Cleaving *Review*

Riding on the heels of her first book, author Julie Powell's Cleaving: A Story of Meat, Marraige and Obsession was ripe to be a best seller. Turning in her kitchen apron for a butcherhouse cleaver seemed a natural progression. But instead of a fairly good book, which I was hoping for, I encountered a car wreck from the very beginning.

Julie's profanity laced, self indulgent, embarrassingly over honest memoir is not good at all. If Ms. Powell had stuck with the "meat" of the story there might be some redeeming qualities about it. On this topic, meat, Julie is passionate. She sees a slab of animal flesh as a work of art just ready to be sectioned, deboned, and frenched. And she seems to be good at it.

It's when she moves to the marraige and obsession parts of her book, which is the vast majority of pages, that this reader wishes it would qualify as a short story. Julie shares way too much of her failing marraige and subsequent affair with her lover D. Much more than I, or anyone else needs to know. When Julie tries to come across as honest and clever in her confessions she comes across more like pathetic and desperately in need of a therapist.

The only redeeming quality of the book was reading about the author's travels to Argentina, the Ukraine and Tanzania. Here we meet some likable characters and learn a little about their culture. If you could excise the rest of the fat out of this book you might have a grade A cut of a book. Since you can't, I would recommend you not even bother with this porker.

The Wall: Growing Up Behind the Iron Curtain *Review*

He was born in the middle of Europe in the middle of the twentieth century at the start of the Cold War. In his graphic memoir, Peter Sis tells what life was like for a boy who loved to draw and make music, who joined the Young Pioneers, stood guard at the giant statue of Stalin, passed Louis Armstrong in a snowstorm, longed for blue jeans and Beatles-style boots, let his hair grow long, secretly read banned books, listened to jammed radio, and traveled with the Beach Boys when they toured Czechoslavakia. Peter Sis's story of growing up under a totalitarian regime proves that creativity can be discouraged but not easily killed, and that the desire to be free came naturally to a generation of young people behind the Iron Curtain.

Author Peter Sis draws us into life, both literally and figuratively, in Czechoslavakia during the Cold War in this compelling graphic novel of his childhood and adolescence. So many public displays of loyalty were compulsory and children were encouraged to spy on their families and classmates for actions and opinions that were contrary to Communist party beliefs.

I didn't realize the extent to which their lives and creativity were stifled. Czech teens had to resort to making their own electric guitars and hiding them in basements and attics. Long hair was considered a sign of Western decadence and if caught the police had orders to cut it.

In 1968 when censorship was slowly starting to lift, Western influence began to filter in. They heard about a "wild woman named Elvis Presley" only to find out the she was a he! Western music became more readily available and blue jeans were allowed (although no one could afford them) and the Harlem Globetrotters visited Prague. It was a time of freedom and euphoria albeit short lived.

The author's illustrations are mostly pen and ink, but Communist red stands out in almost every drawing. In just a few short lines on each page this book gave me a deeper understanding about life behind the Iron Curtain before perestroika and glasnost were introduced to the Soviet Union.

Housed in the juvenile section of our library, though easy enough to read, I feel this book is better suited to young adults.

The Concise King *Review*

The Concise King is a compilation of featured recordings of Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. edited by Clayborn Carson, Peter Holloran and Kris Shepard. Eight speeches of Dr. King were chosen including of course two of his most recognized: I Have a Dream and I've Been to the Mountaintop.

Both of these speeches I have heard throughout the years in bits and pieces and TV clips. Never have I actually sat down and listened to them in their entirety. Not one for listening to political ramblings I didn't know if I would enjoy listening to this 3 hour CD or even finish it. But I was entranced.

Dr. King has a passion for his message and an overpowering love for the poeple to whom he is speaking. His speeches start out slow. Not dull slow, but in thoughtfully articulated words and carefully organized sentences. Soon the pace picks up and by the end of the speech Dr. King's voice is raised in volume, quickening in tempo and tremoring with excitement and the importance of the message.

I was totally captivated not only by the sound of his voice but the strength of his message. A couple of lines in particular that really stood out for me and I found to be most eloquent were from his Where Do We Go from Here speech:

"Let us be dissatisfied until men recognize that out of one blood God made all men that dwell upon the face of the earth. Let us be dissatisfied until that day when nobody will shout white power, when nobody will shout black power, but everybody will talk about God's power and human power!"

