Reading with Style discussion
note: This topic has been closed to new comments.
Archives
>
Winter 13/14 RwS Completed Tasks - Winter 13/14
From Post 846Connie wrote: "20.10 Between the Wars
Siddhartha by Hermann Hesse
YA assignment, no Lexile listed
+20 task (Hesse was born in 1877)
Task total: 20
Grand total: 830"
I show a Lexile score of 1010 for this book and have therefore added the following:
+10 Oldies
+10 Combo (10.9, 20.6)
Kate S wrote: "Karen GHHS wrote: "10.6 – Beginnings/Endings:On Such a Full Sea by Chang-rae Lee
Chang - Rae Lee is a versatile author. He has written about immigration and identi..."
Oh, darn, I forgot all about that stipulation. Would it be too complicated if I switch A Long Way Gone to 20.4? Then I would gain 15 points there and lose the 20 for On Such a Full Sea for a net loss of 5 points, total: 1830. does that work?
Karen GHHS wrote: "Kate S wrote: "Karen GHHS wrote: "10.6 – Beginnings/Endings:On Such a Full Sea by Chang-rae Lee
Chang - Rae Lee is a versatile author. He has written about immigra..."
That works!
Kate S wrote: "From Post 846Connie wrote: "20.10 Between the Wars
Siddhartha by Hermann Hesse
YA assignment, no Lexile listed
Thank you, Kate. I had seen your post about the Lexile site being down over the weekend. You're one step ahead of me!
20.9 Daytona 500Jane Eyre by Charlotte Brontë
Lexile 890
Although it was published in 1847, the classic Jane Eyre features a heroine that people can admire today. Jane spent her childhood as an orphan in the home of cruel relatives and in a charity school. But she maintained her dignity and spirit, learned from her experiences, and became a governess.
Mr Rochester, a brooding, intelligent man with a family secret, is her employer. He's tired of superficial society women, and enjoys sparring with the inexperienced Jane in a flirty battle of wits. She has to make a decision whether to stay with this passionate, but flawed, man. Jane also meets another man--ambitious but cold--who is interested in her. Jane weighs what she considers important in a marriage--honor, some independence, a meaningful life, an intellectual equal, love, and passion. She truly was a strong woman who wanted control over her own destiny.
The book has a delightfully dark Gothic atmosphere. Rochester's dark secret, strange noises in the night, unexplained fires, a gypsy telling fortunes, desperate walks in the pouring rain, and a bit of the supernatural all contribute to the Gothic mood.
This was my second time reading Jane Eyre, and I was even more impressed with how Charlotte Brontë was ahead of her time in her portrayal of a courageous woman. In addition to Jane's story, the book also showed the sharp divisions in social class. The religious figures in the book ranged from the hypocritical to the charitable. The book gave me a look into Victorian society in an engaging story.
+20 task (507 pages)
+15 oldie (Pub 1847)
+ 5 combo (10.6 first novel)
+10 review
+ 5 jumbo
Task total: 55
Grand total: 905
Task 15.5 - Travel the Pacific Rim - "Seafarer"Fifth Stop
Japan
A/ Author born in Japan
B/ Author's nationality is Japanese
C/ Stories are set in Japan
after the quake: Stories (2000) by Haruki Murakami
+15 Task
+10 Bonus
Task Total: 15 + 10 = 25
Grand Total: 805 + 25 = 830
20.3 Post Colonial The Year of the Flood by Margaret Atwood
This book is written in a very similar style to Oryx and Crake. A pretty slow start with lots of flashbacks. I didn't think I was going to like the book at the beginning because it seemed to be a completely separate story but gradually the world of the Compounds and Oryx and Crake and Snowman merged together with the Gardners and Ren and Toby and the action picked up. I like how the time changed from past to present and how the story from the first book weaved its way into this one. This is definitely a social commentary on the state of the world's affairs and environment and it is not a good one. Atwood is not shy to add horror and disturbing elements to her stories but it doesn't feel trivial or gratuitous, rather it is there because it needs to be. I can't wait to read the final installment.
