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FA 18 Completed Tasks
20.6 The Stone CarversHotel World by Ali Smith
Nineteen-year-old Sara dies after falling down a dumbwaiter shaft in the hotel where she works. Months later, her ghost kicks off the story as it obsesses over how long it took her to fall. Connected to this story are the vignettes of a homeless, poetry-loving woman watchfully camped outside the hotel; the hotel's perceptive receptionist, who is on the precipice of becoming ill; a much-of-the-type, painfully-written dense journalist staying at the hotel; and Sara's alienated and grieving younger sister, who has been staking out the hotel and is equally interested in the ghost's primary question.
I liked this but didn't love it. It's elegantly polyphonic, and it's continually inventive in its words and structures and flights of imagination. The language processing part of my brain (I know no actual neuroscience, just consider this a metaphor) had to stretch to keep up with Smith's agility, and I felt enjoyably breathless when it did. The concerns of the novel--all that current-stage global capitalism neoliberal corporatization idek etc. stuff--were earnestly critical and very much of the era (the story's set in 1999, and this was published in 2001), but far less interesting to me here in 2018, even though I'm still thinking over how Smith intersects this with her interest in the concept of time (and timing and tenses).
+20 Task -- 2001 longlist
+5 Combo (10.5 MPE Penguin Books)
+5 Prizeworthy
+10 Review
Task Total: 40
Season Total: 315
20.5 Singled OutCrocodile on the Sandbank by Elizabeth Peters
I know I read this book a long time ago because I read many of this series in high school (college?), but I quite thoroughly forgot everything but the feel of it and was surprised by part of the ending. Amelia has an over the top personality that is shown both by what she does and how she thinks about herself expressed in the first person narrative. I loved how she was bewildered by how there could be strength in Evelyn's quiet and unassuming personality. I don't think I'd want to be in Amelia's way when she decided on something and expect she'd occasional be uncomfortable to be around even if she was part of the modern era. But in a challenging good-hearted way... The plot was decent and the mystery not entirely predictable (although the motive was either obvious or I remembered it somewhere in the depth of my brain), but it was the character interactions that made the book fun.
+20 task
+10 review
+5 age (1975)
+10 combo (10.2, 10.9)
Task total: 45
Grand total: 770
10.7 AsiansThe Bridegroom by Ha Jin
+10 task
+5 combo (10.9)
+5 prize (Townsend)
Task total: 20
Grand total: 790
10.5 Pet Day Chalice by Robin McKinley
+10 Task (firebird) https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/8...
Task Total: 10
Season Total: 605
20.5 Singled OutSmilla's Sense of Snow by Peter Høeg
approved in help thread- https://www.goodreads.com/topic/show/...
I was conflicted by this novel. I appreciated the depiction of Smilla, a woman who was initially raised in Greenland and later in Denmark. One of the key underlying themes concerns the conflicts inherent in colonies and their mother states. The plot is actually weak...however I will say that I was really drawn to the resolution....even if I knew I would be disappointed (and I was). I was also disappointed because although Smilla is such a likable character, she then has episodes which are more daring and fantastic than James Bond (without the tongue in cheek!) Also... the motivation attributed to Smilla for her quest fails.... 99.9% of people would have their inquisitiveness repelled by a fraction of the obstacles presented to her. I'd like to give 2 1/2 stars...but feeling generous today...so, three stars.
task=20
review=10
combo= 5 (10.5-Flamingo-https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/7...
prizeworthy=15
oldie=5 (1992)
task total= 55
grand total= 365
Post 268 Joanna wrote: "20.2 To Conquer HellKillers of the Flower Moon: The Osage Murders and the Birth of the FBI by David Grann
Review:
This book starts out slowly and builds to an a..."
Welcome back, Joanna! I'm sorry, but this doesn't work for 20.10 because all of the letters have to be in just the title.
