Our local library had a copy of Mitch Albom’s The Five People You Meet in Heaven (well, two actually), but the wait list was so long I had my sister-in-law pick me up a copy (they had 20) to read over Christmas. It’s not a hard book to finish. And not especially worth the easy read, either. It’s a book that, well, aspires to be profound. And falls short at least in my opinion. The basic premise is that a man dies and meets five people that help explain his life and his life’s purpose to him in order to give it meaning. Perhaps I thought it trite because of my belief on life and the after-life; perhaps it’s because while Mitch Albom is a good newspaper columnist he’s really not all that great as a novelist. I feel like I’m supposed to find inspiration in this story, that I’m supposed to look at my life differently, but it didn’t happen.
Author: booknutgirls
Galileo’s Daughter
Galileo’s Daughter, by Dava Sobel is a A fascinating, and well-written, biography of Galileo’s life, scientific and other accomplishments, and relationship with his oldest daughter. I learned much that I didn’t know about Galileo (though I admit, I didn’t know much) and thoroughly enjoyed the time I spent reading this book.
Women Youth Fiction Writers
I figured, since I seem to gravitate toward the same author eventually reading everything she writes (it’s usually a she), that I’d have a woman-only post.
Karen Cushman: She writes historical fiction. I’m not usually a historical fiction person, but I’ve enjoyed pretty much everything Ms. Cushman has written. It’s not my absolute favorite stuff, but it’s good, consistent storytelling. She picked up a Newbery for Midwife’s Apprentice; Catherine, Called Birdy picked up a Newbery Honor.
Her Books (that I’ve read, of course):
The Ballad of Lucy Whipple — a good, but not great, story of the Gold Rush in California as told by a 14-year-old girl.
Catherine, Called Birdy — It’s written as a diary of a 14th-century girl. Trite, but fascinating historical details.
Matilda Bone — A fascinating book about a medieval girl who was raised by priests and how she deals with becoming a bonesetter in the “real world”.
Rodzina –Not one of my favorite Cushman books, but still a good tale of orphans and getting along.
Sharon Creech: She’s a general fiction writer. I didn’t like Walk Two Moons, her Newbery winner, very much. But I have liked others that she’s written quite a bit.
Her Books:
Chasing Redbird — A good, fun, simple book. (Though right now, I can’t remember what it is that it’s about. I do remember liking it, though.)
The Wanderer — I liked this even better than her other ones; it was intriguingly written (in the form of journals of two teenagers) and wasn’t heavy handed in its dealings with death and difference and change.
Joan Bauer: I went through a Joan Bauer phase this summer. Her books are quick reads, mostly dealing with the lives of teen-age girls. But she writes boys pretty well, too.
Her Books:
Hope Was Here — This one has the most spunk of her books. It was a fun take on life seen through a 16-year-old trying to find a place to beling.
Rules of the Road — Fun interesting coming of age story.
Standing Tall — I could say the same here as with all her books (a fun, interesting coming of age story).This one is about a 6 foot 3 inch 12 year old boy and his dealing with being tall and his recently divorced parents.
Sticks — My favorite of her books: a great combination of acceptance, math and pool!
Gail Carson Levine: I haven’t been as impressed with her work, aside from Ella Enchanted, which I loved. It seems to me that she gets stuck in a rut, telling the same story over and over. I didn’t include here her princess-fairy tale series (of which my favorite is Cinderellis and the Glass Hill). My daughter, Megan, read them all and loved them.
Her Books:
Dave at Night — Her least “magical” book; there’s no magic in it at all! A good story about change, finding and making a home, adapting to harsh circumstances and making a difference.
Two Princesses of Bamarre — Not as good as Ella Enchanted, but still an interesting story of a princess who defies what she thinks she is and is able to save her kingdom and her sister.
Edith Nesbit: Okay, so I know women like Laura Ingalls Wilder and L.M. Montgomery and Louisa May Alcott aren’t here. I have read all of their books (well, the “big” ones anyway) and love them all. It seems silly to put them here. Anyway, Nesbit is right up there with them for me.
Her Books:
Enchanted Castle — A very fun, lighthearted story. Truly engaging. One that someday I’ll read to my girls.
The Railway Children — Her stories are always mostly sweet, with a little bitter thrown in. This was about city children in England who suddenly become poor when their father was taken away. They move to the country, and because they’re so sweet, kind and good they make friends with everyone and after a few adventures everything turns out all right in the end. Typical Nesbit, and very enjoyable.
