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bree's log : 2013


bree

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Yes I agree. Where did you buy this edition? Great review, I read 'I Capture the Castle' last year and enjoyed it.

 

It is lovely isn't it? :)

 

It is a 2012 Vintage Children's Classic

 

It's got a rather larger-than-usual font-size and some questions at the back to test children :D

 

(I got it from a wonderful online store here in India)

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It is lovely isn't it? :)

 

It is a 2012 Vintage Children's Classic

 

It's got a rather larger-than-usual font-size and some questions at the back to test children :D

 

(I got it from a wonderful online store here in India)

 

And it's only 5.99 I might have to get this! (even though I have a copy already :blush2: )

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And it what seems like a co-incidence, I have started on White Fang by Jack London :)

(chaliepud, I'm sure you've read this one)

 

Sorry just saw this Bree, and no, I haven't read it though it's always been on my radar, how are you finding it? It's now on my wish list and I'm considering getting it for my kobo sometime soon, thanks for reminding me about it! :)

 

EDIT: I've just downloaded it for free onto my kobo, I'll get to it soon. :)

Edited by chaliepud
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Wow! I didn't know they could be so big!

(I remember reading about "Grey Wolf" from my Russian fairy-tales book as a child - so always assumed they were found in Russia!)

 

And yes, it was winter - early March - but still cold - when we went to Darjeeling.

And the enclosure was bigger than what the pictures portray.

 

You're a dear chaliepud. Your love for four-legged beasts is inspiring :flowers2:

 

Oh, I'm glad their enclosure was a bigger than it looked, wolves do so need a place to go where they cannot be seen.. I'm sure the grey wolves do exist in Russia, in fact I think they have one of the largest populations of wild wolves, including of course the Siberian Wolves, which are simply stunning! :)

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And it's only 5.99 I might have to get this! (even though I have a copy already :blush2: )

:lol:

Perhaps you could give away the copy you have now to someone who'd like to read it.

Then you wouldn't feel so guilty about getting a new one. :)

 

Sorry just saw this Bree, and no, I haven't read it though it's always been on my radar, how are you finding it? It's now on my wish list and I'm considering getting it for my kobo sometime soon, thanks for reminding me about it! :)

 

EDIT: I've just downloaded it for free onto my kobo, I'll get to it soon. :)

Haven't read much yet, chaliepud - but does feel like an interesting book.

Great that you got an e-copy of it - I'm sure you'll really like it :)

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5.
TheUpstairsRoom_JohannaReiss_zpsc3874721.jpg

The Upstairs Room
Johanna Reiss


First Published: 1972
Awards: American Library Assocation (ALA) Notable Book, Newbery Honor (1973), Buxtehuder Bulle (1975), Jane Addams Children's Book Award

Setting: Netherlands, 1939 - 1945

Synopsis (from behind the book):
"Annie, what’s the first thing you want to do when we’re free?"
"Get a bike and go for a ride - a long one."

Ten year old Annie de Leeuw doesn't understand what's going on. Ever since the Germans invaded her town, Annie's life has been in a turmoil. Her friends have stopped speaking to her, she's not allowed in school anymore and now she must leave her family and go into hiding. These horrible things are happening simply because Annie is Jewish!

The Upstairs Room is the author's moving account of her own experiences as a young girl during World War II.

Thoughts:
At the start of it, I thought the book won't be as sad as Anne Frank's Diary was - because you know the author survived.
Yet it was.
Where Anne Frank's book was full of life and optimism and hope - this one is quiet, deeply still and sad - and moves you with its inactivity and bleakness.

To think of a couple of sisters - one on the brink of adulthood - and the other only a child - torn away from their family, friends, and all that's familiar and normal - and to be cooped for two years without sunlight - without answers - and almost without hope - is grim.
This book is told through the eyes of the little girl - who wonders why suddenly her friends shun her at school, why father no longer has time for her, why Jews need to hide, why black hair is dangerous, and why the adults in her life are but human...

Yes, this is another book about The Holocaust and its absolute horror.
Can there ever be enough written? And can one ever read enough?

