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Saijen SilverWolf1 Profile
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Re: Books in 2011


This one sounds like a good one, too! I need to get to the library and get a card!

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TexasMadness Profile
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Re: Books in 2011


Saijen, while I really like this book, I LOVED another one that I read recently but must have been during the gap between my thread here since I don't see it posted anywhere! So I read this a few months ago, but here goes:

The Blood of Flowers by Anita Amirrezvani (2007) [audio narrated by Shohreh Aghdashloo]

First, the narrator of this book was flat out INCREDIBLE. I strongly encourage you to go to the audible site and listen to the sample of the book. Her voice is smoky and complex. Click here and find the small green bar under the book cover with the word 'sample' by it. Just click play and listen to that voice. I imagined a very large, robust woman in her 60s or 70s. Then just google the narrator to find a picture of her (don't want to post it here, so you have to listen first!): Shohreh Aghdashloo.

Image

Yes, she's nearly 60, but I only knew that by reading it - I never would have guessed! Not at all what I expected. Ok, on to the book.

This is another first novel - and one I would have never guessed either! A young village girl in 17th century Persia lives a simple, but comfortable life until her father's unexpected death sends their family into turmoil. She and her mother, with no one else to turn to, must move to Isfahan (the big city) and live as servants in her uncle's household as woman cannot earn money in their society. The girl's skill at rug making does gain her status in the family but more trials await her as she grows up.
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Saijen SilverWolf1 Profile
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Re: Books in 2011


Hm...another one that does sound good!

I'll go check that audio clip out possibly tomorrow, depending on if DH and I end up going to VA or not.....

I'm not sure if our dinky library has an audio book section or not...I've only been in the place twice, and neither time was to check out a book or even really look around..it was to find another building on the grounds! I know....that's horrible! LOL.

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Re: Books in 2011


The Wizard of Loneliness by John Nichols (1966) [paper]

With his mother deceased and his father serving in WWII in Europe, 10 year old Wendall is sent to spend the war with unknown grandparents in a small country town on the East Coast. Wendall is a fiercely independent boy and not lovable at all – not even to his parents. He heads to his grandparents determined to not fit in and to escape as soon as possible. But events lead him to another course of action. In an interesting twist of the typical coming-of-age- story, Wendall matures to the point of actually embracing his remaining childhood.

I’m not entirely sure I liked the book. I was given this book when I graduated 8th grade by a friend of my grandmother’s (along with The Brothers Karamozov and Middlemarch). I had started it then but never finished it until now. Perhaps if I had read it at a younger age, it would have been better. I found the dream sequences long and not lending much to the narrative. The characters at times did such stupid and outrageous things that it made you not believe it was possible. But the overall story was interesting and the characters fun.

Also, I found out this book was made into a movie in 1988 and it stars a guy I went to high school with as Wendall. Netflix doesn’t have it but I’m going to try to dig up a copy!
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Saijen SilverWolf1 Profile
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Re: Books in 2011


How neat about the guy you went to school with being in the movie version of the book!!

Not sure this is my taste. I've still got 2 books that DH got me for Valentine's day..I started one but not finished it yet....and haven't even picked the other one up. Seems like things just keep me from plopping down to just read. Online I go to and from, while online...so it's not like I'm just sitting.
Hopefully things will calm down enough for me to finishe the one book and start the other!

---
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3/8/2011, 2:41 am Link to this post Send Email to Saijen SilverWolf1   Send PM to Saijen SilverWolf1 Yahoo
 
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Re: Books in 2011


Well, after finishing The Twentieth Wife, I got on a "wife" kick. A couple of people had asked if it was a sequel to another book (which it's not) but it piqued my interest. And then I saw a third wife book on my mom's shelf. And I've had insomnia...so I finished them both!

The 19th Wife by David Ebershoff (2009) [paper]

No, not part of a series! This book was an interesting compilation of historical fiction about Brigham Young (of the Church of Latter Day Saints) and his 19th wife who filed for divorce in a widely publicized trial, and a modern day murder amongst the "Firsts" - the separatist group that still practices polygamy. The chapters switch back and forth between the tales and included are some correspondence, articles, etc. It's a clever story telling style and very well done. The voice from the past and the one from the present are so different, it's hard to imagine they were written by the same author!

