It was my outdated book lists that did me in. For some reason I was thinking that until my book list was caught up I couldn't write anything else.
Which, I'm sorry, it just pure silliness. I am the author of this blog for heaven's sake. I can do whatever the heck I want ............. as long as my OCD self lets me that is (hence the problem). HAAAAAAAAAAAAA
The secret to scrapbooking happiness is staying current with your life now, and picking up the back pieces when you can. I'm going to assume the same principle applies with book lists.
So (drum roll please) here are the books I've enjoyed in January so far:
ONE PLUS ONE: A novel by JoJo Moyes / A / **** / KINDLE
On the surface, this novel was the dime-a-dozen story of, "a welfare mom meets a millionaire man and falls in love and lives happily ever after". What is not typical is the way JoJo writes her characters. Moynes is a star at making her characters come to life through a careful revelation of dreams, motivations, and desires.
While the story was a bit unrealistic and sometimes
felt a bit like a wearying grown-up version of, "A Series of Unfortunate
Events" by Lemony Snicket, I still enjoyed it quite a bit.
My favorite quote is this one:
"She felt the sun on her skin, heard birdsong over people talking, revving cars, smell petrol fumes and hot pastry, and the words echoed through her head, unbidden: this is what happiness feels like."
I totally “get” what she means by this. I, too, have had incandescent moments like this (I call it “blissed out”). The older I get the more frequently they come but I still remember the very first time I had one. I was in a grocery store buying fresh limes and cilantro. It was my birthday. I was thinking of the million things I needed to do and buy and make before my friends and family came over for my birthday party. And all of a sudden I had this overwhelming feeling of just pure JOY. It was more than happiness. It was contentment at almost a cellular level. It was awesome.
Across the Universe by Beth Revis / YA / *** / KINDLEA ship leaves earth, headed for a new planet 300 years away. On board are a skeleton crew of workers who (along with their children and their children's children) will act as caretakers for the cryogenically frozen future colonists. The story emerges when one of the colonists wakes up 75 years before her time.
The funny thing about this story is that for some reason I thought it was written in the 70’s. I could have sworn I saw that on the dust jacket. The technology that the author created and explained ( which in turn gave the book it’s sci-fi status) all exists now which I thought was HILARIOUS. But when I was looking at the Amazon page to get the picture for this blog, I realized it was just written in 2011. So if that is the case, where is the pushing of the envelope to the next level of technological awesome? As for the story itself, the author did an okay job with character development and plot but there were a few scenes that were just odd.
I was glad to finish the book but I didn’t love it and
wouldn’t really recommend it. I also found out there are two more books but I do not plan to read them.
THE TELLING ROOM: A Tale of Love, Betrayal, Revenge, and theWorld’s Greatest Piece of Cheese – by Michael Peternity / A / ** / KINDLE
This book had an identity crisis. I couldn’t tell if this novel was a memoir, a
travel narrative, a mystery, a family drama, or a food essay. I can see where the author was obsessed with
the Castilian cheese-maker… they were both narcissistic men incapable of
finishing anything.
To me, the end of the book felt forced. The author readily admits he wanted to live in Spain for a
season, so he proposed a book idea to write about this fascinating cheese-maker
he knew. The idea was accepted and he now
had the funds he needed. This book felt
like it was written only because the author HAD to in order to fulfill his
contract. Everything that happened up to
the point of the contract was interesting…everything after that was boring and
pointless.
A quote from the book:
“We all had our secrets, and maybe the most terrible of them was that we weren't exactly who we thought we were, who we said we were, who we dreamed of being, that we were divided and at war and half made of self-mythologies, too. Sometimes on that staircase spiraling up from the darkness, we met ourselves coming up into the light, not recognizing ourselves or what we might do next."
THE WOMAN UPSTAIRS by Claire Messud / A / *** / KINDLE
This is one of those books that I felt was brilliantly and masterfully written... but ultimately didn't speak to me. I just didn't "get" it, I guess. The main character is a 37 year old single woman who feels like she is living on the outskirts of life. She is bitter. She is forgotten. She is depressed. From the beginning you also know she is murderously angry. The rest of the book tells how she got to that point.
“I’ve finally come to understand that life itself is the Fun House. All you want is that door marked EXIT, the escape to a place where Real Life will be; and you can never find it.”
“We all had our secrets, and maybe the most terrible of them was that we weren't exactly who we thought we were, who we said we were, who we dreamed of being, that we were divided and at war and half made of self-mythologies, too. Sometimes on that staircase spiraling up from the darkness, we met ourselves coming up into the light, not recognizing ourselves or what we might do next."