Post 269 Joanna wrote: "20.10 Fall EquinoxBorn a Crime: Stories From a South African Childhood by Trevor Noah
Review:
A really wonderful audiobook read by the author (who made a livin..."
This is another that doesn't fit 20.10. We'll score it for your 10.5 combo.
Post 292 Joanna wrote: "20.10 Fall EquinoxLocking Up Our Own: Crime and Punishment in Black America by James Forman Jr.
Review:
A compelling book that complicates the mass incarcerati..."
I'm sorry, this again doesn't qualify for 20.10. We'll score it for your 10.9 combo.
15.6 AbBYReverse chronological order
1951-1955
The Children's Home by Charles Lambert 1953
Task total = 30
Season total = 745
10.7 Asian birthSongs from Books by Rudyard Kipling
+10 task
+10 age (pub 1912)
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rudyard...
+5 combo (10.5)
https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/9...
Task total: 25
Grand total: 815
20.5 Singled OutA View of the Harbour by Elizabeth Taylor
Taylor keeps getting better. The introduction in the NYRB edition suggests she had a "lighter touch" with this. As the NYRB introductions tend to be spoilerish, I stopped reading shortly after this comment, but I think the idea is that this is not as dark as her others. That is certainly true compared to the two other titles I have read. It does not mean lighter as humorous or comedic.
There is no plot, and that suits me just fine. That doesn't mean that nothing happens. It is quiet without big drama. Taylor's superb prose cannot be overlooked in providing entertainment, but it is characterization that reigns supreme here. She does a magnificent job exploring the characters of these people while solidly giving us the flavor of a small harbor town post WWII.
The View of the title is a view of four households who live in the older part of a harbor town called Newby. In one is the doctor and his wife, a writer and for all outward appearances are happily married. Two of the others are headed by widows, and the fourth by a divorced woman. There is also a retired single man who has come for a long stay in the town.
The doctor's wife, Beth, and the divorcee, Tory, have been best friends for well over 20 years and live next door to each other. They are as unlike as two women can be. Mrs. Bracey, who has two grown daughters, is paralyzed from the waist down. She is as coarse as can be and was always a gossip. Lily Wilson has the wax works that she ran with her husband and is more lonely than anyone can guess. Bertram Hemingway hopes to become a famous painter, but mostly is interested in people. He helps us know all of the women as well as himself.
As this is one of her lesser read titles, I hesitate to give this 5-stars. How do I leave room for the others? But I did enjoy this enough to allow it to cross the line, though it may languish at the bottom of the 5-star group.
+20 Task
+10 Review
+15 Combo (10.5 - Penguin View of the Harbour, 20.8, 20.10)
+ 5 Oldie (pub 1947)
Task Total = 50
Season Total = 285
10.5 Pet DayZeitoun by Dave Eggers
Wow. I'm still reeling from this one. I'd be disturbed if it were fiction, but the fact that this is a biography makes my skin crawl.
Abdulrahman Zeitoun is a Syrian who, after traveling the world, made a home in New Orleans. He established a successful painting and contracting business. He purchased and fixed up properties to rent out. He married Kathy, adopted her son, and together they had three more children. Their life was good.
In 2005, Hurricane Katrina began her inexorable march up the U.S. Coast, gaining strength on her way to New Orleans. Kathy decides to take her kids to stay with family in Baton Rouge and Zeitoun (as most people refer to him, as they can't pronounce his first name) stays in New Orleans to protect their properties and business. As the storm makes its way over the city, Zeitoun is relieved that it isn't as bad as the news had made it sound...until the levees and flood walls are compromised and all hell breaks loose. Zeitoun has a canoe and goes about the city, helping people, feeding dogs that have been left behind. He feels like he was destined to be in this city in this moment to be an agent of good and salvation. Then the unimaginable happens (view spoiler).
I knew Katrina was a s*%! show, that it was a GIANT failure on every level--FEMA, local law enforcement, all relief efforts, basic human rights being violated left and right by people in power--but hadn't ever heard a story of this magnitude, that close to the epicenter.
