Challenge 13: A Book With A Female Heroine

Donna's Book: The Princess Diarist by Carrie Fisher (Transworld Digital, 2016)

Carrie Fisher died just as I came to this challenge, and she is definitely a heroine, both in real life and in her movies.  I was greatly saddened by her loss and reading this seemed like a way to keep a part of her alive.

Comments: 

After reading this, I was even more sad that Carrie Fisher had died.  Her humour, her courage, her dignity and her honesty shine through every single page.  This was the first of her books that I'd read, but I'll definitely be reading the others.  Carrie Fisher was an amazing woman and the world is poorer without her.  At least, though, we still have her books.

Challenge 13: A Book With A Female Heroine

Ida's book: "Swamplandia!" By Karen Russel (Knopf, 2011)

For me, this reading challenge is about reading new books, broadening my horizons. It can be rather tricky finding books, as you ideally want an amazing reading experience every time, but obviously that's not going to be the case. When I'm stumped for what to chose for a challenge, I go to my "to-read" list on Goodreads, it's VERY long and this time I found this odd title; I can't even remember why I put it on the list. Probably because it sounds absolutely mad. It does, however, use the word "heroine" so I reckon it'll be good for this challenge. We shall see.

Here's the abstract, if anyone would like to read it: 

"The Bigtree alligator wrestling dynasty is in decline--think Buddenbrooks set in the Florida Everglades--and Swamplandia!, their island home and gator-wrestling theme park, is swiftly being encroached upon by a sophisticated competitor known as the "World of Darkness." 

Ava, a resourceful but terrified twelve-year-old, must manage seventy gators and the vast, inscrutable landscape of her own grief. Her mother, Swamplandia!’s legendary headliner, has just died; her sister is having an affair with a ghost called the Dredgeman; her brother has secretly defected to the World of Darkness in a last-ditch effort to keep their sinking family afloat; and her father, Chief Bigtree, is AWOL. To save her family, Ava must journey on her own to a perilous part of the swamp called the "Underworld," a harrowing odyssey from which she emerges a true heroine."

Comments:

So this books was quite a bit different from what I expected! The alligator swamp setting was suitably weird, as were all the characters in the book. It did however get too dark for me, and I feel like I have to put a trigger warning (and SPOLIER ALERT! ---- Get ready!) for rape and pedophilia, because I'm pretty sure I wouldn't have read the book if I had known that. I'm unconvinced that Ava, the main character, ends up a 'true heroine' but her plight and her dedication to both Swamplandia and her family was very convincing. All in all a book that sounded better than it turned out, although it stayed with me for quite some time after I had finished it.

Challenge 12: A book with a Lion, a Witch, or a Wardrobe

Ida's book: "A Discovery of Witches" by Deborah Harkness (Penguin Books, 2011)

I've always loved stories about witches, I find them absolutely fascinating. Although I've read this one before, I decided it was time to revisit it, and seeing as it's October and Halloween it seemed to fit the season 

Comments:

I absolutely love this book, despite it's sometimes frustrating treatment of it's heroine and her sudden frailty when she falls in love. The book does manage to treat the whole witches, vampires and demons with a authenticity that ultimately makes this book such a great read.

Challenge 11: A Book You Started But Never Finished

Ida's book: "The Historian" by Elizabeth Korstova (Little, Brown and Company, 2005)

So this book has been a long way underway. I saw it in a charity shop ages ago and thought it sounded interesting, but given a very slow start, it is continually abandoned in favour of other books. It therefore seemed the obvious choice for this challenge!

Comments:

Good Lord, this took me ages to read! The story itself was okay, I'm a sucker for vampire stuff (no pun intended), but some of the choices the author made just seemed weird. It's almost 3 or 4 different stories interwoven, and sometimes it can be hard to keep track of which year we're supposed to be in. If it wasn't for this challenge I doubt I ever would have finished it, although the final 200 pages or so were pretty good.

Challenge 12: A Book with a Lion, a Witch or a Wardrobe

Donna's Book: "Our Zoo" by June Mottershead (Headline, 2014)

I wanted to avoid the obvious choice for this challenge (although I did read the complete Narnia chronicles when I was young) and this is yet another of the books on my bookshelves that I've never got around to reading.  And there is a lion in it!

