Book Review: Frankenstein

By Mary Wollstonecraft Shelley

Just in time for Halloween I read Mary Shelley's landmark Frankenstein for an online book club.

I really enjoyed this book, but at shy of 200 pages, it still took me a long time to read. I believe my main problem was getting in the right frame of mind to absorb the language of the early 1800s.

I was very curious about the plot of this book. After all, I have seen Young Frankenstein! The story of how Victor Frankenstein created his monster and his eventual undoing was interesting.

This was a great Halloween read. It's not scary, but very intriguing. I highly recommend it to anyone looking for a good, thrilling classic.

Book Review: Tales from the Secret Annex

by Anne Frank

Tales from the Secret Annex is a collection of short stories and essays that Anne Frank wrote to pass her time while hiding from the Nazis. The essays are actually diary snippets her father had chosen not to publish with the rest of her diary entries.

The writing in the short stories is very much that of a thirteen-year-old girl, but below the simplistic sentence structure lies complex thoughts and an understanding of the world beyond her years. The stories are also quite imaginative.

The essays are where Anne really stands out. After all, her fame is based on the diary entries her father did publish. With topics like cheating in French class and arguments with and her thoughts on the Van Daams, her rebelliousness isn't quite up to today's standards, but I do find her honesty and writing style quite endearing.

I found The Sing of Inequity to be the most profound. In this page and a half essay, Anne challenges the prudishness of her compatriots in Amsterdam by writing:

"I don't think we're so very different from nature. And since we people are apart of nature, why should we be ashamed of the way nature has dressed us?"

Why not just be naked? What is wrong with the human form?

 In Happiness Anne states that:

"I had learned that most sadness comes from joy."
 

I don't think most adults have learned this concept, so to see it in the private writings of a 13 year old is astounding to me. It's almost as if the wisdom of a full like was granted to her before her untimely death.

This was an interesting read from a historical standpoint. I would definitely recommend it to anyone interested in Anne Frank.

Rain Taxi's Twin Cities Book Festival

On Saturday morning Claire and I found ourselves in St. Paul at the Twin Cities Book Festival. Being the first book festival I've ever attended, I wasn't sure what to expect. Suffice it to say, I was not disappointed.



The Progress building was packed with book lovers
the moment we walked in the door.

From our first step into the packed historic Progress building to our last steps into the rain mid afternoon, we were entertained and informed. The building was full of book lovers of all ages. The amount of people was my first surprise, but it was definitely nice seeing so many book lovers in one place.

After a quick walk through the Exhibit Hall, Claire and I attended the Author Publicity: Basics and Beyond panel moderated by Steph Opitz, Membership Director for the Council of Literary Magazines and Presses (CLMP) and book reviewer for Marie Claire magazine, featuring author Lorna Landvik, publisher Jerrold R. Jenkins, The Loft Literary Center Executive Director Jocelyn Hale and Minnesota Public Radio's Stephanie Curtis. I wasn't sure how well a toddler would go over in the session, but the acoustics worked in our favor. The large, open building was sectioned off by velvet curtains, but sound from the rest of the building floated in and covered Claire's babbling. We were still able to hear the panelists perfectly, though.

The major discussion point in the panel was building a platform. In the age of social media, having a large following is the way to get a book published. Jenkins pointed out that a writer should build their platform three to four years before publishing a book to have a solid following of between 100 and 150 thousand people.  Agents and publishers have to take a risk on new authors even if their work is good. Having a large online following is appealing to them and mitigates the risk to a degree. This wasn't a new concept to me, but it was a good point to keep in mind.

The panelists did make good suggestions for blogging and writing. Posts and articles that reflect the topic and feel of the novel will break up the self-promotional posts and draw in more followers. The writer should also have some "credits," awards and published short stories and articles to list on queries.

During the Q&A, Jennifer Miller, author of The Year of the Gadfly, asked a good question (and was commended for excellent self promotion for mentioning her book, which I later bought) about whether an author with a big publishing house should handle pitches and self-promotion. The answer was that if the publicist or agent has a contact, he or she should pitch the author, but if not, the author should go ahead and do it him or herself. In response to this, Stephanie Curtis did recommend that when pitching a radio or tv program, the author should have a video or sound clip to prove that he or she can speak well. YouTube here I come!

