(By: daniela bo)
Book reviews, posts, quotes, and pictures for all of the book-lovers out there.
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• About Me
• Wishlist
• Reviews
• Current Reads
• Ask
She'll Ask For Another
Half Broke Horses | Jeannette Walls
After having read The Glass Castle a year ago, which is by the way, one of my favorite memoirs, I was pleased to see that Jeannette Walls had another book. Although not stated, The Glass Castle could be read as a sequel to Half Broke Horses.
The novel stars Lily Casey Smith, who is based on the author’s grandmother. She is a frontier teacher, a rancher, poker player, bootlegger, and a hard-working mother all in one. In Half Broke Horses, she survives droughts, tornadoes, floods, poverty - just about anything thrown her way. Hard times and hard work signify the early 1900s as Lily tries to scratch out a life on ranches scattered throughout the Southern U.S. Left her small town home in Texas to pursue her dreams, that Lily, which, I liked that about her. I admired Lily’s sheer audacity when she was conflicted with so many obstacles. A half broke horse herself, she looped a lasso around her problems and held it tight as a leash.
Albeit, The Glass Castle was more of a gripping read, but Half Broke Horses proved to be worth my time as well.
Looking For Alaska | John Green
I gave in to the hype. I usually don’t, though. I have long-ago strayed away from YA fiction, but I had to at least give John Green a shot.
Miles Halter is fascinated by famous last words and is tired of his safe, boring life at his Florida home. Going after dying poet Francais Rebelais’s search for the “Great Perhaps”, Miles finds himself enrolling at Culver Creek boarding school where anything is but boring. He then gets entangled with the smart, sexy, sophisticated, and wild Alaska Young, who launches him deeper into the Great Perhaps.
Looking For Alaska is a coming-of-age novel thick with excitement, anger, and grief.
It didn’t dawn on me that this novel took place in high school until I was a third into the book. The entire time I pictured a college setting! Man, these kids are bada** :P. Laughed my left buttcheek off at the ‘fellatio fiasco’. You guys will, too. :)
**Slight spoiler alert**
IMO: In reference to the discussion question in the back of the book (I had bonus material), “Was it necessary for Alaska to die?” - NO. It is never necessary for anybody to die in order for one to wake up and smell the roses. It’s cliche to say that yes, you have to appreciate what you have while it lasts, but that’s pretty much what sums up the “After” portion of the book.
Added a few more to my reading wishlist..
I seem to be adding on more books than reading them.. woops :P
- The Virgin Suicides by Jeffrey Eugenides
- Answered Prayers: The Unfinished Novel by Truman Capote
- This Is How: (insert really long title here) by Augusten Burroughs
- Mara by Richard Denney
- To Kill A Mockingbird by Harper Lee
- Hannah’s Dream by Diane Hammond
- All There Is: Love Stories from StoryCorps by David Isay
- Jane Eyre by Charlotte Bronte (two dots above the ‘e’)
My friend recommended me this book a couple of years ago; now that I’ve finally got a hold of it, she tells me that she has second thoughts about it. (Oh, and disregard my freakish thumb).
The Memory Keeper’s Daughter | Kim Edwards
On a dark snow-blinding winter night in March of 1964, Dr. David Henry and his wife Norah are in a hospital where the ongoing blizzard causes the doctor to deliver his own twins. Calm and focused, he concentrates with the task at hand and swiftly delivers the first child: a baby boy, dark-haired and perfectly healthy. The doctor is thoroughly pleased. However, his joy soon falters as the second child is born, this time a baby girl with the same dark hair whose facial characteristics match those of Down Syndrome. The doctor thinks back to how his own sister had died at a young age due to Down Syndrome and had caused his family all sorts of grief. He couldn’t let the child do the same to his own family. Rather than work it out with his wife he tells his nurse Caroline to take the baby away, place her into an institution while he informs his drained wife that the baby had died at birth. Initially, Caroline brought the child to the institution, but was appalled by the conditions that she vanished into another city to raise the girl as her own. So begins a tale weaving between the intricate details of love and grief, unveiling the ever-growing power of redemption and forgiveness.
**Slight spoiler**
I loved the first fifty pages or so; it evoked so much sympathy out of me for Norah, Caroline, and even David for he had to live with the decision he made. Gradually, I was disheartened by Norah’s flighty state-of-mind and her scandalous affairs, which led to an even more broken family. What David did was wrong, don’t get me wrong. However, everyone in the story seemed to contribute to the fault. Edwards’ use of imagery and figurative language played in her favor. Exquisite paragraph after exquisite paragraph. The story, on the other hand, while captivating also led me to believe that it was something straight from a soap opera. Anything that could go wrong did go wrong and it got to the point where the plot was somehow predictable. I enjoyed it while it lasted, though.
The Gardens of Kyoto | Kate Walbert
Bright background for such a gloomy-looking book cover. It was a beautiful summer day, who can resist reading outside?
The inside cover of the book promised a lot more than the story turned out to be. :P I kept searching for the mystery, the love, the heartbreaks, but it all seemed very mundane.