+ 20 Task
+ 5 Combo 10.5 Goodreads Author
+10 Review
Task Total: 35 points
Grand Total: 560 points
10.9 Nobel PrizeNo One Writes to the Colonel and Other Stories by Gabriel García Márquez
+10 task (awarded in 1982)
+5 Oldies (published 1961)
+10 Not a Novel (Short stories)
Task total: 25 points
Grand Total: 1640
20.3 Post ColonialMalgudi Days by R.K. Narayan
Review
R. K. Narayan is a well beloved literary figure in his native India as well as in other countries that large populations of Indians have migrated. When his name is brought up in conversation, it is usually accompanied with a warm smile. Developing his craft as a journalist and writing columns in the Indian newspapers, his forte has become a well-crafted short story. He is probably best known for this particular book and his imaginative township of Malgudi and its surroundings. He has gone on to write more volumes of short stories of this fables place.
Each story is a well-crafted glimpse into a unique situation of a villager’s life. The character and his circumstances are laid out and build to suspense, but as in real life, do not get totally resolved in a day. He leaves the reader to wonder what happens after the climax of the story, just as you might visit a place and meet strangers and even insert yourself a bit into their life but then have to leave at the end of your time not knowing how their lives ultimately turn out. He mixes humor with tragedy. He accurately describes the ways humans justify their actions and use all their coping mechanisms to cover their foibles. A true interpreter of the human nature that only in India but great insight into people as a whole.
+20 pts - Task
+10 pts - Review
+ 5 pts - Combo (20.10- b 10 Oct 1906))
+ 5 pts - Oldies (1942)
+10 pts - Not a Novel (short stories)
Task Total - 50 pts
Grand Total - 840 pts
I also read what has become a new "Group Reads Book" for those of us participating in the sub challenge! (smile)15.4 TtPR -Seafarer - Malaysia
The Garden of Evening Mists by Tan Twan Eng
+15 pts - Task
+10 pts - Bonus
Task Total - 25 pts
Grand Total - 865 pts
Task 20.1 - 1964: Read a book by an author born in 1964.Banana Yoshimoto
Asleep (1989) by Banana Yoshimoto; translated by Michael Emmerich (Hardcover, 177 pages)
Review:This book consists of three novellas, all written by Banana Yoshimoto. She has a sparse style, focusing on the essentials (like emotions) and ignoring the non-essentials (like descriptions of the physical – character appearances and surroundings). The novellas are thematically linked. Every novella concerns a 20ish Japanese woman who is grieving the death of someone she cared about; every novella features a doomed romance. The third story, Asleep, describes how someone who is very depressed might see the world.
It would be interesting to read a Banana Yoshimoto story that reflected one of the various physical disasters Japan has undergone since this book was published (earthquake, terrorist attack, nuclear power station meltdown).
My overall reaction to the novellas: well-written but depressing. Recommended for readers of literary fiction.
+20 Task Total
+05 Oldies -25 to 75 years old: 5 points (1939-1989)
+10 Not-a-Novel (10 points):
+10 Review
Task Total: 20 + 05 + 10 + 10 = 45
Grand Total: 830 + 45 = 875
TtPR - Seafarer15.9 (9th stop): Mexico
Like Water for Chocolate by Laura Esquivel
+15 task
+10 Seafarer bonus
Task total: 25 points
Grand Total: 1115
20.3 - Post ColonialThe Montana Stories by Katherine Mansfield
Review:
When I first saw that this book contained all the stories and fragments that Katherine Mansfield wrote while she was living in Montana, I thought she must have lived in the USA for a time - but in fact she and her husband John Middleton Murry rented a chalet in a small village called Montana high in the Swiss alps, hoping it would help her recover from tuberculosis.
She did some of her best work there and this book includes, for example, 'The Garden Party' and 'At The Bay'. But after about 7 months she left for Paris, and she died in France about a year after that.
I loved the stories and even some of the fragments. It's a little frustrating when you're getting into a story and you turn the page and it says "Unfinished" - especially with a long fragment called 'The Dove's Nest' which was becoming an intriguing mystery. But even these first drafts of unfinished stories are marvellously well written.
