Ultimate Popsugar Reading Challenge discussion
2023 Challenge - Advanced
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48 - A Book That Features Two Languages
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The Adventures of China Iron by Argentinian author Gabriela Cabezón Cámara is an exuberant queer retelling of the 1872 epic poem about gaucho Martín Fierro starring his young wife China Iron who runs away across the pampas with redheaded Scottish Liz on a series of adventures. ⭐⭐⭐⭐ here is my review
Wondering if I can stretch this to a book translated from original language to English.... I mean, that's still two languages, right?
I read Last Night at the Telegraph Club for this prompt in 2022, there are some Chinese characters with translations as footnotes as well as romanized Chinese (can't remember if it was Mandarin or Cantonese that the characters spoke) - the author even goes into how she used Chinese in the Author's Note at the end :) Not sure what I'll read for this in 2023 yet, but I have some Poirot, and there's usually a little bit of French in those.
Kerry wrote: "Wondering if I can stretch this to a book translated from original language to English.... I mean, that's still two languages, right?"That's what I did this year, and I'll probably be doing it again for the upcoming year.
I think I have some of my Firefly books I can use since they have Mandarin in them.
Tree Girl by Bolivian author Ben Mikaelsen is set in Guatemala in the 1980s and is the fictionalised account of a teenager who survives the massacres which caused the tragic death of tens of thousands of Indigenous Guatemalans. ⭐⭐⭐⭐ here is my review
I still recommend What the Chickadee Knows by Margaret Noodin. Anisihinaabewin on one side, and English on the other. Great choice if you want not only two languages but also a BIPOC poet.I recommend it to total strangers. Life is short!
Moon of the Crusted Snow is a wonderful book with Anishinaabemowin language woven in throughout. It's slotted as "post-apocalyptic" but I would perhaps call it more magic realism verging on social horror? I don't generally enjoy full-on horror though and this book was beautiful to me.
Lailah wrote: "Moon of the Crusted Snow is a wonderful book with Anishinaabemowin language woven in throughout. It's slotted as "post-apocalyptic" but I would perhaps call it more magic realism ve..."Such a good book! And there's a sequel that supposed to come our in May 2023 - hopefully it will fulfil this prompt, but if not, there's always published in Spring 2023!
My mom recently mentioned that she's pretty sure The Knife of Never Letting Go had two languages but it's been a while since she had read it. Can anyone verify?
The more books I read that feature a language that I don't know, the more I wonder why people still do it. On some level I get it, they want to bring a piece of the culture in through language. And sometimes if you can get it through context, that's great. But there are some books, like Chilling Effect (english and spanish) that had so many long sentences in spanish that I often just had no idea what was said. I don't mind when it's english and french, but I can speak both of those. I read Villette last year, which has a lot of french with the english.
I don't know what I'll read for this one yet.
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omg Villette was ridiculous with ALL THE FRENCH. It's a novel written in English by an English author, why so much French? I just skipped those parts, because what could I do?
War and Peace also had pages and pages of untranslated French. In case that description makes it appealing to anyone.
I read Native Tongue for this prompt this year, and it's about a group of women creating a new language, so you don't need to understand what's being written. I'm not sure I'd recommend it, but it does fit the prompt. I also read Doomsday Book, which has Middle English (or Old English, maybe). The MC is learning it during the story, so again it's easy to follow. The Poet X featured Spanish. There were a couple of words I googled, but I could still follow most of it, even though my Spanish is limited to counting to ten and some foods.
Muppets Meet the Classics: The Phantom of the Opera has some Spanish words peppered in by Pepe in his dialogue, and it will probably have some French when Piggy's character appears.
https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/5...Angie Cruz
How Not to Drown in a Glass of Water: A Novel
This book is pretty good and also a one night read.
Would you consider the crazy rich Asians series by Kevin Kwan fitting to this category? I've never seen any of them on the listopia, but they use Cantonese throughout the books.
Once again, if you're happy with fictional languages and you like SFF, you have options.The Wheel of Time by Robert Jordan has the Old Tongue sprinkled throughout every book—sometimes a few words, sometimes whole sentences or paragraphs.
Most (maybe all) of JRR Tolkien's books have Elvish
There are a lot of Star Trek books with Klingon
Honor by Thrity UmrigarCrying in H Mart by Michelle Zauner
The Kite Runner by Khalid Hosseinni
All the Rage by Sabaa Tahir
How could I forget to recommend Project Hail Mary by Andy Weir? It features an alien language.PHM was one of my top reads last year. I had to read it to write quiz questions for our county's reading quiz bowl, and I loved it so much I immediately bought the audiobook so my husband and I could listen to it on our drive to Florida and back—which was just a week after I finished the book. It was that good.
If you like audiobooks, Project Hail Mary is an excellent choice. There's one feature of the books that really shines in audio, and it made me very happy to experience the book a second time. (view spoiler)
Heather wrote: "Would you consider the crazy rich Asians series by Kevin Kwan fitting to this category? I've never seen any of them on the listopia, but they use Cantonese throughout the books."If I recall, Cantonese was sprinkled throughout Crazy Rich Asians. I would count it. As long as it's not just a word or two, or a couple of sentences used once, I consider it fair game.
I can't recall how much Cantonese is in the rest of the trilogy. Maybe someone else can chime in there.
Lilith wrote: "I still recommend What the Chickadee Knows by Margaret Noodin. Anisihinaabewin on one side, and English on the other."Oh, that sounds lovely, and just a bit challenging. I might start this one early in the year, and read it off and on, one poem at a time, as the mood hits.
