BOOK: Broken for You by Stephanie Kallos

Broken for You by Stephanie Kallos, 372 pages

TBR Lite; 20-10 Challenge: Charity book

I originally heard of this book at Literary Feline, when she named it one of her favorite books of 2007. I've been planning, and meaning to read this for over 2 years. I wasn't disappointed. It's a wonderfully layered book, with themes of family, and healing, and atonement.

Plot outline:
When Margaret, a reclusive Seattle resident, discovers she has a brain tumor, she takes the opportunity to make some changes. She decides to take boarders into her large mansion, full of stuff. Her first boarder, Wanda, is chasing after her ex-boyfriend. They strike up an unlikely, but lovely friendship. Margaret and Wanda develop and change as their friendship grows, each giving the other what she needs.

The book is filled with many wonderful characters who were a part of, or enter the women's lives. The layers of meaning in the title, broken, culminate with the mosaic works that Wanda makes with smashed pieces of Margaret's china collection, which is beautiful. What else does the book have? Some ghosts, some Holocaust survivor's, some very broken people, some timely coincidences, and people meeting other people who can add to and improve their lives, and then they do.

My only quibble is that I hate reading about dreams in books. The book itself is full of symbols and motifs, why is it necessary to show Margaret's dreams as her illness progresses? Dreams are so random, and you can get any meaning out of them you like. It's not just in books; I never understand why people will tell you all about the dream they had last night. It's either completely random and meaningless, or else they are sharing parts of their psych that I really don't want to see.

Speaking of coincidences and to end on a better note. I was looking in my google reader for some other reviews to link to, and I found a review posted by Dewey of the hidden side of the leaf from November 2007. Her blog isn't available anymore, but her feed is still there and will show up on my occasional searches. It's a bittersweet thing, (Dewey died in 2008) but nice to come across. Like Margaret, Dewey was about building a community around her. Plus, she didn't like the dream sequences either! She had the following quote from the book,

“Look then at the faces and bodies of people you love, the explicit beauty that comes not from smoothness of skin or neutrality of expression, but from the web of experience that has left its mark. Each face, each body is its own living fossilized record. A record of cats, combatants, difficult births; of accidents, cruelties, blessings. Reminders of folly, greed, indiscretion, impatience. A moment of time, of memory, preserved, internalized, and enshrined within and upon the body. You need not be told that these records are what render your beloved beautiful.”


also reviewed at:
carriek at books and movies
small world reads
3m at onemorechapter

BOOK: She Got Up Off the Couch by Haven Kimmel

She Got Up Off the Couch by Haven Kimmel, 304 pages
and Other Heroic Acts from Mooreland, Indiana

TBR Lite; Women Unbound

If you haven't read Kimmel's first memoir, A Girl Named Zippy: Growing Up Small in Mooreland, Indiana, you should go get that book and read it. Let me share a snippet of She Got Up's introduction, and if you find this humorous at all, you will like these books.

Kimmel is describing the publishing of her first book.



I turned around one day and the book was taken on by a publisher and then it had a cover - and I am talking about the most unfortunate cover imaginable: me as a six-month-old baby, wearing a dress my mother made. I was a tragic little monkey child: bald, with the kind of ears that look fine on woodland creatures but in human culture tend to be corrected surgically. I was holding Mom's watch, which was dripping with drool, as I was teething. I'm sorry, I need to say this all again. On the cover of the book was my cross-eyed monkey baby picture, holding a drool-drenched watch. ... thus did A Girl Named Zippy skitter out into the world, and thus was my self-respect laid to rest.

I just love Kimmel's voice. She narrates the story of her life as she saw it as a child, and she was a bit of an unusual child. She has a way of describing feelings and events as a child sees and feels them, and putting into words these huge, dramatic thoughts. Zippy hated shoes, but is forced to wear a pair of sandals for a family event. The sandals had a flower on them, which made them ten times worse, so she tries to destroy them. Suddenly, the shoes become a part of her feet and then she doesn't mind them, but she can't admit that, barely even to herself. She's not supposed to like shoes!

