Review: The Sweetness at the Bottom of the Pie

The Sweetness at the Bottom of the Pie by Alan Bradley and Narrated by Jayne Entwistle

Flavia de Luce #1

Mystery, Published 2010

Challenges: Mount TBR, Audio Book RC

Shelf Life: 2 years, 10 mos. – bought April 2010

Read March 2013, 10 hrs unabridged

Story: 4/5

Narration: 5/5

Book Blurb:

It is the summer of 1950–and at the once-grand mansion of Buckshaw, young Flavia de Luce, an aspiring chemist with a passion for poison, is intrigued by a series of inexplicable events: A dead bird is found on the doorstep, a postage stamp bizarrely pinned to its beak. Then, hours later, Flavia finds a man lying in the cucumber patch and watches him as he takes his dying breath.

For Flavia, who is both appalled and delighted, life begins in earnest when murder comes to Buckshaw. “I wish I could say I was afraid, but I wasn’t. Quite the contrary. This was by far the most interesting thing that had ever happened to me in my entire life.”

Thoughts:

I loved quirky Flavia.  She is a 10 year old chemist, lover of anything poisons, amateur sleuth, and always looking to get back at her older 2 sisters.  The book is told from Flavia’s POV and she is always sure she sees things the right way.  When a dead black snipe shows up at the back door with a postage stamp stuck through its beak, Flavia is at once intrigued.  Then when a mysterious man shows up to talk to her father in the middle of the night and a dead man shows up in the cucumber patch, she knows something has gone awry.  Flavia takes the reader on a very interesting and usually amusing trip to solve the mysteries surrounding her grand home, Buckshaw.  There are several mysteries that run throughout the book and they are slowly unraveled, leaving plenty of time for Flavia’s character development.

The audio is very well done and I’m looking forward to listening to the next in the series.

Quotes:

Unless some sweetness at the bottom lie,

Who cares for all the crinkling of the pie?

The Art of Cookery, William King

It was as black in the closet as old blood. (First line)

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Review: Legacy by Cayla Kluver

Legacy by Cayla Kluver and Narrated by Anna Chlumsky

Legacy Trilogy #1

YA historical fantasy, Published 2009

Challenges: YA Historical Fiction, Audio Book Challenge, Mt. TBR

Shelf Life: 7 months – bought 9/20/11

Read April 2012, 12.5 hours unabridged

Story: 4/5

Narration: 5/5

Book Blurb:

I noticed his eyes. They were blue, sharp and intense. Despite the youthful glows of his suntanned face, his eyes were cold and unfriendly, suggesting he had great experience in the world and was now expecting the worst.In her seventeenth year, Princess Alera of Hytanica faces one duty: to marry the man who will be king. But her father’s choice of suitor fills her with despair.When the palace guard captures and intruder—a boy her age with steel-blue eyes, hailing from her kingdom’s greatest enemy—Alera is alarmed…and intrigued. But she could not have guessed that their clandestine meetings would unveil the dark legacy shadowing both their lands.In this mystical world of court conspiracies and blood magic, loyalties will be tested. Courage won’t be enough. And as the battle begins for everything Alera holds dear, love may be the downfall of a kingdom.

Thoughts:

I originally started this book back toward the end of last year, and ended up setting it aside for something else.  The story just never grabbed me, despite the fact that I really wanted it to.  When I saw that it had been narrated by Anna Chlumsky, I decided to give it another try and thoroughly enjoyed the story.  Anna really does a great job narrating the story.  Like many first books in a series like this, the plot did seem to drag for the first half of the book – I was dying to know if there was going to be any real action at all.  The beginning of the book did grab me, but it seemed to take forever for the next real thing to happen.