After the session, Claire and I walked around the Exhibit Hall again as we made our way to the Children's Pavilion, where Claire had a good time dancing to the Splatter Sisters, coloring a mask with the Minnetonka Center for the Arts, creating a book with the Minnesota Center for Book Arts and painting her own face with the help of the Minnesota Children's Museum. The volunteers, writers and performers in the Children's Pavilion were excellent, warm and very helpful.

All of my literature waiting to be read.

After all of that fun, we finally had a chance to really take in the Exhibit Hall. It was a great opportunity to learn about the many book organizations in the Twin Cities, publishers and literary magazines. I still have a stack of information to dig through. I hope to be able to participate in some of the groups to meet some more book lovers.

Now, back to Jennifer Miller. After asking a question during the Q&A session, I saw her book at the Magers and Quinn Booksellers table where she was scheduled to do a signing after 4:00, which was too late for me to stay with a toddler. The book looked intriguing and had a beautiful cover, so I bought it and decided to track her down to beg for a signature.

But that proved harder than I thought. Once, as I was chasing Claire passed the Literary Magazine sale table, I glanced up as I ran passed a woman and gave her the 'sorry my child's so wild smile' and she gave me an 'it's OK' smile back or I decided to interpret it that way. After passing her I realized who it was. But Claire was onto the music table, so I let her play with the instruments because she's going to be a musical prodigy and I like to encourage her.

My second attempt came after the Susan Isaacs book reading, but unfortunately Jennifer walked out behind me as I was bent over talking to Claire. Are you seeing a pattern here? Claire foiled my attempts, but I still have what looks to be a great book to read.

We had a great, long day at the Twin Cities Book Festival. I have plans to go next year, possibly sans toddler, to really take in all of the information.

Book Review: Bossypants

 

By Tina Fey

To fulfill the humor portion of my 2012 reading challenge, I picked up Tina Fey's Bossypants. A collection of stories about growing up and growing into her role as boss and the many awkward stages along the way.

I love Tina Fey, and I expected to laugh out loud, cry and possibly pee my pants while reading this. But I didn't. It was still a really good book, though. Tina has a knack for writing and making herself relatable.

Tina comes off as very human in this book. She bounces from awkward and nervous to empowered in a natural, realistic way. I really hope this is the first of many books from her.

I really enjoyed reading this book, and I highly recommend it to others to read.

Book Review: Remarkable Creatures

By Tracy Chevalier

 

I first stumbled onto Tracy Chevalier when I read The Girl with the Pearl Earring. I loved the way Chevalier created an entire story around a Vermeer painting of a young girl with a pearl earring. I quickly fell in love with several of Chevalier's other books. She became one of my favorite authors and landed a spot on my 30 Things Before 30 list.

 



Remarkable Creatures is her latest work, published in 2009. Like her other books, this one is well researched and well written. Her characters' dialects and actions feel authentic.

Remarkable Creatures gently drops its readers into the early 1800s, when women's rights were severely limited and having a mind of one's own was a cause for intense disapproval. As usual, her characters are strong women who challenge authority and buck convention. They work to make a name for themselves in a time and an industry in which women were persona non grata.

The remarkable creatures are more than just the two female narrators who chose to live life on their own terms. The early 1800s brought about many discoveries of the natural world. Charles Darwin's The Origin of Species, introducing the concepts of natural selection and survival of the fittest, would be published in 1859. While passing time, waiting to die, and reading about the natural world would have been more fitting for an upper class spinster and a poor girl should have been a dishwasher, the narrators found their passion, their lives' calling in fossil hunting on the beaches of England.

The tales of fossil hunting and the challenges of a friendship that challenges class and age fill the pages of this book and really flesh out the story. This book is a must read for historical fiction lovers. Tracy Chevalier may be one of my favorite authors, but I would recommend this book regardless.



