Other Books I've Read

Friday, May 06, 2005 , terribly early in the morning

Practical Demonkeeping

I began my love/hate relationship with Christopher Moore right after Christmas when I read The Stupidest Angel.  I loved the book and couldn’t put it down, but at the same time it was so fast-paced that it almost gave me a headache.  A glutton for punishment, I picked up Moore’s very first book about the town of Pine Cove, Practical Demonkeeping, and it didn’t disappoint.  It was fast-paced, humourous, and (of course), weird, and it was good enough that I immediately went and ordered 3 more of Moore’s books from Amazon.  Many of his older titles are available at “bargain prices” (i.e. $4.95), so snap them up while they’re available.

Posted by Leigh-Ann on 05/06 at 05:27 AM
Other Books I've Read • (0) Comments • (0) Trackbacks • Permalink

An Anthropologist on Mars

I’m very behind in my “book reports”, so thought I’d get caught up with a few tonight.  I recently finished reading An Anthropologist on Mars by Oliver Sacks, and I’ll admit that it was slow-going in spots.  I think I started reading it about two months ago, but I only picked it up a couple of times a week (usually in-between reading something else).  It’s a fascinating book full of incredible stories, but the chapters are LONG.  I loved every case study covered in the book (especially the study about the artist who become colour-blind), but the depth of detail was far more than I needed to know.  Sacks doesn’t write “over my head”, but he includes historical data and related materials which make the case studies a bit dry.  It’s like a really, really great slice of cheese that’s been grilled between two massive slices of bread—too much padding and the good stuff gets lost.  I’ve got a couple of Sacks’ other books on my Amazon wishlist and I’ll definitely read them (The Man Who Mistook His Wife for a Hat is already here in the hallway book stack), but I’m going to grant myself permission to skim over the parts that drag.  I give you permission to do that, too :)

Posted by Leigh-Ann on 05/06 at 05:16 AM
Other Books I've Read • (0) Comments • (0) Trackbacks • Permalink

Friday, March 18, 2005 , terribly early in the morning

Beaver

My father sent me a gift subscription to Beaver magazine, and I just can’t resist letting you know that IT’S NOT PORN!  I don’t know who named this magazine but they either led a very sheltered life or they have a dark sense of humour… I would have gone with something like “Moose” or “Great White North” or even “Dominion”, but no one asked me.  The magazine is published by the Canada History Society and is really great quality on heavy paper with many full-colour photos and graphics.  It’s not an overly thick magazine, but as it contains no advertising you’re definitely getting your money’s worth.  The articles are well-written and entertaining, so it’s great for a history buff but still tolerable for someone who just likes a good story.  I’m both a history buff and someone who likes to read, so I’ve enjoyed my first issue and look forward to the other 5 to be delivered over the course of the next year.  I’m still concerned about the name of the magazine, though… next thing you know, someone will start a magazine called “Willy” and claim that it’s about whales.

Posted by Leigh-Ann on 03/18 at 05:35 AM
Other Books I've Read • (1) Comments • (0) Trackbacks • Permalink

Thursday, March 17, 2005 , terribly early in the morning

Vernon God Little

I was browsing through the selection of books at the Quality Paperback Book Club  a couple of months ago, and the title, Vernon God Little by DBC Pierre caught my eye.  According to the reviews, it was definitely a “love it or hate it” book, and the fact that it promised to be “darkly comedic” was enough to make me buy a copy.  I notice it’s no longer for sale at QPB and perhaps that should have been an omen, but regardless, I pulled it off the shelf and started to read it a few days ago.