The stories, both past and present, were compelling and heart wrenching. Polygamy in that society was/is a tool for power and often highly abused. It was interesting to contrast this with the harem in Moghul India. While that group of women was by no means perfectly friendly to each other, it was not an amoral, seedy affair. However, individual men could also take more wives (not just the emperor) and this was a much loathed practice amongst the women. I also saw this in another book I read recently called The Good Earth about ancient China. So many cultures have practiced, and struggled with, polygamy. I think it is more accepted and workable in these cultures where the custom has existed for many generations - unlike the Mormons who practiced it for 50ish years officially.

Anyway, the book was quite well written and the story great.

A Reliable Wife by Robert Goolrick (2009) [paper]

Wow. Set in Wisconsin in 1907-8, this story was not at all what I expected. An older, rich gentlemen advertises for a reliable wife to share his life and gets far more than he bargained for. But he is not as easily duped as you may at first think. The story took a few predictable twists and turns – probably to get you comfortable – and then proceeded to baffle and confound me with each new chapter.

The last half of the book, I continually dreaded the ending. I knew it was going to be one of those books with a dreadful end, something that I would simply view as a waste of my time…but then another turn and my prediction for the end would change. But again, it seemed even worse than the last outcome. This went on and on and I found myself unable to stop reading even though I was sure I was going to regret it. The despicable behavior, the defeated attitude, it was all too much. But AGAIN I would be surprised. Not until the very last paragraph did I have any idea of what truly was going to happen. And I loved the ending. I’ve never read such a suspenseful book – especially because I didn’t even realize it was being suspenseful. It was so cleverly done, that I just thought it was predictable prose with a few twists. I wish I could say more about the plot but I don’t want to give a thing away!
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Firlefanz Profile
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Re: Books in 2011


Reading right now Keys to the Kingdom. It's a novel written by Alison Armstrong, a lady who does wonderful seminars called "Celebrating Men, satisfying Women".

I watched her on video last year, talking about important concepts that help men and women make a better partnership. Now I finally treated myself to the novel. I dream of participating in a seminar by her - alas, she only teaches in Southern California.

Guess I'll have to go there. emoticon emoticon

---
- Firlefanz

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Hannah Steenbock
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TexasMadness Profile
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That sounds like an interesting style for a book. I read that she believes we absorb information better through stories so instead of a "how-to" book, it's a novel that demonstrates it all! I love it!

The Master Butchers Singing Club by Louise Erdrich (2003) [paper]

Starting at the end of WWI and spanning just beyond WWII, this book follows the life of a German butcher, former sniper in the war, who emigrates to the US to escape the crippling depression in his homeland, only to be faced with another one across the ocean. He manages to bring his new family to North Dakota and works hard to make a living. The small town is full of other characters, notably a young woman who was raised by an alcoholic father and no mother. She returns to the small town with her lover and crosses path with the butchers wife, whom takes her in like a lost child.

The book was a wonderfully well written story. The characters were well developed and intriguing. Sometimes I hated the things that happened or wished they could have turned out otherwise, but it wasn't that I thought the story was wrong - just that life can sometimes be wrong. I've thought a lot about this book after I finished it. The story is pretty much over at the end of the novel, but the characters were so real, so alive, that I wonder what happened next. Not in that way you do when a book leaves somethings out of the end, but just in the way you wonder what happened to so-and-so that you used to know or your old high school friend, or neighbor. You think of them fondly and hope they are having a good time in life. That's how I now think of the characters in this book.
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Saijen SilverWolf1 Profile
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Re: Books in 2011


Sounds like a good book, Texas!

I just sent out an order for a book called
'The Red Garden'. It's written by the same woman who wrote 'Practical Magic' I have that in movie form..and I'm hoping this book is as good as Practical Magic is!
It'll be about a week or so before I get it.

---
"Do unto others as you would have them do unto you"
~~@Saijen@~~
3/15/2011, 4:57 am Link to this post Send Email to Saijen SilverWolf1   Send PM to Saijen SilverWolf1 Yahoo
 
TexasMadness Profile
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Re: Books in 2011


The Yokota Officers Club by Sarah Bird (2002) [paper]

Set in the 1960s with plenty of flashbacks to the early 1950s, the book follows a college freshman as she rejoins her military family after spending a year at school for the first time living a civilian lifestyle. She has a new perspective on life and her family. They have been restationed in Japan - a place that she felt was truly home as it was the longest assignment of her nomadic childhood. But something happened at the end of the first tour in Japan that left her family forever changed. She was too young to understand it then, but she is finally granted the insight and opportunity to discover the truth.

It turns out that much of this book is based on the life of the author. While she admits her life was much more boring and there was no secret controversy, she did live in Japan and go on many of the adventures. It was neat to here that she based in on stories from her father too!
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