Tree of Smoke

Did anyone get all the way through it? I am at about 150 and trying to decide whether or not to keep going. Interesting but a tough slog of fiction and hard to know whether the payoff will be worth it.

Imperial Life in the Emerald City

Of course, this title makes me think of Oz, as I am sure the author intended, and this creates an additional aura of unbelievability to the reporting in this book. The subtitle is "Inside Iraq's Green Zone" and it is a disturbing tale of America's Wizards in Washington as they manhandle history and people. As Perky said, after she read it, "very compelling." Beautifully written in an interesting and balanced tone.

Man Gone Down

I've just finished Man Gone Down by Michael Thomas and am late sending it on to Gretchen. It is an incredible novel, and I look forward to reading it a second and third time to understand more of it. Before I started, I snuck a peek at the extratextual descriptions on the back and saw that it was compared to Invisible Man by Ralph Ellison and then later saw the phrase "Homeric odyssey." These and other references guided me in my reading. The unnamed narrator wanders through his life-- present, past, and future, through his racial identities, through New York city, through his education--formal and informal. As he wanders, each moment is paradoxically intentional, detailed, and explicit but without resolution. I'm wandering here myself, I realize, trying to find words to say how great and significant I think this novel is. Here are a few passages: "The new world regarded the old world. The old world clung to its mother's legs." (You'll understand this when you have the proper context!) Okay, here's a better one that shows the humor of the novel--the opening lines: "I know I am not doing well. I have an emotional relationship with a fish--Thomas Strawberry." "And it occurs to me not to ask about the dream deferred, because almost everyone knows what it is, on some level, to fail."

Little Heathens-Mildred Armstorng Kalish

Interesting look at rural life in Iowa during the depression..probably a lot like other rural parts of the country at that time.
Beginning caused a lot of questions...why no mention of how her Mom and Dad (who was sent away by her father early in her life) met? Other confusing aspects would have been helped by a family diagram which I have seen in other "historical" or family novels/memoirs.
Wonderful writing that engaged me initially, but got VERY repetitive as the book went on.
Inclusion of family recipes was also interesting at the start, then easy to skip over...maybe because I am not the cook in our house.
Overall a fun, not heavy, read which I needed at the start of the year.

Kathy H.

Out Stealing Horses

Okay, I'm in! Some of the rest of you family and friends may need to have Jessie send you a new invitation in case you didn't sign up when we were first invited!

Out Stealing Horses is a wonderful book. The story takes place in Norway in 1948 and then 1999 maybe, near the border of Norway and Sweden. Since Tom and I visited our friends Hans and Gunn Skei (you might have met them at Thanksgiving or in previous years at the 4th of July, or Gretchen in the January before you went to Chicago) at their "farm" house-cabin in Sweden where there was a forest that we searched in for mushrooms and a river that we walked and then boated on, I could easily picture the landscape of the novel. But that is not all. It is beautifully and thoughtfully written. Without any spoilers here are a few of the lines that touched me:

“with the weather-beaten, lined face of a man who had undoubtedly been out on a cold night before and dealt with wayward things, complicated things in a contrary wind, things of high gravity—I could tell that when we shook hands.”

“What he had taught me was to be reckless, taught me that if I let myself go, did not slow myself down by thinking so much beforehand I could achieve many things I would never have dreamt possible.”

“You decide for yourself when it will hurt.”

That's just from the first thirty pages. I look forward to the rest of you having the chance to read this beautiful novel, even those who don't necessarily like fiction. ---Pearl

Favorites from 2007?

Hello All,

Before we each get too far in our first books (or probably in some cases before we start on our second), I was hoping that we could briefly reflect on the 2007 book club. For those that are new members of this book club, please feel free to add your thoughts of other great books that you read in the last year.

In general, I read a lot of non-fiction and already had two of the five on my list to read before we even began. This post is not intended as a knock on that side of the list - I throughly enjoyed all five nonfiction works. However, it was the two novels by female authors that were absolutely surprising delights (in very different ways) that really had me excited to participate again.

When I first saw the list on Christmas Day, 2006, Calamity Physics by Pessl was the one that I was the most concerned with. Why would I want to read a novel about physics? Who knew that it would be an incredibly entertaining suspenseful novel with tons of literary references and not an ounce of physics (well at least not the equation kinds). It was hard to put it down.

On the other hand, Messud's Emperor's Children was so filled with tragic characters, I wanted to put it down. I kept trying to simply put it in the mail and forget about it. I didn't have any desire to know the characters or learn more about their lives. Yet, something kept pulling me back. Finally finishing it one morning at 4 am, I promptly put Messud's previous works on my Amazon list. This one actually had real characters and intentions that could have actually lived in our real world.

So as we start 2008's list, I'm hoping that I find one work that gets me as excited as those two gems from last year. And knowing the quality from last year, I don't think I will be disappointed.

Gearing Up for a Great Year in Reading

Hello All,

Greetings from the Blog. I've sent out an email invitation to each member of the Family and Friends Book Club to join this blog. I've set this up as a "members only" blog. This means that anyone can view it, but only invited and registered members can post and comment on the blog. If you have any difficulty logging in to the blog after you register, please contact me at jessie_hayden@yahoo.com, and we'll get things sorted out.

Some other helpful hints. Be sure to save the blog URL in your Bookmarks/Favorites, so that you can easily access it. Also, once you are registered, you can sign in to the blog by simply going to the blog site (http://familyandfriendsbc.blogspot.com) and clicking on "Sign In" at the top, right-hand side of blog page. Sign in with your Blogger username and password and begin blogging.

I'm looking forward to a year of great books!