What are we reading? Sept 2021 Edition
Annie Deighnaugh
2 years ago
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What are we reading? Sept 2020 edition
Comments (119)I finished a bunch of books this summer while hunkered down. My favorite was Nothing to See Here by Kevin Wilson. It is the story of an unlikely nanny to two high profile children who have the annoying habit of combusting. It is so wonderfully done and the nanny is a jaded badass with a soft side. Highly recommend. (Plus, every reviewer--NPR, NYT--has loved it.) In a close-second is Djinn Patrol on the Purple Line by Deepa Anappara. In this book, the impoverished inner city of Delhi (I think) becomes a character. The story is about three nine year olds in India who try to solve the disappearance of a classmate. The main character, Jai, gets his detective smarts from what he sees on crime shows, although it is his smarter female friend who seems to ask the right questions, much to Jai's annoyance. The story is rich in details about community living, from schooling to the public toilets, to street food. It has a lot of "Slum dog Millionaire" about it. And like that movie, (which I loved,) It is both funny and heartbreaking as the book is loosely based on the huge numbers of children in India who go missing each year. Yes, life for Jai and his family is unimaginably difficult, but it would be wrong to say it isn't joyful as well. I also read Louise Penny's A Better Man. I love the Inspector character, but I felt the plot on this one was really weak. But in the end, it wasn't so much of a whodunnit than a conscience wrestling match. And for that this book was good. Eta: I also read 28 Summers by Elin Hilderbrand. Meh. It's a hallmark movie by an author who writes two novels each year. If you like your chick lit set in Nantucket, you'll love it. I found it formulaic and the characters did nothing for me. It should come with a bottle of Barefoot brand white wine. I also read The Tattooist of Auschwitz by Heather Morris. It was captivating, sad, joyous and funny, though usually never at the same time. I passed it along to my parents who both loved it too....See MoreWhat are we reading? January 2021 edition
Comments (136)I'm laughing because my "editor genes" haven't left me since I retired; they've just slowed down. I woke up this morning with the realization that I may have typed "reign" instead of "rein" in a post I wrote two days ago. It's a common mistake that always jumps out at me when other people do it, but then I went and did it myself. Correction made. Not to worry, Nutsaboutplants--I'm still absorbed in the book. I did move it downstairs, and I actually want to finish it quickly. I'm interested enough to want to know how it ends, but I find it disturbing. It's an unsettling book....See MoreWhat are we reading? August 2021 Edition
Comments (159)I'm very much enjoying This Tender Land by William Kent Krueger. Almost from the start it read like an echo of Huck Finn. Halfway thru the book I googled the two titles and this came up: Krueger said that one thing he knew about this book when he started was that he wanted the kids to be on an epic journey, and the journey he thought most about was Homer’s “Odyssey.” For years, local author William Kent Krueger has wanted to write an updated version of Huckleberry Finn. “I knew it would be a story of kids on the river, but an updated version,” he said. “I knew when I wrote the story it would still be in the past, but I wasn’t sure just when.” The multi-award winning author has spent the past three years researching and writing the book, while still working on his Cork O’Connor fiction series about an Irish and Ojibwe private investigator. The result is “This Tender Land,” a story of four Minnesota orphans set in the Depression era, who flee from the Indian school they had been sent to and travel by canoe along the river, connecting along the way with others who are trying to survive hard times. The author wrote in 1st person narrative as the protagonist. It's important to remember that this is his recollection of his youth and that he is now 80 something. That helps to explain how and why his characters, as children, speak and think as much older than they are. However, it puts me off when a six year old - I know the age well - speaks philosophically and uses adult vocabulary. iI takes you away from a really good story when that happens. The racial issue in Huck Finn is also in This Tender Land because one of the four is a Native American. Who had his tongue cut out as a child. He uses very fluent sign language as do the other two boys. This boy, called Moses, is gifted in many ways and liked by all the four come upon. He begins to show his rage at the racism he experienced and others he knew. I give it four stars, one off because of the disconcerting language of an adult coming from children. it has great suspense, which I love. Good descriptions of their world, largely living outdoors and intriguing interaction and relationships among the four. This from Good Reads: In the summer of 1932, on the banks of Minnesota's Gilead River, the Lincoln Indian Training School is a pitiless place where Native American children, forcibly separated from their parents, are sent to be educated. It is also home to Odie O’Banion, a lively orphan boy whose exploits constantly earn him the superintendent’s wrath. Odie and his brother, Albert, are the only white faces among the hundreds of Native American children at the school. After committing a terrible crime, Odie and Albert are forced to flee for their lives along with their best friend, Mose, a mute young man of Sioux heritage. Out of pity, they also take with them a brokenhearted little girl named Emmy. Together, they steal away in a canoe, heading for the mighty Mississippi in search for a place to call home. Over the course of one unforgettable summer, these four orphan vagabonds journey into the unknown, crossing paths with others who are adrift, from struggling farmers and traveling faith healers to displaced families and lost souls of all kinds. With the feel of a modern classic, This Tender Land is an enthralling, bighearted epic that shows how the magnificent American landscape connects us all, haunts our dreams, and makes us whole. (less)...See MoreWhat are you reading? November 2021 Edition
Comments (107)Finished The Marriage Plot by Jeffrey Eugenides. Agree with chisue about the self-absorbed nature of the characters, but that’s precisely the essence of teens and 20+ year year-olds in the throngs of self-doubt and self-discovery, right? Loved — simply loved — the authenticity of grad students and post-grads doing pure research (i.e. anything remotely readily applicable to real life), their life of intellectualism, poverty and blissful impracticality. Before I went into law, I did my doctorate in what was the beginnings of AI at a time when AI wasn’t a household word. With those street--creds (for what they’re worth), I can tell you the book felt like a capsule of those impossibly heady years of high-octane interdisciplinary discussions and debates that lasted all night. Evolutionary biology, yes! Stephen Gould, yes! Theory of meaning, yes, yes, yes!! Anyway, you get the point, the author gets it, it’s the real deal. As chisue points out, the book also bears witness to the sad, slow and painful unraveling of the mind of a manic-depressive. (I recall Katherine Graham’s account of her brilliant husband’s descent into bipolar disorder in her memoir from the late 1990s, with uncannily similar details of a manic-depressive’s behavior.) The writing was quite good too. Overall, a great read if you’re into subjects of this kind. 3.5 to 4 stars....See MoreAnnie Deighnaugh
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