Reading groups, recommendations and re-reads

As I have stated before I decided this year to sign up for a number of reading challenges in the hopes that I could catch up on my TBR and WTR piles of titles. There are of course other sources of books than the TBR piles two of those are reading groups and recommendations.

 I belong to two reading groups down here in the ‘real’ world one in our village and one in our nearest town. They are run by the County Library who sends out a list of available books every year from which the groups chose 12 books from a choice of just over 100. Belonging to both groups has often meant that I have to re-read a book, which is great if it was a book I enjoyed the first time around, bit ugh if not!

 The catch to these groups and also its strength is that one reads outside what is a normal comfort read. Many times this is an effort but just as often one can be surprised into a new enjoyment, new genre, and new author. An open mind is a requisite of these reading groups.

 Recommendations can be tricky things until you find a source with similar tastes to ones own. I have a couple of friends whose enjoyment of books always seem to mirror my own and some friends whose tastes sometimes do. On the whole the broadsheet reviews are helpful and a couple of radio programmes can steer me to undiscovered treats.

 I find myself, as life circumstances change and evolve, relying increasingly on recommendations from others. Those long blissful hours of browsing through bookshops laden shelves are sadly a thing of the past for me now.

Also one of my great delights is re-reading books I have enjoyed in the past, I do like to have time to revisit these during the year, so I will try and match these to my other challenges but sometimes one just has to read what takes one’s fancy!

 So I shall be categorising and listing my reading under book groups and recommendations as well as challenges. I foresee many oddities and mixed reactions over this year!

East of the Sun: Julia Gregson

This was one of my Reading Group reads and also a Chunkster one,  coming in at 480 pages.  I have mixed feelings about the book.  The history and locale I did enjoy very much. I have visited India and seen the incredible vibrancy of life lived at top volume and the author has captured this to a certain extent, it is an impossible achievement, no collection of words could adequately describe the experience.  Her portrayal of one section of colonial life also was believable.  But one  is left with the impression that all colonials in India behaved in that way which, of course, they didn’t.

More impatient readers in our reading group- thought the action was slow but I thought it suited the historical setting; the long privileged sea journey, cruise style, the hot languorous days in India.  It conjured up a vision of a less frenetic lifestyle. The story unfolds much like an extravagantly wrapped gift and half the fun is in that unwrapping – do not be impatient in the reading.

Julia Gregson also managed to contrast the different cultures and lifestyles well.  Between the Raj and the Indian population, between those who were there just to take and enjoy and those who wished to ‘help’. The lack of understanding and the assumptions each culture brought to bear.  Dispersing some of our modern assumptions as she did so.

It was interesting to see how even those who did not ‘rule’, who were trying to help out of the charity of their hearts/conscious  were distrusted and despised because of how their ‘good works’ and ‘intentions’ imposed alien values onto the  ‘helped’ culture.

I am not a romance reader as such and I found the three girls love affairs vaguely tedious, but I was assured by those who read romances that they were well portrayed take their word for that.

The most satisfactory strand of the girls’ lives, for me,  was that of  Rose.  Although it was the most disastrous, it portrayed the whole crazy colonial business of marrying one’s own  kind, no matter what so well. Going native not being a ‘decent’ option. Rose had only known her future husband a few weeks, could barely remember what he looked like and was so unprepared for marriage I’m surprised she stayed the course!  She summed up the whole ‘child of the army’ ideal.  Knowing her duty, willing to sacrifice herself for cherished ideals, with well bred chin held high she made a fair stab at a life that would have sent a lesser girl screaming into a pit of hell.

Viva on a quest to reclaim her past, finds the truth is not straight forward.  There are a fascinating few chapters on how the invention and reinvention of lives in the past changes present thoughts; how it is impossible to know truth from fabrication in the end.

Victoria was a favourite with many of the book group.  Desperate for a husband, any husband.  Never having been in that predicament I found I had less sympathy for her.  Victoria irritated me, I was left  wanting to shake her and tell her to behave better – I’m growing old I fear! ?

As always with an historical novel the student side of me kicked in and I was left wanting to know far more about the political situation running through the backdrop of the girl’s stories.  Unfair of me because it was not that kind of book, which is why I do not pick these books normally. I should read history books if I wish to know about history!

