CHALLENGE: Notable Book Challenge, Update

A Short History of a Reading Challenge:

Once upon a time, I met some bloggers who read books. All the books I liked to read - the ones you find on lists. I haven't decided if it's the books I like, or just checking off the lists, either way, I am having fun. Way back in once upon a time 2007, Wendy, at caribousmom, organized a challenge to read a number of books from the NY Times Notable Book list. *Historical note: She was probably one of the first people to set up a blog specifically for a challenge. She invited participants to post reviews to the group blog. I tiptoed around, reading their reviews, reading some of the books, and then finally getting brave enough to join in all the fun. I read a great group of books from the list that year:

• Half of a Yellow Sun - Aldichie *best of this list*
  
• The Echo Maker - Richard Powers
• The Translator - Leila Aboulela
• Arthur and George - Julien Barnes
• The Road - Cormac McCarthy
• Alentejo Blue - Monica Ali
• One Good Turn - Kate Atkinson

The next year, 2008, wendy expanded the challenge to include notable book lists from several sources besides NY Times. She made another blog, with all the lists available. Lots more people joined. Each time, she left the challenge parameters up to the reader, to set their own personal challenge. In 2008, I read:

• The Gathering by Ann Enright (NYT 2007)
• Heart-Shaped Box by Joe Hill (PW Best Book)
• The Book Thief, Marcus Zusak (2007 IRA CL/R SIG Notable Books) *best*
  
• House of Meeting by Martin Amis (NYT 2007)
• Long Way Gone: Memoirs of a Boy Soldier, by Ishmael Beah (NYT 2007)
• In the Country of Men by Hisham Matar (NYT 2007)
• Black Swan Green by David Mitchell (ALA 2007) *best*
  
• Out Stealing Horses by Per Petterson (NYT 2007)

In 2009, she made it a perpetual challenge. I confess, I forgot about going to the blog but I still had the lists in the back of my mind. I made my own post that I use to keep track of the books I've read from the NY Times Notable books each year, copying the idea from Michelle at onemorechapter. (I copy lots of great ideas from Michelle, thanks!) I limited it to NY Times just for convenience - how many lists can I keep track of anyway? Many of the same books get listed anyway. It appears that 8 books is about my average each year to read from the list.

Today I saw an update from Wendy which made me remember this little personal challenge. While there are still two months left in the year, I have already read 8 books from the NY Times notable book lists over the years. I don't pick just from the latest year, I allow myself to pick from any of the lists because there are still tons of great books I've missed over the years. So the list from this year:

• The Road Home - Rose Tremain
• Cloud Atlas - David Mitchell
• Gilead - Marilynne Robinson
  
• Dancing to Almendra - Maya Montero
  
• Then We Came to the End - Joshua Ferris *best*
  
• The View From Castle Rock - Alice Munro
• American Wife - Curtis Sittenfield
• Special Topics in Calamity Physics - Marisha Pessl
  

I can't see me reading anymore this year, but I'll try again next year, and keep reading these listed books. Thanks Wendy, for starting this whole challenge, and promoting good books and the community of book bloggers.

CHALLENGE: New York Times Notable Books 2006

New York Times Notable Book 2006 Challenge

It is time to close the books on this challenge - I can't see me reading any more of them this year, although I still have two on the shelves: Lisey's Story and Special Topics in Calamity Physics. It is time to face facts: they aren't getting read this year.

I originally signed up at the NYT Notable Book Blog and my intro post stated I hoped to read six. I only joined this challenge half way through the year, in June, so I took a little easier way. I ended up reading 7 books, with two more yelling at me from beside my bed: read me.

Half of a Yellow Sun - Aldichie
The Echo Maker - Richard Powers
The Translator - Leila Aboulela
Arthur and George - Julien Barnes
The Road - Cormac McCarthy
Alentejo Blue - Monica Ali
One Good Turn - Kate Atkinson


Wow, when I look at that list, there were some great books listed.

This challenge has morphed into the Notable Books Challenge, encompassing several notable book list from this past year 2007. Here's where I've signed up for another year of recommended books, with wendy (caribousmom), our host. Come by and join the group at the blog; it is more fun to read with others.

BOOK: One Good Turn by Kate Atkinson

One Good Turn by Kate Atkinson

New York Times Notable Book 2006

randomhouse book for review

I like books like this: a murder mystery, with a seemingly unconnected cast of characters. The first half of the book is spent setting the stage and I felt like a juggler keeping track of all the people and motives and backstories. And then, gradually, people become connected and the story really picked up.

