I would say - pi..."

Yes it's a coffee table book. I suppose adult picture book makes it sound sleazy!

Yea it's not listed on Goodreads for some strange reason. My library edition was published by Thames and Hudson. They do arty books. The author is Suzanne Turley who is the garden designer. So it's not really what you'd expect from the title as all the gardens are just only her commissions/design. So they kind of end up looking similar - someone had pots of money to spend.

As for Aotearoa..that is the Maori name for New Zealand but none of the gardens are especially or exclusively native. They actually look more English (hedges, topiary, borders) or Dutch (perennials)..more European than anything.

None are really foresty or particularly beachy or feature kumara..or attract native birds. Still interesting to look at ..more eye candy than anything...although, because they are commissions, rich people tend to focus more on sculpture and showing off the mansion rather than actually caring about the plants. So mostly they just mass plant it with one or two species.

Selina: sounds like the book is a brochure/ advertisement for the author, posing as a book

This was a better book IMHO because this is about a gardener AND architect who made his own garden.
Ohinetahi: Garden, House and Art by Miles Warren

Ohinetahi means 'only daughter'. It's a private house and garden near Christchurch and looks a bit like NZ's answer to Sissinghurst. Although Larnach Castle might give it a run for it's money. However Miles Warren did design and plant the garden and renovated the house/homestead...and he really made it his own. It is open to the public but it's a labour of love. He has employed gardeners to help him but he did all the layout and lived there (with his brother and sister-in-law who were also gardeners) plus it survived the earthquake and them moving away.
I'd like to see it, it's got everything you could think of a grand garden should have...hedges, focal points, follies, statues, woodland, flower borders, a red garden (it was originally white, to copy Sissinghurst, but didn't really work), lawn, vege garden, greenhouse, gazebo, rose garden etc etc.

Selina wrote: "Kit wrote: "Selina: is that Private Gardens of NZ(with part of NZ)? I couldn’t find PG of Aotearoa.
Is an adult picture book a coffee table book?

The Mediterranean is a really great - I think I wo..."

Yes a lot of arty books are like that unfortunately. More like someone's collected a whole lot of glossy magazine articles, it reads like one.

Exit Through the Gift Shop by Maryam Master

A 12.5 year old girl is dying of cancer...and this is her diary. I thought it was pretty good story despite the theme, though it does address bullying I'm wondering if it is a bit too mature for my children (up to year 6, age 11), sometimes I wish I worked in an intermediate/middle school library because they get the best chapter books at that age when they are mature enough to grasp them.

I don't think it would really help anyone actually suffering from cancer though esp as we don't know if the narrator survives and it it's treated in a rather flippant manner. (Think David Walliams 'parents are rather dim')

Empire of Pain: The Secret History of the Sackler Dynasty by Patrick Radden Keefe
4 stars
[bookcover:Empire of Pain: The Secret History of the Sackler Dynasty|43868109

Unfortunately, the idea that a company is only concerned about profits and not whether their product is harming people or the environment is all too common. That is basically the premise of this book. What makes Purdue Pharma stand out from other companies is the Sackler family. Other companies do not have just one family that is pocketing the money. It is hard to explain in a review the depths this family takes to deny the devastation the drug Oxycotin has caused and still does to this day. I appreciate the amount of research that went into making this book and the effort the author seems to take to remain impartial. The only reason I gave it 4 stars instead of 5 was because at times it seemed a little long winded and repetitive.

The Barbizon: The Hotel That Set Women Free by Paulina Bren

This has been on my TBR list for a while..curious about the all-women hotel in NYC the focus of Sylvia Plath's Bell Jar narrative where young women stayed on their guest editorship? Or where Grace Kelly made her start as a young actress about town?

This book is a history of that place from beginnings in the pre-suffragette days when the Titanic sank and right up to the early 21st century when it was taken over and made into luxury condos.