I love Chester Zoo, and the hour that I spent listening to June Mottershead talk about this book and her childhood memories was one of the best hours of my life!  Sadly, she is no longer with us but as long as there is this book, a part of her will go on and on!

Comments:

Although this ended rather abruptly, when June got married, I may have felt like that because I wanted the book to go on and on.  It was full of June's wonderful memories of Chester Zoo, how it started and grew and prospered.  The tone was often very matter-of-fact, like growing up in a zoo is something that everyone does!  But that just made the book more wonderful.  It makes you wonder why there was never another series of Our Zoo on TV, because there is a wealth of unused material in the book.  That alone makes this worth reading!

Challenge 11: A Book You Started but Never Finished

Donna's Book: "Confessions of a Kamikaze Cowboy: A True Story of Discovery, Acting, Health, Illness, Recovery, and Life" by Dirk Benedict (Square One Publishers, 1987)

As with the book I chose for the previous challenge, I bought this because I was going to a signing event with Dirk Benedict and wanted a signed copy.  I meant to read it all before I went to the event, but got slightly distracted by Page 13.  It took me quite a while to get passed page 13!!  And so I never finished it.  I will do so for this challenge!

Comments:

I loved this! The overall message seems to be that there's no point trying to search for the meaning of life or of living your life according to some code or another. There is no code; it's just about you. But it's also about consequences. However you choose to live your life will have consequences for you and for the world around you. Accept those, and you've pretty much got it.

The other reason I liked this is because it shows Dirk's intelligence, depth and insight. He's not the cardboard cutout, two-dimensional characters that you sometimes see him portray on the screen, but much more than that. Someone that I'd like to get to know for HIM!


Oh, and page 13. Definitely worth reading for page 13!!

Challenge 10: A Book Set Somewhere You've Always Wanted To Visit

Donna's book: "And Then We Went Fishing: A Story of Fatherhood, Fate and Forgiveness" by Dirk Benedict (Square One Publishers 1995)

I bought this ages ago because I was going to an event where Dirk Benedict would be signing and I wanted a signed copy, but I never got round to reading it.  Half if it is set in Montana, which is one of the states in the US that I have yet to visit.  I've got a 'bucket list' goal to visit every American state (33 down, 17 to go) and so I thought this would fit nicely into Challenge 10.  Besides that, I'm going to another signing event with Dirk, and I wanted to be able to tell him that I had actually read his book this time!

Comments:

This is a truly beautiful book. I can't remember the last time that I read a book from start to finish in one sitting, but I couldn't put this down. Without giving anything away, the intertwining and juxtaposition of two momentous events in Dirk Benedict's life, builds to a climax that is breathtaking, and both heartbreaking and heart warming. Think you now Dirk Benedict? Unless you read this book, you don't, and you never can.  It's now nearly two weeks since I finished reading this, and it is still touching my soul.  I think that it always will.

Challenge 10: A Book Set Somewhere You've Always Wanted To Visit

Ida's book: "The Kitchen Boy: A Novel of the last Tzar" by Robert Alexander (Penguin Books, 2004)

Originally I had wanted to read 'The Romanovs' by Simon Seberg but seeing as that book is incredibly long I decided to pick something a little lighter, given that I am supposed to be writing my MA thesis at the moment. Anyway, I've been interested in the Romanov family since I was around 10 years old, when the film Anastasia  came out: it was the first film I saw more than once in the cinema and I remember renting it on VHS so many times, before I finally got my own copy. So clearly this book had to take me pack to the Russian empire and why not do it with a murder mystery - or rather, a survival mystery. I am familiar with the narrative idea of a kitchen boy (because it was also used in the film) but other than that I didn't know much of those last few weeks; a fiction book is probably not the best informative tool, but I'm looking forward to it nonetheless.

Comments:

It was incredibly slow at first, and given that I'm going on a 2 week holiday to Canada later this month, I wanted, if possible, to finish this book before then. I therefore decided to get the boring bits over with and then read one chapter each night of the (hopefully) good ones. Well, suddenly I couldn't put the book down and I just had to finish it so I did... 5 hours later I was done. I have no idea how accurate the book is with regards to the family's life in that little house, but seeing as two corpses were never found, it's always interesting to see what a writer does with that kind of set up and I was not disappointed! I thought I had it sussed, but the final twist was very good and actually quite believable. So even though the book is a bit slow, the ending more than makes up for it!