I found East of the Sun an easy book to read and despite my half hearted opinion I did read it without flagging, and was engaged with the characters. I beleive it is a very good read of its genre.

The Thousand Autumns of Jacob de Zoet

The Thousand Autumns of Jacob de Zoet by David Mitchell

 Read as part of Mount TBR Reading Challenge

and The Chunkster Reading Challenge.

The Thousand Autumns of Jacob de Zoet by David Mitchell

I found this book in a charity shop one bleak early autumn day last year , bought on a whim because I had read two books of David Mitchell’s and quite liked them  – did I need another book? of course not, my TBR pile is higher than a house however –

What a treat this offering turned out to be.  I was drawn instantly into 18th century Japan.  Swept through the clash of cultures, through a fascinating picture of a Japan and a Dutch nation so different from todays.

Dutch traders perched precariously on the edge of Japan, their Nations  domination over the world’s trade routes already at an end. Japan, secretive, insular, ruled by rigid and prescribed rituals, manners and behaviour. Two cultures who despise, mistrust and misunderstand each other.

This is an ambitious and imaginative work.  Within the pages, are traders, spies, interpreters, servants, naval men, slaves and high ranking officials.  We follow them, through the main and many subplots in a wonderful weaving of suspense, intrigue, betrayal, conflict, love and loss. A richly drawn tapestry of emotions to satisfy the reader.

Into this mix comes Jacob de Zoet a moral young man of integrity and honesty. Trusting in his faith and his belief in promises made, naïve in the ‘wicked ways’ of the world he is no match for the combined cunning of both the Dutch and the Japanese. It is the story of the fates and fortunes of this young man and the woman he dared to love that we follow.  Two coloured threads in the densely woven cloth of the story.

David Mitchell has the happy knack of enabling one’s imagination so we can clearly view the sights, smell the mix of scents and odours, listen to the clamour and the silences. This story is set in the closing years of the 1700s and violence is rapid and many times casual, as it was throughout the world.  These are no worse, no better, than found at any time.

David Mitchell offers us a snippet of history invites us in to become part of it.  There is a lot to get one’s head around, from the names, ranks, the foreignness of the two cultures and their respective histories – the histories are such an integral part of what happens it is worth getting to grips with these:)

It is not for the faint hearted, not a book for casual reading on the beach or park bench, not one to be glanced at.  Every one of the 546 pages exude knowledge from their fibres.

One day I shall read it again.

Inanna:Queen of Heaven and Earth

Read as part of The Telling Tales Reading Challenge

Inanna:  Queen of Heaven and Earth

her stories and hymns from Sumer

by Diane Wolkstein and Samuel Noah Kramer

1984 ISBN0-09-158181-8

I was introduced to Inanna last autumn on a mythology workshop.  The tutor gave us a taste and I fell instantly under Inanna’s spell.  Within hours I had tracked down a second hand copy (not easy) and ordered it. When the book arrived I was bogged down in so many writing commitments that I reluctantly put it aside, after a brief foray, until I could savour it with relish.  I have now done so and am even more enchanted than before.

This edition of the book combines so many aspects of my interests I feel it may have been written just for me:)  It is collaboration between a cuneiformist expert/specialist and an amazing folklorist.  The story and cycle of Inanna has been pieced together painstaking over decades from ‘fragments’ of clay tablets dating back to 2000BC. Anyone who knows me will know how I delight in these connections, continuations and interpretations of  times past. So early language, storytelling, anthropology all come together, magic.

Sumer is situated in the southern half of modern day Iraq between present day Baghdad and the Persian Gulf – probably the birth place of modern civilization. With new discoveries every decade how can we tell? The tablets as they are found are divided between international museums.

Diane Wolkstein, although at first trying to tell the story in prose, her natural way in storytelling, found she had to relate it in verse, as far as possible keeping to the Sumerian verse line.  The result? A small masterpiece of mystery, power and extravagance.

It is more than a story of Inanna; just 106 pages of the 206 page book detail her story.  The rest is given up to a fascinating account of the history of the peoples of the area and their culture.  There are photos of the tablets and fragments which have been scattered around the museums of the world, and explanations of the symbolism and rich imagery of the mythology.  Something for every part of me.

