S's 2012 Book Wrap Up

note:  If you've ventured here from my other blog, The London Diaries, I apologise for the repeat post--this is cross-posted from the original blog post at TLD.

It's been a long year for me with lots of mammoth reads including a few from Martin's A Song of Fire and Ice series and Cronin's second book in the Passage Trilogy.  So without further ado, here's the 2012 book wrap up (with December's books included in the mix).

Books Read:  52

1. Rivers of London - Ben Aaronovitch
2. Moon Over Soho - Ben Aaronovitch
3. The Hungry Ghosts - Anne Berry
4. Island of Lost Girls - Jennifer McMahon
5. Before I go to Sleep - SJ Watson
6. The Sense of an Ending - Julian Barnes
7. Last Man in Tower - Aravind Adiga
8. The Leftovers - Tom Perrotta
9. Londoners:  The Days and Nights of London Now—As Told by Those Who Love it, Live it, Left it and Long for it – Craig Taylor
10. The Woman in Black – Susan Hill
11. The Dogs of Babel – Carolyn Parkhurst
12. A Storm of Swords (A Song of Ice and Fire, #3) – George R.R. Martin
13. I to I: Life Writing by KY Feminists - Elizabeth Oakes and Jane Olmsted
14. A Blade of Grass - Lewis DeSoto
15. Let's Pretend This Never Happened: A Mostly True Memoir - Jenny Lawson
16. The Gargoyle – Andrew Davidson
17.  Stuart: A Life Backwards – Alexander Masters
18. The Poison Tree – Erin Kelly
19. State of Wonder – Ann Patchett
20. The Knife of Never Letting Go – Patrick Ness
21. A Feast for Crows (A Song of Ice and Fire, #4) – George R. R. Martin
22. House Rules – Jodi Picoult
23. Extremely Loud and Incredibly Close - Jonathan Safran Foer (Sister Read)
24. We Are All Made of Glue - Marina Lewycka
25. War of the Wives - Tamar Cohen
26. Ours Are the Streets - Sunjeev Sahota
27. Fried Green Tomatoes at the Whistle Stop Cafe - Fannie Flagg
28. Vaclav and Lena - Haley Tanner
29. The Small Hand - Susan Hill
30. The Hour I First Believed – Wally Lamb
31. The Story Sisters – Alice Hoffman
32. Wintergirls – Laurie Halse Andersen (Sister Read!)
33. Jezebel – Irene Nemirovsky
34. A Confederacy of Dunces – John Kennedy Toole
35. The Hypnotist – Lars Kepler
36. Gone Girl – Gillian Flynn
37. Lace – Shirley Conran
38. The Psychopath Test: A Journey Through the Madness Industry – Jon Ronson
39. The Woman in the Fifth – Douglas Kennedy
40. When She Woke – Hillary Jordan
41. The Snow Child – Eowyn Ivey
42. The Casual Vacancy – JK Rowling
43. Daughter of Smoke & Bone – Laini Taylor  (Sister Read!!!)
44. Savages – Don Winslow
45. Florence and Giles – John Harding
46.  The Twelve (The Passage, #2) – Justin Cronin
47. Behind the Beautiful Forevers:  Life, Death and Hope in a Mumbai Undercity – Katherine Boo (Sister Read)
48. The Greatest Love Story of All Time - Lucy Robinson
49. A Passionate Love Affair With a Total Stranger - Lucy Robinson
50. The Statistical Probability of Love at First Sight - Jennifer E Smith (Sister Read)
51. The Final Confession of Mabel Stark - Robert Hough
52. Thirteen Reasons Why - Jay Asher

Books Abandoned:  6

1. The Elegance of the Hedgehog - Muriel Barbery
2.  A Heartbreaking Work of Staggering Genius – Dave Eggars
3. The Strain – Guillermo del Toro
4. The Dead Room - Robert Ellis
5. 77 Shadow Street – Dean Koontz
6. Les Miserables - Victor Hugo  (Got to be too depressing.  I do plan on finishing this one in 2013 but it'll be a work in progress)

Books in Progress - 1

1. On the Island - Tracey Garvis-Graves

It's always really fun going back and seeing what I read throughout the year, remembering which books I loved and others that weren't so hot.  

So which ones were my favourites this year?  That's a tough one to call.  I nearly peed myself laughing while reading quite a few of these... Lawson's "Let's Pretend This Never Happened" was definitely a highlight for me this year as were both of Robinson's books.  It seems like the funny/sweet books I read this year were the most relished and well received.  Sometimes you need a bit of humour in your life, I guess.

So that's the list for 2012.  My goal was 75 books so I was a bit short from that, but I'm totally okay with that as a lot of the books I read were pretty hefty (thank goodness for my Kindle).  2012 also saw the beginning of Two Sisters Reading; hurrah for that!

So what are my reading plans for 2013?