THE WOMAN UPSTAIRS by Claire Messud / A / *** / KINDLEThis is one of those books that I felt was brilliantly and masterfully written... but ultimately didn't speak to me. I just didn't "get" it, I guess. The main character is a 37 year old single woman who feels like she is living on the outskirts of life. She is bitter. She is forgotten. She is depressed. From the beginning you also know she is murderously angry. The rest of the book tells how she got to that point.
“I’ve finally come to understand that life itself is the Fun House. All you want is that door marked EXIT, the escape to a place where Real Life will be; and you can never find it.”
WRITTEN IN MY OWN HEART'S BLOOD (OUTLANDER) by Diana Gabaldon / A / ***1/2 / HARD COPY BOOKThis book is 848 pages. This book is big enough to cause back strain. And eye strain. And brain strain. I read all 848 pages, but only out of dogged dedication to the brilliant author who gave me Jamie Fraser. I love Jamie Fraser. I will read every book I can that has Jamie Fraser in it. There was nothing BAD about this book... there are just so many stinking story lines. There are just so many stinking PEOPLE. I just want to read about Jamie Fraser, okay? As one GOOD READS reviewer said, "An extra star out of loyalty....but this was a sprawling historical novel that sprawled too far -- ".
That being said I still think Diana Gabaldon could write the phone book and I'd read it.
Side note: The Starz channel has started making a television series of Outlander. Considering it is about Jamie Fraser as well as being made by Starz I was not surprised to hear that it is over-the-top sexy. I don't have the Starz channel. But my friend Tiffany does. So Stephanie Bruse (who will love me forever as I introduced her to the original Outlander book) and I plan to take a day off work and sit in Tiffany's dark basement and eat popcorn and finally maybe see what is under Jamie Fraser's kilt. For the record, I do not love the guy that has been cast as Jamie for the show, but once I see him in action this may change. In my mind I picture him more as a red haired Chris Hemsworth type.
WHAT ALICE FORGOT by Liane Moriarty / A / **** / KINDLE
From GOODREADS: Alice Love is twenty-nine,
crazy about her husband, and pregnant with her first child. Imagine Alice Alice
I really enjoyed this novel. Even though the whole memory loss thing was a little far-fetched, it wasn't the linchpin of what made this a great story. Once again Moriarty shows her gift for character development. She is able to take heavy subjects such as infidelity, infertility, divorce, death, and family breakdown and craft them into a story that is realistic enough to be meaningful but still bright and hopeful enough to be enjoyable.
This is the story of a group of parents whose children are
starting Kindergarten in an Australian beach town, but it could have been about
the women in my book group or my BUNKO club or even (GASP) my Relief
Society. You have the do-gooders… the
drama queens… the pot-stirrers. The working moms, the stay-home moms, the
never-married moms, the divorced moms. The one that has to look perfect… the
one always on a diet… the one you love and can’t stand all at the same time.
This author is amazing at character development. While the
story focuses mainly on the lives of three women, you get such an amazingly
realistic look at how their lives intertwine not only with each other but with
the other people in their lives.
The story starts with an act of bullying by one child to
another and spirals to an out-of- control but at the same time carefully
crafted climax.
This book is so spot-on with the depiction of relationships between family members, friends, and the circles in which we move.
This is the second book by this author I have read this
month. This one is probably my favorite of Moriarty’s that I’ve read so far. It
had a great plot, laugh-out-loud humor, and real suspense (in other words –
everything I love in a book).
Favorite quotes:
“Bonnie and her mum are both members of Amnesty International," said Abigail. "Of course they are," murmured Madeline. This must be how Jennifer Aniston feels, thought Madeline, whenever she hears about Angelina and Brad adopting another orphan or two.”
Favorite quotes:
“Bonnie and her mum are both members of Amnesty International," said Abigail. "Of course they are," murmured Madeline. This must be how Jennifer Aniston feels, thought Madeline, whenever she hears about Angelina and Brad adopting another orphan or two.”
LOTS OF CANDLES, PLENTY OF CAKE by Anna Quindlen / A / ****1/2
/ KINDLE
From GOODREADS: In this irresistible memoir, the New York Times bestselling
author and winner of the Pulitzer Prize Anna Quindlen writes about looking back
and ahead—and celebrating it all.
I listened to this book as I drove to St George
for a training session this week. The
first chapter brought me to tears. The last chapter did as well. In the middle
were so many beautifully written essays commenting on women’s lives, women’s
passions, and women’s dreams as told from the perspective of the aging author. While there were times when I didn’t agree
with the political or religious views of the author, for the majority of the
book I was nodding my head going YES! I feel that way, too! Oh MY!!! She really
touched on the commonality of women’s experiences that exist despite all our
differences on the surface. I don’t know
if I would have liked reading this book as a “younger” reader… and it’s
interesting that I was more likely to enjoy the stories of her life from when
she was a child up to about the age I am now.
