pickAnother awesome book to read in October. It had the running theme of Lazarus and returning from the dead.
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pickAnother awesome book to read in October. It had the running theme of Lazarus and returning from the dead.
pickBrilliant. Extremely creepy short stories from the Queen of Gothic Literature.
pickBrilliant. Kadish uses classic literature to describe the ups and downs of new love, politics of an academic department, and the relationship between a mentor and her advisee all while the mentor plans for her tenure promotion. Loved the quotes. Loved the literary elements used to push the story. Just a fascinating author.
pickI really enjoyed the banter between all the friends. A great mystery - plenty of betrayal. The action kept my attention. It was published in the 90s so communication was through pay phones. Would it still be considered realistic fiction?
What a day. I found out I won Dracula from @Librarybelle - thank you so much. And then I traveled to Greensboro with a wonderful friend from my book club to meet Ruta Sepetys. She was such a wonderful and inspiring person and she understood that empathy should be taught through history.
pickEnjoyed reading about the different messages that a flower has and how flowers can repair broken hearts. I cared for each member of the unconventional family and was thrilled with the ending.
pickThis is a refugee story from the 90s while Soviet Union was falling apart. It begins in Georgia (Caucasus Mtns), and while one ends in France, the other refugee sacrifices her liberty to ensure success. A truly inspiring story. Because of the Around the World Challenge, I've read several books on refugees. I'm thinking of purchasing some of these books for the narrow-minded for Christmas. Would they read it? Would they start having more empathy?
pickYou know it is definitely a pick when you are halfway finished and you are dying to know the end. I'm trying so hard not to glance at the last page.
pickWhen I saw the heft, I thought it would be her whole life. Was I wrong? It started when she was 55!!! It was sad as one by one, of those few whom she trusted, were dying. Elizabeth had such a turbulent beginning and that beginning affected how she lived during the last fifteen years of her life and reign. She didn't want to be seen as an impulsive tyrant as her father, but you better not underestimate her either. So glad I read this.
@megnews @Laughterhp @Chrissyreadit I have changed my mind. I didn't want to have anything in the 20th century and this is set in the 19th. Has anyone read it?
As spooky as I can handle. My mother was deathly afraid of birds because she was attacked by blue jays once and because she watched the movie when she was young. I couldn't help to call Mom just now and tell her that I bought a book for her. She was not enthusiastic about the gift.
#SeptemberReads2019
#ReadHarder2019 Piecing Me Together (diversity middle grade), Handmade Marketplace (business) Still Alice (self published) 24/24 DONE 😆
#AroundtheWorld2019 Dona Barbara (Venezuela), the Shark god (Vanuatu), Enrique's Journey (Honduras), A Tale of Love and Darkness (Israel), The Door (Hungary), We Need New Names (Zimbabwe) 25/52
#Booked2019 Enrique's Journey (Addiction) and Akata Witch (PoC - MC paranormal) 24/24 Done
pickI enjoy reading about complicated familial relationships and I believe Akata Witch had one. Sunny thinks her father hates her, but actually doesn't trust her because she is a girl. Sunny has powers that she inherited from her mysterious grandmother, but no one will tell her anything because no one in her family knows; they just don't want her to end up like the grandmother who was killed by a student.
pickBrilliant. Genoa can make a reader empathize with the people who suffer from TBI. I'd never heard of this condition till I read this book. She brings the brutality, the stubbornness, the overwhelming frustration, the ultimate humility, and even humor to the forefront. This book is just as well written as Still Alice.
pickIf I can remember its tongue in cheek presence, I like it and can recommend it.
pickZimbabwe #ownvoices - What do you do when your country is in the middle of a civil war, your father is dying of AIDS, and you and your friends steal guavas so you can eat? Should you leave to live with your aunt in America? Darling leaves and is eaten up with guilt, homesickness, and bitterness (the family and friends left behind need money). This was a realistic view of an emigrant from an African nation.
