January: BookFest 2012

It's been a rough start to a new year. All the signs might have been there, if I'd looked a little closer. Plague. Pestilence. I can't understand a single lyric from a Top 40 song. If that's not a signs of Armageddon, it should be. I've been plagued by birds, crazy people, hit by a car, and can't find my bank card. All of that could lead me to have a major hissy fit. Instead, I have chosen to wallow in fiction (and a little bit of non-fiction) instead. And this year, just for fun, I'm tracking what I read. Some are re-reads, some are guilty pleasures, and some will actually challenge me to think. When I'm not too tired for brain function, that is.

So, with January at a close, here were my reads for the first month of 2012, or at least some of them, since I didn't start keeping track until around the 20th of the month....

The Fault in Our Stars by John Green - recommended by a co-worker, and much enjoyed. Katie is reading this one now. I do love a good young adult book. I read most of this one in one evening, realized it was 1:30 a.m., put it down, turned off the light, and couldn't sleep. 2:00 a.m., I had to finish the book, because it was haunting me. It haunted me after I was through as well. I'll reread this one.

Looking for Alaska also by John Green - recommended by me, because I loved the first one I read of his so much. It was well written, and I liked the characters. Not as much as the first, but still a good read.

Paper Towns - yeah, also by John Green. Sue me - my kids were sick, and I was on a roll. I liked this one almost as much as Fault in Our Stars. The characters were quirky, and I love a good road trip story.

This Beautiful Life by Helen Schulman. This one was based on a true story. Not terribly great writing, but a compelling story. Not so much about the well-known case that was in the papers, but about what happened to a family as a result of one bad decision. I have kids - it scared me a little to see how quickly a life could be ruined. Or a whole family and all of their lives. One bad decision. Ouch.

Punished by Vanessa Steel. Disappointing. It was a rushed telling of a story of abuse. Nothing more to say.

Always to Remember by Lorraine Heath. Nome de Plume of a friend of mine; we used to be in the same writer's group many, many years ago. I read this when she first published it in the early 90's, and recently noticed that it was available for Kindle. So, I indulged myself. While basically a romance, it was so much more than that. I love the idea that courage isn't necessarily about a big, loud show of action. Sometimes true courage walks in silence. In the faces of women sending their men to war. In the actions of a man doing what he believes is right, even in the face of violence. Good re-read.

Speaking of good re-reads. I picked up Good Omens by Neil Gaimon and re-read it one day last weekend. Fabulous. Simply a fun, good read. Who would have thought the end of the world could be so entertaining. The Antichrist and his buddies off to saves the world, and they didn't even know it. From chattering nuns to hell hounds named Dog. Awesome clever.

Collapse by Jared Diamond. How Societies Choose to Fail or Succeed is the subtitle. Like with his previous book, Guns, Germs and Steel, Diamond gets to the heart of the matter - human nature doesn't change. We can change locations, times, weather..all manner of details. Essentially, people are still people. None of his ideas were startling or new, but it was well-told, with several well-made points about civilization now and in the past. Took me a while to get through this one.

On Chesil Beach by Ian Mcewan. Like always, his attention to character development and motivation was incredibly detailed. But there was something about this tale that irritated me. I know, the very point of "if only" was integral to the plot. But I wanted to shake both of them. If only they had been born a few years later. If only they had felt free to say what each was thinking. If only he'd followed her sooner. If only. They were immature, and their story ultimately ends in unhappiness, because they couldn't communicate with one another. I did enjoy the attention to the time period's details though. This was the era in which my parents married. Gave me some insights there.

A Midsummer Night's Dream by William Shakespeare. I don't really need to explain this one, right? Katie's reading it for a class assignment. Her comments made me want to re-read a favorite.

Songs for the Missing by Stewart O'Nan. This was also recommended by a co-worker. (Note to self: congratulate self on acquiring a co-worker with good literary taste.) This story was well-told, though perhaps not what I expected when I first began reading. Despite a missing girl and a possibility of foul play, the real story centers on her family. As in This Beautiful Life, the theme is really about how lives affect one another and what happens to those connected to tragedy. The human triumph is in our ability to keep going and keep living. I saw a dance performance this month also based around this theme - the human endurance and capacity for love after loss. Amazing. O'Nan's deceptively simple writing was amazing as well.

Weetzy Bat by Francesca Lia Block. This one looked so promising and the reviews were so nice. It seemed like a quirky coming of age story. I like those. This was quirky. And weird. And poorly written. And full of strange sequences of events, and names that don't make sense. When I was done reading it, I had the realization that reading this book must be a written rendition of what it is like to trip on acid. Now I am even less inclined to drop acid. I wasn't inclined before, but I'm less inclined now.

Jerusalem Maiden by Talia Carner. Recommended by a parent at school. I enjoyed this story thoroughly. I like putting myself outside of my own cultural constructs. It's hard enough for any child to break free of parent expectations and culturally accepted ideas. For the protagonist in this story, living in early 20th century Jerusalem, the idea of choosing a life as a single artist is unheard of. It was a well-told tale of someone living the life they choose, no matter what, and the difficult choices along the way. Good read.

And that brings me to the books queued in my Kindle. The Cobra Event by Richard Preston. The Coming Plague by Laurie Garrett. I figured with the world ending this year and all, I ought to get a leg up on what could happen. Figured I'd start with the plague. I'll look for some good books on earthquakes next.