Challenge 9: A Book With A Colour In The Title

Donna's book: "A Funny Thing Happened on the Way to the White House: Humor, Blunders, and Other Oddities from the Presidential Campaign Trail" by Charles Osgood (Hachette Books, 2008)

OK, I admit that I might have cheated slightly with the theme for this challenge, but white is definitely a colour!  Given the upcoming presidential election, and all the hatred that it seems to have generated, I thought that something that put the humour back into American elections might be just the tonic!

Comments:

This was such a disappointment.  It felt like Osgood got bored half way through writing this and lost interest.  There are some funny quotes but many of them needed more context or explanation to show why they'd been included.  There was a very basic summary of the themes for each election that provided a reasonably good overview but, as I often say to students, this reads more like a final draft than the finished product.

Challenge 9: A Book With A Colour In The Title

Ida's book: "Half of a Yellow Sun" by Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie (Knopf, 2006)

Since reading Adichie's "We Should All Be Feminist" for a reading group at my university, I wanted to read more of her writing and this book fit the bill perfectly. It's not what I would normally go for, but that's quite exiting and I can't wait to see what world the book (and author) will show me.

Comments:

Having never read anything about Nigeria or Biafra, this was an eye-opening reading experience for me! Sometimes I felt the book proceeded too slowly, but still I couldn't leave it for too long I simply had to know what would happen to the characters. It's such an amazing book I can't really do it justice, but I will definitely read more from Adichie. 

Challenge 8: A Book At The Bottom Of Your "To Be Read" Pile

Donna's Book: "The Life and Times of the Thunderbolt Kid: Travels Through my Childhood" by Bill Bryson (Transworld, 2010)

I confess.  I just want to read some more Bryson.  But I got this book back in 2010 when it first came out and I've never got around to reading it, so I think it fits well enough into this challenge.  Bill Bryson writes with both intelligence and humour, and he is the perfect antidote to the madness-that-is-end-of-year-marking!

Comments:

I finished reading this ages ago, but the end-of-year-marking madness, and then the trying-to-write-as-much-as-possible-for-the-new-book-over-the-summer madness rather took over!  As always, Bill is wonderful and I recommend this to anyone who wants a nostalgic, humorous and insightful look back at the 1950s.  In telling the story of his own growing up, he also tells the story of the way that America 'grew up.'  As such, I realised that while I was reading this, I was actually 'at work.'  This will be added to the list of recommended reading for my students who study cultural changes in the US during the Cold War.  I recommend it to you too!

Challenge 8: A Book At The Bottom Of Your "To Be Read" Pile

Ida's book: "Did She Kill Him? A Victorian Tale Of Deception, Adultery, And Arsenic" by Kate Colquhoun (The Overlook Press, 2014).

I bought this book last year in the local Oxfam charity shop and it's been sitting on my shelf ever since. I don't really have any expectations of what it'll be like, so this is something of a leap of faith (as it was when I bought it on a whim) but I'm ready for a (possibly) murderous woman from the Victorian era, so bring it on!

Comments:
Okay, so this book became a bit of an obsession for me, which I hadn't actually expected! First of all, it's set in Liverpool which was nice because I knew the places described in the book. It also managed to paint a picture of the Victorian era, by piecing together letters, transcripts and the like (always in italics so you knew these were the 'facts' as they were written down in the 1880s). Finally, the fate of this young woman, Florence Maybrick just kept me coming back for more and I was genuinely angry at the shoddy police work done at the time and the incompetent judge. These books about murder cases are curious things, as it would be quite easy to just look up whether she was sentenced or not, but I managed to steel myself and read through the book without looking up the case, which really is the only way of reading this kind of book, constantly asking yourself - yeah, but did she do it? Amazing book about a time when arsenic was simply everywhere and a the worst a woman could do was to have an affair.

Challenge 7: A Book By An Author You Love

Ida's book: "Harry Potter and the Philosopher's Stone" by J.K. Rowling (Bloomsbury, 1997)

So I'm well aware this challenge simply states "a book by an author you love" and not "a book you've read before" but I see no problem in re-reading and re-discovering old favourites, so that's what I'm doing this month. The first book came out in Denmark when I was 10 or 11 so it was the perfect age for me and I just fell in love with the whole concept. It's also a relatively short and easy read and I have multiple essays to write over the next month and a half so I needed something that I could properly relax with and I knew this book would be lovely to re-read.