I found the rhythm of the verse picked me up, carrying me effortlessly in its hypnotic and slightly addictive way.  The language was superb and beautiful; the story of Inannas life cycle fascinating.  From young inexperienced maiden through her fertile years to her aging this is a goddess seen in a whole. Familiar characters appear, such as Gilgamesh and Lilith, fleetingly, and then are left behind.  Real persons people Inannas life, the ancient Sumerian heroes, a wonderful mesh of reality and spiritual which is so captivating in mythology.

Diane Wolstein calls this the worlds first love story (well written one anyway!) she describes the story, and I have to agree, ‘tender, erotic, shocking and compassionate.’   It is all of those, the language is in places raw and blunt, this after all is a goddess concerned with life and fertility. Her worshippers depended on her, in their barren surroundings, for life itself.  The language is stark in the trials, tribulations, tortures and death, of the participants.  It is extravagantly jubilant in the love, triumphs and successes won. A splendid, wonderful read.

I felt a sadness when I came to the end, because I had come to an end. And because although the work on these tablets continues, and there may well be more to come of Inanna, I probably will not be around to experience them.

I have my copy and if anyone wishes to borrow it they will be ankle tagged and have to live with an armed guard for the duration.  I do not intend to let it go!

Telling Tales a Challenge

Another reading challenge I have entered this year is the Telling Tales Challenge over on an an arm chair by the sea and who wouldn’t want to read in an armchair with a sea view to glance up at occasionally – I booked my seat and thought long and hard about my choices.  The range to choose from being wide and deeply satisfying. You can see the choice of genre here.

Over the past year I have been considering stepping into the realm of full length fantasy/fairy tale/myth writing myself – I indulge a little in my short stories.  So I thought this challenge would be ideal to re-acquaint myself with all the many forms of storytelling that has held mankind in rapt attention since before we have written records.

I shall of course be reading collections of stories for many of these come in the short form. Among them I have:

Two volumes of collected Myths and Legends of the British Isles, I must start with my own land:)

Then I am going to refresh my memory of the terrible grimness of the Brothers Grimm – I was brought up on these over 6 decades ago, nothing like the fairy tales of today that children read – if memory serves me right.

If I am going to re-read Grimm I feel I should re-read Hans Christian Anderson also.  The problem always with these vast works is that only the few are remembered and just looking down the index of both these I know I shall be startled to discover how many I don’t know or can’ remember.  So let the fun commence with these. The Grimm collection has over  200 and the Anderson 290 stories.  I am hoping to find a few new favourites to take into my old age.

I’m going to visit antiquity ancient  Sumer and Greece with a few classics  such as Inanna and Gilgamesh and The  Odyssey – this last will overlap with a Classics Challenge I am doing.  The first two will directly aid my intended myth attempt.

As this intention to write a myth of my own is going to based on creation myths I will be reading 2 different collections of creation myths from around the world.

Bringing myself up to date I am going to explore Angela Carter of whom I have heard much but not  read to my shame, so nestling on my shelves I have her Bloody Chamber and also Angela Carters Book of Fairy Tales collected from around the world.

Also on modern-day writing Black Thorn, White Rose,  Snow White and Blood Red and A Trolls Eye View all edited by E .Datlow and T.Windling, modern day twists on the traditional!

And as Fairy Tales, Myths and Legends are an international force I shall read a translation from the Japanese of The Book of Hero’s by Miyuki Miyabe.

All in all I think I am in for many treats this year.

The Small Island Review

I am a member of 2 reading groups down here in the real world.  They are both run by our County Library Service, so both groups choose their books from the same list of a 100 +titles on offer.   I have belonged to the group in my nearest town for 9 years and the one in the village for 6 and so many of the books I read are ones I have read before.  I don’t as it happens mind too much as if I have enjoyed a book I am very happy to read it again and if it was one I didn’t enjoy I just wing it on memory at the discussions!

Our December title A Small Island by Andrea Levy is one I have read before and I wrote a small review at the time for the in house library newsletter – I have found it as good a read this 2^nd time and have resurrected and added to my original article.

