I Love Books!

The Swallows of Kabul, by Yasmina Khadra

This small book (it's only 195 pages) was so moving and powerful, I could hardly put it down.  Even though Iraq and Afghanistan are in the news so frequently, it's hard for me to imagine what life is really like in these countries.  The writing in The Swallows of Kabul is stark and evocative.  It puts you so clearly in Kabul, even under the physically and emotionally stifling woman's burqa.

It's one of those stories where the lives of unrelated characters intersect.  Usually you can guess how this will happen, but this climax surprised me.  And the ending was a shock, but I can't see how it could end any other way.

Shiny Things = Mountains and other stuff

It's been months.  I've been distracted.  But I did warn you, see up there, at the top of the page?!  Just so you know, I have been reading.  In fact, I have a backlog of books to write about (look all the way down on the left there).  So, hang tight, more on books later.  First, I've just finished with a major distraction of the last six weeks, a beginning mountain climbing class through the Mazamas, a local climbing organization.

It was a lot of fun, now I'm looking forward to reaching the summits of some local peaks, including Mt. Hood, Mt. Adams, Middle Sister, and more.  Here are a couple of shots from my adventures.

Soon, we'll get back to our regularly scheduled programming!

Bookcrossing

I've known about Bookcrossing for awhile.  I think I might have registered and released a book or two some time ago, but I'd forgotten about it.  If you aren't familiar with the site, it's a place to register books so you can "release them into the wild" for someone else to find, and then follow where they go.  It's a book version of wheresgeorge.com, plus a lot more for readers and lovers of books.  There are discussion forums, and other fun ways of sharing books.

I just joined something called a bookray.  It's a planned sharing of a book.  The first person creates a list of those who want to participate.  They read the book, comment on it in the forum then send it to the next person.  They read it comment on it, and send it on.  There are books that have been going around the world for months and years.  I'm excited to be a part of it.

The bookray I joined is for Jane Austen's Northanger Abbey.  I'll put my thoughts up here after I've finished it.  The person who is reading it now happens to live close to me, so we might have an in-person hand-off of the book, rather than mailing it.  If you're interested in joining the fun, check out this Bookcrossing.com forum.  You might need to join first, I'm not sure.

Tell them ILoveBooksPDX sent you!

Drunk, Divorced & Covered in Cat Hair by Laurie Perry

The full title of this hilarious and sometimes poignant book is Crazy Aunt Purl's Drunk, Divorced, and Covered in Cat Hair: The True-Life Misadventures of a 30-Something Who Learned to Knit After He Split.  And that about sums it up.  Perry, aka Crazy Aunt Purl, somehow manages to make it through all of the craziness that overwhelms her after getting dumped.  She figures out how to be true to herself, or more accurately find out who she really is, when she's no longer part of a couple.  Knitting takes a starring role in the transformation.  (My favorite part about the knitting "recipes" are the wine recommendations!)

She writes so honestly about the experience it is both heart-wrenching and hysterical.  She makes up words with abandon and sprinkles her writing with Southernisms.  Reading this book feels like you're having a conversation with a good friend.  A little one-sided, of course, except for when I found myself talking back.  It's possible it's just me, but somehow Perry makes you feel like you're right there with her, which leads to the talking to a book thing.

And I'll tell you, having been through a similar experience myself, she nails the feelings you go through, the anger the sadness, the eventual happiness over some silly things that feel like victory.  You don't have to be a knitter, divorced or Southern to love this book.  Just be ready for an entertaining read that will having you adding her blog to your favorites list.

The Joy Diet by Martha Beck

I've read Beck's earlier work, Finding Your Own North Star: Claiming the Life You Were Meant to Live, and really enjoyed it, so I was thrilled when the library had the audio version of  The Joy Diet: 10 Daily Practices for a Happier Life available when I set out on a road trip earlier this month. 

Beck's style is simple, fun and encouraging.  While the diet metaphor seems a little stretched at times, the ideas are sound and even somewhat unique. In fact, I found the ideas in the book so useful for me and my clients I purchased a hardcopy as soon as I arrived home.

Beck maintains that unlike a food diet, with the joy diet you have to take the steps in order and master each one before moving onto the next.  The first step, getting quiet and doing nothing, is probably the hardest, and she gives ideas on what to do if you have a tough time mastering it.

The ten practices (in order) are:

- Do nothing for 15 minutes

- Tell yourself the truth (through a prescribed set of questions)

- Identify and explore a deep desire

- Explore creativity in bringing about your desire

- Take small risky steps toward your desires

- Give yourself at least three treats per day, one for taking the risk and two just because

- Turn your work into play

- Laugh at least 30 times per day.  (Does that seem like a lot or a little to you?  The average adult laughs 15 times per day -- the average child 300+ times!)

