This fall, so far, my reading list has been much more diverse than normal. I have only read a few thrillers & mysteries, and instead have read more memoirs and fiction that reads like memoirs. It wasn't a conscious decision, but somehow I managed to choose some really, really wonderful books. And through them I've traveled to India, Australia, Hungary, Tibet, Ireland, and Italy. That sounds so pompous and.. uninviting - but please believe me, I have no patience for dry boring stories... these books were all books that drew me in and continued to occupy my thoughts when I was unable to be reading.
The Book I Can't Stop Talking About
Ok, so I read this one later than most of you. It's going to be a movie soon, and it was a book club selection for my local book club, but I missed that month because of our sons wedding... and then I finally read the book. Oh my word is it good! It's the true story of a very poor little boy in India who got separated from his older brother, got on a train, and ended up very far from home with no idea where he was, where he lived, or how to return. He is eventually put in an orphanage, adopted by an Australian family, grows up, and then uses google maps, for years, to search for landmarks until he finds his childhood home and returns to tell his family what happened to him. Not only does the author have an amazing story, but either he has a talent for writing, or an amazing editor. Either way, it's an amazing book that I have not stopped talking about since I read it.
Another not new book - this one was originally published in 1952, and I just now got around to reading it. Had I read it sooner, I would have required my children to read it as part of their high school curriculum. Similar to A Long Way Home, it's a true story, this one about the first European to enter Tibet. The goodreads summary explains it well "Harrer was traveling in India when the Second World War erupted. He was subsequently seized and imprisoned by British authorities. After several attempts, he escaped and crossed the rugged, frozen Himalayas, surviving by duping government officials and depending on the generosity of villagers for food and shelter. Harrer finally reached his ultimate destination-the Forbidden City of Lhasa-without money, or permission to be in Tibet. But Tibetan hospitality and his own curious appearance worked in Harrers favor, allowing him unprecedented acceptance among the upper classes. His intelligence and European ways also intrigued the young Dalai Lama, and Harrer soon became His Holiness's tutor and trusted confidant. When the Chinese invaded Tibet in 1950, Harrer and the Dalai Lama fled the country together."
This is not a dry boring read, it's absolutely fascinating and is added as one of my all time favorite reads.
Returning to my normal genre, I read Genuine Fraud, by the same author as We Are Liars. I'm in the minority on this one, as I loved it and liked it even more than We Are Liars. Someone has mentioned that it's a rip off of the Talented Mr Ripley by Patricia Highsmith, but I had not read that book (it's on my to read list now) so this story was not in the least bit ruined for me. I have no idea how to explain what this book is about, without ruining the story.
Another "thriller" of sorts, definitely a mystery, but this one is on my favorites list for a different reason. It's truly different. The book is written in reverse. Not in normal reverse, like from the future looking back, but rather it's like the book was written, then assembled front to back, with the last chapter being chapter one. Week 10, Week 9, Week 8... you get bits and pieces of the story and then later find that they mean different things because of things that happened in week 4, that you don't learn about until near the end of the book.. it should be as confusing as my explanation, but the author makes it work, and I loved it. I don't think I'd want to read this style all the time, but since it was so unique to me, it really stands out and is added to my favorites.
For a lighter, fun, read, I read The Madwoman Upstairs. Although I have read a good bit of the Bronte sisters work, I do not know much about their personal lives and all the theories and rumors that surround them. I'm not a Bronte expert. So this book did not annoy me the way it seems to have annoyed those who have very strong opinions on the actual history of the sisters. I understand their outrage, I have been similarly upset over historical based fiction in the past... but I don't think this is meant to be in the least bit historical. It's simply fiction about a Bronte descendant and a fictional lost Bronte treasure. I didn't think it was laugh out loud funny, but it was light and amusing and I enjoyed it.
https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/34121119-camino-island
Speaking of light reads, after listening to John Grisham's book tour podcasts (they are excellent! I am usually not a huge fan of podcasts, but these were like visiting bookstores to hear authors speak.. and we were doing a lot of road trips at the time, so they were perfect to listen to while driving) I had to read Camino Island. Grisham set out to write a "beach read" and he nailed it. It's about a fictional theft of the Fitzgerald manuscripts from Princeton's library, and also about a bookstore. This is nothing at all like his normal books.
