Connie ’s
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(group member since Nov 11, 2013)
Connie ’s
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from the Reading with Style group.
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I just claimed Women of the Silk by Gail Tsukiyama for 20.4 China. Post # 548.We have another BINGO on Row 2 now.
20.4 Go For The Gold!Women of the Silk by Gail Tsukiyama
A fortune teller made the prediction that eight-year-old Pei would never marry, convincing her silent father that the young Chinese girl would only be a drain on the impoverished family's resources. She was sent to work in a silk factory with her wages returning to her family each month. Motherly Auntie Yee ran a home for the young girls working in the silk factory, and a sisterhood developed among the lonely girls. In the early 20th Century, marriage often included long hours farming, beatings from husbands, and supervision by unfair mother-in-laws in the patriarchal society. So while the hours were long at the silk factory, many women chose to remain unmarried and employed there because they had some independence and money. The Japanese invasion of China caused an upheaval in the lives of Pei and the other silk workers, and forced them to run to safety.
The author has a Chinese mother and a Japanese-American father (from Hawaii), and she was raised culturally Chinese. She wrote a quiet book with Chinese culture, history, and the details of silk thread production woven into the plot. Pei and her friends are endearing characters, and I cared about their outcomes as I read the story.
+20 task (China)
+10 review
Task total: 30
Grand total: 570
Louise Bro wrote: "Tien wrote: "Oh yay! Good job, Connie!Are you still reading for China?"
He he, it sounds like Connie is on the national reading team for China :-)
If only reading were a Olympic discipline, we mi..."
That's the only way I would get into the Olympics, Louise!
Great job finishing the two books!
10.5 Mod TaskI Know This Much Is True by Wally Lamb
Although this book is a chunkster at 897 pages, it was so engaging that I didn't want to put it down. Thomas and Dominick Birdsey are identical twins with very different personalities. The book opens in 1990 with Thomas, a paranoid schizophrenic, cutting off his hand as a protest against the Gulf War as he chants the Biblical verse "...and if thy right hand offend thee, cut it off and cast it from thee...". After Thomas is put into a maximum security ward at the state mental hospital, Dominick tries to have his brother moved to a different environment.
Dominick loves his disturbed brother, but feels that Thomas has been a heavy anchor tied to him, holding Dominick down so he's barely able to breathe. He's had to protect the gentle Thomas his whole life. Meanwhile Dominick is trying to cope with his own life falling apart, and is holding a lot of hurt and anger inside. They both are trying to make sense of a childhood with an abusive stepfather and a passive mother. The book goes back to a third generation in the form of a rather melodramatic journal about the life of the men's grandfather, an immigrant from Sicily. The twins' parents are products of poor parenting, and problems continue to the next generation.
The book incorporates religion, mental illness, abuse, divorce, death, parenting, and infidelity into the story. Written in the late 1990s, it also explores issues of that time such as the war, racism, and Native American casinos. Some of the best parts of the book are the conversations between Dominick and Dr Patel. Dr Patel had been counseling Thomas, but soon realized that "there are two young men lost in the woods" and added Dominick to her private practice. Wally Lamb writes great dialogue in a conversational tone, giving the reader the feeling they are having a heart-to-heart talk with the character. Incidents involving Dominick's best friend, fast-talking car salesman Leo, add humor to the book. "I Know This Much Is True" is a page-turner, and is highly recommended.
+10 task
+15 combo (10.4 light list, 10.7 first letter, 20.3 winner of Audie Award for Fiction 2000)
+15 jumbo (897 pages)
+10 review
Task total: 50
Grand total: 540
Tien wrote: "Oh yay! Good job, Connie!Are you still reading for China?"
Yes, I'm readingWomen of the Silk for China.
Tien, I just finished a book with 898 pages so we will get our jumbo points there. That will give 15 jumbo points. For 10.5, I Know This Much Is True. I will write a review and post tomorrow night in the completed tasks and the team 4 threads. No need to hurry on the Ned Kelly book.
