Book Buzz

STEIG LARSSON

A rousing read. Quite a page turner. GIRL is a continuation of Girl with the Dragon Tattoo. Set in Sweden, Michael Blomkvist ,the journalist, writer and publisher, is trying to help his friend and one time lover Lisbeth Salander.  Salander is wanted for three counts of murder. No one beside Blomkvist is looking for other leads. The murdered couple had researched and written an expose of human trafficking and prostitution. Some powerful people will be named when the book is published by Blomkvist. Salander was severly abused as a child. She trusts no one. Not even a friend.

Again a horrible cover in Canada. I borrowed this pic from Culture Witch.

SUZANNE COLLINS

Arresting concept: the youth of the nation pitted against the youth of the nation for public entertainment. Each year a male and female youth are chosen from each district. A complex draft chooses the contestants. At age ten each name goes into the draw; each year after the name goes in draft an additional time. Eleven twice, twelve three times, thirteen three times.  All names are kept in the draw year after year. When the kids have been chosen, they get a bit of training and then are throwen into an arena for a fight until death, for the amusement and control of the masses.

A good book but at 350 pages it needed serious editing. Unfortunately  GAMES does not come to a complete finality. It sets the scene for a sequel. Even within a series a novel should be complete on its own.

MARGARET ATWOOD

Since Atwood’s newest novel starts where ORYX ends, I thought I would refreshen my mind by reading this excellent saga. Wow what a book. No punches held. Not post- apocalypse, this novel tackles the devastation from before and during as well as post. Snowman is the last human left alive after an engineered virus designed by Crake is dispatched to the populous.  Crake spared Snowman to take care of his new species: a humanoid creation made by splicing different DNA.

It is a dark look at our future. It reminds me of the song (first line ) I Can Ride My Bike with No Handlebars. Starts off as simple braging but graduates into a megalomaniac ready to destroy the world.

I can hardly wait to read The YEAR of the FLOOD.

NANCY WERLIN

SURVIVAL is the story of three siblings and their trials to survive their crazily abusive mother Nikki. The father of Matt and Callie, the two oldest, is unable to stand up against his ex-wife and protect his children. Matt dreams for a superhero who will take them out of their situation. The story is a letter written to Emmy the baby of the family. He wants her to know the true story so that if Nikki turns up again she will know to stay clear.

It is a well written and well thought out novel for young adults. A touching read that won’t be forgotten easily.

JONATHAN HICKMAN

J M RINGUET

Best Graphic Novel I have read recently. Hickman iluustrates  genetic engineering and the creation of super-humans, from a corporate, profit point of view. The book is a documentary telling the story of two rival scientists who were both trying to bring about the next step in human evolution but solely for a profit. The rival scientists are both trying to create superhumans; one via genetic engineering and the other using technological modifications. Au cureent is the inclusion of venture capatalists who fund the research again for a profit share.

I enjoyed the way Hickman slowly revealed the consequences of this human engineering.

Art: lauralengyel.com

JAMES A. LEVINE

Not an easy book. Batuk is a child prostitue. She was sold into the trade by her father.  Auctioned to wealthy man, her owner likely received more from that first customer than the father was initially paid. Life goes downhill from there being sold to increasingly cheaper, less classy brothels.

She befriends a boy in the brothel. Puneet earns at lease double to what men pay for her because he is a boy. But after a visit from two police officers he is left bleeding and wounded from have a night stick inserted into his wiry  frame. The men leave the brothel laughing.

Author Levine is a doctor at the Mayo clinic. He was inspired to write NOTEBOOK after doing medical research in India. He devoting the proceeds from the sale of the book to help exploited children.

Well worth reading despite the pitiful ending.

MICHAEL GRUBER

Someone left the witch a baby.  She knew that she shouldn’t but she keeps the child to raise as her own. The ugliest child ever born she calls him Lump. A she bear suckles him and is his nurse. Lump grows up believing himself to be beautiful and pities human children when he catches a glimse because they are so repugnant. When he realizes how the non-enchanted world operates, he covers his face with a mask. He developes intois a most angry young man. The most fun is when Lump meets characters from fairy tales. In these revised tales the stepmother is never evil. Hansel and Gretal run away from an abusive mother and are saved by the witch.