Well, for starters, I'm not aiming for a specific "body count".  I'm perfectly happy with quality over quantity this time around.  I plan on picking up "Les Miserables" off and on and working my way though that as well as giving other books I've left off on another chance.  In exciting news, Vikram Seth's "A Suitable Boy" is finally being released for Kindle in March (I've already pre-ordered it) which means I'll be tackling that in the Spring.  So excited for that... what a mammoth book!  I'd also like the opportunity to do more pre-release reviews as I did for Robinson's "A Passionate Love Affair With a Total Stranger" so if anyone reading this would like to throw some books my way, I'd be happy to review them!

That's all from me for 2012!

X

S

D's Reading Plans for 2013

Hello all! I'm super excited for several reasons. First off, finals are over and it's Christmas Break! Additionally, S and her husband N finally made it home last night. I'm so so so glad they're in town, I simply wish that I could spend more time with them. Whatevs, S is probably tired of me already.

Lastly, I'm excited because it's almost time for a new year. I'm normally not overly sentimental about the calendar, but 2013 will bring many important things for me: I'll get my driver's permit, I'll go on my first airplane to my first destination outside the U.S. on my first mission trip, and I'll get to enter the joy (and by joy I mean utter disaster) that is junior year. More relevant to this blog, however, it'll also be a year of classics: everything that I read will be a literary classic, with exception of sister reads (so you don't have to be bored, never fear) or the unlikely event that I finish everything on the list.

You must be thinking, "now why on Earth would D do this to herself?" Well, it mostly has to do with the fact that I call myself a literature nerd and yet there are so many important books I haven't read. Chick lit and YA mystery thrillers are of course important to read, but the classics aren't dead, either! I really do want to read them, and this gives me the opportunity to do it all at once.

Below you'll find my current list of must-reads for 2013. Feel free to make suggestions, so long as they are considered a part of the major literary canon. Also, not Pride and Prejudice. S and I may not have everything in common, but our unmeasured hatred of that particular book is our greatest bond. I can bear watching a bit (and only a bit, mind you) of The Lizzie Bennet Diaries, a Youtube series that takes a modern spin on P&P. That's as close as I'll ever get. So yeah, not Pride and Prejudice.

Anyway, here's the list. There are several books on here (like Little Women and The Great Gatsby that I attempted to read when I was younger and they were either too much for me to understand or too boring  at the time. These are in no particular order:

1. Little Women by Louisa May Alcott
2. Les Miserables by Victor Hugo
3. A Tale of Two Cities by Charles Dickens
4. The Great Gatsby by F. Scott Fitzgerald
5. The Adventures of Tom Sawyer by Mark Twain
6. The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn by Mark Twain
7. 1984 by George Orwell
8. Animal Farm by George Orwell
9. Brave New World by Aldous Huxley
10. The Brothers Karamazov by Fyodor Dostoevsky
11. The Catcher in the Rye by J.D. Salinger
12. East of Eden by John Steinbeck
13. The Grapes of Wrath by John Steinbeck
14. Lord of the Flies by William Golding
15. Frankenstein Mary Shelley
16. Moby Dick by Herman Melville
17. Silas Marner by George Eliot (Mary Anne Evans)
18. Middlemarch by George Eliot
19. The Adventures of Sherlock Holmes by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle

Quite an extensive list, I'll say! It would be nice to have an even twenty, though...hmm, could YOU be the one to help me out?

That's all for now! Merry Christmas, Happy New Year, and whatever else you celebrate, I hope it goes well for you too.
Bye now,
~D

December Sister Read: The Statistical Probability of Love at First Sight

The Statistical Probability of Love at First Sight by Jennifer E. Smith

Synopsis (as taken from Goodreads):  Who would have guessed that four minutes could change everything?

Today should be one of the worst days of seventeen-year-old Hadley Sullivan's life. Having missed her flight, she's stuck at JFK airport and late to her father's second wedding, which is taking place in London and involves a soon-to-be stepmother Hadley's never even met. Then she meets the perfect boy in the airport's cramped waiting area. His name is Oliver, he's British, and he's sitting in her row.

A long night on the plane passes in the blink of an eye, and Hadley and Oliver lose track of each other in the airport chaos upon arrival. Can fate intervene to bring them together once more?

Quirks of timing play out in this romantic and cinematic novel about family connections, second chances, and first loves. Set over a twenty-four-hour-period, Hadley and Oliver's story will make you believe that true love finds you when you're least expecting it.

D’s Rating:   ❤❤❤  (out of five hearts)

S’s Rating: ❤❤❤❤1/2  (out of five hearts)


D’s Thoughts:

After reading such a dark and frightening work--Behind the Beautiful Forevers by Katherine Boo--last month, it almost felt necessary to throw in some easy-read chick lit this month. Right before reading TSPoLaFS, I read Anna and the French Kiss by Stephanie Perkins (and by read, I mean devoured). That's how badly I needed the chick lit. Coincidentally, the two books are somewhat similar: the main male protagonist is British, both girls have "bad" dads and are suddenly enlightened that the guys have much worse by comparison,  there are multiple airport exchanges; the list goes on.
Now then. TSPoLaFS (what an initial-ism  right?) was...how should I put it? I would have probably understood it a bit more if I myself was madly in love with someone, or had at least experienced romantic love before. I still thought some of the things Hadley and Oliver did were cute and sweet and "awwwww"-worthy, but at the same time I often found myself wondering how Hadley could be so irrational. I'm only 15, though. Maybe I'll understand eventually.

