[ 
Mood: Very Sad ]
Someone near and dear to me has been diagnoses with breast cancer. (Not me people, this isn’t one of those "a friend" kind of things.) To help cheer them up, I am looking for songs about breasts. This person has a slightly naughty sense of humour, as in she titters like a drunk librarian when I tell off colour stories and jokes.
Edit: So send me your suggestions.
[ 
Mood: Sleepy ]
[ Currently: Dealing with a sick toddler ]
Chelsea Handler is a comedienne and actress who focuses on writing about her life. And revealing details you didn’t really need to know. One of her earlier books chronicled her one night stands.
This book looks at Chelsea’s relationships with men, her family and friends. She shares stories about being pulled over while driving intoxicated, taking her father on vacation and being taken by a midget con-woman.
Handler embellishes the stories and mixes in her sarcastic, crude sense of humour. And believe me, she has a potty mouth that a sailor would envy. Handler is not Anne of Green Gables, but you can’t help but like her. She turns this sarcastic, crude eye on both others and herself. No one is safe from her, at times, selfish, self-centered diatribes. I laughed outloud more than once.
The book on CD that I listened to was read by the author, further enhacing the experience. Her delivery was geniuine, and as a reader (or should it be listner), I had no trouble visualizing what was happening.
Worth the time, but do not listen to this near the little ones or easily offended.
[ 
Mood: Happy ]
[ 
Currently: Eating Breakfast ]
Natasha Friend has proven herself to be a genius when it comes to capturing the lives of pre-teen and teen girls. In this novel, she looks at the life of Evyn, a thriteen year-old girl who lost her mother when she was very young. Since then it has just been her dad, her brother and her. Their life is happy, if a little financially strapped.
That all changes one day when she and her brother come home from camp to the announcement that her father is getting married to a college professor and the family is moving to Boston.
Evyn’s world is turned upside down as she is thrust into a blended family. The college professor, Eleni, already has six kids. Evyn’s dog isn’t allowed in the house. Girls at her new toney private school only want to be friends with her to get info on her handsome new stepbrother. Her best friend back in Maine seems to be drifiting away and making new friends. To top it all, her stepmother is pregnant.
Having lived through an experience similar to Evyn, this book was an accurate portrayal of how children deal with dramatic change in their lives. Evyn lashing out at those around her is very typical. Contrasted to this is her brother Mackey embracing the move as a chance to be someone else. I also found this book incredibly moving as Friend hit the nail on the head on the emotions these kind of upheavals bring. Manditory reading for a parent planning to blend their family, let alone the kids who might have to live through it.
[ Mood: Happy ]
[ Currently: Eating Breakfast ]
James Patterson is a publisher’s dream. He produces two hugely popular mystery/thriller series that routinely hit the bestseller lists. Patterson is so popular that he needs co-authors to help push out the pulp that his readers demand. He even makes appearances on Castle.
5th Horsman is the fifth (how appropriate) installment in his Women’s Murder Club series. It finds our four female protagonists dealing with three concurrent cases; a hospital malpractice suit, a murder spree in the same hospital and a series of deaths of young escorts.
And that is the problem with this book. There is too much going on. By packing more action than a Bruckheimer movie into 410 pages, Patterson (and co-author Maxine Paetro) sacrifices things like character development. It would have been a far better book if we had only had the hospital malpractice/hospital murder plot and they left the escort murders for another book.
That being said, this book is a very quick read. With chapters lasting three or four pages at most, a strong reader can plow through this book in less than a day. Not high literature, but a fun way to spend a few hours,most likely on a beach or beside a pool.
[ Mood: Sleepy ]
This is one of those books that I have been meaning to read since forever. The hype around the book has been heady, topping best seller lists, Scholastic crowing about it being brilliant. So I added it to my library hold list. And waited.
And waited.
I was tempted to pick up a copy for myself at the bookstore several times, but I have been burned by picking up books before reading them. So I waited some more.
When it finally showed up on the holds shelf at my local library, I immediately put it at the top of my reading pile.
Taking place in a post-apocalyptic North America, the book tells the story of Katniss, a 16 year-old girls who lives with her widowed mother and sister. Her father died in a mine explosions several years before and it has fallen to Katniss to take over his role as hunter. She barely managed to eke out a living for her family, providing food and trading some of her by hunting in the woods.
And her twelve year-old sister is chosen to participate in the Hunger Games.
Originally devised to punish the districts for rebelling against the Capitol, the Hunger Games are an annual event that pit one boy and girl between the ages of 12 to 18 from each district against each other in a fight to the death. The winner will be given a life of luxury and their district will get extra food rations for the year.
Before she realizes what is happening, Katniss volunteers to take her sister’s place. She now must use the skills she learned in hunting in order to survive. But can she find allies and learn how to play the game in order to return to her family? And what about the feelings she is developing for another contestant.
