This novel was more beautiful than I thought it would be. I heard about it through the New York Times Book Review and Oprah's magazine and was impressed that a first time novelist, at age 26, made such an impact. A well deserved impact.
I think what I liked best was the style she wrote in, how she left so many things unwritten and really did leave us without a lot of "facts". Everything feels like it's general except for the stories. I'm not sure that made sense....
Somewhere in the Balkans, we have no idea where, a doctor and her grandfather are introduced to us. From there, we follow both their paths via stories told to us from the past. The doctor, Natalia, explains to us how her grandfather always took her to the zoo to see the tigers. We end up back in her grandfather's village as he's growing up and learn about the Tiger's wife, a deaf-mute who has a special bond with a tiger that escaped from the zoo during the war. From there we travel with Natalia to another place where she is providing vaccinations to orphans and trying to find the place her grandfather died to get his belongings. The back to stories of her grandfather's encounter with the "deathless man" who Natalia is sure she is going to meet as well.
As jumbled as my telling of this is, trust me that the book weaves everything together in to one seamless, beautiful story of doctors, death and tigers.
Monday, January 16, 2012
Sunday, January 15, 2012
The Leftovers by Tom Perrotta
The plot of this book intrigued me. What if something, Rapture-like, has taken millions of people one day? What happens to those who are left to deal with the chaos and bewilderment? This book isn't Left Behind. It's not religious and it doesn't even say it was the Rapture, just a day where millions of people vanished, all religious types, all beliefs, nothing to join anyone together.
First, what you get is very angry Christians who believe they should have been taken as well, and since they weren't, they make it their mission to unearth every deep nasty secret about those who were taken to prove that the phenomenon wasn't the Rapture. You get people who try to ignore the whole thing happened. You get people who lose their entire families in a split second and have to figure out how to survive. You get people who join cults to try and make sense of what happened.
This book is a story, of ordinary people living through something extraordinary, and not doing such a great job at it. We follow the Garvey family: Kevin, Laurie, Tom and Jill, who survived the event intact but end up broken apart. We also meet Nora, who lost her husband and 2 small kids and realizes that she is broken beyond help, no matter how hard she fakes it.
The ending gives some hope but the entire book is a sad read of people just struggling to live their ordinary lives that somehow fell off the tracks.
First, what you get is very angry Christians who believe they should have been taken as well, and since they weren't, they make it their mission to unearth every deep nasty secret about those who were taken to prove that the phenomenon wasn't the Rapture. You get people who try to ignore the whole thing happened. You get people who lose their entire families in a split second and have to figure out how to survive. You get people who join cults to try and make sense of what happened.
This book is a story, of ordinary people living through something extraordinary, and not doing such a great job at it. We follow the Garvey family: Kevin, Laurie, Tom and Jill, who survived the event intact but end up broken apart. We also meet Nora, who lost her husband and 2 small kids and realizes that she is broken beyond help, no matter how hard she fakes it.
The ending gives some hope but the entire book is a sad read of people just struggling to live their ordinary lives that somehow fell off the tracks.
Tuesday, January 10, 2012
In The Garden of Beasts by Erik Larson
I've rediscovered the library, if only because they now offer ebooks and audiobooks. This is my first ebook loan and I devoured it. I heard about this book on the NY Times book review podcast and it piqued my interest.
The subtitle of this book is Love, Terror and An American Family in Hitler's Berlin. This book doesn't focus so much on Hitler as it does the Dodd family who ends up in Berlin as a result of the father's ambassadorship from President Roosevelt. It's amazing to think now, but thank goodness back then people kept diaries and wrote actual letters that could be saved. We just don't do that now. I mean, besides everyone and their brother posting stuff on the internet.
Dodd was an academic, his daughter Martha was apparently a bit of a slut for the times (we know this by her diary and letters). Dodd tried to be a good ambassador for the US, but once he and his family arrived in Berlin it became clear how bad things were, even if it took Martha a little longer to not celebrate with the Nazis. The US seemed to only be focused on Germany's repayment of debt and not caring about how Hitler was running things.
Most people, hopefully, know from history class about Germany and the start of WWII. You don't get a huge history lesson with this book even though it describes quite a bit of the disturbing events leading up to WWII and Germany's invasion of Poland. What you get is a regular person's account of living in this horrible place under the rule of Hitler. You get Dodd's depression at what he sees as his failure to be a good ambassador, even though he really did do what he could. You also see everyone else's complete lack of regard to the situation. It appalls me how many people in the US government turned their head to what Dodd reported, instead merely asking about the money.
It appalls me how easily Hitler gained power, how after his first "purge" of undesirable people (using the excuse of treason), Americans in Berlin commented in letters how "exciting" it was. Hundreds, if not more, people were pulled from their homes and shot in the back and it's "exciting"?? This is how evil triumphs. When good people fail to do anything. When good people turn their head and believe that since it's not THEM who is persecuted, it's ok. At some point, Dodd even notes that Jewish people are happy with Hitler, when he executed General Rohm.
