Dostoevsky, Fyodor "A Little Hero"

Dostoevsky, Fyodor "A Little Hero" (Russian: Маленький герой/Malen'kiy geroy) - 1857

Novel in Nine Letters - 1847
A Gentle Creature - 1876
A Little Hero - 1849

This booklet consists of three short stories, but I liked the "Novel in Nine Letters" the best. It's the correspondence between two men who somehow always manage to miss each other. 

Dostoevsky said of this: "When I was penniless the other day, I visited Nekrasov. While I was sitting with him, the idea came to me to write a novel in nine letters. When I returned home, I finished the novel in one night. In the morning, I brought the manuscript to Nekrasov and received 125 rubles for it."

In this story, you can tell that Pyotr Ivanych wants something from Ivan Petrovich and vice versa. One excuse for why the meeting doesn't take place follows another. Very funny.

I had already read "The Gentle One" in another collection. (see here) Also an interesting story about the beginning and end of a relationship and how it all came about.

I found the actual story, or rather the one that adorns the title, rather boring. An eleven-year-old falls in love with his cousin, and the "gentlewomen" of society make this the subject of their amusement, making fun of him, and embarrassing him. Nevertheless, it's a Dostoyevsky story and therefore worth reading in its own right.

From the back cover:

"At that time I was nearly eleven, I had been sent in July to spend the holiday in a village near Moscow with a relation of mine called T., whose house was full of guests, fifty, or perhaps more.... I don't remember, I didn't count. The house was full of noise and gaiety. It seemed as though it were a continual holiday, which would never end. It seemed as though our host had taken a vow to squander all his vast fortune as rapidly as possible, and he did indeed succeed, not long ago, in justifying this surmise, that is, in making a clean sweep of it all to the last stick."

Bythell, Shaun "Remainders of the Day"

Bythell, Shaun "Remainders of the Day: More Diaries from The Bookshop, Wigtown" - 2022

I absolutely love Shaun Bythell's books about his shop and his customers, his clients and his friends. I had already read his former ones and this is just as great.

So, this is certainly one of the best books I read this year. Shaun Bythell's humour is one of the greatest. I hope he will write a new book soon.

Here are some examples:

"Some people (so we're told) don't read. What unfulfilling lives they lead."
I couldn't agree more.

And his favourite from the book "Nil Desperandum, a Dictionary of Latin Tags and Phrases":
"Timeo hominem unius libri." - "I fear the man of one book!"
We definitely should!

A sixteenth century Spanish curse:
"For him that stealeth this book, let it change into a serpent in his hand and rend him."

Book description:

"After twenty years running The Bookshop in Wigtown, Scotland, Shaun Bythell's life has settled into a mostly comfortable routine; days spent roaming between the shelves, poetry nights by the fire, frequent drop-ins from friends with gossip.

But while customers come and go - whether or not they’ve paid - there’s never a quiet moment in The Bookshop. Apart from the usual stream of die-hard trainspotters, antiquarian porn collectors and toddlers looking for somewhere cosy to urinate, Shaun still must contend with his employees’ increasingly eccentric habits, the mayhem of the Wigtown Book Festival and the shock of the town’s pub changing hands.

Warm and witty, with Shaun’s iconic mix of deadpan humour and grouchy charm, Remainders of the Day is the latest in his bestselling diary series."

Petrowskaja, Katja "Maybe Esther"

Petrowskaja, Katja "Maybe Esther" (German: Vielleicht Esther) - 2014

A great tale of a Jewish family's history. One critic wrote that Katja Petrowskaja could have written a great novel, but only reproduced fragments. I think it is precisely these fragments that show more of what this family - representative of all other Jewish families - went through, all the little details that you don't often hear about.

A wonderful book.

From the back cover:

"An inventive, unique, and extraordinarily moving literary debut that pieces together the fascinating story of one woman’s family across twentieth-century Russia, Ukraine, Poland, and Germany.

Katja Petrowskaja wanted to create a kind of family tree, charting relatives who had scattered across multiple countries and continents. Her idea blossomed into this striking and highly original work of narrative nonfiction, an account of her search for meaning within the stories of her ancestors.

In a series of short meditations, Petrowskaja delves into family legends, introducing a remarkable cast of characters: Judas Stern, her great-uncle, who shot a German diplomatic attaché in 1932 and was sentenced to death; her grandfather Semyon, who went underground with a new name during the Bolshevik Revolution in Russia, forever splitting their branch of the family from the rest; her grandmother Rosa, who ran an orphanage in the Urals for deaf-mute Jewish children; her Ukrainian grandfather Vasily, who disappeared during World War II and reappeared without explanation forty-one years later - and settled back into the family as if he’d never been gone; and her great-grandmother, whose name may have been Esther, who alone remained in Kiev and was killed by the Nazis.

How do you talk about what you can’t know, how do you bring the past to life? To answer this complex question, Petrowskaja visits the scenes of these events, reflecting on a fragmented and traumatized century and bringing to light family figures who threaten to drift into obscurity. A true search for the past reminiscent of Jonathan Safran Foer’s Everything Is Illuminated, Daniel Mendelsohn’s The Lost, and Michael Chabon’s Moonglow, Maybe Esther is a poignant, haunting investigation of the effects of history on one family."

In 2013, Katja Petrowskaja received the Ingeborg Bachmann Prize, one of the most important awards for literature in the German language.