This sequel is a bit darker, as Zippy is growing up and becoming more aware of her surroundings and the lives of her family members, beyond how it affects her.

The 'she' referred to in the title is her mother, who spends the first book on the couch, reading. In the second book, coinciding with the second wave of feminism in the early 70s, her mother got up, learned to drive a car, and attended university.

Zippy says to her Mom - "Actually, my only plan was to sit and chat with you."
"Do you remember," Mom asked, turning a page of the paper she was grading, "what I used to say before napping?"
Of course I did, it was [rule] number seven. " 'I'll be asleep if you need me, so try not to need me.' "

I absolutely have not done this book credit in this review for the enjoyment I received. I guffawed aloud several times, and one time I tried to read a funny line to my daughter, and I couldn't get it out, I started laughing so hard.

BOOK: Poppy Shakespeare by Clare Allan

Poppy Shakespeare by Clare Allan, 341 pages

TBR Lite; Orange January (shortlist, new author 2007)

I first heard of Poppy Shakespeare in Shakespeare Wrote for Money, one of Nick Hornby's essay books, and I made note. Several years later, it's my first complete book of 2010, to kick off Orange January.

It's a look into the mental illness world in England. I think it makes lots of statements about who belongs in institutions, what exactly makes someone crazy, the decisions made within the mental illness infrastructure. The story is narrated by N, a product of the system she proudly proclaims, starting when Poppy Shakespeare enters their Institution, the Dorothy Fish day center. N and Poppy are Dribblers, not as serious as the Flops, who are inpatient, while the Dribblers live on their own and spend time in the center. There is always a hierarchy.

N is a lifer, who never wants to leave, and has trouble understanding why Poppy doesn't want to stay, but N is chosen to help Poppy get around the place. By having N narrate, all the facts that are presented must be examined carefully, and really, the reader must read between the lines. The dialogue is rough, and slang, but I had no problem following it. It is ultimately very sad amidst the humor, and makes you wonder who is crazy and who isn't.

Weren't nobody else in the world, he said, not Astrid Arsewipe - couldn't argue with that - not Middle-Class Michael, not no one at all, alive or dead or both or neither, known as much about dribbling as I did. page 2

BOOK: The Nine Lives of Charlotte Taylor by Sally Armstrong

The Nine Lives of Charlotte Taylor by Sally Armstrong, 390 pages

Women Unbound Challenge; TBR Lite; Canadian Book Challenge

Sally Armstrong was always fascinated by her great-great-great-great-grandmother. Charlotte Taylor was legendary in their family - running away from England with the family butler, landing in Canada as the only English woman in the Miracmichi, the rumors of her love with a local native man, the many husbands she buried, the twelve children she raised. As she investigated into Charlotte's life, she made some conjectures about where she might have gone and how she lived. Since Charlotte lived in the late 1700s, there wasn't a ton of information. But combining family legend with known information, she has written a wonderful tribute to an amazing lady.

It is published as fiction, but it is, as they say, based on a true story. The Miramichi is in northern New Brunswick, still a generally wildish type area, based on my own prejudices and stereotypes. Armstrong writes a fascinating story, showing the reader what life was like for the early settlers in Canada. Not easy to be a woman, but Charlotte was the type of woman who thrived in a pioneer setting. She was able to make decisions that helped her (the men to marry) and then pick up herself was bad things happened (she buried several husbands.) Through it all, she was determined to own her land and defend her family. She maintained friendships with the Mi'kmaq, and Armstrong shows the poor treatment the natives received.

For those interested in historical fiction- a Canadian view of the deportation of the Acadians, the settlement by the English and the Loyalists from the States (the American Revolution crept into Canada since the British were still ruling here), the treatment of the Mi'kmaq, this is a great book. Besides this broad view, the specific life of Charlotte Taylor was remarkable, as one woman living in the wilds of New Brunswick maintained her family and built a legacy.

CHALLENGE: TBR Lite 2010

Hosted by jen at MizB's Reading Challenge

You have your choice of ONE of the 3 options:

OPTION A: read 6 books in 12 months ~ your list of books CANNOT be changed, but you are allowed to have an “Alternates” list to choose from (like in the Original TBR Challenge).