I enjoyed reading about the various famous and not so famous women who stayed there, whether they were aspiring models or Gibbs girls secretaries, or elderly spinsters or Mademoiselle college cadets. It was meant to be a safe haven for women where no men were allowed to enter, it had maid service and cheap dining. It kind of reminded me a bit of the late 90s Sex and the City trope...young women in NYC looking for an independent life but actually hoping to snare a husband. I never quite got that glaring contradiction...! I also didn't know that in the US if you were a married woman some states didn't allow you to work as it would have been taking jobs from the men.

Packing for Mars: The Curious Science of Life in the Void
Mary Roach
4/5 stars
One of my favorite authors is Mary Roach and she does not disappoint in this book about the space program and living in space. She discusses the myriad of problems of living in space including living in confined quarters, eating, washing and toilet issues. This still holds up even though it was written in 2010.

I just finished reading The Equivalents: A Story of Art, Female Friendship, and Liberation in the 1960s by Maggie Doherty. It's the story of some of the women (including poet Anne Sexton) who fellows in the early days of Radcliffe Institute for Independent Study during the early 1960's.

My review is here:
https://mypointbeing.com/2022/01/17/t...

Isle of Tears by Deborah Challinor

An historical fiction set during the 1860s at the time of the NZ Land Wars. While it's no Gone with the Wind, it was still interesting to read, with a plucky heroine and some romance thrown in.

The Child in Time
Ian McEwan
3/5 stars
A young couple’s daughter is kidnapped at a grocery store and the couple struggle to deal with the loss of their child and end up separating. Will they ever get over their grief and re-unite? Not my favorite of his books but never the less, it is compelling!

West with Giraffes by Lynda Rutledge
4 stars


Reminiscent of Water For Elephants, this is fiction based on a true story about giraffes that survived a hurricane at sea and after embarking on the East Coast made the treacherous ride to the West Coast around the time of the Dust Bowl Days. The story is told through the eyes of a 105 year old man in a nursing home who was the young driver of the giraffes and went through many pitfalls along the way. I enjoyed this book but at times was confused as to whom the narrator was talking to, especially at the end. At times the story did not seem very believable so for me would have been better if it was truly a nonfiction book.

The Halloween Tree
Ray Bradbury
4/5 stars
It is Halloween and Carapace Clavicle Moundshroud, a sinister man appears to a group of friends who are about to go trick or treating but their friend Pip is missing. Moundshroud takes them on a journey which transcends time and place to find their friend. I enjoyed this Bradbury tale.

Surfacing
Margaret Atwood
3/5 stars
A young, woman artist, along with her boyfriend and another couple, travel to an isolated island in Quebec. She is searching for her father who has gone missing and they end up staying in his cabin. Unfortunately, the longer she stays there, the relationships between her friends and lover strain and the more her state of mind unravels. Not my favorite of all her books but I love her writing and the ideas she provokes.

Julie wrote: "
Surfacing
Margaret Atwood
3/5 stars
A young, woman artist, along with her boyfriend and another couple, travel to an isolated island in Quebec..."
I thought this was one of Atwood's stranger novels. I didn't really get it and I read it a couple of times. I recall the unknown narrator (never given a name) was ruing an abortion.

My favourite Atwood novel was always Cat's Eye.

VinitaF wrote: "Selina that sounds interesting. I love Louis Theroux’s interviews !"

I saw Louis Theroux has published another book about how he couldn't travel anymore cos of covid restrictions, so he decided to write about his own weird family instead.Theroux the Keyhole

A customer came into the shop and bought this book, and I said had you read any of his dad's travel books, and the customer had no idea who Paul Theroux was.

Last Tang Standing By Lauren Ho

A millennial Bridget Jones for the Crazy Rich Asians set. This ones a boozy lawyer trying to make partner. And her mother is a typical Tiger.
Fun, fast paced and witty.

Some children's books

Dog Man: Mothering Heights by Dav Pilkey Brilliant masterpiece though I found little connection/reference to the Emily Bronte classic in this book...did Wuthering Heights have giant sippy cups battling each other? I can't remember.