Chevalier, Tracy "The Last Runaway"

Chevalier, Tracy "The Last Runaway" - 2013

I have liked Tracy Chevalier, ever since my first novel written by her, "Girl with a Pearl Earring". I have since read more of her books but not enough, as it looks like.

Her story of an English Quaker girl who emigrates to the United States in the middle of the 19th century is absolutely fantastic. I think with today's background, we can all follow the feelings and thoughts of Honor Bright, we can sympathize with her actions. She was pretty brave to leave her home country to accompany her sister who was going to get married there. Even with the whole family, some would not have done that given the choice.

I think the author researched the background pretty well. None of us has lived at the time but I have read quite a few books about slavery, the Underground Railroad, Quakers, all important topics in this book. We get a long list of books that Tracy Chevalier used for background information which makes me believe that we can trust that it's true what she writes in her story. This is definitely a well written and believable book.

I liked Honor Bright but I liked Belle Mills and Mrs. Reed just as much, if not even more. I could even forgive some of the other characters for what they did. Today, this would be unacceptable but back then, this was how it was.

I also loved that they included a map. I mean, I know where Ohio is but I wouldn't have known where the towns mentioned are supposed to be.

At the end of the book, Tracy Chevalier mentions that it gives hope to us still, that in extreme circumstances we too would still do the right thing. Yes, let's hope that, at least for us, because we can see every day that many, many people don't do the right thing and applaud even those who don't.

At the end of the novel, the author gives some recommendations about further readings. I have read two of the four books mentioned and can only second that opinion.

On the Civil War:
Frazier, Charles "Cold Mountain" - 1997
Jiles, Paulette "Enemy Women" - 2002
Olmstead, Robert "Coal Black Horse" - 2007

On the Effect of Slavery:
Morrison, Toni "Beloved"

From the back cover:

"Honor Bright is a sheltered Quaker who has rarely ventured out of 1850s Dorset when she impulsively emigrates to America. Opposed to the slavery that defines and divides the country, she finds her principles tested to the limit when a runaway slave appears at the farm of her new family. In this tough, unsentimental place, where whisky bottles sit alongside quilts, Honor befriends two spirited women who will teach her how to turn ideas into actions."

Alvarez, Julia "In the Time of the Butterflies"

Alvarez, Julia "In the Time of the Butterflies" - 1994

This was my first novel taking place in the Dominican Republic. I wanted to read "In the Time of the Butterflies" for ages, somehow I never got to it. The story breaks your heart. As we live in a time of war at our doorstep again, this might be even more important than it was ten years ago, at least in our part of the world. There have always been wars, there have always been dictators. Julia Alvarez tells us about a family that was giving it all, fighting for a free and better life of their compatriots and who paid the highest price possible.

What is amazing in this book is that there are very little things how you can become an enemy of a dictator without even wanting to get involved in the first place. Revolutionaries, or so-called revolutionaries are not always some weird people who stand up and say, hey, I don't like that guy, let's do something about it. Often, there is not much you can do about being on the blacklist. I have read many books about wars or slavery, other dictatorships, and often have found that I probably would have ended up just the same as the protagonists. However, here I am sure I would have, although, having said that, I am not as pretty as the Mirabal sisters were, so I might have gone unnoticed.

What I liked about the style of the book, there are four sisters and they all tell their stories, mostly in a kind of diary. They all get their say and you can see how each one of them thought about the dictator, the country, how each of them was affected in a different way. A little like "The Poisonwood Bible" by Barbara Kingsolver where the four sisters tell their stories.

There is no page that doesn't captivate you. From the beginning, you are right there, in the middle of the family, living with them, fearing with them.

While this is not a non-fiction book, the novel is based on the life of these courageous women. We need more like them.

Julia Alvarez mentions that she "believes in the power of stories to change the world". I think she contributes to this and we must read more by this brilliant storyteller. We need authors like her to make us aware of what is going on in this world and that we should fight for a better one.

One quote I loved a lot:
"I am pro whoever is right at any moment in time." We all should be.

From the back cover:

"They were the four Mirabal sisters - symbols of defiant hope in a country shadowed by dictatorship and despair. They sacrificed their safe and comfortable lives in the name of freedom. They were Las Mariposas, 'The butterflies,' and in this extraordinary novel Patria, Minerva, Maria Teresa, and Dedé speak across the decades to tell their own stories - from tales of hair ribbons and secret crushes to gunrunning to prison torture - and describe the everyday horrors of life under the Dominican dictator Trujillo. Now through the art and magic of Julia Alvarez's imagination, the martyred Butterflies live again in a warm, brilliant, and heartbreaking novel that makes a haunting statement about the human cost of political oppression."

If you don't have the time, yet, to read this fantastic account of some wonderful women, read their story here on Wikipedia.

I read another book on the subject, this time about the dictator Rafael Trujillo:

Vargas Llosa, Mario "The Feast of the Goat" (Spanish: La fiesta del chivo) - 2000

Adams, Sara Nisha "The Reading List"

Adams, Sara Nisha "The Reading List" - 2021

I received this book from a friend who had read and loved it. Thank you, Lisbeth.

And I loved it just as much. We all have reading lists with books that are special to us. They might have helped us through a hard time, inspired us, taught us, informed us, reminded us of something or someone, or just made us feel good afterwards.