Five Children and It — Again, a very Nesbit story: Five children on holiday discover a creature who can do magic. All about their adventures that follow their discovery.
Youth Fiction Reject Pile
Okay — I read most of these a while ago… take everything with a bit of a grain of salt. Sometimes a bad mood or a bad day can affect how I react to a book. (Thanks to Julie for the Reject Pile idea…)
National Velvet, Enid Bagnold (I found it boring. I tried to like it, I really did.)
The Princess Diaries, Meg Cabot (If this can get published, I can get published. It’s terrible. The movie is so much better.)
The White Mountains, John Christopher (It was an interesting premise, but didn’t really hold together well.)
The Witches, Roald Dahl (I liked some of his other books, which were delightfully weird. This one was just weird.)
Eva, Peter Dickenson (A girl wakes up from a coma as a chimp. Enough said.)
Skeleton Key, Anthony Horowitz (By the time I got to this one, the third in the Alex Rider series, I felt like: “Yawn. How much more can this kid go through? How boring.”)
The Tail of Emily Windsnap, Liz Kessler(A great premise; unfortunately, lousy execution. It’s not that it was bad, it just wasn’t good.)
The Wish, Gail Carson Levine (It was okay… but she seems to be stuck in a rut.)
Roanoke, Sonia Levitin (Okay. I don’t remember why I didn’t like this one.)
Story Girl, L.M. Montgomery (I read this in an attempt to see what her other books are like. Anne of Green Gables is better. This one is interesting, but the ending just falls off and you don’t really get to know or care about the characters.)
Zel, Donna Jo Napoli (Don’t remember exactly why, I just remember being turned off by it.)
Fair Weather, Richard Peck (It was okay; I just like his other book – A Year Down Yonder – better.)
The Golden Compass and The Subtle Knife (His Dark Materials, vols 1 and 2), Philip Pullman (His anti-adult, anti-religious positions tuned me off.)
If You Come Softly, Jacqueline Woodson (The only reason this was published was because it was “politically correct”: a Jewish girl falls in love with a black boy. The story itself was uninteresting.)
Dream Soul, Lawrence Yep (I found it uninteresting.)
Non-Fiction Reject Pile
Okay — I read most of these a while ago… take everything with a bit of a grain of salt. Sometimes a bad mood or a bad day can affect how I react to a book.
Is Jesus a Republican or Democrat?, Tony Campolo (Possibly because I was reading this while I was 9 months pregnant with my daughter Caitlyn…)
Philistines at the Hedgerow, Steven Gaines (I just don’t care that much about the Hamptons. )
Blue Latitudes, Tony Horwitz (The information on Captain Cook was good, but it’s hard for me to have respect for an author who spends about 90% of the book either drunk or drinking.)
Angela’s Ashes, Frank McCourt (I picked it up because of the buzz, and I just didn’t get why this was supposed to be so great.)
Mothers who Think, Camille Peri and Kate Moss (Feminist mothering schlock.)
Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance, Robert M. Pirsig (I only read the first part, and found that this was not a travel book. I felt betrayed.)
12,000 Miles in the Nick of Time, Mark Jacobson (It was an okay memoir of a family’s travels in Southeast Asia and the Middle East, but I thought he spent too much time ruminating about his teenage daughters and not enough on what they saw.)
Live From New York, Tom Shales (If you have fond endearing memories of Saturday Night Live you might be more interested in the sordid lives of those who were on the show that I was. I also find oral histories hard to be consistently interested in..)
Me Talk Pretty One Day, David Sedaris (He’s not as funny in print; he’s better when he reads his stuff.)
Fiction Reject Pile
Okay — I read most of these a while ago… take everything with a bit of a grain of salt. Sometimes a bad mood or a bad day can affect how I react to a book.
Open House, Elizabeth Berg (An Oprah book. I was expecting something with a powerful heroine; instead I got a whining divorcee.)
The Da Vinci Code, Dan Brown(Let this be a lesson: never, ever read two books by the same author back to back. I enjoyed Angels and Demons better. But then, that’s not saying a whole lot.)
Wuthering Heights, Charlotte Bronte (For me, it was like watching a train wreck. And that is never a pleasant way to spend one’s time.)
The Professor’s House, Willa Cather (I was bored by this.)
