Book Quotes of the Week

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"When you reread a classic you do not see more in the book than you did before; you see more in you than was there before." Clifton Fadiman

"These are not books, lumps of lifeless paper, but minds alive on the shelves. From each of them goes out its own voice... and just as the touch of a button on our set will fill the room with music, so by taking down one of these volumes and opening it, one can call into range the voice of a man far distant in time and space, and hear him speaking to us, mind to mind, heart to heart." Gilbert Highet

"The stories of childhood leave an indelible impression, and their author always has a niche in the temple of memory from which the image is never cast out to be thrown on the rubbish heap of things that are outgrown and outlived." Howard Pyle

"Fill your house with stacks of books, in all the crannies and all the nooks." Dr. Seuss

"Fiction gives us a second chance that life denies us." Paul Theroux

"To sit alone in the lamplight with a book spread out before you, and hold intimate converse with men of unseen generations – such is a pleasure beyond compare." Kenko Yoshida

Find more book quotes here.

Ghosh, Amitav "River of Smoke"

Ghosh, Amitav "River of Smoke" (Ibis Trilogy #2) - 2011

This novel is Part 2 of the "Ibis Trilogy". I was happy that it had been written already when I finished "Sea of Poppies" because it meant I could carry on with the story right away.

Seldom have I been so eager to start the next book in a series as with this one. That might be partly because the first book didn't seem to have a proper ending and just invited you to carry on with this one but it certainly is also due to the fantastic talent of this author of telling you a story.

As I have written in my review about "Sea of Poppies", Amitav Ghosh manages to describe everything in a way that you feel you are there. He is such a realistic writer, it is unbelievable. It feels like you have time travelled and are in India or China in the 19th century.

If, like me, you have read the first book in the series, you could not wait to see what happened to the characters of that story. And you won't be disappointed. However, while he introduces other people that did not appear in the first book, it takes him quite a while to come to terms with the fate of some of our heroes from the Ibis. If you are very impatient, you might get just a little annoyed with the storyteller.

A lot of new topics are introduced into this part, even though they have been slightly touched in the first novel. One of them is morale and the difference between Hinduism and Christianity.

I don't want to repeat everything I said about the first episode of the story, so I just refer you to my review of "Sea of Poppies". I also read the third one in the series now: "Flood of Fire".

Apparently, the author said in an interview, “I don't know whether I'll be able to stop at three". Well, I'd love him to write more than three of these but I'd really like him to hurry up with the next one.

See more comments on my ThrowbackThursday post in 2025.

From the back cover:

"In September 1838 the fortunes of all those aboard three ships on the Indian Ocean - the 'Ibis', the 'Anahita' and the 'Redruth' - are upended in tempestuous seas. On the grand scale of an historical epic, 'River of Smoke' follows the motley collection of storm-tossed characters to the crowded harbours of China. All struggle to cope with their losses - and for some, unimaginable freedoms - in the alleys and crowded waterways of nineteenth-century Canton. As transporting and mesmerizing as an opiate-induced dream, 'River of Smoke' will soon be heralded as a masterpiece of twenty-first-century literature."

There is a good website about "The Ibis Trilogy".

Ghosh, Amitav "Sea of Poppies"

Ghosh, Amitav "Sea of Poppies" (Ibis Trilogy #1) - 2008

This novel is Part 1 of the "Ibis Trilogy".

I have only read "The Glass Palace" by this author so far. It was a book club read and it is one of my favourite books ever. I don't want to say too much in the first line but this novel will join it on my shelf of favourites.

This book has it all, history, love and war, the people from different countries. Amitav Ghosh manages to invite us into this world. I love it when you have the feeling that you are there. You can see the colours, hear he sounds, smell the smells, it's so lifelike.

This novel describes the fate of a ship and its passengers, At the beginning, we get to know the sailors, then the different people who will become passengers later on, all from different kinds of life.

Amitav Ghosh manages to describe all classes of people so well, the different castes in India, the British and other foreigners, all neatly put into their respective drawers. The women belong in yet another part, they have nothing to say, they get married off to someone, have to produce the heir. Everyone is forced into a certain role due to social and political reasons. And yet, everyone tries to live with their fate in their one different way, some are subservient, others rebellious. Some form an attachment to people from the other groups, others desperately try to keep that invisible wall between them.