Here we have a reading list that has been compiled by somebody anonymous and turns up at several places. It helps a widower get over the death of his wife, a teenage girl who finds a lot of examples to get through a tough time in her life, a little girl to take her first steps into a more "grown up" thinking.

This is what the Reading List says:

Just in case you need it:
To Kill A Mockingbird
Rebecca
The Kite Runner
Life Of Pi
Pride And Prejudice
Little Women
Beloved
A Suitable Boy

I think most of us have a feeling where the reading list might come from. I discovered that my idea was right from the beginning. Which made the book even more special.

I have read all of the books except for two:
Lee, Harper "To Kill a Mockingbird" - 1960
Du Maurier, Daphne "Rebecca" - 1938
Hosseini, Khaled "The Kite Runner" - 2003
Martell, Yann "Life Of Pi" - 2001
Austen, Jane "Pride & Prejudice" - 1813
Alcott, Louisa May "Little Women Series" - 1868-86
Morrison, Toni "Beloved" - 1987
Seth, Vikram "A Suitable Boy" - 1993

At the end, the author adds more books that she would have liked to include in the list, had it been "hers". She mentioned that they found her at just the right time in her life.

Lahiri, Jhumpa "The Namesake" - 2003
Roy, Arundhati "The God of Small Things" - 1997
Smith, Zadie "White Teeth" - 1999
Adichie, Chimamanda Ngozi "Americanah" - 2013
Heiny, Katherine "Standard Deviation" - 2017
Mistry, Rohinton "A Fine Balance" - 1995
Kawakami, Hiromi "Strange Weather in Tokyo" (センセイの鞄/Sensei no kaban) - 2001
Carter, Angela "The Magic Toyshop" - 1987
Angelou, Maya "I Know Why The Caged Bird Sings" - 1969
Hosain, Attia "Sunlight on a Broken Column" - 1961
Smith, Ali "There But For The" - 2011

As you can see, I have read most of those books, as well, I might have to check out those that I didn't. I noticed that all but one of the books have been written in English. I bet that my list would have had books from more than just two countries. There are so many great authors out there in this world.

From the back cover:

"When Aleisha discovers a crumpled reading list tucked into a tattered library book, it sparks an extraordinary journey.

For the list finds Aleisha just when she needs it most, the stories transporting her away from everything - her loneliness, her troubles at home - one page at a time. And when widower Mukesh arrives at the library, desperate to connect with his bookworm granddaughter, Aleisha introduces him to the magic of the reading list. An anxious teenager and a lonely grandfather forming an unlikely book club of two.
Some stories never leave you.

And some change your life, forever."

Robinson, Marilynne "Gilead"

Robinson, Marilynne "Gilead" - 2004

I like Pulitzer Prize winning novels. And I like Oprah books. This one is both and I'm not sure whether I did like it or not though I can say for sure that it could have been a tad faster, with a little more pace to it than it had. Granted, the story is supposedly told by an old man who writes to his son. He know he will not be around much longer and the son is still quite little, so he writes to his adult son in about twenty years.

Gilead is the name of the fictional small town in Iowa where the family Ames lives. John is a clergyman as well as his father and his grandfather were and he tells his son the story of their family and their town. It all flows from one event or even non-event into the next.

Given the profession of the protagonist who also functions as the narrator of the whole story, this novel is quite into religion. I am a Christian but not American and I have always felt there is a wide distance between the two beliefs, probably as wide as the ocean that separates us, especially between my Catholic Christianity and that of many American protestant denominations. I can follow a story that is based around religion, I can even read certain religious writings but reading about a whole life of a person who thinks he is better because he believes in the one and only way how to live your life and probably wanting to enforce it onto his son, well, it was a bit much.

The whole book sounded to me like the last sermon this guy was ever going to give and that his son was condemned to follow it letter by letter for the rest of his life.

The book was not what I usually experience with Pulitzer Prize winning novels. It happens rarely but it happens. Unfortunately. We can't always agree with everyone. And apart from the one author who didn't accept the Oprah nomination, I think this is also the first Oprah book I can't warm to.

Marilynne Robinson received the Pulitzer Prize for "Gilead" in 2005.

From the back cover:

"Winner of the Pulitzer Prize and National Book Critics Circle Award, Gilead is a hymn of praise and lamentation to the God-haunted existence that Reverend Ames loves passionately, and from which he will soon part.

In 1956, toward the end of Reverend John Ames's life, he begins a letter to his young son, an account of himself and his forebears. Ames is the son of an Iowan preacher and the grandson of a minister who, as a young man in Maine, saw a vision of Christ bound in chains and came west to Kansas to fight for abolition: He 'preached men into the Civil War,' then, at age fifty, became a chaplain in the Union Army, losing his right eye in battle.

Reverend Ames writes to his son about the tension between his father - an ardent pacifist - and his grandfather, whose pistol and bloody shirts, concealed in an army blanket, may be relics from the fight between the abolitionists and those settlers who wanted to vote Kansas into the union as a slave state. And he tells a story of the sacred bonds between fathers and sons, which are tested in his tender and strained relationship with his namesake, John Ames Boughton, his best friend's wayward son.

This is also the tale of another remarkable vision - not a corporeal vision of God but the vision of life as a wondrously strange creation. It tells how wisdom was forged in Ames's soul during his solitary life, and how history lives through generations, pervasively present even when betrayed and forgotten."

