Nose in a Book

The Life and Times of the Thunderbolt Kid:Travels Through my Childhood by Bill Bryson

Basically this a is memoir of Bryson’s childhood in the 1950s (I guess that’s pretty obvious from the subtitle)  but it’s so much more.  There’s not much of a summary I can do because it’s a memoir but Bryson covers topics like getting a free meal at a local restaurant (probably my favourite part of the book), the threat of nuclear war (which apparently didn’t worry anybody in those days), trying to get into the nudey tent at the state fair and many, many others.

I’m a big fan of Bill Bryson and this book didn’t disappoint me.  It was laugh out loud funny and always entertaining.  I know this review is kind of lame but there’s not much to say without giving away the funny bits and either you like Bryson or you don’t.

I did find a review where one commenter stated that Bryson was a commie and the reviewer agreed.  I’m not sure where that came from but it could have something to do with the fact that it was pretty obvious that Bryson was not a huge fan of McCarthy.

Practical Jean by Trevor Cole

Read for: Canadian Book Challenge, 2010 Green Books Campaign

This review is part of the Green Books Campaign.  Today 200 bloggers take a stand to support books printed in an eco-friendly manner by simultaneously publishing reviews of 200 books printed on recycled or FSC-certified paper. By turning a spotlight on books printed using eco- friendly paper, we hope to raise the awareness of book buyers and encourage everyone to take the environment into consideration when purchasing books.

The campaign is organized for the second time by Eco-Libris, a green company working to make reading more sustainable. We invite you to join the discussion on “green” books and support books printed in an eco-friendly manner! A full list of participating blogs and links to their reviews is available on Eco-Libris website.

Practical Jean is printed on paper that is 100% recycled.

Jean is your average, middle-aged woman living in a small town.  She’s obsessed with leaves and devotes her time to sculpting them into pieces that are almost guaranteed to crumble.  After three months of caring for her dying mother, she tells her husband she wishes she had just ended it near the beginning and spared her mother all that pain.  A few days after the funeral she plans an evening with her closest friends and it is as she sits there with them that she gets her idea – a way to help protect them from ever growing old and suffering.

Jean was such a fun character.  You know right from the beginning as you are introduced to her love of leaves and her devotion to sculpting them (even in the face of multiple failures) that she’s just a little off.  But as you continue reading you begin to realize just how off she really is.  And even though she’s truly crazy, she’s still lovable.  After all, everything she does is because she loves her friends.

Even though the book was slightly morbid, it was funny and I could understand the motive behind Jean’s actions (not that I would agree with her actions – just to reassure all my friends out there!)  And the story and the characters were so believable.  Jean’s logic was just so logical!  I could totally imagine someone deciding that this is the best course of action to follow!  And just to be clear, in case any of my friends are considering this – I’m happy to live a long life and grow old, thanks.

Savvy by Ingrid Law

Mibs Beaumont is about to turn thirteen and in her family that is a BIG deal because at thirteen, your savvy begins to show itself.  One of her brothers caused a hurricane on his thirteenth birthday and her other brother has a way with electricity.  But just two days before her birthday, Mibs’ father, who comes from the non-savvy side of the family, is involved in an accident that puts him into a coma that’s he’s not coming out of.  Mibs decides that she needs to get to him because she’s sure that she can pull him out of his coma.  So she sneaks onto a bus along with some others (some accidentally, some on purpose) and the adventure begins.

This book was a quick, fun read.  I loved the writing.  It was a little bit silly, but not overly so, just enough to make it fun to read.  I liked this book but I didn’t love it and I can’t quite figure why.  It just didn’t grab me like some books do.  It was fun and well written and there was a good, original story with even a little bit of a message but somehow it just didn’t do it for me.  I liked the characters but sometimes they were just a little too much, or not enough.  Now, I realize I’m not the target audience for this book and that may have something to do with my disappointment in the book.  I was just expecting a little more from a book that won a Newbery Honour (2009).

Cutting for Stone by Abraham Verghese

Read for: Book Club, Global Reading Challenge – Africa

Marion Stone, a siamese twin, was the son of an Indian nun and an English surgeon at a hospital in Ethiopia.  His mother died in childbirth and his father got scared and took off so Marion and his brother were raised by two Indian doctors who also worked at the hospital.  The story covers a fifty year span and a lot of stuff happens.  I can’t really say much more about the story without spoilers.  The story is about the relationship between the twins, the political history of Ethiopia and medicine.

The book started out a little slow.  It’s a long book and the first 100 or so pages could have been condensed a lot.   That’s about how long it took for the twins to be born but after that the book just took off and didn’t stop.  I loved the writing style in this book.  There were quite a few stories to be told and some flashbacks were necessary but instead of having the book jump all over the place like some do, Verghese just put the flashback in when it was pertinent and didn’t use it as a device to try and build suspense.  (I hate it when I’m reading a story and just when I start to get involved with the characters, the author drops the reader into another story. )

I also really liked reading about Ethiopia and the life they lived there.  I’ve always had a certain vision of Ethiopia and reading this book made me realize how wrong I’ve been.  It was also very interesting to read the experience of Marion when he first came to North America.  I’ve read lots of books about people coming to America but the way Verghese described it seemed so real.

