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Post by Webs on Apr 16, 2018 8:58:36 GMT -5
They're all semi-autobiographical except for Wide Sargasso Sea, so if that one wasn't for you, probably don't bother with any more. Except if you like Jane Eyre and haven't read Wide Sargasso Sea (which is the Story of the first wife in JE), that is completely different and very good. I had read Wide Sargasso Sea and liked it. That's why I was hoping to like this. Oh well, not all authors are for everyone. Aside from Movable Feast, I don't like Hemingway either.
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Post by Webs on Apr 16, 2018 8:59:16 GMT -5
I'm going to start The Brief Wonderful Life of Oscar Wao today.
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Post by scrubb on Apr 16, 2018 10:53:16 GMT -5
I really liked that, WEbs, but read it long enough ago that I don't remember it all that well.
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Post by Liiisa on Apr 16, 2018 17:56:00 GMT -5
I loved that book! I recently read his new collection of short stories, too, but they weren't quite as good as Oscar Wao.
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Post by tzarine on Apr 16, 2018 19:42:58 GMT -5
webs i loved wide sargasso sea! read it in high school
have you seen the movie?
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Post by ozziegiraffe on Apr 17, 2018 5:53:48 GMT -5
37. Twisted Threads, Lea Wait. Quite a good cozy mystery, and I might look for more in the series to see how the characters develop. However, I found the clergyman who collects ouija boards as a hobby and actually uses them quite improbable, and a distinctly jarring note.
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Post by scrubb on Apr 17, 2018 19:08:45 GMT -5
The Child Finder, by Rene Denfield. About a woman who investigates cases of missing children.
I bought it on the strength of her other book, The Enchanted, which I read last year and loved. This one was also good but not as magical to me. A bit too much (especially in the first half) of telling the reader instead of showing the reader. Still well worth reading - the author has a very, very rare ability to write about absolutely horrible, awful, terrible things with clarity and compassion for everyone. Some people might find her leaning too far over the line and think she's sympathetic towards the people who do terrible things to innocent people, but I find it more that she truly tries to understand and explain them, without any suggestion that they be excused or forgiven. Compassion is the best word I can think of for it.
Subject matter may be too difficult for many, too.
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Post by Queen on Apr 18, 2018 1:57:21 GMT -5
Just read the "mini" book - Babette's Feast, by Isak Dinesen. One of those things that's been on my list forever and given that it's only about 40 pages long I don't know why I didn't read it years ago! It was a good concept - think it could have actually made a decent full novel, but it works as a novella, too. Have you seen the movie? It's one of the most visually stunning movies I've ever seen.
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Post by scrubb on Apr 18, 2018 12:02:54 GMT -5
No - I remember that it showed at our independent cinema here, many years ago, but I didn't get to it. Might have to try to find it.
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Post by scrubb on Apr 20, 2018 0:41:37 GMT -5
Oops. Went to an annual booksale that our Symphony puts on, for the first time. Found out they had some great books, and everything was very inexpensive. I'm not sure how many books I have, but the most expensive one was $3, most were $1.50 or $2.00, and I spent $39.80.
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Post by lillielangtry on Apr 20, 2018 1:00:42 GMT -5
Ha! That's quite a haul!
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Post by scrubb on Apr 20, 2018 22:25:49 GMT -5
Went back today with Mr_S. Another $30... mostly birding books this time, plus a couple hiking guides and a few novels.
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Post by scrubb on Apr 21, 2018 14:19:05 GMT -5
Finished the first of my haul: The Frog Prince: A Fairytale for Consenting Adults, by Stephen Mitchell.
Retelling of the frog prince tale, with a bit more background and a touch of the Tao Te Ching thrown in. ENjoyable.
Now I'm starting a Gerald Durrell book about his zoo, called "The Stationary Ark".
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Post by ozziegiraffe on Apr 22, 2018 3:35:35 GMT -5
38. The Brain's Way of Healing, Norman Doidge. Continues from The Brain that Changes Itself. Fascinating accounts of healing using techniques that depend on the neuroplasticity of the brain. Now I want to learn more about Feldenkrais. I'm hoping some of these methods will become mainstream where I live.
