Barefoot by Elin Hilderbrand
Two sisters and one friend arrive on Nantucket ready to spend the summer sorting through a laundry list of emotional issues. Melanie’s pregnant – but just discovered her husband has been cheating on her. Brenda was fired from her dream job as a college professor after her affair with a student was discovered. Vickie, mother to two small boys, has been diagnosed with cancer. Then there’s Josh, who the women hire to help with babysitting, but he ends up being handy at a whole lot more.
Perhaps since it was the dead of winter and I was mooning for the sea and sunshine and summer, this shallow chick-lit novel – which is what it was -- well, it wasn’t so bad.
Julie & Julia: My Year of Cooking Dangerously
by Julie Powell
Julie Powell did a very cool thing. She resolved to -- in the span of a single year -- cook every one of the 524 recipes in Julia Child's legendary Mastering the Art of French Cooking. That’s a whole lot of weird French food! She started a blog about the experience and her witty style attracted a lot of readers and an unexpected reward: global news coverage and a book deal -- to say nothing of a new-found respect for decent kitchen gadget’s and aspic.
Former temp girl makes good. What a great story. And yes, it’s a great book.
Midnight at the Dragon Café by Judy Fong Bates
The quintessential Chinese restaurant – it’s a fixture in every small to medium town in America. Ever wonder what goes on upstairs in the living quarters where the quintessential Chinese family lives? Well, here’s one version and it’s a doozey. Set in the 1960s, this is the story of Su-Jen and the hard life behind the scenes at the Dragon Café. Judy Fong Bates writes beautifully, and paints a vivid portrait of a childhood torn between two cultures and unspoken secrets.
The Hour I First Believed by Wally Lamb
This is Lamb’s first book since the Jurassic age and I was really looking forward to it.
I was immediately pulled in to Caelem and Maureen’s life. They were both teachers at Columbine High School, and Maureen was in the library on that fateful day. Unable to get past the trauma, they move back to the family farm in Connecticut. Soon after, Caelum discovers a file cabinet full of old diaries, letters, and newspaper clippings in an upstairs bedroom. Five generations of his family ancestors, from the Civil War era to Caelum’s own strange childhood spring to life. Sounds great huh? It’s more than enough, right? Unfortunately Wally Lamb didn’t think so and added so many more twists and turns and characters that it made this book read like a mini-series gone bad.
1.18.2009
12.28.2008
Books Read November 2008
She’s Come Undone by Wally Lamb
Dolores Price is the only child of Bernice and Tony – both of whom continually disappoint and mentally abuse little Delores. Of course they’re dealing with a chorus of their own demons, so when Dad hits the road and Mom lands in a mental hospital; Dolores goes to live with Grandma in Rhode Island. Life is still crap so she tries to eat herself happy. Along the way she’s raped by her Grandmothers tenant, makes friends with the local tattoo artist, and somehow gets to college -- only to become a go-fer for her perfect roommate. Delores ends up stealing said perfect room-mates boyfriend years later but revenge isn’t what it’s cracked up to be.
In anticipation of Lamb’s new release (The Hour I First Believed) I re-read She’s Come Undone. It was good but not nearly as good as I remember way back when. This brings to mind that saying, something about not putting your foot in the same river twice.
Skeleton’s at the Feast by Chris Bohjalian
Set during the final months of World War II, an interesting group of people attempt to cross through the Third Reich, from Warsaw to the Rhine to reach the British and American lines. There’s eighteen-year-old Anna Emmerich, the daughter of Prussian aristocrats, her lover, Callum Finella, a twenty-year-old Scottish prisoner of war who was a forced laborer on her family’s farm. And there’s the mysterious twenty-six-year-old Manfred, a Wehrmacht corporal–who’s really Uri Singer, a Jew from Germany who managed to escape a train bound for Auschwitz. A powerful story, and completely different from Bohjalian’s previous work I might add. A war story with a different spin but same lesson -- war doesn’t determine who’s right, just who’s left. Can you say: “Hollywood screen-play?”
The Ethics of What We Eat by Peter Singer & Jim Mason
A really awesome book and whew, none too soon. It may sound text-book-y. It. Is. Not. The book follows three families (bargain shopper, an organic shopper, and a vegan shopper) as they make their food choices, traces back to where the food comes from, how it was raised, who raised it, how the food affects the family, and how those food choices affect the entire world!.
Unless you’ve been living under a rock for the past few years, you know that unclean, unethical and horrifying farming practices are what are wrapped up in those nicely packaged cuts of beef, chicken and pork sitting in your grocery store. Singer and Mason take it a step further and give us reason to consider their origins, and how we can use our consumer dollars for change. I thought I knew quite a bit about this subject-- but holy hamburger, this book is the bomb. And for all you locavores out there -- some of their findings are not what you’d expect.
