Jump to content

Readwine

Member
  • Posts

    204
  • Joined

  • Last visited

Everything posted by Readwine

  1. Sue, sorry for the late response as I have not been on the site long enough to reply in these past weeks. Montefiore took a substantial amount of time describing and developing Sashenka
  2. Sashenka by Simon Montefiore Blurb from Amazon: Starred Review. Lauded historian Montefiore (Young Stalin) ventures successfully into fiction with the epic story of Sashenka Zeitlin, a privileged Russian Jew caught up in the romance of the Russian revolution and then destroyed by the Stalinist secret police. The novel's first section, set in 1916, describes how, under the tutelage of her Bolshevik uncle, Sashenka becomes a naive, idealistic revolutionary charmed by her role as a courier for the underground and rejecting her own bourgeois background. Skip forward to 1939, when Sashenka and her party apparatchik husband are at the zenith of success until Sashenka's [personal decision regarding] a disgraced writer leads to arrests and accusations; in vivid scenes of psychological and physical torture, Sashenka is forced to choose between her family, her lover and her cause. But as this section ends, many questions remain, and it is up to historian Katinka Vinsky in 1994 to find the answers to what really happened to Sashenka and her family. Montefiore's prose is unexciting, but the tale is thick and complex, and the characters' lives take on a palpable urgency against a wonderfully realized backdrop. I finally came to this book as my TBR pile dwindled slowly. I was really looking forward to indulging in a large tome of historical fiction, but unfortunately I came away a little disappointed. Montefiore undertook a massive span of history. From 1916 to 1994, Russia saw tremendous changes. To be able to encapsulate all of it in a novel is very hard. I think he tried to do it through his main character, Sashenka, by focusing on her development as a pristine Bolshevik and Comrade, and her experiences as she fell in the clutches of the secret police. Factually, I think he succeeded. Emotionally, however, he paints Sashenka (and most of the other characters) as totally self-centered and uncaring. This really disturbed me. There seemed to be no empathy in that world at all, and I just could not believe it. I felt that the terror and despair of the Stalin era was treated in the novel as a newspaper clipping, to be read and forgotten. It seemed that none of Montefiore
  3. Sashenka by Simon Montefiore Blurb from Amazon: Starred Review. Lauded historian Montefiore (Young Stalin) ventures successfully into fiction with the epic story of Sashenka Zeitlin, a privileged Russian Jew caught up in the romance of the Russian revolution and then destroyed by the Stalinist secret police. The novel's first section, set in 1916, describes how, under the tutelage of her Bolshevik uncle, Sashenka becomes a naive, idealistic revolutionary charmed by her role as a courier for the underground and rejecting her own bourgeois background. Skip forward to 1939, when Sashenka and her party apparatchik husband are at the zenith of success until Sashenka's [personal decision regarding] a disgraced writer leads to arrests and accusations; in vivid scenes of psychological and physical torture, Sashenka is forced to choose between her family, her lover and her cause. But as this section ends, many questions remain, and it is up to historian Katinka Vinsky in 1994 to find the answers to what really happened to Sashenka and her family. Montefiore's prose is unexciting, but the tale is thick and complex, and the characters' lives take on a palpable urgency against a wonderfully realized backdrop. I finally came to this book as my TBR pile dwindled slowly. I was really looking forward to indulging in a large tome of historical fiction, but unfortunately I came away a little disappointed. Montefiore undertook a massive span of history. From 1916 to 1994, Russia saw tremendous changes. To be able to encapsulate all of it in a novel is very hard. I think he tried to do it through his main character, Sashenka, by focusing on her development as a pristine Bolshevik and Comrade, and her experiences as she fell in the clutches of the secret police. Factually, I think he succeeded. Emotionally, however, he paints Sashenka (and most of the other characters) as totally self-centered and uncaring. This really disturbed me. There seemed to be no empathy in that world at all, and I just could not believe it. I felt that the terror and despair of the Stalin era was treated in the novel as a newspaper clipping, to be read and forgotten. It seemed that none of Montefiore’s characters acted or reacted with outrage, despair, unbelief, terror. They just kept going on in their little lives. It is not until we meet, Katinka, the modern historian, that I felt the author gave the Stalin horror’s a voice – at least someone commenting on the injustices, the sadness. She demanded answers. I give it a 6/10
  4. You are absolutely right - really original. I just finished it late, late last night. Looking forward to the next one. Lisbeth is such an extraordinary character. Very, very original. I had no idea Larsson is deceased. What a pity he did not live to see all his success. Does anyone know if you can get the Swedish film version with English subs. If Brad Pitt plays Blomquist in the American version - what a pity. Let's hope not. He is too plastic for my taste, and Blomquist is a complex character. I am going to really savour the remaining books. You are right Janet, cracking read.