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Post by scrubb on Apr 22, 2018 11:39:41 GMT -5
I did not know that Feldenkrais worked with brain neuroplasticity, but that's very interesting. A friend of mine had severe carpal tunnel to the point where she was unable to work on a computer anymore at all. She was a university professor so it really limited her. (She tried going to voice recognition software, but found that lead to damaged vocal chords.) Anyway, Feldenkrais saved her. I think it took a long time and she had a leave of absence for at least a year, but she got back to her old job and has been able to continue working on computers for more than a decade since that crisis.
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Post by ozziegiraffe on Apr 23, 2018 1:11:22 GMT -5
39. The Cat, the Professor and the Poison, Leeann Sweeney. Quite a good mystery and quite well written, though the plot was a little improbable. I have another in the series to try, so that will tell me whether I want to continue the series. I'm not sure making quilts for cats would be a viable way to make a living!
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Post by scrubb on Apr 23, 2018 11:18:41 GMT -5
FINished Gerald Durrell's "The STationary Ark" which is mostly his presentation of why zoos are important for conservation of endangered species, and for increasing our knowledge about animals. He pushes that they must be designed and run for the benefit of the animals, not the viewing public - that making sure the animals have comfortable spaces designed to make them feel secure, and appropriate food has to be the basis of everything. He says that repeatedly and at least part of his hope is to raise funds for his zoo, so although I agree with his outlook and appreciate that there was a need to change zoos from being "public entertainment" to places of science and good animal husbandry, it got a bit repetitive. luckily, he spiced it up with anecdotes about their animals, which are always fascinating and entertaining.
His book was written in the late '60s or early '70s and I think that in western countries, at least, his vision is more or less the norm now. At least, I hope so.
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Post by ozziegiraffe on Apr 23, 2018 16:55:04 GMT -5
I did not know that Feldenkrais worked with brain neuroplasticity, but that's very interesting. A friend of mine had severe carpal tunnel to the point where she was unable to work on a computer anymore at all. She was a university professor so it really limited her. (She tried going to voice recognition software, but found that lead to damaged vocal chords.) Anyway, Feldenkrais saved her. I think it took a long time and she had a leave of absence for at least a year, but she got back to her old job and has been able to continue working on computers for more than a decade since that crisis. Sounds like what Doidge refers to in the book. It takes constant repetition, time and dedication to make new brain pathways when the old ones have been damaged.
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Post by scrubb on Apr 24, 2018 21:51:47 GMT -5
Today I finished another of my sale-haul: The REader by Bernard Schlink. It's one of very few books I've read set in GErmany after WWII - about the next generation of people whose parents were adults during the war. Worthwhile.
Oh, and one day last week I reread a kids book I used to love - The Wolves of Willoughby Chase. It's still an absolute delight - it has EVERYTHING for a melodramatic kids story. Two little girls have to face wolves, a wicked cousin who sends the little girls away to a horrible orphanage/boarding school and tries to steal all the family money; a counterfeiter, a daring escape with a boy who lives off his wits; a kind but impoverished old aunt; a house with secret passages; a catastrophe at sea - it's got it all.
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Post by lillielangtry on Apr 25, 2018 2:16:56 GMT -5
Today I finished another of my sale-haul: The REader by Bernard Schlink. It's one of very few books I've read set in GErmany after WWII - about the next generation of people whose parents were adults during the war. Worthwhile. Oh, and one day last week I reread a kids book I used to love - The Wolves of Willoughby Chase. It's still an absolute delight - it has EVERYTHING for a melodramatic kids story. Two little girls have to face wolves, a wicked cousin who sends the little girls away to a horrible orphanage/boarding school and tries to steal all the family money; a counterfeiter, a daring escape with a boy who lives off his wits; a kind but impoverished old aunt; a house with secret passages; a catastrophe at sea - it's got it all. The film of The Reader, with Kate Winslet, is also very good. I also loved Willoughby Chase as a child.
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Post by ozziegiraffe on Apr 25, 2018 4:37:55 GMT -5
40. Still Life, Louise Penny. With interesting characters and plot, this book is a great start to a cozy mystery series. I'm looking forward to more of Inspector Gamache.