Many novels told from the perspective of a teenage girl just so happen to be about a girl who is extremely well-spoken, if only so that the author can use fancy metaphors without losing the girl's identity. This was not the case in TSPoLaFS: Hadley rarely said anything incredibly deep or inspiring because that's not who she was. She was, quite frankly, the typical moody teenager. I'll gladly accept that if it means a more authentic character. Bonus points to the author.

Finally, I have a love-hate relationship with the setting and voice of the book. I enjoyed the compact, 24-hour long plot. It was never tiring. However, the brevity of time made some of Hadley's decisions even more irrational than they already were. Additionally, the book was told in the present tense. It wasn't technically or grammatically incorrect, but it simply felt odd and less settled.

So, I give the book 3 hearts. What did you expect, a Dickens masterpiece? Read this book when you're bored with classics or tear-jerkers. That's when you'll appreciate it the most.

Standout Quotes:

"We all knew. And nobody talked about it. Somewhere along the line, someone made the decision that we'd all just be quietly miserable, and so that's what we did."

"[Big weddings] are all for show. You shouldn't need to prove anything if you really mean it. It should be a whole lot simpler than that. It should mean something.
"It does mean something. It's a promise."
"But not everyone keeps that promise...And even if you do, it doesn't matter that you once stood in front of all those people and said that you would. The important part is that you had someone to stick by you all that time. Even when everything sucked." 


Album to listen to while reading this book: We Sing, We Dance, We Steal Things by Jason Mraz (and what a beautiful mess Hadley and Oliver were)

S’s Thoughts:
Ah, me... this month's book hit really close to home for me.  N (my husband) and I met for the first time in an airport.  Sort of.  And by sort of, I mean we'd been chatting online for over a year and then he flew over to see me and that's when we met for the first time... in the arrivals area of the airport in my hometown.  Sweet, no?  Except in my version (which is of course the truth) he looked right through me because he didn't recognise me and I had to call out to him to get his attention.  Maybe not so sweet, but things have definitely improved since then.  God... I feel as though I've spent my life searching for N in arrival lounges and saying goodbye to him at the security gates.  I'm pretty sure the first year or so of our relationship was staged in airports.

Anyway, onto TSPoLaFS.  I loved this book... really.  I don't give out five stars (or hearts) much so this one got four and a half.  That's pretty strong, in my world.  It was lighthearted, cute and just an all around fun read which I really needed at the time.  (Heck, I still do which is why I've been zoning out with serious chick-lit lately.)  I thought Hadley and Oliver were just freaking adorable and I totally saw myself in Hadley's shoes when she sets off into London on her own to track down Oliver; totally something I would have done for N in a heartbeat.  (Instead I settled for googling his postcode and obsessing over which house in the grainy satellite image might be his.  Stalk much?)

One of my favourite things about this book is how it's staged over the course of 24 hours.  That's it... all of the action (or as in on the plane, non-action) is staged in just one day.  Smith does a fantastic job of keeping us from being claustrophobic and the action from being static on the plane through flashbacks and engaging dialogue. 

I don't think there was anything I didn't like about the book.  Yes, the plot and outcome were totally predictable but then again, why shouldn't they be?  It's YA fiction blurring into the realm of chick-lit... it's not as if it's going to have some worldly Dickensian theme running throughout it (y'see what I did there?).

Standout Quotes:
"In the end, it's not the changes that will break the heart; it's that tug of familiarity."

"'When you're on the other side of it,' she says, 'fifty-two years can seem like about fifty-two minutes.'"

Album to listen to while reading this book: Sappy, yes, but my wedding playlist is what I listened to while reading TSPoLaFS.

 
January’s book is S’s choice and is "Before I Fall" by Lauren Oliver.
*Note from S* - I had actually chosen "Hate List" by Jennifer Brown, a book about a school shooting and the aftermath facing those left behind, two weeks ago before the devastating shooting at Sandy Hook Elementary in Connecticut. Given the horrible nature of Friday's events, I didn't feel right choosing this as our next book.  It's just too current for something so raw. I didn't think I could emotionally deal with hearing all of the news and seeing all of the reports about the tragedy and then reading a work of fiction about another shooting.  There's only so much about the dark side of human nature one can take in a short space of time. I do plan on reading "Hate List", probably as a Sister Read, in the future.  Just not right now.
 