Comments:

No surprises here, except that it was so lovely to rediscover Harry's world, and J.K. Rowling's wonderful writing. Quidditch was, and remains, the only sport I could ever get into.

Challenge 7: A Book By An Author You Love

Donna's Book: "The Road to Little Dribbling" by Bill Bryson (Transworld Publishers, 2015)

It wasn't hard for me to pick a book for this challenge.  I've always loved Bill Bryson's books and I've got about three that I haven't read so this challenge is the ideal opportunity to finally getting aroud to reading at least one of them!  I have to confess that I've already read the first few pages, and I laughed out loud at every single one of them.  I'm really looking forward to the next month!

Comments:

Because of the annual madness-that-is-end-of-year-marking, I had a feeling that I'd get a bit behind with the reading challenge, but that just means that I had longer to be entertained by Bill Bryson.  I'd post my favourite quotes from the book here, but that would mean that I'd had to type out virtually the whole book!  (And besides the time that would take, there is a teensy problem with copyright infringement if I do that.)  Suffice to say that I laughed out loud at virtually every page.  Mr Bryson has not lost his keen observational skills, or his comic touch in describing what he's seen and done.  This is brilliant from start to finish.  Do yourself a favour.  Read this book!!

Challenge 6: A Book By An Author You've Never Read Before

Ida's book: "The Summer Book" by Tove Jansson (Sort of Books, 2003 (org. 1974))

Although I've seen countless Moomin cartoons on the telly I've never actually read anything by Tove Jansson. One of my friends recommended me this though, so I'm gonna give it a go. I have absolutely no expectations for this book, but the cover is very nice, and someone who came up with the Moomins can't be a bad writer!

Comments:

For some reason I found it very difficult to finish this book, hence the belated post here. There is no overarching narrative, the chapters seem like they're dipping into the rich stories of summers spent on a tiny island in the Gulf of Finland. The young girl can be quite annoying at times but is also incredibly well-written and totally believable, as is her relationship with her grandmother who's sarcasm, wit and wisdom kept me reading the book, she really was the star of the story.

Challenge 6: A Book By An Author That You've Never Read Before

Donna's Book: "A Wilder Rose" by Susan Wittig Albert (Persevero Press, 2013)

I grew up reading Laura Ingalls Wilder's series of "Little House" books, and then relived all of them through the TV series.  I'm proud to say that I read the books first though.  So, when I came across this book, it had to go on my reading list.  It's a fictionalised account of the relationship between Laura Ingalls Wilder and her daughter, Rose, as they worked to publish the Little House books against the backdrop of the Great Depression.  Although Susan Albert declares it to be a work of fiction, it's based upon letters and private papers and so will also be biographical.  I'm hoping that this will make them very similar to the Little House series and will continue Laura's story told in her original series.

Comments:

I really loved this!  Although it's hard to always remember that this is a work of fiction, that may be because I wanted so much for it to be true.  The characters seem so real, with Albert bringing the letters and documents upon which this book is based truly to life.  What was so great is that the Laura in this book came across as a real human being, with all the flaws and frailties that humans have, rather than as a fictionalised heroine.  I think that, in reading this, I finally found the real Laura; the Laura that I was hoping to find.

The main storyline addressed the debate that has arisen in recent years over who was the true author of the Little House books -- whether it was Laura, or whether it was Rose.  Not having read anything on that subject, it's easy to be convinced by Albert's argument.  However, I'm not sure that it really matters to me who actually wrote the books.  They were written; that's enough for me.  What I found much more interesting was the way that this book delved into the relationship between a mother and her only child; how Rose clearly adored her mother and the conflict she felt between wanting to do everything that she could for her mother while at the same time living her own life.  If Rose sacrificed to write the Little House books, as Albert seemed to imply, then I got the impression that it was a sacrifice that Rose never, ever regretted.  To me, a greater understanding of that mother/daughter relationship is the real gem of this book.

Challenge 5: A Book Published This Year

Ida's book: "Destination Thailand (The Lonely Hearts Travel Club, Book 1)" by Katy Colins (Carina, 2016)

This proved to be rather a tricky challenge, and I ended up buying an ebook from the iBooks thingy on my iPad, mostly because I didn't fancy spending a lot of money on a newly published hardback book that I might not like, but also because it was easy and I didn't have to go into town (I can be so very lazy). 

