The Language of Flowers by Vanessa Diffenbaugh

I was so sad to finish The Language of Flowers as I enjoyed it from start to finish.  This was a compelling read that had great detail and life to it.  It is the story of Victoria Jones and her life full of struggles.  Victoria was passed through the foster system and at 18 is emancipated and must find a way to survive.  This is where the real story begins as she meets people from her past and works towards a new and fresh future.  We get to know Victoria as a young girl through her memories and also as a young woman as she tries to make something for herself.  Victoria’s most comfortable way of communicating with people is through flowers and the symbolism that they have.  She uses this skill as she tries to survive and also make connections with the people she meets.  This book is difficult to describe but I would highly recommend it.  There wasn’t a thing I didn’t like about this book!  If you need more reassurance check out the reviews on Amazon.com, they will sell you for sure!

 

352 Pages

The Mermaid Chair by Sue Monk Kidd

I finished up The Mermaid Chair while travelling for work and overall I found this book enjoyable.  First off, you may recognize the name of the author.  Sue Monk Kidd also wrote The Secret Life of Bees which I just happened to love.  Unfortunately, I did not love The Mermaid Chair as much as her first work.  The story follows Jessie Sullivan, a woman who is in what I would describe a mid-life crisis.  Her mother is ill so she escapes her monotonous and vanilla life to go and take care of her.  While visiting her mother (who lives on a small island with few inhabits besides the monks that run the monastery on the island) she falls for a monk that is just months away from taking his final vows.  The story winds together issues Jessie has with her mom and their past together, Jessie’s relationship with her husband back on the mainland and her new fling with the monk from the island.  I thought the book was a little slow but it kept me reading so there is always something to be said for that.  The last ¼ of the book was when it got more interesting.  I especially liked a few twists that I did not see coming at the end.  I think that some of the situations were a little unreal and I had a hard time believing that there would not be more consequences for some of the things that went on.  I think many would find this book enjoyable and I would most likely recommend it to others.  I borrowed it from the library and was glad as it is one that I don’t think I will read again but sure enjoyed it the first time.

368 Pages

The Hearts of Horses by Molly Gloss

What a lovely book this is!  I borrowed it from Meredith some time ago but only now got around to reading it.  I think I could describe it as a "gentle read".  The language is descriptive, the characters are well developed and there is something that just calms you as you read this book. 

The story centers around a young girl named Martha who leaves home at a young age looking for work breaking horses.  She terms it "gentling wild horses".  Many of the young men and hired hands are off fighting the war as the year is 1917 so Martha follows her heart not only to escape and abusive and cruel father, but to find work doing what she loves.  The story weaves through a long and hard winter but Martha discovers friendships and a place in the community.  There is a richness to the story that describes how people and animals touch each others lives in the most unexpected and profound ways.   

I recommend this book for a heartwarming and pleasant read.

289 pages

Outlander by Diana Gabadon

What a great read!  Aunt Mary recommended this book while we were visiting in Colorado and I was skeptical, but enjoyed every page!  This is the first book in a series of a genre I didn't think I would cotton up to, but I did and can't wait for the next book.  There is time travel involved and I thought "oh-boy" but it is well done.  The year is 1945 and Claire, a former combat nurse, and her husband are enjoying a second honeymoon in the British Isles.  She is out walking alone, learning about natural healing herbs when she comes across a Stonehenge like circle of boulders.  She innocently touches and peers through a cleft in one of the rocks and poof!  She is Sassenach - an "outlander" in a Scotland torn by warring clans in the year 1743.  I know it sounds sort of goofy but it is so well done that it just becomes a delightful story full of great characters, history, and of course passion. 

I recommend this book whole heartedly - I couldn't put it down!

850 pages

Flight Behaviour by Barbara Kingsolver

Hmmm.  I finished this book about a month ago and am trying to remember enough to review it!  I don't think Amazon reviews are allowed here, but I am going to do it anyway - just like the last couple of books I read!  One of my favorite books is "Poisonwood Bible" by Kingsolver so I anticipated having the same reaction to this book.  She is a talented writer, spins a good tale, and I am glad I read this book, but I don't wish to read it again.  The subject is just a little too wacky for me - all about the discovery of a miracle due to climate change.  I guess the change goes beyond the actual "climate" but also the change in the main character's (Dellarobia) life.  So here is what Amazon has to say:

"Flight Behavior is a brilliant and suspenseful novel set in present day Appalachia; a breathtaking parable of catastrophe and denial that explores how the complexities we inevitably encounter in life lead us to believe in our particular chosen truths. Kingsolver's riveting story concerns a young wife and mother on a failing farm in rural Tennessee who experiences something she cannot explain, and how her discovery energizes various competing factions—religious leaders, climate scientists, environmentalists, politicians—trapping her in the center of the conflict and ultimately opening up her world."