+20 task
+ 5 combo (20.10 born 1888)
+10 review
+10 not a novel - short stories
+10 oldies - all written before she died in 1923
Task total: 55 points
Grand total: 1170
10.7 keep it shortBlind Willow, Sleeping Woman by Haruki Murakami ( Frank o'Conner award)
I have read nearly every book by Murakami that is published in English. In fact, Norweigan Wood is the only one I haven't read yet. I am a big fan and I was very much looking forward to reading this collection of short stories, especially since I loved the other short story collection The Elephant Vanishes. I don't know what it was about Blind Willow, Sleeping Woman, but this just did not live up to my expectations. In the introduction Murakami gives details about individual short stories in the collection. It seems a number were written relatively early in his career, several of which were heavily revised before they were published in English, and a few were written more recently. Perhaps because of this they lacked a cohesiveness. While they were all fun to read, a number of them felt too insubstational, and none of them really blew me away. Three stars.
+10 task
+10 review
+10 not a novel
+5 combo ( 10.8)
Task total 35
Grand total: 470
20.2 PicaresqueThe Stainless Steel Rat by Harry Harrison
My dad recommended this book to me ages ago, and I am glad I finally got around to reading it. It is a fun light book about a space cowboy. Actually, the main character is a criminal in a future society which has almost entirely wiped out crime. He lives outside of societal constrictions, creates his own rules, but holds himself to a strict moral code ( no killing). As I read the book, many aspects of it struck me as before their time. Although published in 1961, the novel anticipates the social changes later in the decade, is right on the cutting edge in its discussion of drug experimentation, and uses the term warp drive years before Star Trek was first aired. A fun book I look forward to sharing with my sons in the near future.
+20 Task
+10 review
+5 combo (20.2)
+5 oldies
Task total 40
Grand total 510
10.1 - Reading ResolutionsGraphs, Maps, Trees: Abstract Models for a Literary History by Franco Moretti
+10 Task
+10 Not-A-Novel
Task Total: 20
Grand Total: 230
20.9 Daytona 500The Stone Monkey by Jeffery Deaver
+20 task (548pgs)
+5 (combo 10.3)
+5 (combo 10.4)
+5 (combo 10.5)
Task total: 35
Grand total: 250
10.5 Goodreads AuthorizedVery Bad Men (David Loogan #2) by Harry Dolan
+10 task
Task total: 10
Grand total: 260
15.5 TtPR - Seafarer CambodiaTomorrow I'm Dead: How a seventeen-year-old Killing Field survivor became the Cambodian Freedom Army's greatest Soldier by Bun Yom
+15 pts - Task (fits A & C)
+10 pts - Bonus
Task yoyal - 25 pts
Grand Total - 890 pts
10.6 – Beginnings/Endings:Far Far Away by Tom McNeal 790 Lexile
+10 Task: newest book
Task Total: 10
Grand Total: 1840
20.6 20th CenturyThings Fall Apart by Chinua Achebe
Lexile 890
Okonkwo is a successful farmer in a Nigerian village in the late 19th Century. He has vowed to be the opposite of his relaxed, lazy father. Okonkwo's social status in the village is important to him, and he is respected because he's a strong wrestler and a fierce warrior. But Okonkwo is unkind to his sensitive son and beats his wives because he wants to project a strong, manly image. The first half of the book shows the traditional Ibo village with its folktales, rituals honoring the ancestors, and tribal laws. The people are working together as a clan. The author does not pretend that all the indigenous traditions are perfect. For example, twin babies are brought into the wilderness to die, women are often beaten, and some people are shunned.
Then the English white settlers come into the village. The Christian missionaries convert some of the villagers, especially the meek and the outcasts that had not been well accepted by the clan. As the clan members are no longer operating under the same set of beliefs, the Ibo traditions and culture weaken. Okonkwo's friend says, "How do you think we can fight when our own brothers have turned against us? The white man is very clever. He came quietly and peaceably with his religion. We were amused at his foolishness and allowed him to stay. Now he has won our brothers and our clan can no longer act like one. He has put a knife on the things that hold us together and we have fallen apart."
Okonkwo is later angered by some unjust treatment by the colonial government, and he acts instinctively with violence. He does not think about what would be best for the clan in the situation.