The book ending up being a “hate it, love it, hate it” book for me (hey, I sound like Randy Jackson—it was just “aw-right” for me, dawg).  The first couple of chapters were confusing and difficult to read, as it’s written in an odd, small-town vernacular.  Many words are mispronounced by Vernon, the narrator, and are written-out as interpreted by him, so “scapegoat” becomes “skate goat”, for example, and while it’s sort of “cute” at first, it’s annoying after a while.  There are at least one or two words that I just never figured out at all, proving that not everyone enjoys a malapropism.  After I got used to the rhythm of the book I started to enjoy it, and read everything up until the last chapter with enthusiasm.  It’s a good story and it moves quickly, but the plot can be confusing at times, and I definitely think I was helped because I already knew the book was about the aftermath of a high school shooting (a la Columbine).  I was annoyed by the surplus of pedophiles in the story, and never really understood the motives of Eulalio, the “bad guy”.  Mostly though, my irritation at the ending of the book erased any enjoyment I got from the rest of it.  The story goes from being at least plausible to being something akin to science fiction as Vernon ends up on death row, where his fate is decided by viewers of a reality TV show (the viewers get to choose who dies every week).  Vernon ultimately decides to go to his death rather than divulge evidence which would exonerate him.

Some reviewers at Amazon.com complained about the bad language in the book, and the fact that none of the characters were “likeable”.  I didn’t care about any of that stuff, I just hated that the storyline was fuzzy and that the book ended in a really stupid way.  Vernon God Little was winner of the 2003 Man Booker prize, and Life of Pi was the winner in 2002, so I’d say that the chances of me reading the 2004 winning title, The Line of Beauty by Alan Hollinghurst are just about nil.

Posted by Leigh-Ann on 03/17 at 06:18 AM
Other Books I've Read • (0) Comments • (0) Trackbacks • Permalink

Thursday, March 10, 2005 , terribly early in the morning

Surviving the Extremes

I was very sneaky and just finished reading a book which wasn’t on my “Currently Reading” list.  The book was Surviving the Extremes: What Happens to the Body and Mind at the Limits of Human Endurance by Kenneth Kamler, and I loved it.  It’s the perfect book for couch potatoes like me who want to experience every possible adventure in life, but who can’t seem to walk down a flight of stairs without twisting an ankle.  In the real world the Sahara desert would make short work of me, but through “Surviving the Extremes” I was able to imagine all the physical challenges without risking anything more than a papercut.  Kamler does a great job of combining anedotal stories of people lost at sea, trapped underwater, stranded in the desert, exposed at high altitude, and even in outer space, with factual medical information about how such environments affect our physiology.  The book is peppered with useful survival information as well—if you’re lost in the desert with no water, you should refrain from eating because the process of digestion uses up more water than would be ingested from the food, for example.  The initial chapter about life in the Amazon was a bit flat and seemed to meander a bit, but Kamler really excels when he writes about his personal experiences scuba diving and climbing Mount Everest.  He’s written another book strictly about his Everest experience, which I’ll definitely read shortly (it’s on the bookshelf). 

Posted by Leigh-Ann on 03/10 at 04:47 AM
Other Books I've Read • (0) Comments • (0) Trackbacks • Permalink

Friday, February 25, 2005 , early morning

Fat Girls and Lawn Chairs

I was intrigued by the title, and I was intrigued by the photo on the cover (a cat wearing a wig and makeup and looking a bit like Dame Edna, if Dame Edna had been born in a trailer park), so I bought a used copy of Fat Girls and Lawn Chairs by Cheryl Peck.  I’d read “iffy” reviews of it on the QPB.com site, but the Amazon.com readers seemed to love it, and my love of the cover and title made me optimistic.  I started reading and was amused.  I thought to myself, “How could anyone not love this book?”  I then got further along and thought, “This is a fairly likeable book”.  I got about two-thirds of the way through and thought, “How on earth did anyone ever agree to publish this book?!”  It never did live up to the cat photo.

The book is a collection of more-or-less true anecdotes about the author, her family, and friends.  The author is a lesbian, she’s from a large family with sisters and brothers, she’s got a partner, she’s got a pet, and she’s got a lot going on in her life which probably makes for a good story if you’re at a picnic or sitting around the dinner table, but the stories just aren’t that funny when they’re written out.  I think a lot of them have that, “I guess you had to be there” quality to them.  Cheryl Peck isn’t a bad writer, but a lot of the anecdotes are rambling and unfocused and just sort of… end.  Many of the stories are like all those bad sketches on Saturday Night Live, the ones with a funny premise which never seem to go anywhere and which end abruptly.  She’ll introduce a story as being about her brothers, but then she writes mainly about her sisters and tosses in a brother reference as the closing sentence in an attempt to tie up all the loose ends.  It reads awkwardly.  Peck is also a poet, and interspersed with the anecdotes are a number of her poems, some funny, some serious.  The amusing ones are okay, but the serious ones are such a downer that they completely destroy any good fun you might be having while reading.  The poems also make the book seem like a lesbian book, where women are getting in touch with their feelings, blah, blah, blah.