 A Small Island by Andrea Levy

 Take six characters, three white and three black, and set them into the cauldron that was the Second World War and its immediate aftermath, stir a little and you have this great read.  With characters that feel real and a story line which encompasses just a tiny part of our multicultural history this is an un-put-down-able book. Dealing, as it does, with the beginning of mass immigration from the British colonies, the collapse of the British Empire, the role played by the Commonwealth countries in Britain’s defence (a very little known story to our shame I fear) and Britain’s’ role in the world changed beyond recognition it is of extreme interest to today’s British readers at least but I also think to others outside this particular small island.

Exploring the universal stories of humanity we have in this tale the ordinary braveries and cowardice’s of people, the loves and hatreds that are not to do with the great global conflicts but is everything to do about men and women just being.  It is a story about racial tensions to be sure but it has a good deal more to offer.

The Small Island?  Is it Jamaica or Britain?  Both, but also many more small islands.  The small enclosed islands that people live in, the rigid rules of different aspects of society.  So the isolated farm, the confines of family care responsibilities, the isolation of army units in a foreign clime, the rocky bleakness of intolerance all try to entrap people within their small boundaries, to keep change at bay.  These are to be escaped and our protagonists all make the attempt and, on their way, grow and change.

The characters in A Small Island show courage and determination in the different ways they cope with life.  No-one has an easy passage through this time of great change.  They have hopes and ambitions, some come about, many have to evolve and adapt to circumstances.  The world is in a period of great upheaval but despite the huge forces unleashed across the world our ‘ordinary’ folks do carve out a version of their dreams. At the end we wish them well as they make their way forward.

Andrea Levy writes with some anger, not a little humour and certainly with compassion.  She is definitely on my list of impatient ‘when is she going to write another one for goodness sake’ books.

Some books are massive!

Two of the reading challenges I have signed up for this year are the Tea & Books Reading Challengeand the Chunkster Reading Challenge.  I have been cautious at the level I am going in on the first of these challenges as some of these are seriously large.  It is not the process of reading them which dictates caution, I have no problem from that aspect I am and always have been a rapid reader.  As a child teachers, librarians and even, for the shortest while, parents would test me to check I wasn’t lying when I said I had finished a book.

That was then – nowadays the problem lies with age.  Oh no not the eyes – the eyes can be accommodated with a pair of specs.  No it’s the wrists and fingers which have driven me to reading e-books more and more. They increasingly complain at holding a book, a combination of  smashed bones, bone grafts and pinning combined with ageing and the aches and pains that come with that condition have left me with a feeling that if I am to read those books of that size remaining on my shelves I must hurry and do so!

I have arranged them all in a special section of the shelves and, if luck walks alongside me this year, I will not only read the few but maybe update my ambitions and read the whole amount – ah sweet dreams.

As it is the biggest of them will have to be read on a table top, maybe all of them, I can still dimly remember the days of curling up with a chunk of alternate life.  However us oldies are made of stern stuff and I will do!

The Tea & Books Challenge demands books of 700+ pages and I have entered at the Berry Tea Devotee which is 4 books of over 700+ now most of those I have to read (I am endeavouring to clear my TBR pile at the same time) are well over this 750 mark

Of Time and the River by Thomas Woolfe = 1035

The Pillars of the Earth by  Ken Follet = 1076

A Suitable Boy  by Vikram Seth = 1474

Antony Adverse by   Hervey Allen = 1133

The Brothers Karamazov by  Dostoyevsky = 846

The Lord of the Rings by Tolkein = 1069 (re-read)

The Tale of Genji by  Muraski Shikibu = 1090

Poor Fellow my Country by Xaviar Herbert = 1463 (re-read)

Three  of these overlap the Classic Challenges  and could overlap the Chunkster Challenge so I have put them all up- maybe I’ll read them all maybe not.