pickOh my, what a beautiful memoir. Oz's childhood was surrounded by memories of Jews, who escaped WWII, and their memories of those who didn't. He was raised by scholastic, erudite parents who wanted their son to be Someone. Oz and his father survive the birth of a new nation only to mourn and crawl out of the ashes that came after his beloved mother's death. So sweet and haunting. Oz clearly wrote to purge himself of bitterness and hate. 5 stars
There were no pictures, plants, or ornaments. Only books, more books, and silence filled the room, and a wonderful rich smell of leather bindings, yellowing paper, mold, a strange scent of seaweed and old glue, of wisdom, secrets, and dust.
panI can't tell what I read. It seemed to be written in code and I didn't have the key to decipher. I was told to read each line carefully or I would miss something. How true. In a long paragraph of everyday dialogue, you would see the words, "did you hear about the attack on Clinmore?" and nothing else. It was set during the Irish Rebellion which is important, but it wasn't clear when the author wrote about it. I want my missed time back.
pickA fun read. #nwc #novelwatchingcrew The grammatical errors drove me crazy. Now, to watch the movie and sing with my daughters.
pickBy the time I neared the end, I came to the realization that You Can't Go Home Again was written to show how Wolfe's worldview had evolved through his life's experiences. I resented his apparent passivity to racism. I scorned his descriptions of the rich. I was appalled at the mistreatment of his fellow train passenger. He understood his innocence will never return. He saw and lived inhumanity and knew it to be ugly. #wolferead Thank you @Lcsmcat
P 465 #wolferead @Lcsmcat almost your own words. LOL!!
pickThis book would make a great horror movie. Emerence lives to make others dependent on her and when they disappoint, the revenge is twisted and cruel. Emerence is very contradictory - she loves animals, but beats them and imprisons them. A hard read, but I couldn't put it down till I found out what was hidden behind Emerence's last door. Shudder.
pickAnother tear-jerker. Makes one pray that they are never told that they have early onset Alzheimer's. Especially a hard-working academic who loves reading to learn.
pickI cried. So many tears. A boy's tenacity, desperation, and love for his family is written so Americans can sense what these young refugees endure. The hardships are unbelievable - being killed or damaged from trains, exploited by gangs all through Mexico, rapes, separated from mothers who work in America so the children can LIVE, getting caught and not giving up. I'm so glad I read this book. Pulitzer Prize Winner
"...fights break out between municipal and state police officers over who gets to rob a group of migrants." Heartbreaking
#nwc #novelwatchingcrew I enjoy a good frenemy story. Reading how the four held hands to keep from sliding down mud touched my Maleficent cold heart.
For the life of me I can't understand Wolfe's purpose in writing a man's death as he gruesomely did in ch 29. The history of America was weaved through the fabrication of his death. It was very disturbing. #wolferead
Up to ch 31 #wolferead. Reading the part how Libya Hill was affected by the Depression really shook me. I don't know why. I've always known NC was affected too. I think this week I am going to research Asheville during the Depression. It also reminded me of Its a Wonderful Life - except the Building Trust is run by unscrupulous men and the blind judge (Mr. Potter) may be who saves the town through evil, cruel ways.
1. Set in Cade's Cove, Tennessee ♥️
2. Thunderstorms need to leave because it is almost time for our Bigfoot Festival. 50,000 people are expected in our little town.
3. Didn't have one. I had a blind date who took me to the library. On our second, he took me to Barnes and Noble. Been married for 19 years.
4. 2 daughters, 2 cats, 3 dogs, 2 geckos, and a guinea pig.
5. Thank you @AkashaVampie for the tag.
Thank you so much @CBee. What a lovely surprise in my email. 💜
so-soI enjoyed the parts that portrayed how Vanuatu Islanders entwined their belief system with Christianity. Very interesting. I disliked how Montgomery insisted that the beliefs were fictitious. He was insistent that the Islanders prove their black magic worked.
pickI feel like I have gotten a go-ahead. First goal - knit like a fury for Christmas. If successful, I'll really start in earnest.