+10 Task (https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/9...)
+10 Review
+15 Prizeworthy
Task total: 35
Season total: 895
10.5 Pet Day Purity of Blood by Arturo Pérez-Reverte
+10 Task (penguin) https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/7...
+5 Combo 10.2
Task Total: 15
Season Total: 620
20.4 BirdsongThe Three-Body Problem by Liu Cixin
In my opinion, good science fiction speculates on what humans do when put in a situation that we have not yet experienced. And this book does that very well. And for American readers adds the exotic premise of first contact being made by Chinese scientists during the Cultural Revolution. I appreciated the translator’s spare notes that help English language readers understand some nuances of Chinese history and culture. I am looking forward to book 2 of Cixin Liu’s trilogy.
+20 task (first chapters of the book take place in 1967, the rest of the book takes place " forty-plus years later"
+10 combo (10.2, 10.9)
+5 prizeworthy-Hugo
+10 review
Task total: 45
Season total: 175
15.6 AbBY chronologicalDate Range 1961-1965
Career of Evil by Robert Galbraith aka J.K. Rowling
+30 Task (author born 1965)
Post Total: 30
Season Total: 170
10.9 9, 10, 11In Bed with a Highlander by Maya Banks
10 letter word in title
Post Total: 10
Season Total: 180
15.7 AbBY chronologicalDate Range 1966-1970
Undead and Unemployed by MaryJanice Davidson
+30 Task (author born 1969)
Post Total: 30
Season Total: 210
20.10 VowelsThe Communist Manifesto by Karl Marx
I stumbled across this in my library's online offerings and was curious what the fuss was all about. The first section had an interesting view of history that eventually turned into a "don't bother trying your foolish counter-arguments on us". And the final section had the biggest reason why it was considered dangerous - the complete endorsement of overthrowing all existing governments and social structures! In some ways it was sad reading the passion of the 30 year old, knowing how "no private property" and "the workers decide together" played out into the development of new class structures instead. I did not spend much time thinking about the book, just read the clear text and moved on.
+20 task
+10 review
+15 age (1848)
+10 combo (10.5 mpe is Penguin, 10.9)
Task total: 55
Grand total: 870
20.7 A month in the countryForgotten Time by Kameron Scott
128 pages
This book was cheesey and silly. The main character obviously wants to be Indiana Jones (who is referenced partway through) and the adventure is more Crystal Skull than the earlier movies. It is a male-sided (heterosexual) romance novel as much as an adventure novel. By which I mean it reads rather like a bodice ripper, containing the associated smut scenes, but from the man's point of view, which was a bit different reading experience and nothing I had seen before. The book wasn't bad, exactly, as long as a sense of humor was kept, but I am really glad I did not pay money for it.
+20 task
+10 review
+5 combo (10.9) (series only has 2 books anywhere, just for some reason he wrote 3 before 2???)
Task total: 35
Grand total: 905
20.4The Three-Body Problem by Liu Cixin
+20 Task (1960s and 2000s)
+15 Combo (10.2 Series---Remembrance of Earth's Past #1; 10.4 Bookshelves-21st C.; 10.7 Crazy Rich Asians-China.
+5 Prize-Hugo Award
Task Total: 40
Grand Total: 40
20.10 Fall Equinox The Haunting of Hill House by Shirley Jackson
Somehow, I never read this before. Of course, I knew the story. I envisioned Catherine Zeta-Jones and Lili Taylor the entire time I read, and I have a powerful urge to re-watch 99’s The Haunting, the OG flavor, and Rose Red.
I love haunted house stuff where the house itself is the character and not something boring like the ghost of a nun or whatnot. Why is that so delicious to me? It’s also terrifying because you can deal with a ghost - it was a person and it can be freed via ghost therapy or banished. But a house? You can’t ghostbust a whole structure. It is what it is and if it doesn’t like you? GTFO.