I also liked the story.  It took an unexpected turn but it worked.  There was a lot of technical language (at least to me) but it never seemed overwhelming and it never took away from the story.  I look forward to reading more from Verghese.

Player One by Douglas Coupland

Read for: Canadian Books Challenge 4

First of all…this is totally unrelated to the book but my biggest pet peeve is when the library puts the bar code right over the title or the author of the book.  My library copy of this book has the sticker right over the title.  Why do they do that?  There are lots of other good places on this cover for the bar code that wouldn’t hide the title of the book.  Another book I have from the library has the sticker right over the author’s last name.  What’s up with that?  Anyway, rant over.

This book was really weird, and not just normal Coupland weird, but really out there weird.  It’s a good thing it was short because otherwise I might not have finished it.  It’s about these four people who are in a hotel lounge when the world goes insane after the price of a barrel of oil hits $350.  (I have to admit, as an Albertan whose husband works in the oilsands, my first thought on that was “Woohoo!”)  They barricade themselves inside the lounge and basically just talk and kill time.  Other than that, there’s not much to the book (as I said, it was short).

I guess I’ll start with what I liked.  I like Coupland’s writing.  Even when he is writing about serious stuff, he still has a little bit of irreverence in his writing that somehow makes Coupland’s version of the apocalypse easier to read about and even laugh about.  I actually also really liked his characters.  They all seemed a little lame and sad at the beginning but as I read the book I came to like them all and see the good in them.

Now for the rest.  I can’t say I didn’t like this book, I just didn’t get it.  I needed more time with it but it has to go back to the library so that’s not going to happen.  I feel like this is a pretty lame review but I just have nothing to say about the book.  If you like Coupland and you have the time to dedicate to reading it, you’ll probably enjoy it.

Along for the Ride by Sarah Dessen

This is the first e-book I’ve ever read but I don’t have any specific device for reading e-books so I just read this one on my computer.  Obviously, that’s not an ideal way to read a book but the ease of getting the book from the library and not having to remember to return it was pretty nice.  I’ve definitely been an anti-e-book kind of girl and I’m still not planning on buying a dedicated device but I’m starting to see the appeal.

Anyway, Auden, whose divorced parents are both a little self-involved, decides to spend the summer before heading off to university, with her father and his new wife and infant child.  When she arrives, she’s surprised to find her normally put-together step-mother, on the couch looking like she hasn’t slept or showered in a few days and not so surprised to find her father completely oblivious to the stress his wife is feeling.  As Auden tries to come to terms with what’s going on a home, she begins to form friendships with some of the locals who have issues all their own.

I loved this book.  There is something so comforting about Sarah Dessen’s novels.  She’s so good at telling basically the same story over and over but still making it a completely new and different story (if you know what I mean).  Her main characters are always individuals, they never feel like the same character from book to book (which a lot of authors that are a prolific as her tend to do).  And the story is always unique.  And her writing is just so easy to read.  It just flows.  I can read through her books so quickly and not even realize how much I’ve just read because it’s just so effortless.  Someday I’m going to run out of Sarah Dessen books to read and that’s going to be a very sad day for me!

Ysabel by Guy Gavriel Kay

Read for: CBC 4

15-year-old Ned is in Provence, missing the last two months of school, while his father, a super famous photographer shoots photos for a new book.  The first morning he is wandering around an old cathedral, while his dad shoots outside.  While in the church he meets Kate, a young exchange student from New York.  As she is showing him around the church they catch a man climbing out of a tunnel he shouldn’t be in.  Over the next few days, Ned runs into the mysterious man several more times.  But it is on the evening of Beltaine when Ned and Kate are in a place they shouldn’t be, when the story truly begins.  Ned calls his father’s assistant, Melanie, for help and when she arrives she is swept into an ancient story that has been replaying itself over and over for 2500 years.  Ned and Kate and a few others must enter the world of the mysterious man to rescue Melanie before she’s lost forever.

I had a hard time getting into the book.  At times I really liked it and would be totally absorbed but as soon as I put it down that all went away.  I never had that feeling of the book calling me, needing to be read.  Because of that I had a hard time finishing it.  It also seemed to move really slowly.  I actually didn’t really like this book that much.  The only reason I ended up finishing it and not abandoning it is because I wanted to review it for the Canadian Book Challenge.  I honestly can’t say why I didn’t like this book.  The writing was good, the story was interesting, the characters were likable and well developed – there’s isn’t any one specific thing I can pinpoint that made me dislike this novel.  I think perhaps it was mostly a timing thing.  Maybe if I’d had more time to devote to reading it I would have been more caught up in the story and enjoyed it more?  Who knows.