Bythell, Shaun "Confessions of a Bookseller"

Bythell, Shaun "Confessions of a Bookseller" - 2019

After having read and thoroughly enjoyed "The Diary of a Bookseller", I was really happy to find that Shaun Bythell had written a second book, "Confessions of a Bookseller". Now, these "Confessions" are similar to the sarcastic comments I loved so much in the "Diary".

If you liked his first book, you should definitely read this one. If you haven't read either of them, you should start reading both, I assure you, you, you will devour them.

We follow Shaun through a year in the bookshop. He tells us how many customers come to the shop every day, how much money goes through the till, that is quite interesting. But even more interesting is the way he acquires those books, his visits to houses where a whole library is sold or people bringing in boxes of books they'd like to sell.

Then there is the talk with customers who would like to haggle. I think everyone believes that once it is second hand, they can ask for a discount because it "didn't cost anything in the first place". Yes, it is. And if a second-hand shop puts a price on an item, I can either take it at that price or leave it. After I read the first book, I found comments by some of his customers on how rude he was. I think, some of them should be grateful that they made it out of the shop alive. The author is very witty and very funny. I think only that gets him through the day.

Anyone who has always dreamt of opening a second-hand bookshop should definitely read this before. I still would love it but, customers, beware!

I hope that I can visit this shop and its author one day. He also has a website: The Bookshop. And a blog.

From the back cover:

"'Do you have a list of your books, or do I just have to stare at them?'

Shaun Bythell is the owner of The Bookshop in Wigtown, Scotland. With more than a mile of shelving, real log fires in the shop and the sea lapping nearby, the shop should be an idyll for bookworms.

Unfortunately, Shaun also has to contend with bizarre requests from people who don't understand what a shop is, home invasions during the Wigtown Book Festival and Granny, his neurotic Italian assistant who likes digging for river mud to make poultices."

As the owner of The Bookshop in Wigtown, Scotland, you might think Shaun Bythell's days are taken up with sorting through rare and valuable first editions - or snoozing by the fire with the latest literary gem. But you'd be wrong. Instead, beset by bizarre requests from customers who appear not to know what a shop is, locked in an endless struggle with Amazon and terrorised by his bin-diving, poultice-making employees, Shaun's trials and tribulations make his life very far from a fairy tale."

And now I am looking forward to "Seven Types of People You Find in Bookshops".

Top Ten Tuesday ~ Epistolary Novels

         

"Top Ten Tuesday" is an original feature/weekly meme created on the blog "The Broke and the Bookish". This feature was created because they are particularly fond of lists at "The Broke and the Bookish". It is now hosted by Jana from That Artsy Reader Girl.

Since I am just as fond of them as they are, I jump at the chance to share my lists with them! Have a look at their page, there are lots of other bloggers who share their lists here.

This week, our topic is Books With Your Favorite Trope/Theme

Sometimes it would be nice to have a closer explanation of what the suggestion really means, I have done several about a certain theme:

Top Ten Books From My Favourite Genre. I chose historical fiction here.

Top Ten All Time Favourite Books in X Genre. This was one about my favourite classic books.

According to Wikipedia, "a literary trope is the use of figurative language, via word, phrase or an image, for artistic effect such as using a figure of speech."

So, I thought I should check what kind of books fit into a certain category and before even checking my lists, I thought of epistolary novels. I love writing (and receiving) letters (mostly e-mails today but it's about exchanging news via written word rather than social media, so that counts in my opinion) and reading books that are written as letters or diaries is a lot of fun. So, epistolary novels it is.

When I came to choosing which book to put on this list, I found many that were written by people who suffered from a war or other devastating circumstances and that's what I went with. Maybe Mr. Putin should read at least one of those books, it might change his mind.

Atwood, Margaret "The Handmaid’s Tale" (Re-Read) - 1985
Dugain, Marc "The Officer's Ward" (F: La Chambre des officiers) - 1999
Filipović, Zlata "Zlata's Diary: A Child's Life in Wartime Sarajevo" (BOS: Zlatin dnevnik: otroštvo v obleganem Sarajevu) - 1993
Frank, Anne "The Diary of a Young Girl" (NL: Het Achterhuis) - 1942-33
Hanff, Helene "84 Charing Cross Road" + "The Duchess of Bloomsbury Street" - 1970 + 1973
Hesse, Karen "Letters From Rifka" - 1992
Remarque, Erich Maria "All Quiet on the Western Front" (GE: Im Westen nichts Neues) - 1928
Schami, Rafik "A Hand Full of Stars" (GE: Eine Hand voller Sterne) - 1987
Shaffer, Mary Ann & Barrows, Annie "The Guernsey Literary & Potato Peel Society" - 2008
Zweig, Stefanie "Nowhere in Africa" und "Somewhere in Germany" - 1995+1996

📚 Happy Reading! 📚

Brooks, Geraldine "Foreign Correspondence"

Brooks, Geraldine "Foreign Correspondence: A Pen Pal's Journey from Down Under to All Over" - 1997

Geraldine Brooks describes how she started writing to many different people from all over the world because she felt so far away from everything. That was the same for me, even though I lived in the middle of Europe. But at the time, the little village in Northern Germany might as well have been on the moon.

Other than that, there wasn't a huge difference in her upbringing and mine. We are about the same age and grew up in similar circumstances, though my parents were purely working class, no former singer or anything, and they were from the same area where they lived and died.