Body and Soul, Frank Conroy (A genius pianist comes of age. The beautiful passages about his playing almost saved this book for me. But not quite.)
Think of England, Alice Elliot Dark (I don’t know what I expected from this book. It was trite, while trying to be deep, and often confusing.)
Like Water for Chocolate, Laura Esquivel (Call me uneducated, but I happen to like my magic in fantasy books… I just don’t get “magic realism.” Inner passion setting buildings on fire – not for me! I’m really not all that sophisticated in my literary taste, I admit.)
The Monk Downstairs, Tim Farrington (A Pretentious book about Relationship. Graphic sex – just short of heaving bosoms – didn’t help.)
One Thousand White Women, Jim Fergus (I don’t care for books where the white man needs to be redeemed by the “noble savage”. Sorry.)
Cold Mountain, Charles Frazier (Read it because of the buzz, but didn’t get why this was supposed to be so great.)
Neuromancer, William Gibson (Admittedly, I only read a couple chapters of this. But I didn’t want to finish some 15-year-old computer geek’s wet dream.)
High Fidelity, Nick Hornby (Too much foul language for my taste. I’m a prude.)
Remains of the Day, Kazuo Ishiguro (Russell really liked it, though.)
Dragon’s Winter, Elizabeth Lynn (Good idea, lousy execution.)
A Game of Thrones, George RR Martin (Too much sex, too much violence, too much silly story.)
The White Dragon, Anne McCaffrey (After the first two books in the Pern series, which are quite good, I really expected this to be good. It wasn’t.)
The Knocker on Death’s Door, Ellis Peters (A very silly mystery.)
Moo, Jane Smiley (Too many characters, too much plot, not enough caring on my part. I read half and didn’t bother with the rest.)
The Bonesetter’s Daughter, Amy Tan (I like Amy Tan; I just felt she was repeating herself.)
Age of Innocence, Edith Wharton (I liked the movie better.)
The Enchanted April, Elizabeth von Arnim (Ditto.)
Bill Bryson
I love his work. I discovered him a while back, with Mother Tongue, which is a absolutely hilarious and engaging look into the English language. I did read his “companion” book, Made in America, which isn’t nearly as hilarious or engaging, but interesting nonetheless. Anyway, a while after that, I discovered he is a travel writer (or, as I prefer, a “place” writer), which is my favorite kind of non-fiction. I love to read interesting books about people going to interesting places, and he’s both.
I’m a Stranger Here Myself
This book had me rolling in the aisles! It’s funny (hilarious!) and an interesting book to read. Pick this one up and read it, if only for his diatribe on computer spell-checkers and his tax “guide” among other things. And see if he’ll have you wanting to live in New Hampshire, too.
Walk in the Woods
A highly entertaining tale of the author’s determination to walk the Appalachian Trail. Fun to read, even if you’re not a hiking buff.
Lost Country
He was snarky, snide and quite rude at times. I guess you can’t always like everything from one author.
Notes from a Small Island
I didn’t understand it; perhaps if I had any connection to England, it would have been better.
A Short History of Nearly Everything
Not one of his travel books – instead it’s a tome on everything scientific. I’m not sure how much sunk in, but it was fascinating reading.
In a Sunburned Country
A very fun book about his travels in Australia. Made me (almost) want to visit Australia.
Song of the Lioness
I first read about The Song of the Lioness series by Tamora Pearce in the Chinaberry catalog (which I love by the way). It sounded like something I’d enjoy: a fantasy-adventure series with a strong heroine as the main character. The four books are small; none of them took very long to read (except I was reading them in December, and it took much longer because I was so busy!). I really enjoyed the first, Alanna: The First Adventure; it was fun, it had a good plot and premise and it clipped right along. The middle two: In the Hand of the Goddess and The Woman Who Rides Like a Man were kind of sluggish. But the last one, Lioness Rampant picked back up and came up with a spectacular ending. I did have a big complaint with the whole series, though (and this will betray my prudishness when it comes to books): I thought sex was way too prevalent for a teen series. It’s not that it was ever graphic (it wasn’t), but just that it was there. The main character, Alanna, loses her virginity at 16, and by the time the series ends she’s had three different lovers. Not that I minded the way Pearce portrayed relationships — I’ve had relationships that mirror the ones Alanna had — it’s just that I minded the way she equated sex with love. Alanna is told by the “Goddess” in the second book to find “love” and the result of that is that she ends up having sex with the Prince whom she “loves”. Not what I would have preferred. But then, I have a big hang up with sex equaling love anyway. I don’t think it should… and the media tend to portay it that way. I want my girls to grow up thinking that love comes first, that love is an outgrowth of friendship and sex is something to be saved for after marriage. On that little point alone, I probably won’t encourage my girls to read this series.
