Edith Wharton: The Age of Innocence

One Word Summary: Dilettante

Synopsis: A man marries one woman, but he loves another.

Rate: 3 canvas-backs

Recommendations: This is a helpful book if you want to think great thoughts. It's wonderful if you like to feel frustrated and powerless. It's also nice if you're into rules, and even better if you enjoy debates on whether the society is going to pot. It's also really well written.

Questions:

1. Before they are married Archer fantasizes about 'awakening' May. During their courtship he is at some pains to educate and inform her tastes, but he abandons the task even before the wedding. How is his behaviour towards May mirror to his unconsumated love for Countess Olenska?


2. When I was a child my mother told me that May manipulated Archer to acheive her own ends, she implied that it was a bad thing for May to do. Is May a sneak or a product of her time? Was it wrong of her?


3. Somewhere in the novel Archer complains to Countess Olenska "I don't Understand You!", and she growls back, "Yet you understand her!" Do you understand either of them? What ideas do these two women represent? Why does he love one and scorn the other? Why does he stick with one and forsake the other?


4. Is society going to pot? Would you like to live in Old New York? Visit?


5. Food Food Food! What is canvas-back? How does May's image as Diana the Virgin Godess jive with her food loving tribe?

Carey Wallace: The Blind Contessa's New Machine

One Word Summary: "Would you tell me theses things if I were not blind?" (or something like that)

Synopsis: A young girl grows up in a summer cottage near a man made lake on her father's property (she does sometimes sleep in her family's house). She befriends an eccentric and already married inventor. She notices she's going blind. She observes her condition scientifically. She marries a handsome playboy. She begins a 'passionate' affair with her neighbour the inventor. They are caught. Her husband removes her to the city. Upon her death she returns the typewriter to her former lover.

Recommendation: This book would be great for a group. There's a lot to discuss. And it's all interesting. For a small book it's pretty complicated. Carolina has a rich fantasy life, my eyes mostly glazed over during these passages but I didn't fail to notice the coldness darkness mingled with the warmth and beauty she created. I especially like how the story just ended, it felt like having one of my senses cut off.

Rate: Three Lemon Trees

Jonathan Safran Foer: Extremely Loud and Incredibly Close

One Word Summary: I would spend my only life with you/ Grandma

Synopsis: A boy goes on a quest to find his father by following a series of (meaningless?) clues that lead him to meet every Black in the NYC phone book.

Review: Sorry if the synopsis doesn't capture the genius of ELAIC. Read the book. It's a love story that will fill you with sadness and hope.

Rate: 5 boroughs

Questions:

1. Who was that enlightenment philosopher/scientist who said refering to love he felt for his mistress "I never wanted more to believe in our eternal souls", or something like?
2. Does it mean anything that JSF wrote about a boy going on a quest which is not exactly pointless?
3. Is Grandpa selfish? or sad? or human? Should he have just got over it?

Other Books:

Slaughter House Five by Kurt Vonnegut

Hiroshima by John Hersey

The Odyssey by Homer

About a Boy by Nick Hornby

That children's book where the father dies and leaves his son a locked box and the boy, with the help of his best friend, goes on a quest to find the key. Inside, among other things, is a playing card. The story ends with a deep fried twinky and some sort of hula hoop routine at a fairground talent show. Incidentally the boy only eats PBJ.

The Incredible Invention of Hugo Cabret by Brian Selznik

The History of Love by Nicole Krauss

Everything Is Illuminated by Jonathan Safran Foer

Nicolas Drayson: A Guide to the Birds of East Africa

One Word Summary: Jack is local
Review: Bravo, Mr Drayson. I felt like you were my best friend sharing an incredible tale with me over a cup of tea in the garden. I loved this book first for the title, and next for your flare for understatment. You kept me interested for more than 8 hours! I loved the whole thing. It was tangental, hilarious, and humane all wrapped up in 202 pages. Bravo.

Synopsis: Malik, a short round balding brown man, enters an impossible wager at his gentleman club to win the right to ask Rose Mbikwa to the annual hunt ball. The story is about this diminutive man greatness, with a lot of bird watching.

Rate: 5 Red Bishops

(Note this novel is higly quoteable. It's worth having a copy to keep forever!)