S will also be posting a super awesome review of the new book by Lucy Robinson, "A Passionate Love Affair With a Total Stranger", which she was lucky enough to be given an advanced copy of.  Great laughs!

See you soon! S & D

November Sister Read: Behind the Beautiful Forevers: Life, Death, And Hope In A Mumbai Undercity by Katherine Boo

Behind the Beautiful Forevers:  Life, Death, and Hope in a Mumbai Undercity - Katherine Boo

Synopsis (as taken from Goodreads):  
In this brilliantly written, fast-paced book, based on three years of uncompromising reporting, a bewildering age of global change and inequality is made human.

Annawadi is a makeshift settlement in the shadow of luxury hotels near the Mumbai airport, and as India starts to prosper, Annawadians are electric with hope. Abdul, a reflective and enterprising Muslim teenager, sees “a fortune beyond counting” in the recyclable garbage that richer people throw away. Asha, a woman of formidable wit and deep scars from a childhood in rural poverty, has identified an alternate route to the middle class: political corruption. With a little luck, her sensitive, beautiful daughter—Annawadi’s “most-everything girl”—will soon become its first female college graduate. And even the poorest Annawadians, like Kalu, a fifteen-year-old scrap-metal thief, believe themselves inching closer to the good lives and good times they call “the full enjoy.”

But then Abdul the garbage sorter is falsely accused in a shocking tragedy; terror and a global recession rock the city; and suppressed tensions over religion, caste, sex, power and economic envy turn brutal. As the tenderest individual hopes intersect with the greatest global truths, the true contours of a competitive age are revealed. And so, too, are the imaginations and courage of the people of Annawadi.

With intelligence, humor, and deep insight into what connects human beings to one another in an era of tumultuous change, Behind the Beautiful Forevers carries the reader headlong into one of the twenty-first century’s hidden worlds, and into the lives of people impossible to forget.

S’s Rating: ❤❤❤   (out of five hearts)

D’s Rating: ❤❤❤  (out of five hearts)


S’s Thoughts:
I really should be working on my NaNoWriMo novel right now.  Really.  I'm not behind but if I don't get any words in today, I'm going to be on par which I'm not happy about.  I really want to finish ahead of schedule.  I really want to be done.

But that's another story.

BtBF was our first venture into the world of non-fiction here on Two Sisters Reading.  I have to really be in the mood for non-fic, my life is complicated enough without having to concentrate on someone else's for a while.  I was definitely in the mood for BtBF from the start:  N and I are hopefully planning a trip to India in the next year or two and, living in the area of London we live in, I get the amazing opportunity to soak up India's culture.  It's fantastic, really.

That being said, BtBF was a depressing book from the start.  It wasn't a bad book, in fact, I quite enjoyed it... but there were times when all of the horrible experiences and circumstances for Abdul and his family and neighbours were just too much.  There's just this overwhelming sense of filth, both physically and morally, in Boo's descriptions of the slum and the people living there.  I found One Leg particularly repulsive, given her actions which reverberate throughout the entire book, affecting everyone's lives around her.

I gave it three hearts out of five, only because there were some parts that I felt dragged on a bit and didn't lend themselves to the story.  I loved the fact that there was no real resolution to Abdul's story because, to be honest, that's his life and for a young man living in a slum there is no real resolution until death.

Morbid, no?


Standout Quotes:

"His storeroom--120 square feet piled high to a leaky roof with the things in this world Abdul knew how to handle.  Empty water and whiskey bottles, mildewed newspapers, used tampon applicators, wadded aluminium foil, umbrellas stripped to the ribs by monsoons, broken shoelaces, yellowed Q-tips, snarled cassette tape, torn plastic casings that once held imitation Barbies."

"She didn't cry for the fate of her husband, son, and daughter, or for the great web of corruption she was now forced to navigate, or for a system in which the most wretched tried to punish the slightly less wretched by turning to a justice system so malign it sank them all.  She cried for the manageable thing--the loss of that beautiful quilt, a parting gift to a woman who had used her own body as a weapon against her neighbours."

"Additional income would be forfeited to his decision to walk down the virtuous path recommended by The Master at Dongri, and to stay out of police interrogation cells for the rest of his life.  He would no longer buy stolen goods.  His mother seemed fine with his decision.  He hoped she'd actually been listening.  She seemed half absent in her exhaustion, and definitely hadn't been listening later, when he asked if his suffering might be rewarded with an iPod."

"After midnight, returning home to Dharavi ancient with grief, his mother tossed into the gutter the prescriptions the doctor had written for Sanjay.  There had been no time to go out to the road and fill them."

"If the house is crooked and crumbling, and the land on which it sits is uneven, is it possible to make anything lie straight?"

Album to listen to while reading this book: I live in an area of London that is quite high in the Indian and Pakistani demographic. Just taking a walk down the road, passing the open air markets and mobile phone stands provides soundtrack enough.

D’s Thoughts:

Like S, I'm usually not one for non-fiction. I usually only make exceptions for books that are either a) filled with interesting studies or b) for a project. But hey, why not deviate from the norm?