The hype around this book is well deserved. While we have seen these themes before (The Game, Running Man), The Hunger Games still manages to be a gripping young adult dystopian novel, full of action. Suzanne Collins has given the story just enough grit so the older reader is engaged, but keeps it clean enough that schools can put it in their library.
You know it’s going into the next After Harry.
[ 
Mood: Cool ]
[ 
Currently: Watching Fringe ]
I just finished the book that started the "twisted" classics trend we are in the midst of now and it has proved to be quite brilliant. Now, in preparation for reading Pride and Prejudice and Zombies, I read the original Jane Austen novel. I found that piece of literary work quite dull until Lydia ran off with Wickham. Not so with this book. Apparently taking the original Jane Austen novel and turning it on its head actually works.
Co-author Grahame-Smith has left significant portions of the book alone, inserting the supernatural elements as appropriate. The zombie plague is the reason for so many militia men around, rather than the tail end of the Napoleonic wars. Charlotte Lucas’s choice to marry the odious Mr. Collins makes a lot more sense in this book.
As a work of horror, the story is quite mild, although there are scenes, like the zombie baby and the burning grounds that make your blood run cold with the implications.
As a work of comedy, it appears the author (or the publishers) are well aware of who is reading the book. The readers questions at the back include "Does Mrs. Bingham have any redeeming features?" and a reference to the zombie element being added at the last minute to increase the commercial success of the book.
Overall, this book was an easy and engrossing read. It would be a great way to get some people to read Austen (or at least elements of Austen).
[ Mood: Sleepy ]
[ Currently: Waiting to eat ]
Assassination Vacation is Sarah Vowell’s record of her obsessive visits to any place associated with the assassinations of three US presidents. We follow the author around as she visits former law offices, vacation homes, museums, even places where autopsies take place. As we get the travel log, we are also treated to an intimate history of the three assassinations and the people involved.
The only criticism I have of this book is that there is similar treatment for Kennedy. I would have loved to have Vowell’s caustic, but very astute eye turned on Camelot and everything around that day in Texas. This addition would have made the book a step above your average historical or humour book.
Now I didn’t actually read this book, I listened to it via my MP3 player, as I am wont to do. Vowell reads her own audiobook, which gives the work a far more intimate feel. In addition, there are guests to read the writings of various players in the stories. Most notably, John Stewart as James Garfield was the best of these. His slightly sarcastic voice captured the intelligence of a little known president.
Worth the time.
[ Mood: Happy ]
Wounded by Eric Walters
My rating: 3 of 5 stars
Eric Walters is one of my favourite authors for young adults. His books are topical and attractive to the boys I teach. He is also Canadian and a former teacher, so bonus points!
This latest book deals with how the war in Afghanistan is affecting families back home. We see the affect a death has on a military family, as well as the main character dealing with his father’s return from Afghanistan. The youth in the book deal with a father suffering from post-traumatic stress disorder, as well as their own issues around fear of loss.
The only criticism I have of this book is that the ending is a little abrupt, leaving the reader wondering what was going to happen. I wish the author could have spent one more chapter as a denoument, as the ending did feel a little forced.
Still an excellent book to help young people understand that war affects more than the soldiers and that more than the families of dead soldiers deserve our sympathy and respect.
[ Mood: Happy ]
[ Currently: Eating Breakfast ]
Over on my Facebook page, I celebrate the wacky, wierd and wonderful holidays that exist in the world. I have talked about National Dance Like a Chicken Day and Lost Sock Memorial Day.
So today, I was setting up my info for National Medical Transcription Week. And on the main page they have this poster:
What does that look like to you?
I know what it looks like to me.
The Intersect is real, and the dude data entering the info about your prostate has it in his head.
[ Mood: Happy ]
Before I start, let me state that I LOVE Sarah Dunant’s Italian Renaissnce historical novels. They are so well researched and so well written that they pulled me into historical fiction, a genre that I hate. Why you ask? Because I have two history degrees and I spend far too much time nitpicking for me to even enjoy the book. So given that, you can imagine how much I was looking forward to this book.
But I digress, on to the review!
Sacred Hearts tells the story the inner life of a convent in Renaissance Italy, where easily half the nuns were placed there because the were unmarriageable or their families did not have the money for their doweries. Many others have entered the convent because there is no other choice for them. We see the politics as the truly religious clash with those who have no vocation as the reformation fast approaches the convent.
Mixed into this is a young novice who has been placed into the house of Santa Caterina because her romance with the music teacher could bring scandal to the family. Her fighting against the restrictions brings her into the relm of Suora Zuana, the apothecar mistress who struggles to make a connections with this angry young woman.
This novel is about small things in minor no-name lives, but it is completly engrossing. The ending, while not Hollywood by any means, gives you hope as you see how these characters are going to make the best out of a bad situation. Like all Sarah Dunant’s work, this book is meticulously researched, and it is this detail that brings this book to life.
It was so incredibly good.