In the Chunkster Challenge the books have to be  450+ pages and as with the first challenge I have more than I need in the house – this size is much more manageable for my hands so have gone for the Mor-book – ly  Obese level which is 8 books in the year 3 of which must be 750+ and the other 5  the 450+

so apart from the above I have

The Thousand Autumns of Jacob de Zoet  by David Mitchell

The Owl Killers by Karen Maitland

Making History by Stephen Fry

The Historian by Elizabeth Kostova

Dejà Dead by Kathy Reichs

Saving Fish from Drowning by Amy Tan

Lacuna  by Barbara Kingsolver

The Map of Love by Ahadaf Soueif

The Mammoth Cheese by Sheri Holman

East of the Sun by Julie Gregson

Family Matters by Rohinton Mistry

These are the lightweights of the massive world coming in at between 450 and 700 pages.

these can overlap the TBR Reading Challenge.  All in all if my wrists will stand up to the task i am going to so enjoy my challenges.  It is unfortunately addictive I keep seeing others I would like to enter – stop it – stop it I’m supposed to be writing a book this year.

Classical Literature:Reading Challenge

I am combining the two classic reading challenges in one post – cheating I know but there is a certain overlap.

It’s been interesting to see what others define as a classic and as always see I need to do a catch up into modern thought.  That a classic transcends time sounds very fine but how much time? I find it difficult to accept that something written since I have grown up has had enough time to elapse to be called a classic as opposed to good literature.  However as I have been reading for 6 decades and time travels faster these days I realise I am out of step.

In Sarah’s Back to the Classics there is a category which states a classic with an award – as far as I can see most literary awards go back to just before or after I was born so I have had to grit my teeth and go for it:) as to 20c classics I can accept those penned in the early part of the century as even for me enough time has passed to see if they will last.  Picky picky me!  Actually it has been fun and absorbing to choose my reads for the challenges and very interesting to see what are considered classics – there is a whole new world of reading opening up to me in my dotage.

My list is not final yet but it might take months for the couple that are missing to be found and I may well change my mind on the ones I have picked but I do have some kind of a list.  I am combining all my reading challenges with my way to high TBR pile and hopefully will not have to buy too many more so with that in mind I went hunting through my books (they number in their thousands – I inherited many) where I found enough unread books

So for Back to the Classics I have picked

Tale of Genji by Muraski Shikibu:  for the Romance

Written probably in the 11th century I have been wanting to read it for a long time – at first I was going to have it as my translation however I seem to have read all the classical ‘romances’ and couldn’t find anything in the modern that I thought did the ‘time’ bit to my liking and this book is a romance although probably not quite how we use the term now – and at over 1000 pages ticks the box in my 700- page challenge as well = Result!

Of Time and The River by Thomas Wolfe : for 20th Century

This was written in1935 – enough time transcending even for me! I know little about it – I bought it as a Penguin Modern Classic in the early 70s when I had pretensions! And it has sat on the shelves quietly biding its time.  This also 1000+ pages and so ticks another of my 700+ challenge read = another result (I’m on a roll here)

The Brothers Karamazov by Dostoyevsky: for 19th century

This will be another one for the 700+ challenge and it is in a beautiful Folio Edition so will be real delight to read.

The Borrowers by Mary Norton for the classic with an award

This is a children’s classic apparently it came out in 1951 or 2 – I never thought of it as a classic as I listened to it on the radio at primary school however on consideration I will believe the lists and remember that it was over 50 years ago.  It has lasted as can be seen by how many different adaptations of the story in book and TV productions there are and the fact that it is easy to buy in the shops. As its a tale about little people living under the floorboards I can use this for myTelling Tales reading challenge = I do like a bargain

The Picture of Dorien Gray for the horror classic

I was astonished quite recently to think I had not read this yet.  I have seen screen adaptations which I have enjoyed so am looking foward to reading the proper version – there never has been an adaptation as good as the original (in my humble opinion:) – = Ah well

The Iliad by Homer for the translation

One should have read this and so will rectify it now – I can also use this one for the Telling Tales challenge- I believe I will have to buy this as I hear there are even better translations recently published = great

The Lord of the Rings by Tolkein as the re-read

It was going to be the place I’m never likely to go but as I have read it more times than I can remember  I started reading it back in the 60′s and pretty well every 2-3 years since.  My all time fav. of the 20th Century.    It could double in the Telling Tales Challenge and the 700+

I still have to find a play – I loath reading plays I would like to find something challenging so will delve into ancient Greece first. Would a poem do instead something from the Norse legends ?Prob. not

And a place not likely to go to – not sure about that one.  Possibly King Authur’s Britian as I have a fancy to read Morte Authur.