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Post by mei on Apr 25, 2018 6:45:37 GMT -5
So, I'm supposed to read "The Hungry Road" by Ben Okri in the next 10 days or so for a new bookclub I'm maybe joining. So not motivated... it's dragging me away from other books I'm busy in (or well, not very busy, but still, I want to read those books more). I've also read it before, I think. At least the beginning, but I can't remember anything about it other than that.
For those who've read it: is it worth continuing and spending my time on this book?
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Post by scrubb on Apr 25, 2018 21:17:29 GMT -5
The FAmished Road - it just wasn't my kind of book. One of those ones where I could see that it was very good, it was innovative and well done, but I just didn't enjoy reading it.
What I do remember is that it's very similar all the way through, so if you're not enjoying the beginning, it doesn't change.
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Post by ozziegiraffe on Apr 27, 2018 3:40:13 GMT -5
41. What are Friends For, Helen Ellis. A very funny account of four retired women finding an alternative to a retirement village. I'd already read the sequel, Twelve Days to Christmas, but had difficulty finding this introductory novella. I think Helen has written a prototype for our Figjam/ TTWT retirement home.
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Post by Liiisa on Apr 28, 2018 10:38:39 GMT -5
20) Ta-Nehisi Coates, We Were Eight Years in Power
This is a collection of Coates' essays published in The Atlantic during the Obama administration. He introduces each with a piece on black history and events described in the essays. I'd already read most of them at the time of publication, but am glad I picked this up to hear his current perspective on these pieces, particularly in context of the current administration's support for white supremacy. Interestingly the title wasn't written about Obama but rather was a quote from a 19th-century piece on the post-Civil War Reconstruction period.
21) Beatrix Potter, The Tale of Mr. Jeremy Fisher
I saw the link to this book that river put in rikita's thread and decided to read it since I've never read that one. Her illustrations of nature are so fantastic.
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Post by ozziegiraffe on Apr 28, 2018 20:12:22 GMT -5
42. Bed, Breakfast and Bones, Carolyn L. Dean. This book is a good start to a series. The MC is trying to resurrect the family B&B, but encounters assorted opposition, including a skeleton in the garden. The characters are believable and open to development in future books.
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Post by scrubb on Apr 28, 2018 20:25:59 GMT -5
Last night I finished "Tell the Wolves I'm Home" by Carol Rifka Brunt. Excellent, poignant coming of age book set in the 1980s during the early AIDS crisis, it is narrated by 14 year old June whose much loved uncle (and godfather) dies, leaving those who love him bereft. Her relationship with her older sister is also a big part of the book. Highly recommended.
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Post by Queen on Apr 29, 2018 15:53:05 GMT -5
#whatever
A Gentleman in Moscow Amor Towles
A diversion. It's premise is that a man, a count - who is now a "former person", has been sentenced to house arrest in one of Moscow's chicest hotels. There he lives a life of watching the world go by. Occasionally the world intrudes, and you see some of the soviet underbelly, but mostly you glide across the surface with the Count. Even though the novel is set in a confined space and the narrator rarely ventures beyond the walls of the Metropole you feel the politics impinging. I don't want to give the ending away, let's just say it's deliciously satisfying.
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Post by scrubb on Apr 30, 2018 21:59:44 GMT -5
In the Garden of Beasts: Love, Terror, and an American Family in Hitler's Berlin by Erik Larson.
Tells of the American Ambassador to GErman from 1933-1938, though it really focuses on 1933-1935. William Dodd, his wife, and his 2 adult children went to Berlin in spring of 1933. He was a mostly-principled but rather ineffective man; his daughter Martha is the other main character. She had many affairs with inappropriate men and although she admired the Nazis at first, within a year or so she came to hate them and more or less was subverted into working for the Russians against them, although not to any great extent. She came across as quite foolish, flighty and self-absorbed to me, but I think the author had a soft spot for her.
It was an interesting perspective from which to view German politics in those years. When Dodd got back to the US , in late 1938, and was no longer confined by the protocols of speaking for his country, he tried to warn everyone that Hitler was an animal but he was largely ignored.
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Post by tzarine on Apr 30, 2018 22:04:54 GMT -5
i love the tales of mr jeremy fisher!
what i talk about when i talk about running murakami is brilliant & i love his observations
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