There was nobody else — there never could be anybody else for me but you. I’ve loved you ever since that day you broke your slate over my head in school.
I’m so glad I’m finally getting around to reading this series. I enjoyed the first two Anne books, and this one was no exception. This one is about Anne’s college years, her relationship with her friends Priscilla and Philippa, and also about her beaux Gilbert and Royal.
Spoilers ahead, but it probably doesn’t matter as most of you have already read the book anyway…
Of course, how could she choose anyone BUT Gilbert? I do wonder why it took her so long to realize that. Besides their relationship, I enjoyed reading about Patty’s Place, Davy’s further development, and all the other girls’ drama. I do think I enjoyed Anne of Avonlea just a bit more than this one, but I still fell in love with Anne of the Island as well. I probably won’t get to the others in the series until next year, but I’ve enjoyed these first three books tremendously.
I just love Neil Gaiman (not to mention that his looks remind me of a close friend I had in college). Well, I love his books, too, and this one was no exception. It’s my third Gaiman, and although I still think I liked Coraline a tiny bit better, I loved The Graveyard Book.
Just like Coraline, I listened to this on audio with my two teenage sons. If you haven’t heard Gaiman narrate his own books, you’re definitely missing out. Most authors should not narrate their own books; Gaiman is one who should never allow someone else to do so. His voice is perfect for it, and of course, no one would ever know his books better than he does.
The Graveyard Book contains a colorful (though some are long dead) cast of characters, some very creepy scenes, and some genuinely heartwarming ones. It’s one of those perfect children’s/YA books in which it was definitely written to also appeal to adults. It was great for the R.I.P. Challenge, and it was great to experience another one of Gaiman’s treasures as a family.
Hmmm, well, I happened to get this book from the library on the Saturday before the Booker Prize was announced “just in case.” When The White Tiger was revealed as the winner, I was really surprised. Not only did it have the longest odds to win, but I had recently read The Secret Scripture and not-so-secretly hoped it would win. In fact, the committee admitted these two were the main contenders and that the decision was not unanimous.
To be honest, I kind of groaned when I heard Adiga’s book was the winner. I don’t have a love affair at all with the Booker prize winners that I’ve read, so I was a little skeptical that I would enjoy this one. But, being the trooper that I am, I thought I’d give it at least 40 or so pages to see if it could capture my interest.
Surprise, surprise; it did. Not only is it a scathing indictment against India’s treatment of its poorest citizens, it also manages to be a clever black comedy. This is exactly what the prize committee chairman revealed as the reason behind its decision. So which book did I like better, The White Tiger or The Secret Scripture? It’s really comparing apples to oranges. They’re just not the same type of book at all. They both are worthy social commentaries on the authors’ home countries, but just written in a totally different style. While Sebastian Barry’s prose is lyrical, Adiga’s is biting (and comical). They both work spectacularly, just in different ways. I can definitely see why the committee had a difficult decision on its hands, and either one would have been a winner in my book.
How does it fare against the other Booker Prize winners? Well, I definitely enjoyed it more than some of the other winners I’ve read, including:
Starred Reviews: Publisher’s Weekly, Booklist, Library Journal, and Kirkus
2008, 240 pp.
It’s rare that a book gets starred reviews from all four major review publications. Was this book that good; does it really deserve that much attention? Yes, absolutely. I really, really loved it; so much, in fact, that I held off reading the last 20 pages or so for two days because I didn’t want it to be over.
Psychoanalyst Leo Liebenstein thinks his wife Rema has disappeared. Not only that, but he believes she has been replaced by a simulcrum, someone who looks and acts (almost) exactly like her. Meanwhile, Harvey, one of Leo’s mental patients (who believes he has the ability to control the weather) is also missing. Not buying in to the simulcrum’s Rema-like performance, Leo goes to the ends of the earth to Buenos Aires and Patagonia to try to uncover the truth of what has happened to his wife.
I’ll be the first to admit that although I enjoyed this book tremendously, it won’t be to everyone’s tastes. It’s very quirky, very eccentric, but also intelligent and extremely funny. Much of what I found humorous in the novel was due to the fact that I went to Argentina in April, so I was able to get many of the inside jokes about dog poop in the streets, maté tea, Alpha Wh*re Rays, and many other references to Argentinian life. The author had been in South America for a year working on public health issues, so her writing comes from first hand experience in the region. There were, of course, also references to the (not so funny) “Disappeared.”
This is Rivka Galchen’s first novel, and I definitely will be anxiously awaiting whatever she comes up with next. Oh, and if her literary career doesn’t work out (I have no doubt that it will), she can always fall back on her MD that she received from the Mount Sinai School of Medicine.
What can I tell you further? I once lived among humankind, and found them in their generality to be cruel and cold, and yet could mention the names of three or four that were like angels.
I’d be happy if this book won the Booker Prize. Yeah, I would, and I haven’t read any of the other contenders yet! Sebastian Barry is a magnificent writer, and I will definitely be reading more of his work.
Roseanne McNulty is almost 100 years old, and Dr. Grene is the psychiatrist attending her at Roscommon Mental Hospital. The story slowly unfolds by giving alternating accounts of Roseanne and Dr. Grene. As he seeks to understand her and her tragic past, he must also deal with some tragedy of his own. As everyone knows, ‘grief lasts two years.’
With Ireland as a backdrop and themes of religion, mental illness, and family loyalty and betrayal, The Secret Scripture is superbly crafted and is definitely worthy of the Booker Prize.
