I've finished 3 challenges this year but still have loads to go.
Most recently I signed up for the Short Story Challenge where I'm aiming to read 5 short story collections by different authors, I have started this one by reading a short story by Joyce Carol Oates each evening.
Like the Short Story challenge the Graphic Noevl challenge is an attempt to try somethin g new, I have to read 3 graphic novels by the end of the year, I've read one, see here, and have the other two ready to be read.
The Southern Reading Challenge is also underway, I'm currently reading Gone With the Wind, a huge book!
The Complete Booker Challenge and the Booker Challenge 2008 are run at the same site, the first is an ongoing challenge to read all the Booker Prize winners, the second is a sub challenge to help, for this you need to read 6 Booker winners or nominees by the end of the year. I've read three, and have 3 to go.
The Notable Books Challenge takes a list of book awards for the year and then you pick 8 of those books to read, this keeps me up-to-date with new fiction. 2 down 6 to go.
What's in a Name is a clever little challenge in which there are 6 categories linked to the title and you have to pick a book to fit each. 1 finished for this, 1 on the go and 4 to start.
Upcoming Challenges
In July I start both the Classics Challenge, 5 classics and one book that deserves to become a classic in the future, and I also start the 2nd Canadian Book Challenge 13 books set in Canada or by Canadian authors - I've picked my titles but will need to look at whats avaliable in England as I'm discovering many of the less well known authors are harder to get hold of.
Starting in August and lasting 10 months is the Book Awards Challenge 2, for this I have to read 10 award winning books from 5 different awards. If anyone is interested in joining see here
As you can see I have a lot of books to get through, and this doesn't even take into consideration the long term projects, Bookrings and yahoo groups I'm reading for!
Monday, 23 June 2008
Sunday, 22 June 2008
A Quarter With Joyce Carol Oates
I'm reading through a variety of works by Joyce Carol Oates with BFB readers and the Literature Study Group both over at Yahoo. This is the list of books with proposed dates for discussions to start, no one is expected to read every book and other comments about JCO work is welcome. I'm certainly not tricking myself that I'm going to read all of them but I'm going to give some a go. I have Bellefleur ordered but I still haven't recieved it so I won't be reading it in time for the discussion, I also have Middle Age out from the library so I'll be way ahead with that one. And as some pre-reading I am looking at some of JCO's short stories, one of which I have reviewed here. Previously I have read We are the Mulvaneys, which I absolutely loved and Rape: A Love Story which I certainly didn't love so this may be a bit of an adventure.
The Reading List
01.07.08 Bellefleur
01.07.08 What I Lived For
16.07.08 A Garden of Earthly Delights
08.08.08 Wonderland
01.09.08 Middle Age: A Romance
16.09.08 Zombie
Did you know?
- She has published an average of 2 books a year since 1970
- Frequent topics in her work include rural poverty, sexual abuse, class tensions, desire for power, female childhood and adolescence, and occasionally the supernatural
- Violence is one of the most frequent topics in her novels
- She also writes under the pen names Rosamond Smith and Lauren Kelly
If you have any recommendations etc for me let me know.
My Thoughts: The Space Between Us, Thirty Umrigar
The Space Between Us is a novel about the relationship between a servant and her employer in Bombay. One lives in the slums, the other in a nice apartment, one has to work long hours everyday the other complains if she has to make breakfast. Despite this their is a bond between the two women, they would not class themselves as friends for the social divide between them is just to great a step to bridge, but they rely on each other for support. And despite the social divide their lives frequently parallel each others. Until an event occurs which puts this bond to the test.
This book falls into that area of books about Eastern communities which we seem to be swamped with at the moment. Communities which have huge social and gender divides and which seem a million miles away from the concerns of the Western world. I certainly wouldn't say this is one of the best examples but it is a good read, some thing perhaps that fits in as an easy read between harder/heavier books. The relationships are well constructed, believable but I could see the conclusion coming from miles away, there were no surprises with this novel. I also felt that I would like to have spent more time seeing what life was like in the slums of Bombay. As seems to be a regular thing with these books, they were centred around the women giving us their views on the absent men in their lives.
I read this for the Notable Book Challenge Book 2 of 8
Other Bloggers thoughts:
The Sunday Salon and a short story review.
Another busy week this week so again not a lot of reading completed, I can't wait for the 6 weeks summer holidays so I can catch up on the reading for all the challenges I am participating in, and just wallow in the garden (if the British weather sorts itself out!), with a good book and hours and hours of free time.
I have managed to finish two great books, both recommended: A Pure Swift Cry and The Space Between Us, which I have yet to review. This afternoon I will be going out to lunch, doing some more marking and lesson preparation, catching up on Big Brother and watching The History Boys, I may squeeze in a chapter of Gone With The Wind or start Elizabeth Costello if I'm lucky.
I did this morning read a short story over breakfast, so I'm going to include a mini review here.
'Concerning the Case of Bobby T' - Joyce Carol Oates.
An excellent short story. The basic story is that Bobby T got locked up for knocking a young girl around. But Oates doesn't like telling stories in a basic way. This story is told in fragments, fragments of time and fragments of the victims and perpetrators lives. We see into the days and years after this act of violence showing how a single act of violence can control and affect the lives of those involved for years to come.
Oates employs an omnipotent narrator, giving the story a report like tone, you feel like you are simply watching the scene. No feelings, elaborations or judgemnets are made the reader is made to feel like the judge and jury, who is to blame is for you to decide.
