We read this in our international online book club in December 2024. And before I begin, let me tell you, this was my favourite of our selection this year, besides "Morning and Evening". And I did not think I would like it at all because this is so not my genre.
Have you ever wondered what your life might have been if something had or hadn't happened. If you hadn't visited that school you went to, if you had decided to get another profession, if you had met another partner in life? Well, here you can find how it might be if you could explore your life in different circumstances.
Imagine a library on the way between life and death. Nora, our protagonist, finds herself just there and tries quite a few different alternatives.
It's so wonderful to see what choices she could have made and where they would have led. Brilliant story.
From the back cover:
"Between life and death there is a library.
When Nora Seed finds herself in the Midnight Library, she has a chance to make things right. Up until now, her life has been full of misery and regret. She feels she has let everyone down, including herself. But things are about to change.
The books in the Midnight Library enable Nora to live as if she had done things differently. With the help of an old friend, she can now undo every one of her regrets as she tries to work out her perfect life. But things aren't always what she imagined they'd be, and soon her choices place the library and herself in extreme danger.
Before time runs out, she must answer the ultimate question: what is the best way to live?"
Read my original reviews, for the links click on the titles.
Read my original reviews, for the links click on the titles.
I have read one book by Olga Tokarczuk (Primeval and Other Times) when she received her Nobel Prize for Literature. And I wanted to read more by her since then. A bookclub member lent me one now and I read it in more or less one go, it is so exciting. Janina Duszejko is such an interesting character. And the story is starting so quietly, you don't even notice at the beginning that it is a crime story which are not my favourites.
Even though she is the protagonist of the novel, you don't see her as such at the beginning. Janina is a middle-aged, slightly weird woman living in the middle of nowhere in the mountains at the Polish-Czech border where she looks after the summer houses of some rich people. She works with astrology and translates poems by William Blake. She loves animals and she is a conservationist. A remarquable woman.
Where this story leads to, I don't know. But I recommend this book to anyone who is interested in great literature.
From the back cover:
"One of Poland's most imaginative and lyrical writers, Olga Tokarczuk presents us with a detective story with a twist in DRIVE YOUR PLOW OVER THE BONES OF THE DEAD. After her two dogs go missing and members of the local hunting club are found murdered, teacher and animal rights activist Janina Duszejko becomes involved in the ensuing investigation. Part magic realism, part detective story, DRIVE YOUR PLOW OVER THE BONES OF THE DEAD is suspenseful and entertaining reimagining of the genre interwoven with poignant and insightful commentaries on our perceptions of madness, marginalised people and animal rights."
And why the German translation is called "Der Gesang der Fledermäuse" (The Song of the Bats) is still a mystery to me.
Olka Tokarczuk received the Nobel Prize for Literature in 2018 "for her narrative imagination that with encyclopedic passion represents the crossing of boundaries as a form of life".
I contribute to this page: Read the Nobels and you can find all my blogs about Nobel Prize winning authors and their books here.
Brown, Rita Mae - The Hunsenmeir Trilogy - 1987-99
A story about two elderly ladies, the Hunsenmeir sisters, and the Lesbian daughter of one of them.
Ingalls Wilder, Laura "Little House Books" 1932-1971
Laura's father was a pioneer, so she and her sisters moved around North America from one unsettled piece of land to the next.
Kneale, Matthew "English Passengers" - 2000
Sailors from the Isle of Man wanted to smuggle a little alcohol but end up in Tasmania. This story tells about the effect they had on the people living there already, the native Australians.
Osorio, Elsa "My Name is Light" (Spanish: A veinte años, Luz) - 1998
A highly interesting novel about something that didn't happen that long ago, yet is not so widely published.
Luz wants to find her father, Carlos, one of the many political activists in Argentina who literally 'disappeared'.
Wilde, Oscar "The Importance of Being Earnest" - 1895
A wonderful, humorous play. A hilarious satire.
Read my original reviews, for the links click on the titles.
I find it hard to write this review. I love books by Joyce Carol Oates, I think she deserves the Nobel Prize. I am intrigued by the figure of Marilyn Monroe, I read the book "Marilyn" (Goodreads) by Norman Mailer ages ago. I think I was expecting something along that line.