So. I knew the story, but I didn’t know the story. Was this creepy? Yes, but it was rarely scary. There were a few moments of eeek, and yes - when the cat started banging on the door for breakfast in the pre-dawn and then the door slowly swung open and a shadowy figure entered... I almost screamed. I would have if the kitten did not break the tension by his plaintive meeps and purring. And as I was finishing it, that kitten walked in the window and disturbed the sheers and my peripheral vision was all DANGER GHOST... So yes, it did have a wonderful low-key creep factor that will stay with you.
But Eleanor. Ah, I loved her! She is so weird and so unreliable, and she is my worst nightmare of what I would be if I ever snapped. Terrifying and also delightful.
Loved this book.
+20 task
+20 combo (10.4 Next Best shelf, 10.5 Penguin MPE, 20.5 Eleanor is single, 20.7)
+5 oldie
+10 review
Task total = 55
Season total = 800
From Post 289Valerie wrote: "20.7 A Month in the country
A Month in the Country by J.L. Carr
I didn’t really know what to expect of this novella (I have to admit the description sounded a bit bori..."
+5 Combo 20.10
From Post 294Karen Michele wrote: "10.8 Cli Fi (Karen Michele's Task)
The End We Start From by Megan Hunter
+10 Task: climate change is not stated, but massive flooding has happened in London caus..."
Sorry, this does not appear to be a female head of household (quite yet) in this story.
From Psot 301Anika wrote: "20.6 The Stone Carvers
We Are All Completely Beside Ourselves by Karen Joy Fowler
When we first meet Rosemary Cooke, she is in college. She seems normal, if somewhat..."
+5 Combo 10.4
10.5 Pet DayA Lucky Man by Jamel Brinkley
A gracefully written and cohesive collection of nine stories that focus on men and boys negotiating the poles (poles that shouldn't be opposing poles) of masculinity and vulnerability. His characters wrestle with the experience of boyhood and the performance of manhood--intersected by race--and with not being able to grasp what is going on with girls and women in the meantime. His stories are stories of friends and brothers and sons, who often can identify something sweet and vulnerable in their relationships to each other, but who struggle to reconcile that with the upkeep of everything that's kept them alive and strong so far. Not all his protagonists cross the bridge into saying or doing something unsayable, something that burns down illusions and creates a strange and frightening human connection, but my favorites of the stories were ones where the protagonists clearly do: "Everything The Mouth Eats" (the capoeira brothers story) and "Clifton's Place" (in which burning down an illusion means Ellis complies with someone else's delusion).
Midway through the first story, I wasn't sure if I was going to commit to the entire collection--such a pretentious narrator whose lustful intentions I didn't want to be an audience to--but then something shocking happened (view spoiler) and after that surprise, I decided I was willing to follow wherever Brinkley's storytelling was going. That first story in particular went somewhere deep and complex and hard-to-hold-on-to, and I don't regret the decision to read the whole collection.
Content-wise, it's purposely All Male Gaze, All The Time (one story includes a POV from a woman). Beyond even the oblivious narrators' gazes, many of the girls and women in these stories aren't simplistic, even if they're only presented in the context of men. It's also completely clear that said context is not how to understand them, that they aren't understood within that context. However, I personally wasn't very interested in reading, over and over again, women entering the page with immediate and consistent objectified descriptions of their bodies, all those girls and women being harassed, though I understood Brinkley's purpose.
Style-wise, Brinkley does this thing, this technique (?), in the vast majority of the stories, where he uses the character's present as a sieve to filter out something essential in a memory the character has, and while that got heavy-handed after a half-dozen times, it was still mostly effective and still quite poignant.
+10 Task -- MPE Graywolf Press
+10 Review
Task Total: 20
Season Total: 335
10.10 Group ReadHistory of the Rain by Niall Williams
Set in rural County Clare, Ireland, after the economic collapse of the 2000s, this beautiful story of poetry, fish, water, and tragedy is narrated by teenage Ruth Swain who, for reasons unexplained at the beginning, is confined to her bed on the narrow top floor of a rain-drenched, ramshackle house full of books on the shores of the River Shannon.