OPTION B: read 6 books in 12 months ~ you CAN change your reading list throughout the year

OPTION C: make up a list of however many books you think you could get read in 12 months, as long as they are from your TBR stack/list, and then read them between January 1st and December 31st. You must have at least 3 books on your list.

Some Other General Guidelines:

• You are allowed to overlap with other challenges


• Audiobooks are allowed


• e-Books are allowed, but must still be books that you’ve wanted to read for at least 3, or more, months


• You should still have a list of books posted somewhere for others to see


• You don’t have to read your books in the order you put them on your list

Here's my list:

1. Poppy Shakespeare - Clare Allan Jan 3/10
   


2. Book of Negroes - Lawrence Hill Mar 12/10
   


3. Broken for You - Stephanie Kallos Mar 5/10
   


4. Molakai - Alan Brennart


5. She Got Up Off the Couch - Haven Kimmel Feb 11/10
   


6. Lost Highway - David Adam Richards

And the alternates:

• Man Gone Down - Michael Thomas
  


• Miss Julia Meets Her Match - Ann Ross
  


• The Well of Lost Plots - Jasper Fforde
  


• The Last King of Scotland - Giles Foden
  


• Love Walked In - Maria del Santos
  


• Vernon God Little - DB Pierre Feb25/10
  

BOOK: Special Topics in Calamity Physics by Marisha Pessl

Title and Author of Book?
Special Topics in Calamity Physics by Marisha Pessl, 514 pages

Fiction or non-fiction? Genre?

fiction

What led you to pick up this book?
I heard of this book over two years ago when the title caught my fancy. For the non-physics fans out there, there is no physics in the book. It was one of the NY Times Notable Books in 2006.

More recently, I picked it because it was on my TBR Lite Challenge list, and Marisha Pessl was born in October, making it a perfect book for Celebrate the Author.

Summarize the plot, but don't give away the ending!
Blue van Meer, college student, is writing a book about her last year in high school. Her childhood has been spent all over America as her political/philosophical Professor father moves from college to college. She makes friends with a pretentious group of students and an unbalanced and sketchy teacher at her newest school.

What did you like most about the book?
The final 100 pages made up for a slow middle section. I liked the way the plot evolved in the end and all the events and references from earlier were explained.
The literature references were fun, and the final exam at the end was a very unique way to tie up the book and give some perspective on events and characters in the book.
The writing was smart and chockful of information, historical, factual, and literature.

What did you like least?
I lost interest in the middle of the book as the mystery was still far off.
The continual allusions and references got a bit tiring after a while.
Blue's dependence and admiration of her father were a bit creepy.

Have you read any other books by this author? What did you think of those books?
This is her only book published.

What did you think of the main character?
Blue was a unique voice, very educated. At times she seemed conflicted between her tremendous intellect and understanding of characters, with her obvious lack of ability to interact with people. She never knew what to do or say, but she could think and analyse everybody.

Any other particularly interesting characters?
Everyone was interesting, from Hannah the teacher, to the Bluebloods, Blue's friends.

Share a quote from the book:
Love or, more accurately, infatuation ("Take as much care with words expressing your sentiments as you will crafting your doctoral dissertation," Dad said.) was one of those no-good drifter emotions. (page 390)

The girl…nervously bared her long and pointy teeth (see ‘Venus Flytrap,’ North American Flora, Starnes, 1989).

What about the ending?

The ending was very good. I was ready for it about 150 earlier, but the payoff was very good.

Which of your readers are most likely to enjoy this book? Why?

It's a NY Times Notable Book, so people who like listed books would like it. It's a coming of age story as well, and lots of literature references.




Marisha Pessl was born October 26, 1977.

BOOK: In the Company of the Courtesan by Sarah Dunant

In the Company of the Courtesan by Sarah Dunant, 400 pages

TBR Lite Challenge; celebrate the author

I loved Dunant's The Birth of Venus many years ago, and excitedly bought her sequel to read. The poor book languished on my shelf for several years, always going to be read next, but ultimately overlooked. So finally, I read Dunant's second book as her newest book, Sacred Hearts is making its rounds of the blogosphere, to rave reviews. So I feel like I am with it, reviewing a hot author, I'm only three years behind in the book I should be reviewing.



