Reading with Style discussion
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Winter 14/15 RwS Completed Tasks - Winter 14/15
20.9 - Respect EldersThe Human Stain by Philip Roth
Coleman Silk at the age of 71 retired in disgrace from the college of which he had long been a professor and a dean. A rigid, commanding authority figure, that aggressively restructured the college, Silk was not beloved among the faculty. So when a student accuses him of racism, Silk finds little support. Instead of calmly stating his case and allowing the incident to blow over, Silk resigns, preferring to belligerently defend his reputation. The novel begins with an unnamed narrator (much later identified as Zuckerman) describing Silk's appearance at his wooded retreat demanding the novelist write his story. Thus begins an unlikely friendship. The novelist is told the story of Coleman's disgrace and witness how he is able to find freedom and a semblance of peace in an affair with a 34-year-old janitor with a tragic past of her own.
I found it to be a fascinating novel about identity and how one's self-creation and perception so frequently differs from how others see us. Roth is an excellent writer and while I found the book to be enthralling, I was a little disappointed in the smugness with which the author conveys Daphne's thoughts. And my other overarching thought of the is book is that there are so. many. words.
+20 task
+10 combos (20.6 - Jewish, 10.5 - Author Achievements)
+10 review
Task total: 40
Grand Total: 210
20.3 HistoricalAnna Karenina by Leo Tolstoy
+20 task
+10 combo(10.2, 20.9 - died at 82)
+10 non-western author
+20 jumbo (964 pp)
+10 oldies (p.1877)
Task total 70
Grand total 270
20.2 PersephoneThe Cross Eyed Bear Murders by Dorothy B. Hughes
+20 task
+15 combo(20.1-p.1940, 20.5 female protagonist, 20.9- died at 89)
+5 oldies
Task total 40
Grand total 310
20.3 HistoricalAll the Light We Cannot See by Anthony Doerr
+20 task
+10 review
+5 jumbo
I had high expectations for this book, and for the most part, they were met. Since most of you have read and/or know the plot by now, I want to focus on what worked for me and what didn't.
The good -
The writing - some of the phrases and descriptions in this book took my breath away. Doerr writes like a poet, in short, fragmented sentences much of the time, and his writing is lush and gorgeous. It reminded me a bit of the writing in A Constellation of Vital Phenomena, another book that I loved.
The perspective - I've read more than a handful of books in the last few months about WWII and Nazi Germany, and I really enjoyed reading it from the perspective of children coming of age during the war. It was also interesting to consider the tragedy from Werner's point of view - Doerr helped the reader understand that there were so many unwitting participants fighting for the Nazis who simply had few (or no) other options than to fight. I was equally blown away when considering what it would have been like to be blind during the war. When I let myself truly consider Marie-Laure's experience, it was just terrifying. Can you imagine living through WWII, not knowing what the leaflets said that were dropped on your city, warning you to evacuate immediately? Not knowing if the person you were talking to on the street was your friend or foe because you couldn't see their uniform? I can't think of many things more unsettling, and Doerr did a really fantastic job of getting inside Marie-Laure's head to let the reader "see" from a blind person's perspective (I wonder if he has a close friend or relative who is blind - he did such a great job with this I can't imagine he doesn't).
The less than stellar-
The writing - I know that I said the writing was part of the good, but it was also part of what made me give this four stars instead of five. Because of the short, fragmented sentences, it was sometimes hard to immerse myself in the story - I found myself getting distracted quite a bit, and I kept having to pull myself back into the novel. It didn't help that the book was also broken up into very short chapters - sometimes less than a page - and that it was also chopped into time periods that jumped around from the 1930s until present day. I think this book might have worked better in a traditional narrative form (at least, I think it would have worked better for me as a reader). The choppiness seemed unnecessary and didn't add much to the reading experience.
Overall, I'm so glad that this is my first book of 2015 - and despite my minor annoyances with it, I'm very impressed with Doerr and highly recommend it to those of you who have yet to pick it up.
task total: 35
grand total: 240
Kate S wrote: "Valerie wrote: "10.2 NutcrackerThe Heart of a Dog
I discovered Bulgakov at the beginning of 2014 with The Master and Margarita, so when I saw this in the bookstore I bought it wi..."