It's easy to look back on what is done and wonder why things went the way they did. In a way, not a lot has changed with humans. We still have a tendency to look the other way when it's not us being harmed. We have a tendency to gang up on a particular group of people just because everyone else is (illegal immigrants is our new phase). And we still have a tendency to let evil triumph, all because we were just standing still.
The subtitle of this book is Love, Terror and An American Family in Hitler's Berlin. This book doesn't focus so much on Hitler as it does the Dodd family who ends up in Berlin as a result of the father's ambassadorship from President Roosevelt. It's amazing to think now, but thank goodness back then people kept diaries and wrote actual letters that could be saved. We just don't do that now. I mean, besides everyone and their brother posting stuff on the internet.
Dodd was an academic, his daughter Martha was apparently a bit of a slut for the times (we know this by her diary and letters). Dodd tried to be a good ambassador for the US, but once he and his family arrived in Berlin it became clear how bad things were, even if it took Martha a little longer to not celebrate with the Nazis. The US seemed to only be focused on Germany's repayment of debt and not caring about how Hitler was running things.
Most people, hopefully, know from history class about Germany and the start of WWII. You don't get a huge history lesson with this book even though it describes quite a bit of the disturbing events leading up to WWII and Germany's invasion of Poland. What you get is a regular person's account of living in this horrible place under the rule of Hitler. You get Dodd's depression at what he sees as his failure to be a good ambassador, even though he really did do what he could. You also see everyone else's complete lack of regard to the situation. It appalls me how many people in the US government turned their head to what Dodd reported, instead merely asking about the money.
It appalls me how easily Hitler gained power, how after his first "purge" of undesirable people (using the excuse of treason), Americans in Berlin commented in letters how "exciting" it was. Hundreds, if not more, people were pulled from their homes and shot in the back and it's "exciting"?? This is how evil triumphs. When good people fail to do anything. When good people turn their head and believe that since it's not THEM who is persecuted, it's ok. At some point, Dodd even notes that Jewish people are happy with Hitler, when he executed General Rohm.
It's easy to look back on what is done and wonder why things went the way they did. In a way, not a lot has changed with humans. We still have a tendency to look the other way when it's not us being harmed. We have a tendency to gang up on a particular group of people just because everyone else is (illegal immigrants is our new phase). And we still have a tendency to let evil triumph, all because we were just standing still.
Monday, January 2, 2012
The Outlaw Demon Wails by Kim Harrison
Another Rachel Morgan/Hollows book, 6th in the series.
Rachel is a witch, who lives in a sanctified church with Ivy, a vampire and Jenks, a pixy. The formed the business Vampiric Charms to help capture demons and to deal with magical problems. But they have more than their share of problems of their own.
In the last book, Rachel lost her vampire boyfriend, Kisten, to a murderer and we still don't know who. She's still dealing with it when Marshall appears. He's a witch who helped Rachel out before and is looking for a job in Cincy. Possible romance? Maybe.
In this book, Al, the demon, is being summoned by someone to kill Rachel. She's determined to find out who it is and to stop Al from coming after her and her family. We get to meet Rachel's mom in this book and I hope she shows up in the other books too.
Fast paced and still entertaining. I really think this series gets better with each book.
Rachel is a witch, who lives in a sanctified church with Ivy, a vampire and Jenks, a pixy. The formed the business Vampiric Charms to help capture demons and to deal with magical problems. But they have more than their share of problems of their own.
In the last book, Rachel lost her vampire boyfriend, Kisten, to a murderer and we still don't know who. She's still dealing with it when Marshall appears. He's a witch who helped Rachel out before and is looking for a job in Cincy. Possible romance? Maybe.
In this book, Al, the demon, is being summoned by someone to kill Rachel. She's determined to find out who it is and to stop Al from coming after her and her family. We get to meet Rachel's mom in this book and I hope she shows up in the other books too.
Fast paced and still entertaining. I really think this series gets better with each book.
Friday, December 30, 2011
Girl With The Dragon Tattoo: The Movie
I finally got out to see this movie last night. This might be the first time I ever was meh about a book but really wanted to see the movie. It might have something to do with Daniel Craig.
My main issues with the book were the sexual violence which did get toned down in the movie, although not by much, and the slow moving, too detail oriented pace. My thought with the movie was that they would have to remove a lot of the details that I felt moved way too slow in the book. And they did! While the movie wasn't a fast paced movie (it felt like forever before the characters met up, but less forever than the book felt) it moved along quite nicely.
Craig and Mara were excellent in their roles. Although I admit to just enjoying Daniel Craig pretty much no matter what, he was a really good Mikael and Rooney Mara was a great Lisbeth.