I spent a long time reading this one because the prose can’t be gulped down but needs to be savoured. It meanders like the river, but it rewards patience.
5 stars from me, and a big thankyou to Elizabeth for choosing it!
+10 Task
+ 5 Combo (20.4 passages set during Ruth's father's and grandfather's youth, with big gaps)
+10 Review
Task Total: 25
Season Total: 575
20.2 To Conquer HellVoices from Chernobyl: The Oral History of a Nuclear Disaster by Svetlana Alexievich
+20 Task
+25 Combo (10.2, 10.3, 10.5 Chernobyl Prayer: A Chronicle of the Future, 10.8, 10.9 Chernobyl = 9 ltrs)
+10 Prize-Worthy
Points this post: 55
RwS total: 115
AbBY total: -
Season Total: 115
15.8 AbBY, Chronological (skipped 1970-1974) 1975-1979The Woman in the Window by A.J. Finn (1979--thanks again, Elizabeth, for your help finding this!)
+45 Task
Task total: 45
Season total: 940
Task 10.9 = 9, 10, 11 This challenge includes the 9th, 10th and 11th months of the year. Read a book with a 9-, 10-, or 11-letter word in the title.
Com mit tee
Dear Committee Members (2014) by Julie Schumacher
Thurber Prize for American Humor (2015)
Review: Dear Committee Members is an epistolary novel. All the letters were written by one man (named Jason) over a one year period (September 2009 to August 2010). Jason is a tenured professor of English at a Midwestern American college. (The author is a female professor of English at the University of Minnesota – write what you know!) The majority of letters are “Letters of Recommendation” for various students and colleagues. Some of the letters made me laugh out loud – they were written to reflect what professors would really like to say in a “Letter of Recommendation” instead of the rather bland statements that they normally do say. This book was a quick, entertaining read, perfect for lighthearted reading time.
+10 Task
+10 Review
+05 Prize-worthy
Task Total: 10 + 10 + 05 = 25
Grand Total: 165 + 25 = 190
10.8 Cli FiA Canticle for Liebowitz by Walter M. Miller Jr.
This novel centers on the monastic order (Albertian Order of Leibowitz) that has been charged with keeping the fragments of human knowledge safe after a “Flame Deluge” (a nuclear holocaust). It is divided into three sections, in which we follow the order through the ages, starting with the lawless ‘medieval’ age, then the ‘renaissance’ centuries later, and finally the space age. The premise of the monks being the keepers of knowledge is very effective here.
It wasn’t until the middle of the third section that I really comprehended just how terrible this novel is. I feel that word expresses my feelings well and works for a novel with religion as a key element. It is fierce, awesome, prescient, depressing (because humans seem doomed to keep making the same mistakes and it is like looking in a mirror), and powerful. This book is a stellar example of why I think everyone should read science fiction, particularly speculative sci-fi.
That said, I will rate it 4.5* (rounded down for GR to 4). This is because the first section dragged a bit, even though it is necessary to the story. Also, as any of you who read my reviews here knows, I always have an issue with novels that have more than a modicum of religion in them which taints my ratings.
10 task
10 review
10 prize
5 oldie
10 combo 10.5 (bantam), 10.9
______
45
Running total: 360
10.10 Group ReadsI Am Legend by Richard Matheson
This book.
Reading this book, right now... it was something.
So, let it be known that right now I am SUPER FURIOUS and THE PATRIARCHY MUST BURN.
That colored my reading heavily.
Adult language is used so avert your eyes if you are sensitive!
At first this is a quaint vintage vampire story, but I quickly got annoyed with ordinary-white-dude that somehow is going to figure all this shit out with just the help of his local library. I mean, knock yourself out Neville... what else are you going to do? But something just grated that this dude was probably going to do the thing that actual scientists failed to do. Everyone needs a hobby - it was more the approach like he’s the only one making links, HE IS GENIUS, rather than oh snap those poor people with advanced degrees must have all gotten vamped fast - they stood no chance.