The author had a multicultural childhood in Ogidi, a village in Nigeria, where the traditional Ibo culture was present. But Achebe was the son of a missionary, and was educated in English in good schools. As a university student he was interested in the indigenous Nigerian cultures and their oral traditions. "Things Fall Apart" was his first novel, published in 1958.
+20 task (#120 on 20th Century list)
+10 combo (20.3 post-colonial, 10.6 beg/end)
+ 5 oldie (pub 1958)
+10 review
Task total: 45
Grand total: 950
10.9 - Nobel Prize: Read a book written by an author that has won a Nobel Prize for Literature.The Good Earth by Pearl S. Buck 2/15/14
Lexile 1530
Pearl Buck won the Nobel Prize for Literature in 1938.
Review
The Good Earth is a book I’d read many years ago in my early teens. While I remembered it fondly and the highlights of the story remained in my memory, this re-read brought back many details that had been forgotten. Pearl Buck was honored with the Nobel Prize in Literature for her depictions of Chinese peasant life and masterful biographies. This book won the Pulitzer Prize in 1932 and the William Dean Howells Medal in 1935. I do feel this excellent novel is deserving of such honors.
Born in West Virginia to missionary parents, Pearl Buck spent the early part of her life in China. I think this shows in her writing, noting all the cultural detail evident in The Good Earth. Without spoiling the story for those who have yet to read the book, I’ll say that it starts with the marriage of a poor farmer to a woman he bought from a local Lord in whose house she had been a slave. It goes on to depict their experiences in good times and bad. Life is not easy for them, and the reader learns much of the destitute life of poor Chinese farmers. There are many sub-plots in the book that certainly
keep the reader engaged. Having enjoyed this re-read, I will probably make time in the not too distant future to re-read the other two books of this trilogy.
Combo: 20.6 - 20th C - This book is #70 on the linked list today.
Combo 20.10 - Between the Wars - Pearl Buck was born in 1892.
+10 Task
+10 Combo (20.6, 20.10)
+10 Review
+10 Oldies (pub. 1931)
This completes my RwS challenge, and having completed the TtPR Sub-Challenge, I claim my RwS Bonus and the Mega Bonus.
Task total: 40 points
TtPR Total: 240
Seafarer Well Traveled Bonus 100
RwS Total: 1050
RwS Bonus: 100
Mega Bonus: 200
Grand Total: 1690
10.5 - Goodreads authorized:Season of the Witch by Mariah Fredericks, 520 Lexile
+10 Task
Grand Total: 1850
20.7 - Group Reads ReduxWhite Noise by Don DeLillo
+20 Task
+10 Combo (20.5 - Disturbing; 20.6 - 20th C)
+ 5 Oldies (1985)
Task total=35
RwS Finish=100
Grand total=1120
TtPR - Seafarer15.10 (10th stop): USA
The Siege: A Family's Journey Into the World of an Autistic Child by Clara Claiborne Park
+ 15 task
+ 10 Seafarer bonus
+100 TtPR finisher bonus
Task total: 125 points
Grand Total: 1295
20.10 - Between the Wars Read a book written by an author born between the Civil War and WWI (1866-1913). The Doll: The Lost Short Stories by Daphne du Maurier 2/16/14
Daphne du Maurier was born in 1907.
Combo: 10.6 - published in 2011, 22 years after her death, this is the author's most recently published work.
+20 Task
+5 Combo (10.6)
+10 Not a Novel (Short Story Collection)
Task total: 35 points
TtPR Total: 240
Seafarer Well Traveled Bonus 100
RwS Total: = 1085
RwS Bonus: 100
Mega Bonus: 200
Grand Total: 1725
10.1 - Reading Resolutions #2Johnny and the Dead by Terry Pratchett
Review:
Again, a very well written children's/youth novel by Terry Pratchett. It's thoughtful, yet amusing. The story is quite creative and I liked the solution at the end. Johnny Maxwell is saving someone again, this time it's the local cemetery. The cemetery is supposed to be sold to a company which is going to build office buildings on top. Johnny and his friends speak up at a public meeting, reminding the adults that the past is important for the people living in the present, and that the cemetery is more than just dead people, but a place to remember, and even a place for recreation and nature.
