Dewey's 24 hour read-a-thon: An Elegy for Easterly by Petina Gappah

Pages read total: 751 (+ 66 pages of picture books)
Books read: Finished Bel Canto by Ann Pratchett, read What I Was by Meg Rosoff, The Old Man and the Sea by Ernest Hemingway, An Elgy for Easterly, Mrs Biddlebox (pic book) and The Viewer by Gary Crew
Total reading time: approx 12 hours


I woke up fairly tired this morning after 4 hours sleep but picking up this book soon had me awake and interested again.

An Elegy for Easterly is a collection of short stories all revolving around different people from Zimbabwe, people of all classes suffering from similar problems.
Presidents wifes left to suffer after the husband dies of AIDS, families cheated by neighbours who borrow money to eascpe to the Western World, women unable to have children who are judged by all, families seeing yet another young daughter marrying a man with AIDS who has already buried two wifes.
The themes are recurring: AIDS, deception, corruption, the black market and the ever increasing prices and political promises that can reck a nation.
I never read short stories one after another as I find that they merge into one another, but with this collection each character was held seperately in my mind, each life story complete in itself.
A collection I would definately recommend to others.

Challenges:
2009 Pub Challenege
100 Shots of Short
A-Z Title
Orbis Terrarum
999 (African Reads and short story collection)
Olympic Challenge

Short Story Monday: 'Reunion' by John Cheever

This is going to be very short and sweet as I have to spend my evening working (bleurh!). Rather tha reading a short story I listenened to one from The New Yorker's short story podcast (if you click here you can also listen to the short story or even subscribe to the podcasts for free.

'Reunion' is a very short story, lasting only around 7 minutes. The story tells of a young man meeting his father for the first time in three years. His father offers to take him out for dinner. His father's attitude to every person he meets who he considers of a lower status than him is a disgrace, he is rude, ignorant and arrogant obviously feeling power with every person he manages to belittle.
This story is well worth a listen, especially because the man reading it, Richard Ford, has such a lovely voice and intonation. Check it out!

Plus check out my much more prolific short story reading from yesterday here

The Sunday Salon: Indonesian Short Stories

The latest issue of Words Without Borders (always well worth checking out) includes several short stories by Indonesian women. As I'm having a Sunday filled with marking, housework and reading the heaviest novel I can find I decided that I would dip into these in my breaks between tasks.
Maybe Not Yem by Etik Juwita
In a very plain and undersatate language this short story tells of the journey back to Indonesia by a group of migrant female workers. The narrator sits beside a woman determined to spring fear into her, filling her with tales of crimes migrant workers play onto their wealthy bosses.
The journey portrays the many ways that these women are in a constant battle, everyone is out to rip them off, so by the time they return home to their families the little money they earned working so hard has been tugged and pulled in many directions all for the benefit of others.


In complete contrast to Maybe Not Yem, is The Century Carver
by Oka Rusmini
This story is rich and full of detailed description. The Carver in the story is Kopag, blind for the whole of his life he has been taught the beauty and power of wood. Able to carve beautiful women without ever having seen one he earns his families fortune.
When one day a woman walks into the room and speaks to him, he declares her the most beautiful woman alive, comparing her to the beauty of wood:
"The beauty of this young woman was extraordinary. The indentations of her body and her face resembled those in a piece of timber. She was timber of exquisite beauty. It was odd that other people were unable to see her loveliness, to appreciate the beauty that nature had entrusted to her. Even old Gubreg made no comment when Kopag praised the prettiness of this eighteen-year-old girl. What was wrong with the criteria he had used to judge her beauty?"
His family are shocked and distraught at his choice as externally she is pitifully ugly,without sight his version of beauty is very different from the conventional concept held by the rest of society.

Road to Heaven by Abidah El Khalieqy is the story of a mother's death and life. As the mother dies her appearance cahnges to one of extreme beauty and happiness, a smile creeps over her face, eeryone comments on it, except the father:
"A telephone rang in my heart. "He's jealous, extremely jealous," a disconnected voice said. With the smile of an angel on her lips, my mother looked very young, as if she had returned in time to her age as a young woman, on the day she got married twenty years ago."
As the daughter travels with her mother's body to the final resting place we hear of the brutality her mother felt at her father's hands, brutality caused because the father was jealous of his wife's love of God.

Sunday Salon: A Tidy Up and Short Story Weekend

I couldn't participate in the read-a-thon as I have loads to do this weekend - marking etc, I had to work in a bar last night and I have to be perky for the last week of school for the term, which is a shame as I'd love to know how long I would have lasted for. Instead I decided I'd try and read as many short stories as I could in a weekend around all the other stuff I had to do. (This will help towards the Short Story Challenge, and 100 Shots of Short. The list so far:

1. Instructions, Gaiman

2. Diseasemaker's Croup, Gaiman

3. Goliath, Gaiman

A very perculiar tale. A man 'judders' through time, he lives his life again and again, repeating and changing aspects of it each time. He has been designed to save the world against aliens, and seems to get various bits of information at each point in his life, everytime earth is attacked he returns to an earlier point, eventually being at a point where he can make a difference.

4. A Stone Woman, Byatt

A scar from an operation feels strange and lumpy, leaving the woman feel like she has a part of her which is not her own body. Weeks later she realises that this scar is producing little red grains of glinting sand, which start emerging from different sections of her body. As time passes her scar turns into a line of rock, carnelians, diamonds, granite etc start forming in mounds across her body.