I have managed to finish two great books, both recommended: A Pure Swift Cry and The Space Between Us, which I have yet to review. This afternoon I will be going out to lunch, doing some more marking and lesson preparation, catching up on Big Brother and watching The History Boys, I may squeeze in a chapter of Gone With The Wind or start Elizabeth Costello if I'm lucky.
I did this morning read a short story over breakfast, so I'm going to include a mini review here.
'Concerning the Case of Bobby T' - Joyce Carol Oates.
An excellent short story. The basic story is that Bobby T got locked up for knocking a young girl around. But Oates doesn't like telling stories in a basic way. This story is told in fragments, fragments of time and fragments of the victims and perpetrators lives. We see into the days and years after this act of violence showing how a single act of violence can control and affect the lives of those involved for years to come.
Oates employs an omnipotent narrator, giving the story a report like tone, you feel like you are simply watching the scene. No feelings, elaborations or judgemnets are made the reader is made to feel like the judge and jury, who is to blame is for you to decide.
Monday, 16 June 2008
"Cathedral" by Raymond Carver (Short Story)
This is the first short story I have read as partof my participation in A Curious Singularity, a blog in which they read a short story each month.
This month the chosen short story was 'Cathedral' by Raymond Carver. I have read his short story collection What We Talk About When We Talk About Love last year so I was expecting something great and that is what I got.
There will be spoilers in this from now on so if your planning on reading it or would like to read it first click on the title, it is just a few pages long.
In the story the narrator appears a little unfriendly from the start, too blunt and very negative. He spends the first part of the story complaining about how he has his wife's friend, a blind man, coming to stay for a few days. I got the feeling he would have been grouchy however was coming to stay, but he felt particuarly put out because the guest was blind. He also seemed put out as his wife and the blind man seem to have a very close relationship, something you just can't imagine the narrator having.
When the guest arrives the narrator feels very awkward with him, and resorts to turning on the TV as a destraction, the wife falls asleep and the men are forced to communicate. On the TV there is a show about Cathedrals and he realises the blind man has no idea what a cathedral is. After failing to describe it well, he draws a picture of it with the blind man following his hand movements. This moment of touch and the drawing of the cathedral seems to wake the narrator up to life and where he is.
I found this was a really good read, the voice of the narrator is well played out in the sparseness of the tone. It also really reminded me of an English lesson I taught with a young blind boy, the children where talking about their past time and we realised he had no concept of golf or fishing, what happened, how big the golf ball was etc. His mentor managed to bring in some golfing gear to let him feel and we tried our best to describe a fishing rod but it was a lot harder than I had imagined it would be.
For another review of the story check out A Work in Progress
This month the chosen short story was 'Cathedral' by Raymond Carver. I have read his short story collection What We Talk About When We Talk About Love last year so I was expecting something great and that is what I got.
There will be spoilers in this from now on so if your planning on reading it or would like to read it first click on the title, it is just a few pages long.
In the story the narrator appears a little unfriendly from the start, too blunt and very negative. He spends the first part of the story complaining about how he has his wife's friend, a blind man, coming to stay for a few days. I got the feeling he would have been grouchy however was coming to stay, but he felt particuarly put out because the guest was blind. He also seemed put out as his wife and the blind man seem to have a very close relationship, something you just can't imagine the narrator having.
When the guest arrives the narrator feels very awkward with him, and resorts to turning on the TV as a destraction, the wife falls asleep and the men are forced to communicate. On the TV there is a show about Cathedrals and he realises the blind man has no idea what a cathedral is. After failing to describe it well, he draws a picture of it with the blind man following his hand movements. This moment of touch and the drawing of the cathedral seems to wake the narrator up to life and where he is.
I found this was a really good read, the voice of the narrator is well played out in the sparseness of the tone. It also really reminded me of an English lesson I taught with a young blind boy, the children where talking about their past time and we realised he had no concept of golf or fishing, what happened, how big the golf ball was etc. His mentor managed to bring in some golfing gear to let him feel and we tried our best to describe a fishing rod but it was a lot harder than I had imagined it would be.
For another review of the story check out A Work in Progress
Sunday, 15 June 2008
My Thoughts: A Pure Swift Cry, Siobhan Dowd
I have meant to read this book for a few years now, but never quite got around to it (like many other books) so when I saw it on the Notable Books challenge I added it to my list of challenge books, and I'm really glad I did.
This book is categorised as young adult fiction but is definately part of the cross over genre.
The book is set in Ireland, in a small rural village. The Talent family are busy coming to terms with their mother's recent death and the relative abandonment of their father. Shell may be only 15 but she is the one left responsibe for running the house, feeding her father and acting like a mother to her younger brother and sister. The occupants in the village mey feel sorry foe Shell and her family but they offer little to help, usually just sympathetic glances. When Father Rose arrives in the village Shell thinks she has found a friend and Jesus, but this relationship is not to last long. Shell then retreats into finding comfort with the local choir boy, Declan Ronan, a child who doesn't quite follow with the rules of Catholicism. A scandal occurs with Shell lft smack bang in the middle of it.
As an adult reading this your able to look on and see the mistake she is making, and see the reality of situation that she is too naive to be able to read herself. A great story about growing up and dealing with what life throws at you.
5/5
If you have read this book feel free to comment or leave a link to your own review.
Short Story Reading Challenge
I'm joining another challenge, The Short Story Reading Challenge in which the readers aim to read a variety of short stories or short story collecteions throughout 2008. I am picking option 2 in which I aim to read 5 short story collections before the end of the year. On my list I have:
My Reads:
Skin, Roald Dahl
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