I think in the case of this series, I'll forgo the rest of the books and just wait on the movies. I've already added the Swedish versions to my Netflix queue to see how those are in comparison.
On a side note, seeing as how the movie is set in Sweden in the winter, I was loving the knitted hats and scarves. I particularly liked Lisbeth's slouchy gray hat. Setting off to find the pattern ....
My main issues with the book were the sexual violence which did get toned down in the movie, although not by much, and the slow moving, too detail oriented pace. My thought with the movie was that they would have to remove a lot of the details that I felt moved way too slow in the book. And they did! While the movie wasn't a fast paced movie (it felt like forever before the characters met up, but less forever than the book felt) it moved along quite nicely.
Craig and Mara were excellent in their roles. Although I admit to just enjoying Daniel Craig pretty much no matter what, he was a really good Mikael and Rooney Mara was a great Lisbeth.
I think in the case of this series, I'll forgo the rest of the books and just wait on the movies. I've already added the Swedish versions to my Netflix queue to see how those are in comparison.
On a side note, seeing as how the movie is set in Sweden in the winter, I was loving the knitted hats and scarves. I particularly liked Lisbeth's slouchy gray hat. Setting off to find the pattern ....
Thursday, December 29, 2011
Flash and Bones by Kathy Reichs
While I love Bones, the TV show, I much prefer the Temperance Brennan books. She's not nearly as socially awkward in the books even though she's just as intelligent.
This was an almost 9 hour audiobook (the last 2 hours entertained me while deep cleaning my bathroom and bedroom - thanks audiobooks!) that is based in Charlotte, and centers around NASCAR racing. I didn't know this going in which is good. I'm not a NASCAR fan but this book kept the mystery interesting with only a bit of NASCAR related info.
A body turns up in the landfill behind the speedway, encased in asphalt in a barrel. People come out of the woodwork with speculation on who it could be: Cindy Gamble or her boyfriend Kale Levett, who went missing in the 90's. Could it be an Atlanta guy, Raines, who was supposed to be at the speedway and disappeared off the face of the earth? Add in idiot right-wing Patriot Posse members, the FBI and NASCAR fanatics and you got a mighty fine book.
This was an almost 9 hour audiobook (the last 2 hours entertained me while deep cleaning my bathroom and bedroom - thanks audiobooks!) that is based in Charlotte, and centers around NASCAR racing. I didn't know this going in which is good. I'm not a NASCAR fan but this book kept the mystery interesting with only a bit of NASCAR related info.
A body turns up in the landfill behind the speedway, encased in asphalt in a barrel. People come out of the woodwork with speculation on who it could be: Cindy Gamble or her boyfriend Kale Levett, who went missing in the 90's. Could it be an Atlanta guy, Raines, who was supposed to be at the speedway and disappeared off the face of the earth? Add in idiot right-wing Patriot Posse members, the FBI and NASCAR fanatics and you got a mighty fine book.
Wednesday, December 21, 2011
Stardust by Neil Gaiman
A lovely audiobook read by Mr. Gaiman himself. I really enjoy it when he reads his own books, he just has that way about him.
Published in 1998, this is a good little story about fairies and regular folk. The audiobook was about 6 hours long so it seemed like a short little book. The village people of Wall guard their wall and the only gap in it very sternly because on the other side of Wall is the land of Faerie. Every nine years, faerie folk come and set up a market right outside of Wall and the villagers get to mingle with the faeries, who they otherwise ignore.
A villager and a faerie got together (*cough*) and a baby was born, named Tristran. He does not know the circumstances of his birth, being raised inside Wall with regular family. He falls in love with Victoria and as they are walking to her house they see a falling star. Desperate for any sign of affection from Victoria, Tristran offers to fetch her the star if she will give him anything he desires. She agrees. He goes off, through the gap in the wall and past the guards.
Tristran does find the star, and a slew of other faerie folk who keep the story moving along pretty quickly.
Another great book by Gaiman.
Published in 1998, this is a good little story about fairies and regular folk. The audiobook was about 6 hours long so it seemed like a short little book. The village people of Wall guard their wall and the only gap in it very sternly because on the other side of Wall is the land of Faerie. Every nine years, faerie folk come and set up a market right outside of Wall and the villagers get to mingle with the faeries, who they otherwise ignore.
A villager and a faerie got together (*cough*) and a baby was born, named Tristran. He does not know the circumstances of his birth, being raised inside Wall with regular family. He falls in love with Victoria and as they are walking to her house they see a falling star. Desperate for any sign of affection from Victoria, Tristran offers to fetch her the star if she will give him anything he desires. She agrees. He goes off, through the gap in the wall and past the guards.
Tristran does find the star, and a slew of other faerie folk who keep the story moving along pretty quickly.
Another great book by Gaiman.
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