Category: Books

The Sunday Salon – New Books Today

Published on by Margaret12 Comments

Well, new to me at any rate. I’ve been out shopping – it still seems wrong that the shops are open on a Sunday, but every now and then I do go, despite feeling slightly guilty. Of course I had to go to the bookshop, have a cup of coffee and then just have a look at the books. Fatal, I came home with four.

Les Miserables by Victor Hugo. I’m reading this along with Danielle. I borrowed a copy from the library but I’ll only have to keep renewing it and I’m enjoying it, so I bought it. The copy in the shop was slightly damaged – so I got a discount, can’t be bad.

Purple Hibiscus by Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie, because I enjoyed Half of a Yellow Sun (I wrote about it here). It was one of the 3 for 2 books and the marketing worked, because I then had to pick 2 more books.

I bought The Gathering by Anne Enright – the 2007 Booker Prize winner, because I’ve read mixed reveiws and wanted to see for myself.

And Owen Sheers’ Resistance because it looks so interesting – a war story but this time an imagined history of what could have happened if D-Day had failed and the Nazis had invaded Britain.
And now I’m off to cook the dinner and hopefully read some more of Les Miserables in my new copy (I’m only up to page 164).

The Sunday Salon

Published on by Margaret19 Comments
This is my first post for the Sunday Salon and I feel very much ‘œthe new girl’. I’™m the 99th member so there are many experienced members and I’™m feeling quite shy. I’™ve read the notes on what to do so here goes.

This morning I read a few pages of Elizabeth Gilbert’™s Eat, Pray, Love. I’™m not terrible impressed with it so far and I don’™t think I’™ll finish it as it’™s a library book and someone else has reserved it and I have to return it next by Wednesday. I’™m still in the ‘œeating’ part, which is in Italy. The first few chapters explain the background to Elizabeth Gilbert’™s reasons for travelling and it is her depression and despair that I found hard going. Now she is in Italy it’™s beginning to grab my attention and this morning I read her account of going to watch a football match between Lazio and Roma. Apparently Italian men go to a bakery after their team has lost a match and cheer themselves up by standing about leaning on their motorcycles, ‘œtalking about the game, looking macho as anything, and eating cream puffs.’ I must remember to suggest this to my husband and son the next time their team, Manchester United, loses. Fortunately that’™s not today because they beat Aston Villa 4 ‘“0 yesterday. I hope the Italians will be eating cream puffs (and there will be no violence) on Tuesday when Manchester United are playing Roma in Rome.

What else am I reading? Yesterday I started to read Penelope Lively’™s Consequences. I’™ve yet to read one of her books and be disappointed and so far this is living up to my expectations. It starts in 1935 when two young people, Lorna and Matt meet quite by chance in St James’™s Park in London. They come from very different backgrounds but are instantly attracted to each other and despite opposition from Lorna’™s parents they get married. As the title indicates the predominant theme of this book is how events follow on from chance meetings and how our lives are changed because of the decisions we make. For some time now I’™ve been interested in the Second World War period and from my reading of this book so far it sets the scene and captures the atmosphere of the pre-war and early war years. There is a nostalgic feel to the settings, looking back to how things were and how the war inevitably changed people’™s lives and expectations.

This morning I’™ve read some more. Lorna and Matt have had a daughter, Molly, the war began and Matt was called up. I won’™t say too much as I don’™t want to spoil it for anyone who hasn’™t read it. This book is just so good, I can’™t praise it enough. It’™s full of such quotable extracts, such as this in defining happiness Lorna realises that it is ‘œanother condition, of a different quality, a state of being that lifts you above ordinary existence, that pervades every moment, that confers immunity.’

Later in my reading this morning I came to the section when Molly having gone through university, takes a job as a librarian ‘œbecause someone had left a copy of the Evening Standard in the tube’ advertising the job and she thought why not? Thus setting in motion another train of events. But the bits that I particularly like in this section are the descriptions of the library and of books (I used to be a librarian). Here are just a few examples:

‘œFiction is one strident lie ‘“ or rather, many competing lies; history is a long narrative of argument and reassessment; travel shouts of self-promotion; biography is just pushing a product. As for autobiography ‘¦’

‘œThat is the function of books: they offer a point of view, they offer many conflicting points of view, they provoke thought, they provoke irritation and admiration and speculation. They take you out of yourself and put you down somewhere else from whence you never entirely return.’

‘œThe surface repose of a library is a cynical deception.’