The book jacket explains that Peck was encouraged to write this book by family and friends, and that it was originally self-published.  I can see how the collection might have appealed to people who know her, but it just didn’t appeal to me.

Posted by Leigh-Ann on 02/25 at 07:44 AM
Other Books I've Read • (0) Comments • (0) Trackbacks • Permalink

Saturday, February 19, 2005 , evening

The Bullfighter Checks Her Makeup

I was waiting for Nancy to sign some papers at the mortgage company today, so I sat in the waiting area and read Susan Orlean’s book, The Bullfighter Checks Her Makeup.  I didn’t get much further than reading the Introduction, but it contained a paragragh which really nailed it on the head for me.  Orlean talks about her love of non-fiction and refers to a piece she once read in The New Yorker: After I read it I had that rare, heady feeling that I now knew something about life I hadn’t known before I read it.  At the same time, the story was so natural that I couldn’t believe it had never been written until then.  Like the best examples of literary non-fiction, it was at once familiar and original, like a folk melody—as good an example as you could ever find of the poetry of facts and the art in ordinary life.  *That* is exactly why I love non-fiction so much.  I love having the chance to share someone else’s experiences and to “walk a mile in their shoes”, even if the mile may not seem particularly interesting, or the shoes particularly comfortable.  I want to read about the lives of doctors and nurses and explorers and soldiers and veterinarians and animal rescue workers and ordinary people so I have the chance to have as many life experiences as possible, even if it’s just through the pages of a book.  I have this really deep yearning in me to climb Mount Everest, even though I don’t like heights and I’ve never climbed even a large hill and I don’t really like the cold, either, and I’m certainly not in great physical shape.  But climbing Mount Everest seems like it would be the ultimate in physical achievements, so I read as much as I can find by people who’ve accomplished it, especially if they’re just ordinary people like me who want to do something extraordinary.  I’m quite sure I’ll never even get close to Mount Everest in my lifetime, probably not even Nepal, but by reading stories by other people, it’s a little bit like being there.  A little bit is better than none at all.

Getting back to the book itself, I love Orlean’s writing, and of course I think this book is great.  It’s no “Orchid Thief”, of course, but it’s not half bad ;-)

Posted by Leigh-Ann on 02/19 at 08:06 AM
Other Books I've Read • (0) Comments • (0) Trackbacks • Permalink

Saturday, February 12, 2005 , early morning

Burn Unit

I read a review of “Burn Unit” in Entertainment Weekly, and thought it sounded like just the kind of book for me.  Non-fiction, medical, with a nice mix of human drama and factual information.  Being about burns, I thought it might be a particularly intense book, and I was looking forward to reading it after EW gave it such a strong recommendation.  When I finally did read it, well, it was a bit of a snoozer.  Zzzzzzzzzzzz.  Like that.  There were some things that the author, Barbara Ravage, did very well.  The historical information about burn treatment was fascinating, and the details about modern burn treatment—skin grafts, artificial skin, etc.—gave me a lot of insight into the on-going damage a burn can inflict to the body, and why treatment for certain things, like types of chemical burns, is an effort in futility.  It was horrifying to know that even a small a burn with hydrofluoric acid (say, a burn which affects as little as 2.5% of your total body surface area) may kill you despite immediate medical attention.  Spooky stuff.  On the other hand, there were large portions of the book which were neither informative nor fascinating, and I almost quit reading half-way through.  When the author tries to relate the “human side” of burns, by interviewing burn victims and doctors/nurses in hospital burn units, the book turns into an episode of “Touched by an Angel”.  All the medical personal are bestowed with divine powers, all have super-human abilities, and all exude horribly cliched characteristics like “calm confidence”.  In the introduction to the book, the author explains she didn’t want to invade the privacy of the burn victims, so instead of writing exact accounts of what an individual endured during burn treatment, she has instead “consolidated” information about a number of different patients, and from that has constructed patients who supposedly reflect actual experiences yet are completely anonymous.  This technique really doesn’t work.  The people in the book have a flat, wooden quality to them, like characters on a bad TV show (hence the previous “Touched by An Angel” reference).  I was also really bothered by the fact that one of the burn victims was a gay man with an alcohol problem, and he also had deeply religious parents who didn’t accept his sexuality.  After being burned, the gay man gets his life together after he “finds God”, and I thought the entire story arc was offensive.  There was a point right after the man is burned and brought to the hospital, and his parents are giving the doctors his medical background.  The parents mention the son’s alcohol problem, but choose to not mention “his lifestyle”.  This is never followed-up in the book, and the son’s sexuality has nothing to do with why/how he was burned, so mentioning that he’s gay at all just seems like cheap gossip.  His parents don’t accept that their son is gay, their son is burned in a fire, he finds God, punishment duly noted.