Hi Kate:
Thanks for the heads up. I expanded on it. I didn't change the score though.
20.4 1001 list: Middlemarch by George EliotA study of life in a fictitious small town in early 18th -century England. The work has numerous characters which are for the most part easy to keep track of. The novel begins and ends with a focus on Dorothea Brooke. Dorothea is a complicated individual who is simultaneously naive and insightful. She marries an older man but the marriage does not turn out the way she imagined. When she becomes a widow, her husband's will casts aspersions on her fidelity. Although there are many subplots, most of the serious action surrounds a scandal involving a banker....whose actions taint several others...including the man who loves Dorothea. I thought the novel was very well written and clever. My only quibble is with the quotations that begin each chapter....almost all of which were cryptic to me...and so unlike the rest of the very distinct writing.
+20 task
+10 review
+5 Combo (10.4 Island)
+15 Oldie (1782)
+20 Jumbo (904p)
Total= 70
Grand Total= 100
Question- Could someone tell me how I find out how many times a book has been shelved as Jewish?
Ed wrote: "Question- Could someone tell me how I find out how many times a book has been shelved as Jewish?"
Welcome, Ed! In the right-side panel on the book page is a section called "genres". These are really shelves by GR members and will say the number of users who have shelved as such. These will be the most popular shelves. Just below that section is a link in green "see top shelves" which you can click on. The next screen is in order by the number of shelves, so that "Jewish" for instance, might be hard to readily see. When I'm looking for a specific shelf name, I use my browser's find feature (Ctrl-F for Windows) to find the shelf name.
Also, in the help thread, is a link to the Jewish shelf where you might get ideas. Yeah, I know, there are lots of titles to scroll through - the above is the way to see for a specific book, though.
Elizabeth (Alaska) wrote: "Ed wrote: "Question- Could someone tell me how I find out how many times a book has been shelved as Jewish?"
Welcome, Ed! In the right-side panel on the book page is a section called "genres". Th..."
ok...thanks Elizabeth...I think I figured it out. The book I'm planning to read for the task has been shelved 21 times as Jewish. I had never noticed that feature before.
Ed
10.9 EconomicalFreedom by Jonathan Franzen
Review: I know The Corrections is the book Franzen is most known for, but this is the one I chose to read first. I chose to read it now for a challenge and I had time since it is still vacation time. I was not sure what to think at first. The first 25 or so pages gives an overview of a family in the St. Paul suburbs of Minnesota. I was not too into it at first and slept on that. The next day I started again, there was a POV shift, and I got sucked into the story. The story of Walter and Patty Berglund is complex and the way Franzen tells it keeps you thinking.
Part of the story is a memoir written by Patty in third person. In other parts of the novel, the POV shifts to third person accounts of the rest of the supporting characters. I liked this because then I felt like I understood Patty, Walter, Joey, and Richard more.
I also found the ideas embedded in the story to be interesting, most notably the concept of "freedom" itself. I am sure to be thinking on this topic for time to come. It also makes you think about the environment and zero-population growth.
+10 Task (2010 list)
+10 Review
+5 Jumbo (576 pages)
Task Total = 25
Grand Total = 120 points
10.8 Two for OneAlice in Wonderland by Lewis Carroll
The Queen of Spades by Alexander Pushkin
+ 10 task
Task total: 10
Grand total: 325
Task 10.8 - Two for One - Read a combination of 2 or more books, each under 100 pages, that total at least 100 pages when combined.
Most popular version: 62 pages
The Imaginary Mistress (1841) by Honoré de Balzac (Paperback, 62 pages)
Most popular version: 46 pages
An Episode Under the Terror, and Z. Marcas (1840) by Honoré de Balzac (Paperback, 46 pages)
+10 Task (#10.8 pagecount <100 pages)
+15 Oldies -151 to 250 years old: (1764-1863)
Task Total: 10 + 15 = 25
Grand Total: 290 + 25 = 315
10.9 - Economical:Do No Harm: Stories of Life, Death and Brain Surgery by Henry Marsh
Review: Henry Marsh is one of the UK's foremost neurosurgeons. In this book he describes what it is like to be involved in life-and-death situations on a daily basis. There is a little bit of blood and guts in the early chapters, but I am the most squeamish person in the world and I coped. Mostly, Mr Marsh talks about the thoughts, doubts, emotions and decision-making processes of neurosurgeons, who can be seen as infallible gods by their patients but who are, in the end, only human with the same ability to make mistakes as the rest of us. However, in their case, any mistakes have the most disastrous consequences.