Book Review: The Hunger Games

By Suzanne Collins

Finally, after months, maybe even years of hearing about it, I picked up The Hunger Games. This is one of the books I had to read in 2012, and it feels good to check it off the list.

Collins' book places us in a gritty dystopian world where kids pay the heaviest price for the sins of their forebearers.

The book is well written, but there are instances when Collins tells rather than shows us what's happening. This is very common when one narrator is relied upon to tell the story. There were also some predictable moments, but in all, this was an interesting and engaging story. I highly recommend this to the few people left in the world who haven't already read it yet.

Coming up I'll have a review of The Hunger Games movie and a book vs. the movie comparison.

Book Review: Moloka'i

This is one of the most beautiful
cover images I've ever seen.

By Alan Brennert

If you're looking for an inspiring story about a life well lived, this is it! Moloka'i is the story of young Rachel Kalama who is ripped from her family and all she knew to spend her life in isolation on a small tropical island. Rachel must start a new life and create a new family.

Despite a debilitating illness, Rachel is able to live a full, adventurous life on the small island of Moloka'i. Her heartbreaks and triumphs became my own as I progressed through the book. Brennert has really immersed the reader in Rachel's life. You'll live with Rachel as she learns about life, love and loss and you'll be able to follow the changes the 21st century brought through her experiences.

I highly recommend this book, but that comes with a caveat. I sometimes found this book so heartbreaking that is made me incredibly angry. I contemplated throwing the book across the room more than once. It was well worth pushing through, though.

Book Review: Bringing Up Bebe

By Pamela Druckerman

Druckerman's Bringing Up Bebe made a splash last winter before it had even hit the shelves at bookstores. The book stirred up controversy by promising to show American mothers just how much better French mothers do it. The book wasn't as anti-American as it was portrayed, but it was still a very entertaining read.

Druckerman's PR folks decided to pull out all the stops by casting their lot in with Amy Chua of Tiger Mother fame. Chua's advanced praise received the top spot on the back cover. (Spot two went to French Women Don't Get Fat author Mireille Guiliano.) If the two of them combined isn't enough, Chua "couldn't put Bringing up Bebe down" and "love[s] Pamela Druckerman's premise that parents of all cultures should be able to learn from one another." While true, it's laughable coming from someone whose notoriety is based on her disdain for Western mothers.

This book wasn't a how to to French parenting but a memoir of Druckerman's struggle to be a good mom and fit in with the French mothers who surrounded her.

Unsurprisingly, French babies are better eaters and sleepers than American babies. Dr. Michel Cohen, author of the New Basics and a French doctor transplanted in Tribeca, recommends that parents pause before responding to their crying newborns. He says this gives the infant a chance to self soothe and sets them up for successful sleep. In The Happiest Toddler on the Block, Dr. Harvey Karp makes the same recommendation to teach toddlers patience.

As far as eating is concerned, French infants eat four times a day by two to three months old. This schedule encourages good eating habits. As they age, French children are introduced to a world of wonderful foods, which they eat and enjoy. French mothers know they have to keep trying to get their kids to eat new foods.

I was fascinated by all the government-paid perks that French women get, incluidng perineal retraining and subsidized daycare. Thanks to that subsidized daycare, very few Parisenne women stay at home. Despite that, French women lag behind American women in some major regards including:

• a larger earnings gap between men and women,
• fewer women in the legislature and heading larger corporations, and
• French women spend 89% more time doing household work and caring for their children than men do.

According to Druckerman, an indication of rampant sexism in France is that post partum perineal retraining is often used to keep French husbands satisfied, not to help women. I do think the government benefits parents receive might help French mothers feel better about the discrepanices.

In the end, I can conclude that Chua was right, using tips from other cultures can be good for us as parents. I think that does neeed to go both ways; Western mothers aren't all overindulgent and sometimes we do say no to our children.

Do you have any thoughts on this book?