Besides, Johnny has been asked for help, by the tenants of the cemetery themselves: The dead can be seen by Johnny, and thanks to him, they get in touch with current events and real life again...life (and death) can be very eventful in Blackbury.
+10 task
Task Total: 10
Grand Total: 155
10.5 Goodreads Authorized
City of Dark Magic by Magnus Flyte
Review: Pretty silly. Let me see how many best seller clichés are included in this book:
Exotic locale –a castle in Prague; a handsome, rich, available man (a prince, no less); sex; a cold war spy intrigue; a heroic dog; the fictional presence of an historic figure—Beethoven; a bright spunky female protagonist; and an ancient secret society/quest. At least, the irritating but angelic, blind, child-prodigy, 400 year man and an alchemical drug to make all these things come together in one story were new to me. I was able suspend my disbelief most of the time but, every now and then, there were glaring disconnects that made me go back and re-read a couple of paragraphs to check that I wasn’t crazy and that the author had said something different before.
This might work for an airplane read—you don’t need to concentrate (in fact probably better if you don’t) and there is plenty going on.
+10 Task-
+10 Review
Task total
Grand total:
* this is the "debut" book of Magnus Flyte, which appears to be the pen name for two authors, one of which has published before. If this doesn't qualify please put the book in as 10.5 and adjust my total accordingly.
15.7 TtPRSeafarer-Chile
The Savage Detectives by Roberto Bolaño
+15 Task
+10 Bonus
Post Total: 25
Season Total: 1020
15.8 TtPRSeafarer-Peru
The Time of the Hero by Mario Vargas Llosa
+15 Task
+10 Bonus
Post Total: 25
Season Total: 1045
20.10 Between the WarsCrossing to Safety by Wallace Stegner
+20 Task (author born 1909)
+5 Oldies (1987)
Post Total: 25
Season Total: 1070
10.6 Beginnings and EndingsWe Are Water by Wally Lamb
+10 Task (Most Recent Book)
+5 Combo (20.9-561 pages)
+5 Jumbo (561 pages)
Post Total: 20
Season Total: 1090
From Post 800Heather wrote: "15.9 - Philippines
Noli Me Tangere (Touch Me Not) by José Rizal
+15 task
+10 bonus
task total: 25
grand total: 1185"
Heather, I show an addition error here. In post 774, you have a score of 1200. Add 25 points from Post 800, should give you 1225, not 1185.
From Post 890Norma wrote: "20.9 Daytona 500
The Stone Monkey by Jeffery Deaver
+20 task (548pgs)
+5 (combo 10.3)
+5 (combo 10.4)
+5 (combo 10.5)
Task total: 35
Grand total: 250"
+5 Jumbo
Theresa~OctoberLace wrote: "20.10 - Between the Wars Read a book written by an author born between the Civil War and WWI (1866-1913). The Doll: The Lost Short Stories by Daphne du Maurier ..."
+5 Oldies (we use the author's death date for this type of collection)
From Post 888Jama wrote: "20.2 Picaresque
The Stainless Steel Rat by Harry Harrison
+20 Task
+10 review
+5 combo (20.2)
+5 oldies"
Sorry, Jama, you can't claim a combo with the claimed task. If this is a typo, please let me know.
From Post 889Ashley wrote: "10.1 - Reading Resolutions
Graphs, Maps, Trees: Abstract Models for a Literary History by Franco Moretti
+10 Task
+5 Not-A-Novel
Task Total: 15
Grand Total: 225"
Ashley, Not a Novel is worth 10 points
From Post 895Theresa~OctoberLace wrote: "10.9 - Nobel Prize: Read a book written by an author that has won a Nobel Prize for Literature.
The Good Earth by Pearl S. Buck 2/15/14
Lexile 1530
Pearl Buck won the No..."
Congrats on your finish!
+5 Combo 20.4
itpdx wrote: "10.6 Beginnings/EndingsCity of Dark Magic by Magnus Flyte
Review: Pretty silly. Let me see how many best seller clichés are included in this book:
Exotic locale ..."