  5. I just started this one and from your review and all I've read and can't wait until tonight (I shall have a little time to devote ot it) Yeahhhh.
  6. Sooo hard: 1. Jane Eyre - Charlotte Bronte 2. 1984 - George Orwell 3. Frankenstein - Mary Shelley 4. Short Stories - Horacio Quiroga 5. The Painted Bird - Jerzy Kosinski
  7. 2010 TBR LIST Purple Hibiscus Chimamanda Adichie Never Have Your Dog Stuffed Alan Alda The Sacred Scripture Sebastian Barry Jane Eyre Charlotte Brontee (reread) Incidents in the Rue Laugier Anita Brookner The Misalliance Anita Brookner Sacred Games Vikram Chandra The Luminous Life of Lily Aphrodite Beatrice Colin The Darwin Conspiracy John Darnton The Gargoyle Andrew Davidson The Welsh Girl Peter Ho Davies The Paris Enigma Pablo de Santis A Guide to the Birds of East Africa Nicholas Drayson Birdsong Sebastian Faulks The We Came to the End Joshua Ferris Love Among the Butterflies Margaret Fountaine The Victoria Vanishes Christopher Fowler Hanna's Daughters Marianne Fredriksson In the Woods Tana French The Way of the World David Fromkin The Cellist of Sarajevo Steven Galloway Sea of Poppies Amitav Ghosh A Reliable Wife by Robert Goolrick The Maltese Falcon Dashiell Hammett Imperium Robert Harris Notes on a Scandal Zoe Heller The Talented Mr. Ripley Patricia Highsmith The Fatal Shore Robert Hughes Love in the Present Tense Catherine R. Hyde Innocent Blood PD James Mister Pip Lloyd Jones Endurance Alfred Lansing Palace Walk Naguib Mahfouz Midaq Alley Naquib Mahfouz The Mozart Conspiracy Scott Mariani The Rose of Sebastopol Katharine McMahon Under Fishbone Clouds by Sam Meekings Be a Pack Leader Cesar Millan A Member of the Family Cesar Millan Becoming Madame Mao Anchee Min Mexican High Liza Monro Felix in the Underworld John Mortimer The House at Riverton Kate Morton Starter for Ten by David Nicholls Star of the Sea Joseph O'Connor Inishowen Joseph O'Connor Out Stealing Horses Per Petterson The Circular Staircase Mary R. Rinehart Shantaram Gregory Roberts The Interpretation of Murder Jed Rubenfeld The Visible World Mark Slouka Longitude Dana Sobel The Case for Christ Lee Strobel Mrs. Miniver Jan Struther Cloudstreet Tim Winton The Story of Edgar Sawtelle David Wroblewski The Ginger Tree Oswald Wynd The Shack William P. Young
  8. In 2009, I challenged myself to read 52 books. I only made it to 44, but still proud of myself of that accomplishment. This is the most books I've ever read in a year (notwithstanding the years in university) and I owe it to the motivation BCF provides. Thank you. For 2010, I am reasserting that challenge 1. Shashenka by Simon Montefiore 6/10 2. The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo by Stieg Larsson 9.5/10 3. The Girl Who Played with Fire by Stieg Larsson 9/10 4. The Brutal Telling by Louise Penny 8/10 5. Remarkable Creatures by Tracy Chevalier 8.5/10 6. The Sweetness at the Bottom of the Pie by Alan Bradley 10/10 7. The Crossing Places by Elly Griffiths 9/10 8. Forty Words for Sorrow by Giles Blunt 2/10 9. The Broken Shore by Peter Temple 3/10 10. Alice I Have Been by Melanie Benjamin 8.5/10 11. The Water Room by Christopher Fowler 8/10 12. Through Black Spruce by Joseph Boyden 9/10 13. Wolf Hall by Hilary Mantel 6/10 14. The Other Bolelyn Girl by Phillippa Gregory 9.5/10 15. Shutter Island by Dennis Lehane 6/10 16. Dissolution by CJ Sansom 8/10 17. The Swan Thieves by Elizabeth Kostova 10/10 18. The Man from Beijing by Henning Mankell 0/10 19. The Princess of Burundi by Kjell Eriksson 3/10 20. The Postmistress by Sarah Blake 8/10 21. Heresy by SJ Parris 8.5/10 22. Dark Fire by CJ Sansom 9/10 23. Solar by Ian McEwan 8/10 24. Gone with the Wind by Margaret Mitchell 10/10 25. The Bridge of San Luis Rey by Thornton Wilder 10/10 26. The Chemistry of Death by Simon Beckett 8/10 27. Sovereign by CJ Sansom 9/10 28. The Girl Who Kicked the Hornet's Nest by Stieg Larsson 9.5/10 29. Written in Bone by Simon Beckett 7.5/10 30. Revelation by CJ Sansom 9/10 31. Malinche by Laura Esquivel 5/10 32. The Little Stranger by Sarah Waters 8.5/10 33. The Bishop's Man by Linden MacIntyre 8.5/10 34. Pearl in China by Anchee Min 9/10 35. Watership Down by Richard Adams 8.5/10 36. The Portrait by Iain Pears 6/10 37. The Glass Palace by Amitav Ghosh 9/10 38. The Weed that Strings the Hangman's Bag by Alan Bradley 9.5/10 39. The Thorn Birds by Colleen McCullough 8.5/10 40. Blacklands by Belinda Bauer 7/10 41. Four Fires by Bruce Courtney 8.5/10 42. Gallows View by Peter Robinson 8/10 43. A Dedicated Man by Peter Robinson 8/10 44. The Religion by Tim Willows 5/10 45. A Bend in the River by V.S. Naipaul 9/10 46. A Necessary End by Peter Robinson 8/10 47. The Hanging Valley by Peter Robinson 8/10
  9. Here is my link to be closed. Thank you. http://bookclubforum.co.uk/forum/showthread.php?t=9111&highlight=readwine