My take on Orson Scott Card
My general opinion on Card is that his earlier stuff is better. I find that these days, he gets too preachy and philosophical (if you can call it that) in his writing for my taste. Give me straight-up storytelling without the moralizing, please.
My favorites:
Folk of the Fringe
I really liked his take on the post-apocalyptic world, and the Mormon religion’s place in it. The best stories (it’s a book of short stories) were the first (the name escapes me now), Pageant Wagon and America, all of which were based on intriguing ideas, well-developed and just plain enjoyable to read.
Rebekah
I set out to dislike this one; I’m really not one who likes “retelling” of Biblical stories. But the storyteller I like in Card came out and he told a really good story about a strong woman and the choices she makes in her life. It’s a really good book. I’d like the chance to read Sarah and Leah and Rebekah, but as the library here doesn’t have them, I’ll have to track down someone who does.
Ender’s Game
It was more violent than I remembered, but it’s still an excellent science fiction story. Though Speaker for the Dead (posted here) is the better book.
Ones that are just “okay” (not bad, but not great):
Enchantment
An interesting take on Sleeping Beauty, though I was often frustrated with the storytelling. (I often found myself yelling at the book to get back to the story and stop the moralizing!)
Ender’s Shadow
This was fascinating, not because it was well-written (Card’s writing has gotten overly prolific as he’s aged) but because it was a different take on an already told story. It was worth it to read just to get another “perspective” on Ender and his whole saga. A good companion book to Ender’s Game.
Shadow of the Hedgemon
A good book, if you don’t mind it not being about Peter Wiggin. Card doesn’t moralize as much as he usually does and the way Bean goes about rescuing Petra I found quite fascinating.
Ones I wouldn’t read again:
Shadow Puppets
There was too much moralizing not enough storytelling. And the story that was told wasn’t interesting.
Xenocide
It needs to be read, if only to finish off the Ender story. Otherwise, it has no use. I didn’t even bother re-reading Children of the Mind to confirm I hated it when it first came out.
(I think there’s a general trend here… his series tend to deteriorate; the latter books are generally worse than the earlier ones.)
I have read the first three books of the Alvin Maker series, but it’s been a while. I remember liking them, but since the library here doesn’t have them, I haven’t had the chance to re-read them and see if I still think they’re worth the time. I have also read — and would recommend on the basis of what I remember — Card’s collection of short stories, Maps in the Mirror. While, like all of his writing, it’s not consistently good, there are some very good short stories. Granted, it’s been a while since I read it last.
Jonathan Strange & Mr. Norrell
So, upon Russell’s recommendation (he’d read good things about it and thought it sounded fascinating), I read the 800-page tome Jonathan Strange & Mr. Norrell by Susanna Clarke. Her whole basis of the book was a Jane Austin world: the mannerisms, the language (even the spelling) of an early-19th Century novel, except with magic. It made for a fascinating premise. In this world, at the beginning, magic has all but disappeared from England. There are “theoretical magicians”: those who study magic, but don’t practice it. Then, magic is dramatically brought back by Mr. Norrell, who has been buying up books on magic and studying them in order to become a practicing magician and bring respectability and use back to magic in England. He is later joined by Jonathan Strange, first as a pupil and then as a rival.
Observations: 1)it’s a lot like the Lord of the Rings in that it’s whole premise is that it’s an “actual” novel from the time, which makes one accept the fantastic more readily. Tolkien wrote an “epic”/”history” that just happened to involve elfs, dwarfs, hobbits and orcs. Clarke wrote a 19th century novel that just happened to be about magic. It wouldn’t have worked if she wrote a novel ABOUT 19th century magic. 2) It’s a really long set up for a really great pay off. There’s 615 pages of background information and general set up for the less than 200 pages of really good storytelling. I almost found it too tedious — there were times I thought about just putting it down, but then something would happen to keep me going. I’m glad I stuck with it. The whole ending is really fabulous. And Clarke didn’t quite neatly tie everything up so there could be a sequel. I just hope it’s not as long!
The Book Nut 