I'm reading "the prisoner of heaven," and you should too

I'm remembering to tell you in time, before I have the book all read.  I am really enjoying this book and I want you to go check it out so we can talk about it.  Also if you've read any of the other books in the series I want to know, but don't tell me what happens in them.  I haven't read the others, and was irked when I found out there were previous books, but in the introduction it says the books can stand alone and be read in any order.  So it better work or I am going to personally write to Mr. Ruis Zafon and give him a piece of my mind. 

Read it!  It's fun. 

what I thought about a bunch of halloweeny books

I got way behind on books. 

1.  A Newbery Halloween, compiled by Martin H. Greenberg and Charles G. Waugh

2.  Spirits, Spooks, and Other Sinister Creatures, selected by Helen Hoke

3.  Seventy-seven Clocks, Chistopher Fowler

4.  We'll Always Have Paris, Ray Bradbury

1.  Many of these stories suffered from being extracted from larger works, and the maturity level varies widely.  Uneven and not very engaging.
2.  This one was better.  There's nothing too awful in it that would scare older elementary or junior high kids.
3.  I am conflicted about this book.  It's very creative, like the other Bryant and May book I read, but there was a referral to sexual assault as "having intercourse" that bothered me intensely.  Don't worry, it's not an Oprah-type book that will make you want to throw up while the flames from your eyes are burning the organs of all pedophiles past, present and future.  I mean, because you want to do that anyway, right?  But this one will not substantially intensify that desire. 
4.  This was not the strongest Bradbury collection I've ever read. 

what I thought about "the zombie survival guide"

I liked this book.  It inspired me to practice shooting so I can hit the thing I'm aiming at, and it made me realize that zombies are not so scary, as long as you can keep your wits about you.  There were some inconsistencies, though--at first he says that zombies can't climb, but then he says to be careful where you put your anchor (if you're avoiding the zombies on a boat), because a zombie could climb the chain right into your boat.  What?  How can a zombie climb a chain, but not a ladder?  It's like he thinks I'm not paying close attention to his advice or something.  By the way, a trench spike is a good zombie weapon.  This is one way in which zombie defense is different from human defense.

He says that at first, when the zombie apocalypse is still in its beginning stages, the most danger will come from the marauding bands of thugs, not the zombies.  Freaking thugs, am I right?  So pretty much any End-Times scenario includes blood cults or similar, and it sucks to be a woman or a child NO MATTER WHAT.  So pumped about that. 

Go ahead and read this book.  It might depress you, but then again, it might make you feel a little better prepared for when everything goes pear-shaped, which it will. 

what I thought about "advent"

I'm kind of mad at this book, but not as mad as I could be.  I picked it up at the library, off the staff recommendations shelf, and at first when I saw that it was about a boy with strange powers whose parents didn't understand him, I was like, "Flippin heck.  Here we go through another inferior Harry Potter retread (see: The Magicians)."  But it got very different very fast, and it was so creative and so well written that I was just in love with it.  The characters were new and interesting, and the sense of place is very strong.  But then toward the end there is some heavy use of deus ex machina, and he lost me.  A whale for some reason?  Masks and open doors?  Eskimos out of nowhere?  It's like Treadwell was writing two different stories and forgot to connect them until the end, and then he was all slapdash about it, when his craftsmanship was so impressive for the rest of the book.  I felt gypped. 

I was a lot more angry until I saw that it's the first book of a trilogy.  So my criticism is conditional.  Maybe it will all make sense in a minute.  The conclusion is still a little jarring, but I will see what happens.  I'm very eager to read the next two books.  If you like fantasy or mythology you should read this book.  There is some use of the F word, if you'd rather not read that. 

zombie survival guide

I think you guys should go check out "The Zombie Survival Guide" and let's talk about it.  The counsel is surprisingly applicable to real life, except zombies are way easier to defeat than similarly bloody-minded humans. 

what I thought about "the water room"

It's such a delight to find new, well-written series.  I have a bunch of No. 1 Ladies' Detective Agencies and Peculiar Crimes Units that will keep me busy for a long time.