This is a very honest book, and respectful of the patients described. If I was in their position, I would very much want Mr Marsh to be my surgeon (even under local anaesthetic - gulp!).
+10 task (2014 list)
+5 combo (10.4 set in UK)
+10 review
Task total: 25
RwS total: 410
AtoZ total: 15
Grand Total: 425
20.3 - HistoricalThose Who Save Us by Jenna Blum
A few years back, I visited the town in Pennsylvania where the German ancestors of my family first settled and where their German last name was changed to a more Americanized version because of the difficulties of being German in America after WWII. I have been interested in the Holocaust and read a lot about it over the years, both non fiction and historical fiction, but I have not read as much about the German people living through the war. Like one of the protagonists in Those Who Save Us, I am curious about the German people at the time and how they got through such a horrific time and decided what to do and not to do and what to know and not to know. This book was compelling to me for those reasons and kept me turning the pages and wanting more in the end, but still satisfied with the ending. This was a five star book for me and I recommend it highly to those with similar interests and lovers of historical fiction!
+20 Task: on list
+ 5 Combo: 20.6 - Jewish 23 shelvings
+10 Review
Task Total: 35
Grand Total: 575
10.3 1980sThe Locked Room by Paul Auster
Review:
My favorite of the three books in the New York Trilogy, this book continues the exploration of philosophical questions of self, authorship, character, truth versus fiction, watched versus watcher, and other such themes. The book neatly brings in elements from the earlier stories and changes the way those other stories resonate in my mind. The book is too hard to describe and too strangely constructed to be worthy of much in the way of plot description, but rest assured that despite being post-modern metafiction, it's highly readable and accessible. I've enjoyed the other Paul Auster books I've read, so I think I'll be seeking out more of his work this year.
+10 Task (Part of The New York Trilogy)
+10 Review
+10 Combo (10.5, 20.4)
+5 Oldies
Task total: 35
Grand total: 210
20.10 Goodreads FeatureThe Interestings by Meg Wolitzer
I’ve had The Interestings on my bookshelf for a bit and the only real reason I’ve had for NOT reading it is because I have it in hardcover and those are annoying to lug around. I enjoyed this book, I really did. I was maybe a bit surprised with how much I did enjoy it. I thought it was well written and flowed nicely, even though it was going back and forth between past and present. I found it very interesting that one of the main elements of the novel which was so central, was finally succinctly mentioned at about page 444! I was struck by that with a resounding “Finally” while I was reading it. These kinds of novels, I find, really make me think about myself and my own relationships. Very interesting indeed.
+20 Task
+10 Review
Task Total=30
Grand Total=60
20.4 - 1001:The Music of Chance by Paul Auster
Review:
This was my very first Paul Auster novel and I was excited to start it because lots of people love his work. I finished it about 24 hours ago and I am still angry. I've been trying to read reviews online, in the hope that they would point out something I missed somewhere and thus make it all make more sense, but it seems that's not going to happen. I just can't stop thinking about and being mad at the ending!
I enjoyed reading the book and I wanted to read more, to find out what happens next. Because of the obviously excellent writing I didn't have any problem with the plot being totally absurd (as a result of a lost poker game with eccentric millionares, two guys are perfectly fine with spending two months building a wall out of 15th century stones imported from Ireland, to pay back their debt in physical labor?). I was okay with the pace of the novel being sort of slow at times. I was fine with there being some very odd characters and events and several shifts in the atmosphere and scenery. It was an intriguing read and I liked the symbolism and the many themes explored (freedom, power and control, money, chance and luck shaping our lives vs our own choices). I have often thought about the role that chance and random coincidences play in people's lives and enjoyed how that theme was the essence of the book.