I highly recommend The Brief Wondrous Life of Oscar Wao by Junot Díaz, which has quite a bit of Spanish in it. I read it last year for the "Anisfield-Wolf Book Award winner" prompt and thought it was great.
What do you guys think of Archer's Voice for this one? I mean.. ASL is another language, and Archer and Bree both since through the entire book... but we dont "read" the second language, its just implied.I have a few French books with Italian content from when i was doing my masters (I am french) so i might check those out as well
I think it's so weird that they're already recycling this prompt but okay lol.def gonna read Carrie Soto Is Back for this and I can also recommend all Elizabeth Acevedo books :)
I do not understand why they redid this prompt? It was hard enough the first time around, ugh. Surely there’s enough ideas out there that they don’t need to use the same prompt two years in a row - did someone just forget? Sorry I know I’m being grumpy but really? For those who need an idea, and don’t want to do fantasy/sci fi, I did The Colony by Audrey Magee (sorry don’t think I can link it on my iPad) - Gaelic is the second language and not only is there Gaelic in it, but one if the themes of the book is about losing a language and culture. It was a pretty decent read.
I'm reading
The Kitchen Boy: A Novel of the Last Tsar. There is a lot of Russian in it.Could also use for historical fiction or a book about a family. Very good, so far.
I'm using Sword of Destiny by Andrzej Sapkowski. It's a prequel to the main Witcher series.Parts of the book feature a language that I think might be Celtic. I recognized words like "Sidhe" at any rate. In this context, it's the language of elves, dryads, and other mythical/magical people.
Mullumbimby is an award-winning contemporary fiction by Indigenous Australian author Melissa Lucashenko. It features smart and sassy Jo Breen who finally achieves her dream of owning a property in her ancestral Bundjalung country only to run into problems with the neighbours, her horses, her teenage daughter, and last but not least, the handsome new bloke in town who is putting together a controversial Land Rights claim. The book features words and phrases in Bundjalung. ⭐⭐⭐⭐ here is my review
How about The Tea Girl of Hummingbird Lane?
If you haven't read The Whale Rider yet, this works very well. There's enough Māori featured that it qualifies, but the translations into English are in the text - or the meaning is easy to figure out. I really enjoyed it.
Lilith wrote: "If you haven't read The Whale Rider yet, this works very well. There's enough Māori featured that it qualifies, but the translations into English are in the text - or the meaning is e..."What Lilith said. I read it for last year’s challenge and loved it!
Risa wrote: "Project Hail Mary is on the Listopia for this one. Can someone tell me what the second language is?"It might be considered a spoiler but is prominent and very important to the book. (view spoiler)
I was having a hard time with this prompt but then someone told me about The Right To Be Cold: One Woman's Story of Protecting Her Culture, the Arctic and the Whole PlanetThey said that it has Indigenous vocabulary in the introduction and the first chapter so this book will be perfect, especially since I'm trying to do more Indigenous books for the prompts.
Okay found another that will work:When the Light of the World Was Subdued, Our Songs Came Through: A Norton Anthology of Native Nations Poetry
Not only does it have two languages but it has multiple ones in various Indigenous languages.
I'm currently reading Perfectly Parvin by Olivia Abtahi. The main character is an American-born Iranian teen girl, studying Farsi. It's throughout the book, so it would definitely fit the prompt.It also fits the family and Booktok prompts.
Risa wrote: "Thank you!"If you like audiobooks, Project Hail Mary is even more awesome in audio. I read it because I was being paid to write quiz questions for it, and then bought the audiobook for my husband and I to listen to on our road trip. It was so good I didn't care I had literally read it a week earlier.
The way the second language is handled in audio is wonderful!
I read The Sentence by Louise Erdrich. It contains words in Ojibwe. It seemed a good fit as language and writing play such a big part in this book.I would just say, 'Read it'. It was an excellent book. Now I have to read The Book of Form and Emptiness, which beat it to the Women's Prize for Fiction, to see why.
It would also fit:
PopSugar: BookTok; book about a family. It would be a good book to buy from an independent book store since it's mainly set in an independent bookstore.
ATY: book where books are important; W Award; book related to the arts; book related to pride; NPR; book related to a ghost; book that involves a murder; author with more than 7 books.
Recs: Last time this prompt came up, I'm pretty sure I read The Galaxy, and the Ground Within. Thomas Hardy often sticks ancient Greek into his novels, but you don't need to know it.
LeahS wrote: I read The Sentence by Louise Erdrich. It contains words in Ojibwe. It seemed a good fit as language and writing play such a big part in this book.I'll have to take this one under advisement. It's been sitting on my shelf for months.
Heather wrote: "Would you consider the crazy rich Asians series by Kevin Kwan fitting to this category? I've never seen any of them on the listopia, but they use Cantonese throughout the books."I've wondered about Dial A for Aunties and Four Aunties and a Wedding for similar reasons.
Ultimate Popsugar Reading Challenge
Books mentioned in this topic
A Long, Long Time Ago and Essentially True (other topics)The House on Mango Street (other topics)
The Firekeeper’s Daughter (other topics)
Warrior Girl Unearthed (other topics)
The Egypt Game (other topics)
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Authors mentioned in this topic
Angeline Boulley (other topics)Louise Erdrich (other topics)
Thomas Hardy (other topics)
Olivia Abtahi (other topics)
Melissa Lucashenko (other topics)
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Two that I read recently:
Cemetery Boys by Aiden Thomas
Carrie Soto Is Back by Taylor Jenkins Reid
This was prompt #42 for this year's challenge. HERE is the discussion post and HERE is the Listopia.
I won't create another listopia. Let's just add to this current one. :)