Book Discussion: Secrets of Six-Figure Women

 

By Barbara Stanny

As women we often discount ourselves. Most of us know is bad for us mentally and physically, but it's also bad for our careers. As modern women, careers are a large part of our lives if not ourselves. It's time we start to refocus on ourselves. Reading this book is a step in the right direction.

Secrets of Six-Figure Women is a quick, engaging read chock full of excellent advice. Stanny, whose father was a successful and recognized businessman, was a chronic underearner who set out to learn the secrets of successful women. What she learned was both surprising and expected.

For example, I was surprised to learn that many of the six-figure women didn't work unGodly hours. Many have taught themselves to focus and work as little as four hours a day, and they're even more successful than when they'd worked four hours by 8:00 a.m.



It takes focus to reach six figures.

While surprising, I'm fully in support of this. What's the point of making six-figures if you can't enjoy it? (This is a rhetorical question. Life is meant to be lived; not worked.)

It wasn't surprising at all that Stanny found belief in oneself, hard work, education, and talent to be the most important factors to her interviewees success. These are four marked characteristics that I would list for successful women.

Stanny also found that six-figure women have a profit motive (they expect to be well compensated), audacity (they often step outside their comfort zones), resilience, and encouragement. She also learned that the women were self aware, were non-attached, and had financial know how.

Stanny is quite quotable in this book. Her writing is strong and her insight deep. Her quotes are the type I'd want to embroider on a pillow, if I had the patience to embroider. Some of her most quotable lines include the following:

"[T]he moment we stop waiting and start acting, we have the opportunity to walk through a doorway to a richer, fuller, more abundant life." (page 73)

"Our state of mind shapes our way of life." (page 74)

"To really change your financial situation, you have to let go of that part of yourself that stands in the way of greater abundance." (page 117)

Of course you can't write a book about women succeeding in the workplace without addressing sexism. According to the women interviewed, there are two ways to handle sexism: 1) shake it off or 2) leave the organization.

Shaking it off would be a good idea for minor instances of sexism, the cases in which proving oneself will help eradicate a sexist culture or superior. But sometimes the culture is so bad that you just need to leave. I know it's sometimes hard to leave when we want to change the culture, but it's not always possible, especially when the culprit is an older man. Some people need to age out of the workforce before we can change negative corporate cultures.

Success sometimes requires adequately handling sexism.

This only addresses the cases when women have a choice to stay or leave. When a woman is forced out due to sexism, she has to do something about it.

Stanny ends with a little last minute advice:

"Claim your power. Value yourself, honor yourself, take all your desires to heart."

What do you think? Do you have any tips to help women achieve six-figure success? Do you agree with the two ways to handle sexism? I'd love to hear your thoughts.

R.I.P. Donald J. Sobol

Did you grow up reading Encyclopedia Brown? Like My Side of the Mountain there are certain aspects of the Encyclopedia Brown books that I still recall to this day. Encyclopedia Brown taught readers to be observant and critical of our surroundings.

Donald J. Sobol passed away at the age of 87 on July 11th. I hope his legacy continues to live on, and that my daugher could read some of these books some day.

Rest in peace Mr. Sobol.

Rest in Peace

May and June seemed to have been plagued by the loss of important authors. We lost Maurice Sendak on May 8th, Jean Craighead George followed on May 15th and Nora Ephron rounded out the triumvirate on May 26th. If death truly does come in threes, I hope we’ll be done for a while.

Maurice Sendak was and will continue to be loved and remembered for Where the Wild Things Are. It’s hard to believe that Where the Wild Things Are was first published in 1963. Love and acclaim for the book hasn’t dried up in the nearly 50 years it’s been a part of our world. Sendak has received the Caldecott Medal, the Hans Christian Andersen Award, the National Book Award, the Laura Ingalls Wilder Medal, the National Medal of Arts and the Astrid Lindgren Memorial Award among many, many other deserved awards. He’ll be remembered for many years to come for his contributions to children’s literature as an author and illustrator.