The detectives in "The Water Room" are old Englishmen, one of whom has false teeth and buys kidneys from street butchers.  It talks about London's underground rivers, and I found the whole thing thoroughly fascinating.  I am going to read the crap out of this series. 

what I thought about "let's pretend this never happened"

I started reading Let's Pretend This Never Happened a few weeks ago, because it was on the wall of librarian picks.  Boy, what a dud.  I had to stop reading it, which I almost never do.  But I've reached the point in my life where I don't have to finish books that are not worth my time.  It's uneven and self-indulgent, and it's simply not funny enough.  There are some good bits, like the time her dad woke them up to show them the squirrel puppet he had just made, and referring to intestines as "the poop rope," but it's all so self-aware, like she's so pleased with how unique she is, and her family is SO SHOCKING AND DIFFERENT.  It's a shockbrag.  Well, as the moral of the classic fable "Duckbilled Platypus vs. Beefsnakstick" taught us, just because you have a lot of stuff, don't think you're so special. 

It reminded me a lot of the Heather Armstrong book I read, in that the voice that charms in short-form writing becomes unbearably grating in long-form writing.  Is this true of all bloggers-cum-memoirists/novelists?  It makes me fearful for my own hoped-for authorial career. 

what I thought about "the goose girl"

This is a superb book.  I loved it and thought the retelling of the familiar fairy tale was creative and rich.  I'm going to see if I can get Grant to read it.  He'll probably be like, "It says "girl" in the title, nopes."  Boys are so stupid.  They miss out on so much wonderful literature because they think it will be too girly.  Tell me, ladies, have you ever turned down a book merely because it looked too boyish?  I guess I don't read the sports section of the newspaper, that might count. 

It's a quick read, and very rewarding.  Shannon Hale is a talented writer, and I realized that she was also the author of "Princess Academy," another book I enjoyed.  They both, like "True Grit," have female protagonists who are strong and clever and resourceful, but not in a contrived or pandering way.  I like that.  I think I've explained how much I hate the princess culture in which we teach our daughters to be selfish, shallow, vain little consumers, so it's nice to see something that bucks that tradition in a way that feels completely organic and natural. 

what I thought about "true grit"

I loved this book!  It was fun.  The narration and dialogue themselves make the book a worthwhile read.  It's so refreshing to have a female protagonist upending gender stereotypes without being all, "I'M UPENDING GENDER STEREOTYPES!"  Mattie Ross is complicated and not always sympathetic, but she is delightful.  I'm going to read it to my kids if we ever finish The Eighty-Dollar Champion.

what I thought about "the fourth turning"

Saturday morning I sat down with my yogurt and opened the book to where I'd left off reading the day before.  I turned a page and saw yet another table showing the interaction between the four types of historical events and the four kinds of human personalities, and I thought, "Screw this noise."  I'm not going to spend any more of my valuable time plowing through this book that endlessly repeats itself.  The upshot is: history is cyclical, taking about 100 years to complete one turning. We're headed for a crisis, which will affect and be affected by each of the currently living generations.

Good luck, everybody.  Let's promise each other to remake the world in a good way.

what I thought about "a monster calls"

This is young adult fiction. It's a story about a boy whose mother is dying of cancer, and I cried while I was reading it, of course.  It's an interesting treatment of the subject.  Compelling and honest and real.  I think I might read it to my boys.  I don't know that they'll grasp all of the nuance, and appreciate the layers of the story, but I think it will still be a thought-provoking and rewarding story.  I recommend it. 

what I thought about "the godfather"

Boy, what a wild ride.  I enjoyed this book immensely, although I did have to skim the sexy parts--especially the part where Sonny and Lucy sneak off during Connie's wedding.  Look, tell me about garrotings and beatings and shootings all you like, but don't be describing lurid sex acts!  It's indecent.  I'm a violent prude, that's the way I feel.

I've wanted to read this book for like a hundred years, but my understocked library doesn't have it.  They've got Omerta and some other Puzo stuff, but not this one.  So when I saw it at the D.I. for two bucks I jumped on that horse. 

A good read.  Glad I finally got it. 

what I thought about "outliers"

I know I'm way behind the curve on this one.  Sorry!  It's not that I didn't want to read it, it's just that there are so many books in the world. 

I liked this book a lot.  But I want him to do a study on professional hockey players who are born in the last three months of the year, because those are the true outliers, at least according to his premise.  They have the deck stacked against them, and yet they still make pro. 