- Connect with someone important to you

- Feast with or without food, in other words celebrate moments by savoring them completely

Eat Pray Love by Elizabeth Gilbert

I've been seeing and hearing about this book for some time now, always meaning to pick up a copy, but never quite getting around to it.  On a recent road trip through California, I was given a copy by a dear friend with the request that I pass it on to someone who'll appreciate it.  That road trip resulted in lots of new books, some that I never would have chosen on my own.  I'll be writing about them as quickly as I can.

Back to Eat, Pray, Love.  The book is divided into three sections, each chronicling about four months in the author's life as she tries to regain her sanity after a painful divorce.  Eat is the part about Italy, where she gained 20-some pounds gorging on pasta and wine while learning Italian and re-learning how to pay attention to her desires. Part two is at an ashram in India, and of course the pray part. Surprisingly this section has some of the funniest lines (thanks to Richard from Texas).  The final part is about her time in Indonesia, where she spends time with two different healers, and a crew of interesting ex-pats.  And yes, she finds love, unexpectedly.

The journey she takes is personal and universal.  For everyone who's looked for something more in their life, you'll probably devour this book.  It's an amazing and wonderful way she chose to heal herself after a great pain, a breaking open, which eventually allowed her to become more of herself.  And, I don't know about you, but I sure could use a little bit of that.

The Whole World Over by Julia Glass

I finished this book awhile ago and there have been many shiny things distracting me this month, so now I'm finally getting around to writing about what I've been reading. 

InThe Whole World Over Julia Glass once again sucks you in completely.  The unlikely plot (NYC pastry chef becomes chef for governor of New Mexico) seems completely believable as she writes it.  And that's just the primary character.  The book had amazing breadth with several other interconnected stories running simultaneously.  It was wonderfully easy to keep the characters and all their stories straight.  You know how sometimes multiple complicated storylines can be difficult to follow?  Not at all a problem here. 

Fenno from Three Junes appears in the book near the beginning, around page 45 or 50.  He seems to have matured out of his angst of the first the book. I read an interview with Glass, where she says that she was surprised to have him show up. 

Love and relationships are the centerpiece of this book.  But more specifically, I'd say it is about connections and connecting.  What brings people together, keeps them together and splits them apart.  And like connections and relationships, the end of the book just sort of happens, there isn't any miraculous coming together or resolutions to the issues of the characters. 

I continue to think about the characters of this novel, as if they exist out there in a world not unlike my own.

Duck Duck Wally by Gabe Rotter

I'm not sure how to begin to describe Duck Duck Wally.  A friend read it because the protagonist's dog is named Dr. Barry Schwartzman -- he is referred to as "The Doctor."  She passed it on to me because it ended up being such a fun read.  I started laughing while reading the jacket and didn't stop until the last page.  Well, that's not really true because I still laugh while thinking about some of the things in the book.

Wally Moscowitz is the ghost writer for a big name Hip Hop star.  He is sworn to secrecy about his real job.    His dog and best friend, The Doctor, is kidnapped and things get really crazy.  I suspect that the hip hop life (and other stereotypes) portrayed in the books might be perceived as politically incorrect in a Borat kind of way.  Oh, and the language.  Don't bother with the book if you have any qualms about swearing and rauncy slang. 

With that all being said, I was engaged through the whole story, laughed out loud and was compelled to read parts aloud to anyone who would listen. 

Five Quarters of the Orange by Joanne Harris

Mother/daughter relationships and food play a big part in this book as they did in Chocolat (by the same author).  But Five Quarters of the Orange is a much darker story.  It takes place in a small French village during and then years after the German occupation during World War II.

The protagonist, Framboise, is tenacious and clever, both as a nine year old and as the much older widow.  Her mother is a hard woman, plagued by incapacitating migraine headaches.  Few of the characters are likable in the traditional sense.  Disconcertingly, the kindest character is a Nazi soldier.  It was interesting when I realized that I didn't really like any of these people, as that's one thing that usually draws me into books.  But, I respected them, cut them some slack, perhaps because of the time during which they lived, or maybe the fact that they didn't seem to care about being likable.

Framboise inherits her mother's notebook, which is a mélange of recipes, notes, memories and entries in a foreign language that she doesn't recognize.  The notebook helps her piece together a fuller picture of the dramatic events of her ninth year.

It's interesting how we think we have the whole picture based on our own experience, and yet, the "reality" can be very different, when all the parts start coming together.

Blogging Trackbacks

I started this blog for several reasons, a few are obvious, such as I'm a reading freak.  The other reason was I wanted to understand and experiment with all the cool techno stuff that you can do with blogs (and my coaching blog isn't set up for).  Of course I'm a little behind the times and don't get how all of this stuff works.  Luckily there are people out there to help.  Kirsten Farris, who has Bulldog Marketing is awesome at explaining things, and she's the one that extolled the virtues of Typepad, ease of use being high on the list.  At any rate, I think she's finally helped me understand trackbacks.  Although I'm not sure I'm using it in the right context, I'm trying one anyway!