Skip to main content

Posts

Showing posts from July, 2010

Featured Post

Infinite Country by Patricia Engel | Thoughts

   Published : 2021   ||    Format : print   ||    Location : Colombia ☆ ☆ ☆ ☆ ☆   What was it about the country that kept everyone hostage to its fantasy? The previous month, on its own soil, an American man went to his job at a plant and gunned down fourteen coworkers, and last spring alone there were four different school shootings. A nation at war with itself, yet people still spoke of it as some kind of paradise.. Thoughts : Infinite Country follows two characters - young Talia, who at the beginning of this book, escapes a girl’s reform school in North Colombia so that she can make her previously booked flight to the US. Before she can do that, she needs to travel many miles to reach her father and get her ticket to the rest of her family. As we follow Talia’s treacherous journey south, we learn about how she ended up in the reform school in the first place and why half her family resides in the US. Infinite Country tells the story of her family through the other protagonist, El

Friday Finds -- July 30, 2010

Hosted by  MizB  at  Should be reading , this meme asks you what great books did you hear about/discover this past week? There have been a lot of good books floating around lately. Well, they are there always - but I did find some great ones this week. Unwind by Neal Shusterman I came across this book first last year, but didn't find it interesting enough to add it. But when one of my online book clubs chose this book to read, I had to add it. It's interesting how your tastes change. One moment you are sure a book is not for you, and the next day, it goes to the top of your TBR. It's a good thing, else we would be very boring people with predictable reading tastes. Incidentally, I was reminded of Scott Westerfeld's Uglies series when I read this synopsis. In a society where unwanted teens are salvaged for their body parts, three runaways fight the system that would "unwind" them. Connor's parents want to be rid of him because he's a

Review: The Color Purple by Alice Walker

This is a book that needs no introduction. In fact, I had no idea either what the book was about before starting it. I don't recall ever reading the synopsis, which I now read for the first time. The Color Purple is a book of letters. Celia is a black woman who is so ashamed of her life that she cannot even talk of it to God. So she writes to God instead. She starts writing at age 14, and chronicles her life for the next 20 years. Raped and abused by her father, she wants to prevent her sister Nettie from the same fate. Eventually she gets married to "Mr. _____" (whose surname is never revealed). This man beats her, which she yields to, believing that it is proper for a man to beat his wife. In fact, she is so submissive, she doesn't ever protest. Then she meets Shug, an attractive, independent black woman who has always been attracted to Celie's husband. Through Shug, Celie learns to express herself more and discovers her creative self. In Shug, she finds

Review: A House at the Edge of Tears by VĂ©nus Khoury-Ghata

In a city of Beirut, five shabby dwellings circle a courtyard with a pomegranate tree. One night, the residents hear screams when a boy is harassed and assaulted by his father for masturbating in his sleep. When his wife begs him not to kill the boy, he says The thought of killing him never crossed my mind. I want to bury him alive. The boy is sent off to a monastery and later to an insane asylum. Each time, he returns back worse than before. His father also disapproves of the poems he writes, but his sister benefits from them, by narrating this story. Over time, the boy gets lost in his own world as he becomes increasingly mentally challenged. A House at the Edge of Tears is a daughter's means to combat her shame, a sister's means to tackle her lack of helplessness at her brother's situation. VĂ©nus questions her father's action of throwing his wife and three daughters outside while keeping his son tied up at home. She wishes her mother had spoken up instead o

It's Monday! What are you reading? -- July 26, 2010

This is a weekly event initially hosted by  J. Kaye  at  J. Kaye's Book Blog , now by Sheila @  One Persons Journey through a world of Books , to celebrate what you are reading for the week as well as books completed the previous week. Books completed last week Having just returned back from watching Inception , I totally forgot about this post. My conscious and "subconscious" kept muddling over all the facts before it "woke itself up" and I remembered this post. So it's been another busy week, and I got only one book done. -  The Color Purple  by  Alice Walker Books reviewed -  The Lion's Game by Nelson Demille Books on my nightstand I guess I did become too ambitious with my reading list last week, so I have pretty much the same set of books on my nightstand again. One Vacant Chair   by  Joe Coomer : I started reading this one yesterday, but didn't get that far in. It's quite funny at times, plus engrossing. C