  10. The Disappeared by M.R. Hall Brief Summary from Amazon: In the bestselling tradition of Patricia Cornwell's Kay Scarpetta, M. R. Hall's heroine Jenny Cooper makes her debut as a coroner with a detective's eye and a woman with a home life as complicated as her cases. In this brilliant debut, Jenny investigates the disappearance of two young Muslim students, who vanished without a trace seven years ago. The police had concluded that the boys, under surveillance for some time for suspicion of terrorism, had fled to Pakistan to traffic in the atrocities of Islamic fanaticism. Now, sufficient time has passed for the law to declare the boys legally dead. A final declaration is left up to a coroner, Jenny Cooper. As Jenny's official inquest progresses, the stench of corruption is unmistakable. Not only does it appear that British Security Services played a role, but the involvement of an American intelligence agent soon makes it clear that a vast conspiracy is in play. As Jenny builds an ever-strengthening case implicating a shocking collection of power and influence, she meets with a determined and increasingly menacing resistance. When she links the students' "vanishing" to the unidentified corpse of a beautiful young woman and the fate of a missing nuclear scientist, Jenny is forced into an arena in which she is pushed to the breaking point and beyond. She must struggle with her own inner demons while fighting a lone and desperate battle to bring an unspeakable crime to justice. This second book in the series was very good and kept you wanting to arrive at the resolution. Hall further develops the character of Jenny, showing her fragility and fury a little more and manages to enlarge the supporting cast a little more. I loved the character of Alec McAvoy: down, dirty and brilliant. Again, being a series, The Disappeared leaves you with a HUGE OMG at the end. Hurry, Mr. Hall, I want more
  11. The Coroner by M.R. Hall Brief Summary from Amazon: Many are the debuts in the crime fiction field that create a brief flurry of interest then sink without trace. It’s a fairly safe bet, however, that MR Hall’s The Coroner won’t suffer that fate – this is a fresh and original piece of work that is already gleaning a fair measure of praise. Hall has worked extensively in television on such successful series as Judge John Deed, Kavanagh QC and Dalziel and Pascoe, and the expertise gained there is parleyed into very impressive results here. The beleaguered heroine, Jenny Cooper, is not in the best of shape. She has been recently divorced, and has suffered a nervous breakdown. But Jenny is hoping that her new job – Coroner for the Severn Vale -- will get her life back on an even keel. Living on a desperate diet of anti-depressants and downers, she finds herself involved in looking into something worrying: the deaths of several teenagers at local detention centres. Has her predecessor neglected some crucial information in this area? As Jenny digs deeper, she encounters a solid wall of bureaucratic resistance. But however screwed up her own life is, Jenny is not going to give up on the uphill task she’s set herself. We have, of course, encountered the troubled, damaged protagonist before, many times – both in male and female form. But such is M R Hall’s skill that even in this over-familiar territory, clich
  12. Chesilbeach, The Lacuna was a bit of a muddy field, but I HIGHLY recommend The Poisonwood Bible by Kingsolver. It is not as historically detailed as The Lacuna so the story flows much better. It is a bit of a hefty tome, but I could not put it down and did not want it to finish. Here is a little blurb from Amazon: The Poisonwood Bible follows an evangelical Baptist minister's family to the Congo in the late 1950s, entwining their fate with that of the country during three turbulent decades. Nathan Price's determination to convert the natives of the Congo to Christianity is, we gradually discover, both foolhardy and dangerous, unsanctioned by the church administration and doomed from the start by Nathan's self-righteousness. Fanatic and sanctimonious, Nathan is a domestic monster, too, a physically and emotionally abusive, misogynistic husband and father. He refuses to understand how his obsession with river baptism affronts the traditions of the villagers of Kalinga, and his stubborn concept of religious rectitude brings misery and destruction to all. Cleverly, Kingsolver never brings us inside Nathan's head but instead unfolds the tragic story of the Price family through the alternating points of view of Orleanna Price and her four daughters. Cast with her young children into primitive conditions but trained to be obedient to her husband, Orleanna is powerless to mitigate their situation. Meanwhile, each of the four Price daughters reveals herself through first-person narration, and their rich and clearly differentiated self-portraits are small triumphs. Rachel, the eldest, is a self-absorbed teenager who will never outgrow her selfish view of the world or her tendency to commit hilarious malapropisms. Twins Leah and Adah are gifted intellectually but are physically and emotionally separated by Adah's birth injury, which has rendered her hemiplagic. Leah adores her father; Adah, who does not speak, is a shrewd observer of his monumental ego. The musings of five- year-old Ruth May reflect a child's humorous