So, I really liked this story because it was also mine. When I was fourteen, I had my first penfriend. She was from Romania, and I met her once even though we are not in touch anymore. But I have two very good penfriends who started writing to me shortly afterwards, from France and the USA, and we are still in touch. The French friend has visited me several times (first alone, then with husband and family) and I have visited her, as well, same thing, first alone, later with husband, then with children.

I have lived abroad for more than half of my life. I think wanting to meet people from other countries stems from my first friendships by letters. I started to learn Esperanto when I got the opportunity and went abroad as soon as I was able to. Having penfriends certainly encouraged me to explore the world further.

But even if you don't belong to the keen letter writers, Geraldine Brooks has a fantastic way of describing her life as well as that of others, totally interesting.

So far, I have only read this book and "March" by Geraldine Brooks. Must change that.

From the back cover:

"As a young girl in a working-class neighborhood of Sydney, Australia, Geraldine Brooks longed to discover the places where history happens and culture comes from, so she enlisted pen pals who offered her a window on adolescence in the Middle East, Europe, and America. Twenty years later Brooks, an award-winning foreign correspondent, embarked on a human treasure hunt to find her pen friends. She found men and women whose lives had been shaped by war and hatred, by fame and notoriety, and by the ravages of mental illness. Intimate, moving, and often humorous, Foreign Correspondence speaks to the unquiet heart of every girl who has ever yearned to become a woman of the world."

Stoker, Bram "Dracula"

Stoker, Bram "Dracula" - 1897

I am neither a fan of fantasy nor of horror. But the subject for our Xanadu reading challenge in November was "Classics: any adult or children’s classic in any genre that you have never read before". There aren't really any genres I never read, I have tried everything, some I like a lot more than others, so I chose one that I rarely read. My son still had "Dracula" at home, so I thought this is the best time to finally read it.

Of course, there is no way I didn't know the Dracula story even though I never even watched a snippet of one of the many films they made out of this classic. So, the story wasn't a surprise. I also wasn't shocked or frightened, that is not the reason I don't read horror stories, they usually just bore me.

I am glad I read the novel because it is always talked about so much. But I don't believe in vampires and I wouldn't say I was excited about the story. Still, as it is one of the classics, it was an alright read even for such a truth lover like me.

From the back cover:

"A true masterwork of storytelling, Dracula has transcended generation, language, and culture to become one of the most popular novels ever written. It is a quintessential tale of suspense and horror, boasting one of the most terrifying characters ever born in literature: Count Dracula, a tragic, night-dwelling specter who feeds upon the blood of the living, and whose diabolical passions prey upon the innocent, the helpless, and the beautiful. But Dracula also stands as a bleak allegorical saga of an eternally cursed being whose nocturnal atrocities reflect the dark underside of the supremely moralistic age in which it was originally written - and the corrupt desires that continue to plague the modern human condition."

Wharton, Edith "Ethan Frome"

Wharton, Edith "Ethan Frome" - 1911

The starter book for "Six Degrees of Separation" for December is "Ethan Frome". Often, I haven't read the starter book or even heard of it. But I have read and liked "The House of Mirth", so I decided I could read this one, especially since it's just a novella, so I could read it in between.

A good story about life under harsh circumstances about a century ago. I am sure this could have been a good chunky story, as well, but the author decided to keep it short. And for once, I didn't even mind that much.

I probably should read more by Edith Wharton. Any recommendations?

From the back cover:

"With this intensely moving short novel, Edith Wharton set out 'to draw life as it really was' in the lonely villages and desolate farms of the harsh New England mountains. Through the eyes of a visitor from the city, trapped for a winter in snowbound Starkfield, readers glimpse the hidden histories of this austere and beautiful land. Piecing together the story of monosyllabic Ethan Frome, his grim wife, Zeena, and Mattie Silver, her charming cousin, Wharton explores psychological dead-lock: frustration, longing, resentment, passion.

First published in 1911, the novella stunned its public with its consummate handling of the unfolding drama, and has remained for many readers the most compelling and subtle of all Wharton's fiction."

Zusak, Markus "The Messenger"

Zusak, Markus "The Messenger" (US: I am the Messenger) - 2002

A couple of years ago, I read "The Book Thief" with my book club and really loved it.  Not just me, the other book club members were also full of praise. I always thought that was the author's first book but that is not the case and when I found out, I had to read at least one more of his books. And this will probably not be my last one, either. Because I loved this even more.

We get to know Ed Kennedy and his friends, all more or less "losers" who don't have a brilliant future in their lives. Ed's siblings went to university, he is a taxi driver with not formal education. His friends are in similar situations. That's when Ed becomes "The Messenger".

I loved all the messages he had to deliver, they were compassionate and showed a lot of empathy. And that's how I came to love Ed, as well. What a wonderful young man. And most of the recipients of the messages are wonderful, as well. We learn that we can help others just by being there, lending an ear, buying them an ice cream … It doesn't need much to be the hero in someone else's life and we don't always need a reward for that, either. The book itself contains a great message.

Spoiler:

I wasn't too sure about the twist at the end. But then I decided, I know someone wrote Ed, he isn't real. But I would have liked another ending, one that made me believe until the end what he existed and what this was all about. Now, I still don't really know what the reason behind those messages are.

