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June 19
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Cathryn
gave
 
to:
Mansfield Park (Paperback)
by Jane Austen
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my rating:
Added to my books!
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read in June, 2008
Cathryn said:
"If you want to read Jane Austen, this is a great book. I just could not stand the heroine! Fanny Price is such a simpering and shy bag of nerves that sometimes I just wanted to throttle her and make her stand up for herself. She has the same demea...more
If you want to read Jane Austen, this is a great book. I just could not stand the heroine! Fanny Price is such a simpering and shy bag of nerves that sometimes I just wanted to throttle her and make her stand up for herself. She has the same demeaning lowliness as Esther in BLEAK HOUSE that is supposed to be a virtue but is really so annoying. It is interesting to compare her with Elizabeth Bennett and think about how Austen was able to fashion such polar opposite heroines; it makes me admire her creativity more. And perhaps, as irony was her big "thang", she enjoys the difficulties and challenges of making such a wallflower the heroine. Fanny Price either becomes the foil to typical novels of the day, or she is a caricature of them.
p.s. I read almost the entire book online at work, thanks for the tip Katie C!...less
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Cathryn
gave
to:
Chocolat (Paperback)
by Joanne Harris
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my rating:
Added to my books!
add my review
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read in May, 2008
Cathryn said:
"This was such a fun book to read, except that I started it the same week I decided to go off sweets. I'm interested to know if the author has ever seen the foreign film "Babette's Feast" because although the circumstances differ, the love ...more
This was such a fun book to read, except that I started it the same week I decided to go off sweets. I'm interested to know if the author has ever seen the foreign film "Babette's Feast" because although the circumstances differ, the love affair and sensual aspect of the food does not....less
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June 02
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Cathryn
gave
to:
Snow Flower and the Secret Fan: A Novel (Paperback)
by Lisa See
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my rating:
Added to my books!
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May 28
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Cathryn
gave
to:
The Kite Runner (Paperback)
by Khaled Hosseini
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my rating:
Added to my books!
add my review
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Cathryn
gave
to:
A Thousand Splendid Suns (Hardcover)
by Khaled Hosseini
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my rating:
Added to my books!
add my review
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May 23
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Cathryn
gave
to:
Northanger Abbey (Barnes & Noble Classics Series)
by Jane Austen
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my rating:
Added to my books!
add my review
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read in March, 2008
Cathryn said:
"This lesser known Austen book is actually now considered one of her best. It is highly reflexive as there are often long expositions on the praise or criticism of the novel. The novel plays against convention and is pointedly self-aware that the hero...more
This lesser known Austen book is actually now considered one of her best. It is highly reflexive as there are often long expositions on the praise or criticism of the novel. The novel plays against convention and is pointedly self-aware that the heroine is not very pretty, the hero did not fall in love with her first, etc. Because of this it sometimes doesn't go down as easily as more conventional novels, but that is how Austen planned it and it should be better read as an exercise in irony. ...less
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Cathryn
gave
to:
Plainsong (Paperback)
by Kent Haruf
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my rating:
Added to my books!
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April 18
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Cathryn
gave
to:
Gabriel Garcia Marquez's Love in the Time of Cholera: A Reader's Guide (Continuum Contemporaries)
by Thomas Fahy (Goodreads author!)
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my rating:
Added to my books!
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Cathryn said:
"Okay, I didn't read the "Reader's Guide" but that's the only thing that would pull up when I wrote the title in.
I love the writing and prose of this book! It's a translation from the Spanish, so I'm not sure if the word choice seems so...more
Okay, I didn't read the "Reader's Guide" but that's the only thing that would pull up when I wrote the title in.
I love the writing and prose of this book! It's a translation from the Spanish, so I'm not sure if the word choice seems so interesting because it really is and the author is great, or because it is a literal translation of am ordinary Spanish word. It is so beautifully written and plays off of turn of the century Caribbean interpretations of 19th-century Romanticism. Be warned, however, the LOVE in this story is often sexual and often explicitly detailed....less
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Cathryn
gave
to:
His Dark Materials Trilogy (The Golden Compass; The Subtle Knife; The Amber Spyglass)
by Philip Pullman
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my rating:
Added to my books!
add my review
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read in February, 2008
Cathryn said:
"BEWARE: this is a long review, escape while you still can
I really got drawn in to the fantasy world from the beginning and loved the originality and creativity of the author. I also thought the writing was well; there was a lot of imagery, descri...more
BEWARE: this is a long review, escape while you still can
I really got drawn in to the fantasy world from the beginning and loved the originality and creativity of the author. I also thought the writing was well; there was a lot of imagery, descriptions, and metaphors that were intelligent and clever and obviously took some thought. I couldn't help but compare this book with another fantasy book that we all know and love: Harrius Potterus. Maybe it's because I've read them both recently, or they're the only fantasy books I've read since probably before my mission; I don't know what the reason is but I feel the need to draw comparisons.
Firstly: As far as fantasy worlds I think the authors are pretty even. Both worlds were surreal, exciting, and enticing.
Secondly: Writing style is two thumbs up for Compass and two thumbs down for Potter.
Thirdly: Overarching plot and depth of the composition is also two thumbs up for Compass and a neutral no thumbs for Potter. This is why: Inventing a world of witches and wizards is cool, but Rowling really doesn't go anywhere with it. The struggle with Lord Voldemort is just one battle (albeit a major one) within the world she has created. HOWEVER: Inventing a world by completely subverting biblical theology and human belief is awesome. I'm not saying that I agree completely with the premise of this series, but I also don't think that the author's intention was to proclaim his atheist beliefs. I believe he has taken the oldest of tropes and subverted it in a new and original way. That is what makes the series so genius! He plays upon religious sensibilities by mentioning and referring to biblical/apocryphal events, but he so turns the events that something new is created. For example in book 3 (forgive me because I'm just speaking about the series as a whole, not just the first book) we learn that their god was actually just the first angel and he lied to everyone who came after him by saying that he had created them. There's a grain of tradition, but he has so creatively turned it that he makes it into something different. Way to go imagination!! Notice, I didn't capitalize god because this god and this whole series is fiction. As the author subverted the tradition, it didn't really affect me because I was experiencing it within a fantasy world that he had created, the god he describes is in no way my God. Make sense?
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