Sunday Salon

I was thinking I wouldn't get much reading done in the last week, but actually managed to finish two books and read another. I have my last week of school coming up, and then from Friday I am free (after the dreaded Christmas works do!). I'm probably only going to read one book during the week, but then I will be reading lots more over the holidays, around exam marking, lesson preping and studying, oh and spending time at home for Christmas.

Just a quick note to say you should check out this story - The Parade of You, by Barth Anderson, it's a very perculiar story about a death ritual but beautifully written.

A Challenge and a My 100th Book!!!

Another Challenge!!! My Year of Reading Dangerously 2009


Your job: Read 12 books you deem "dangerous." between January 1st and December 31st 2009. They may be banned or challenged books, new-to-you genres, books that seem to inhabit a permanent space on your stacks, or authors you're afraid of. The possibilities are endless! If it's dangerous to you, it's challenge-worthy to us!

My Pool: I'll read some of these and probably discover other books as I read throughout the year.

War and Peace
The Awakening by Kate Chopin

A Passage to India by EM Forester

Night, Dawn, and Day by Elie Wiesel

Inferno, by Dante

Beasts, by Joyce Carol Oates
Man in the Dark, by Paul Auster
American Born Chinese, by Gene Luen Yang
The End of America, by Naomi Wolf
The Chocolate War, by Robert Cormier
Maus I and II, by Art Spiegelman
The Grapes of Wrath, by John Steinbeck
Moll Flander's - Defoe (Banned)
Fahrenheit 451 - Bradbury (Banned)
Brave New World - Huxley (Banned)
Cry, the Beloved Country (Banned)
The House of Spirits, Allende
Wild Swans

My thoughts: Hardboiled/Hardluck by Banana Yoshimoto
I polished off these two novell this weekend. Hardboiled is a strange mystical story about a Japanese woman on a walking trip, everything seems to be fine untill she comes across a shrine, an area with a funny feel to it. The day continues with many strange occurances including fires and ghosts. Very simply told, an easy way to pass an hour but not overly exciting.
Hardluck this was the better of the two, only around 50 pages in length it tells the tale of a young woman waiting for her sister - who has been labelled 'braindead' to die. During this tiem she mets a man, a man she knows ahe would love if only she had met him at another time.

Japanese Literature Challenge book 2/3

My Thoughts: East of Eden by John Steinbeck & Choke by Chuck Palahniuk

I've been reading East of Eden as part of a read-a-long and I am surprised to say I finished the book in the week it was supposed to be finished. A few times I fell behind, but caught up easily. This was a great way to pick up a book which looked daunting in size. And a great book too.

East of Eden tells the story of Adam, he grows up in a tense household, of sibling rivalry. Desperate to love someone he immediately falls for the first women to come through the door. Cathy, certainly has no plans to be a perfect housewife. She is fiesty, and out for herself and herself alone, walking out on him when their twin sons were just a few days old. The book then continues with the story of how Adam copes, and his sons life.

My favorite characters were Lee the chinese cook, and Sam Hamilton a loving neighbour.

Lived up to my high expectation of Steinbeck, and made me look forward to reading 2 of his books in 2009 for Becky's mini challenge.

Choke was a 'different' book to say the least. Dealing with the life and childhood of a sex addict, its full of sex, and grated on my teeth everytime he called his penis, his 'dog', yuck! Talking about his childhood, he speaks of his mother's numerous kidnappings of him from various foster parents, and then her arrests days later. Randomly he talks aboout his childhood in the third person, and clearly despises the way he acted as a kid. His mother is now in a medical care centre, where he has had to devise an ingenious way of getting money from strangers to pay for her medical bill.

Should it be on the 1001 list? I doubt it, it was certainly different, but definately not outstanding.

More Challenges for 2009

I do realise that I will probably not finish some of these but I really enjoy creating a 'pool' and looking at other peoples recommendations, which then leads me to abandon my pool and read something different.

The World Citizen Challenge
I've signed up to read at least 3 books. I have a few on my TBR pile to consider:
Blood River: A Journey to Africa's Broken Heart, Tim Butcher
The Trouble With Tigers: The Rise and Fall of South-East Asia

Plus I'd like to read some history, I'm quite interested in Colonialisation and Slavery, or some books about Religion and Cultures - particuarly the treatment of women in other cultures.

2009 Young Adult Book Challenge
12 YA books. I've done this before and never struggled with it. I have several on my TBR pile I'd like to read including: the rest of the Twilight series,
the Scot Westerfeld books,
Witch Child,
Clay,
No Angels
And then I'll probably read some of the Carnegie nominees

Dewey's Books Reading Challenge

1. Pick one book from each of the 6 years that Dewey has archives of. You can
access her archives by clicking on the archive link in the sidebar of her website. It’s a dropdown menu. For
instance, you would read one book that she reviewed in 2003, 2004, 2005, 2006,
2007, and 2008 for a total of six books.

I've linked each of the books to her review
2003: Lullaby by Chuck Palahniuk
2004: The Inner Circle by T.C Boyle
2005: Alias Grace by Margaret Atwood
2006: Madame Bovary by Gustave Flaubert
2007: The God of War by Marisa Silver
2008: After Dark by Haruki Murakami

The World in Shorts

Short Stories from across the World - Starting from Today and on-going (lets see how well travelled I can be).

Face, Alice Munro

(Ohio) The Gold Cadillac - Mildred Taylor

A Stench of Kerosene -Amrita Pritam

Indonesia: Maybe Not Yem, Etik Juwita

Short Story Sunday

I found a great selection of short stories in the back of an exam anthology our school used to teach, I have been reading these on and off, and they have been great. They are also from all different parts of the world so they have also been enlightening.

This morning I read:
'The Gold Cadillac' by Mildred Taylor

This 1950's story starts with a father returning home with a new Cadillac, gold in colour, gold insides the full works, a car that everyone stops and stares at. But the problem is he is black, in Ohio where he lives thats fine, but when he wants to travel down to Mississippi it's like "putting a loaded gun" to his head.

"A Stench of Kerosene" by Amrita Pritam

What starts of as a happy story, a story of a seemingly independent, confident girl in 1950s India changes drastically when her husband is given a new bride, as his first bride hasn't produced any children.

The Sunday Salon: December the nightmare month for reading!

My reading has fallen lower and lower throughout November and December, I'm not sure if its just because I discovered Runescape (I am a Geek offically) or because of the huge amounts of marking I'm having to do or because the kids at school are all crazy at the mo, that I come home so tired that sitting playing in a virtual world is the most I can do.

I need to finish one challenge by the end of December, and really need to get my butt into gear to start working on my challenges that I have already signed up for to finish mid 2009, as I have signed up for a huge amount in 2009. I'm not hugely disappointed if I don't complete challenges, it's about trying to make myself dive into mount tbr, and finding new discoveries from other peoples reviews. I will also be joining Eva's World Citizen challenge, as I feel I know so little about the world, even about England. I lack knowledge of politics, history, culture and religion - the little I do know is stuff I had to research as it related to a novel I studied.

As for this weeks reading, I'm planning on finishing Choke by Chuck Palahniuk and the last few chapters of East of Eden. I will be swamped with exam marking for most of the time, I'm trying to get it all finished so me Xmas holidays can be spent studying and planning for teaching Lord of the Flies - I'm trying to make the lessons very hands on, and introduce lots of theories, real life links and politics as they are high ability kids. I had them studying politics in relation to the film V for Vendetta this term, and seem to have brought about some radical ideas, and quite a lot of ideas and thoughts about why some terrorists strike - not sure how well it will go down with the parents!