There is a great attention to detail, which I did enjoy, but was ready for something exciting to happen.  I was often disappointed by Alera’s actions because in Hytanican society, women have very limited roles and she has yet to defy her father, the king.  There were many twists and turns that happened that I was definitely not expecting.  I was expecting a little more romance or love triangle as well, but most of the storyline revolves around Alera being married off to someone who she despises.  By the end I just knew I had to know how Alera would deal with the consequences of her fate.  With Cayla being such a young writer, you just know her next works will only get better and better.

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Top Ten Books I Loved But Never Wrote a Review for…

This top ten is actually perfect for me because I am a tad bit behind on my reviews for one, and two, I sometimes have a hard time writing a review for some books. I don’t know what it is, it could be a book I just thought was meh, ok and don’t have much to say about OR it could be a book I LOVED and just can’t find those perfect words to express my feelings.

So on that note…here are the ones I LOVED but maybe didn’t get the blog love they deserve.

(IN NO PARTICULAR ORDER.)

Please let me know if you would like more indepth reviews to these books!

1. Harry Potter Series by J.K. Rowling

Yes, I have read the series and I LOVE IT!  I have reread all of the books, some several times over, all except Book #7.  I have seen all the movies and I recently went to Harry Potter WORLD, which was AWESOME! I keep meaning to post my pics from there, but haven’t gotten around to it for some reason! I have the HP scrapbook paper, the list goes on and on!  I love the world building in these books, the descriptions of the castle alone make me want to pack up and find platform 9 3/4.

2. Across the Universe by Beth Revis

A love out of time. A spaceship built of secrets and murder.

I read this one back in January and loved it.  Even for those like me who aren’t sci-fi freaks will love Amy and Elder.  Elder has lived on the spaceship Godspeed his entire life, with planet earth a mere fleeting thought.  When he discovers his uncle has not been completely honest with him about the future of the ship and the people that serve him, Elder must act quickly.  Will he save Amy before it’s too late and who is setting out to destroy these innocent lives? There is a lot of world building and set up, which is to be expected in the first book of a new series and I am already anticipating book #2 – A Million Suns coming out early next year.

3. The Peach Keeper by Sarah Addison Allen

Welcome to Walls of Water, North Carolina, where the secrets are thicker than the fog from the town’s famous waterfalls, and the stuff of superstition is just as real as you want it to be.

I am a HUGE fan of SAA! Rarely am I ever caught up on a series or all of any author’s list of books, but I have read and loved all of Sarah’s. I love the mix of southern charm, a little romance, history, and a bit of magic thrown in.

SAA’s Other Books: Garden Spells, The Sugar Queen, The Girl Who Chased the Moon

4. Tiger’s Curse by Colleen Houck

Passion. Fate. Loyalty. Would you risk it all to change your destiny?

Again, another first in a YA series.  If you love adventure and romance, you are sure to love Tiger’s Curse.  Kelsey has just graduated high school and is eager to find a job so that her adoptive family won’t have to support her anymore.  Unsure about her future, Kelsey finds a temp job working the local circus that has just come to town.  Among the acts is a beautiful white tiger that Kelsey often goes to spend her down time.  Little does she know that this caged tiger is Ren, a young Indian prince who was cursed to the life of a tiger 300 years ago.  Before she knows it, Kelsey is whisked away to India to help Ren break the curse.  I loved the setting of this book – the jungles, the castles, the caves, the waterfalls – it is so lush! I already have book #2 – Tiger’s Quest and book #3 is slated to come out this fall.

5. Iron Fey Books 1, 1.5, 2 by Julie Kagawa

These books include: The Iron King, Winter’s Passage, and The Iron Daughter

Overall, I am really enjoying this series and CANNOT wait to get to book #4, The Iron Prince, which is told from Ash’s point of view.  He is definitely one of my favorite characters so far in this series.  Of course, I also love the cat saith, because there has to be one and Grimalkin is awesome.  There is still a lot of beautiful world building going on and I really do like the descriptiveness of it, however I do find myself often bogged down in the prose.