* * *

Needless to say, I love his writing style.

From the back cover:

"protect the diamonds
survive the clubs
dig deep through the spades
feel the hearts

Ed Kennedy is an underage cabdriver without much of a future. He's pathetic at playing cards, hopelessly in love with his best friend, Audrey, and utterly devoted to his coffee-drinking dog, the Doorman. His life is one of peaceful routine and incompetence until he inadvertently stops a bank robbery.

That's when the first ace arrives in the mail.

That's when Ed becomes the messenger.

Chosen to care, he makes his way through town helping and hurting (when necessary) until only one question remains: Who's behind Ed's mission?"

Goethe, Johann Wolfgang von "Italian Journey"

Goethe, Johann Wolfgang von "Italian Journey" (aka Letters from Italy) (German: Italienische Reise) - 1817

Goethe is considered one of the greatest thinkers in the world. He was not just a writer of novels, poetry and play, he was also a scientist and an artist. One of his most famous non-fictional publications is the "Theory on Colours", published in 1810, including his colour wheel and a very early study on the physiological effects of colour.

In his late thirties, he embarked on a trip to Italy, not a two week holiday like we are used to nowadays, no, he stayed for more than a year, travelled through the country and observed their culture and art.

In this book, he tells us all about his visits to the various parts of Italy, the museums and operas, his meeting the local population. Since not many people could travel at the time, it was something like a travel documentary you might watch on television today of a place you know you will never get to visit.

But he didn't just do a sightseeing tour, he also made botanical, mineralogical, geological and geographical researches and made quite a few discoveries, e.g. on the propagation of plants.

So, if any of this interests you, I can heartily recommend the book. After all, he was a perfect author and could tell stories in a way not many can. However, if you think the topic is too dry, I recommend other works by Goethe, e.g. "The Sorrows of Young Werther" (German: Die Leiden des jungen Werther).

But it is certainly worth reading Goethe. I hope he is as great in the translations as he is in German. In the "Country of Poets and Thinkers", he truly is one of the greatest. His thoughts are still as up to date as they were 200 years ago.

From the back cover:

"In 1786, when he was already the acknowledged leader of the Sturm und Drang literary movement, Goethe set out on a journey to Italy to fulfil a personal and artistic quest and to find relief from his responsibilities and the agonies of unrequited love. As he travelled to Venice, Rome, Naples and Sicily he wrote many letters, which he later used as the basis for the Italian Journey. A journal full of fascinating observations on art and history, and the plants, landscape and the character of the local people he encountered, this is also a moving account of the psychological crisis from which Goethe emerged newly inspired to write the great works of his mature years."

 

The picture on the cover of the English book (Goethe in the Roman Campagna) was painted by his friend Johann Heinrich Wilhelm Tischbein whom Goethe visited in Rome during his travels. The picture is both the most famous one by Tischbein as well as the most famous one of Goethe.

Barbery, Muriel "The Elegance of the Hedgehog"

Barbery, Muriel "The Elegance of the Hedgehog" (French: L’Elégance du hérisson) - 2006

This book had been on my TBR pile for too long and since I was determined to get it a little smaller by the end of the year, I finally started. Plus, I wanted to read more in French, so hopefully that's a start.

While this book is about philosophy and Russian literature, it's not that high brow to read because it's also about normal people and it makes you think about the meaning of life. If you love Russian literature, it's even better because one of the protagonists loves it, as well.

The story unfolds by the reports of two very different women, 12 year old Paloma Josse and 54 year old Renée Michel who is the concierge in the building Paloma and her family live in. You would think, they have nothing in common but this is where we can learn that even with a very different background, we can find a soulmate everywhere.

A nice read. I wouldn't mind a second book to see what goes on in Paloma's life when she grows up.

From the back cover:

"Renée is the concierge of a grand Parisian apartment building, home to members of the great and the good. Over the years she has maintained her carefully constructed persona as someone reliable but totally uncultivated, in keeping, she feels, with society's expectations of what a concierge should be. But beneath this facade lies the real Renée passionate about culture and the arts, and more knowledgeable in many ways than her employers with their outwardly successful but emotionally void lives. 

Down in her lodge, apart from weekly visits by her one friend Manuela, Renée lives resigned to her lonely lot with only her cat for company. Meanwhile, several floors up, twelve-year-old Paloma Josse is determined to avoid the pampered and vacuous future laid out for her, and decides to end her life on her thirteenth birthday. But unknown to them both, the sudden death of one of their privileged neighbours will dramatically alter their lives forever.

By turn moving and hilarious, this unusual novel became the French publishing phenomenon of 2007: from an initial print run of 3,000 to sales of over 2 million in hardback. It took 35 weeks to reach the number one bestseller spot but has now spent longer in the French bestseller lists than Dan Brown."

Myers, Benjamin "The Offing"

Myers, Benjamin "The Offing" - 2019

The latest "Favourite Book of the Independents" was announced and it was "The Offing". I had seen it in a bookshop and thought it sounded interesting but because my TBR pile keeps growing and growing, I hadn't bought it. This is the one time where I am glad that I can't borrow English books in my new home town because now I own it. It's definitely a keeper.

I'm glad this received the prize because so far, "Where the Crawdads Sing" (which had received last year's prize), had been my favourite book of the year. I think it has been replaced with this one.