Houghton Mifflin, 2008

Ben Sherwood: The Man Who Ate the 747

One Word Summary: The Greatest Love
Review: I liked this novel. It was hard stay interested at first, but then it grew on me. Although, quirky characters are getting a bit cliche. Still I liked it.
Synopsis: J.J. Smith learns that love is more than biological algebra. Turns out there's more to it than pheromones, facial symmetry, and vocal resonance.
Rate: 2 antacids

Bantam Book 2000

Rosina Lippi: The Pajama Girls of Lambert Square

One Word Summary: Dog Lover's Paradise

More Words: Why can't a conversation just be a conversation? For the most part I'm incapable of analyzing people's words while they're talking. I usually need a few days to figure out what their word choice, inflection, and tone really meant (and what I should have said). If this novel reflects reality then other people must be more interesting/intelligent/crazy than me. Also Julia and Dodge rushed to conclusions, which is boring. I like a good tension filled courtship. I couldn't finish the last 20 pages; but I did like the expensive bedding.

Synopsis: A Claustrophobic and an Agoraphobic fall in love and then learn how to live with each other.

TSPMNL: Sex
Rate: 2 pillows

G.P. Putnam's Sons 2008

Carloine Adderson: Sitting Practice

One Word Summary: the second noble truth/thinking
More Words: The blurbs on the back were so enticing that I had to try this book. And I wasn't disappointed. It is very well written. I especially liked how two people, so in love, can completely not get what the other is thinking or feeling.

The Globe and Mail review: Adderson achieves a remarkable
effect with her prose. Its clarity is so overwhelming that it becomes
intoxicating.
The Vancouver Sun wrote: Adderson's prose is characterized
by fierce intelligence, razor-sharp wit, and wry omniscience. She writes with a
tone of subdued mirth or bemused wisdom that lends the book both immediacy and
intimacy. In her hands sex, religion, parenting, even something as simple as
making bread come from a completely unexpected vantage that makes them suddenly
new and strange.

Synopsis: Iliana and Ross are in love. Six weeks after their wedding a car accident leaves Iliana paralyzed. She and Ross struggle to cope with their personal and mutual tragedies. Plus a whole family of idiosyncratic people join them for the ride.

Things Some People Might Not Like (TPMNL): The F-Word, Adultery, Atheism, Gluttony
Rate: 3 tennis balls

Trumpeter 2008

Tanya Egan Gibson: How to Buy a Love of Reading

One Word Summary: Meta-
More Words: First off, I liked this book. Professional reviewers seemed to think it shallow they called it an unsuccessful attempt at meta-fiction. Still, I think people should give it a try- ideas about substance abuse, and love, and beauty, and how we change people are still zinging around in my head. The title caught my eye. I opened the book, read the inside jacket and almost put it down. Then I read the beginning chapters and thought "what is this gossip girl a la Megan McCafferty crap!" But I persevered and came out at the end sobbing-how embarrassing right. The end is sappy. I almost want to read The Great Gatsby a fifth time (another olive of mine). Anyhow the writing is clever and not a little self mocking as it readjusts itself to suit Carly's preferences. Yep, this is a fun book. Read this book.
Synopsis: Carly is fat, unpopular, unfashionable, uncool, and maybe a little freakish (ref: possible public masturbation debacle). In a misguided attempt to reinvent Carly, her parents commission an author to write a book for Carly to love. Enter Bree (and Justin), the author (and the author's past), they talk about writing and what makes a good story. They, Bree and Justin, are the best thing that's ever happened to Carly. They care about her. They reinvent her. Meanwhile Carly loves Hunter. He is bent on self destruction, and Carly can't save him. One thread of this story is how she let's him go.

Rate: 3.5

Dutton [Penguin Group] 2006

Questions:
Why are the only responsible adults in this book writers of fiction?
Does Hunter love Carly? I know he says so, but does he?
Does everyone create and liveout their selfimages?
Is Hunter's goodness, payback for Carly's favour?