Harlan Coben is second only to Rex Stout on my list of favorite authors. So oddly enough, even though this is not one of my favorite books by him, it's one of my favorite books. It was very, very good. Not his best, but still fantastic.
Room, by Emma Donaghue, remains on my list of all time favorite reads. That is the only reason I picked up this book. I can't imagine I would have ever been interested based on it's description alone... and it is a different read, for me. I loved it so much more than I would have thought possible. Goodreads touts this as a "psychological thriller" - but I don't agree. It is a mystery, but the mystery isn't as interesting as the surroundings. I've read several books since I finished this one, but as I sit here trying to explain why I loved this, I can still picture, the room, the house, the area it is told in.. and there were never long descriptive passages to tell you those things, they were descriptions weaved into the story that stuck with me. "In the latest masterpiece by Emma Donoghue, bestselling author of Room, an English nurse brought to a small Irish village to observe what appears to be a miracle-a girl said to have survived without food for months-soon finds herself fighting to save the child's life.
Tourists flock to the cabin of eleven-year-old Anna O'Donnell, who believes herself to be living off manna from heaven, and a journalist is sent to cover the sensation. Lib Wright, a veteran of Florence Nightingale's Crimean campaign, is hired to keep watch over the girl."
My Brilliant Friend by Elena Ferrante is everything I hate in a book. It starts out with a "mystery" that you never return to in this book. It ends abruptly - so abruptly that you may think your book is missing pages. And then you find out that it's actually book one of FOUR, and that the four books are really not stand alone at all, but rahter one monstrously huge book that is cut into 4 books to be sold separately. (I think book two, alone, is 470 pages. )
But what a story... it grips you, pulls you in, and is hard to put down.
(On the other hand, I've started book two, and I am not loving it nearly as much. I want it to move on so I can find out what happened and it's dragging a bit...)
"Beginning in the 1950s in a poor but vibrant neighborhood on the outskirts of Naples, Ferrante’s four-volume story spans almost sixty years, as its protagonists, the fiery and unforgettable Lila, and the bookish narrator, Elena, become women, wives, mothers, and leaders, all the while maintaining a complex and at times conflictual friendship. Book one in the series follows Lila and Elena from their first fateful meeting as ten-year-olds through their school years and adolescence.
Through the lives of these two women, Ferrante tells the story of a neighborhood, a city, and a country as it is transformed in ways that, in turn, also transform the relationship between her protagonists."
My husband follows Jon Actuff on twitter, and as I started about my 15th project this year (Nope. Not exaggerating. A children's book, a cookbook, two different etsy stores, new craft venture (I got a cricut! LOVE this machine!), three new committees, TWO fiction novels at the same time (I've written approximately 3 chapters for each book - that's it.) a new genealogy book (written about our family history, not genealogy in general) , Redoing a bedroom in our house (with intent to make it the "new" master bedroom, and our current bedroom the new guest room - TWO of our sons got married and moved out this year...)
Well, he may have mentioned 8 or 37 times that John Acuff has this new book out about finishing projects. Finishing, not starting, apparently being the goal. Who knew? I'm the queen of starting. I love to start things. I love to plan them and organize them. Finish them? Uhm... I'm too busy starting the next 12 things!
So this book was written for me. And yes, I finished the book. And the cookbook, and I'm almost finished with the children's book. Did THIS book help me? Maybe. I didn't actually follow the homework each chapter. (Although I always thought his suggestions were great ideas.) But it is a really great book, and a lot of it has stuck with me. My favorite is Choose What To Bomb. I now at least feel better about not keeping up with my email.
Seriously, this is an incredibly practical book that I think I will re-read next year. Because I realized by chapter one that my problem is not really "finishing". My problem is that my kids are grown, for the first time I am facing a truly empty nest, and I have no idea what my focus is supposed to be.... so I am trying everything. And that's ok. This is also a year where I had two weddings (two sons married in one year), two cross country trips, two surgeries, two construction projects on the farm... so it wasn't the best year for finishing projects. And that's ok. Maybe next year I'll make figuring out my goals a project.
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