Robert is only sixteen years old. He is to follow his dad as a coal miner, like every other young boy in his village in Durham in the Northern part of England. World War II has just ended and Robert wants to see a little from the world. Post-war England isn't exactly a dream but him being strong and many men missing, he finds jobs here and there and then carries on into the next village.

Until he hits the sea in Yorkshire and Dulcie's cottage. Dulcie is older, a lot older than Robert, lives alone but has had an interesting life. She shares her experience with the young foundling, gets him interested in literature and shows him that there is a lot more out there in life than what his village back home has to offer.

This is a brilliant book about so many things, England and Europe, the ocean, literature, poetry, the simple life, nature. He writes it as a sort of memoir from when he himself is old.

It already starts with a great quote: "For no one really wins a war: some just lose a little less than others." I don't understand how people don't get it.

To just show you his brilliant use of language, here's one of his nature descriptions.
"The land flowed forward now in a grassy tessellation of fields farmed and grazed, and divided by dusty tracks and densely packed tree-covered glades."

This book is just beautifully written. A fantastic example of great literature.

The author is from Durham himself. He has received many prestigious prizes already. I'll have to read more of his books.

From the back cover:

"'After all, there are only a few things truly worth fighting for: freedom, of course, and all that it brings with it. Poetry, perhaps, and a good glass of wine. A nice meal. Nature. Love, if you're lucky.'

One summer following the Second World War, Robert Appleyard sets out on foot from his Durham village. Sixteen and the son of a coal miner, he makes his way across the northern countryside until he reaches the former smuggling village of Robin Hood’s Bay. There he meets Dulcie, an eccentric, worldly, older woman who lives in a ramshackle cottage facing out to sea. - and she introduces him to the pleasures of rich food, sea-swimming, sunburn and poetry. The two come from different worlds, yet as the summer months pass, they form an unlikely friendship that will profoundly alter their lives.

From the Walter Scott Prize-winning author of The Gallows Pole comes a powerful new novel about an unlikely friendship between a young man and an older woman, set in the former smuggling village of Robin Hood’s Bay in the aftermath of the Second World War."


"The Offing" has been chosen favourite book of the year 2020 by the German Indepent Bookshops.

Brontë, Anne "Agnes Grey"

Brontë, Anne "Agnes Grey" - 1847

Anne Brontë, the youngest and lesser known of the three Brontë sisters. I have no idea why because her stories are just as great as those of her sisters. If not better. They are more down to earth, in my opinion.

There are some parallels to the story of Jane Eyre who works as a governess just as Agnes Grey does. That is probably because it was what the Brontë sisters experienced themselves. Agnes Grey is partly autobiographical, Anne Brontë added a lot of her own life here.

You can tell Anne is the daughter of a pastor, just as Jane Austen was, another parallel to a great author.

We learn about the hard life of a governess. If parents don't really want to be involved, want to discipline their children but also don't want others to discipline them but want those others to teach their children, you are always the piggy in the middle. How is the poor governess to instill the love of learning in children who are not told to follow the teacher? I know that teachers have a similar problem nowadays with parents who think their kids are little angels and little Einsteins at the same time while at the same time … well, let's not go there.

What a shame she died so young. I loved "The Tenant of Wildfell Hall" as much as I loved this novel. Would have been great to be able to read more of her writings.

From the back cover:

"When her family becomes impoverished after a disastrous financial speculation, Agnes Grey determines to find work as a governess in order to contribute to their meagre income and assert her independence. But Agnes's enthusiasm is swiftly extinguished as she struggles first with the unmanageable Bloomfield children and then with the painful disdain of the haughty Murray family; the only kindness she receives comes from Mr Weston, the sober young curate. Drawing on her own experience, Anne Brontë's first novel offers a compelling personal perspective on the desperate position of unmarried, educated women for whom becoming a governess was the only respectable career open in Victorian society."

Waltari, Mika "The Secret of the Kingdom"

Waltari, Mika "The Secret of the Kingdom" (Finnish: Valtakunnan salaisuus) (The Malinianus Duology) - 1959

This is my third book by Finnish author Mika Waltari, I read all of them in a book club, always suggested by a Finnish member as one of their most important authors.

And it's true, Mika Waltari has some important thoughts to convey, whether it's about religion, philosophy or life itself. You notice this guy knows what he is talking about.

In this book, he describes the life of a Roman citizen who witnesses Jesus' crucifixion and then gets drawn into his circle, meets the apostles and other friends whose lives have been affected by Jesus of Nazareth. He has a great way of describing the story, makes you believe you've been there yourself. Definitely makes you believe that this could be how it was.

Certainly, a great book if you want to explore your faith but also if you just want to delve into the history of Christianity from the outside. This is a very detailed and descriptive story about the passion and its aftermath, starting at Easter, finishing on Pentecost.

I'm not surprised I liked this book because I also liked the other ones I read (The Egyptian, The Dark Angel). A great author.

From the back cover:

"Against a background of the strife-torn land of Judea two thousand years ago, Mika Waltari has written what is certainly his most important novel.

Seeking the meaning to his life in the study of philosophy, the young Roman. Marcus Manilianus, discovers in an Alexandrian library a vast number of predictions, all tending to confirm his own feeling that the world is about to enter upon a new era. Two chance encounters with Jews who proclaim the coming of a world leader whom they call the Messiah or King, cause Marcus to resolve to make a visit to the Holy City of the Jews. He arrives outside Jerusalem in time to see crowds - some curious, some shocked - staring up at three crosses on a nearby mound. Above the center cross, an inscription had been fixed: JESUS OF NAZARETH, KING OF THE JEWS.