This book was well timed in that I've been thinking A LOT lately about what my future life will bring. I've accomplished the goals and expectations the younger me had set for myself in regards to education, marriage, motherhood, and career. Sooner than I would like the most important part of my life will change as the last one of my children launches into the world. While I will still be part of their lives, I almost picture my time with them as an amazing tapestry that will soon be cut off the loom. They are the warp of my current life, and I've wound myself around them and their needs and their activities and their dreams and their desires. It has created a beautiful, satisfying picture. I envision a new "scene" being woven but I don't really know what I want the pattern to be just yet. Many of the htings I thought I may want to do as an "older" adult I don't really care to do anymore (like getting my master's degree). There are things I would LIKE to do and even some dreams I have but if they never happen, I would be okay with that, too. I think time has mellowed me a lot from the more ambitious person I was. I am so content with the glorious mediocrity of my life now. Maybe someday my mid-life crisis will hit and I will want to write that novel or hike that mountain or make that mark; but right now I don't have any plans or sense of structure to my future life.
Sorry for the looonnnng list of quotes from this book... there were so many... but these are some of the passages that "spoke" to me:
“First I was who I was. Then I didn’t know who I was. Then I invented someone and became her. Then I began to like what I’d invented. And finally I was who I was again.”
.
"That's what's so wonderful about reading, that books and poetry and essays make us feel as though we're connected, as though the thoughts and feelings we believe are singular and sometimes nutty are shared by others, that we are all more alike than different."
.
"Maybe I had three children in the first place so I wouldn't ever have to play board games. In my religion, martyrs die."
.
"Time passed, almost imperceptibly. First we were so young and then we were so buys and then one day we awoke to discover that we were an age we once thought of as old. We were trying to make it through each day, and then suddenly we looked around and realized the days were months, were years, and almost magically and unconsciously, we had made it through a couple of decades."
.
"My God, how did this happen? The alchemy of parenthood is so mysterious. It can't be true that somehow we were responsible for creating these three unique and remarkable human beings. We didn't know enough, do enough. There were endless diaper changes, baths, books, Band-Aids, doctor visits, parent-teacher conferences, plays and athletic events and family dinners, so much scut work. It's as though we were working on long repetitive shifts on an assembly line and in the end we had the Sistine Chapel."
This book was well timed in that I've been thinking A LOT lately about what my future life will bring. I've accomplished the goals and expectations the younger me had set for myself in regards to education, marriage, motherhood, and career. Sooner than I would like the most important part of my life will change as the last one of my children launches into the world. While I will still be part of their lives, I almost picture my time with them as an amazing tapestry that will soon be cut off the loom. They are the warp of my current life, and I've wound myself around them and their needs and their activities and their dreams and their desires. It has created a beautiful, satisfying picture. I envision a new "scene" being woven but I don't really know what I want the pattern to be just yet. Many of the htings I thought I may want to do as an "older" adult I don't really care to do anymore (like getting my master's degree). There are things I would LIKE to do and even some dreams I have but if they never happen, I would be okay with that, too. I think time has mellowed me a lot from the more ambitious person I was. I am so content with the glorious mediocrity of my life now. Maybe someday my mid-life crisis will hit and I will want to write that novel or hike that mountain or make that mark; but right now I don't have any plans or sense of structure to my future life.
Sorry for the looonnnng list of quotes from this book... there were so many... but these are some of the passages that "spoke" to me:
“First I was who I was. Then I didn’t know who I was. Then I invented someone and became her. Then I began to like what I’d invented. And finally I was who I was again.”
.
"That's what's so wonderful about reading, that books and poetry and essays make us feel as though we're connected, as though the thoughts and feelings we believe are singular and sometimes nutty are shared by others, that we are all more alike than different."
.
"Maybe I had three children in the first place so I wouldn't ever have to play board games. In my religion, martyrs die."
.
"Time passed, almost imperceptibly. First we were so young and then we were so buys and then one day we awoke to discover that we were an age we once thought of as old. We were trying to make it through each day, and then suddenly we looked around and realized the days were months, were years, and almost magically and unconsciously, we had made it through a couple of decades."
.
"My God, how did this happen? The alchemy of parenthood is so mysterious. It can't be true that somehow we were responsible for creating these three unique and remarkable human beings. We didn't know enough, do enough. There were endless diaper changes, baths, books, Band-Aids, doctor visits, parent-teacher conferences, plays and athletic events and family dinners, so much scut work. It's as though we were working on long repetitive shifts on an assembly line and in the end we had the Sistine Chapel."
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