6. City of Bones by Cassandra Clare

When fifteen-year-old Clary Fray heads out to the Pandemonium Club in New York City, she hardly expects to witness a murder – much less a murder committed by three teenagers covered with strange tattoos and brandishing bizarre weapons.

So I listened to this one (14.5 hours unabridged) and overall really enjoyed it.  I did not enjoy the narrator, so perhaps I will try actually reading book #2. Clary, like Meghann in the Iron Fey series, can be just a tad annoying at times (teenagers!), but I was hooked once she was hooked up with Jace and the other Shadowhunters.  I am really interested in reading the Infernal Devices series because I think I will really enjoy the historical aspect of it.

7. Graceling by Kristin Cashore

In a world where people born with an extreme skill – called a Grace – are feared and exploited, Katsa carries the burden of a skill even she despises: the Grace of killing.

Katsa has a special skill, or Grace, and has allowed herself to be used by her uncle, the King, all her life.  But lately, she has secretly defied him by going on missions to help the innocent or get rid of those hungry with power.  She had never met anyone capable of matching her Grace, until she met Po.  If you enjoy high fantasy and adventure, I think you will love this one.  Katsa and Po soon find themselves on an adventure of a lifetime. I am eager to read the companion book, Fire, and WHEN is BITTERBLUE going to be RELEASED??

8. Eldest and Brisingr by Christopher Paolini

Darkness falls…Swords clash…Evil reigns. 

Oaths sworn . . . loyalties tested . . . forces collide.

HUGE fan of this series and have already pre-ordered my copy of Inheritance.  I also listened to the audio versions of these books, and have read Eragon twice now.  The narrator, Gerard Doyle, really does an excellent job with all the voices…except Saphira, IMHO, she sounds like Yoda or Grover, which I found a bit distracting (and funny) at times.  In Eldest, Eragon has been staying at the Beor Mountains (with the dwarves), but must now spend his alotted time at Ellesmera (with the elves) to learn more about the dragon riders and enhancing his fighting and dragon skills.  I loved the lushness of the elven lands and was sad to see him have to leave.  In Brisingr, Eragon uses more magic, reunites with his cousin Roran, joins the Varden and starts to fight Galbatorix and his SPOILER ALERT!! half-brother Murtagh.  Favorite characters are still Solembum and Angela.

9. Hex Hall by Rachel Hawkins

Three years ago, Sophie Mercer discovered that she was a witch. It’s gotten her into a few scrapes.

This was a cute, quick read that includes a lot of paranormal beings.  There’s witches, vamps, ghosts, faeries, shape shifters, warlocks, etc etc.  ANOTHER first in a series, but I loved Sophie’s personality.  She’s not your typical whiny teenaged girl, she’s got sass and spunk!  There is a great mystery aspect to this book and Rachel really keeps you guessing until the very end.  Can’t wait for book #2 – Demonglass.

10. The Hobbit by J.R.R. Tolkien

Bilbo Baggins was a hobbit who wanted to be left alone in quiet comfort. But the wizard Gandalf came along with a band of homeless dwarves. Soon Bilbo was drawn into their quest, facing evil orcs, savage wolves, giant spiders, and worse unknown dangers. Finally, it was Bilbo-alone and unaided-who had to confront the great dragon Smaug, the terror of an entire countryside . . .

A classic that I had never read and I finally read it in early 2010.  My favorite main character is Bilbo, of course! He’s quite humorous.  I love adventure books WITH MAPS!! I just can’t get enough! I often flip back to see where we are on the journey and Bilbo makes quite the journey for a hobbit.  I should really read TLOTR trilogy…

WOW, I feel relieved, like a burden has been lifted! 10 very much loved books…10 reviews…DONE! This makes me happy!

♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥

Top Ten Tuesday is an original feature/weekly meme created at The Broke and the Bookish. This feature was created because we are particularly fond of lists here at The Broke and the Bookish. We’d love to share our lists with other bookish folks and would LOVE to see your top ten lists!

