...working title...
...my best friend is the man who'll get me a book i ain't read. Abraham Lincoln
Saturday, February 26, 2011
authors...
Wednesday, February 23, 2011
my top picks from last semester...
Tuesday, September 14, 2010
materials for young adults...
Thursday, August 26, 2010
couldn't finish it...
Sunday, August 22, 2010
as seen on facebook: cap'n bloodsnatch
go ahead... be grossed out...
but why?
this is my new-found freedom I've found from reading flow: the cultural history of menstruation by elissa stein. occasionally, I read non-fiction, and this book was recommended by one of my more “interesting” patrons. this patron handed me this book, and in a voice heavy in conspiracy said, “you’ve been lied to.” a little weird yeah.
but this book was so interesting in the fact that MEN have made us embarrassed by this thing our body does for no specific reason that anyone knows… a thing that has been understudied, misunderstood and corrupted by the femcare industry and pharmaceutical companies.
stop! I love men. I’m not a man hater… but this book is one of those books that makes you rethink everything you’ve ever thought about your period because it’s men who have convinced us that we’re crazy, depressed, practically abnormal and should be shunned.
shunned? sequestered? hmm… a little red tent time? I could handle that far better than charlotte
flow is an easy read… maybe not so much for the people in your life who are a bit squeamish, because it’s one of those books where you are compelled to read parts out loud in disgust, anger or in laughter.
happy reading!
Wednesday, July 28, 2010
oh, hello... have we met?
i've been reading a bunch, even if i haven't been posting. first of all, i want to continue the last post because at first i was disappointed with how the help ended. i expected great earth-shattering changes for aibileen and minny and the rest of the help. and when the book ended, i didn't feel that. in my mind, i was thought, "really? that's it?"
but two months later, and after reading sit-in: how four friends stood up by sitting down with my guys... i had one of those slap yourself up-side the head moment!! the whole movement was based on the tiny and patient steps by people who saw that any gain is a gain--no matter the size. and what skeeter, aibileen and minny did was earth-shattering because it made people stop and think. so now i recommend the help whole-heartedly versus my eeh review in may. sometimes, I wonder about myself…
happy reading, my friends!
Monday, May 24, 2010
chatty-cathy
for example, nabokov's lolita or bernhard schlink's the readerare both are fabulous books, and are worthwhile reads. but they are too one-sided to me. i'm aware that's a literary device, and creative license, and lalalalalaaaa...
but give me somethin' that i can sink my teeth in and hear a fuller version of the story.
the help by kathryn stockett is a talking book!
there are three different voices talking about what happens when the color lines get blurred in Jackson, Mississippi in 1962. the world is on the verge of change, and it's starting to trickle south, as it were.
one thing i love about southern books, is everyone's got a nickname. think about the ya-ya sisterhood... and the help is no different. eugenia "skeeter" phelan has come home from ole miss with a degree and not an MRS like her all of her friends. she has aspirations different from the junior leaguers... skeeter wants to be a writer! sadly the only journalism job available in jackson is as the housekeeping advice columnist.
yep, there's a bit of irony there, as she's never done anything for herself because she was raised by "the help" too. but thru a series of events finds herself turning to aiblieen and minny, house maids, for help on the housekeeping column, and the column turns into a book about what it's like to be a black maid in mississippi.
in 2010, the civil rights movement is a moment in history that invokes a wide range of emotions for everyone, i'd suppose. for me, it was breaking out in goosebumps in the nashville public library's civil rights room with a lunch counter replica and ugly visions of peaceful demonstrations...
or being on the lincoln memorial with hot tears escaping down my cheeks with thoughts of dr. martin luther king having a dream for a better future while standing on the very same stepl...
or the anger, shame and disgust i feel by reading this book! these friends of skeeter's are steeped in a sweet tea of ignorance! and i know this is how the world was then, and how they were raised, but an initiative for every home having a separate bathroom for the help because they carry diseases that the whites can catch? really...!?!
the fear i feel for the help who are working with skeeter on her book, i can't help wonder what will happen when the book is completed. and what will skeeter do? will she continue to say thank you--and actually mean it--to the black women who wait on her? will what they're doing make any difference in the world in which they live?
i don't know...
obviously, i'm not done with the book yet... my ipod battery died this morning! i'm dying to finish it!!
however, here are a couple of other books I loved with good talk:
almost paradise by susan isaacs--certainly not high literature, but a good story told from two sides of a courtship, marriage, and betrayal.
the divine secrets if the ya-ya sisterhood by rebecca wells
joy luck club by amy tan
the other boleyn girl by philippa gregory