597 pages

The Art of Hearing Heartbeats by Jan-Philip Sendker

I finished this book a few days ago and really enjoyed it.  Michael and I went to a fabulous bookstore in Crested Butte, CO and they had the most amazing salesman! I told him some books I had recently read and enjoyed but expressed that I was having a hard time “getting into” a book lately as the recent ones I read I had loved so much.  He provided so many great recommendations and this was one of them.  He thought it would be easy for me to become invested in and he was correct.

               This story follows Julia as she sets out to find what has happened to her father who disappeared the day after she graduated law school.  This search brings her to a small village in Burma where her father grew up.  Here she encounters a man that knows the story of her father and pledges to lead her to him shall she want to listen.  It takes you on twists and turns and can really stop and make you wonder how much you pay attention to in everyday life.  The book is written in such detail it amazed me.  I truly felt like I was there along with Julia in her search.  What was enjoyable was that the details didn’t weigh the story down at all, it flowed beautifully.  I enjoyed every aspect of this book and would love to read another one like it again.  I would highly recommend this book!

The Alchemist by Paulo Coelho

I just finished The Alchemist by Paulo Coelho last night and I loved this book.  The characters are simple to follow and the story is as well. With that being said I became engrossed in Santiago’s quest for his treasure and to fulfill his personal legend.  The story follows Santiago as he encounters different people that help guide him towards his treasure.  The story speaks loudly about following your dreams, listening to your heart in addition to many other life lessons.  There are elements of danger, suspense, love and adventure which for me made the perfect formula for a good book.  I found myself reading quickly at points to try and find out what would happen next or where Santiago’s path would lead him so I look forward to reading this book again to soak up even more of the details of his journey.  This book has been criticized for its simplicity and blunt writing but I enjoyed the simplicity.  You sure didn’t have to contemplate for long to understand the messages the characters were trying to deliver and I appreciated that.  Overall, a great book that I look forward to reading again!

Crazy Little Thing by Tracy Brogan

I had been reading some pretty boring books so I was in search of a light summer read and found it with this book.  This is the story of a divorced mom of 2 and her adventures during the summer she spends living with her crazy aunt and cousins trying to recover from her recent divorce.  There is nothing complicated about this book or terribly thought provoking but it worked to take me out of my zone and into the story.  I finished it in just a couple of days and thoroughly enjoyed it.  It had been long time since I had a read like this and it was refreshing!  Also, it was a free book rental through Amazon Prime so reading it on my kindle for free was pretty handy! I would recommend this for a quick and easy summer read.

February Roundup

Well, I have been remarkably bad at blogging the books I've read this year. So here is a brief recap of what i remember reading in February (March to follow later):

"Zero Day" by Mark Russinovich - First off, the author of this book is best known for his series "Windows Internals", a guide to how the Windows operating system works under the hood. So it was perfectly natural that he should write a computer security themed techno-thriller featuring someone who looks remarkably like him. The bad guys in the story unleash a variety of computer attacks that could cripple the US economy, and it is up to our plucky hero and his improbably hot love interest to save the day. There are actually some pretty accurate technical points in the book, but it is mostly brain candy.

"Hounded" and "Hexed" by Kevin Hearne - These are the first two books in the Iron Druid Chronicles, which follow the adventures of a 2000 year old druid (who still looks 23) who owns an occult bookshop in modern Tempe, AZ. He gets involved in a variety of mishaps and adventures involving the local werewolves, witches, faeries, and minor deities. These books are pure brain candy, but are a lot more entertaining than they should be by any critical analysis. I enjoyed them quite a bit - exciting fantasy adventures in a unique setting, with some great characters.

The Twelve Tribes of Hattie by Ayana Mathis

Well.  I had to start this book twice because I just couldn't get in to it.  Then somewhere in the middle I couldn't put it down.  That crescendo faded fast and finishing it became slow and laborious.  I must be missing something.  It has gotten great reviews and the endorsement of Oprah, so it must be good, right?

The story centers around Hattie Shepherd who as a young 15 year old girl flees from Georgia to Philadelphia hoping for a chance at a better life.  However, that didn't go as planned.  She ends up marrying a man who is nothing but disappointing.  Her first two babies (twins) die of pneumonia in 1925 leaving Hattie a hard and bitter woman.  She gives birth to nine more babies and proves to be a cruel and seemingly unloving mother.  The chapters of the book chronicle her children and how their parents, particularly their mother, has made an impact.  Some of of the story telling is from Hattie's point of view, and some from her children.  I think that is what is going anyway?