5. The Duc De L'Omelette, Poe

The Tidy Up:

I finished the Young Adult Challenge hosted by Joy weeks ago and seem to have forgotten to post a round up. I read the following books

Books I've read for this challenge:
1 Twilight , Meyer
2 Mirrormask, Gaiman
3 Journey to the River Sea, Ibbotson
4 Gatty, Crossley-Holland
5 Apache, Landman
6. The Garbage King, Laird
7. Roll of Thunder, Hear My Cry, Taylor
8. Ruby Red, Glass
9. Blankets, Thompson (Graphic Novel)
10. Goodbye Tsugumi, Yoshimoto
11. Three Shadows, Pedrosa (Graphic Novel)
12. Varjak Paw, S.F Said
13. Rabbit Proof Fence, Pilkington

My favorite: Gatty

My Least fav: Mirrormask

I've also decided to be rusthless and get rid of a few challenges I am definetly not going to finish. I'm abadoning: The New Classics Challenge, Unread Authors Challenge, and 2nds challenge so I can focus on finishing the rest.

For the rest of the day I will be reading short stories in between marking exams, going out for lunch and getting some cleaning done

A Week of Reading Short Stories

I'm attempting to get 100 Shots of Short off to a good start by reading at least one short story everyday this week. Teaching has really helped (kinda cheating I know)

On Monday I reread Lamb to the Slaughter by Roald Dahl to the kids at school. The story stars off all peaceful and calm and then unexpectedly turns dark. Always a favorite

On Tuesday I read The Red Room (H.G Wells) twice, to 11 year olds then 16 year olds. This 19th century tale is a great read for haloween, the brave young man ventures off into the red room to face whatever it is that lurks up there.

I also read a story for pleasure, Country Lovers by Nadine Gordimer. This was an excellent read. Set in Africa, it talks of how black and white children start off as friends, almost equals in play and in development, but the private education and benefits of the white children brings seperation, the division into master and worker. But one pair of children continued their friendship, from their teens, with innocent gift giving and hanging out through to 18, when this had developed into a secret sexual relationship. As with all secret relationships the outcome isn't happy. Very well, and very simply told, making the ending even more heart wrenching.

The Sunday Salon: Short Story Sunday

I've had a busy week, but managed to read all of The Hours, and I'm halfway through The End of Mr Y, which I'm really enjoying and planning to spend a few hours on later once I've got all my jobs done. And England is bathed in gorgeous sunshine at the mo, so I'm off for a wander around town and into the library to make sure I enjoy it before it disappears again.

My first short story for 100 Shots of Short.

Gold Boy, Emerald Girl By Yiyun Li (can be found online here).

A very melancholy tale set in the busy Beijing but with that air of tranquility that you often fing in Chinese stories. He has been brought up along by his mother, and she alone by her father. Despite countless attempts to get them married, both had remained single. When he arrives back from the freedom of America his mother is quick to try and set up a meeting between him and one of her prized students.

Anyone know any good online stories to recommend? I'm going to try and do Short Story Sunday everyweek from an online story.

100 Shots of Short

I really enjoyed Short Story September, but find I'm not very disciplined at reading short stories, but I discovered this ongoing challenge 100 shots of short at robaroundbooks. You just have to read 100 shortstories and you have as much time to do so as you like.

1. Gold Boy, Emerald Girl By Yiyun Li (can be found online here).

2. Lamb to the Slaughter, Dahl (can be found on-line here)

3. The Red Room, H.G Wells (can be found online here)

4. Country Lovers, Nadine Gordimer (Review here)

5. Veronica, Adewale Maja-Pearce

6. Instructions, Gaiman

7. Diseasemaker's Croup, Gaiman

8. Goliath, Gaiman

9. A Stone Woman, A.S Byatt

10. The Duc De L'Omelette, Poe

11. Pages from a Journal Found in a Shoebox on a Greyhound Bus Between Tulsa, Oklahoma and Louisville, Kentucky, Gaiman

12. The Day the Saucers Came, Gaiman

13. Raw Material, A.S Byatt

14. The Pink Ribbon, A.S Byatt

15. The Ostler, Wilkie Collins

16. The Pit and the Pendulum, Edgar Allan Poe

17. Samuel Lowgood's Revenge, Mary E. Braddon

18. Lost Hearts, M. R James

19. An Occurance at Owl Creek Bridge, Amrose Bierce

20. A Vendetta, du Maupassant

21. Open Arms, Robert Olen Butler

22. Mr Green, Robert Olen Butler

23. The Trip Back, Robert Olen Butler

24. Crickets, Robert Olen Butler

25. Letters from My Father, Robert Olen Butler

26. Love, Robert Olen Butler

27. The Gold Cadillac - Mildred Taylor

28. A Stench of Kerosene -Amrita Pritam

29. The Parade of You, Barth Anderson. (Copy can be found here)

30. Face, Alice Muro (Copy can be foud here)

31. The Ladies of Grace Adieu, Susanna Clarke

32. On Lickerish Hill, Susanna Clarke

33. Mrs Mabb, Susanna Clarke

34. The Moor, Russell Banks
35. Dundun, Denis Joohnson
36. Timothy's Birthday, William Trevor
37. The Birthday Cake, Daniel Lyons
38. Turning, Lynda Sexton
39. Maybe Not Yem, Etik Juwita
40. Forever Overhead, David Forster Wallace
41. Angel of Mercy, Angel of Wrath, Ethan Canin
42. The Birthday Present, Andrea Lee
43. The Bath, Raymond Carver
44. A Game of Dice, Paul Theroux
45. Close to the Water's Edge, Clare Reegan
46. Birthday Girl, Murakami
47. The Lottery, Maria Edgeworth
48. The Curious Case of Benjamin Button, Fitzgerald
49. Jelly-Bean, Fitzgerald
50. Godmother Death, Jane Yolen
51. Crocodile Tears, A.S Byatt