LauraT’s Comments (group member since Aug 06, 2013)

LauraT’s comments from the All About Books group.

I'd like to read Gilded Needles by Michael McDowell

music

I second Camille: The Lady of the Camellias

Christine wrote: "




[bookc..."

I think you'd better write also the title: it is not always so easy to see or understand what you'reading!

Finished.
A real masterpiece!!!
To add something to what I've written before, i can say that the central point remains, even with all the other things and issues present, the personal responsability of our actions: no one is evil or saint; each and everyone of us make mistakes, sometimes the mistakes are what render us human. As long as we don't deny them...and are willing to assume the responsability of their results, and put things to rught, if and how possible
Timshel!

I've started it (for the second time - I had read it some 5 or 6 years ago) this Sunday and I have to say I'm appreciating the re-reading a lot.
The first time probably it suffered with the comparison with The Grapes of Wrath, that remains in my opinion his masterpiece. This time I'm taking my time with it, and I've seen beyond the absolutisms of the plot.
Kate is not a "credible" character; as Adam or Samuel: one too evil, the others too good.
Still they represent aspects of human life - as many of Dicken's characters.
And the books describe much more. The whole section on words, translation...that's incredible: how what we call "the word of God" in nothing else that a word of man - dealt with, manipulated, torn, worked with depending on culture, tradition, feelings...
And what about this bit?
"Mary said, “Uncle Tom, how do you get to be a boy?”
“How? Why, Mary, you’re just born a boy.”
“No, that’s not what I mean. How do I get to be a boy?”
Tom studied her gravely. “You?” he asked.
Her words poured out. “I don’t want to be a girl, Uncle Tom. I want to be a boy. A girl’s all kissing and dolls. I don’t want to be a girl. I don’t want to.” Tears of anger welled up in Mary’s eyes"
Of course Steinbeck couldn't even think about trans gender or LGBTQ+, but feeling the hardship of being a woman almost a century ago... what a man; what a writer!

Elizabeth Strout The Burgess Boys pag 139
Josephine Tey The Franchise Affair pag 271
John Steinbeck East of Eden pag 736
Giorgio Basani L'airone pag 105
Winston Graham Bella Poldark pag 446
Josephine Tey To Love and Be Wise pag 256
Grace Paley Enormous Changes at the Last Minute: Stories pag 204

Tot pag 2157

I definitly agree with you!

Alannah wrote: "I’ll be honest, I’m finding it hard to motivate myself to keep reading."

My only motivation has been the fact that I had said here I was reading it!!!
I've hardly met a book so universally disliked!!!

city

I'm re-reading Letter From Peking- ; interesting

I'm in!!!

Greg wrote: "I'm at 25% now, and although I still think that the characters are not fully alive or quite right, I am finding the events behind some of the pieces of art a little more interesting . . . the recep..."

Not accurate at all Greg! I'm not an Art History expert, but those are two of our most important figures ever. And trust me, thigs were different!

32 Elena Molini La piccola farmacia letteraria pag 276 ***1/2
33 Juan Gómez-Jurado Tutto brucia pag 499 ***
34 Grazia Deledda Cosima pag 176 ***
35 Jane Gardam Old Filth pag 290 ***1/2
36 Alba de Céspedes L'anima degli altri pag 136 ***1/2
William Shakespeare King Henry VI, Part 1 pag 360
Elena Molini Piccola libreria con delitto pag 324
Winston Graham The Twisted Sword: A Novel of Cornwall, 1815 pag 656

Do it Greg!!! That one is really a great book.
After having read that I remember that I started my personal pilgrimage to all Michelangelo's works I could see - many I have to admit: most of his masterpieces are still in Italy: Rome, Florence, Siena, Milan...

Leslie wrote: "Having been reading too many serious/depressing books lately so I decided to reread Anne of Green Gables via audiobook. It works for the group color challenge and always makes me feel g..."

I love all Anne's books - from first to last!!!

compost

romance (in Italy most Romances are published by an editor called Harmony)

28 Dorothy Strachey Olivia pag 135 ***
29 Stephanie Storey Oil and Marble pag 362 **
30 Barbara Perna Annabella Abbondante. Il passato è una curiosa creatura (La giudice ficcanaso Vol. 3) pag 443 ***
31/140 Anna Nerkagi Aniko pag 154 ***1/2
Elena Molini La piccola farmacia letteraria pag 276
Winston Graham The Twisted Sword: A Novel of Cornwall, 1815 pag 656

Ok, I finished and didn't like it a bit.
Since this is the spoiler free thread I write all that I've considered; but the sense of a spoiler here is a bit funny: almost everybody knows what has happened to Michelangelo and Leonardo!!!

When I started it I had hoped it could at least resemble The Agony and the Ecstasy; not even a faraway relative, as we say in Italian.
Sorry but I really didn't like it AT ALL.

A pseudo tale on the conflictual relationship between Michelangelo and Leonardo, seen as two kids fighting for a prize in school. They didnt' get along well, it is knwon. But the were adults, artists, not kids!
We are talking here of two geniuses of one of the most outstanding period of western civilization, the Renaissance!, expanding widely above painting and sculpting.

Annoying the usage of pseudo Italian - more often wrong than right; writing in English you don't have to know how the Italians speak; but if you use Italian phrases please, check if it's how we say those things! If not you, at least an editor! Italian is not Spanish, even if it sounds the same to you!!! We'd never say Mi amico, not even miO amico (which woyld be the Italian correct form), but amico mio. And many many more errors in the book.

And also the anecdotes, it's easy to google them: Michelangelo is said to have asked his Mosè "Why don't you talk to me" (and even hit his knee with the hammer!) - seeing it so real, so like a human being, not to the bulk of the marble from which he created the David.