What I got was a description of a child who didn't stand a chance in the world. How she became one of the greatest icons in the film industry? That was a long and arduous way and it didn't bring her any joy.
I had to remind myself often that this was just a book based on the real life story of the film star, even though most of the facts were true.
It was a long and heavy read. Did I enjoy it as much as the other JCO books? I'm not sure but I'm glad I read it.
From the back cover:
"In 'Blonde' we are given an intimate, unsparing vision of the woman who became Marilyn Monroe like no other: the child who visits the cinema with her mother; the orphan whose mother is declared mad; the woman who changes her name to become an actress; the fated celebrity, lover, comedienne, muse and icon. Joyce Carol Oates tells an epic American story of how a fragile, gifted young woman makes and remakes her identity, surviving against crushing odds, perpetually in conflict and intensely driven. Here is the very essence of the individual hungry and needy for love: from an elusive mother; from a mysterious, distant father and from a succession of lovers and husbands. Joyce Carol Oates sympathetically explores the inner life of the woman destined to become Hollywood’s most compelling legend. 'Blonde' is a brilliant and deeply moving portrait of a culture hypnotised by its own myths and the shattering reality of the personal effects it had on the woman who became Marilyn Monroe."
Catherine Newman
Newman, Catherine "Sandwich" - 2024
#6Degrees is a monthly link-up hosted by Kate at Books Are My Favourite and Best. I love the idea. Thank you, Kate. See more about this challenge, its history, further books and how I found this here.
I found this on one of the blogs I follow, Books are the New Black who found it at One Book More. It was originally created by Reviews from the Stacks, and the idea is to spell the month using the first letter of book titles
December: Christmas or Non-fiction
I don't have many books that are about Christmas. I might find a few but then they also have to fit the letters. So, I went with the easier option (for me): Non-fiction.
I've been doing Throwback Thursdays for a while but I noticed that I wrote a lot of reviews in a short time when I first started. One of my blogger friends always posts the reviews of one month but that would be too much. So, these are my reviews from the fourth part of December 2011.
Fontane, Theodor "Effi Briest" (GE: Effi Briest) - 1894
The story takes place in the late 19th century. Fontane managed the description of the society excellently.
Handford, Martin "Where's Wally?" (aka Where's Waldo) - 1987
I guess Wally is known worldwide because he is going everywhere. Mind you, he is also hiding everywhere, so I'm surprised anybody knows him at all.
I have spent many many happy hours with my boys trying to find Wally and a lot of other things in the strangest places. This is a wonderful book to share with your children.
Haynes, Melinda "Mother of Pearl" - 1999
The Deep South of the US in the 1950s. Joody Two Shoes is a bit of a fortune teller, someone who knows everything, she brings some mysticism into this novel that heavily verges on Magic Realism.
Hesse, Karen "Out of the Dust" - 1997
Karen Hesse has a great style to write about the problems of ordinary people throughout history. Here she describes the life during the Great Depression in the 1930s in the US.
For the Classics Spin #39, we received #3 and this was my novel.
I have read most of the books by Charles Dickens by now but there are still a few left. So, I was happy that this number got drawn. So, here was the chance to devour one more of his fabulous books.
And fabulous it was. It had everything a Dickens novel needs: villains and virtues, rogues and good people, a helicopter mother from the Georgian era, just a caleidoscope of people from his time with lots of intrigues. Not to forget the great names he gives his characters: The Cheerybles, The Crummles, Sir Mulberry Hawk, Newman Noggs, Peg Sliderskew, Wackford Squeers, one of them funnier than the last.
Of course, this is a novel against social injustice. And while we might think that is better today, some things never change.
Obviously, a lot happens in the story, much of it is already given in the synopsis, so I wouldn't want to add to that in order not to spoil it for the first-time readers. Therefore, I finish with a quote from Oscar Wilde (in "The Importance of Being Earnest"): "The good ended happily, and the bad unhappily. That is what fiction means".