In any case, this book teaches so much about life in India at that time, about the Opium War. We learn about the fate of the farmers who are forced by the colonialists to produce opium which they, in turn, import into China so they can afford the trading with that country. So many lives are affected and destroyed because some Europeans want Chinese products. It also is a lot easier for the occupiers to destroy the lives of anyone who originally lived in the country than the other way around. We see that one wrong accusation can take away one man's wealth and honour.

I would have liked to have some sort of ending to this part of the book but because I started it late, "River of Smoke" was already out and I carried on with it right away.

I also read the third one in the series now: "Flood of Fire".

In an interview the author mentioned that "oil is the opium of today." I think he is absolutely right and it might help to think about what we are doing to people in the other parts of the world today.

I guess some people might have a problem reading this as there are a lot of different versions of English used, that of the sailors is different of that of the Indians, that of the British different than that of the other foreigners, there are many different dialects and idiosyncrasies. It seems irritating at the beginning but I can only encourage everyone to keep on going, it's definitely worth it. We also learn that a lot of words have come to the English language from the colonies this way. An interesting observation, if you like language.

This story is like "One Thousand and One Nights", so many different stories, so many different lives. And all in a country far far away and a long time ago. Fascinating. Enchanting.

I read this book as part of the Reading Challenge "Chunky Books". I love that group and am looking forward to reading and discussing a lot more tomes with this group.

See more comments on my ThrowbackThursday post in 2025.

From the back cover:

"On an old slaving ship named the 'Ibis', fate has thrown together a truly motley crew of sailors, coolies, and convicts, including a bankrupt raja, a French runaway and a widowed opium farmer. As their old family ties are washed away, they, they come to view themselves as jahaj-bhais, or ship-brothers. Against the backdrop of the Opium Wars, this unlikely dynasty is what makes 'Sea of Poppies' so breathtakingly alive - a masterpiece from one of the world's finest novelists."

There is a good website about "The Ibis Trilogy" and "Sea of Poppies".

Amitav Ghosh was shortlisted for the Booker Prize for "Sea of Poppies" in 2008.

MacLaverty, Bernard "Cal"

MacLaverty, Bernard "Cal" - 1983

A difficult book to read. Not because it has been written in a weird way or because it has difficult words in it. Just the topic. The problem in Northern Ireland. Catholics against Protestants. Brother against brother. Father against son. Anyone can be your enemy.

What a sad story, what a sad history. Is there a solution? If they will ever find it, there is nothing in this book that gives us hope. And if it did, it wouldn't be as authentic as it is.

The author gives you the feeling that the characters are trapped in their life, in their environment, in their role in society. There is no hope for a young boy in Belfast, he gets no decent education and he doesn't get a job even if he had a decent education.

Cal tries his best to get out of this. He even works as a farmhand although he has no experience with working on a farm, he probably hasn't been on a farm before he gets hired. And then there is his love for a young widow. Not exactly an easy life. But what do you do when you have no choice?

If you like to read about different kind of history, like to understand what people are going through, this is the book for you. It was written about thirty years ago but it still feels as true as it did at that time. Bernard MacLaverty manages to put the whole conflict in this rather short (160 pages) book

From the back cover:

"For Cal, some of the choices are devastatingly simple... He can work in an abattoir that nauseates him or join the dole queue; he can brood on his past or plan a future with Marcella. Springing out of the fear and violence of Ulster, Cal is a haunting love story in a land were tenderness and innocence can only flicker briefly in the dark."

Book Quotes of the Week

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"Stories are one thing that will be constant in life. Whether told, written, reenacted they are a fundamental part of human nature." Jessica Shirvington

"Keep reading. It's one of the most marvelous adventures that anyone can have." Lloyd Alexander

"So please, oh please, we beg, we pray, go throw your TV set away, and in its place you can install a lovely bookshelf on the wall." Roald Dahl

"The person who deserves most pity is a lonesome one on a rainy day who doesn't know how to read." Benjamin Franklin

"And when you love a book, commit one glorious sentence of it - perhaps your favorite sentence - to memory. That way you won't forget the language of the story that moved you to tears." John Irving, In One Person

"Books are lighthouses erected in the great sea of time." E.P. Whipple

Find more book quotes here.