Jane Urquhart- A Map of Glass

One Word Summary: Diseases that begin with "A"
Summary: A man is found frozen to death in the snow. A woman grieves for him. And a young artist lets go of the past.
More Words: It was difficult to stay interested in A Map Of Glass. I didn't understand the woman and I felt sorry for Malcolm. I didn't care about Jerome. Then my feelings changed. How do authors work their magic on our perceptions? I liked this story. Andrew's 'memoirs' are ethereal like a fairy tale, the whole novel has a pleasant aftertaste that I've enjoyed for the past three weeks. I still don't understand the woman, but she doesn't frustrate me anymore. I pity Malcolm, and Jerome is still Jerome.
Questions:
I like the questions I found at BookBrowse:
http://www.bookbrowse.com/reading_guides/detail/index.cfm?book_number=1746

Quotes:
"I doubt it," said Annabelle, removing a ledger from the edge of Deveen Bog and watching the map slowly curl back into a cylindrical shape. "Nothing goes on forever." (p253)

Only much later in life was he able to realize that, even in a colony whose wealth was founded entirely on the slaughtering of wild animals and the clear cutting of forests, there were moments of pure magic. (p255)

His father had smiled. "Now that is the definition of avoidable difficulty," he said to his son. "Who but a fool would choose to live in such a wild, inhospitable place? No one but an Irishman would endeavor to haul furniture to such a grey, destitute, though"- he had admitted with an uncharacteristically dreamy look in his eye-" in certain lights, beautiful mountain." (p257)

Margret Atwood: The Handmaid's Tale

One Words Summary: Aiden Quinn
Storyline: In response to an apathetic population, unable to reproduce itself, a militant patriarchal group overthrows the U.S. government and establishes a theocracy which reduces everyone to a function. Suddenly women cannot own property, cannot work outside the home. Reading is against the law. Other minorities are silently removed. All infractions are punishable by death.

More Words: Now I feel guilty for enjoying my life as a stay at home wife and mother who bakes and is completely dependent on her man for food-shelter-clothing-affection. Gosh I don't even drive these days! However the real difference between my life and The Handmaid's Tale is choice. Still I can't help but wonder if I've been duped by The Man (or the troubadours).


Questions:

1. Why is Moira's lassitude so terrible?
2. The women in Gilead are segregated from the men, and they are isolated from other women by class, function, and suspicion. They seem to lack any form of companionship (even words). Which is more important romantic love or friendship?
3. What is the ancillary function of a Handmaid? Are the Commander's sterile?
4. Atwood uses pornography to manifest the level of 'social degradation', how is her barometric choice relevant to our society?
   The military coup is chilling especially in light of 9/11. Could something similar really happen?
5. THMT was published in 1985. When was America really becoming frightened by the AIDS epidemic?
6. Mme Defarge knit, Snow Flower had a fan, how would a woman in Gilead have 'written'?

Quotes:

I admired my mother in some ways, although things between us were never easy.
She expected too much from me, I felt. She expected me to vindicate her life for
her, and the choices she'd made. I didn't want to live my life on her terms. I
didn't want to be the model offspring, the incarnation of her ideas. We used to
fight about that . I am not your justification for existence, I said to her
once. (p122)

That was when they suspended the Constitution. They said it would be temporary. There wasn't even any rioting in the streets. People stayed home at night, watching television, looking for some direction. There wasn't even an enemy you could put your finger on. (p 174)

No mother is ever completely a child's idea of what a mother should be, and I suppose it works the other way around as well. (p181)

I've tried to put some good things in as well. Flower's for instance, because where would we be without them. (p?)

Jane Urquhart: The Stone Carvers

One Word Summary: King Ludwig gifts a bell
More Words: There is some breathless feeling associated with reading a book set in a place you call home. I miss Canada. This is a great novel, it's really too bad it will be forgotten. Urquhart build miracles with words. I think I might have another go at Away. I think I might have to read more Canadian authors. But this, this is a great novel.

Plot Summary: A no longer young woman leaves home to help carve a monument. So many things happen.

