Connie ’s
Comments
(group member since Nov 11, 2013)
Connie ’s
comments
from the Reading with Style group.
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Great job! Thanks for doing the organizing, Tien.
Wonderful, Louise!
OK, we can wait. That's great that you're getting so many canon points, Tien. That was the square in column I that I worried about. It's good to know now what others are planning to read. I tend to read library bookgroup books, and monthly reads for GR groups at the beginning of the month. So the end of July is more flexible.
Tien wrote: "What our reading plan looks like... couldn't quite get it to align so had to shorten your names, sorry!Cora | Con | Tien
15.5 | 10.6 | 15.2
10.6 | 10.7 | 20.2
10.2 | 10.8 | 20.9
20.7 | 20.6 | 20...."
Column I has 30 canon points in it so that might be difficult.
Since Coralie is reading some books with jumbo points and we will have enough 15 point books, 5 across would work. What would you think about working on 5 across and B5-O1 diagonal at the same time?
After I finish my 20.1 book, my next books probably will be10.6
10.7
10.8
20.6 (I have several WWI books to read)
15_
I was looking at the BINGO card, and thinking about our next Bingo in case I had to get books from the library in another week. I personally do not have any books planned with canon points or jumbo points. Unless other team members do, we could choose one or two Bingo lines to try without canon or jumbo points. Ideas could be:2 across
3 across
O down
B5 to O1 diagonally
Any preferences?
In post # 276, I just posted for Out of Africa for these points:B1-group read
B5-10 review points
It also has 15 combo points that we can use for either the I2 or O4 squares.
10.10 Group ReadOut of Africa by Isak Dinesen
After seeing the movie "Out of Africa" for the second time recently, I wondered if I would enjoy the book as well. Not to worry, the book is even better since the author was a keen observer and an accomplished storyteller.
Isak Dinesen is the pen name for the Baroness Karen von Blixen-Finecke who came from Denmark to British East Africa (Kenya) with her husband in 1914. Although they soon separated, Dinesen stayed to run a large coffee plantation near Nairobi. She tells stories about the customs of the native workers on the farm, the beauty of the Ngong Hills, and her British neighbors. The most important person in her life was the charismatic big game hunter Denys Finch-Hatton who tragically died in a plane crash in 1931. Unfortunately, the coffee plantation failed in the same year, and Dinesen had to leave her farm and return to Denmark. She brought back a wealth of stories with her, and published "Out of Africa" in 1937.
This book has to be read as a book written in the 1920s since it's not always politically correct by today's standards. I did cringe when Dinesen wrote about trophy hunting, although I could understand when they shot wild animals killing their lifestock. The author came across as an energetic, kind person who helped the natives with their medical problems and tried to learn about their culture. Earlier, the colonial powers had taken over land that once belonged to the native people. Dinesen made a real effort to find land for her employees to settle on after her farm was sold. This was an especially interesting memoir written by a warm, talented woman.
Great choice for a group read, Elizabeth!
+10 task
+15 combo (10.6 Biography-920; 10.7 ; 20.7 ID=Idaho)
+10 review
Task total: 35
Grand total: 300
The South American book I will be reading for Lit points for B3 is News of a Kidnapping by Gabriel García Márquez. He was born in 1927.If any of us read other South American authors in July, it's good to remember for a future bingo that G3 has the requirement to read 3 different authors born in 3 different decades for 20.1 (South America).
10.7 First LetterCasanova's Chinese Restaurant by Anthony Powell
Writer Nick Jenkins and his artist friend Barnby spend an evening at the Mortimer pub and Casanova's Chinese Restaurant. Nick is introduced to a group of musicians, and becomes close friends with composer Hugh Moreland (based on Powell's friend Constant Lambert). This book revolves around the musicians and their marriages. Nick also marries, but still plays the role of the observer and does not reveal details of his own marriage. His leftist brother-in-law goes to Spain during the Spanish Civil War. The Abdication Crisis also is in everyone's thoughts, and fits in with the book's emphasis on marriage.
Set mostly in 1936, "Casanova's Chinese Restaurant" is the fifth book in a twelve book series, and cannot be read as a stand alone novel. I enjoyed the social satire, the new characters, and getting reacquainted with some favorites that pop up in every book.
+10 task
+10 review
Task total: 20
Grand total: 265
Coralie wrote: "I will read The Drowned World for my square peg. I could also read a Margaret Atwood for the Virago part of 10.2. It doesn't look as though we will need it, but I will be reading [b..."That sounds great, Coralie. With all of us working on LiT points, we'll have some to use on another bingo later.
After the team gets one BINGO, are we supposed to work together for a second BINGO later in July?
The B column is fine with me. Here's some ways I could contribute:1. I'm going to read Out of Africa for a group read in July.
3. I could read one South American translated book.
5. I write reviews for almost everything.
I'll see what others are doing, and can fill in some other slots if needed.
10.7 First LetterLast Night at the Lobster by Stewart O'Nan
Manny De Leon is spending a double shift working his last day as the manager of a Red Lobster. The bosses at the corporate headquarters have decided to close this older restaurant. Lacking the holiday spirit, the bosses picked December 20th as the last day of operation.