A good fairy tale. Superb cover illustration.

DEBORAH GRABEIN

I have been doing some rather heavy reading of late so I wanted something trashy. I found it in this mystery in my latest library stash. The fun part is backstage and behind scenes of a popular rock and roll band. Blacklight is a successful band, now aging and doing comeback tours for its many die hard fans. A tabloid sleaze journalist, Dillan, is planning a no holds barred, unauthorized biography. All the dirt and of course there is dirt. But on opening night of the North American tour, his body is found in lead guitarist, JP Kinkaid’s dressing room. Kinkaid’s long term girlfriend (he never got around to divorcing his wife), found the body.

Trashy but fun and light. Just what I needed.

ANNE MICHAELS

A beautifully written, poetic phrases pour from the pages, but plot wise unsatisfying novel. It me against the critics on this one. VAULT has been longlisted for the Giller Prize. The background to this poetry are the dam building projects in Quebec in the 50’s and Egypt in the 60’s. Perenial problem is what do we do with the people whose land is flooded. Avery is an engineer in both projects. He met his wife Jean on the former and lost her during the later. All is well at this point but three-quarters into the story Michaels interjects a new character into the mix and fogets about Avery until the last few pages. She has an affair with an old man, an artist. And a new background Warsaw pre, during and post WWII. What Avery thinks or how he feels is not there which creates a large gap in the tapestry of Vault.

Quote: “–Please go.     His words turned her cold. But he did not let go.   She gradually felt her longing was not separate from his. The slow, impossible, surrender to what was true. He did not let go, and in this union, his confession of aloneness was as close to love as all that had yet passed between them; as close as love is to the fear of love.”

Read it for the language. Forgive the breach in the tapestry.

WILL EISNER

So many graphic novels are aimed at a youth audience, it is refreshing to chance upon a graphic novel for adults. However this is not a pretty book. Eisner tackles some major issues of our time. The father is incapacitated due to age? Alzheimer’s? The family reunites to discuss how to take care of him. Buried resentments and past abuses surface for each child. Be happy that this is not your family in crisis.

But like all graphic novels powerful graphically but still a quick read.

AMITAV GHOSH

What pulled me into this novel were the great characters. Characters were introduced with such rapidity that I wrote a character sheet to keep them straight. Deeti  is a young mother living by the Ganges some 50 miles east of Benares. She grows poppies because she must (the destruction of the rural economy is of no concern to the British), but though she is not  user, her husband is an opium addict. The people are no longer aloud to grow crops to feed themselves, they must supply the British with opium to sell to the Chinese, who don’t want it. This book reminds me of all I learned in Liquid Jade about the opium trade and wars in colonial times. Historical fiction puts it in a human context.  All the main characters come alive. Ghosh’s characters breath life into the story.

I also enjoyed the use of local and antiquated vocabulary. There are words and expressions from Hindi, Urdu, Hindustan and others as well as colonial and sailing vocabulary.  Though it got waring by the end of the novel.

At almost 500 pages the novel was too long. It dragged in the last quarter though the very ending picked up speed. The final ending seems to lead to a sequel and isn’t  diffinative  which was disappointing.

But all and all worth the read. And this type of  historical fiction usually isn’t my first choice.

NOTE:  image not the book cover but Sea of Poppies by Louise Southan watercolor landscape (http://images.google.ca/imgres?imgurl=http://www.dreamgallery.co.uk/watercolor_e_detail/sea_of_poppies.jpg&imgrefurl=http://www.dreamgallery.co.uk/watercolor_e_amain/aimage04.htm&usg=__6bc7Hqj9dvlZEQK-yofZVwVX6lE=&h=300&w=432&sz=72&hl=en&start=7&sig2=nREF97fXnX68HDPZWom2PQ&tbnid=3PTuBbYAJUKgsM:&tbnh=88&tbnw=126&prev=/images%3Fq%3Dsea%2Bof%2Bpoppies%26gbv%3D2%26hl%3Den%26sa%3DG&ei=cEe0StqpBovUMtb7-doO