The one thing I can pick out that I really liked was the dialogue.  The characters were comfortable with each other and had a witty dialogue going on that had me laughing out loud several times.  Although I didn’t love this book, I will definitely be giving Guy Gavriel Kay another chance.  I’ve heard plenty about him and it’s all been good.

The Forgotten Garden by Kate Morton

In 1913, a little girl turns arrives in Australia from England on ship all alone .  She can’t remember her name or how she came to be on the ship.  The dockmaster takes the little girl in, gives her a name – Nell and raises her as his own.  When she is 21, he decides to let her know about her mysterious origins.  This knowledge changes her whole outlook and eventually she sets out to England to try and find out who she is and why nobody ever came to look for her.

The story is told from several different points of view, Eliza in the early 1900s, Nell mostly in the mid 70s and Cassandra mostly in 2005.  After Nell dies, Cassandra, her granddaughter, is left to try and solve the mystery of Nell’s parentage and her solo voyage to Australia.  Eliza is the author of a book of fairy tales that was one of the few things Nell had with her when she arrived in Australia.

The story had so many narrators and so many characters that it had the potential to become quite confusing but it didn’t.  It was a long story with lots of twists and turns and while it wasn’t a book I just HAD to read, it was still very captivating and enjoyable to read.  It moved slowly but not in a bad way.  It was a very comfortable read.  It’s the kind of book you like to curl up with on a rainy day.  It reminded me a lot of The Thirteenth Tale by Dianne Setterfield.

It is a very long book but it didn’t feel like it was too long.  Sometimes books like this that have lots of little ends to tie up tend to wrap everything up at the end too quickly and it feels like the author was rushing to meet a deadline or something.  Not this book – the pace was nice and even throughout the book and it had great flow (even though it was told through so many characters.)  I really enjoyed this book and I can’t wait to read more of Morton’s novels.

Going Bovine by Libba Bray

This was another book I picked up because it was part of the library’s summer teen survivor contest.  This one I enjoyed a lot more than the other one.

Going Bovine is about 16-year-old Cameron who is pretty disappointed in life and his family when he starts seeing weird stuff.  At first he just ignores it or attributes it to some bad pot, but eventually it gets to be too big to be ignored.  The doctors diagnose him with Creutzfeldt-Jakob disease, otherwise known as mad cow disease.  The rest of the book is one giant hallucination (or is it?).  He sees an angel who sends him on a mission to find Dr. X who can cure him.  The mission takes him all over the southern United States and teaches him a lot about himself and his family.  It helps him to come to terms with his disease and his coming death.

I wasn’t sure how I felt about this book until the very end.  It was a little wacky.  (But maybe that was the point?)  But as strange as everything that happened was, there was a still an element of the real about it that kept you wondering if it was all in Cameron’s head or if only part of it was.  It also had some pretty good lines – my favourite:

‘Yes. Putopia. It stands for Parallel Universe Travel Office…pia.’ Dr. O. breaks in. ‘We haven’t figured out the whole acronym yet, but we wanted to secure the domain name before anyone else did.’

Also, Cameron was reading Don Quixote in his English class at school just before he was diagnosed and I suspect there are many parallels between the two novels but I haven’t read Don Quixote myself so I can’t say for sure.  (Can anyone help me out with that?)

The book was well written, funny, poignant and enjoyable.  The only complaint I have is that sometimes there was so much crazy going on I found it a little hard to follow.  I also suspect there was a ton of symbolism and such that I missed out on.  I bet this would be a great one to discuss in a high school English class though…

Skulduggery Pleasant by Derek Landy

I picked up this book at the library because it won the Teen Survivor contest (the local library picks a few books each year and then they vote off a new book each week) this summer.  It beat out Airborn by Kenneth Oppel, which I loved.  I figured it had to be good.  Well, I was disappointed – very disappointed.

Stephanie’s rich uncle has just died, leaving most of his money and property to her.  When she is staying at his (her) house one night she is attacked by a strange man demanding a key.  Just before he kills her Skulduggery Pleasant (a strange man she met at the funeral) bursts onto the scene and saves her life.  He then introduces her to a world where magic exists and the bad guy, Serpine, is searching for the ultimate weapon which apparently belonged to her uncle.

First off, I’m pretty sure I went into this book with unfair expectations.  Because it won the contest, I was hoping for something GREAT and it wasn’t.  But if I had just picked it up without those expectations, I might have enjoyed it more.

It actually wasn’t a bad story and the writing was pretty good.  I just found that the story jumped around a lot.  I felt like the author was trying to build excitement and suspense but it just came off as a little hyperactive.  It just didn’t seem to flow very well.

What I liked about the book though was the dialogue.  Stephanie and Skulduggery had these funny little conversations which I found very entertaining.  I don’t plan on reading any more Skulduggery books but I’m sure that lots of people will enjoy this book.