2011 Reads

It is satisfying to me to look at the books I read last year...

The Lover's Dictionary by David Levithan
Incendiary by Chris Cleave
The Absent Traveler by Randall DeVallance
Bloodroot by Amy Greene
Battle Hymn of the Tiger Mother by Amy Chua
Chocolate Wars by Deborah Cadbury (yes, THAT Cadbury!)
Annabel by Kathleen Winter
Oranges Are Not The Only Fruit by Jeanette Winterson
Delirious by Daniel Palmer
Blood, Bones, and Butter by Gabrielle Hamilton
Unfamiliar Fishes by Sarah Vowell
Swamplandia! by Karen Russell
Heads You Lose by Lisa Lutz and David Hayward
P.S. I Love You by Cecilia Ahern
Shadow Tag by Louise Erddrich
Major Pettigrew's Last Stand by Helen Simpson
Among the Missing by Dan Chaon
Mennonite in a Little Black Dress by Rhoda Janzen
The Poisoner's Handbook by Deborah Blum
Needful Things by Stephen King
Bossypants by Tina Fey
A Visit From the Goon Squad by Jennifer Egan
Await Your Reply by Dan Chaon
The Language of Flowers by Vanessa Diffenbaugh
The Absolutely True Diary of a Part-Time Indian by Sherman Alexie
Turn of Mind by Alice LaPlante
The Hunger Games by Suzanne Collins
When God Was a Rabbit by Sarah Winman
Contented Dementia by Oliver James
Catching Fire by Suzanne Collins
Mockingjay by Suzanne Collins
Big Girl Small by Rachel DeWoskin
Before I Go to Sleep by S.J. Watson
The Weight of Silence by Heather Gudenkauf
Domestic Violets by Matthew Norman
Neverwhere by Neil Gaiman
Alone Together by Sherry Turkle
Rin Tin Tin: The Life and the Legend by Susan Orlean
The Leftovers by Tom Perrotta
The Night Circus by Erin Morgenstern
Moonlight on Linoleum by Terry Helwig
Seriously...I'm Kidding by Ellen Degeneres
Musicophilia by Oliver Sacks
Gun, with Occasional Music by Jonathan Lethem
Skippy Dies by Paul Murray
The Prank by Adam Black
Buddha in the Attic by Julie Otsuka
In the Woods by Tana French
Toast by Nigel Slater
Laura Rider's Masterpiece by Jane Hamilton
War Horse by Michael Morpurgo
City of Thieves by David Benioff
Aftertaste by Meredith Mileti

...and to remember ones I really enjoyed....

IN THE WOODS
by Tana French

     

It took me several tries to get into this book, but once I did, it was worth it. A mystery, set in Ireland, where the main character - and narrator - is a detective...and a victim.

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THE PRANK
by Adam Black

     

I loved this. Written as a breaking news story online through facebook "likes" and posts, blogs, news releases, interviews, etc. This book has much to say about how we ingest and interpret the information we glean online. brilliant.

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THE NIGHT CIRCUS
by Erin Morgenstern

     

Morgenstern has created a magical world which may just sweep you away.

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THE WEIGHT OF SILENCE
by Heather Gudenkauf

     

Callie, a young girl comes running from the forest after being missing. She doesn't speak. Why doesn't she speak? What happened in the forest? This book stayed with me long after I finished reading it.

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THE HUNGER GAMES trilogy by Suzanne Collins

               

Even though this is categorized as a "teen" selection, this is a great story, set in a future world with characters to root for...this is excellent.

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BEFORE I GO TO SLEEP
by S.J. Watson

     

A taut psychological thriller...the main character had and accident that caused a mental condition where she doesn't remember who she is or what her life is when she wakes up in the morning. Every morning she wakes up next to a man who is a stranger to her. She has to rediscover her life every day. really well done.

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MAJOR PETTIGREW'S LAST STAND
by Helen Simpson

     

Set in an English village, Major Pettigrew, a proper, retired, widowed military man, discovers love, which others in the village find improper. delightful!