Extract-
This is a bit from the Introduction, and it really touched me with its simplicity and sincerity-

"I have not tried to write a historical book, although it may have some historical value. What I did try to write was a simple, human book, in which my sister and I suffered and complained, and sometimes found fault with the Gentile family that took us in for a few years, in which the members of that family were not heroes but people, with strengths and weaknesses."

 

Rating: ★★ - I liked it

Edited by bree
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That sounds interesting! I've never heard of it but it sounds like a nice book. That said, I'm ashamed to admit I haven't actually read The Diary of Ann Frank in its entirety (just bits of it for history lessons etc).

Nothing to be ashamed of :)

We all have our own routes before we get to a particular book :)

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Bree

It's books like the last couple you've read which makes us see one of the reasons that books are so important. If it weren't for these books being written that tell of something that happend in the past ,we'd never learn from history,but be more inclined to repeat it .

It's too bad you didn't enjoy the one very much.Ihave read books like that myself, where the writing isn't that good, or maybe it's just not the type of writing I like,but the story they are trying to portray is an important one .

Hopefully, especially in that person's case, she will have voiced her opinion,which others are trying to silence,but she is getting it out to the world. It sure would be nice to see the day come when people are ALL free to do that without fear of persecution .

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Bree

It's books like the last couple you've read which makes us see one of the reasons that books are so important. If it weren't for these books being written that tell of something that happend in the past ,we'd never learn from history,but be more inclined to repeat it .

It's too bad you didn't enjoy the one very much.Ihave read books like that myself, where the writing isn't that good, or maybe it's just not the type of writing I like,but the story they are trying to portray is an important one .

Hopefully, especially in that person's case, she will have voiced her opinion,which others are trying to silence,but she is getting it out to the world. It sure would be nice to see the day come when people are ALL free to do that without fear of persecution .

You've put that perfectly julie.

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And you're a sweetheart

I can't call the books "used" as they've been treated with a lot of care and preserved wonderfully.

And I can't say "second-handed", as I have a strong suspicion they are not just that :D

 

Wise words, all around :D

 

The Moonstone

Wilkie Collins

 

A great review on The Moonstone, bree, thanks! I have a copy of it but it's a very old hardback and it's heavy and big... In a way I love it that it's so old and distinguished, but on the other hand I'd like to have an easier to read copy. Anyhow. I started reading the book some time ago but couldn't get to it. I'm hoping it's just one of those cases where I wasn't in the right mood for that particular book, and the right time will come later. Your review has made me more convinced of this, and maybe next time I won't feel so scared about starting the novel :blush:

 

I hope you will find more books by Collins to read! :)

 

"Devi" is brilliant!

It means "Goddess" in Sanskrit - and every time I see the "A Devi Creation" watermark on your pictures, it makes me smile and think "Indeed it is" :)

 

Wow, that's brilliant! Devi should be pleased :D

 

Nothing to be ashamed of :)

We all have our own routes before we get to a particular book :)

 

Well said, bree :smile2:

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^^ Thank you for your lovely comments frankie :)

 

Completed White Fang - my first 3-star book of the year.

(I hope to be back later and put down my thoughts on it)

 

Thought I could squeeze in one more book before starting on The Woman in Black - for February's Reading Circle.

 

Have picked up Sula by Toni Morrison. I've been curious about her for a while now - there are no less than five of her books appearing in the 1001 Book List!

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6.
WhiteFang_JackLondon_zpsdd231090.jpg

White Fang
Jack London

First published: 1905
Setting: mostly "Northland Wild" - a region in the Arctic

Synopsis (from behind the book):
White Fang is part dog, part wolf - and the only one of five tiny cubs to survive. In his lonely world, he soon learns to follow the harsh law of the North - kill or be killed.
But nothing in White Fang's life can prepare him for the cruel owner who buys him and turns him into a vicious killer- a pit dog forced to fight for money.
Will White Fang ever know the kindness of a gentle master or will he die a fierce killer?