What I liked about the first book was the setting: 1400s in Florence, a city I was about to visit. Having read about the burning of the bonfires of the vanities, and then visiting the city was an amazing experience. In the Company of the Courtesan is set in 1500s Venice, and the descriptions of the canals and the city are fabulous again. On my Mediterranean trip, we ended out cruise in Venice and spent a wonderful day there, and this book has brought all those wonderful memories of Venice, and glass, and churches all back. Even back in the 1500s, the water in Venice is both beautiful and disgusting. But the city in some ways hasn't changed, and it was easy to imagine being there again.




For me, the setting was really the big part of the book. The story, narrated by Bucino, the courtesan's dwarf, was interesting, but not terribly plot driven. Most of the novel is the description of life in Venice, for the Courtesan, trying to make it in her birth city, after being driven out of Rome by the fighting. A cast of colorful characters are kept in line by Bucino, but it wasn't until the last one hundred pages that some twists happened that had me scurrying through to the end.

I liked that it wasn't a bodice ripper, with wild scenes, even though it was about a courtesan. It was more about the dwarf, and how he managed to make a life for himself, with power and money, at a time it couldn't have been easy.

That's me on the left with my sister. Oh, I'd love to go back to Italy! For now, I am left with reading great stories that take me back there, if only in my head for a while.

BOOK: The Sister by Poppy Adams

The Sister by Poppy Adams, 275 pages

What's in a Name?: relative; 2009 TBR lite; DeweyBooks

If the measure of a book is how much it makes you think, then this book was great. There are several aspects to it: the behaviour of moths (the title this book is known by in the UK), the relationship amongst a fairly dysfunctional family, and the narrator herself.

The moths and their behavior is the family specialty, and the narrator, Virginia, has devoted her life to their study. The story begins with Virginia's sister, Vivien, returning to the family home after over 45 years away, with no contact at all. Why hasn't Vivien kept in contact with Virgina in all those years? Ginny's routine will be severely affected here, and it causes her to remember back on her life beginning during and after the second world war, at the time of her sister's birth. We travel back and forth between past and present, and some rather dramatic events, all of which we begin to see through Ginnie's rather suspect view of things. She continually states she is a scientist, and only looks at the facts, which covers up her lack of emotion and feeling.

Fairly early on, I gathered that the narrator was not all there, and that her view of events was severely restricted by whatever disorder she had. It felt like something was kept from her, and I would have liked to hear more from Vivien's point of view. But maybe it was not knowing what really happened that kept the story interesting; it is up to the reader to decide what really happened. I liked trying to see the parallels between the moths and Virginia, whereas I imagine many people skim over the moth stuff. It does get a bit tedious, and only the game of trying to see why it was written there kept me into that part of it. And that is why I think this book was so good: it really engaged me and had me trying to read between the lines.

The idea of the unreliable narrator, when I can recognize it, generally makes a book I will like. In ways I cannot particularly quantify, it reminded me of The Interloper, The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night-Time, and ??( there's another one that's not coming to me now, something British, with remembering). I read a few reviews that found the ending ambiguous, but I liked the ending, and thought it made sense, for Virginia.

BOOK: Then We Came to the End by Joshua Ferris

Then We Came to the End by Joshua Ferris, 385 pages

TBR Lite 2009

We really enjoyed this book, but we haven't read many (any?) books written in the first person plural, and it was surprisingly effective. It epitomized the group think that develops in an office, the culture of a staff.

Our business was advertising and details were important. If the third number after the second hyphen in a client's toll-free number was a six instead of an eight, and if it went to print like that, and showed up in Time magazine, no one reading the ad could call now and order today. No matter they could go to the website, we still had to eat the price of the ad. Is this boring you yet? It bored us every day. (page 3)

I knew I'd like this book after I encountered this line on the first page and I ha!ed out loud. It just tickled my funny bone, all the way through. Then the email that got sent by Marcia to "all" instead of just Genevieve, "It's really irritating to work with irritating people," which went around the office faster than the flu and led people to comment to Marcia continuously about it. You know, if you have worked with anyone at all, how those type of things never die.