BtBF was exactly what I thought it would be: incredibly disturbing and upsetting. I do feel like, after reading it, I understand more about the situation and conditions of Indian slums. This would have been much more helpful last year, when I was assigned to a year of study on India and Haiti in my AP Human Geography class. I suppose it's better than never, though. And hey, knowing is half the battle. (click to lighten the mood)

I agree with S: there were many parts of the book that went on for ages with no visible value. Additionally, it's rather clear that Boo is a reporter: there was no "dressing up" of any situation. She told it exactly how it was, with very little input of opinion from anyone except the characters involved, and left you to think about any further implications.

Most of the book is spent chronicling those who believe that their lives are about to change for the better, just as Mumbai becomes a more global, top-tier city. I was nearly convinced that perhaps some would reach the cliched happily-ever-after. Their stories (or at least, those who are still alive) may not be completely over, but as far as we can tell, no such luck. As for those who are dead? Maybe they've lucked out in this situation.

Do I get something out of being just as morbid?

Standout Quotes:

"Everything around us is roses" is how Abdul's younger brother, Mirchi put it. "And we're the garbage in between."

"If what is happening now, you beating me, is to keep happening for the rest of my life, it would be a bad life, but it would be a life, too." And my mother was so shocked when I said that...Sunil thought that he, too, had a life."

"Water and ice were made of the same thing. He thought most people were made of the same thing, too. He himself was probably a little different, constitutionally, from the cynical, corrupt people around him...but here was the interesting thing. Ice was distinct from--and in his view, better than--what it was made of. He wanted to be better than what he was made of. In Mumbai's dirty water, he wanted to be ice."

"For some time I tried to keep the ice inside me from melting," was how he put it. "But now I'm just becoming dirty water, like everyone else. I tell Allah I love Him immensely, immensely. But I tell Him I cannot be better, because of how the world is."


Album to listen to while reading this book: Nothing specific, but the book often mentioned cinemas as a great escape, particularly for young boys. I'm a bit reminded of movie scores in general. 

December’s book is D’s choice and is The Statistical Probability of Love at First Sight by Jennifer E. Smith. What a mood change!

See you soon! S & D

The one where S pokes her head out of her laptop...

I'm taking a break from NaNoWriMo to respond to D's last post where she had some misgivings about participating in probably the WORLD'S GREATEST CHALLENEGE EVER.

If you don't already know what NaNoWriMo is, check out their website for the full details.  The short story?  From 1st November to 30th November you write a 50,000 word novel.  50,000 words is the recognised count for a short novel so... you write a novel in a month!  Only 1,667 words per day--easy, right?

Ha ha, my friend.  That's where you're wrong.  Ha ha, I say to you again.  Life gets in the way.  You get tired or your husband gets man flu.  You forsake your social life, the gym.  Want to go for a jog?  Well, you can't, skippy, you've still got 785 words to go before you hit your daily target.  Oh, friends are going out and they want you to come along?  Well have you hit your word count yet?  No?  Hm... I wouldn't if I were you.

That's how my brain talks to me in November.  Seriously.  It's like having a teacher inside your head, constantly barraging you about whether you've done your homework or not.  It's intimidating.  It's scary.  I'll probably never be published.  But you know what?  It is as fun as hell.  How many of my friends can actually say they've written a novel?  Zilch, nada, zero.  It's a bragging right!  Fingers crossed, this will be my second novel this year.  I've even got my first on my Kindle; it's a horrible piece of crap but it's like it's a real live book!  Ah, delusions.

Anyhow, I wanted to answer D's points from her last post.  She wrote:

1.      I feel as though one of the key qualifications to being a good writer is to have read many books--many, many more than I have. It helps you understand the concept of a novel as well as various styles and strategies to convey your message.

2.      I have no clue what I would write about. Most of the "moral messages" I'd want to send would parallel way too closely to my own life. Fictional works and autobiographical works don't exactly overlap.

3.      Between my lack of confidence and my lack of motivation, I would decide that my novel is stupid and not worth writing by November 3rd. 

Let me answer each point.

1.      You can't tell me you haven't read enough books to have an idea of style and strategies in novelling.  I've seen the books you read as well--you're reading the same stuff I do and I'm 26!  (Well, okay, duh... there is this blog of course where we read THE SAME THING once a month but you know what I mean).

2.      I never have a clue what to write about until about two days before NaNo starts.  Last year, the first year I actually completed the challenge, I only had one character name and an image in my head of something I witnessed in Paris.  That's it.  I wrote a novel off the back of that (albeit a craptacular one).  The point of NaNo isn't to write anything good, it's to write.  Period.  And yeah, it takes a lot of time and pretty much sucks the life out of you but at the end the victory is sweeter than sweet.  And as for autobiographical stuff leaking into fiction?  First rule of writing is to write what you know.  Now, for the book I'm writing now I may know jack all about being in the music industry and partaking in hard drugs (rock and roll, yeah!) but I do know about my main character's back story because there's bits of my own in there.  You'd be surprised how many words you get out of writing about your character's house or friends purely because they're a mirror image of your own.  It's like the material's already there, you just have to copy it!  You can plagiarise yourself and your life and stick different names to it all... that's totally okay.