Thoughts:
My sister is the one in the family who has a deep connection with animals - and almost every few days she keeps rescuing strays off the street - and I just accept their presence as long as they don't annoy me (and do my bit by feeding them when she's not around.)
So, me being the way I am, I wasn't too sure how much I could get into White Fang - and how much I would enjoy it.

It started off a little vaguely and bit by bit it, slowly, but surely, it drew me in.
I was mesmerised by the intensity of the writing. The book demanded my concentration and the deeply descriptive words painted startling images in my mind. I could actually get into the skin of White Fang, and his (3/4 wolf and 1/4 dog) mind. There were bits of the book which brought lumps in my throat, which made me clench with anger, and even smile with joy. It is splendidly written and the pages certainly gripped me.
(I can only image how much more a person like my sister, or chaliepud, or any of you who feel so much more for animals than I do, will enjoy it)

Apart from brilliantly letting us see Life through the acute senses of a wolf from the wild, White Fang raises some important questions-
How much of who we are is instinct?
How much of it is because of the "moulding" from our environment?
Do we have it in us to give others the benefit of the doubt, to extend our kindness at the hope that that even someone seemingly-cruel can blossom?

White Fang, to me, is a classic.

Passages from the book:
There are lots of bits in the book which left me filled with wonder, and sometimes, even breathless, at their sheer intensity.
These are a few I could pick out (having not marked them while reading)-

The aim of life was meat. Life itself was meat. Life lived on life. There were the eaters and the eaten. The law was: EAT OR BE EATEN. He did not formulate the law in clear, set terms and moralise about it. He did not even think the law; he merely lived the law without thinking about it at all.
....
Had the cub thought in man-fashion, he might have epitomised life as a voracious appetite and the world as a place wherein ranged a multitude of appetites, pursuing and being pursued, hunting and being hunted, eating and being eaten, all in blindness and confusion, with violence and disorder, a chaos of gluttony and slaughter, ruled over by chance, merciless, planless, endless.


This was a female of his kind, and it was a law of his kind that the males must not fight the females. He did not know anything about this law, for it was no generalisation of the mind, not a something acquired by experience of the world. He knew it as a secret prompting, as an urge of instinct - of the same instinct that made him howl at the moon and stars of nights, and that made him fear death and the unknown.

 

Rating: ★★★ - I loved it

Edited by bree
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You should be able to see them now Janet :)

(And I love "prettyful")

Thanks - it worked so I was able to see your lovely pictures. :) I use prettyful a lot! :D Have you read Call of the Wild by Jack London too?

 

I love your review of The Upstairs Room by Johanna Reiss. :)

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Hi Bree, I enjoyed all your latest reviews . Glad that you did like I Capture The Castle so much after all the trouble you went to to get hold of your copy.

Thank you vodkafan - I enjoyed reading your thoughts on it on the Reading Circle thread :smile:

 

I use prettyful a lot! :D Have you read Call of the Wild by Jack London too?

prettyful has a lovely happy ring to it! (I often wish beautiful was spelt beautyful :) )

 

Great review of White Fang. I've heard of it of course, but didn't know anything about the story. Bought it for my Kindle - well, downloaded it as it was free.

I hope you like it too bobblybear :friends3:

 

Have you read Call of the Wild by Jack London too?

Glad to see you liked White Fang, have you read Call of the Wild by the same author? That's definitely on my list!

This is my first book by Jack London - I would like to read Call of the Wild - should try and get it.

 

I didn't read much of your White Fang review Bree, I'll pop back once I've read it myself, I should be getting to it over the next week or so, I'm hoping I'll like it as much as you did, I'm just worried its going to be too sad!!

:friends0: I so sorry it left you so sad chaliepud

 

 

If it helps it all comes together very nicely for White Fang towards the end - the last third of the book he meets a lovely man who treats him love, care and dignity. And White Fang dedicates his soul to him. He even goes with him to live in his house in US, and the book ends with him fathering a frisky litter :)

(Though before all this - he goes through worse things than what you read - so it was a good thing that you stopped reading when you did)

 

 

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