We are going to count this as 10.5. It appears both authors using this pen name have previously published books (as well as later titles). Thanks.
From Post 884Deedee wrote: "Task 20.1 - 1964: Read a book by an author born in 1964.
Banana Yoshimoto
Asleep (1989) by Banana Yoshimoto; translated by [author:Michael Emmerich|5472..."
Sorry, Deedee, this is considered a novel not a collection of short stories and therefore does not qualify for not-a-novel points.
From Post 894Connie wrote: "20.6 20th Century
Things Fall Apart by Chinua Achebe
Lexile 890
Okonkwo is a successful farmer in a Nigerian village in the late 19th Century. He has vowed to be the o..."
Connie, it appears you have earned an RwS Finish! I have books recorded for each of the 20 tasks and have awarded you the bonus. Congrats!
Kate S wrote: "From Post 884Deedee wrote: "Task 20.1 - 1964: Read a book by an author born in 1964.
Banana Yoshimoto
Asleep (1989) by Banana Yoshimoto; translated by..."
I'm sorry, this is my fault that it got miscategorized. Should be short stories and not-a-novel.
Kate S wrote: "itpdx wrote: "10.6 Beginnings/EndingsCity of Dark Magic by Magnus Flyte
Review: Pretty silly. Let me see how many best seller clichés are included in this book:
..."
I don't see a book published before this one under the Magnus Flyte name on GoodReads.
15.8 Malaysia TtPR SeafarerThe Garden of Evening Mists by Tan Twan Eng
Yun Ling has retired from the Malayan Supreme Court, and traveled back to the Cameron Highlands where she had lived during the Malayan Emergency in the 1950s. She has just been diagnosed with early aphasia, and wants to write down her memories before her mind forgets the past.
Yun Ling and her sister Yun Hong were teenage prisoners in a Japanese prison camp in the Malayan jungle during World War II. Although they had Chinese ancestry, they were admirers of Japanese gardens which they had visited with their parents. Yun Ling promised Yun Hong that they would create a garden if they lived through their ordeal at the prison. Yun Ling was the only survivor, and she decided to create a Japanese garden to honor her sister and wash away some of her survivor's guilt.
After the end of World War II, the country contended with communist terrorists during the Malayan Emergency in the 1950s. Malaya was multi-cultural and multi-ethnic, and was still under the control of the British at that time. Yun Ling was visiting a family friend who was the owner of a tea plantation. He suggested that she ask his neighbor, Aritomo Nakamura, to design her Japanese garden. Aritomo had been a gardener to the emperor in Japan in his younger years. Aritomo takes Yun Ling on as an apprentice in his own garden so she can learn the art of designing a Japanese garden. As they work together, hidden details about their lives during the war are revealed, layer by layer. Memories form an important theme in this book.
There is a contrast between the peaceful serenity and beauty of the Garden of Evening Mists, and the violence that is taking place outside its walls. The author wove together poetic descriptions of Asian art and culture with depictions of brutal atrocities to create a wonderful story.
+15 task
+10 bonus
Task Total: 25
Grand Total: 1075
Kate S wrote: "From Post 894Connie wrote: "20.6 20th Century
Things Fall Apart by Chinua Achebe
Lexile 890
Okonkwo is a successful farmer in a Nigerian village in the late 19th Cen..."
Thanks you, Kate. The RwS challenge was fun. Now, two more books to go on the TtPR.
This topic has been frozen by the moderator. No new comments can be posted.
Reading with Style
Books mentioned in this topic
A Dance with Dragons (other topics)Tracks (other topics)
Weird Things Customers Say in Bookshops (other topics)
The Frenzy (other topics)
The Counterfeiters (other topics)
More...
Authors mentioned in this topic
George R.R. Martin (other topics)Robyn Davidson (other topics)
Jen Campbell (other topics)
Francesca Lia Block (other topics)
André Gide (other topics)
More...
On Such a Full Sea by Chang-rae Lee
Chang - Rae Lee is a versatile author. He has written about immigration and identity, war and aging a..."
Sorry, Karen, this book is too new for task 10.6. The task requires the most recent book as of 12/1/13, so a 2014 publication date does not qualify. Sorry again.