Though that speech was given August 16th, 1967, less than 2 months before I was born, it is sadly still relevant today. Let none of us be satisfied until Dr. King's message of love and acceptance is written upon the hearts of our children and imprinted in the minds of the next generation.

The Arrival *Review*

A stop at the library yesterday netted a first for me- a graphic novel. I have never read a graphic novel before but after reading a post written by At Home With Books I figured I had to give it a try. It seems graphic novels aren't just glorified Spiderman comic books similar to what my son picked out to use for his Reading merit badge for Boy Scouts several years ago.

Several graphic novels were listed in the post but alas, my regional library only carried two of them so I came home with both. The novel I sat down with yesterday- The Arrival by Shaun Tan, was not only my first graphic novel it was also my first ever wordless book (is that cheating?). I figured this 128p. book would be an easy start for me and I would be pounding out a review in just under 1/2 hour. Surprisingly, it took me a couple of hours to "read".

Without words, each picture must be carefully perused to make sure hidden meanings and subtle nuances are not overlooked. Each sepia-toned square of artwork tells a small part of the big story. When we see, after the main character boards a ship, 60 pictures of sky and clouds we understand the length of the journey he must endure as he leaves his homeland in search of a better life for him and his family. When we see the lines of people in the immigration halls we see the hour after hour wait to get identification papers. When we see the look of confusion and hopelessness on our hero's face we understand how hard it is to communicate with others who speak a language so foreign from their own.

I will admit I will never look at a graphic novel as just a comic book again. And while it will probably never be one of my favorite genres, I am intrigued enough to try a couple more. Do you read many graphic novels? What are some you would recommend?

The Physick Book of Deliverance Dane *Review*

The Physick Book of Deliverance Dane is a book I had been wanting to read for a long time. After just reading The Heretic's Daughter by Kathleen Kent, I didn't know if I wanted to wade into another book about the Salem Witch Trails but The Heretic's Daughter had left me a little unfulfilled.

In my local Wal-Mart store a $5.00 hardcover promotion caught my eye when there big as you please a copy of The Physick Book of Deliverance Dane by Katherine Howe had been conjured up. Not one to let an opportunity like this pass me by I grabbed one of the few remaining copies and headed to the self checkout.


The dust cover reads: Harvard graduate student Connie Goodwin needs to spend her summer doing research for her doctoral dissertation. But when her mother asks her to handle the sale of Connie's grandmother's abandoned home near Salem, she can't refuse. As she is drawn deeper into the mysteries of the family house, Connie discovers an ancient key within a seventeenth-century Bible. The key contains a yellowing fragment of parchment with a name written on it: Deliverance Dane. This discovery launches Connie on a quest- to find out who this woman was and to unearth a rare artifact of singular power: a physick book, it's pages a secret repository for lost knowledge.


As the pieces of Deliverance's harrowing story begin to fall in place, Connie is haunted by visions of the long-ago witch trials, and she begins to fear that she is more tied to Salem's past than she could have ever imagined.

Rarely does the printed word indulge all 5 of your senses: sight, touch, taste, smell and sound. The author, Katherine Howe has an incredible gift of describing things without using forced similes. I can see what Connie sees, I can feel what she feels.

I can see the thick layer of dust on every surface of her grandmother's abandoned house and the sunlight as it tries to shine through it on the window panes. I can feel the cold escape the old-fashioned icebox as Connie opens it on a warm summer day, and the moistness of the damp grass as Connie's bare heels dip into it as she stretches on a blanket on the ground.

Crawling in between the covers and settling in amongst the pages made me feel so much a part of the story that there was almost an other worldliness quality about it, which probably caused me to rate it in my mind much higher then the storyline deserved.

Though not a 5-star book it was a very enjoyable read and I would recommend it just on the basis of the author's descriptive gift and way with words.

Is there a book that has made you feel like you could see, taste, hear, smell and feel exactly what the character does? Let me know what it was!

Results of the Virtual Book Club Vote

The votes are in! The Virtual Book Club has picked Hotel on the Corner of Bitter and Sweet by Jamie Ford. Coming in a close second, and now a now on reserve for me at the library is Blue Like Jazz by Donald Miller. Laura from the Calico Critic's comment was the one that convinced me to read it.