So in summary, good information about burns and burn treatment, but not great character development.  If you want to really get inside the head of a burn victim, this book won’t help you.  I wouldn’t recommend the book to anyone unless they enjoyed the Lifetime movie of the week, because that’s about as thought-provoking as it gets.  If you really want to know about the experiences of an average person working in the medical profession and coping as an average person might, I’d definitely suggest “Ambulance Girl” by Jane Stern.

Posted by Leigh-Ann on 02/12 at 07:08 AM
Other Books I've Read • (0) Comments • (0) Trackbacks • Permalink

Thursday, February 10, 2005 , evening

Driving Mr. Albert

It’s late, and I should get to bed, but I wanted to take just a brief moment to comment on a book I read a few months ago entitled, Driving Mr. Albert : A Trip Across America with Einstein’s Brain.  This book holds the current record for “sitting on my bookshelf for the longest period of time without being read”.  I seriously started to read this book, then gave up on it, at least three different times before I finally forced myself to finish it.  I was determined to not let this book be my literary Waterloo but it was a tough battle, and the book nearly won.  It was seriously one of the dullest stories I’ve ever encountered.  When I first read about the book after its release I thought it would be a masterpiece—how could a book about driving across America with Albert Einstein’s brain in a Tupperware container be anything but entralling?!  In reality, it was a boring book with boring characters, and would have been fascinating if condensed as a 6 page magazine article.  Anything longer than that just seemed like filler.  The real star of this story is the brain itself, floating in little chunks in a plastic bowl.  Other than that, the rest of the cast are sort of pathetic.  I have a feeling the author thought the premise of the story was great, but when he took the actual roadtrip he realized he’d have nothing to write about, but then he forced himself to write the book anyway.  And I forced myself to read it, so now we’re even.  When I finished reading it, I mailed it to a friend in Florida as a gag gift—I don’t think I’ve ever given away a book before.  I think it has a future as a doorstop or table-leg-equalizer or something.  Blech.

Posted by Leigh-Ann on 02/10 at 08:48 AM
Other Books I've Read • (0) Comments • (0) Trackbacks • Permalink

Sunday, February 06, 2005 , terribly early in the morning

The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night-Time

My friend Celine suggested I read The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night-Time, so I took her up on the offer, but I figured it would be one of those hip books for young ‘uns that would go right over my old grey head.  I was wrong—it ended up being a fascinating, fast-paced book with great characters, including the narrator, an autistic teenage boy.  The book is worth reading just for the glimpse into the mind of an autistic person (albeit a highly-functioning one), and is full of observations of daily life that most of us take for granted.  It’s not a flawless book—the overall premise of “who killed the dog, Wellington?” is a bit weak, and the resolution to the “mystery” is a bit weak, but the journey through the book is nevertheless well worth it.  I’d recommend this book to anyone for its entertainment value, and promise that you’ll never look at red cars the same way again.

Posted by Leigh-Ann on 02/06 at 05:29 AM
Other Books I've Read • (0) Comments • (0) Trackbacks • Permalink
Page 3 of 4 pages  <  1 2 3 4 >

Adopt a Big Dog!