Jackson Brodie is the main character, I suppose, and according to the back cover, he was the investigator in Atkinson's last book, Case Histories. I would mention that it wouldn't be required to read the first book, as I didn't feel I missed any back story in reading the sequel, but I would be very interested in seeing what happens with Jackson next. Jackson witnesses a road rage incident that sets off the chain of events and characters. A meek writer, an obnoxious comedian, a dirty rich developer, his fed up wife, and a few Russian immigrants round out some of the characters, along with a tough female detective for Jackson to butt heads with.

Although it felt a little long, the action is continuous and a thread of humor is woven throughout so that I enjoyed reading it a lot. The summer arts festival in Edinburgh provides the background, and Atkinson kept my interest with so many different characters.

BOOK: The Road by Cormac McCarthy

The Road by Cormac McCarthy

I finished. I still have the little pit or knot in my stomach that I had during the whole reading. I can see why this book won the Pulitzer Prize for literature this year, and why it was an Oprah pick, with her usual depressing and dreary themes. But that makes it sound like I didn't like it, and I did, I liked it a lot.

I've been reading reviews of this book all year, and I know a lot of people have already read this book. So I knew about the strange punctuation and didn't notice it because I had been warned. In fact, in dewey's review at the nyt notable book review blog, she made an excellent analysis about how the level of discussion and punctuation varied directly with the hunger of the main characters.

Plot outline: A man and his son, never named, are travelling and surviving in a post apocalyptic America, summarized wonderfully by someone somewhere (I can't find who) as ash,ash,ash, forage,forage,forage, and then more ash, forage, sleep. This was very bleak, colorless, and depressing, and I just kept thinking: What would I do? How could people survive? Would you want to? And yet, I kept picking this back up, and I read it fairly quickly, in a few days. And every time, I was immediately transported to this terrible world, with 'bad guys' and cannibals, and fear, and survival. The father is doing everything he can, to survive and protect his son.



A few thoughts and questions:

- Plastic is not all bad, since it was one of the only things to survive. If there hadn't been plastic items for them to scavenge, they would not have found much
- What have the father and son been doing for all the years since the son was born? Have they been walking all this time? Have they met nobody safe in all this time?
- What happened to all the bullets in the gun? Because there were more than one, I believe, at some point.


caution: possible spoilers
Some thoughts which may be spoilerish, because I just went back and read all the reviews and discussions at nyt notable book blog

Were the people at the end good or bad?
I think there were a lot more good people around, and more survivors somewhere, but the father was too afraid to find them. He never tried to find if anyone they met was safe, he automatically suspected everyone. Quite rightly in most occasions, and people trying to survive have to do whatever they can, but the fact that he avoided everyone, I don't think he was ever going to find the good people. His son was more open and hopeful, and so, he would find the good people.

I did like the theory about the ending being the father's happy ending to a story - I hadn't thought of that and it is very interesting.

But there has to be more religious overtones to the story, because of the apocalypse ending of the world. How does God, and religion, continue in a world like that? Is there a place/need for it? And I think the book shows there is a need, we need to trust people, and good will triumph.

BOOK: Arthur & George by Julian Barnes

I am so glad I just finished reading The Hound of the Baskervilles. At times I felt I was reading Arthur Conan Doyle's biography, and the line between fiction and nonfiction has become very blurred for me. Much of what I read will become my belief about Doyle, even though I know it shouldn't. Barnes writes in a note at the end of the book that quotes and excerpts from newspapers are all factual.

This is the story of two men, Sir Arthur Conan Doyle and George Edalji, one a famous writer, and one a quiet solicitor wrongly accused of a crime. I found the prose compelling and enthralling as I read the life story of both men, and how they eventually met, and how their stories became entwined. Doyle comes off as priggish and arrogant as his character, Sherlock Holmes. Edalji, son of a Parsee Vicor, is very British as well, with his stiff upper lip and resignation to his fate.
Barnes is very ambitious with his story, and I quite enjoyed it. It felt a little weak at the end, as he tried to connect the ideas of faith, and spiritism and the characters. It was rushed in content and yet slow at the same time. However, overall, a great read, with meticulous details and a wonderful telling of an obscure event in British history. Barnes is now two for two with me, having read and enjoyed A History of the World in 10.5 Chapters.

from the Guardian (UK) " Arthur & George is Julian Barnes's inventive account of a true and important miscarriage of justice... What Barnes adds to the tale--it was cause celebre of its day--is imagination, insight, passion, and of course his beautiful writing."

BOOK: Alentejo Blue by Monica Ali

I just spent a lovely week in the Alentejo region of Portugal, living among the locals, as well as with a few British tourists, and a few ex-pat Brits as well. Each person I met told me a little about their life, but it's funny how they see each other. It is so easy to label someone as 'trouble', or 'know-it-all' or 'nosy' based on a few characteristics. Once you meet the person, and realize why they are, or are not, the way they are, it all changes. As Joao, an old wise man of the village said, "There's more than one way to look at it."
I stayed until the fall festival occurred. At the same time, Marco, a cousin and former resident returned home, successfully from abroad. It was a great festival, lots of food and music, but everyone was there and there were some personality fireworks. Some people stayed, some people left, and then, life continued.