And what did the Bookies book club choose? They also chose Hotel on the Corner of Bitter and Sweet!

The Friday 56

Rules:

* Grab the book nearest you. Right now.

* Turn to page 56.

* Find the fifth sentence.

* Post that sentence (plus one or two others if you like) along with these instructions on your blog or (if you do not have your own blog) in the comments section of Storytime with Tonya and Friends.

*Post a link along with your post back to Storytime with Tonya and Friends.

* Don't dig for your favorite book, the coolest, the most intellectual. Use the CLOSEST.

Appleton just glimpsed Goodman Dane brush his fingertips over his wife's knee, and in that tender gesture the true depth of Dane's fear unfurled before him. To have one's wife talked about as a sorcerer was a worrisome thing indeed.

Virtual Book Club

The book club that I am in- hosted by Sheila of One Person's Journey Through a World of Books- met last night to review The Heretic's Daughter by Kathleen Kent. While I did not personally think it was a great book it seemed to get decent reviews from the other members of the club. At the end of the review we usually rate the book on a 1-5 scale. There were a lot of 4's going around the table. I ended up rating it a 2.5. (see review here).

The floor was then opened up for nomination's for next months read. A long time ago we decided that the February book should be a romance read in honor of Valentine's Day. However, many of us do not particularily care for a straight bodice ripping romance book. So, most of our nominations this month do not fit into the romance category but here they are:

City of Bones by Cassandra Clare- Teenager Clary discovers she can see supernatural beings that no one else can, gets drawn into the world of the Shadowhunters (teens who kill demons and monsters) and learns that her mother is mysteriously connected to all the strange happenings around her. (Publisher's Weekly)









Blue Like Jazz By Donald Miller- Miller is a young writer, speaker, and campus ministry leader. An earnest evangelical who nearly lost his faith, he went on a spiritual journey, found some progressive politics and most importantly, discovered Jesus' relevance for everyday life. This book, in it's own elliptical way, tells the story of that journey.(Publisher's Weekly)












The Lightning Thief by Rick Riordin- The escapades of the Greek Gods and heroes get a fresh spin in the first book in the Percy Jackson and the Olympians series, about a contemporary 12-year old New Yorker who learns he's a demigod. (Booklist)







Hotel on the Corner of Bitter and Sweet by Jamie Ford- Henry Lee is a 12-year old Chinese boy who falls in love with Keiko Okabe, a 12-year old japanese girl, while they are scholarship students in a prestigious private school in World War II Seattle. Henry hides the relationship from his parents who would disown him if they knew he had a Japanese friend. (Schoolibrary Journal)







Dear John by Nicholas Sparks-The story of John Tyree, a young soldier home on leave, and Savannah Curtis, the idealistic college student he falls in love with during her spring vacation. Over the next several years, the couple is seperated by John's increasingly dangerous deployments. When 9/11 occurs John is faced with the difficult decision to choose between love or country. And like all those left behind Savannah must decide to wait or move on.







Push by Sapphire- Precious Jones, 16 years old and pregnant by her father with her second child, meets a determined and highly radical teacher who takes her on a journey of transformation and redemption.









What I Did For Love by Susan Elizabeth Phillips- Georgie York, once the costar of America's favorite television sitcom, has been publically abandoned by her famous husband, her film career has tanked, her father is driving her crazy, and her public image as a spunky heroine is taking a serious beating. What should a down-on-her-luck actress do? Not go to Vegas...not run into her detestable former costar, dreamboat-from-hell Bramwell Shepard...and not get caught up in an ugly incident that leads to a calamitous elopement.







Let the Great World Spin by Collum McCann- It's August of 1974, a summer "hot and serious and full of death and betrayal", and Watergate and the Vietnam War make the world feel precarious. A stunned hush pauses the cacophonous universe of New York City as a man on a cable walks (repeatedly) between World Trade Center Towers. This extraordinary, real-life feat by French funambilist Philippe Petit becomes the touchstone for stories that briefly submerge you in ten varied and intense lives- a street priest, heroin-addicted hookers, mothers mourning sons lost in war, young artists, and a Park Avenue judge.


Now this is where you come in with the Virtual Book Club. Have you read The Heretic's Daughter? What were your thoughts and what would you rate it? And if you were in our book club, which of the above books would you have voted for?