That’™s all for now. More thoughts later on today.

LibraryThing Early Reviewers Group

Published on by Margaret3 Comments

LibraryThing Early Reviewers

I’ve just added a new widget to the sidebar to the left but I’m putting it in this post as well because I like the image and I’m so pleased that there are now some books available to us in the UK. LibraryThing in conjunction with publishers provide advance copies of books, in exchange for reviews.

I didn’t expect to be lucky enough to get a copy as there many more people applying for copies than are available. So I was so pleased when I had a message that I had snagged an Early Reviewers copy of Our Longest Days edited by Sandra Koa Wing – it arrived in the post yesterday.

It looks fascinating and fits in so well with my reading interests as it’s full of extracts from diaries written during the Second World War. I’ll be writing more about this book!

Half of a Yellow Sun by Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie

Published on by Margaret4 Comments

Half of a Yellow Sun by Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie, 2007, Harper Perennial 433 pages. Winner of the Orange Prize for Fiction 2007.

This book is based on the Nigeria-Biafra War of 1967 – 70 and I’m old enough to remember hearing about it at the time. Then I had little idea what it was all about – now I understand a bit more. Nigeria became a Republic in October 1960 and Half of a Yellow Sun begins in the early 1960s in Nsukka in the south eastern area where Ugwu becomes Odenigbo’s houseboy. The story centres on these two characters and Olanna, Odenigbo’s partner, her twin sister Kainene and her partner Richard. Odenigbo is a professor at the University and his house is the meeting place for academics who debate the political situation as it leads up to violence and the secession of Biafra as an independent state. The title of the book comes from the symbol on the Biafran flag, which was half of a yellow sun.

The novel moves forwards and backwards in time between the late and early1960s as the civil war proceeds. Focussing on the struggle between the north and the south, the Igbo, Yoruba and Hausa people, it brings home the horrors brought about by war, the ethnic, religious and racial divisions and the suffering that results. Ugwu at the start of the book is an ignorant young teenager from a poor village eager to learn but still steeped in the superstitions of his family – the old ways. By the end of the novel he has become a valued member of the family and is writing a history of his country. Richard, the white man in love with Kainene but not fully accepted into her world, is eager to be considered Biafran, but is still on the outside. He is in Nigeria studying African art – the Igbo-Ukwu roped pot – and is recruited into writing articles about the war for the outside world, but the story of the war is Ugwu’s to tell and not Richard’s. Olanna’s family is wealthy and even though they are Igbo, they cannot understand her relationship with Odenigbo who is committed to the Igbo cause and would prefer her to marry Madu, a major in the Biafran army. Once the war starts they are all drawn into the conflict, the situation spirals out of their control and they each react in differing ways.

The book explores the conflicts between nationalities, different cultures, different backgrounds and upbringing, between what is traditional and tribal and what is new. Although the violence and deprivations of the war are horrifying and form the dominant element in the story this is not just a war novel. It is also a novel about love and relationships, between parents and children as well as between men and women; about how people learn to adapt and cope with life.

I found the characters to be real, so much so that I could imagine I was there in the thick of things. I sympathised with Richard in his efforts to be accepted and suffered with Olanna when she was confronted with the horror of war and grieved over the plight of the refugees. It reminded me of Chinua Achebe’s novel Things Fall Apart, which I read about 10 years or so ago and Adichie writes of his novels in an article at the end of her book:

Achebe’s war fiction then, humane and pragmatic as it is, becomes a paean to the possibilities that Biafra held. The stories have an emotional power that accumulates in an unobtrusive way and stuns the reader at the end; there are sentences in them that will always move me to tears.

She writes of her own work:

If fiction is indeed the soul of history, then I was equally committed to the fiction and the history, equally true to the spirit of the time as well as to my artistic vision of it.

How well she has succeeded. Half of a Yellow Sun is an emotional book without being sentimental, factual without being boring, and I was completely absorbed in it to the end.

Cover-Up – Booking Through Thursday

Published on by Margaret10 Comments

This week’™s Booking Through Thursday question comes from Julie, who asks:
While acknowledging that we can’™t judge books by their covers, how much does the design of a book affect your reading enjoyment? Hardcover vs. softcover? Trade paperback vs. mass market paperback? Font? Illustrations? Etc.?

