My Thoughts: Sky Burial by Xinran

At just 168 pages I didn't expect this book to include as much as it did. The novel is a story the author tells about the life of a wonderful woman she once met briefly. The Chinese women Shu Wen falls madly in love with another doctor, they marry as he is off to help the Chinese army in their trip into Tibet. Going along as the medical aid rather than a fighter doesn't seem all that dangerous, yet 100 days into her marriage and Wen's husband is dead. What is worse, the army have no body to send back to be buried or any details of how her husband died.
Wen decides to join the army herself as a medical aid, in order to be able to travel to Tibet and try to discover just what happened to her husband. Just a few days into her travels in Tibet Wen is seperated from the army and with a rich Tibetan woman she finds herself in the wilderness of Tibet, staying with a Tibetan family who survive from the land and move from place to place according to the season and their needs.
I loved the insight that was given into this society and culture, Tibet is one of those countries that I caould name on a map and know that there are problems with China but that is about it. Since reading this book I have an urge to discover more about the history, people and culture of Tibet - through both novels and non-fiction. If anyone has any recommendations share them here.

Challenges:
A-Z (Author)
Orbis Terrarum
Lost in Translation (from Chinese)

My Thoughts: The Hive by Camilo Jose Cela

This was my second Orbis Terrarum read. The chain so far = House of Spirits -> The Hive (as they are both homes)


This is one of those books were I'm not really sure what to say. The book centers around a busy cafe in Madrid, with a rather bossy owner, she is domineering, unapproachable to both staff and customers and is so frightening that the staff makes tons of mistakes out of fear. I'm assuming that she is a metaphor for the Spanish dictator during the Spanish civil war, as the book is set just after the war.
The novel is hundreds of short segments each featuring glimpses into customers and employees of the cafe and their relatives. As over 100 characters are introduced it is often hard to follow a story through, so I'll give you a few ideas of the types of common themes. Many of the young girls turn to prostitution or are having affairs, the men are ofte immoral, sleeping with prostitutes or weaklings afraid of the matriarch. There are also a lot of comments on the dysfunctional family, who appear happy on the surface but has much going on below the water.

I read this fairly quickly and thought it was ok, but as there were so many characters (in just 250 pages),I wasn't ever that gripped or particuarly drawn in.

Challenges:
Orbis Terrarum 2/10
Banned and Challenged 1/4
A-Z (Title)
The Decades Challenge (1950s)
My Year of Reading Dangerously 2/12
Lost in Translation (from Spanish)

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This is a test post as I seem to have lost my front page

My Thoughts: The House of Spirits by Isabel Allende

I feel like I haven't posted a book review in ages, this book is that reason - 2 weeks it has taken me to read it, something that never happens. I like to finish books quickly because it gives me a sense of acheivement but also because I have so many other books waiting to be read, so this was a slog BUT worth it.

This is my first read for Exploration: Latin American Reading Challenge, my own reading challenge so I'm really behind! I've got till April 30th to read 3 more books.

The House of Spirits is a family saga set in an unnamed country in South America. The family is full of characters will spiritual abilities, some (apparently) gorgeous women with green hair, and many love affairs.
The novel focuses primarily on one man and his wife, daughter and granddaughter. The women are all stubbon and rebelious in their own ways, often failling to speak to their family for months on end.
As the years pass the patriach is faced with the creeping interest in socialism all around him, what starts as a whispered dream gradually comes to rule the country creating disruption and poverty for many.

I enjoyed reading about the characters and their strong love affairs that defied social expectations, in particular Alba the granddaughter out of the the women she was the strongest, her rebellion was open and for the help of those weaker people around her. Her grandmother Clara's spiritual communications also meant that we always had a hint as to what would hapen in the future.
However, I struggled with the paragraphs, my copy had tiny text and despite this a paragraph often spanned over a page. The detail was very intricate and often took a lot of concentration, I have to say that I prefered Daughter of Fortune and Portrait in Sepia.