The book follows Manny, hour by hour, in the restaurant while a blizzard dumps snow on the parking lot outside. Some of his crew show up in spite of the weather because they have a sense of loyalty toward Manny. Manny is kind and decent to his employees, and the restaurant is a bit of a home for him. He works hard, pitches in to keep everything running smoothly, and keeps the crew's spirits up. He's one of many unrecognized workers who shows up, does their job well, has pride in their work, but never gets any glory. As the hours tick down to closing time, we also find out the complications in Manny's personal life. There is also resentment by some of the crew members who will not be hired by another restaurant in the chain.
"Last Night at the Lobster" is a low key novella about the working class. The book will make the reader appreciate the people who come to work with a smile on their face day after day. Even though it's a quiet book, it kept my interest since I cared about the characters and the writing was excellent.
+10 task
+10 review
Task total: 20
Grand total: 245
Wonderful! I have a few biographies I've been wanting to read.
10.7 First LetterCity of Secrets by Stewart O'Nan
Great Britain had been occupying Palestine after World War II, and issued quotas allowing only 75,000 Jews to immigrate to Palestine over five years. Brand is a Latvian illegal refugee who survived both German and Russian concentration camps because he had good mechanical skills. In the mid 1940s he shipped off to Jerusalem where the Haganah underground gave him a new identity, and an occupation of a taxi driver.
Brand had lost everything--his beloved wife, his family, and his identity. He feels survivor's guilt, and has painful memories of the atrocities he has witnessed. He's falling in love with another survivor who is also a member of the resistance--a former actress who now works as a prostitute.
The Haganah carries out attacks on British property to protest the British blockade of Jewish refugee ships and British immigration restrictions. But things become more violent and lives are lost when the Haganah joins with the Irgun. Brand is carrying out missions planned by their leaders, transporting explosives and other resistance workers in his taxi. He's a good man who is becoming increasingly uncomfortable as the violence escalates. The underground fight, which started with good intentions, now possesses moral ambiguities. As Brand witnesses the carnage from a terribly violent attack, he wonders who he is becoming and what kind of a man he wants to be.
Brand is a wonderful conflicted character who has experienced too much tragedy in his life. This thriller is based partly on actual historical events, mainly in 1946 Palestine. The author showed the complexity of the political situation while creating an exciting work of fiction.
+10 task
+10 review
Task total: 20
Grand total: 225
10.2 Picador/ViragoBrooklyn by Colm Tóibín
Eilis lives in a small Irish village in the early 1950s with her sister and widowed mother. At about twenty years old, she is unsophisticated and had never been away from home. There are few job prospects--or marital prospects--in the village so her mother and sister give Eilis an opportunity to immigrate to America. Eilis had no great desire to leave Ireland, and she just accepts other people planning her life. She comes from a family that is placid on the surface, with little discussion of their emotions.
An Irish-American priest in Brooklyn arranges for Eilis to work in a department store, live in a boardinghouse with other Irish girls, and take night courses in bookkeeping. When she meets a handsome, cheerful, Italian man who genuinely cares for her, Eilis seems to just fall into the relationship. Their relationship and her bookkeeping courses fill her time so she feels less homesick for Ireland.
When a family tragedy occurs, Eilis is called back to Ireland. She gets into a comfortable routine with her old friends who admire her new American clothes and hairstyle, and feel her new confidence. Eilis has roots in Ireland, but now also has opportunities and obligations in America. Is she going to make her own choices, or will other people and circumstances make the choice for her? Along with the usual coming-of-age challenges, Eilis was also trying to find out where she wanted to call home.
I especially liked the author's use of local color in Ireland, on the ship crossing the Atlantic, and various places in New York such as Coney Island and a Brooklyn Dodgers game. He did a great job of imagining 1950s New York. I often wondered how many emotions Eilis was hiding below the surface and wished I could see more into her mind, especially at the end of the book.
+10 task
+ 5 combo (20.7 US-initials CT)
+10 review
Task total: 25
Grand total:205
10.7 First LetterLong Man by Amy Greene
It was 1936 in East Tennessee, and the Tennessee Valley Authority had completed the building of a dam to bring electricity to the area. The town of Yuneetah was being flooded, and the heavy rain was accelerating the rise of the water. The federal government had bought up the farms along the river, and almost everyone had been relocated except for Annie Clyde Dodson. She had Cherokee ancestors, and will not give up her strong ties to the land that she wants to pass down to her daughter. Her husband is tired of the backbreaking work of farming the depleted soil, and wants to move north to work in a steel mill. Then their three-year-old daughter, Gracie, and her dog vanish. Amos, a one-eyed hobo, had been seen in the area and is under suspicion in the disappearance. It's a race against time as they search for Gracie while the rain pours down, and the flood waters rise.
Yuneetah's residents are the working poor whose families had lived in the isolated mountains for generations. The rains washed away the soil in the higher land, and flooded the lower areas. Some people welcomed the chance to settle their debts, and move on during the hard Great Depression years. But their history was being taken away from them as their homes and farms were destroyed, and their families' graves were moved. Although economic progress was eventually made in the area because of the TVA, the holdouts did not trust the "men in suits" running the government project.
Amy Greene's writing is beautiful with a strong sense of place, and an Appalachian Gothic atmosphere. The plot moves slowly, but builds in suspense. Love of family, and mistrust founded on past events both are important elements. But this is very much a character-driven novel. I was very impressed with the well developed, unforgettable characters with interesting back stories. By the end of the book, they felt like real people, rather than characters in a novel.
+10 task
+10 review
Task total: 20
Grand total: 180
Sounds like a fun opportunity to get to know the other RwS members better. I'll sign up.
Can these July books also be used to complete our RwS challenge, or are these extra books?