In the beginning, it just seemed like stories and situations, and I wasn't sure how much I would read of these, albeit funny stories, but no apparent plot. Close to the middle though, a plot emerged, and the book really took off, as the tone changed a bit. Breast cancer can do that. Ferris was able to continue with the funny even with a much more depressing topic. Ferris is a very talented writer.

If you've worked in a cubicle, or an ad agency, or with other people nearby, if you enjoy quirky humor, if you like reading about the interactions of groups, this book is for you. If you love your work, or hate your job, you'll find something to relate to.

BOOK: Cloud Atlas by David Mitchell

Cloud Atlas by David Mitchell, 509 pages

tbr lite, 1% well read


Six stories, stacked within each other like Russian dolls, through time past and present. Or six movements of a musical composition, with connecting themes and overlapping characters. The overall idea and execution of Mitchell's novel worked better for me than the individual pieces. I preferred some stories and characters and writing to others. But the idea that he develops is quite amazing. As the music is described in one section: In the first set, each solo is interrupted by its successor; in the second, each interruption is recontinued, in order. Revolutionary or gimmicky?
Exactly.

There were parts of each that I really liked. From Adam Ewing's diary, I enjoyed the musings on social strata among the races and why some people were conquered. A little history from the Southern Pacific Chatham Islands was interesting. From the Letters from Zedelghem, I liked the connection of characters to Black Swan Green, another book of Mitchell's I enjoyed. Luisa Rey's Mystery was a good old fashioned mystery with espionage and adventure.

The writing in Timothy Cavendish's Ghastly Ordeal was the easiest to read but the story was not as interesting." The Orison of Sonmi-451" was my favorite story. Set in a futuristic corpocracy in Korea, a breakdown in this dystopian world is investigated. The use of words and ideas extended from now to this imagined future was pretty cool. "Sloosh'a Crossin' An' Ev'rythin' After" was the center story, the smallest Russian doll of the book. It was toughest to read with the dialect and bastardization of the English language, and although it slowed me down, it was very well done. Trying to see how it connected to the rest was the best part of this story.

This was nominated for the Man Booker Prize in 2004 and I am surprised it didn't win, if only for the imaginative and ambitious writing. It is such a different book, and while I didn't love it, it will stay with me for a while, thinking of the connections and way the stories layered.

CHALLENGE: 2009 TBR Lite

For those of you who felt too much "pressure" with the TBR challenge, Jenn has created another option for you. The TBR Lite Challenge for 2009 is designed to get readers to read from their TBR mountains.
You have your choice of ONE of the 3 options:
OPTION A: read 6 books in 12 months ~ your list of books CANNOT be changed, but you are allowed to have an “Alternates” list to choose from (like in the Original TBR Challenge).

This is a challenge that looked much too intimidating to me over the years, but the 'lite' version may be just right. I usually put these books on lists for other challenges but they never get read, so if they get put on a challenge, maybe that will help. I'm going with the locked in version, because I really want to read these books, but I hold out no hope of actually completing this challenge.

Books I've bought but haven't read in about a year:

1. Cloud Atlas David Mitchell Jan 24/09


2. Special Topics in Calamity Physics by Marisha Pessl Oct 18/09


3. Then We Came to the End Joshua Ferris May 12/09
   


4. In the Company of the Courtesan by Sarah Dunant Aug 23/09
   


5. With No One as a Witness by Elizabeth George


6. Lost Highway by David Adams Richards

alternates: (books from the generous blogosphere)

Captain Corelli's Mandolin from bethany

The Sister by Poppy Adams, from Trish July 2/09

Oak Leaves from framed

The Last Single Girl in America from bookfool

A Conspiracy of Papers from bybee

The Nine Lives of Charlotte Taylor by Sally Armstrong from Becky