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Review: The Mammoth Hunters

The Mammoth Hunters by Jean M. Auel, Audio narrated by Sandra Burr

Earth’s Children Series #3

Fiction, Published 1985

Challenges: Audio Book Challenge, Historical Fiction Challenge

Read April 2011, Unabridged – 26 hrs

Story: 3/5, Narration: 5/5

• #1: The Clan of the Cave Bear
• #2: The Valley of Horses

Book Blurb:

Now with her devoted Jondalar, Ayla boldly sets forth into the land of the Mamutoi – the Mammoth Hunters, the Others she has been seeking.  Though Ayla must learn their strange customs and language, it is because of her uncanny hunting and healing skills that she is adopted into the Mammoth Hearth.  Here Ayla finds her first women friends, and painful memories of the Clan she has left behind.  Here, too, is Ranec, the dark-skinned, magnetic master carver of ivory tusks to whom Ayla is irresistibly drawn – setting Jondalar on fire with jealousy.  Throughout the icy winter, Ayla is torn between her two men.  But soon will come the great spring mammoth hunt, when Ayla must choose her mate and her desiny – to remain in the Hearth with Ranec, or to follow Jondalar into a far-off place and an unknown future.

Thoughts:

I came to love many of the members of the Lion Camp and their relationships with each other and with the newcomers.   They not only accept Ayla and Jondalar into their camp, but also her horses.  They even build an annex for them, which many of the Mamutoi find shocking, to persuade Ayla to stay the winter with them.  Among their members, is Rydag, a young boy who is like Ayla’s son, half Clan and half “the Others.”  When Ayla teaches him the Clan ways to talk with his hands, the members of the Lion Camp realize that he is not dumb, but was just unable to speak like them. 

I’ve been listening to the audio books of this series back to back. Absolutely LOVED The Clan of the Cave Bear and The Valley of Horses, but this one seems very, very repetitive and had to listen to 26 hours of Ayla’s ridiculous love triangle drama. Come on Jondalar, step up!!   You would think that after all the mishaps in their communication skills in the valley that they would have realized that perhaps they should consider NOT making assumptions about what the other person thinks or feels and just come out and ask them! It certainly would have saved a few hundred pages of ridiculous miscommunications!  Really, for someone who is supposed to be so understanding of subtle, and perhaps not so subtle, body language, you would think Ayla would get it through her thick skull why Jondalar is avoiding her and sleeping with another man in the SAME cave as him where he can HEAR EVERYTHING does not help matters…seriously!!!

I will continue with the series because I want to see what happens with Ayla and Jondalar, but do they have to be the most genius members of all mankind, really???  I would like to see another person come up with a new idea instead of Ayla or Jondalar. And I wonder what will happen with Wolf!

LOVE THIS REVIEW on Amazon! Hilarious!

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Review: The Valley of Horses

The Valley of Horses by Jean M. Auel, Audio narrated by Sandra Burr

Earth’s Children Series #2

Fiction, Published 1982

Challenges: Audio Book Challenge, Historical Fiction Challenge

Read March 2011, Unabridged – 21 hrs

Story: 5/5, Narration: 5/5

• #1: The Clan of the Cave Bear
  

Book Blurb:

In The Valley of Horses, Ayla, the unforgettable heroine of The Clan of the Cave Bear, sets out on her own odyssey of discovery away from the nurturing adoptive family and friends of the Clan.  She is in search of others like herslef and in search of love.  Driven by her intelligence, her curiosity, and her destiny, she explores where the Clan never dared to travel and encounters a hostile world of awesome mystery, glacial cold, terrifying beasts, and intense loneliness in which survival itself is a constant battle.