We Bought a Zoo: The Amazing True Story of a Young Family, a Broken Down Zoo, and the 200 Animals That Changed Their Lives Forever by Benjamin Mee
This is the true story of spunky Benjamin Mee and his family who (with Grandma’s entire life savings) buy a rundown zoo in the English countryside. Mee had a dream to refurbish the zoo and run it as a family business. Of course that’s easier said than done especially when you have absolutely no zoo experience. What were they thinking? The book traces the journey which is equal parts humor (to his children: “Quiet. Daddy’s trying to buy a zoo.”), part head scratcher (dangerous animals escape regularly) part magical (the Dartmoor Wildlife Park opens to rave reviews) and part heart-breaker (Mee’s wife dies of glioblastoma.)Hey, this isn’t the next great British novel, but it’s a good, fast read and more than anything I admire someone who focuses on how to achieve a dream instead of coping out and not trying. Think of all the people who die not even having tried.
Wesley the Owl: The Remarkable Love Story of an Owl and His Girl by Stacey O’Brien
Ah, yes it must be animal month at Inside the Book – because here’s another true animal story. It’s Valentine's Day 1985. Wesley the owlet is only four days old when he’s adopted by biologist Stacey O'Brien. She unselfishly commits to giving him a home for life which means among other things -- feeding him more than 28,000 mice over Wesley’s 19 year life-span! At the time O’Brien’s working at Caltech in a kind of scientific Hogwarts, where owls fly from office to office and brilliant scientists study animals. Although Wesley has nerve damage and can’t fly, O'Brien makes important discoveries about owl behavior, intelligence, and communication. She talks about "The Way of the Owl" to describe Wesley’s unconditional love, loyalty and trust. O’Brien’s photos are almost as good as the story, but of course the story is thoroughly engaging, heartwarming, and funny.
Wind, Sand and Stars by Antoine de Saint-Exupery
Hasn’t everybody read Saint-Exupery’s The Little Prince? (If you haven’t, don’t admit it just read it – it takes all of an hour.) So, when I realized his book Wind, Sand, and Stars had been recently named to National Geographic's "Top Ten Adventure Books of All Time" I had to get on the bandwagon. Even though it’s billed as an “adventure book,” it’s got a quiet, thoughtful pace, and brings to mind Beryl Markham’s West with the Night. And perhaps the greatest surprise of all? On page 288 the question of who wrote one of my favorite quotes was revealed because there it was: “Life has taught us that love does not consist in gazing at each other but in looking outward together in the same direction.” NatGeo got it right – it’s a classic written by a great adventurer.
FYI -- Saint-Exupery, born in Lyon, France in 1900 was known as the "Winged Poet." He took his first flight at age eleven and became a pilot at twenty-six. He was a pioneer of commercial aviation and flew in the Spanish Civil War and World War II. He wrote The Little Prince, Wind, Sand and Stars, Night Flight, Southern Mail, and Airman's Odyssey. In 1944, while serving with a French air squadron, he disappeared during a flight over the Mediterranean.
Dolores Price is the only child of Bernice and Tony – both of whom continually disappoint and mentally abuse little Delores. Of course they’re dealing with a chorus of their own demons, so when Dad hits the road and Mom lands in a mental hospital; Dolores goes to live with Grandma in Rhode Island. Life is still crap so she tries to eat herself happy. Along the way she’s raped by her Grandmothers tenant, makes friends with the local tattoo artist, and somehow gets to college -- only to become a go-fer for her perfect roommate. Delores ends up stealing said perfect room-mates boyfriend years later but revenge isn’t what it’s cracked up to be.
In anticipation of Lamb’s new release (The Hour I First Believed) I re-read She’s Come Undone. It was good but not nearly as good as I remember way back when. This brings to mind that saying, something about not putting your foot in the same river twice.
Skeleton’s at the Feast by Chris Bohjalian
Set during the final months of World War II, an interesting group of people attempt to cross through the Third Reich, from Warsaw to the Rhine to reach the British and American lines. There’s eighteen-year-old Anna Emmerich, the daughter of Prussian aristocrats, her lover, Callum Finella, a twenty-year-old Scottish prisoner of war who was a forced laborer on her family’s farm. And there’s the mysterious twenty-six-year-old Manfred, a Wehrmacht corporal–who’s really Uri Singer, a Jew from Germany who managed to escape a train bound for Auschwitz. A powerful story, and completely different from Bohjalian’s previous work I might add. A war story with a different spin but same lesson -- war doesn’t determine who’s right, just who’s left. Can you say: “Hollywood screen-play?”