Quotes:

Like every other man, woman, and child in Bavaria, Father Gstir was well
aware that King Ludwig was mad, and he knew that an interest in Canada was
precisely the kind of course the King's mad mind was likely to take. p10

"It is the same with almost anything that remains abandoned. Friends,
sweethearts, places, homelands, houses, and this castle in my mind. After a
certain period of time the roof goes and there is no turning back. Still it is
important to see what kind of ruin remains, for it is my contention that only
the greatest works make beautiful ruins." p53
She felt utterly fixed within the dimensions of a house. p142

"Listen, Tilman said gently to his friend, "anything you want is possible.
My grandfather knew a priest once who built a gigantic church in the wilderness
- right in the middle of a forest - a stone church. With a bell. And my
grandfather carved the alters out of wood, just like he was in Europe."
p210

People up and die, she thought, they up and die before they have their fill
of the impossible. Her grandfather had died before Tilman's much-longed-for
return. Father Gstir had died before the bell for his illogical church was
blessed. Eamon, without ever laying a hand on a military aircraft. They all had
approached their desires naked, simple and glowing, without artifice or
disguise, their wide open hearts an uncomplicated target for annulment of one
kind or another. Renunciation was an option they never even had time to consider
before they were rejected by experience and the light was cancelled.
This was not going to happen to her. She would court the impossible, but
she would conceal herself, confuse the spirit of annihilation, bring no
attention to her quest. p253

Questions:
Why is Klara the only woman in this book? (not counting her mother, her grandmother, the nuns and Crazy Phoebe)
What are Klara's feminine qualities? What are her masculine qualities?
Can we have whatever we dream?
Must time erase everything?
How is tenderness important in this story?
What's the significance of the whistle?

Viking Penguin 2002

Dave Eggers: A Heartbreaking Work of Staggering Genius

One Word Summary: Frisbee
More Words: I read this book for the obvious reason. And because the back jacket promised something mind blowing. So yeah, it blows. Hehe. Actually I don't even know what self-conscious means. I mean I know how I feel when I've done something publicly humiliating, but this is different. I've never read Kierkegaard. I think I'm supposed to like this book. Everyone likes it. It's really gimmicky. He swears a lot. He thinks about sex a lot. He's all about the mid-stream. He might not be telling the truth. He's got issues with sentimentality. He's carrying the grief of the world. He sees himself as some sort of Christ figure, and his mother is... Mary? He might be a cannibal. And yet he's an everyman- a failure, a dreamer, a tired old man, a noying. But he is never mediocre. He is magnificent. And his brother too, even more. Even more.

This book is revitalizing. I feel renewed. Like it's sping and I'm twenty and anything is possible. I should become some sort of activist and start something great. You know change the world, make it a better place, for you and for me and the entire human race. Naturally I really liked this book. It made me happy, except the part at the end where he wrote "I hate you, I hate everyone". That's what he wrote right?

Questions:
Did he mean that? The part where he hates me?
What's Toph doing these days?

Censorship: Egger's does swear a lot and try to have sex a lot. It's got Alcoholics and and it's full of Death. My daughter should probably grow up before she reads this. By grown up I mean a) she can think for herself and b) she not a self absorbed immature person. Of course this book isn't necessary for survival and there are plenty of similar works (but the style is striking and it is like a dose of sunshine). So I guess everyone should read it at their own peril. Think skin cancer.

New Words:
Solipsism, Bathos (with a 'B')

If I were a stalker:
Dear Mr. Eggers
I just read you Heartbreaking book. It was fine.

Here's a picture of my brother. He's a man now and would prefer to be called Rob. Or Bob. Or Robert. While I was reading your words I kept thinking this is my brother. When I saw your picture I thought there is my brother, whose dog is that?
Of course half way through I realized you are not my brother. You don't even look like him. Only for a moment I believed you were the same. He is a bright star. A superhero. He always says, "Thanks for the compliment, but I am not nearly so wonderful." I'm pretty sure he's right, but I don't believe him anyway. Tears and snot are dripping off my face as I write- I love my brother.
Incidentally, he has read Kierkegaard.
I wonder if you're regretting that part in the introduction where you invite everyone to write to you. Do people remember the return address envelope? I'm not actually going to mail this because, well, it's just begging to be mocked, or ignored, or lost.
ah... all the best,
Sheri

Amy Tan: The Bonesetters Daughter

One Word Summary: Shooting Star
More Words: Amy Tan is Effortless.
Other Words: Forgiveness, Freedom, Happiness, Love. I love reading Amy Tan's stories. Once I fantasized that I would be writer like her and write a transcendental ghost story. For now it's enough to enjoy her work. And I have my own mother to thank for introducing me to Amy Tan. Thanks mom.