misunderstanding of the exotic world to which she has been transported. By revealing the story through the female victims of Reverend Price's hubris, Kingsolver also charts their maturation as they confront or evade moral and existential issues and, at great cost, accrue wisdom in the crucible of an alien land. It is through their eyes that we come to experience the life of the villagers in an isolated community and the particular ways in which American and African cultures collide. As the girls become acquainted with the villagers, especially the young teacher Anatole, they begin to understand the political situation in the Congo: the brutality of Belgian rule, the nascent nationalism briefly fulfilled in the election of the short-lived Patrice Lumumba government, and the secret involvement of the Eisenhower administration in Lumumba's assassination and the installation of the villainous dictator Mobutu. In the end, Kingsolver delivers a compelling family saga, a sobering picture of the horrors of fanatic fundamentalism and an insightful view of an exploited country crushed by the heel of colonialism and then ruthlessly manipulated by a bastion of democracy. The book is also a marvelous mix of trenchant character portrayal, unflagging narrative thrust and authoritative background detail. The disastrous outcome of the forceful imposition of Christian theology on indigenous natural faith gives the novel its pervasive irony; but humor is pervasive, too, artfully integrated into the children's misapprehensions of their world; and suspense rises inexorably as the Price family's peril and that of the newly independent country of Zaire intersect. Kingsolver moves into new moral terrain in this powerful, convincing and emotionally resonant novel. Gosh. I might have to reread it I highly recommend it.
  13. The Lacuna by Barbara Kingsolver Brief Summary from Amazon: Starred Review. Kingsolver's ambitious new novel, her first in nine years (after the The Poisonwood Bible), focuses on Harrison William Shepherd, the product of a divorced American father and a Mexican mother. After getting kicked out of his American military academy, Harrison spends his formative years in Mexico in the 1930s in the household of Diego Rivera; his wife, Frida Kahlo; and their houseguest, Leon Trotsky, who is hiding from Soviet assassins. After Trotsky is assassinated, Harrison returns to the U.S., settling down in Asheville, N.C., where he becomes an author of historical potboilers and is later investigated as a possible subversive. Narrated in the form of letters, diary entries and newspaper clippings, the novel takes a while to get going, but once it does, it achieves a rare dramatic power that reaches its emotional peak when Harrison wittily and eloquently defends himself before the House Un-American Activities Committee (on the panel is a young Dick Nixon). “Employed by the American imagination,” is how one character describes Harrison, a term that could apply equally to Kingsolver as she masterfully resurrects a dark period in American history with the assured hand of a true literary artist. Kingsolver is one of my most favorite writers: her descriptions, whether landscape, actions, or psychological ambivalence, are terrific. I was very much looking forward to reading this novel as her previous one, The Poisonwood Bible, was outstanding, and it has been nine years of waiting. Additionally, the fact that The Lacuna is set during a very dramatic time in Mexico’s history as well as deals with very true life dramatic personages (Diego Rivera, Frida Kahlo and Leon Trotsky), I could not wait to get started. Unfortunately, the format of the novel, narrated in the form of letters, diary entries and newspaper clippings, really interrupted the flow of the story though it is an interesting technique (maybe not for 500+ pages). The story is well researched and does give the reader motivation to find out a little more about Trotsky’s time in Mexico, Stalin’s hatred of him and Frida Kahlo’s life and psychology, as well as the American era of McCarthyism (the politically motivated practice of making accusations of disloyalty, subversion, or treason without proper regard for evidence). The main character, however, is Harrison Shepherd, a fictional figure. The story of The Lacuna is really his, but in the end it is the story of Trotsky, Kahlo and American McCarthyism as Shepherd never really develops into a character of any substance. He serves merely as a reporter for the other personages in the novel and he ends up being insipid and bland. I think Kingsolver forgot to give him a spine. Pity really. At any rate, the novel is worth a read. I was just a little disappointed. I give the book 8 out of 10
  14. Sue, Sashenka by Simon Montefiore in on my TBR list (near the top ). So I am glad it affected you so. For me, I would have to say there were two books that surprised me this year: The Guernsey Literary and Potato Peel Pie Society by Mary Ann Shaffer and The Help by Kathryn Stockett. The only way I can described them in one word is "Lovely." Absolutely lovely surprises.
