I bought this book on Amazon, not knowing anything about it except that it was highly recommended by Amazon. Also, the fact that a book reviewer compared Henry House to Garp made it a lot more attractive to me.
This is the story of Henry House, who was a "practice" baby in a college home economics program. Apparently, colleges used to offer classes on how to raise babies, clean houses, etc. There's no big surprise to me there. What was surprising was that these colleges would take an orphan baby and then have a group of college students take turns being this babies mother. Then, when the child was a year old, they would give the baby back to the orphanage. Wow! That's a little shocking, don't you think?! Henry was one of these babies who now struggles with feeling abandoned, lost, and mistrustful of women. Of course, he doesn't know that he's struggling with these feelings...he's just an ass.
I really liked this book, even though the main character was not a typical protagonist. Recommended!
Thursday, January 20, 2011
Book 2: Eragon by Christopher Paolini
I finally finished this book on CD. It is a young adult book about dragons and elves and dwarfs. It reminded me a lot of the Lord of the Rings trilogy. I don't know...I think I'm pretty ambivalent about this book. I'm not jumping up and down, but I might read the next book in the series if I have time. I wonder if my feelings would have been different had I read it instead of listening to it. The dragon's voice really bothered me because it sounded like the actor was going to start coughing at any minute.
I would recommend this book to people who like Lord of the Rings and need something new to read...or to adolescents who are looking for something to sink their teeth in to.
I would recommend this book to people who like Lord of the Rings and need something new to read...or to adolescents who are looking for something to sink their teeth in to.
Tuesday, January 11, 2011
A book from 2010-Room by Emma Donoghue
Since I'm not reading as quickly as I'd like, I thought I'd give a review of a fabulous book I read in 2010. I actually bought this book with an Amazon gift card I got for being healthy (yeah insurance, I guess) and bought it because it was highly recommended.
This is the story of Jack, who was born into captivity...but doesn't know it. His mom was kidnapped by an obviously deranged man and held in his tiny sound-proof garden shed a la whats-her-name Dugard. So 5-year old Jack has no idea about the outside world. The story is told from his point of view, so we feel his innocence and struggle with understanding his mom's sporadic bouts of depression.
I really liked this book a lot. It was innovative and a great study into the psychology of parenting, depression, being held captive, etc.
Since it talks about escape in the summary, I guess I won't be spoiling anything if I tell you that my favorite part was watching Jack and his mother adjust to life on the outside after being everything to each other for 5 years and living in a tiny tiny space. One example of something that Emma Donoghue wrote about that you wouldn't even think of is that Jack has never seen a stair. So at five years old, he is terrified of the stairs and starts out by going down on his butt or his stomach like a year old. I like the way this author's brain works. It makes me think...
This is the story of Jack, who was born into captivity...but doesn't know it. His mom was kidnapped by an obviously deranged man and held in his tiny sound-proof garden shed a la whats-her-name Dugard. So 5-year old Jack has no idea about the outside world. The story is told from his point of view, so we feel his innocence and struggle with understanding his mom's sporadic bouts of depression.
I really liked this book a lot. It was innovative and a great study into the psychology of parenting, depression, being held captive, etc.
Since it talks about escape in the summary, I guess I won't be spoiling anything if I tell you that my favorite part was watching Jack and his mother adjust to life on the outside after being everything to each other for 5 years and living in a tiny tiny space. One example of something that Emma Donoghue wrote about that you wouldn't even think of is that Jack has never seen a stair. So at five years old, he is terrified of the stairs and starts out by going down on his butt or his stomach like a year old. I like the way this author's brain works. It makes me think...
Monday, January 10, 2011
Book 1-I Feel Bad About My Neck by Nora Ephron
Before you judge, I read this book for my book club. We were looking for something light and humorous to read during the Christmas holidays since we would be discussing it in early January. Yuck! I didn't really like this book at all. Most of Nora's observational essays were things that other writers have already observed in a much more humorous way. I was bored through most of this book.
Nora writes about cooking, aging, parenting, self-maintenance, purses, etc. Ha ha. Not really. Not a single Ha in the whole book, as far as I'm concerned. Could be that I'm not old enough to really understand the humor in what she writes, but I doubt it. I'll probably find out when we have our discussion meeting.
If you do happen to find yourself in the presence of this book and a few minutes, I would recommend reading the last chapter. In my opinion, the last essay is actually very heart-felt and touching. Maybe it's because Nora didn't feel like trying to be funny about the topic of death...but she lost her neurotic Woody-Allen like tone and actually had some novel things to say.
Hopefully my next book will be better!!
Nora writes about cooking, aging, parenting, self-maintenance, purses, etc. Ha ha. Not really. Not a single Ha in the whole book, as far as I'm concerned. Could be that I'm not old enough to really understand the humor in what she writes, but I doubt it. I'll probably find out when we have our discussion meeting.
If you do happen to find yourself in the presence of this book and a few minutes, I would recommend reading the last chapter. In my opinion, the last essay is actually very heart-felt and touching. Maybe it's because Nora didn't feel like trying to be funny about the topic of death...but she lost her neurotic Woody-Allen like tone and actually had some novel things to say.
Hopefully my next book will be better!!
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