Quotes:

...and sometimes she had to remind herself that teenagers had souls. p21
She wanted to write a novel in the style of Jane Austen, a book of manners about the upper class, a book that had nothing to do with her own life. Years before, she had dreamed of writing stories as a way to escape. She could revise her life and become someone else. She could be somewhere else. In her imagination she could change everything, herself, her mother, her past. But the idea of revising her life also frightened her, as if by imagination alone she were condemning what she did not like about herself or others. Writing what you wished was the most dangerous form of wishful thinking. p 28

And then I realized what the first word must have been: ma, the sound of a baby smacking its lips in search of her mother's breast. For a long time, that was the only word the baby needed. Ma, ma, ma. Then the mother decided that was her name and she began to speak, too. She taught the baby to be careful: sky, fire, tiger. A mother is always the beginning. She is how things begin. p. 263

Very Romantic Words:

"There is no curse," he said. I was listening hard, trying to believe that
I would always hear him speak. "And you are brave, you are strong, " he went on.
I wanted to protest that I didn't want to be strong, but I was crying too much
to speak. "You cannot change this," he said. "This is your character."

He kissed my eyes one at a time. "This is beauty, and this is beauty, and
you are beauty, and love is beauty and we are beauty. We are divine unchanged by
time"

Aphoristic Abstruseness*
no matter how neurotic, argumentative, beautiful, talented, depressing all people deserve a mothers love and lover's passion.

*I stole this word combo from Rebecca Solnit

Anita Shreve: Light on Snow

One Word Summary: Coincidence

More Words: I liked this story. It makes you wonder what would you do if you were the father/mother/girl/police officer/parents of the mother/the grown up baby? It's not a bit like the Heintz dilemma, but it got me thinking about it. I really enjoyed the author's style too. I want to read more of her work.

Summary: A father and daughter are snowshoeing in the woods. They find a newborn in the snow. They save the newborn. The story is about how they handle the fallout and handle their own personal grief.

Sarah Smith: Chasing Shakespeare

One Word Summary: Shakespeare is the god of your own image

Other Words: Lightening [Bug]

More Words: This book was okay. I'm sure it would be fascinating to someone who has read beyond high school Shakespeare and who was maybe part of a medieval club in college or who actually thinks about poetry. Gosh, this book makes me wish I were like that - but only if I don't have to change my name to Hilde the cobblers daughter, or cook with cloves, or wear a cloak, or play rpgs, or crack jokes in Olde English, or... Anyhow, since I don't' have a working knowledge of the political dynamics of 16th century England this book was way over my head. However it was still pretty okay.

Summary: Joe-bluecollar-mr.Shakespeare grad student finds a letter written by Shakespeare in a dusty collection of fraudulent papers. The letter claims that Shakespeare is not Shakespeare. The timing of the discovery coincides with the major publication on Shakespeare (which represents a lifetimes work). Enter VaVaVoom Posy from Harvard. Together Joe and Posy embark on a quest to discover who Shakespeare really was and become famous overnight.

Moral of the Story: Don't Be Anne. And Instant Gratification is a mirage- greatness takes a lifetime.

Censorship: The F word is abundant and there is a sexy red bra, a tattoo, and other vavavoomness- but no indecent exposure.

Quote:

I believe God is a librarian. I believe that literature is holy, Mr. Roper, it is the best part of our souls that we break off and give to each other, and God has a special dispensation for it, angles to guard its making and its presentation HB p.136

List of things To do:

1. Rename myself Hilde
2. Appreciate good poetry
3. Write bad poetry
4. Read the books mentioned on the back jacket: Possession by As Byatt, Daughter of Time by Josephine Tey
5. Find a picture of WH the Earl of Southampton circa 1590

Tracy Chevalier: Falling Angels

One Word Summary: Bad Mom

Reactionary Words: I wonder if you could sue the family of a woman who fails to watch your children at a public rally, and whose neglect causes the violent death of one of your children. I wonder what I would do to her if she didn't already die herself. Honestly this is another fantastic book that I hated. First of all I'll admit to being a selfish person but I've never reached the heights Kitty Coleman achieves- possibly because I'm not very intellectual and I'm not stuck in Victorian England. But people like her drive me crazy. She's sociopathic. I'm simultaneously disgusted with and sorry for her unsatisfaction.