Tiger Daughter by Rebecca Lim
Inevitable someone would write this! But a bit dark matter for some. Also came with a note at the end for those priveliged enough not to understand what being a child of immigrant parents is really like

Rowley Jefferson's Awesome Friendly Adventure Greg Heffly's best friend gets spin off series, but Greg kinda ruins the story by constantly interrupting.
Rowley Jefferson’s Awesome Friendly Spooky Stories is way better...Greg is absent till the last story and this is where Rowley shines.

Best Babysitters Ever by Caroline Cala
First of a series, but this time a bunch of 12 year old girls want to make money so they can have a party, rather than actually babysit. Is this what it's come down to?? Features a deliciously evil big sister character.

Demon Dentist by David Walliams
Perfect read while waiting in the surgery

Millions by Frank Cottrell Boyce
A saints obssessed boy and his brother find a million pounds tossed off a train on the eve of the switchover to euros. They only have 17 days to spend it all what do they do with it??
I enjoyed this book and heard there was a movie made of it.

Wartime Blues for the Harpers Girls by Rosie Clarke
Book 5 of series of continuing saga, now it's 1917. The war has been dragging on but this time it's more in the background, with the only shortages being of quality goods in the Harpers store. Sally, the one who married the boss, is preggers with second child and is continually described as 'lucky' while there are several repetitive telling, not showing sentences that irked me as a reader. However there's enough twists in the plot to keep one going.

Although one I thought was far fetched is a when one homeless child turns up, introduces herself to one of the Harper girls and she takes her in. What child really says 'I'm so and so, I'm five years old, I'm homeless, can I live with you?'

The next book in the series is going to be called 'Victory Bells for the Harper's Girls' which I suppose it heading towards 1918. But I just wonder how Rosie Clarke is going to handle writing about the Influenza Epidemic of 1918. Or maybe the Harper's Girls are all immune?

I recently finished listening to the audiobook version of Scientist: E. O. Wilson: A Life in Nature by Richard Rhodes. Quite interesting. I reviewed the book in my blog:
https://mypointbeing.com/2022/01/28/s...

Pacific: The Ocean of the Future by Simon Winchester

Another Simon Winchester 'hodgepodge' this time about the Pacific, though it's only from 1950s onwards, a kind of loose history in ten chapters of various events in the Pacific that took Winchester's fancy. Some of the chapters were interesting but others I skipped, and I got a bit tired of Winchester's asides and justifications as he glosses over some things while appearing to be throughly investigative on others. (Mostly regurgitating what he'd already read on another topic). Good for things I didn't know much about but I was disappointed that a book on the Pacific totally ignored New Zealand.
Australia's inept govt gets a mention, so maybe should be glad NZ was spared.

Silent Night by Danielle Steel

Danielle Steel is like a brain break for me. You know she's always going to be on the female character's side no matter what life throws at her (and that character will often be rich, attractive, or have no problem hooking up with their romantic interest at the end).

This one, I think could have done with a better title though. Not really about Christmas or nights or even silence, although the young girl at the centre of the opening tragedy (always in Danielle Steel novels, some tragic turn of events happens to begin with) is brain injured in a car accident and does not speak for a while after the trauma. But the novel is mostly about her childless aunt who then learns to be a mother and of course, finds love through her selflessness (and a man too!)

The Shattering: America in the 1960s by Kevin Boyle
4 stars


If you have read other books about the civil rights movement, or lived through the 60's, there is not much new here. If you haven't, this is a good comprehensive look at the events that led up to civil rights laws in America.

Breakfast of Champions
Kurt Vonnegut Jr.
3/5 stars
Writer Kilgore Trout who writes fiction finds out that a car dealer thinks he is writing the truth in this unusual satire. I thought I had read some Vonnegut before this book but nothing comes up in my logs. I’m not sure if I would read any more of his books though he is highly acclaimed.