That's great, Louise. It looks like both of those books will help. I suppose we all get caught up in the Bingo game, and all try to do our part, but please don't worry if a book doesn't get read. Unexpected things come up in life. My sister is on the recreation staff at a nursing home. Now those residents really take Bingo seriously, and try to fool the staff into giving them the trinkets they get as prizes!
Tien, I'm sure I can find a book set in China at the library this week. It sounds like you'll be very busy so don't try to fit in another book, but just enjoy your weekend away. Thanks for the offer.
I started I Know This Much Is True by Wally Lamb (on the Great American Novel list for 10.5). It's over 800 pages so will give us the jumbo points for N1.
It looks like we need a book set in China for 20.4 for N2. I'll find something to read for that task if no one else is doing it.
I claimed My Beloved World for 20.9 with 10 points for combos and 10 points for review in post #505.
20.9 PoliticsMy Beloved World by Sonia Sotomayor
Sonia Sotomayor, the first Hispanic appointed to the United States Supreme Court, has written a candid memoir about her life leading up to that appointment in 2009. Her young life began in a Bronx housing project with an alcoholic father who died young, and a mother who worked long hours as a nurse. Sotomayer had a warm extended family who gathered at her paternal grandmother's home. She was diagnosed with Type I diabetes at age 7, and learned to give herself the insulin shots. She was self-reliant, even at that early age, because she could not depend on anyone else being available to help her manage her diabetes.
School was challenging since she came from a home where Spanish was spoken, but she was intellectually curious and a hard worker. Trips with her family to Puerto Rico developed a strong attachment in Sotomayer to the island and its people. She tells about her work in volunteer organizations helping other Hispanics while a student at Princeton and Yale Law School. She appreciated the help of an important group of mentors along the way to becoming a lawyer, and eventually a judge. She worked fifteen hour days in a New York County District Attorney's office, private practice, and as a judge. But she always cultivated a large group of friends that acted much like family, people who were especially important to her after her divorce.
This entertaining memoir is upbeat, humorous, and compassionate. It's filled with local color, especially in the chapters about her Hispanic heritage. Sotomayer is an inspiration to others that dreams can come true.
+20 task (approved)
+10 combo (10.7 First Letter, 10.6 Biography 920 in Brooklyn Public Library)
+10 review
Task total: 40
Grand total: 520
Way to go, Team 2!!!
Thanks for keeping track of all the tasks, Tien!
10.3 HolidayTalk Before Sleep by Elizabeth Berg
Elizabeth Berg is an expert at writing dialogue between women, and expressing how women draw strength and understanding from their close female friends. In "Talk Before Sleep" Ann Stanley is helping to care for her best friend, Ruth Thomas, in her losing fight with metastatic breast cancer. She is joined by three other friends of Ruth who each offer support in their own way.
Ann is a former nurse, a quiet woman who is devoted to her family. Ruth, an artist, is more unconventional and spontaneous. When Ruth is facing death in her early forties, Ann is dreading losing her best friend. Ann also realizes she will be losing that vibrant spark in her life, the person who helps Ann enjoy life more fully and exposes her to new experiences. Ruth also had her own emotional journey to travel with the support of her beloved friends.
The story is told with a lot of humor, especially in the flashbacks to happier days. It also shows the joys and sorrows in the women's roles as wives and mothers. The men in the book are not well developed characters, but are presented as stereotypical "types". But that is not too important since the spotlight is on the connection that female friendships provide.
+10 task (#40 on list)
+10 review
Task total: 20
Grand total: 475
Kate S wrote: "From Post 442Connie wrote: "20.10 Metafiction
Behind the Scenes at the Museum by Kate Atkinson
Kate Atkinson has written a multigenerational story about a dysfunctio..."
You're right. I'm getting the Kates mixed up--it was Kate Grenville on the Picador list, although I read a Picador publication.
I would like to lock in My Beloved World by Sonia Sotomayor while "politics" is still on the main page.