Many literature loving adults probably remember reading Jean Craighead George’s Julie of the Wolves and My Side of the Mountain among other books. Although not my typical book choice, My Side of the Mountain made such an impact on me as a preteen that I randomly recall parts of the story as I go about my daily life (which has nothing to do with living alone in the mountains). George’s books brought the outdoors and natural life to an audience that isn’t always naturally receptive to it: young girls; while, at the same time, still being entertaining for and loved by boys (after all, I did find this book on my older brother’s bookshelves).

Despite a long list of accomplishments, I believe that Nora Ephron’s most important contribution to the world was in showing that women can be multiple things and do multiple things well. Ephron herself was an award-winning filmmaker, director, producer, screenwriter, novelist, playwright, journalist, author and blogger. She was nominated three times for the Academy Award for Original Screenplay for Silkwood, When Harry Met Sally… and Sleepless in Seattle. Ephron came from a successful literary and film family. Her parents were screenwriters (Take Her, She’s Mine among others), her two sisters Delia and Amy are screenwriters and her sister Hallie is a triple threat—journalist, book reviewer and crime fiction novelist.

Many of us heard the news of the passing of these authors with sadness, but their contributions to the craft of culture will be remembered for a long time to come.

What impact have these authors had on your life?

Book Review: The Five People You Meet In Heaven

By Mitch Albom

OK. I’ll admit it. After Tuesday’s with Morrie encouraged bored people to interact with senior citizens from their past, I thought this book was a spiritual self-help book. I was wrong, but it happens from time to time.

This was an interesting story. I particularly liked how the MC’s life was recounted by the five people he met in heaven.

The reader had a good voice; he had perfected the low-class New York accent required of the MC well.

Overall, this was a good, quick book.

Book Review: The Night Circus

By Erin Morgenstern

This richly imaginative fable is full of beautiful language and sumptuous settings. The circus of Morgenstern’s imagination is very graphic and very elegant. The characters are richly imaginative, the magic unusual.

The well-crafted story of Le Cirque des Reves is told in vignettes that follow the characters through many years. As the story switches from character to character, it was easy to forget how each person fit into the puzzle, partly because the connections weren’t all revealed in the beginning. For a time I thought there were too many characters, but in the middle of the book, when all the characters had been introduced, it became more clear who each character was. I still believe the story would have benefitted from at least two less characters.

This book was such a treat, and I hope the movie is no less a feast for the eyes. I highly recommend this book.

What's Your Number?

Thirty Five. That’s my number.

No, I’m not referring to how many sexual partners I’ve had. It’s actually the number of books I’ve read from the 1001 books you should read before you die list.

I don’t necessarily agree with the list, so it’s not a major goal of mine to increase my number. Shakespeare’s absence from the list is a huge oversight. He’s too integral to the English literature that has been written since his time.

So, anyway, what’s your number? 

Book Review: Aleph

By Paulo Coehlo

Because of my great love for Isabel Allende, www.literature-map.com suggested that I give Paulo Coehlo a try. I planned to read The Alchemist or Veronika Decides to Die, but I happened upon this book on the “New Books” shelf at the front of the library.

This book was hard to enjoy. I had to force myself to like it. For about the first half, I thought it was a supernatural memoir. Then I noticed the back cover said Fiction, but according to a New York Times interview with Coehlo from September 2011, this was his experience on a train across Siberia in 2006. I can’t put into words how sad this made me. Viewing it as fictional was the only thing that got me through the book.

The story itself is interesting, if viewed in the context of being purely fictional. The writing was a bit boring and lacked true style and eloquence. That contributed to my difficulties reading the book.

I would not recommend this book, but it wasn’t bad enough that I’d never read his other works.

Book Review: SPOOK

By Mary Roach

This is the second book I’ve read by Mary Roach. My first foray into her writing was almost two years ago when I read Stiff. I thoroughly enjoyed Stiff, and I was excited to go on another research excursion with Roach. An excursion is really what these two books were right down to Roach traveling to various locations for work.

This book was not a disappointment at all. Roach applied her branch of research to science’s quest for answers regarding the afterlife, and I thoroughly enjoyed being along for the ride.