3.      Stupid?  Have you read my novel from last year???  Oh, no, wait, you haven't.  You know why?  Because it's papier-mâché material.  Seriously.  It's beyond bad.  It's like, "Young and the Restless" trying to be hip.  My main character gets amnesia, for crying out loud!  ( I got stuck and needed the word count, okay?)  There are no stupid novels unless they're read by others and judged as so.

So next year, D is going to do NaNoWriMo with me.  She just doesn't know it yet.

S

PS - not counting what D wrote, all of the above amounts to 655 words.  Seriously.  I could have put that towards my NaNo word count.  You're lucky I'm ahead of the game and edging into 9k territory on day 3.

The One Where D Goes on Many Tangents

Happy Halloween!
With so many things to talk about, let's see how long it takes before I become a babbling brook to you. (If anyone can catch the song reference in that last sentence, I'll love you forever.)

First, another awesome book blog, We Heart YA, posted a lovely link on their Facebook page today. I thought it was appropriate, so I decided to share it here. Ladies and gentlemen, the United States of Young Adult Lit!

Second, an update on why I haven't really posted many book reviews here: marching band. I've only read 2-3 books per month (including the sister read) since marching band started. How sad, right? However, in a kind of good news/bad news situation (good news for my reading and sleeping habits, bad news for my otherwise-nonexistent exercise regimen, excuse list, and musical variety), marching band is over! That was so important that I needed boldface! Now, I'll actually have time to read. In fact, here's a guarantee: if I don't read at least 5 non-school-related books in the month of November, I will do some sort of punishment assigned by S. There will be photos, and it'll go on my Facebook too so people, ya know, actually see it.

Unfortunately, just as my schedule is becoming more open, S will not be so available: November is NaNoWriMo! I do not participate in National Novel Writing Month, but S is a veteran to the event and will make it her first priority. 
In case you're curious, there are three reasons I don't do NaNoWriMo:

1. I feel as though one of the key qualifications to being a good writer is to have read many books--many, many more than I have. It helps you understand the concept of a novel as well as various styles and strategies to convey your message.
2. I have no clue what I would write about. Most of the "moral messages" I'd want to send would parallel way too closely to my own life. Fictional works and autobiographical works don't exactly overlap.
3. Between my lack of confidence and my lack of motivation, I would decide that my novel is stupid and not worth writing by November 3rd. 

Well, that's all I've got on the book front. I'm sending thoughts, prayers, and general warm feelings to those affected by  Hurricane Sandy (luckily, neither S nor I are even remotely close to that region). Stay safe and take comfort in what you can.

Amo quod amur,

[I love because I am loved]

~D

October Sister Read - Daughter of Smoke and Bone by Laini Taylor

Synopsis (as taken from Goodreads):  
Around the world, black hand prints are appearing on doorways, scorched there by winged strangers who have crept through a slit in the sky.

In a dark and dusty shop, a devil's supply of human teeth grows dangerously low.

And in the tangled lanes of Prague, a young art student is about to be caught up in a brutal otherwordly war. Meet Karou. She fills her sketchbooks with monsters that may or may not be real; she's prone to disappearing on mysterious "errands"; she speaks many languages—not all of them human; and her bright blue hair actually grows out of her head that color. Who is she? That is the question that haunts her, and she's about to find out.

When one of the strangers—beautiful, haunted Akiva—fixes his fire-colored eyes on her in an alley in Marrakesh, the result is blood and starlight, secrets unveiled, and a star-crossed love whose roots drink deep of a violent past. But will Karou live to regret learning the truth about herself?

D’s Rating: ❤❤❤❤ 3/4   (out of five hearts)

D’s Rating: ❤❤❤❤ (out of five hearts)


D’s Thoughts:

I originally chose this book because it was on NPR's 100 Best-Ever Teen Novels list that we've already had a discussion about on this blog, which you can read here. Granted, Daughter of Smoke and Bone was number 87, but I fancied the title and S hadn't read it either, so it was a good match. 

Look, I'm not saying it's the greatest book ever written, but it should have been at least a little higher on that list! The plot, without giving too much away, was so original, and I was always on edge about what would happen next. Not once did I think, "okay, we get the point, you're dragging this on a bit much", which is pretty rare for me to say. Additionally, the "darkness" of the plot balanced perfectly against every gooey-lovey-hopey scene so that the book wasn't too much in either direction. Finally, it was so beautifully written! I know I've said that about pretty much every book on here, but Ms. Taylor always knew the perfect word to use. For example, take this quote out of context, and every girl now has a way to describe how she has felt around at least one person in their lives. Put it in context, and it's even more suitable for the situation: "It brought a flush to her cheeks. The temerity of butterflies to trouble her now. What was she, some giddy girl to swoon at beauty?"