I was not so crazy about the story line or the writing style.  I found it to be disjointed and it ended as if the author just got tired of writing.  I looked more than once to see if the Acknowledgments had some sort of conclusion.  No luck.  Maybe you will like it more than me but it isn't one I will re-read or recommend.  (241 pages)

Life Among Giants by Bill Roorbach

First off, Thank you to Meredith and Michael for this wonderful Christmas gift!  It was a great read and thoroughly enjoyable!  But I read it over two months ago and I can't remember all the details.  I just know I loved it.  The main character, Lizard, and his wacky sister are witness to his parents mysterious murders and the whole book revolves around finding the killer and making sense of the action.  It is funny, entertaining, a bit of mystery and intrigue and well... you know, I think I better do a cut and paste from Amazon!

"At seventeen, David “Lizard” Hochmeyer is nearly seven feet tall, a star quarterback, and Princeton-bound. His future seems all but assured until his parents are mysteriously murdered, leaving Lizard and his older sister, Kate, adrift and alone. Sylphide, the world’s greatest ballerina, lives across the pond from their Connecticut home, in a mansion the size of a museum, and it turns out that her rock star husband’s own disasters have intersected with Lizard’s—and Kate’s—in the most intimate and surprising ways.

Over the decades that follow, Lizard and Kate are obsessed with uncovering the motives behind the deaths, returning time and again to their father’s missing briefcase, his shady business dealings and shaky finances, and to Sylphide, who has threaded her way into Lizard’s and Kate’s lives much more 

deeply than either had ever realized. From the football fields of Princeton to a stint with the NFL, from elaborate dances at the mansion to the seductions lying in wait for Lizard, and ultimately to the upscale restaurant he opens in his hometown, it only takes Lizard a lifetime to piece it all together."

The Namesake by Jhumpa Lahiri

I finished The Namesake a few days ago and I really enjoyed the read.  I really got into quickly and it was a nice flowing read.  It is about a Bengali family and their life.  The parents were born and raised in Calcutta and moved to the USA after their arranged marriage.  The two children were born in the U.S. and work to balance the clashing cultures and values of society and their family. It is interesting to read about the adjustment for the parents into the American way of life and the children as they try and live the American lifestyle outside of the home and the traditional Indian lifestyle in the home.  The characters are interesting and well developed.  I found myself very fond of all of the characters and was able to relate to each person differently.  Many times I find myself "rooting" for a specific character and their wants and desires but it in this book I found myself equally interested and curious about all the characters.  I would thoroughly enjoyed this book and would high recommend it! 

After looking at another review Google has a more enticing way of describing the book so here is the Amazon.com description:
The Namesake is a finely wrought, deeply moving family drama that illuminates this acclaimed author's signature themes: the immigrant experience, the clash of cultures, the tangled ties between generations.
The Namesake takes the Ganguli family from their tradition-bound life in Calcutta through their fraught transformation into Americans. On the heels of an arranged wedding, Ashoke and Ashima Ganguli settle in Cambridge, Massachusetts, where Ashoke does his best to adapt while his wife pines for home. When their son, Gogol, is born, the task of naming him betrays their hope of respecting old ways in a new world. And we watch as Gogol stumbles along the first-generation path, strewn with conflicting loyalties, comic detours, and wrenching love affairs.
With empathy and penetrating insight, Lahiri explores the expectations bestowed on us by our parents and the means by which we come to define who we are.

Makers - Cory Doctorow

On our cross country drive, I finished what will most likely be my last book of 2012: "Makers", by Cory Doctorow. This is a piece of near-future speculative fiction based around the idea of the democratization of manufacturing brought on by 3D printing. Cheap access to printers by hacker types (in the tinkerer sense of hacker) upsets the way companies do business and brings about a flourishing of inventiveness and innovation. The story follows two guys who spark it all, their rise to fame, their coming to terms with how big companies do business and all of the messiness of hackers trying to make it in the Real World.

I thought this was an interesting book, especially since I am fascinated by 3D printing. I think Doctorow spends a lot of time talking to people who think like he does - this is similar in a lot of ways to another of his books, "Down and Out in the Magic Kingdom" in that it centers around Disney and the "Disneyfication" of our culture. This is an interesting thought to explore, but I don't see our culture collapsing in quite the same way - there's a danger in the shallowness of our consumer culture and our desire to be continually entertained, but the heroes of the novel facilitate this kind of shallowness even as they try to fight it. Their entire business model is based on cool hunting and making crap to fill the niche until someone else figures out how to make it cheaper. I don't know if this irony was intentional, or if I am just cynical (maybe both?), but it overshadowed the novel for me. The story is well written and even gripping at times, but I couldn't get the philosophy to jive.