I would probably have said that I really liked the novel, except for this: just when I was getting very intrigued with how it's going to resolve, it didn't. The book just ended, with no resolve, no answers, the ending not even flowing naturally from the previous events. Just like that, it was done. It felt a bit like Auster simply decided he wasn't interested in finishing the book, so he just didn't bother. I was just staring at the book, not believing that was it, feeling cheated. I'm not one who needs a novel to neatly tie everything together and present the answers and spell everything out for the reader, I can do my own thinking but this... I am pretty sure I am still missing something, because it just didn't make any sense. If the point was that even the way your life ends is governed by chance and it can come at any time, well, even that didn't really work. Not sure now whether or not to read any of his other books!
+20 task
+5 combo (10.5 - Author Achievements: Paul Auster won the Princess of Asturias Awards in 2006)
+10 review
+5 oldies (published 1990)
Task total: 40
Grand total: 105
10.4. Island DreamsZERO by Marc Elsberg
Review: It's a technological thriller in which an American company develops software to "help people improve" by using available technology to track their body functions and lifestyle. Via smartwatches, smartphones and data glasses the software collects peoples data, analyzes it and suggests via "ActApps" the optimal actions to take. When a teenager dies in London, shortly after the American president is attacked by drones thanks to "Zero" a cyberactivist/-terrorist grouping, London female journalist Cynthia Bonsant gets the job of her life: Write about Zero's activities and lead the digital hunt at the same time.
The book seems a bit hurredly written, as if the author feared someone else might publish a similar idea before him, and before events like Edward Snowden & Co. feel old-fashioned. The characters are not as well developed and authentic as in Elsberg's previous novel.
+10 task (estimated 75 to 80 percent are set in London, UK)
+10 review
Task Total: 20
Grand Total: 105
10.4 Sovereign StatesThe Duchess War by Courtney Milan
Review: This is the first book in Milan’s Brothers Sinister series. I’d read the prequel novella and loved it, so I was greatly looking forward to this book. Milan has quickly become one of my favorite romance authors, and this series has so far not disappointed me. She does such a good job of mixing perspectives – someone in her novels is usually someone with mixed parentage or of a lower class or something else special that moves her books beyond the typical upper class drawing room type stuff usually found in historical romances. Her view of what people could have been is one I’d like to see – I’d like to believe there were dukes in the 1800s who befriended their bastard brothers and wanted to abolish the peerage system. This book has one such duke, matched with a woman whose past would be seen as a scandal to most of society, but not to him. It’s a fun book, although I’m even more looking forward to the next in the series.
+10 Task (set entirely in England except a couple of pages in France)
+10 Review
Task Total: 20
Grand Total: 315
10.6 Foreign LanguageThe Fat Years by Chan Koonchung
Review: The Fat Years is not a hard book to read. When I was reading it, I flipped through the pages like I would a good thriller. The problem is that it felt like a dream that makes no sense, and not in a good way for me. For some reason, I had a similar feeling reading this as when I read Cloud Atlas, but I’m not sure there are many similarities between the books.
It’s set in near-future China, which really ends up being more like contemporary China. A few years before, the majority of the Chinese people have mysteriously forgotten an entire month, and the story is (kind of) about figuring out where that month went and what happened during it. Really, though, the book was about the dangers of what government could do (is doing?) to its people, and the last section, when the main characters finally find out what happen, reads more like a treatise than the end of a good mystery. That part reminded me a lot of War and Peace, when Tolstoy waxes on and on about historians.
All in all, this book was more interesting to me because it’s been banned in China than for its actual content, but it was still worthwhile to read.
+10 Task (written in Chinese)
+10 Non-Western (born in China, lives in China)
+10 Review
Task Total: 30
Grand Total: 345
20.8 Exiles and EmmigrantsLegend by Marie Lu
+20 Task (born in China, lives in USA)
Lexile 710 – no styles
Task Total: 20
Grand Total: 365
10.9 EconomistAmerican Rust by Philipp Meyer
Review: I’ve been trying to read just about anything I find set in the Pittsburgh area, since it’s my hometown and I get a little homesick sometimes. This one gets filed under “the setting distracts me” – the author isn’t originally from the Monongahela Valley, but still put in the occasional Pittsburgh reference that just threw me off most of the time. The rest of the book was my least favorite kind – disaffected young men (really, everyone is disaffected) making stupid decisions to try to “escape.” At least most of these people actually had reason to feel disaffected – the loss of jobs after all the mills closed in the area was, and to some extent still is, a real problem. That was one of the problems though – it was hard to tell when in time the story was set, although there were enough clues to place it fairly contemporarily with when it was written. I ended up rating this two stars, but wish I could have given it more.