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WHEN GOD WAS A RABBIT
by Sarah Winman

     

Starting as a little girl, Elly tells her story of her family, including her brother Joe and her best friend Jenny Penny. This is endearing, quirky, poignant and very engaging. A very good read!

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ANNABEL
by Kathleen WINTER


     

This novel enveloped me from the beginning. Though compared to Jeffrey Eugenides's MIDDLESEX because they both deal with hermaphrodites, ANNABEL is more intimate in scope. I loved this.

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THE LOVER'S DICTIONARY
by David Levithan

     

Such a brilliant idea - a love story told through dictionary entries. REALLY well done. This would be a wonderful Valentine's Day, engagement, anniversary or wedding gift.

Clicking on the picture of the book cover will take you to Amazon.com. Clicking on the underlined book title will take you to Barnes and Noble's website. You can read more about each book and purchase it there. Doing so helps support the blog. Thanks for reading!

Annabel

I saw ANNABEL described on librarything.com and was intrigued. Unfortunately at that time, the book was not available in the U.S. sad. I wrote it down on my Books I Want List, where it stayed for months.

And then I saw it on a shelf at work! It looked just as interesting as it had when I first read the description. I bought it, read it, and was not disappointed.

       

In a small, coastal Canadian town, Jacinta Blake gives birth to a baby with both female and male genitalia. Treadway, the baby's father, upon discovering this anomaly, decides that the baby is to be raised as a boy, Wayne. Thomasina, a neighbor who helped at the birth knows about the genitalia. Jacinta knows. Wayne does not know.

Treadway very much expects Wayne to be a boy. Jacinta mourns the loss of the daughter she might have had. Thomasina tries to help Wayne, in sometimes unwelcome ways, become aware of his situation.

As his parents struggle in their own ways with raising this child, Wayne knows that something is different about him, but doesn't have any idea what it is. Awareness of his complicated gender identity is a gradual realization for him.

I loved reading this, as a compelling exploration of gender and gender identity - how does gender shape us? How are we shaped by gender?

Fascinating questions, these, and I loved that this book explored this issue. More than that, however, I was captivated by the writing. Lush and rich, I was enveloped by Winter's storytelling from the very beginning.

There will be comparisons made to MIDDLESEX by Jeffrey Eugenides, as both deal with hermaphrodites, but that is where the similarity ends. ANNABEL is a much more intimate novel than MIDDLESEX.

While the ending was perhaps quieter than I might have liked, I loved the story and the writing. Stunning and luminous, this book will stick with me for a long time.

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Can't Read Fast Enough

It's that way, isn't it? For a while it's hard to find a book to settle into, and now I can't read fast enough to keep up with all the books I want to read.

I just started and am devouring ANNABEL by Kathleen Winter. Recently published in the U.S., it's been winning awards in Canada for its luminous writing. Comparisons will be made to MIDDLESEX by Jeffrey Eugenides, as they both deal with hermaphroditism. MIDDLESEX I read and greatly enjoyed. I am liking ANNABEL even better.

        

Next up is ORANGES ARE NOT THE ONLY FRUIT by Jeanette Winterson, a British writer. Semi-autobiographical, she writes about growing up in an evangelical Christian home and discovering her lesbianism.

        


After that might be DELIRIOUS by Daniel Palmer. A thriller, I was interested after reading the first page and discovering that the action starts out in Marin County, California, where I grew up. (Which I know isn't enough by itself to make a good story, but it's a good start for me!)

        

And just yesterday I just saw BLOOD WORK: A Tale of Medicine and Murder in the Scientific Revolution by Holly Tucker, chronicling the conflict between religion and medicine in the 17th century with blood transfusions and looking at the same conflict today with stem cell research and cloning.

        

Happy reading to one and all!

You can send email to: 2of3RsATgmailDOTcom. Thanks for reading!