The quest that ensues leads Marcus through all parts of Jerusalem and into contact with men and women of all stations of life who had known this remarkable man. And by degrees, wonderful if strange things are revealed to him of Jesus’ teaching, and he experiences the odd sensation of almost believing in the destiny of this crucified Roman among the alien Jews, Stands alone on the borderline of two worlds, feelings he belongs to neither, and it becomes vital to him to find 'the way, the Kingdom,' to again knowledge and certainty, not merely belief.

What follows, as Marcus pursues his search for the promised secret of the Kingdom, bring to a climax as exciting and deeply moving a novel as Mika Waltari, certainly one of the world’s outstanding historical novelists, has ever written. It is a story of a time long past, yet it deals with a theme as modern as today: the dilemma of modern man and his culture in gaining and retaining a faith. And always present throughout the novel is the splendor, the irony and humor which have so delighted millions of readers of other Waltari novels from The Egyptian to The Etruscan."

We discussed this book in our international online book club in March 2020.

Staël, Anne-Louise-Germaine de "Corinne: Or Italy"

Staël, Anne-Louise-Germaine de "Corinne: Or Italy" (French: Corinne ou l'Italie) - 1807

I enjoy reading classics and this one is from the same time as my favourite classic writer, Jane Austen.

However, even though, according to a description on Goodreads, this "work has been selected by scholars as being culturally important, and is part of the knowledge base of civilization as we know it, it didn't really capture my interest. It reminded me of some much older literature, the story didn't really develop in a way you would like to follow it.  Some random thoughts here, a letter there. Yes, the book might be important for historical literature but, please, don't impose them on younger students who are not accustomed to reading classics.

From the back cover: (translated from French as I couldn't find an English one except for the above-mentioned quote):

"A cosmopolitan and European novel which evokes France, England and Italy at the dawn of romanticism in the diversity of their mores and their cultures. The story of a woman, the poet Corinne, who opened the debate on the status of women, on the right of women to live independently and to exist as a writer. Corinne is Mme de Staël herself, 'the most extraordinary woman we have ever seen' according to Stendhal, 'a being apart, a superior being such as he meets perhaps one in a century', said Benjamin Constant. Napoleon himself, who saw Madame de Staël as a dangerous messenger of liberty, once declared: 'We must recognize, after all, that she is a woman of great talent; she will stay."

Kidd, Sue Monk "The Invention of Wings"

Kidd, Sue Monk "The Invention of Wings" - 2014

Until now, I only read "The Secret Life of Bees" by Sue Monk Kidd. That was a book club read and I enjoyed it very much.

Having said that, I enjoyed this book even more. The story is based on the real life of two sisters who, at the beginning of the 19th century, fought not only for the abolition of slavery but also for the equality of women. I had never heard of them but was very impressed with their work.

Growing up in the house of slave owners, growing up with slaves, Sarah and Nina/Angelina Grimké come to despise the way the slaves are treated. They both end up in the North and their story is very powerful. In addition, the author has added the story of Charlotte and Hetty "Handful", a slave woman and her daughter and that way woven all the stories in from the other side. Great combination. Taking turns, Sarah and Handful talk about their lives. It is very different from the life we lead nowadays though we know there are still a lot of women around who don't have the freedom and education we have.

For example, Sarah teaches Handful to read. This also happened in real life. They are both severely punished.

People who still believe that the colour of our skin is the main contributor what defines us, should definitely read this.

I'm not surprised Oprah chose this for her book club. It represents everything she stands for.

Just a brilliant novel.

From the back cover:

"Writing at the height of her narrative and imaginative gifts, Sue Monk Kidd presents a masterpiece of hope, daring, the quest for freedom, and the desire to have a voice in the world - and it is now the newest Oprah’s Book Club 2.0 selection.

Hetty “Handful” Grimke, an urban slave in early nineteenth century Charleston, yearns for life beyond the suffocating walls that enclose her within the wealthy Grimke household. The Grimke’s daughter, Sarah, has known from an early age she is meant to do something large in the world, but she is hemmed in by the limits imposed on women.

Kidd’s sweeping novel is set in motion on Sarah’s eleventh birthday, when she is given ownership of ten year old Handful, who is to be her handmaid. We follow their remarkable journeys over the next thirty five years, as both strive for a life of their own, dramatically shaping each other’s destinies and forming a complex relationship marked by guilt, defiance, estrangement and the uneasy ways of love.

As the stories build to a riveting climax, Handful will endure loss and sorrow, finding courage and a sense of self in the process. Sarah will experience crushed hopes, betrayal, unrequited love, and ostracism before leaving Charleston to find her place alongside her fearless younger sister, Angelina, as one of the early pioneers in the abolition and women’s rights movements.

Inspired by the historical figure of Sarah Grimke, Kidd goes beyond the record to flesh out the rich interior lives of all of her characters, both real and invented, including Handful’s cunning mother, Charlotte, who courts danger in her search for something better.

This exquisitely written novel is a triumph of storytelling that looks with unswerving eyes at a devastating wound in American history, through women whose struggles for liberation, empowerment, and expression will leave no reader unmoved."