+10 Task (2009 list)
+10 Review
Task Total: 20
Grand Total: 385
10.8 Two for OneA Kiss For Midwinter by Courtney Milan and Claiming the Duchess by Sherry Thomas
Review: A Kiss for Midwinter gives the story of how the best friend in The Duchess War finds love with one of the doctors present during her most vulnerable moment. Lydia doesn’t understand at first how Jonas communicates – but in a short novella, Milan manages to thoroughly convince her, and the readers, that the serious doctor is her one true love. The Christmas setting was perfect for the season, and I would love to read some more about this couple. I love that neither of them is titled, and they have had real problems in their lives.
Claiming the Duchess sets up Sherry Thomas’s Fitzhugh trilogy. This one is VERY short, and the romance is just okay, but I would like to get to know Christian, who is the hero of the first novel in the series. I’ve only read one of Thomas’s books, but will eventually definitely read more.
+10 Task (A Kiss for Midwinter is 94 pages; Claiming the Duchess is 6,500 words - http://www.sherrythomas.com/claiming-..., which works out to approximately 22 pages based on 30,000 words = 100 pages)
+5 Combo (10.4 – both are set entirely in England)
+10 Review
Task Total: 25
Grand Total: 410
10.4 Sovereign StatesUnsticky by Sarra Manning
Review: This book pulled me in two directions the entire time. I had a fundamental problem with the premise, but I totally fell into the story and the characters. The premise is that a 23-year-old girl and a 41-year-old man enter into a “contract” in which she is paid for essentially being his mistress. Through the course of the seven months, she learns to be more confident and he learns to feel – but the power dynamics never settled well for me. By the end, I thought Manning did a decent job of giving Grace agency and showing Vaughn’s vulnerability, and I really did love the last chapter. I just wish that in the course of this actually quite long book that I’d felt like more of the loose ends had been tied up. I’m going and finding more of the author’s books though, definitely.
+10 Task (aside from a few pages set in trips out of the country, the entire book is set in England)
+5 Jumbo (562 pages)
+10 Review
Task Total: 25
Grand Total: 435
10.4 Sovereign StatesProof by Seduction by Courtney Milan
Review: If I’m not careful, I’m just going to rip through all of Courtney Milan’s backlist and have nothing left within the month. Regardless, I’m enjoying the ride. This is the first book in her first series, so it’s not as polished as her more recent ones, but many hallmarks are there. The heroine is an intelligent and educated woman, who has managed to be resourceful and provide for herself in spite of her unknown familial origins. The hero is a marquess, actually more concerned with status than most of Milan’s other heroes, but still open to change. I love the glimpse into multiple classes and the characters’ development in the course of the book, and am looking forward to the second one in the series.
+10 Task (set entirely in England)
+10 Review
Task Total: 20
Grand Total: 455
Deedee wrote: "Task 20.9 – Respect Elders- Read a book by an author who lived at least 80 years.
Dorothy Gilman
Born: in The United States : ON: June 25, 1923
Died: February 02, 2012
[book:Mrs..."
+5 Oldies
Ed wrote: "20.4 1001 list: Middlemarch by George EliotA study of life in a fictitious small town in early 18th -century England. The work has numerous characters which are for the ..."
I show a publication date of 1872 for this, for 10 Oldies points, not 15. Sorry.
Tuyen wrote: "10.8 Two for OneAlice in Wonderland by Lewis Carroll
The Queen of Spades by Alexander Pushkin
+ 10 task
Task total: 10
Grand total: 325"
+10 Oldies (the newer of these was published in 1865)
10.8 Two for OneThis Wicked Gift by Courtney Milan - 28,781 words: http://www.courtneymilan.com/rambling...
and
Out by Harper Fox - 21,620 words: https://www.smashwords.com/books/view...