Pride and Prejudice and Zombies *Review*

Many know Pride & Prejudice is my all-time favorite book. Between the book (which I have read and reread) and the movie (which I have rewatched many times) I can recite most of the lines uttered by the characters by heart.

I have never read a redo of Pride & Prejudice because I didn't want a book that means so much to me to be tainted or destroyed by another author who doesn't have the same amount of love and respect for this novel as I do.

It was with great trepidation I picked up this audio book at the library. In the introduction the author explains how he uses Jane Austen's original manuscript and just changes words, paragraphs, or basic themes in the book but still leaves large portions of the pages untouched. That statement excited me. I could still have my novel much like it has always been! So I popped it into my car stereo.

The book starts familiarily. In fact, I recite lines from it while driving down the highway,and soon it changes. At first I frown. That's not how it goes I protest. Then I begin to laugh because the new word- zombie- seems so out of place in the halls of Longbourn, the Bennet family home.

At times gruesome with talk of decaying corpses, decapitated heads, and pus filled sores and other times hysterically funny- "What? No ninja?" Lady Catherine DeBourgh exclaims when finding the Bennet sisters were brought up without one, I thoroughly enjoyed this audio book from start to finish.

The voice of Katherine Kellgren is perfect for the voices of the Bennet sisters as I have always imagined them to be: Jane's shy and gentle, Elizabeth's strong and determined, Lydia's silly and immature, and Kitty's more serious.

Read this book knowing it will not be the same book you have come to love through the years but accepting that sometimes I little bit of change is okay.

Bloggiesta Challenge Completed!

What an exciting weekend it has been! I have just taken part in my first Bloggiesta and have accomplished so much! I debated not attempting to do the Bloggiesta since my blog was only 7 days old, but I figured if I learned one thing from this event it would be worth it. And learn I did.

I concentrated not on fixing up my blog to make it look prettier but on doing the mini challenges. In doing these challenges I made my blog more productive. Here is a list of what I accomplished:

1. Creating lists and opinion pots: I wrote one opinion post and made a few lists for future posts

2. Learned about vanity alerts and tried this out

3. Elevator Pitch- wrote one up!

4. Blog Directories- registered in 2 of them

5. Blogging buddy- Found one!

6. Favicons and Gravatars- attempted to do a favicon, downloaded it and it has yet
to show up. I need to try this again.

7. Anchor text- Done!

8. Comment Challenge- This has been fun. I have enjoyed the new blogs I have been
to and will continue to do this.

9. Cheat sheet- Started one. I'm sure it will be a big help in the future.

10. Copyrights- Consider this done!

11. Backing up your blog- Not much here yet but I backed it up and now know how to
keep up with this

12. Blogger Mentoring- I signed up on the forum to become a mentee

13. Brainstorming blogging topics- This was fun and I came up with quite a few
ideas.


Whew! No wonder I am exhausted! I didn't get in as much time as I wanted to but all in all I spent 14 hours this weekend working on this. Head on over to Maw Books Blog and take a look at where you can go to complete these mini challenges as well as see all the ones I didn't get to.
Thanks to all who hosted these mini challenges and taught me so much. I can't wait for the next Bloggiesta. Ole!

An Exciting Win for my Son

Yesterday in the mail I received Draw 50 Mythical Creatures by Lee J. Ames which was a win from Karen at Bookin' with Bingo.

I had told my son (and Karen) when this came in the mail it would be his and he was so excited. My son loves to draw and this would be something different for him to learn how to do since he usually draws cartoon people and cars.

When I opened it he was standing right next to me with anticipation. Within minutes he had come back with his first drawing. Here is a sample of what he learned to do from the book. Thanks Bingo for this giveaway!

Favorite Genres

Everyone has a favorite genre of book. You know...the type of book that you gravitate to again and again. The type of book when reading through reviews on other's book blogs you will read word for word rather then just skimming for the final rating. The type of book that you reach for over and over on the library shelves.

My favorite genre is memoirs. It didn't always use to be my favorite and in 6 months it might be something different but for now it's memoirs. I love reading what other people have done with their life and why they have chosen to take the path they are on. I love reading about how someone who was raised in poverty and depravity went on to turn their life around and do something good for themselves and others.

Inching up in second place is historical fiction. This is kind of funny coming from someone who constantly fell asleep in history class becuase it was so boring. Or maybe it was because history was right after lunch- I can't remember!

