Red

Okay okay okay, I did not finish this book. I didn't even get halfway. The style was intriguing, I loved the idea of the perspective changing all the time BUT, oh man was it boring. I may be fickle, but so many other books in which engrossing things happened were calling to me. Maybe I also just didn't want to put in the effort to actually understand what was going on. It was also difficult to become attached to the characters.

Next time there will be more effort on my part.

Part DOS

I finished...yayyy...my second book in 5 MONTHS!? Such a shame. I must return to my love, and this book was a significant step.

So, on the mystery front, I didn't find this book to be hugely amAzing or revelatory. I kind of wish that they hadn't told you from the beginning that it was one of the three miniaturists...because they really had a fairly small part in the book as a whole it felt. It didn't really feel you were connected to any of them in one way or another, so the discovery of which one was the murderer was fairly anti-climactic.

I didn't really end up loving any of the characters, which I think was the point and not a bad thing, but it made me sad that all of the characters kind of let me down. Well, Esther seemed to be the one character who was moderately consistent with what you knew of her. And Hasan, weirdly, went up in opinion by the end of the book, though his role overall was fairly minor.

The style of writing was quite beautiful, and it definitely made me want to go to Istanbul...in the winter of course. My favorite chapters were the ones told by the storytellers about the various illustrations. So entertaining and artful!

And now, to put it in not so classy words but which thoroughly describe how I feel right now, I'm going to make War and Peace my bitch. Eep!

My Name Is Red

Well I am not half through the book yet, but it is halfway through the month so I thought I'd do a quick review of what I think so far.

I really like it! I like, with the short chapters and various characters, how fast moving it seems. I love books with lots of characters so this is a winner. More and more as I read the 'mystery' genre comes out and is quite interesting how the author teases the suspense and curiosity out of you. The other thing with many characters I think is that it helps you see various sides of each one, not just the positive side of the protaganist and the evil of the antagonist. Instead it's a little more well rounded and leaves it more up to you to decide who you like and why.

Plus, snow just came in the mail, so I'm excited both to continue this one and read that!

September Suggestion

Hey everyone. I realize that we're technically not "transpacific" anymore... but that shouldn't stop us from reading!

I heard an interview with Turkish novelist and Nobel laureate Orhan Pamuk tonight on CBC. His works sounded interesting, particularly his novels Snow and My Name is Red (both translated from Turkish).
My interest was piqued and I thought to myself, those might be interesting books to suggest to the book club...

You must realize that I don't have these thoughts terribly often, so it's something of an event when it does happen.

Thoughts?

Personal Fail

Hey fellow bibliophiles - unfortunately I could not find this book at any of my regular book haunts, although I found a few of Mr. Alexie's other works; and I'm not prepared to stoop to shopping at Chapters.

So, yes - I do suck. Hope everyone enjoyed the book. Does anyone have thoughts for August? My dad gave me a book called Shop Class as Soulcraft, by Matthew B. Crawford, which from the sounds of the epigraph on the back might be something like Zen & The Art of Motorcycle Maintenance.

But - I am open to suggestions and I promise to try to do better next month. Everyone gets one.

Life lesson: Insomnia is good for getting caught up on reading.

I wasn't sure at all what to expect from Diary, and was quite impressed. It almost felt like a series of essays masquerading (successfully) as a young adult novel. Definitely raised interesting and provoking points. Part of me was saying throughout that reservations must be different/better in Canada, which probably proved some of what Sherman was saying.

And just when I thought everything would be going well for Arnold/Junior: BAM, I was stunned by the second half of the book. It was well-written, and no mistake.

My favorite characters were Gordy and Rowdy. Gordy because he didn't mind being the smartest and valued accurate information, and Rowdy because how could I not love someone Arnold/Junior loved so much? When he described climbing the tree, I felt a sudden urge to go out and find a very tall tree and scramble to the top immediately, it was so beautiful.

On the whole, it was a pleasant read, with an ideal balance of light writing and heavy ideas. In that way it reminded me of Can You Spell Revolution?, which is also an excellent read.

Darwin ends.

Oh man! We're good at this! Haha.

Okay so I'm about 10 pages from being done but I decided I'd post anyways. I've had a really hard time getting through the Warriors section so I think it'd actually be my least favorite section.
I really loved Fire From Heaven though. I like that cause and effect stuff. There were some moments in the other stories where I was like "ah..maybe I see what they're getting at..." but then it would give way to "what the?".

It was a great read though!
Can we read something by Sherman Alexie for the summer? Maybe the "Absolutely True Diary of a Part-Time Indian"...I know it's a younger genre of book but I think maybe it would be a really easy summer read with a lot of interesting ideas underneath. We could possibly even finish in a month! haha

Oh yea...Welcome back to the country Marc : )