Review: This Wicked Gift serves as a prequel to the first novel Courtney Milan had published, so it’s a little rough around the edges, but it was still satisfying for a less than 100 page novella. The protagonists are not members of the ton – William may once have had a chance at existing on its edges, but Lavinia never even had delusions of wealth or grandeur. I love it when Milan does that – her stories have their fair share of dukes and earls, but she explores the middle and lower classes too. This is short, so the actual romance happens pretty quickly, but the power dynamics aren’t typical and it was relatively refreshing, even though the premise was a little iffy. It was nice seeing William appear in the following novella, too.
Out hit a strange chord for me – for such a short story, it took me a LONG time to get into it. By the end, I actually would have read more from the two characters, but it’s possible Harper Fox just needs to stick to novels. I’ll have to read one of her full-length ones to gauge that.
+10 Task
+5 Combo (both stories are set completely in the UK – This Wicked Gift in England; Out in Scotland
+10 Review
Task Total: 25
Grand Total: 480
15.6 – T-FThreads and Flames by Esther M. Friesner (Lexile 840)
+20 Task
Task Total: 20
Grand Total: 500
10.10 - Group Reads
Too Much Happiness by Alice Munro
Review: A book of short stories with the feature story about a female novelist/mathematician. Not a typical read for me, but like with most books of this type there are stories that I liked and some that were 'meh'. The story that sticks in my mind is the first one "Dimensions" a father murders his three children and the mother, narrator of the story, is left to muddle through life as best she can. The murderer, her husband, write a letter and at the end says he has something important to tell her on her next visit. Needless to say he doesn’t tell her in person, but writes another letter explaining that he sees their dead children and they are fine, in the afterlife or other dimension. A story that wasn’t so much about forgiveness as much as about understanding and finding a way to move on.
+10 Task
+10 Review
Task Total: 20
Grand Total: 20
10.2 - Nutcracker:Notes from Underground by Fyodor Dostoyevsky
Review: Well, I'm really not sure what to write about this. It's my first Dostoyevsky, and would probably be my last if my DH wasn't so enthusiastic about The Brothers Karamazov. I think maybe it's too clever for me - I just wanted to shake the wretched Underground Man most of the time and tell him to get a grip (don't worry - I wouldn't ever do that to someone depressed in real life). But I see myself as an optimist so maybe we were just destined not to get on.
I listened to the book on CD. That's probably a mistake as it would have been preferable to have stopped reading after each passage, mulled it over, gone back and reread.
The CD was read by DBC Pierre, whose voice fitted very well. There was a passage at the end where DBCP explains why the book means so much to him, and that was probably my favourite part. He ends by saying "don't read this book because it's great; read it because you don't have to". Hmmm.
+10 task (set in St Petersburg, Russia)
+10 review
+10 non-Western
+15 oldies (pub. 1864)
Task total: 45
RwS total: 455
AtoZ total: 15
Grand Total: 470
20.1 RwS Anniversary :A Princess of Mars by Edgar Rice Burroughs
+20 task (published 1912)
+10 Oldies
Task total: 30
Grand Total: 570
20.3 - HistoricalOne Corpse Too Many by Ellis Peters
This was less of a mystery but even more interesting historically than the first book. Here we see the court of King Stephen visiting Shrewsbury during the civil war of 1138, with political treachery rife, and Brother Cadfael agreeing to bury the hanged traitors. But there's one corpse too many - an extra body, of a man who's been strangled instead of hanged, and put with the others for burial. Probably nobody but Brother Cadfael would have noticed or cared. Cadfael knows early on who's done what, but then he has to find the evidence, and make sure the good don't suffer.
+20 task
+10 review
+15 combo (10.3, 10.4 set entirely in the UK, 20.9 1913-95)
+ 5 oldies (1979)
Task total: 50
Grand Total: 430 points
20.10 - Goodreads FeatureHousekeeping by Marilynne Robinson
I found Housekeeping unsettling and felt nervous for the narrator throughout. I had heard of this book and always wanted to read it, but I did not know it was on the darker side when I began because I hate spoilers and try to avoid reading much about a book before starting. I don’t mind dark books and I enjoy coming of age stories, so I was surprised, but not disappointed in the overall story of the book. If I had read it in 1980 when it was first published, I think it would have had a greater impression on me. I wouldn’t have read so many books with the same themes and ideas. With that said, though, there were many breathtaking passages beautifully written. My feelings of nervousness for the young narrator reached their peak in the rowboat scene, but the story didn’t play out in the way I had predicted, so it was overall a satisfying read. I am glad to have read it and am now eager to go on to Gilead and experience Marilynne Robinson’s more recent work.