Challenges:
Exploration: Latin America 1/4
A-Z (Author)
1% Well Read Challenge 1/10
Orbis Terraum 1/10
Decades Challenge 2/10 (1980s)
999 (Always been meaning to read)
What's in a Name (Building)

The Sunday Salon: Challenge Update

I have a fairly busy week, the inspectors are coming to school so I should be busy panicking at the moment, but just not in the mood. Not likely to get much reading done either, I started The House of Spirits early last week and still have tons to go, hopefully I will have finished it by next Sunday.

I thought I should do a challenege update as we're at the end of the month.

A-Z Challenge (Authors) 4/27
A-Z Challenge (Titles) 9/27
In Their Shoes 2/4
The Dream King 2/12
1% Well Read Challenge 0/13 (Starts today)
Orbis Terrarum 0/10 (Starts today)
The Genre Challenge 6/10
The Decades Challenge 2/10
The Carribean Challenge 0/6
My Year of Reading Dangerously 1/12
The World Citizen Challenge 0/3
Y.A Challenge 2/12
Deweys Book Reading Challenge 0/6
100 Shots of Short 49/100
The 2009 Pub Challenge 0/9
Themed Challenge 2/4
999 Challenge 12/81
Book Awards 2 4/10
2nd Canadian Challenge 1/13
Latin American Challenge 0/4 (One book underway)
The Rescue Challenge 0/6
The Graphic Novel Challenge 4/12
Manga Challenge 1/4
War Through the Generations: WWII 1/5
Lost in Translation 2/6
Notable Challenge 1/6
What's in a Name? 1/6
The Well Seasoned Reader 1/3
The Chunkster Challenge 3/6
The Guardian 100 novels 0/10
Banned Book Challege 0/4

A few challenges I need to do a lot of work on, particually The Well Seasoned Reader which finishes this month and The Canadian Challenge, I need to read 12 books by 1st of July.

1% Well-Read Challenge

3M is hosting the 1% Well-Read challenege for another year.

The Rules (taken from her post):

The editors of the book 1001 Books You Must Read Before You Die threw a kink into our challenge when they updated the books with new titles last year. So, I’ve got three options for you on this next challenge:

Read 10 titles from the original list from March 1, 2009 through December 31, 2009.
Read 10 titles from the new list from March 1, 2009 through December 31, 2009.
Read 13 titles from the combined list (of almost 1300 titles) from March 1, 2009 through March 31, 2010. In other words, “What were they thinking dropping titles from Dostoevsky and Jane Austen?”

I was already challenging myself to read more books from this list and have managaged a few already this year so I'm going to plunge in for option 3. I'm not 100% sure what I will read but here is my pool:

1. Watchmen, Alan Moore
2. Blonde, Joyce Carol Oates
3. The Poisonwood Bible, Barbara Kingsolver
4. Great Apes, Will Self
5. Jack Maggs, Peter Carey
6. The Ghost Road, Pat Barker
7. Alias Grace, Margaret Atwood
8. The Reader, Schlink
9. A Suitable Boy, Vikram Seth
10.Jazz, Toni Morrison
11. Wild Swan, Chang
12. Senor Vivo and the Coco Lord,de Bernieres
13. The Unbearable Lightness of Being, Kundera
14. Arrow of God, Achebe
15. V, Pynchon
16. Out of Africa, Dinsen
17. All Quiet on the Western Front
18. The Count of Monte Cristo,Dumas
19. Animals People, Sinha (New List)
20. Small Island, Levy (New List)
21. The Reluctant Fundamentalist,Hamid (New List)
22. Suite Francaise,Nemirovsky

Library Loot 2

I've been to the library twice this week so this is the second instalment. All three books that I picked up were reserved for me so I was very good and didn't look around - I must be up to the maximum allowed books by now.
The Red Tree, Shaun Tan I saw this book blogged about a couple of weeks ago and love picture books so I had to order it in. If I had plenty of spare money I would love to have shelves with this type of book on, books that you can just pick up and marvel at for a short time.
City of Oranges: Arabs and Jews in Jaffa, Adam LeBor - Eva reviewed this earlier this week. I know very little about this political situation so I'm hoping this will enlighten me.
Baghdad Diaries, Nuha Al- Radi (for In Their Shoes Challenge)I have a copy of Baghdad Blog so I'm going to read these in tandam and see how/if the male and female views of the political situation differ.