Worth a read, maybe, but the story didn't make up for the convoluted and self-contradictory philosophy.

Shantaram by Gregory David Roberts

This book had been recommended by cousin Heather as she and I both like all things India.  I am glad I took her advice as this is a great book!  I think I have said before, I like author's first novels and this is Roberts first.  It is loosely based on his life experiences but it is fiction.  Like the main character Roberts was a fugitive from an Australian prison and fled to Bombay to "loose himself".  I have put off blogging about this book as I don't know to to capture it.  It is long, a bit complicated as the plot weaves in and out of so many characters lives.  As the novel begins, Lin (aka Shantaram) arrives in Bombay on a fake passport and is befriended by a tour guide who introduces him to his eventual circle of friends.  Being illegal and destitute, he resorts to the dark side and become involved with organized crime.  For a period of time, he lives in the slums and runs a make shift medical clinic where he learns to love Bombay and her people amid all the poverty and squalor.  Eventually with his connections to the mafia, he ends up helping his boss in a gun running war in Pakistan.  And weaving back and forth in the story is his lover, Karla.  How this all comes together and resolves itself is intriguing, captivating, irresistible, and makes you sad when the book ends - even after 933 pages.  Ah, you would be better off reading the Amazon review.  I am not doing it justice, but I would recommend it and I may even read it again - a rare, rare thing for me!

Children of Húrin

I recently finished "The Children of Húrin" by J.R.R. Tolkien. This is a posthumous work completed / edited by Christopher Tolkien, and it is an extended version of one of the stories from The Silmarillion (Tolkien's prehistory of Middle Earth). The story is nce and tragic, but it is written to sound like a high epic so it sometimes reads like the genealogies in 2 Chronicles or something.

That being said, I really enjoyed this book. It took a while to plow through, but it explains some great back story from The Lord of the Rings and has great action scenes. It's probably not for everyone, but I enjoyed it. It probably won't make any sense unless you've read the Silmarillion... just a warning!

The Night Circus by Erin Morgenstern

What a great read!  I was in the mood for something different and this novel fit the bill.  It is fantasy, a bit of mystery and intrigue, plus the subtle tension of a relationship between two of the main characters.  The story centers around a circus that appears without warning or announcement.  It simply is there - no color, only black and white tents and trappings, and it only performs at night.  But there is none of the traditional fare; it is a circus of amazement and magic.  Behind the scenes there is a competition, a duel of sorts between Marco and Celia who have been trained since childhood by their instructors for this sole purpose.  Only one can remain standing but either of them are aware of their competitor or the rules of the game... or that there even is a game!

I am not doing the book justice with any sort of a review because it is hard to explain.  The plot winds and weaves around several important and well developed characters.  As I was reading it, I thought, "How will I ever explain this?"  But I loved it.  It made me want to read it slowly to savor the story and creative descriptions of the "night circus".  I recommend it!

"Full Black" by Brad Thor

When I was in the airport on the way back from DC last week, I picked up "Full Black" by Brad Thor. This book was hilarious, but not on purpose (I suspect). The first clue is the dedication: "To the patriots who exist all across the political spectrum." This is, of course, a warning that in this book if you're not a white Republican, you're going to have a bad time. The plot is based around an attempt by an antisemitic Jewish banking mogul who is trying to collapse the US government by using Islamic fundamentalist terrorists. I am not kidding - this reads like a Bourne Identity version of the Protocols of the Elders of Zion. The action sequences are exciting, but the plot gets more and more ridiculous over time.

The part of this book that really bothered me was the constant repetition that all Muslims are terrorists, and it's OK to think that until "good Muslims" stand up and denounce terrorism (what do you think they've been doing since 9/11?). There's one scene that is fantastically terrible - a woman in an airport line is looking at two Arabic men and decides that she's going to be different and not assume all Muslims are terrorists. She is immediately blown up by the men, who are of course terrorists. See what happens when you start thinking like a liberal?

You can probably pass on this one.