+20 Task
+ 5 Combo: 10.3 - 1980s
+10 Review
+ 5 Oldies (1980)
Task Total: 40
Grand Total: 615
20.10 Goodreads Feature :The Carpet Makers by Andreas Eschbach
+20 task (thanks Deedee)
Task total: 20
Grand Total: 590
20.3 Historical :Cruel as the Grave by Sharon Kay Penman
+20 task (#146 on list)
+5 Combo (10.4-set in UK)
Task total: 25
Grand Total: 615
20.3 Historical FictionAll the Light We Cannot See by Anthony Doerr
“Open your eyes and see what you can with them before they close forever.”
I don’t think this book was at all what I was expecting and I was very pleasantly surprised to find how much I enjoyed it. For the longest time, I didn’t know exactly where this story was going and that made me quite uneasy. I don’t read a lot of books that are set during WWII so I can’t say if this was a different take on a typical war story but I found it very engaging and of course somewhat disturbing in its own way. It was also heartwarming and poignant in many ways. I was really drawn to the characters. Recommended and I would definitely read more of Doerr’s works.
+20 Task
+10 Review
+5 Jumbo
Task Total=35
Grand Total=95
Kate S wrote: "Ed wrote: "20.4 1001 list: Middlemarch by George EliotA study of life in a fictitious small town in early 18th -century England. The work has numerous characters which a..."
oops...I transposed the numbers. Thanks for catching that Kate.
10.8 - Two for One:The Canterville Ghost by Oscar Wilde (26 pages)
The Death of Ivan Ilych by Leo Tolstoy (86 pages)
+10 task
+10 oldies (published 1887 and 1884 respectively)
Task total: 20
RwS total: 475
AtoZ total: 15
Grand Total: 490
Ed, the Square Peg means that it cannot be used for any other task, so, by definition it can't have combos. Let us know if you want to use it for 10.4 or for 20.9.We award Jumbo points based on the page count of the most popular English-language print edition so that everyone is awarded the same points. To find out the page count of the MPE:
When you look at the other editions page of a book, and the sort is by "num ratings" (menu upper right, but it is the default), the most popular edition will be listed first. In most cases, this is the English language print edition. If it is not, we will look for the first appearance in the list of an English language print edition.
ok Elizabeth.... thanks....I'm still learning. Here is my amended submission:The Tontine by Thomas B. Costain
20.9 Respect Elders
I read this book over 40 years ago when I was a teen..... and loved it. But I really did not remember the book correctly. My memory was of a ribald and comic romp (which it really isn't). The Tontine is a now obsolete life insurance scheme that the characters in the book are subscribed to by their parents. Each year, the surviving subscribers share the dividends. Each year the dividends obviously increase. When only a dozen are left, the hefty dividends become the motive for some greedy misdeeds. Most of the action surrounding the Tontine intrigues occurs near the end. The first 800 pages are really a series of family sagas...mostly concerning the Carboys and Graces who start the book as business partners. Almost the entire book occurs in England with very brief visits to Bermuda, Brazil, America and France. Costain's writing is reminiscent of Dickens. Although I enjoyed the book and rated it 4 stars.... I kept wondering why my teenage self loved it so much and recommended it so often to others.
+20 task (Costain lived to be 80)
+10 review
+5 combo (10.4 almost all the action occurs in England)
+15 Jumbo (815 p most popular version).
Total= 50
Grand Total= 145
Ed wrote: "ok Elizabeth.... thanks....I'm still learning. Here is my amended submission:The Tontine by Thomas B. Costain
20.9 Respect Elders
I read this book over 40 yea..."
Thanks. You may find that sometimes you want to switch your task claims later in the challenge, which is perfectly acceptable. At that time you can just make a post telling us where you posted first and then the new task. This is fine - this time - but we also use the post numbers in our scoring, so we need to not have posts deleted.
By the way, I, too, read The Tontine many many years ago and remember it to this day. Although I almost never reread books, it's one of the rare ones I might consider doing so.