"For a moment they saw a talking dog...then it switched to a pair of twins who were nothing alike (one was boyish and athletic and the other was sort of a diva, and they both sort of looked like Mal, except with yellow hair..."
I about died. This must mean Disney had already put Dove Cameron in the role before Isle of the Lost was written.
#wolferead Finished Book 2. When the firemen flooded the basement, did the water kill the 500 people who were on the sub? Did the union start the fire just to kill the 2 elevator men who didn't go to the meeting? What does everyone else think?
I'm not done. Did Wolfe write this way to show the rich deserved to fall? Should we not have pity? And Edith declares she is a Socialist because she is a worker. Surely, Wolfe meant to show how insulting that would be to true workers, right? If this is autobiographical, I don't think he cared about keeping friends. Now, I'm done.
#wolferead Up to ch 18 - I have so many thoughts about the party. Wolfe was very clever to remind readers that the Crash would happen shortly after the party. As I read about the characters - Amy, Hirsch, Piggy Logan, I get a sick feeling. Who will survive? Even the crazy scene of Piggy - is it meant to show that they didn't care where their money went? Decadence. Is it true that the rich would invite gay as entertainment -how degrading.
#wolferead Ch 10- I am making a prediction. While reading this chapter how Mr. Jack enjoys his indulgent life, I get the feeling he will fall greatly in the Stock Market Crash that Wolfe very neatly referred.
pickIn the mood for a western? How about a western set in the Amazon? Wow! It was so weird having alligators eat roaming bronchos and monkeys overhead. If you watched The Man who Killed Liberty Valance, you would see certain similarities.1-fighting for the right to fence 2-a lawyer who wants to fight with justice, not violence 3-a friend who kills, but lets the lawyer have the fame 4-menacing villain (but a woman) Differ -native superstitious fetishes
#wolferead Ch 6-7 Aunt Maw's funeral and real estate - I've known so many people like Mrs. Flood. Nosy, knows everything about everyone. I hate how he found about his father wanting his mom buried in his plot and his uncle exhuming her because of a stupid grudge. What is with Appalachia and grudges (Hatfield and McCoy)? How awful would it be to hear such a sordid tale about his mother's exhuming? Nosy people can also be rude.
#wolferead
Ch 5 I dislike the judge immensely. I'm torn over Wolfe's feelings. He clearly thinks people are being used, but he still uses racist words. It makes me think of my childhood. My parents acted like it was a regular word and then say they weren't racist. I know it's the period and the society, at this time, deemed it okay, but it is not okay. I hope the Judge won't be a major character, but I have a feeling he is.
"Their souls we're like the visages of city streets." Ch 4 #wolferead
I liked how Wolfe described NYC's workers. Delivery drivers.
"Each day they faced the perils of the streets with hearts as calm as if they were alone upon a country road."
#nwc #novelwatchingcrew @AkashaVampie @asyouwish great challenge questions.
CHALLENGE 4 book or movie?
Right now, movie, but I'm really enjoying the book.
Is this what you mean - do a different question from each of the challenges every week?
#nwc #novelwatchingcrew @AkashaVampie @AsYouWish I am having a blast with your questions.
CHALLENGE 3 poem
Jocular
Acquisitioner 😋
Youth - Makes me wish I was 15 again.
#nwc #novelwatchingcrew @AkashaVampie @asyouwish thanks for the questions.
CHALLENGE 2 best hair.
I'm in love with Evie's blue/black locks.
#NovelWatchingCrew #nwc @AkashaVampie @AsYouWish great challenges!
CHALLENGE 1 I'm a huge fan of Cameron Boyce. He was my daughter's first crush and his image and voice instantly came to me when he first talked to Evie. You will be missed. RIP.