The Ethics of What We Eat by Peter Singer & Jim Mason
A really awesome book and whew, none too soon. It may sound text-book-y. It. Is. Not. The book follows three families (bargain shopper, an organic shopper, and a vegan shopper) as they make their food choices, traces back to where the food comes from, how it was raised, who raised it, how the food affects the family, and how those food choices affect the entire world!.
Unless you’ve been living under a rock for the past few years, you know that unclean, unethical and horrifying farming practices are what are wrapped up in those nicely packaged cuts of beef, chicken and pork sitting in your grocery store. Singer and Mason take it a step further and give us reason to consider their origins, and how we can use our consumer dollars for change. I thought I knew quite a bit about this subject-- but holy hamburger, this book is the bomb. And for all you locavores out there -- some of their findings are not what you’d expect.
We Bought a Zoo: The Amazing True Story of a Young Family, a Broken Down Zoo, and the 200 Animals That Changed Their Lives Forever by Benjamin Mee
This is the true story of spunky Benjamin Mee and his family who (with Grandma’s entire life savings) buy a rundown zoo in the English countryside. Mee had a dream to refurbish the zoo and run it as a family business. Of course that’s easier said than done especially when you have absolutely no zoo experience. What were they thinking? The book traces the journey which is equal parts humor (to his children: “Quiet. Daddy’s trying to buy a zoo.”), part head scratcher (dangerous animals escape regularly) part magical (the Dartmoor Wildlife Park opens to rave reviews) and part heart-breaker (Mee’s wife dies of glioblastoma.)Hey, this isn’t the next great British novel, but it’s a good, fast read and more than anything I admire someone who focuses on how to achieve a dream instead of coping out and not trying. Think of all the people who die not even having tried.
Wesley the Owl: The Remarkable Love Story of an Owl and His Girl by Stacey O’Brien
Ah, yes it must be animal month at Inside the Book – because here’s another true animal story. It’s Valentine's Day 1985. Wesley the owlet is only four days old when he’s adopted by biologist Stacey O'Brien. She unselfishly commits to giving him a home for life which means among other things -- feeding him more than 28,000 mice over Wesley’s 19 year life-span! At the time O’Brien’s working at Caltech in a kind of scientific Hogwarts, where owls fly from office to office and brilliant scientists study animals. Although Wesley has nerve damage and can’t fly, O'Brien makes important discoveries about owl behavior, intelligence, and communication. She talks about "The Way of the Owl" to describe Wesley’s unconditional love, loyalty and trust. O’Brien’s photos are almost as good as the story, but of course the story is thoroughly engaging, heartwarming, and funny.
Wind, Sand and Stars by Antoine de Saint-Exupery
Hasn’t everybody read Saint-Exupery’s The Little Prince? (If you haven’t, don’t admit it just read it – it takes all of an hour.) So, when I realized his book Wind, Sand, and Stars had been recently named to National Geographic's "Top Ten Adventure Books of All Time" I had to get on the bandwagon. Even though it’s billed as an “adventure book,” it’s got a quiet, thoughtful pace, and brings to mind Beryl Markham’s West with the Night. And perhaps the greatest surprise of all? On page 288 the question of who wrote one of my favorite quotes was revealed because there it was: “Life has taught us that love does not consist in gazing at each other but in looking outward together in the same direction.” NatGeo got it right – it’s a classic written by a great adventurer.
FYI -- Saint-Exupery, born in Lyon, France in 1900 was known as the "Winged Poet." He took his first flight at age eleven and became a pilot at twenty-six. He was a pioneer of commercial aviation and flew in the Spanish Civil War and World War II. He wrote The Little Prince, Wind, Sand and Stars, Night Flight, Southern Mail, and Airman's Odyssey. In 1944, while serving with a French air squadron, he disappeared during a flight over the Mediterranean.
11.28.2008
Books Read October 2008
Flying Changes by Sara Gruen
Annemarie Zimmer's is kind of a neurotic scaredy cat. She worries about her relationship, her daughter Eva's dreams of riding a horse to Olympic glory, and her own demons of a horrible riding accident long ago. This woman just can’t make peace with her past and lets it ruin her present.
Sara Gruen’s Water for Elephants was a real gem, so I decided to try one of her earlier works. Sorry Sara, but although Flying Changes was written well, the story was dusty and nothing very special. I’ve got high hopes for her new book Ape House, due out spring 2009.