I chose this one because it seems like a fairly standard 'chick-lit' book, in the same genre as Bridget Jones which I absolutely loved when the films came out, and which I have since analysed to death in my studies. I therefore begin this book with a mix of feelings: joy because it will be an easy read and provide some escape from the winter chill, and trepidation because I'm pretty sure I'll be annoyed at some point due to post-feminism and all that... so yeah, let's see what happens!

Comments:

So this book was pretty much exactly as I had anticipated: young woman who thinks herself ugly (but is standardly attractive according to the description) is dumped a week before her wedding and decides to go backpacking to find herself... yeah. Most of the time I was annoyed by the amount of stupid/silly things that were happening, not so much because they were unrealistic, but because I saw them coming a mile off - SPOILERS - that guy that's really into you? Yeah, he's after your money, surprise!

Anyway, the last 50 pages or so were pretty decent so it was a nice ending/setting up the main character for the next two books in the series. 

Challenge 5: A Book Published This Year

Donna's Book - "Star Wars: The Force Awakens" by Alan Dean Foster (Century, 2016)

As it's only January 22, I thought that choosing a book published in 2016 was a bit of a challenge but not only did I find one that has an official publication date of January 1, it also is one that I've been dying to read since December 17 last year!

I chose this book because I read the novelisations of the original Star Wars films back in the 1970s and 1980s, and they added so much depth and dimension to the storylines that they made me enjoy the films even more.  In fact, that may be why I love them so much, and have loved them for so long.  And yes, I admit that the main reason why I read the book of "The Return of the Jedi" was because it came out before the film and I couldn't wait any longer to find out who Yoda meant when he said "there is another Skywalker."

I absolutely loved the film of The Force Awakens, and I'm hoping that reading the book will have the same effect as in the past, and I'll end up loving it even more.  We shall see ...


Comments:

WARNING!!! SPOILER ALERT!!!

If you haven't seen "The Force Awakens" then read on at your peril.  There will be spoilers.  However, I hope that enough time has passed that nearly everyone will have seen the film who wanted to.

If you're a reader, and you loved the films, then this book is a must!  It adds depth to the storyline of the movies, and helped to fill in some of the gaps.  For example, right at the start there's an explanation as to why the happy ending at the end of the "The Return of the Jedi" didn't last, and how the First Order was able to rise and gain popularity and support.  Without solving the "who is Rey" debate, there are some tasty clues -- my favourite being Ren's gasp of "it is her!" during the epic lightsabre battle in the snow.

As I read on and on through the book, and got nearer and nearer to "that" moment, I got more and more nervous.  I think that's to the credit of Alan Dean Foster as well as the sheer emotion of what I knew was coming.  The writing was beautiful and really captured the depth and emotion of all the characters.  When Han and Leia shared one last look, when Han and Chewie looked at each other before Han stepped out to face his son, and when Han reached to take the lightsabre from Ben -- all three descriptions were almost too painful to bear.  If anything, I thought the book was even more emotional and sad than the film had been.  Sometimes adding depth to celluloid images is not easy to take!

Overall, then, a great read that really added an extra dimension to the movie.  I'm already looking forward to the novelisation of Star Wars VIII!

Challenge 4 - A Book Your Friend Loves

Donna's Book: "A Christmas Carol" by Charles Dickens 

(1843)
(Project Gutenberg E-Book, FREE, so no excuse)

For this challenge, I asked several friends for recommendations and ended up with a great list.  One of the suggestions, though was this book and, as I was reading over Christmas for this challenge, and as I'd never read the original book -- and just seen various versions of the film -- I felt like I should choose this one.

Comments:

I'm sure that there isn't anyone who doesn't know the story, but no matter how many film versions you've seen, there is absolutely no excuse (in my opinion) for not reading the book.  The original books are always best, and I wondered if that would hold true for A Christmas Carol, especially given how long ago it was written.

Well, of course it goes!  Books are always best.  But I admit that I will still be watching "The Muppet Christmas Carol" next Christmas Eve.  However, what really struck me was how the script to Muppet Christmas Carol follows the text of the book so closely, which is probably why Charles Dickens receives credit for the movie on IMDB!  Sometimes, you just can't improve on the original!

Seriously.  If you've never read the book then, along with watching your preferred version of the film next Christmas, give yourself a treat and read the book too.