It certainly makes you reevaluate your parenting. Good thing we have so many books in our house! 

too tired

I had to take back the Earth book.  It's funny, but I got too busy.  I liked the DK paintings book, but obviously it's not a comprehensive look at art throughout history.  And there is some stupid art in the world.

I'm still working on "The Fourth Turning."  I've gotten to a point where it doesn't all read like a foreign language, and it is an interesting topic, but it's sort of repetitive.

what I thought about "the no. 1 ladies' detective agency"

Great book.  I have meant to start this series for a long time but have never gotten down to it.  Silly me.  I am so excited to check out the next one. 

more bringing up bebe

I put a comment to this effect down in the BuB post, but I'm putting it here as well--what do you think are the benefits of "American" parenting--specifically the pushing and competitiveness and disrespect of authority?  I know that I tend to encourage my children to not think that adults have all the answers or are the de facto moral leaders.  And the sort of people who grab the world by the tail, if you will, were rarely well-behaved, compliant children.  Am I off-base? 

my notes on "the handmaid's tale"

I don't want to take the time to craft an elegant post around my hurriedly scribbled notes, so I'll just try to lay them down in a somewhat discernible fashion, and you guys can choose which, if any, you want to talk about.

1.  I have had a number of people say to me, "I don't care about politics."  Well, this book is a shining example of why we can't afford not to care about politics.  I don't think much of people who don't vote, or who laugh about their willful ignorance of the affairs of the country.  I like my stories and shallow pursuits, too, but I also read the paper and listen to the news, because I am a grownup. 

2.  In the Red Center they use the phrase "freedom from."  As in, people used to have the freedom to do things, now they have freedom from things.  It reminds me of a conversation I had with my cousin's wife.  They lived in China for a year, and she commented about how much she loved being able to go running anywhere, at any time of the day or night, and how she didn't have to watch her kids, because China is so safe, and she'd love to move back there someday.  That's a scary thought, to me.  China is a fine place, I'm sure, but I like saying what I think without fear of imprisonment.  I don't like exchanging liberty for safety, within reason.  And "within reason" is something that you have to spend a lot of time parsing, if you're a responsible person. Because I've been blessed enough to live in safety AND freedom my entire life.  Would my opinion change if I'd ever seen what it's really like to live in a bad area? 

Also, the Aunts talk about how women are safe from the dangers of rape and other violence, but they aren't really.  The flesh trade outside the city is still very vibrant, and despite the pretty face they put on it, the Ceremony is merely state-sanctioned rape.  Lacking the authority to deny consent is the same thing as lacking the ability to give consent, and thus every sexual liaison between the handmaid and the Commander, and the more intimate relationship that Fred pursues, is rape.  

3.  In the flashbacks Offred is very different, and it took me a while to figure out what it is.  But then I realized that her current self is very infantile, and I wondered if it was an example of how treating people like children is self-actualizing.

4.  Offred misses the mundanities, like oranges and lingerie stores and going with her family to get ice cream. 

5.  In order to maintain control an oppressive regime relies heavily on its citizenry to be their eyes and ears, to inform on each other.  How long would it take before we became as craven and duplicitous as the people in the book? 

6.  The nomenclature for the handmaids is abhorrent--once I realized that "Offred" stands for "property of Fred," I was disgusted.  She doesn't get even an item name.  The wives are called "Wife of So-and-so," but the handmaids don't even get that much.

7.  Sexism is still alive and well in 2195, as evidenced by the jokes told in the keynote address at the conference.  They joke about the handmaids' lack of education, they make a put about "tale" vs. "tail," they refer to the underground frailroad . . . groan.

That's what I have for now. 

thoughts on "the fourth turning" as of page 28

Most of the time I think I'm a pretty smart person, until, say, I start talking about math with John's brother David who is into that really scary math where the numbers no longer behave predictably.  Then I feel dumb. I had a class in college called "Goedel, Escher, Bach," about the book of the same name, and I had to drop it on the second day because I was hopelessly out of my depth.  I felt dumb then, too. 

And I have felt dumb ever since I started reading "The Fourth Turning."  It reads like a textbook, and the authors are citing all these historical events that I've either forgotten or never learned about, and it is ROUGH GOING. 

what I thought about "bringing up bebe"

The premise of this book is that French parents, mainly mothers, are far less stressed and neurotic than their American counterparts, and have much better-behaved children.  There are some ugly things about French culture (at least Parisian culture) which I think Druckerman does a decent job of demonstrating, but there is some very sound advice in there.  If you don't want to read the book and want to know what the takeaway is, let me simplistically sum it up for you:  Don't be a doormat.  Settle down.  Your children are far more mature and capable than you think.