The Garden of Last Days by Andre Dubus III
April is a stripper with a problem – what to do with her three-year old daughter when the usual babysitter ends up in the hospital. Gee, instead of taking the night off and letting somebody else make a few bucks, she decides to have her daughter watch children's videos in the office while she works. Of course something’s gotta’ go wrong at the Puma Club for Men – like er, her daughter goes missing! Could it be the disgruntled patron, the quirky foreigner with loads of money to burn, or some random pedophile? The story is set weeks and days before 9-11, and I felt the same psychological tension, and realism that Dubus's mastered in his previous book House of Sand and Fog — but the ending was weak-weak-weak.
The Good Thief by Hannah Tinti
Twelve year-old Ren was left at the Saint Anthony Orpahnage when he was just an infant. He grew up wondering what events could have lead his Mother to abandon him -- especially since he has tangible proof that she loved him dearly. Like all the residents at the orphanage he longs for a home and parents. But once prospective parents see he’s missing his left hand, well, he’s passed over. Miraculously one day a man appears claiming to be his long-lost brother. So, it’s off with his brother and soon he’s introduced to a world of scam artists and petty thieves. The “brothers” end up in the lucrative, if not messy, business of robbing graves – which is difficult for the pious Ren to cope with.
Wow what a story-line! I thought I’d found a great read because the first half was so intriguing. Unfortunately the story ran out of steam and by the last chapter I was really disappointed.
The Plague of Doves by Louise Erdrich
O.K. this is what I’m pretty sure of… there’s an unsolved murder in the small off-reservation town of Pluto, North Dakota. The Ojibwe tribe, living on the nearby reservation, and the people of Pluto are at odds for the next generation over this travesty -- even though there are some inner-marriages and their lives intertwine. Everything else is sort of a blur. Maybe I should have taken notes. Help! Is there a Cliff Notes on this book??
Louise Erdrich's is one of my favorite writers and this is her first book in almost three years – but it addles my brain. I honestly don’t think a reader should have to work that hard to keep characters and plot straight. Maybe in college, but not pleasure reading.
Annemarie Zimmer's is kind of a neurotic scaredy cat. She worries about her relationship, her daughter Eva's dreams of riding a horse to Olympic glory, and her own demons of a horrible riding accident long ago. This woman just can’t make peace with her past and lets it ruin her present.
Sara Gruen’s Water for Elephants was a real gem, so I decided to try one of her earlier works. Sorry Sara, but although Flying Changes was written well, the story was dusty and nothing very special. I’ve got high hopes for her new book Ape House, due out spring 2009.
The Garden of Last Days by Andre Dubus III
April is a stripper with a problem – what to do with her three-year old daughter when the usual babysitter ends up in the hospital. Gee, instead of taking the night off and letting somebody else make a few bucks, she decides to have her daughter watch children's videos in the office while she works. Of course something’s gotta’ go wrong at the Puma Club for Men – like er, her daughter goes missing! Could it be the disgruntled patron, the quirky foreigner with loads of money to burn, or some random pedophile? The story is set weeks and days before 9-11, and I felt the same psychological tension, and realism that Dubus's mastered in his previous book House of Sand and Fog — but the ending was weak-weak-weak.
The Good Thief by Hannah Tinti
Twelve year-old Ren was left at the Saint Anthony Orpahnage when he was just an infant. He grew up wondering what events could have lead his Mother to abandon him -- especially since he has tangible proof that she loved him dearly. Like all the residents at the orphanage he longs for a home and parents. But once prospective parents see he’s missing his left hand, well, he’s passed over. Miraculously one day a man appears claiming to be his long-lost brother. So, it’s off with his brother and soon he’s introduced to a world of scam artists and petty thieves. The “brothers” end up in the lucrative, if not messy, business of robbing graves – which is difficult for the pious Ren to cope with.
Wow what a story-line! I thought I’d found a great read because the first half was so intriguing. Unfortunately the story ran out of steam and by the last chapter I was really disappointed.
The Plague of Doves by Louise Erdrich
O.K. this is what I’m pretty sure of… there’s an unsolved murder in the small off-reservation town of Pluto, North Dakota. The Ojibwe tribe, living on the nearby reservation, and the people of Pluto are at odds for the next generation over this travesty -- even though there are some inner-marriages and their lives intertwine. Everything else is sort of a blur. Maybe I should have taken notes. Help! Is there a Cliff Notes on this book??
Louise Erdrich's is one of my favorite writers and this is her first book in almost three years – but it addles my brain. I honestly don’t think a reader should have to work that hard to keep characters and plot straight. Maybe in college, but not pleasure reading.
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