The only reason this book gets 4 and 3/4 hearts instead of 5 is that it was occasionally hard to follow when the book no longer went in chronological order. There are three chapters toward the end, for example, that go in this order: a certain (very important) day-->the day before-->the day after. I understand the author's intent in doing so, but it usually took a paragraph or two to  figure out where we were.

Organization aside, the book was gorgeous. It was our original intent to not read a book series on TSR, but I just found out that the sequel--Days of Blood and Starlight--comes out on November 6th in the US and November 8th in the UK. You can bet your teeth I'll be reading it!

Standout Quotes:

"The end."
"What do you mean it's the end?"
She said, smoothing her cheek against the golden skin of his chest, "The story is unfinished. The world is still waiting."

"She had never guessed how deep happiness could go. in spite of the tragedy in her childhood and the ever-present press of war, she had mostly considered herself happy. There was almost always something to take delight n if you were trying. But this was different. It couldn't be contained. She sometimes imagined it streaming out of her like light."

"I don't know many rules to live by...but here's one. It's simple. Don't put anything unnecessary into yourself. No poisons or chemicals, no fumes or smoke or alcohol, no sharp objects, no inessential needles--drug or tattoo--and...no inessential man parts, either."


Album to listen to while reading this book: Tragic Kingdom - No Doubt (my latest addiction thanks to S)

S’s Thoughts:

I will be the first to say I was wrong about this book.  I've seen it in the bookshop many times and always picked it up and scoffed at it being YA lit/fantasy/romance.  But this book was good.  I mean, really good.  As in I kept reading it every chance I got, good.  So I take back my misgivings and apologise to D for criticising the book mentally beforehand.

What did I like about the book?  It was different--I don't think I've read anything like it before.  I don't want to go into too much detail and ruin the plot but it was addictive.  The settings were gorgeous... Prague, Marrakech (which I'm planning to visit in early 2013)... amazing.  I loved the descriptions of everything from appearances to the fabric of dresses; it was all very whimsical and I think I needed a dose of the fantastical.

What didn't I like?  Well, not much.  It was a rather dark book and after reading JK Rowling's "A Casual Vacancy" which was just as dark in a more human way, I really feel like I need some serious brain fluff with no substance.  All the depressing storylines are starting to get to me!

Anyhow, I'll definitely be reading the sequel at some point soon.


Standout Quotes:

"Eager to be helful, Razgut supplied, 'She tastes like nectar and salt.  Nectar and salt and apples.  Pollen and stars and hinges.  She tastes like fairy tales.  Swan maiden at midnight.  Cream on the tip of a fox's tongue.  She tastes like hope."

"Such a little thing, and brittle, and the sound it made:  a sharp, clean snap"

"There was no more happiness.  But under the misery, there was hope."

Album to listen to while reading this book:  Falling Up - Digby (local Louisville legends)

November’s book is S’s choice and is Behind the Beautiful Forevers by Katherine Boo.

See you soon! S & D

September Sister Read - The Story Sisters by Alice Hoffman

Synopsis (as taken from Goodreads):  
Alice Hoffman’s previous novel, The Third Angel, was hailed as "an unforgettable portrait of the depth of true love" (USA Today), "stunning" (Jodi Picoult), and "spellbinding" (Miami Herald). Her new novel, The Story Sisters, charts the lives of three sisters–Elv, Claire, and Meg. Each has a fate she must meet alone: one on a country road, one in the streets of Paris, and one in the corridors of her own imagination. Inhabiting their world are a charismatic man who cannot tell the truth, a neighbor who is not who he appears to be, a clumsy boy in Paris who falls in love and stays there, a detective who finds his heart’s desire, and a demon who will not let go.

What does a mother do when one of her children goes astray? How does she save one daughter without sacrificing the others? How deep can love go, and how far can it take you? These are the questions this luminous novel asks. 

At once a coming-of-age tale, a family saga, and a love story of erotic longing, The Story Sisters sifts through the miraculous and the mundane as the girls become women and their choices haunt them, change them and, finally, redeem them. It confirms Alice Hoffman’s reputation as "a writer whose keen ear for the measure struck by the beat of the human heart is unparalleled" (The Chicago Tribune). 

S’s Rating: ❤❤❤❤1/2  (out of five hearts)

D’s Rating: ❤❤❤❤1/2  (out of five hearts)


S’s Thoughts:
"The Story Sisters" is the first book I've read by Alice Hoffman and I can assure you it won't be the last.  Though a relatively short novel, TSS was a dense read filled with allegory and (my favourite) magical realism in spades.  There's nothing like a good read with a bit of magical realism thrown in... my personal favourite is Marquez's "One Hundred Years of Solitude", but TSS gives even that classic a run for its money in my opinion.