Golding, William "Lord of the Flies"

Golding, William "Lord of the Flies" - 1954

A very disturbing dystopian novel, probably because it concerns children and makes us human beings look even less human than some of the other ones I read. (See my list of dystopian novels here.)

What makes people behave in an inhumane way? In this case, children are left to their own device after a plane crash. We can tell from the beginning that there are two different kinds, some that see the final goal, they want to be saved and work for that, others that just want to have instant gratification, i.e. food and are willing to fight for that.

I can see why this novel has become so successful, it is not just the story being told but all the underlying hidden meanings, as well. There are signs everywhere. They boy with the glasses (Piggy), for instance, represents the first group, the more rational thinking.

As in most other dystopian novels, we can see the background of the novel easily. 1954, World War II had been over for almost a decade. Did people go back to being human and treat each other accordingly? I don't think William Golding saw it that way. On the contrary, he feared that there might be a repetition of the hell everyone had just been through, he had fought in the Navy himself so certainly had a lot of bad memories. He had seen that people were not born to be peaceful, that civilization was just a thin line that you could fall off any minute.

This is the main reason I love dystopian novels, it's another way of dealing with history and trying to avoid its repetition. It's another hope that there might be a peaceful time one day.

Great book, should be on everyone's reading list.

From the back cover:

"A plane crashes on an uninhabited island and the only survivors, a group of schoolboys, assemble on the beach and wait to be rescued. By day they inhabit a land of bright fantastic birds and dark blue seas, but at night their dreams are haunted by the image of a terrifying beast.

In this, his first novel, William Golding gave the traditional adventure story an ironic, devastating twist. The boys' delicate sense of order fades, and their childish fears are transformed into something deeper and more primitive. Their games take on a horrible significance, and before long the well-behaved party of schoolboys has turned into a tribe of faceless, murderous savages."

William Golding received the Nobel Prize for Literature in 1983 "for his novels which, with the perspicuity of realistic narrative art and the diversity and universality of myth, illuminate the human condition in the world of today".

I contribute to this page: Read the Nobels and you can find all my blogs about Nobel Prize winning authors and their books here.

Arana, Marie "American Chica: Two Worlds, One Childhood"

Arana, Marie "American Chica: Two Worlds, One Childhood" - 2002

I bought this book mainly because of the bilingual and multi-cultural aspect since I am always interested in this topic. We threw our children into a bilingual situation, they had to grow up with two and a half languages even though the cultures didn't clash as much.

A Peruvian/US-American family, described by the youngest daughter of the family who grew up between her father's Peruvian family who was very much into their ancestors and into FAMILY and her mother's US-American, almost non-existent family. She only saw her maternal grandparents once in her life and none of the others whereas in Peru she was surrounded by grandparents, uncles and aunts, cousins, and a lot of other people that "belonged" to her family's estate.

Even though the story as such was interesting, I wasn't too excited about the style of writing. The story just didn't seem to flow, the author was just as much torn between two worlds in her book as she must be in real life, you have the feeling she is still trying to find her roots, who she really is and that she doesn't come to a conclusion and therefore the story goes a little higgledy-piggledy. She seems to wonder from one word to the next and never belong. So, in that respect, she has just written the right book. But it was not easy to read because if that.

From the back cover:

"In her father’s Peruvian family, Marie Arana was taught to be a proper lady, yet in her mother’s American family she learned to shoot a gun, break a horse, and snap a chicken’s neck for dinner. Arana shuttled easily between these deeply separate cultures for years. But only when she immigrated with her family to the United States did she come to understand that she was a hybrid American whose cultural identity was split in half. Coming to terms with this split is at the heart of this graceful, beautifully realized portrait of a child who “was a north-south collision, a New World fusion. An American Chica.

Here are two vastly different landscapes: Peru - earthquake-prone, charged with ghosts of history and mythology - and the sprawling prairie lands of Wyoming. In these rich terrains resides a colorful cast of family members who bring Arana’s historia to life...her proud grandfather who one day simply stopped coming down the stairs; her dazzling grandmother, 'clicking through the house as if she were making her way onstage.' But most important are Arana’s parents: he a brilliant engineer, she a gifted musician. For more than half a century these two passionate, strong-willed people struggled to overcome the bicultural tensions in their marriage and, finally, to prevail."