Summary: The friendship of three children who meet in a graveyard and and bring with them the ideals of their very different families.

Tracy Chevalier: Burning Bright

One Word Summary: Opposites have one thing in common

More Words: Philip Astley was larger than life. Blake remains a mystery- and yet he's more solid to me. All the characters were fantastic.

Summary: The experiences of a country family who join the circus and live next door to William Blake in nineteenth century London for a year.

Thoughts and Lessons: I know I should be overawed by Chevalier's superb juxtapositioning skills but really I'm just thinking about the secret lives of children. I remember when I left home, how I realized that my mom was a person unto herself and that she had her own dreams and disappointments and they had nothing to do with me. Lately I've grown accustomed to thinking of my children as appendages to me, but maybe they're not after all. And I'm thinking it might be important to find out who they are.
Also as I read this story I kept wondering about the careless parents who don't take very much trouble over their kids, especially in areas of morality. I know eventually you have to let your kids go, but still I think your supposed to bug and nag the people you love. I think you're supposed to make them uncomfortable so they never become complacent. So they're willing to do the right thing, always. And I believe there is a right thing.

Tracy Chevalier: The Virgin Blue

One Word Summary: A Bag of Bones

More Words: This novel is not without merit but that doesn't mean I liked it. And just because I didn't like it a whole lot doesn't mean I could put it down. On reflection The Virgin Blue is a work of genius. Or Chevalier is a genius. Complete, Balance, True to itself, blah blah blah. But there's no happy ending and worse the story offers up no reasons or justifications. Stuff just happens, a lot of it horrific. It makes my head spin, just wanting to know Why? Why?! Why! It's a little like life- too complicated to attribute one reason to a whole slew of events. Anyhow, I think I must be Rick. I don't understand, I'm not interested enough to try, and I'm careful enough to withhold my condescending judgment.

Questions:

1. Who was the first girl under the hearth?
2. What's wrong with Ella's love analogy?
3. What would you do if you were Isabelle?
4. What do Jean-Paul, the wolf, and the shepherd have in common?
5. Is Ella a "woman who is lost, directionless, doesn't know what she wants so grabs at the idea of a baby as something to keep her busy. And she's bored with her husband so she XXXXX the first offer she gets"? Or is she more?
6. Why hasn't Disney princessified Little Red Riding Hood?

Other Books:
The Hundred Secret Senses, by Amy Tan

Censorship: This is not for little girls. It's a little bit horrific, and it's not really a book to read if you want to feel good about life and the world.

Tracy Chevalier: The Lady and the Unicorn

One Word Summary: a mon seul desir

More Words: There is definitely something seductive about this book. I like Tracy Chevalier's style. While the story behind the unicorn tapestries is made up, I'd like to believe there is a real woman behind each one. And it's even better that the women remain a mystery to Mr Casanova, Nicolas des Innocents.

Plot Summary: Oversexed portrait artist, Nicolas des Innocents, is commissioned to design tapestries for Jean Le Viste's home in Paris. He fascinates all the women meets between Paris and Brussells with his seductive words (a unicorn pickup line-of all things). While Nicolas is at work the reader gets a snapshot of medieval life and a glimps at the workings of the human heart.

Questions:

Do men always get what they want?

Which woman are you- scent, sight, touch, sound, taste?

Censorship: This book is full of sex and human desire, like Captain Correli's Mandolin I'd rather have my daughter grow up before she reads this book.

David Mitchell: Cloud Atlas

One Word Summary: I love you, forgive me
More words: Without being sentimental, even a little, this story is about heartache. I really got wrapped up in the narrative. It haunts me still. I'll be going about my day and all of a sudden I'll remember something and I'll have to stop and chew it over again. The dedication was beautiful, although I didn't record it.

Other Books:
Stone Angel by Margret Lawrence
Fifth Business by Robertson Davies
I heard the Owl Call My Name by Margret Craven