MAGGIE SIGGINS

BITTER is a powerful account of what has happened to the people in and around Pigeon Lake over the past 200 years. For over two hundred years, Pelican Narrows has endured an equally torturous relationship with the encroaching European culture, from the Hudson’s Bay Company factors and missionaries of earlier times to the bureaucrats and police of today. Siggins used oral history and documented the personal stories of contemporary Pelican Narrows Rock Cree. She gives us the human faces behind the newspaper stories of native issues. Bitter Embrace is an extraordinary contribution to our history and our understanding of ourselves and what our First Nations Communities have under gone and have to deal with now.

It is a difficult read but should be read by all Canadians and read and discussed by all high school students in Canada.

MICHEL TREMBLAY

I’ve been wanting to revisit this old friend ever since it was part of Canada Reads on CBC. I had forgotten what a challenging read it is. I had to map the author’s family tree – the characters in the book – to keep them straight. Tremblay said he wrote this novel and the next three in the series to tell his family how much he loved them. Beautiful. The novel takes place in one day. The Fat Woman is Tremblay’s mother pregnant with him. Welcome to the family.

I tried to included the family tree but the format is lost so I created a web page. Please take a look. Other character besides family are listed as well.

ARAVIND ADIGA

I discovered this book by reading this review in the New Internationalist:

Top of the swaying piles of books that pedestrian street-hawkers navigate through Mumbai’s traffic jams is Adiga’s controversial first novel. Apart from winning the prestigious Man Booker prize in Britain, The White Tiger has also taken India by storm. But in his native land, Adiga’s efforts have elicited admiration and anger in equal measure. For some, The White Tiger is a bold, honest work that unflinchingly ‘tells the truth’ about contemporary India; others have dismissed it as ‘inauthentic’ and peopled with ‘grotesque caricatures’.

The first-person narrative is dominated by the book’s hero, Balram Halwai, who is writing a letter to the Chinese Premier. The latter is about to visit India to find out about ‘entrepreneurship’ – something ‘India Rising’ has in abundance and China lacks. But what do Indian politicians and élites know about it, asks Balram? Listen to me, he says, and he starts to tell his own dark, intriguing journey to success, from low-caste village boy in ‘The Darkness’ (the northern state of Bihar) to wealthy business owner in the IT hub of Bangalore. It’s a tale of servitude, abuse, betrayal, murder, corruption, theft and ruthless cunning. The message is stark: if you start life at the bottom, this is how you escape poverty and humiliation in India’s ‘democracy’.

The wit is mordant; the politics trenchant; the vision as unforgiving as neon light. Compassion is entirely lacking in Balram’s dog-eat-dog world. There is just one perspective – the protagonist’s – and his distinctive voice, as he tells his story brilliantly, incisively and – of course – controversially.

http://www.newint.org/columns/media/books/2009/01/01/white-tiger/

Great read. Interesting picture of Indian society.

LOUISE PENNY

A dysfunctional but rich family has a reunion at a lodge in Quebec. One of the siblings, the black sheep, meets an untimely demise. Which one of the other family members executed her is such a symbolic way?  It just happens that Chief Inspector Gamache is vacationing at the lodge with his wife so the investigation starts immediately.

Lousise Penny is a good writer. The insult “slid off his back landed on the floor and disintegrated.” However it took Penny 89 pages to get to the murder. I found this title from CBC’s Canada Reads Blog. August was the month to discuss mysteries and their authors. Worth the read but not great.

ALAN MOORE and DAVE GIBBONS

This graphic novel made Time’s 100 Best Novels! Superheros in 1985 are vermin, hated and not trusted by most people. Being a masked hero enforcing law and dispensing justice is illegal. Fear is flowing through the nation – Russia has just invaded Afganistan. Some suspect that Pakistan will be next. Advisors are advocating Nixon to use the nuclear arsenal in a strike first scenario. And someone is executing the masked heros. Classic comic book themes. Good vs Evil. But who decides what is good and what is evil? Interestingly Watchmen is not a quick read. The plot can be confusing.