  15. Definitely The English Patient (book by Michael Ontdaatje). The film was sublime. The book....okay
  16. Santa came, Santa came. Thank you, Thank you. I will admit I opened my pressie as I cannot resist surprises. I must have been good this year because Santa brought me Purple Hibiscus by Chimamanda Adichie. I can't wait to start it. I looove what I call cultural novels. Novels set in different cultures and countries, giving you insight and inspiring interest. Thank you, thank you Santa Here is a little blurb from Amazon: By turns luminous and horrific, this debut ensnares the reader from the first page and lingers in the memory long after its tragic end. First-person narrator Kambili Achike is a 15-year-old Nigerian girl growing up in sheltered privilege in a country ravaged by political strife and personal struggle. She and her brother, Jaja, and their quiet mother, who speaks "the way a bird eats, in small amounts," live this life of luxury because Kambili's father is a wealthy man who owns factories, publishes a politically outspoken newspaper and outwardly leads the moral, humble life of a faithful Catholic. The many grateful citizens who have received his blessings and material assistance call him omelora, "The One Who Does for the Community." Yet Kambili, Jaja and their mother see a side to their provider no one else does: he is also a religious fanatic who regularly and viciously beats his family for the mildest infractions of his interpretation of an exemplary Christian life. The children know better than to discuss their home life with anyone else; "there was so much that we never told." But when they are unexpectedly allowed to visit their liberated and loving Aunty Ifeoma, a widowed university professor raising three children, family secrets and tensions bubble dangerously to the surface, setting in motion a chain of events that allow Kambili to slowly blossom as she begins to question the authority of the precepts and adults she once held sacred. In a soft, searing voice, Adichie examines the complexities of family, faith and country through the haunted but hopeful eyes of a young girl on the cusp of womanhood. Lush, cadenced and often disconcerting, this is an accomplished first effort.
  17. The Adventures of Charles The Well Travelled Bear by Esmerelda Little Flame
  18. Granted. You are now the fastest drummer in the world and will not be caught by waiting anglers. The official name of a drummer is "eastern rock blackfish", but few anglers use that title, and it tends to cause confusion with the closely related luderick or blackfish (G. tricuspidata). East coast anglers also commonly call the black drummer a "pig". I wish that I could rescue more greyhounds.
  19. Santa, I've been sort of good this year (no particular order) 1. The Chemistry of Death - Simon Beckett 2. Wives of the Fishermen - Angela Huth 3. Under Fishbone Clouds - Sam Meekings 4. Mystery Man by Colin Bateman 5. Purple Hibiscus - Chimamanda Adichie I am in Texas and will post worlwide
  20. Lucy, I am not familiar with most of the books you have listed. I would suggest that you not waste your voucher of Her Fearful Symmetry. I would wait till you see it in a Charity Shop. As to The 19th Wife, in my opinion it is worth a read. Prior to reading that book, I must confess my knowledge of the Mormon religion was naught, so I can only assume that the biographical data in the book is true. It is very interesting, though its presentation in the book is quite dry and repetitive. I am glad, however, to have read the book. I found the modern storyline a little more gripping, but not very satisfying as a murder mystery. It shown a bright light, however, on the destructiveness of polygamy. All in all, though I struggled to get through the book at times (pretty hefty tome), I am glad I read it; it presents a very interesting topic.
×
×
  • Create New...