I think the reason why TSS appealed to me at the start was the "sister factor"... I mean, given this is a blog written by two sisters it seemed a perfect fit.  Like in TSS, there are three of us which I thought was a nice similarity anyhow.  And it was weird/funny but, while reading TSS, I pictured myself and my sisters as certain characters.  I saw L (who doesn't do much reading so you won't ever see her on here) as Claire, surprisingly... D as Meg, not surprisingly.  Me?  I identified the most with Elv, especially given the current relationship I have with members of my family. 

Elv is the oldest of three sisters... like me.  Elv is her own spirit... like me.  Pre-kidnapping she's a typical little girl, loves her family/sisters, takes care of them, and in the case of Claire saves them.  Then, well, things happen and she stops living so much for others but instead living for herself.  She gets involved in drugs and crime, is somewhat rehabilitated, meets the love of her life, leaves behind her family and... I won't reveal the rest.  I can identify with that... minus the drugs/crime/rehab. I won't go into the details here because it's quite personal, but also like Elv my relationship with some members of my family is quite strained. 

Anyhow... what did I like a book?  Well, that my fear of moths is justified!  (I hate those damn things... I've always told my husband they were evil!)  Joking (and magical realism) aside, I did enjoy TSS and will definitely be reading more of Hoffman's work soon.  I already have The Dovekeepers on my Kindle so that'll be next I suppose.  If I'm honest, there wasn't really much of anything I didn't like about this book... I even liked the ending!
Standout Quotes:
"Love is what matters," she said.  "Real love.  The kind that turns you inside out."

Demons were said to be cruel, but a demon would never have been so brutal as this.  A demon merely called you by name, threw his arms around you,  whispered his plight, understood yours, then took you for his own.  

The rest of the world didn't matter.  She was one thing only, and that was his alone.  When the counselors held up a mirror, Elv wasn't like the other girls, who cried and covered their heads.  She wasn't like her sister, willing to betray her own flesh and blood.  She didn't flinch when she saw her reflection.  Now that her hair had been shorn, the black rose at the base of her neck was visible, as if in  bloom.  So much the better.  This was who she was inside.

Album to listen to while reading this book: Passerby by Allie Moss

D’s Thoughts: The only reason I won't go as in-depth into TSS as S is because our thoughts are nearly identical. This book reads like a faerie tale, and that's what made it hard to put down. Hoffman puts so much thought into colors of light, the scent of various people, and other such details...it's extremely reminiscent of my own writing. Call me an egomaniac, but I like it when others parallel my literary style. S's comparison of the three sisters being like ourselves is spot-on, so let me go a little more in-depth about the character I identified most with: Meg. Meg is the the middle sister (which is unlike me, as I am the youngest). She is the first to deny the fantasy world that Elv created, and she is also the most aware when Elv no longer "lives for others", She bears most of Elv's later abuse. Meg is book-smart, but her people skills are poor, in part due to the fact that she is not as close to Claire or Elv as those two are to each other. Nonetheless, her sisters care about her, and Meg trusts them...in one case, to a fault. There are fewer details about Meg than there are the other two sisters (once you've read the book, you'll understand why), but I still feel closest to her for a completely different reason. About halfway through the book, while Claire, Meg, and their mother are in Paris, Meg decides that she wanted each of them to remember the way the sunlight looked at that moment: orange. In response, she found a piece of paper and scribbled the word orange, then folded it in half. The motif of sunlight colors does not seem important at first, but it will be discovered later that good memories of Meg will need to be revived regularly throughout the rest of the book because...sorry, not spoiling it!

Perhaps my only complaint was that the time frame of the book was so spread out--upwards of 15 years--that it was hard to remember the beginning once you reached the end. It was necessary, but I wish there would have been a shorter way for every problem to find its solution.

Otherwise? Flawless. There is so much love in this book: not just romance, but the kind of love that sisters have that can't ever break. That, I believe, is what Elv was really searching for in love "that turns you inside out".
Standout Quotes: "[Elv] tried not to let on how excited she was. She was seventeen and ready for the world, whether or not it was ready for her. She could actually feel things after all."


"He wished he could show Claire what love was. The ability to ask for something. The desire to give someone what they asked for."

"Maybe some love was guaranteed. Maybe it fit inside you and around you like skin and bones. That is what she remembered and always would: the sisters who sat with her in the garden, the grandmother who stitched her a dress the color of the sky, the man who spied her in the grass and loved her beyond all measure, the mother who set up a tent in the garden to tell her a story when she was a child, neither good nor bad, selfish nor strong, only a girl who wanted to hear a familiar voice as the dark fell down, and the moths rose, and the night was sure to come."

Album to listen to while reading this book: Hard Candy by Counting Crows (in case you haven't noticed, Counting Crows is by far my favorite band)


October’s book is D’s choice and is Daughter of Smoke and Bone by Laini Taylor

See you soon! S & D