I’™d like to think that I don’™t judge a book by its cover, but I’™d be kidding myself. Once I’™ve read a book its cover no longer has any influence over whether I enjoyed reading it or not. Once I’™ve opened it I tend not to notice the cover. If I know what I’™m looking for eg a specific title, or a book by a particular author then the cover doesn’™t affect me at all. But it’™s a different story when it comes to books I haven’™t heard about before and then do find that I am repelled by some covers, indifferent to others and attracted by some. I don’™t like those covers where you only see part of the body of, usually a woman, as though she has no head, or feet. I don’™t like covers like those on modern publications of Jane Austen’™s novels or ones with photos from the film or TV adaptations of a book, or chick lit covers.

I’™d like to say that I judge a book by its content alone but I don’™t like books that are printed in either a very small or a very large font. I don’™t like it when there are large sections printed in italics, or a smaller font ‘“ the copy of Angle of Repose by Wallace Stegner that I read was like that and I had to flip through the pages to see how much minute font I had to endure. I like the feel of a book in my hands, so smooth, clean paper is a bonus, but I’ll still enjoy a book that’s printed on cheap paper that’s been suffering from too much sun and is falling to pieces.

I don’™t mind hardback or paperback, although I get a bit irritated by both if they’™re hard to hold open when I’™m reading, or if they’™re so tightly bound that you can’™t see the words in the centre without practically forcing the book open. I’m not keen on those paperbacks that have covers that bend open once I’™ve started to read the book. I don’™t know the difference between a trade paperback and a mass-market paperback at all, so I can’™t comment on that.

It looks as though there’™s a lot that I don’™t like when I think about it, but if I’™m enjoying the content then its format doesn’™t really bother me – I just love reading. I like the cover to indicate something about the content of the book and even when it doesn’™t I do like scenes like this one on The Magician’s Assistant. I must write about this book soon, I finished reading it weeks ago. Part of it is set in Nebraska, but not in a house like the one shown on this cover.

As for illustrations if I’™m reading non-fiction then any illustrations – photos, sketches, maps amd plans are a must and I love seeing them ‘“ usually I look at them before reading any of the book. A novel is different, as I like to form my own pictures of the characters from the descriptions. But I do like to have maps and plans of the locations. Recently I’ve read some books set in places I don’t know and I have to stop reading to look up the area such as Nigeria when I was reading Half of a Yellow Sun by Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie. I’ll be writing about this book soon – it’s an amazing and absorbing book.

C J Sansom’™s Matthew Shardlake series of books are excellent in this respect ‘“ and in all others as well. I find it easier to visualise where the action takes place from studying the maps at the beginning of the books. His latest book is out now and I had a late Christmas present yesterday when Revelation was delivered to my door. Thanks D.

Here is the map
and here is a photo this beautiful, big, hardback copy that is shouting READ ME NOW!

Oh No, Not Another Challenge!

Published on by Margaret6 Comments

I really cannot resist this challenge – mainly because I like the title and the picture in the banner. The promise of a good story will always tempt me to open a book and start reading.

This is Carl’s Once Upon a Time Challenge. It began on Friday, March 21st and runs to Friday, June 20th: Midsummer Night’™s Eve. Joining this challenge means you are participating but not committing yourself to any specific number of books. I’m aiming to complete “Quest the First “
which is to read at least 5 books that fit somewhere within the Once Upon a Time II criteria of fantasy, or folklore, or fairy tales, or mythology’¦or your five books might be a combination from the four genres.
These books are on my to-be-read list already and fit into these categories:
  1. Dante’™s Descent into Hell, translated by Dorothy L Sayers
  2. The Chrysalids by John Wyndham
  3. The Gormenghast Trilogy by Mervyn Peake
  4. Cloud Atlas by David Mitchell
  5. Star Wars by George Lucas
  6. Helen of Troy by Margaret George

I was intrigued to read in this Wiki link that Dante’s The Divine Comedy is categorised as Bangsian fantasy. I had never heard of this but according to Wikipedia it is named after John Kendrick Bangs, whose novels deal with the afterlives of various famous people. Whilst I do intend to read The Divine Comedy I doubt that I’ll finish it all before 20 June, so the short version by Dorothy L Sayers seems a good choice for this challenge.

The other books are a mixture of science fiction, fantasy and mythology and I’ve owned them all for a while. Like other unread books I was keen to read them when I bought them. It is time to open them soon. I have actually read the Gormenghast books before, when I was at college, when I borrowed them from the library, but I haven’t read the copies that I own, which are wrapped in sellaphane!