Can you tell I hate Neville yet?
Let me back up - I started hating Neville because we get more details on how worried he is that he’s going to (view spoiler) than the loved ones he lost. And then on one of his trips to the library he thinks about the librarian. He assumes she was a spinster, dying the most horrible death of all - alone and unloved. Because in his world, a woman could not be single by choice! Nah, we all really want the D and if we say we don’t we’re liars or lesbians or can you tell I am DONE with this perspective???
Ahem. Where was I? Part 3. Everything from this point is SPOILERS so if you are really keen on reading my rant, you were warned.
(view spoiler)
I am legend.
Sigh. A girl can hope.
+10 task
+10 combo (20.7, 10.5 I Am Legend Bantam)
+5 award
+5 oldie
+10 review
Task total = 40
Season total = 840
15.7 AbBYReverse chronological order
1946-1950
1922 by Stephen King 1947
Task total = 30
Season total = 870
20.10 Fall EquinoxTales of the Peculiar by Ransom Riggs (940 Lexile)
(I read this thinking I had somewhere found the author’s birth year as 1980 and that I’d be one step closer to my AbBY completion...nope! Foiled again!)
I don’t know if you’re familiar with the Miss Peregrine universe created by Ransom Riggs...if not, you’re missing out! If you love the gorier aspects of Grimm, the elaborate race building of Tolkien, the glorious tongue-in-cheekiness of Gaiman, then you should check this out. This is a collection of fairy tales which is frequently referenced throughout the series, so it’s kinda fun to read the primary source (like reading “Tales of Beedle the Bard” after having read Harry Potter).
This was a quick read and had gorgeous woodcut illustrations at the beginning of each story. The stories stand alone well, so you don’t really have to be familiar with the rest of the series to enjoy them.
+20 Task (tAles Of thE pecUlIar)
+10 Review
+10 Combo (10.2, 10.5–https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/2...)
Task total: 40
Season total: 980
10.5 Pet DayDirty Snow by Georges Simenon
This starts out as sleazy pulp fiction. Frank Friedmaier is an 18-year old punk, full of himself. He and his mother, Lotte, who runs a "house", live in an occupied country without ration cards. They are despised by all, not just because of the immorality, but because of that immorality they can live better than those under occupation. Lotte is fat because she can eat whatever she wants as often as she wants while the neighbors haven't enough, rarely get meat. They have an abundance of coal, while others are cold. In the meantime, Frank lives completely outside the law in ways even his mother would likely condemn.
Early on, I felt compelled to keep reading in the same way one can't turn away from a train wreck. Simenon lays down this foundation of Frank's character to prepare us for what comes later. The novel builds in an unexpected way. The ending is powerful.
Simenon is better known for his Maigret novels. While I have read the first in that series, I have read more of his stand alone novels. Simenon was so prolific I think it unlikely that any but the very few could indulge themselves to read everything. I can't read everything? Ok, I want to read more. This is a full 5-stars.
+10 Task (The Snow Was Dirty)
+10 Review
+ 5 Oldies (pub 1946)
Task Total = 25
Season total = 310
15.1AbBY Chronological orderDate range: 1890-1894
The Mirror Crack'd from Side to Side by Agatha Christie 1890
Task : 15
15.2 AbBY Chronological order1895-1899
Till We Have Faces: A Myth Retold by C.S. Lewis 1898
Task: 20pts
15.3- AbBY Chronological OrderDate range: 1900-1904
Way Station by Clifford D. Simak 1904
Task: 20 points
20.9 Arkansas Midnight in the Garden of Good and Evil by John Berendt
+20 Task
+5 Combo 20.2
+15 Prizeworthy
Task Total: 40
Season Total: 660
20.5 Singled OutHeart in a Box by Kelly Thompson
-single young woman just gets broken up with
-Graphic Novel - no styles
+20 Task
Grand Total : 195 pts
20.5 Singled OutThe Death of Mrs. Westaway by Ruth Ware
Young single woman, whose mother has died manages her own affairs and house.