BOOK: The Echo Maker by Richard Powers

I'm somewhat conflicted about reviewing this book, because I know it is an award winner (National Book Award, 2006) and it was recommended by 3M for the Something About Me Challenge. And I can see why it was an award winner, but I think I read it at the wrong time of the year, when my brain has essentially ceased functioning at the end of June. There were some big ideas in this novel - who are we? how is memory of a person compare with their reality? the trust we have in the people around us? And these big ideas would take a lot more thought than I was prepared to give them.

Mark has been in a car accident and when he awakes from his coma, he believes his sister has been replaced, an imposter. This is called Capgras syndrome and Dr Weber, a reknown cognitive neurologist, comes to investigate.

There were several levels to this novel: the cranes which return to Kearney, Nebraska each year; Mark's recovery and dealings with his sister and their past life; the mystery of what happened to Mark on the night of the accident; Dr Weber's tentative hold on reality in his own life; the different syndromes associated with brain injuries; and the existential questions of self and memory. I mostly enjoyed the mystery of the accident and the note that was left for Mark in the hospital. I found my mind wandering during sections about the cranes and about Dr Weber and his problems. It could have been shorter and I wouldn't have missed much of the filler. Mostly, I didn't connect with the characters and found their actions difficult to understand, especially Mark's sister.

I also enjoyed the setting of Nebraska and feel the author did a great job of describing the feel and mood of the location. The science background describing the different symdromes was also very interesting, as was the mystery of the accident and the Capgras syndrome. I wanted to finish the book and never contemplated not finishing, but it was a little long, and I read three other books after I started this one because I couldn't read this very fast. The pages really dragged in parts and I had to concentrate to get through the novel. I blame much of this on me and my tired head this month.

This was a NYT Notable Book of 2006, and while I enjoyed much of the story I don't think I'll be looking for another of Powers' books for quite a while.

BOOK: The Translator by Leila Aboulela

The Translator is a simple love story, about finding faith and about the life of an exile. Sammar is a Sudanese widow living and translating in Scotland. She begins coming out of a four year mourning period due to the attention of Rae, an expert on Islam and the Middle East. Sammar has been, I hesitate to say living, but going through the motions in Scotland while her aunt/mother-in-law raises her son in Sudan. Rae begins to bring her back to life and Sammar begins to come alive. Her faith in Islam is a stumbling block and the book details her awakening as she returns to Sudan, but she doesn't fit in there either.

I felt so much sympathy for Sammar as she tries to fit in everywhere - she never fit in to Scotland, and her return to Sudan is rough as they see her as an outsider. The writing was lovely and the two countries are wonderfully described. This is a gentle story, more of a character study, but the settings are important too. I prefer a little more story, less lyrical writing, but I enjoyed the book each time I picked it up, and I really enjoyed Sammar and would have liked to know her. She was a strong woman, but her life is so different from mine, in so many respects. I would like to read more about Islam and I enjoyed how her faith guided all her decisions.

BOOK: Half of a Yellow Sun by Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie

I read several reviews over at NYT Notable Books for this book and it did not disappoint. This book has been short listed for the Orange Prize and I am very glad to see that, unlike other award winning literature I've tried to read, this book was extremely readable. Adichie has created characters and a setting that was very easy to be immersed in. And that isn't necessarily a good thing, as Nigeria circa 1967 was involved in a bloody civil war and that is never good for anybody.

To witness the descent that Olanna, her twin Kainene, Olanna's husband Odenigbo, the houseboy Ugwe and Kainene's partner Richard fall into is scary and disturbing. From a comfortable middle class, university life to barely surviving in refuge camps, this novel shows how devastating and quickly war can change everybody's lives. People have to do whatever they can to survive. It was a great reminder that when we see refuge camps on television, each person there had a home, a life, a job before they were displaced. I was thinking about Nigeria while I read this, but also Dar fur, Rwanda, Somalia, Afghanistan and these places we see from a distance. And it is so upsetting.
This novel reminded me of several other books: the opening part of the book, before the war started was much like Reef, with the houseboy fitting into a middle class household, with an academic life; and the spirit of the characters reminded me of A Fine Balance by Rohinton Mistry, a novel somewhat about attitude and dealing with what life throws at you. And you can never believe how awful things get for the characters and how they keep surviving.

To summarize, Half of a Yellow Sun was an excellent book, although the material was disturbing since it details the atrocities civilians and soldiers have to deal with during a civil war. The writing and the characters were enjoyable and I'd like to read the other book by Adichie, Purple Hibiscus.