Ronny's 2008 Reading List

[Ronny]

June

51. Songs In Ordinary Time by Mary McGarry Morris 5/10

50. Island of the Sequined Love Nun by Christopher Moore 5/10

49. Cries Unheard, Why Children Kill by Gitta Sereny 4/10

 

May

48. Coyote Blue by Christopher Moore 7/10

47. The Five People You Meet In Heaven by Mitch Album 4/10

46. The Monsters of Templeton by Laura Groff 6/10

45. I Know This Much Is True by Wally Lamb 6/10

44. The Center of Everything by Laura Moriarty 7/10

43. Memory by Philippe Grimbert 8/10

42. Open House by Elizabeth Berg 6/10

41. Dogs of Babel by Carolyn Parkhurst 5/10

 

April

40. What I loved by Siri Hustvedt 6/10

39. On The Edge of the Woods by Diane Tyrrel 6/10

38. Don't Know Much About History by Kenneth C. Davis 8/10

37. Poplorica by Martin J. Smith and Patrick J. Kiger 7/10

36. A Million Little Pieces by James Frey 4/10

35.Jacob's Ladder, A Story of Virginia During the War by Donald McCaig 5/10

34.Madame Bovary by Gustave Flaubert 6/10

33.In The Company of The Courtesan by Sarah Dunant 5/10

 

March

32.The Book Thief by Markus Zusak 7/10

31.The Woman In White by Wilkie Collins 8/10

30.The Know-It-All: One Man's Humble Quest to Become the Smartest Person in the World by A.J. Jacobs 8/10

29. Gentlemen & Players by Joanne Harris 8/10

28.Gods Behaving Badly by Marie Phillips 7/10

27.Big Stone Gap by Adriana Trigiani 7/10

26.Wonderland by Joyce Carol Oates 4/10

25.Holy Cow by Sarah Macdonald 6/10

24.To My Daughter In France by Barbara & Stephanie Keating 9/10

 

February

23.Broken For You by Stephanie Kallos 6/10

22.The Autograph Man by Zadie Smith 5/10

21.All Creatures Great and Small by James Herriot 8/10

20.Windflower by Nick Bantock 6/10

19.Black Swan Green by David Mitchell 6/10

18.Inkspell by Cornelia Funke 7/10

17.Confessions of a Deathmaiden by Ruth Francisco 5/10

16.The Lessons Of Terror by Caleb Carr 7/10

15.The Ladies of Grace Adieu and Other Stories by Susanna Clarke 7/10

14.A Thousand Splendid Suns by Khaled Hosseini 6/10

13.The Worst Thing I've Done by Ursula Hegi 5/10

12.No Country For Old Men by Cormac McCarthy 6/10

 

January

11.Good Grief by Lolly Winston 8/10

10.Tales of Burning Love by Louise Erdrich 5/10

9.Sleep, Pale Sister by Joanne Harris 8/10

8. Captives of Time by Malcolm Bosse 5/10

7.The Samurai's Garden by Gail Tsukiyama 8/10

6.On Beauty by Zadie Smith 6/10

5.Clash of Kings by George R. R. Martin 8/10

4.Inkheart by Cornelia Funke 6/10

3.Lilith by George MacDonald 4/10

2.The Forest Lover by Susan Vreeland 6/10

1.White Teeth by Zadie Smith 6/10

 

Unfinished

 

Mrs. de Winter by Susan Hill ( Didn't care for it at all, gave up about 60 pages in)

 

We Were The Mulvaneys by Joyce Carol Oates 4/10, I tried to finish this book but it was far to slow paced.

Edited June 16, 2008 by Ronny

[Ronny]

Jacob's Ladder, A Story of Virginia During the War by Donald McCaig 5/10

 

I really wanted to like this book, the cover compared it to Gone With the Wind and Cold Mountain, both of which I liked very much. But the characters were very bland, stereotypical and unlikable, the dialog was flat, and the interactions of the characters left a lot for you to guess at, sometimes they were just down right confusing, characters that were supposedly driven by great passion one moment, didn't care at all the next. They did things that made no sense, or were not in their established character and the author felt no need to explain why. He also tried to show the complex relationship between the slaves and the planters, how dependent and intertwined they each were with the other, but he failed to make it clear or put the needed emotion into it.

 

Most of the descriptive writing was focused on the graphic, gory details of the war, the battles, the field hospitals, the living conditions of the southerners. I think the author wanted to paint a vivid picture of just how gruesome the Civil War really was but he needed to make you care about the characters first to do that well and he just didn't.