Historical fiction is fun to read because you are still getting your "fiction fix"- your escape, but you are also learning something in the process. I have learned so much about my country, the times, the culture and the lifestyle of my ancestors by reading historical fiction.

Third favorite genre would have to be books about different cultures. Again, it's all about learning more about my brothers and sisters around the world. What makes us different and what makes us the same.

I'm interested in your opinion. What is your favorite genre and why?

The Year of Living Biblically Review

Last week I went to the library to pick up a few audiobooks to start my Audio Book Challenge 2010 with. While there I also picked up the book The Year of Living Biblically One Man's Humble Quest to Follow the Bible as Literally as Possible by A.J. Jacobs.

Raised in a secular family but increasingly interested in the relevance of faith in our modern world, A.J Jacobs decides to dive in headfirst and attempt to obey the Bible as literally as possible for one full year. He vows to follow the Ten Commandments. To be fruitful and multiply. To love his neighbor. But also to obey the hundreds of less publicized rules: to avoid wearing clothes of mixed fibers; to play a ten-string harp; to stone adulterers.

The resulting spiritual journey is at once funny and profound, reverant and irreverant, personal and universal, and will make you see history's most influential book with new eyes. The Year of Living Biblically will charm readers both secular and religious. It is part CliffNotes to the Bible, part memoir and part looks into worlds unimaginable. Thou shalt not be able to put it down.

I will admit when I picked this book up I was skeptical of it being a funny book. First off, my sense of humor is a little different and I don't find things to usually be laugh out loud funny. Secondly, being a deeply religious person I find religious to be a serious topic and not one to be taken lightly.

However I will have to admit this book had me hooting and holding my sides. A. J Jacobs writes with a refreshingly honest look at his own agnostic background and the skepticism of his life changing during his year of reading the Bible. He first spends some time reading the Bible, writing down laws and commands from the Bible - over 700 of them- and gets to work trying to find the meaning of the law and following it as literally as possible.

His wife is a little more tolerant of his project then I would be but even she has her limits. One scene from the book that still cracks me up comes to mind. One of the laws the author is trying to follow is the original menstruation law that cites you should not touch a woman for 1 week following her cycle because she is considered unclean.

Leviticus 15:20 goes even farther in saying "everything upon which she lies during her impurity shall be unclean; everything also upon which she sits shall be unclean."
One afternoon A. J Jacobs comes home to sit in his favorite chair and his why informs him he might not want to sit there since she has sat on it. Okay, he moves to sit on another chair. "Sat in that one too," says Julie. "And the ones in the kitchen. And the couch in the office." High five to this enterprising woman!

Filled with entertaining and educational moments this book doesn't quite produce the spiritual awakening that I had hoped the author would find at the end of his year-long quest but this self proclaimed agnostic still gets the right idea. It's not always about which religious sect you belong to, or which way laws you follow to the letter or not. Sometimes it's about the joy in knowing their is a higher power and a higher purpose to your life.

Bloggiesta!

Natasha at Maw Books Blog is hosting this year's Bloggiesta. The Bloggiesta which runs from January 8th-10th is a challenge to clean up your book blog, do all those things you've been putting off for months and learn some new things as well.

Being a new book blogger I thought signing up for the Bloggiesta would be an awesome time to jump in with both feet and see what I could do. I have already spent a total of about 6 hours on this challenge and have to date completed 8 mini challenges. Some successfully, and some not so successfully (my flavicon still has not shown up so I'll have to try this one again.) I feel like the more I know, the more I know I don't know. If that makes any sense!

Hopefully today will be another productive day!

A Little Complication...

Recently you might remember me saying that I had been very lucky and had won 4 audiobooks on other book blogs. Then I signed up for my very first challenge, which was the audiobook challenge. I signed up for the Addicted level-12 audiobooks. Stopping at the library I picked up 2 books on CD to get a jumpstart on the challenge before my wins came in the mail.

I received one of my wins in the mail the other day, and I'm currently halfway through one that I had picked up from the library. I'm really enjoying it too I might add. When disc 4 ended I pulled out disc 5 to insert and...nothing. The CD went part of the way in and stuck! It wouldn't go in any further and it would not come out.

Now here I sit, very excited for all the wonderful reads waiting for me on CD and my CD player doesn't work. Now what do I do?