Goodnight Desdemona (Good Morning Juliet)
by Anne-Marie MacDonald
1990, 89 pp.
Rating:
Good Night Desdemona (Good Morning Juliet) is hilariously fun. Winner of the 1990 Governor General’s Award for Drama and written by the author of Fall on Your Knees, this play takes the main character, Constance, and puts her in the middle of Othello and Romeo and Juliet with very funny results. Plot lines are changed, lines rearranged, and we get to really know the players as never before.
If you’re familiar with both plays you will be in stitches in parts. Lines from the original plays are in italics to help the reader know the difference between those lines and MacDonald’s. Even MacDonald’s are written in iambic pentameter.
Highly recommended — especially for lovers of Shakespeare or those participating in the Canadian Literature Challenge.
Although I haven’t yet read Jhumpa Lahiri’s Pulitzer Prize winning Interpreter of Maladies, after reading Unaccustomed Earth, I can understand why the committee was so impressed with her writing. Her stories of the Bengali immigrant experience were very well developed, and they had closure to them, something I’ve noticed is often times lacking in modern short stories. All the characters in the book have similar backgrounds — high intelligence and high potential — yet each story was unique. Each character was struggling with his or her own set of issues, most of them due to the individuals’ adjustment, or lack thereof, of living in a culture so different from their own or that of their parents.
Themes explored include family, loyalty, duty, and honor. Relationships encountered were father and daughter, husband and wife, brother and sister, roommate to roommate, and childhood friend to childhood friend. Birth, life, marriage, children, divorce, and death. These few stories covered a wide range of experiences of the Bengali immigrant living in America and illustrated well how being Bengali shaped the characters’ choices.
Highly recommended. I will definitely be reading Interpreter of Maladies and The Namesake at a later date.
I love mythology in general, and The Odyssey in particular, so I was hoping to love this book. I did. Margaret Atwood’s retelling of the famous myth from Penelope’s point of view is brilliant and quite humorous. As she tells the story from Hades, we get Penelope’s take on her father, Odysseus, Telemachus, and Helen among others. You probably have to know the story of The Odyssey fairly well to really get the full impact, though. If you’re familiar with the original myth, you must read this re-telling.
This was my fourth Atwood, and I’m looking forward to reading even more of her work during the second Canadian Book Challenge.
Poor Mr. Dinglebat was in a state. He had, he told Jacob Two-Two, recently invested a good deal of money in buying Canadian military secrets, and now he was stuck with them. “No customers,” he said.
This clever children’s book by Mordecai Richler was written for his children and modeled after the same, and it was just simply a delight to read. Featuring not only Jacob Two-Two, but also I.M. Greedyguts, Miss Sour Pickle, and Perfectly Loathsome Leo Louse, this third installment of the Jacob Two-Two series made me laugh out loud at several points. I really, really enjoyed it. (It’s also a good short book for the Canadian Challenge — or if you need a ‘J’ title!)
I have always thought that the human heart is a little like the ocean, subject to tides, that joy rises in it in a steady flow, singing of waves, good fortune, and bliss; but afterward, when the high sea withdraws, it leaves an utter desolation in our sight. So it was with me that day.
Written in French by Gabrielle Roy and translated by Joyce Marshall, The Road Past Altamont captures a sweet young girl’s thoughts and feelings perfectly. I also enjoyed Roy’s descriptions of the vastness of the Manitoba prairie.
The book is really four interconnected stories more than a novel. The first story, “My Almighty Grandmother,” tells of Christine’s love and awe of her matriarch. The second story, “The Old Man and the Child,” is about Christine’s relationship with an elderly neighbor and their visit to Lake Winnipeg. This one was my favorite as I found so much sweetness in the pair’s friendship. In “The Move,” Christine discovers that not everyone lives as she does, and in “The Road Past Altamont,” an adult Christine deals with her mother’s increasing age and unrealized dreams.
I highly recommend this book to readers who enjoy Willa Cather or L.M. Montgomery. I would definitely read another book by Gabrielle Roy.
There was nobody else — there never could be anybody else for me but you. I’ve loved you ever since that day you broke your slate over my head in school.
I just love Neil Gaiman (not to mention that his looks remind me of a close friend I had in college). Well, I love his books, too, and this one was no exception. It’s my third Gaiman, and although I still think I liked 
Neil Gaiman’s 
Atmospheric Disturbances
Although I haven’t yet read Jhumpa Lahiri’s Pulitzer Prize winning Interpreter of Maladies, after reading Unaccustomed Earth, I can understand why the committee was so impressed with her writing. Her stories of the Bengali immigrant experience were very well developed, and they had closure to them, something I’ve noticed is often times lacking in modern short stories. All the characters in the book have similar backgrounds — high intelligence and high potential — yet each story was unique. Each character was struggling with his or her own set of issues, most of them due to the individuals’ adjustment, or lack thereof, of living in a culture so different from their own or that of their parents.
I love mythology in general, and The Odyssey in particular, so I was hoping to love this book. I did. Margaret Atwood’s retelling of the famous myth from Penelope’s point of view is brilliant and quite humorous. As she tells the story from Hades, we get Penelope’s take on her father, Odysseus, Telemachus, and Helen among others. You probably have to know the story of The Odyssey fairly well to really get the full impact, though. If you’re familiar with the original myth, you must read this re-telling.
I have always thought that the human heart is a little like the ocean, subject to tides, that joy rises in it in a steady flow, singing of waves, good fortune, and bliss; but afterward, when the high sea withdraws, it leaves an utter desolation in our sight. So it was with me that day.