The book covers everything from reincarnations in India to how much a soul weights and séances and ectoplasm to medium research. AND (all caps are necessary to indicate my high level of excitement) she got to meet the real Allison DuBois! If you don’t know who this is, then I probably don’t like you but here’s a clue:

Allison DuBois with Allison Dubois

Roach is also funny. I’m not sure how she manages it when writing about science. It’s a miracle, I tell ya!

I highly recommend this book and Stiff (if you can stomach cadaver talk).

R.I.P. Jan Berenstain

Jan Berenstain, beloved co-author and co-illustrator of The Berenstain Bears books, passed away on Friday. For many young readers, the books Jan wrote and illustrated with her husband Stan opened up our worlds. We were introduced to a lovely family of bears who lived in a tree house. I remember dreaming about living in their tree house.

It seems only appropriate that last night when Claire couldn't get to sleep that we turned on the TV and watched the Berenstain Bears. She seemed to like it just as much as I did then.

Sometimes I Just Give Up

Via

One of the reasons I rarely read bad books is that I don't finish them if I don't like them. I've always had a 20 page test. If I'm not at least a bit interested after 20 pages or I can't convince myselft to continue, then I just stop reading. I made it to about page 12 in this book, and that took me several days.

The premise of the book really caught my eye. As a reader, I've definitely cared about certain characters more than others. I was hoping to learn why I often care about them, but I just couldn't get into the book. It wasn't engaging because it was written for a scholarly audience. Not that I don't consider myself smart, but I really don't have the time and focus necessary to read something like this nowadays.

So, sometimes I just give up, and I'm OK with that because it means I get to read one more great book in my lifetime!

30 Things Before 30

Overachieving Dog Overachieves, Via

I feel both like an overachiever and an underachiever for already creating this list. I'm really not sure if I'm just super excited to do things or if I need a lot of time to do them. Either way, I've kind of, sort of created a 30 before 30 list for myself. I say kind of because I only have 13 things so far. Whatever, here it is:

1. Write a novel. (I always amaze myself with my abundant creativity.)
2. Try to get an agent for said novel.
3. Run a 5k.
4. Try out for Jeopardy!
5. Organize and decorate an entire house. 
6. Take a big family vacation.
7. Learn conversational Spanish.
8. Read all books by my favorite authors.
9. Send one card or letter a month just because.
10. Have at least one date night a month.
11. Read at least one new release a year.
12. Read at least one classic book a year.
13. Read at least 30 books a year.

Oh, I am so creative, and I'm sure the next 17 will be just as good.

Expanding on number eight, my favorite authors are Jon Krakauer (three books to read), Isabel Allende (10 books to read) and Tracy Chevalier (three books to read).

Book Review: My Invented Country

By Isabel Allende

My Invented Country by Isabel Allende

Isabel Allende is one of my all-time favorite writers. Her blend of wonderfully rich stories with impeccable writing keeps me coming back for more.

I listened to this a few weeks ago during my commute. I have a love/hate relationship with audiobooks because my enjoyment hinges so precariously on the talent of the voice artist. In this case, I was not let down. Blair Brown did an impeccable job. Her clear, upper class assured voice was perfect for the simultaneously self-assured and self-deprecating writing that is indicative of Allende's nature.

Blair Brown: Television, Film & Stage Actress;
and Voice Talent

This book provided so much insight into Allende's books. Like Gabriel Garcia Marquez, Allende writes the magical realism books that are the bread and butter of the modern South American literary scene. Marquez may be Colombian and Allende Chilean but both countries share the same belief in good and bad spirits. As she shares in the book, Chile is a country that believes in spirits, superstitions, themselves, and above all else, God.

As with her novels, a dramatic sense of nostalgia pervades the lives of Chileans on such a grand scale that the country is full of essayists and historians. This book itself is an exercise in nostalgia, as Allende recounts her childhood growing up in Chile, the revolution that lead to her leaving her country, moving to America for a man, and returning to her home country for visits that both relieve and increase the pangs of nostalgia.

I highly recommend this book for anyone interested in Isabel Allende, Chile, and the lives of writers.