The Sunday Salon -- July 25, 2010

Well, this is the first of two moves, I guess. My apartment lease has run out, so I'm moving to a friend's place for 20 days, before I move out of Blacksburg. I came here with just three huge bags, but in my two years here, managed to double my stuffs. So it's a hard task even thinking of packing looking at everything around me. I'm lucky I'm not moving across the country but just a couple of hours away. Else, I'll be giving away most of these things and fedexing the rest. :shudder: So today's going to be a really busy day. Packing, plus a lunch party! Although I expected to have a light last week, it didn't turn out that way. I ended up with a few more thesis-related tasks, but I have finally (for sure this time) wrapped it up. 11 more days to go! Because of all the work, I didn't get much time to read, only finishing The Color Purple by Alice Walker (which I loved). Within the next four days, I have my eye on one more book, One Vac

Friday Finds -- July 23, 2010

Hosted by  MizB  at  Should be reading , this meme asks you what great books did you hear about/discover this past week? I missed doing this last week, during my understandably busy week and brief hiatus from blogging, but unsurprisingly I wouldn't have had anything to share either considering that I hadn't looked at any new books during that week either. So here are some books I discovered this week. The Secret Lives of Baba Segi's Wives by Lola Shoneyin After recently reading a book on polygamy ( Hidden Wives ), I have become reasonably interested in this theme - a morbid fascination with the lives of the people involved in polygamy and a wondering feeling about how they can ever feel "normal" in such a relation. During my blog-hop recently, I saw this one reviewed at Color Online . Set in modern-day Nigeria, The Secret Lives of Baba Segi's Wives is about a polygamous husband and his four very different wives. For Baba Segi, his collectio

Review: The Lion's Game by Nelson Demille

Brash, sassy John Corey is on the Anti-Terrorist Task Force team, waiting to meet Asad Khalil - a terrorist suspect who had defected. He waits with four others in the Conquistador Club, for the flight to land at the NY airport. Asad however has other plans, which do not include surrender. Although he was handcuffed and escorted by two armed officers, he manages to escape after committing a puzzling, almost impossible crime. Worse, no one knows what he is up to. I have deliberately left out some things from the summary, because there is so much to this book than the plain escape of a terrorist. I have to admit, reading about terrorism is so not my cup of tea. So I was definitely pensive about what I will find, going into this book. I worried needlessly. The suspense in this book was simply awesome! Crimes that seem so impossible being pulled off with panache, making you wonder 'How did that happen?' I'm not big into thrillers, and usually pace them out but The Lion's

It's Monday! What are you reading? -- July 19, 2010

This is a weekly event initially hosted by J. Kaye at J. Kaye's Book Blog , now by Sheila @ One Persons Journey through a world of Books , to celebrate what you are reading for the week as well as books completed the previous week. Books completed last week I had a busy week at school, but I'm hoping that my busy days are behind me now. I read nothing for six days, then finished a book yesterday. - A House at the Edge of Tears by VĂ© nus Khoury-Ghata Books reviewed - Leviathan by Scott Westerfeld - Still Alice by Lisa Genova ( WOW! ) Books on my nightstand After a no-reading week, I'm eager to make up for that. Without being ambitious, here's what I plan to attack this week. One Vacant Chair by Joe Coomer : This is one of the books I am reading for the Spotlight Series this month. I read a couple of pages some time back, and found it really hilarious! The Color Purple by Alice Walker : I wasn't sure at all if I could

Look at what just arrived! - July 19, 2010

This meme is hosted by Marcia @ The Printed Page . It is the gathering place for readers to share the books that came into their house last week (checked out library books don’t count, eBooks & audio books do). I guess I had a good week in books, considering what I received. After seeing The Map of True Places by Brunonia Barry almost everywhere, I was so glad to have won this on twitter thanks to Brain Candy BR . I also have Brunonia Barry's The Lace Reader , but didn't get to it yet. So that's two books by the same author. Need I any more motivation to pick one up? I won Zeitoun by Dave Eggers at Nancy's 2010: A Year of Books . I have read many good reviews of this book and am now very curious about the protagonist - every one of the previews or reviews stops at how he disappears and then comes the question - Will he come back? Alright people - you have me curious. I want to know what happens now. Usually I don't like fiction that are based on som