"The Magicians" and "The Magician King"

While on vacation, I read "The Magicians" and "The Magician King" by Lev Grossman. The easiest way to describe these books would be if Stephen King wrote a Chronicles of Narnia / Harry Potter mash-up. The basic premise is that there is a teenage guy graduating from high school who is obsessed with a fantastic world called Fillory (basically, Narnia). He goes to a college interview, and on the way home gets pulled into a magical college where seemingly, everything he ever dreamed about becomes true. But only kind of. In reality, all the magic is true, but it's not what he expects. It's much darker, and grittier, and much, much more dangerous than he expected.

This is basically an anti-Potter novel. It looks at what would happen if you gave a bunch of college age weirdos and outcasts phenomenal cosmic powers. I don't want to give too much away, but I'll give you a hint - it involves a lot more hedonism and ennui than Rowling could even conceive of.

There's a lot of depth to this book, and it deals with some really interesting questions about purpose, power, and responsibility. The magical universe has no "big bad guy" - so what do magicians do when they graduate from these magical universities? If you're immortal, how long can you handle it? Given phenomenal magical abilities, do you solve world hunger, or redecorate your house once a week to look like a different historical place? There's no simple answers in these books, and I think that's an interesting statement in itself.

The first book is better than the second, but they're both well worth reading. I'd be interested to hear from anyone else who reads these, so speak up if you do!

A Couple of Books

I haven't posted in a while, and in that time, I have finished two and a half audiobooks, a novel, and I have pulled the ripcord on a non-fiction book. Here's some brief summaries:

The Geography of Bliss, by Eric Weiner (audiobook) - What is it that makes people happy? To find out, the author visited a series of countries, some of which rank high on happiness measures (Iceland, Switzerland, the Netherlands, Thailand, etc.), and some of which rank low (Moldova, England). Not to spoil anything, but there are lots of different reasons why people are happy, but fewer reasons why people are unhappy. This was a really interesting listen - very well written, with some interesting philosophical detours into what happiness really is. Made me want to travel more and see some of the places he talked about!

Red Shirts, by John Scalzi (audiobook) - great meta- sci-fi novel about a group of ensigns on the Universal Union spaceship Intrepid (modeled closely on the USS Enterprise) who notice that there's always a junior crew member on away team missions, and that's the guy who always dies. They set off to find out why. I don't want to spoil it, so that's all I'll say. This one gets weird quick, but it is a really great story that touches on fate, destiny, meaning-of-life kind of stuff. Even if you don't like sci-fi, I think you might find this one interesting. (To add to the meta, the audiobook is read by Wil Wheaton, who played Ensign Crusher on Star Trek The Next Generation. He does a great job!)

I got through half of "The World Without Us", by Alan Weisman. It's a thought experiment about what would happen to the planet if mankind suddenly disappeared, leaving behind all our buildings, chemicals, plastic, etc. It's an interesting book, but I got tired of the anti-human attitude that ran through the entire first half. I know we need to be good stewards of the world we have, but the assumption that the untamed wilds are preferable to a human-influenced landscape seems like a big assumption to me. In the first chapter, he talks about a project that is trying to recreate enclaves in Manhattan that restore pre-Dutch landscape and vegetation. It's interesting that he doesn't mention until the last sentence of the chapter that the Native Americans had settled Manhattan for thousands of years and significantly influenced both the flora and the fauna that the Dutch found when they got there. The assumption that European settlement is somehow less valuable than agrarian hunter-gatherer tended forest is just not an assumption I agree with.

Reamde, by Neal Stephenson - entertaining novel about a computer virus that gets out of hand. This novel starts out strong, gets (frankly) rather ridiculous in the middle, and finishes really strong. I mean, you've got Chinese hackers, Russian mafia, islamic terrorists, fundie survivalists, and everything. It's just nuts. But it's well written, and has done interesting things to say about international crime, computer security, and unintended consequences. Weighing in at something like 900 pages, it's an investment, but it pays off.  It's more of a techno-thriller than anything else, and with a good editor could make for an exciting movie.

I was going to write something about the book I just bailed on 25 pages on, but it's not worth it. On to the next book!

Chasing Fire by Nora Roberts

Oh boy.  I was in the airport in Lincoln, NE and needed a book.  The choices were mostly Harlequin Romance types, so I opted for Nora Roberts.  For what it is, it didn't disappoint.  Boy meets girl, angst, resistance,  pursuit, seduction, and victory.  In this bodice ripper (as Max calls them) the man (Gulliver) is a rookie fire jumper, the girl (Rowan) is his trainer and they fight forest fires.  Of course there is murder, mystery and betrayal thrown in to thicken the plot.  If the facts are somewhat accurate, I did learn some interesting things about those that jump out of planes to fight fires - they are nuts!   It was a pleasant, mindless read, but I have had enough of Nora for a while.