+20 Task
Grand Total: 215 pts
10.10 Group Reads News of the World by Paulette Jiles
+10 Task
+5 Combo 10.4
Task Total: 15
Season Total: 675
15.9 AbBY, Chronological 1980-1984Mr. Fox by Helen Oyeyemi (1984)
+45 Task
Task total: 45
Season total: 1025
20.4 BirdsongSparrow Hill Road by Seanan McGuire
This book is about a hitchhiking ghost and different chapters jump around to different parts of the 70 year span of her time in death. It is a fascinating and complete world, with elements of the twilight ghost world familiar from folklore and new elements that are seamlessly interwoven. Individual chapters tell stories about love and loss and living in difficult circumstances, but it is the existence of the ghost realm that drives most of them, as they would not be possible otherwise. I like Rose herself, both her voice and her attitude and how real she feels. the book is a denser read then her recent portal novels, perhaps partly because it was short stories published separately, before it was transformed by editing and additional writing into a novel, but it still flows nicely and I will look forward to getting my hands on the sequel.
+20 task
+10 review
+5 combo (10.4 21st lit oct 2014)
Task total: 35
Grand total: 970
Post 337 Anika wrote: "20.10 Fall EquinoxTales of the Peculiar by Ransom Riggs (940 Lexile)
(I read this thinking I had somewhere found the author’s birth year as 1980 and that I’d be ..."
I'm sorry, Anika. 20.7 is for novels/novellas, and, as this is a collection of stories, doesn't qualify for that task.
Elizabeth (Alaska) wrote: "Post 337 Anika wrote: "20.10 Fall EquinoxTales of the Peculiar by Ransom Riggs (940 Lexile)
(I read this thinking I had somewhere found the author’s birth year a..."
I really need to be better about reading *all* the requirements for a task (I was focusing solely on the <200 pages aspect)! I’ve updated the -5 combo in my records.
15.10 AbBY, Chronological 1985-1989The Beginning of Everything (930 Lexile) by Robyn Schneider (1986)
+60 Task
Task total: 60
AbBY Finisher Bonus +100
Season total: 1185
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Reading with Style
Books mentioned in this topic
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The Big Sleep (other topics)
The Big Sleep (other topics)
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Authors mentioned in this topic
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Diana Gabaldon (other topics)
Raymond Chandler (other topics)
Samuel Richardson (other topics)
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We Are All Completely Beside Ourselves by Karen Joy Fowler
When we first meet Rosemary Cooke, she is in college. She seems normal, if somewhat precocious. Slowly, she reveals the story of her family....her clinically depressed mother, her alcoholic father, her radical (animal rights activist) brother, her disappeared sister. (view spoiler)[About 1/3 of the way through the book, we are finally let in on the fact that her sister, Fern, is a chimpanzee. She was brought into the family at the same time that Rosemary was born as part of a university experiment. They were socialized as twins. At age 5, a traumatic event occurs and Rosemary is sent to live with her grandparents. When she returns to her family, they have a new house and Fern is gone. So Rosemary has lost her twin and it has left a giant hole in her life. (hide spoiler)]
I liked the way the story unfolded, but didn't particularly like any of the characters. The way the author writes about the treatment of animals just reinforced this overwhelming thought (which has developed from so many of the books I've been reading lately related to overpopulation, climate destruction, etc.) that humans are kinda of terrible. Ugh. I need to find something light and uplifting already to reestablish my belief in humanity!
+20 Task (Man Booker nominee 2014)
+10 Review
+15 Prizeworthy
+20 Combo (10.4; 10.5--https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/2... 10.9 "completely"=10 letters; 20.10 wE Are all cOmpletely besIde oUrselves)
Task total: 65
Season total: 860