From the back cover:
"When Nicholas Nickleby is left penniless after his father's death, he appeals to his wealthy uncle to help him find work and to protect his mother and sister. But Ralph Nickleby proves both hard-hearted and unscrupulous, and Nicholas finds himself forced to make his own way in the world. His adventures gave Dickens the opportunity to portray an extraordinary gallery of rogues and eccentrics, such as Wackford Squeers, the tyrannical headmaster of Dotheboys Hall, a school for unwanted boys; the slow-witted orphan Smike, rescued by Nicholas; and the gloriously theatrical Mr. and Mrs. Crummles and their daughter, the 'infant phenomenon'. Like many of Dickens's novels, Nicholas Nickleby is characterised by his outrage at cruelty and social injustice, but it is also a flamboyantly exuberant work, revealing his comic genius at its most unerring."
Here are all the books on my original Classics Club list.
And here is a list of all the books I read with the Classics Spin.
I've been doing Throwback Thursdays for a while but I noticed that I wrote a lot of reviews in a short time when I first started. One of my blogger friends always posts the reviews of one month but that would be too much. So, these are my reviews from the third part of December 2011.
We read this in our international online book club in November 2024.
I knew there was a TV series with that title and I thought this might be interesting.
Well, it wasn't. I know how to play chess but this was too professional for me. Someone who doesn't play chess at all might get bored even quickly. There was too much talk about the game, too many details.
And while I felt sorry for the little orphan, I didn't like the person she grew into, a selfish, addicted girl, too many drugs, too much sex, just not my thing. And none of the other characters were lovable, either, except for maybe the caretaker who teaches chess to Beth.
Comments by other members:
From the back cover:
"When she is sent to an orphanage at the age of eight, Beth Harmon soon discovers two ways to escape her surroundings, albeit fleetingly: playing chess and taking the little green pills given to her and the other children to keep them subdued. Before long, it becomes apparent that hers is a prodigious talent, and as she progresses to the top of the US chess rankings she is able to forge a new life for herself. But she can never quite overcome her urge to self-destruct. For Beth, there’s more at stake than merely winning and losing."
I've been doing Throwback Thursdays for a while but I noticed that I wrote a lot of reviews in a short time when I first started. One of my blogger friends always posts the reviews of one month but that would be too much. So, these are my reviews from the second part of December 2011.
After reading "A Gentleman in Moscow", I definitely wanted to read more of this author and when one of my book club members offered to lend me her copy of this one, I happily said yes.
It is not the same as the aforementioned novel but it is also a good one. A completely different area, a different situation, but you get a similar feeling. This one takes place in New York around the life of a young girl who comes to New York.
We don't hear much about the parents who immigrated from Russia but it is her background that get her into her jobs, as she is able to speak Russian.
We get to know her friends, the circles she moves in. A well-written account of life in the first half of the last century. Amor Towles is certainly an author who knows how to capture an audience.
In the epilogue we find what is probably one of the most important lines from the whole book:
"The thing of it is - 1939 may have brought the beginning of the war in Europe, but in America it brought the end of the Depression. While they were annexing and appeasing, we were stoking the steel plants, reassembling the assembly lines, and readying ourselves to meet a world-wide demand for arms and ammunition. In December 1940, with France already fallen and the Luftwaffe bombarding London, back in America Irving Berlin was observing how the treetops glistened and children listened to hear those sleigh bells in the snow. That's how far we were from the Second World War."
The title is based on George Washington's "Rules of Civility" and you can find them here.
From the back cover:
"In a New York City jazz bar on the last night of 1937, watching a quartet because she couldn't afford to see the whole ensemble, there were certain things Katey Kontent knew:
· like how to sneak into the cinema, and steal silk stockings from Bendel's
· how to type eighty words a minute, five thousand an hour, and nine million a year
· that if you can still lose yourself in a Dickens novel then everything is going to be fine
By the end of the year she'll have learned:
· how to live like a redhead and insist upon the very best
· that chance encounters can be fated, and the word 'yes' can be a poison
· that riches can turn to rags in the trip of a heartbeat ..."