10.10 - Group readsThe New Jim Crow: Mass Incarceration in the Age of Colorblindness by Michelle Alexander
The New Jim Crow is a difficult book for me to review and so I’m going to go at it a bit differently than I would the usual review.
Primary Personal Response:
I have experienced the devastation of the system when trying to enter mainstream society after legal difficulties by helping a young man I taught who was homeless. He was never in trouble for a drug crime (but could have been), but had a felony from his middle school years on his record for a fight in which rocks were thrown, his did some damage, and he went to detention and then foster care. He was abandoned by his family and homeless when I met him, trying to finish high school and turn his life around. In the process of trying to get him into public housing the manager looked at me and said, “but he’s a felon”. He ended up getting into that housing, but it certainly brought home the problems of that label even though time was served and he was only 13 when the incident occurred and pled guilty in court because he did throw the rock and he had no idea what else to do. The problem of returning to society after serving time and the severity of the punishment for recreational drug use making it a felony spoke the loudest to me as I was reading this book. This young man is white, but the community is high income and he stuck out and was an outcast, scapegoat and symbol of that small conservative culture’s rejection of those who are different.
Race in History Response:
As a high school librarian, I recently supported a series of lectures put on by our local public library through a grant, so had learned a lot more about reconstruction, Jim Crow and the economy of slavery over the last year. I had not thought of the War on Drugs as a New Jim Crow, but found Michelle Alexander’s arguments persuasive. Since I saw it as a persuasive piece and so expected the research to support her views, but I am also interested in looking at other research myself. The book was written in 2009 and seemed almost to predict some of the recent deaths that have brought about protests about profiling by the police and exemption from prosecution for those officers. I chose this book primarily to find out more about the justice system regarding race in light of these events and it was a good choice. I am convinced there are still problems regarding race in our country whether or not I am convinced of all of the facts leading to that problem.
The Writing:
I just retired from high school librarianship, so even though I am not a big reader of non fiction texts, I enjoy researching and I think there may be more to dig through before I will be convinced of some of Alexander’s claims, but the book did a good job leading me in that direction. I felt that some of the writing was repetitive and rambling. There were places where I felt Alexander’s reasoning was a bit of a stretch, but overall it was a satisfying and eye-opening book.
+10 Task: thanks for the interesting read, itpdx!
+10 Review
Task Total: 20
Grand Total: 635
Task 20.5 - Mystery Women: In honor of The Moai Murders, read a book by one of these female detective/mystery writers AND whose protagonist/narrator is female.
Lady Molly of Scotland Yard (1910) by Emmuska Orczy (Paperback, 344 pages)
Review:This is a collection of the 12 stories Baroness Orczy wrote starring the aristocratic Miss Molly. She states on page one of the first story that: “we shouldn’t have half so many undetected crimes if some of the so-called mysteries were put to the test of feminine investigation”. Miss Molly uses feminine intuition, combined with facts about child-raising and house-keeping that only women know, to solve cases that have stumped the detectives at Scotland Yard. First published in 1910, these stories are a little bit racist, a little bit classist, definitely anti-Roman Catholic, and resoundingly sexist! They are still in print because: (1) these are the first prominent stories with a female detective; and (2) it was written by the same author who wrote The Scarlet Pimpernel.
+20 Task (#20.5)
+15 Combo (#10.5 England, #20.1 pub. 1910, #20.9 author: 82 years old)
+10 Oldies -76 to 150 years old: (1864-1938)
+10 Review
Task Total: 20 + 15 + 10 + 10 = 55
Grand Total: 320 + 55 = 375
20.8 - Exiles and EmmigrantsRadiance of Tomorrow by Ishmael Beah
+20 Task (born in Sierra Leone, now resides in the US)
Grand Total = 140 points
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Reading with Style
Books mentioned in this topic
The Unbearable Lightness of Being (other topics)Dirty Cop (other topics)
Ghosts (other topics)
One Con Glory (other topics)
The Winner (other topics)
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Authors mentioned in this topic
Milan Kundera (other topics)Kyle Adams (other topics)
Paul Auster (other topics)
Sarah Kuhn (other topics)
David Baldacci (other topics)
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Close Call by Stella Rimington
+15 task points
Grand Total: 200