So all those will do for the classic challenge but I would like to read The Scarlet Letter and the Odysey.  There are in fact several others I have in mind a couple of Lawrences and maybe explore these so called ‘modern classics’  I have only just heard of some of these so I will explore further and report back later in the meantime at least a couple of the above will be included in these challenges as well.

Just how many days are there in a year?

Well I have had great fun tracking down reading challenges – so many- hard to resist joining them all.  So working on the principle that I wish to decrease my TBR pile – which in reality is about a shopful! I have tried to join either those which will help me diminish the pile or in the case of one will help me in my future writing.

I read a comment on one of the challenge pages from someone who wasn’t joining because his TBR pile was down to a couple of books – I was in shock for an amazing time.  A couple! I wish.

Apart from not being able to resist books, and being incapable of just buying one at a time (it is an addiction you know – don’t deny it any of you with piles of books) I also went through a four year period of not reading anything -due to illness and stress they say! I didn’t however stop buying the books.  It was like trying to tempt an invalid with ever increasingly delicious bites  only to have the trays sent back untouched.  I have hundreds in that pile.  Years to clear even if I never bought another. Yeah. Right. That’s never going to happen!

From the 1st of January 2011 I am going to enter the following challenges  (fingers crossed I can finish them)  I am posting the lists of intended books on the page of challenge reads

A Classics Challenge  = 7 classic, 3 of which can be re-reads if wished

Back to the Classics = 1 book from each of 9 different categories

Mount-TBR-Reading Challenge -going to start at Pikes Peak = 12 books

The Tea and Books Challenge -I’m going to start at Berry Tea Devotee = 4 books of over 700 pages

Chunksters Challenge might well go in at Mor-book-ly Obese level = 5 books over 450 pages and 3 books at over 600

It’s not actually as bad as it sounds because with all these I am

a) Clearing my TBR pile – and

b) can overlap in each challenge so some books will be in different challenges.

The next challenge  The Telling Tales Reading Challenge I have taken on this one  because I will be reading these books a lot in the next few months of research purposes – so these books will be aiding my own writing (Yay I can buy some more books:)  I’m going in at level 1 = 5 books but already see this going up!

And of course although I can count the books read in the Sir Terry Prachetts Reading Challenge with The Telling Tales and clearing TBR Mountain  lets be truthful here – this one is just for fun fun fun!  No set books just something, anything by the man.  I have about 5-6 on the TBR pile of his.

So you see I have only committed to about 1 a week over the year – not impossible.

An even higher TBR pile than I imagined!

Part of my festive spring clean was upstairs in the ‘book room’  – very grand.  Actually it will take many months to overhaul and spring clean – probably into the spring.  I have thousands of books, not all mine, they have been inherited through the generations.  Have I read them all? – no of course not, I said thousands:)

When I was moving all the boxes of books (how removal men hate moving this household!) My mother was sliding downhill more rapidly than anticipated and although I had time to commission enough bookcases and unload all the books they never really got sorted as I was busy nursing her.  Now, we moved here 10 years ago!  I’m not such a fast mover as you can see.  I have excuses, since my mother died I have myself been ill and books are heavy and hard work.  I also discovered the joys of writing and cyberspace and. . . .  so – 2012 is the year I hope to lay order on those words upstairs.

Quite looking forward to the next few months.  I have started and already re-discovered many old friends – it does make tidying take a long time when one has to keep stopping to read bits! the modern part my fiction is sort of alphabetical however I suspect for a lot of you it would hardly be called modern it ranges over 6 decades.  I still have all my sci-fi and detective books to sort – would like to slot them into fiction general not sure there’s room tho’  – will see.

I did start early, it’s not quite 2012 yet but a few days, what’s that?  Now I know where things are, and discovered an even higher TBR pile than I could imagine, I have an even greater reason to put on my reading specs and get going.  Having badly slipped in 2011 in the reading stakes I was already determined ‘to do better’.

So having watched fellow ROW’ers get through their reading challenges and having experienced the success of ROW80 myself I looked around for some reading challenges for myself.  Start off slow and small I thought – hah- my fellow ROWers will know I’m no good at small and slow!  There’s so many great challenges out there.  Too many, too many – which to choose and just how many afternoons am I going to spend comparing them all!!!