It was good to read something so completely different.

GUILLERMO DEL TORO and CHUCK HOGAN

Modern gothic. I don’t want to say too much about this story. Let it surprise you. STRAIN is page turner and an easy read. An unusual plague has struck New York City. Bizarre things happen to the people who are infected. The medical officer and authorities are having trouble confining the contagion.

This is the first book of a trilogy. I won’t read more. Vampires as zombies. Not the cool sexy vampires as Anne Rice created.

BEATRICE HOHENEGGER

Tea has had an amazing history in medicine, politics, the arts, culture, and religion. But behind tea there is treachery, violence, smuggling, drug trade, international espionage, slavery, and revolution. Western greed against Eastern spiritual ways.

China first used tea as a remedy. Taoists celebrated tea as the elixir of immortality. Buddhist Japan developed a whole body of practices around tea as a spiritual path, Zen simplicity and order. The first Westerners were merchants which led to trade wars, the emergence of the powerful English East India Company. Spies roamed China to steal the secrets of tea production. An army of smugglers made fortunes with tea deliveries in the dead of night. In the name of “free trade” the English imported opium to China in exchange for tea. China was not allowed to choose. They had to take the opium. The huge tea industry in the eighteenth century reinforced the practice of slavery in the sugar plantations as it became the norm to drink tea with sugar. And one of the reasons why tea became popular in the first place is that it helped sober up the English, who were practically drowning in alcohol. The enormous consumption of tea in England also led to the development of the large tea plantation system in colonial India — a story of success for British Empire tea and of untold misery for generations of tea workers. The British tax on tea sparked the American Revolution.

Liquid Jade is illustrated  with works of art and historical photographs.

No means a perfect book but definitely worth a skim.

Dalia Sofer

When I first started reading SHIRAZ, I thought that it wasn’t by far the best fiction about Iran. But the more I read the more I enjoyed and started to love this story and its writing. It is the story of a prosperous Jewish family in Tehran shortly after the revolution.

Isaac, the father, is a successful jeweler and gem merchant.. In the opening chapters, he is arrested by two armed Revolutionary Guards, taken from his office at lunchtime on a routine workday.  ” What crime has he committed?” is frequently asked. Before the revolution he had  been patronized by many in the aristocracy, including the wife of the shah. This economic class separation between the middle class before the revolution and the revolutionary guards after, was not something that I understood before this book.

Well worth reading.

ANDRE ACIMAN

An impressive novel, this love story of Elio and Oliver. Elio is a seventeen year old boy at his parents villa in Italy. Every year his father, a respected literature professor, takes an intern for the summer to help with his papers, work on his own writing, to enliven the discussion in the house and to enjoy the Mediterranean  in the summer. This summer the intern was Oliver with impressive literary credential, American movie star looks and charming. The story is narrated by Elio as an adult. Though on the surface a gay novel, both young men have relationships with women. Too much of the story is Elio’s adolescent angst whining about Oliver’s coming and going. Which to me really emphasized the inherent power and age difference between the two. But the the ending of the book is strong which pulls it all together.

“Are ‘being’ and ‘having’ thoroughly inaccurate verbs in the twisted skein of desire, where having someone’s body to touch and being that someone we’re longing to touch are one and the same, just opposite banks on a river that passes from us to them, back to us and over to them again this perpetual circulation where the chambers of the heart, like the trapdoors of desire, and the wormholes of time, and the false-bottomed drawer we call identity share a beguiling logic according to which the shortest distance between real life and the life unlived, between who we are and what we want, is a twisted staircase designed with the impish cruelty of M.C. Escher . . . He was my secret conduit to myself — like a catalyst that allows us to become who we are, the foreign body, the pacer, the graft, the patch that sends all the right impulses, the steel pin that keeps a soldier’s bone together, the other man’s heart that makes us more us than we were before the transplant.”