I like this book and am buying a copy for my shelf so I can improve my own parenting as well as recommend the appropriate sections to the other people in my life.  If you guys want to talk about some of the lessons in the book, whether you've read it or not, here's a place we can start:

Let's talk about childbirth.  I often hear the U.S.'s approach to childbirth derided as overmedicated, and we would be so much better off if we just used more natural, traditional methods of childbirth--that's why our infant mortality rate is the highest of any industrialized nation (I have no idea if that statistic is correct, it's just what gets repeated).  But the French culture is far less friendly to doula/midwife/birthing pool/unmedicated childbirth, has a higher rate of epidural use, and yet has a lower rate of delivery complications and infant mortality.  Discuss.  My own suspicions:  it's at least partly due to maternal nutrition.

thoughts on "bringing up bebe" as of page 53

Well, she's still doing the first-person-present thing, but I'm gritting my teeth.  Other than that, I want to take a highlighter and mark great swaths of texts and give it to a number of parents I know.  I just finished a chapter on pregnancy and am now on a chapter about babies sleeping, and although I am no longer in that stage of life I want to shout "TESTIFY!" and run around faith-healing all the sleep-deprived primal birthing worrywarts around me.

what I thought about "the devil in the white city"

For a book about multiple grisly murders and the Chicago World's Fair it was surprisingly sterile.  I liked it but didn't love it.  I don't have any deep thoughts about it.  It seemed like Larson was trying to establish a strong correlation between Burnham and Holmes to add narrative interest, and that didn't work for me, stylistically.  It was okay.

Now I'm reading "Bringing Up Bebe," a book about French parenting written by an American.  I got it because I think that American children are in large ways being failed by their parents who are a curious combination of milquetoast control freaks, and this book claims to have solutions for that.  But already she's losing me, because she opened the first chapter in first person present tense (e.g. "when my daughter is eighteen monts old, my husband and I decide"), which, unless done well, is one of my most hated authorial conceits.  Strike one.

what I thought about "flowering judas and other stories"

Katherine Anne Porter reminds me a bit of Willa Cather and a bit of Wallace Stegner.  Similar gift for narrative detail, similar subject matter.  My favorite story was the first one, "Maria Concepcion."  She's talented.  I like Cather and Stegner better, though.  Maybe I'll check out "Pale Horse, Pale Rider" and see if my opinion changes. 

what I thought about "ten little indians"

This is a collection of sad, funny, often beautiful short stories.  Sherman Alexie is a raw, honest, smart writer, and I need to stop forgetting that he exists when I have a hankering for Native American literature, which I sometimes do, and sometimes Tony Hillerman is not the right fit.  

My two favorite stories are "Do You Know Where I Am" and "What Ever Happened to Frank Snake Church?".  Lovely heartwarming/heartbreaking depictions of marriage, of loss, of betrayal, of resilience.  In "Frank Snake Church" there is an almost throwaway description of a girl who works in the admissions office of a community college, and she is so real.  It's a great book.  Check it out.

Thoughts about Sherman Alexie and/or his writing?

book blog is here, sort of

This is the book blog. I wish we could have a live chat, but then it would get to be a chore like all book clubs. I had one in Lehi where we read The Harvester (like a chaste, rural Harlequin romance, I recommend it) and The Poisonwood Bible (my choice), and that one worked pretty well for over a year, but then I moved. I was in one here and I think we only got through one book, which was The Prize Winner of Defiance, Ohio, which I did not love. I was embarrassed by that mom, and the book was depressing. Then that group went kerplooey, and I've been on my own since, which is fine, but sometimes you want to talk about a book with someone who's also read it. There's no crime in that!

So in the service of not creating an errand for everyone, we will make do with discussing our findings in the comments. It may take a while to get the kinks worked out, so please be patient with my analog-era brainwork.

First up is The Handmaid's Tale, by Margaret Atwood. I'll post my notes in two weeks--that's probably enough time for anybody who wants to read it to track it down, right? I'm excited! It's a doozy.