The Right Time by Danielle Steel
Orphaned girl turns crime writer but has to keep her identity secret and from falling for the wrong man...typical Steel fare. I found the writing repetitive although it kept my interest I just felt the characters were a bit flat and the heroine a bit too good to be true, which annoyed me.

Nineteen Minutes by Jodi Picoult

The plot is a high school shooting..I thought maybe I had seen this scenario in the movie Heathers?!
I can't decide if its well written page turner or just confusing chick-lit. The mothers are neglectful parents. The children are horrible to each other. There's a bad romance. There's some courtroom drama. The men are weak. There's a twist at the end that doesn't really need to be twisted.

It's like a Liane Moriarty novel, but American.

Brain on Fire by Susannah Cahalan

The Lions of Fifth Avenue by Fiona Davis

A historical mystery set in the NYC public library, a family lives in an apartment inside the library as caretakers in 1913 and their granddaughter works there as a collection curator in 1993. Some rare books go missing. Who stole the books? What's not to like in this book about books and libraries?

The author wrote another novel set in the Barbizon called The Dollhouse so I'm keen to read that one too.

Lisey's Story
Stephen King
3/5 stars
Lisey Debusher's husband, Scott, a famous writer died a couple of years ago after a long marriage. Lisey continues struggling from his death and goes to place to where he fought his demons. With the help of one of her sister's, she comes to terms with her life with Scott and his death.
Not my favorite book of King's, I found it awfully long and somewhat repetitive.

Ladies Who Punch: The Explosive Inside Story of "The View" by Ramin Setoodeh
3 stars


I did not watch The View when I was working every day, so I did not know a lot about the earlier years of the show. I also don't like to watch shows where people are arguing and talking over each other so I tend to turn the channel if that happens. So I watch this show once in a while, usually if something interesting is going on. I knew there was a lot strife. That is mostly what this book is focused on. I wish there would have been a more positive tone to the book but it focuses more on the negativity. There is an update at the end of my version, which is the paperback version, but it ends when Megan McCain has just started on the show so it is a little out of date.

The Husband's Secret by Liane Moriarty

I'm now on familiar terms with the world of Liane Moriarty...bored Australian housewives, goofy men, infidelity and moral dilemmas. Usually set around a primary school and the sacrifice of innocent children thanks to neglectful parenting.

This one had 3 couples and a mystery to solve over the course of an Easter week. I thought she pulled it off this time. But I don't REALLY like to read about housewives thinking of sex all the time.

The Rest of Us Just Live Here
Patrick Ness
3/5 stars
"This" is the story of Mikey and his friends, ordinary kids living in times that are no longer ordinary. Indie students at their school are trying to prevent an Immortal invasion. Mikey does not want to accept that he is simply average but ultimately finds that having good friends is what makes life important."
https://www.supersummary.com/the-rest...
I read Ness' A Monster Calls and loved it but this book was just okay for me.

Memory By Margaret Mahy

A neighbour gave me this to read. I don't think I would have picked it myself even though I liked Margaret Mahy as a child, I wasn't that keen on her YA writing.

This one is about a 19 year old called Jonny (why does it annoy me when there's no h in his name??) who's sister fell to her death 5 years ago. He goes back to trace his steps to her old school friend but ends up at the wrong address and falling in with an old lady called Sophie who lives by herself and has Alzheimers.

At first I thought this is all wildly improbable (and why would someone just randomly fall off a cliff, plus, what's with all the 'Pythoness' talk?) but despite this dubious set up, Mahy wins me over with her descriptive storytelling.

Shelf Respect by Annie Austen

A book for book lovers...but why did it not mention Shelfari??
Otherwise yes. Preaching to the choir here.

Selina wrote: "Shelf Respect by Annie Austen

A book for book lovers...but why did it not mention Shelfari??
Otherwise yes. Preaching to the choir here."

Interesting title. Looks like there are some good questions for discussion.