Sharing a hidden valley with a herd of steppe horses, Ayla finds a unique friendship with animals as vulnerable as herself and ingeniously discovers the complex skills needed to survive – skills no Clan member was ever able to master.  But none of her experiences prepares her for the emotional turmoil she feels when she rescues a young man – the first of the Others she has seen – from almost certain death.  Torn between her desire for human companionship and her fear of the unknown Others, she struggles against her deep attraction to the handsome Jondalar.  It is Jondalar who teaches her the meaning of true friendship and love.

Thoughts:

I enjoyed listening to Ayla’s long journey away from the Clan and her many struggles and triumphs.  As we learned at the end of The Clan of the Cave Bear, Ayla has been cast out of the Clan and all the people she grew up with and loves thinks she truly is dead.  So she must leave and follow her adoptive mother’s advice to find the Others, people of her own kind.  She walks a long way and decides she must find a more permanent home for the coming winter since she has not seen any people.  She finds a valley with a cave high above and sets up camp.  The descriptions of her making tools, killing animals for furs and meat, are truly amazing.  She constantly struggles with her complete isolation and makes friends with the most unlikely of her kind.

Jondalar and his brother, Thonolan, are on a rite of passage journey, one that takes them far away from their home, in search of the end of the Great Mother River.  It is a long journey, as they discover many kinds of people often join their families for meals and hunting parties.

The narration switches back and forth between Ayla and Jondalar’s stories until they finally meet and I really enjoyed both of their stories.  Usually, for me, when the story flip flops between two points of views, there is usually one that I like more than the other and can’t wait until it flips back, but that was not the case for this story.  I just could not wait until Ayla and Jondalar’s paths crossed, but this did not happen until at least 2/3 of the way through.

One of my favorite aspects of these books are the maps.  I love maps and whenever a books has one, I often find myself flipping back to it to see where the characters are in relationship to where they’ve been.

Side note: I should probably mention, too, that there are a lot of detailed sex scenes throughout these books, so don’t be shocked…

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Review: Stephenie Meyer’s The Host

The Host by Stephenie Meyer and narrated by Kate Reading

Sci-Fi, Published 2008

Read Oct 2010, Unabridged Audio, 21 hrs

Challenges: RIP V, Audio Book, YA

Shelf Life: 2 years 4 months, Purchased HB 5/1/08

Verdict: 4.5/5

Book Blurb:

Melanie Stryder refuses to fade away.  Our world has been invaded by an unseen enemy that takes over the minds of human hosts while leaving their bodies intact.  But Wanderer, the invading “soul” who occupies Melanie’s body, finds its former tenant refusing to relinquish possession of her mind.

As Melanie fills Wanderer’s thoughts with visions of Jared, a human who has avoided invasion and lives in hiding, Wanderer begins to yearn for a man she’s never met.  Soon Wanderer and Melanie – reluctant allies – set off to search for the man they both love.

Featuring one of the most unusual love triangles in literature, The Host is a riveting and unforgettable novel about the persistence of love and the essence of what it means to be human.

My Thoughts:

I really did not like the beginning of this story, (however, after finishing, I want to go back and reread it).  I made it a few hours into the audio and wondered whether or not I should continue, but boy, I am so glad I did! I think since the beginning starts immediately with an action sequence, with the alien transfer taking place, I was really confused.  I didn’t know where I was or who I was supposed to be.  I have read other reviewers having this same confusion, but I definitely don’t think the audio helps in this aspect.  The narrator makes Wanderer sound very mechanical or robotic.  Her voice is very monotone and it was hard at times to get the needed inflection.

Once some of the background information was given about the aliens and what they were doing, I started to understand what was going on better.  At first I did not like them, especially the Seeker.  Wanderer, however, is truly fascinating.  She has been many things and lived 8 lives before coming to Earth.  Once Melanie awoke inside Wanderer’s mind and started giving her a hard time, that’s when I really became interested in the story and didn’t want to get out of my car so I could listen more.

The love triangle aspect is truly unique.  Melanie and Wanderer (Wanda) both share Melanie’s human body and Jared loves Melanie and Ian loves Wanda.  It takes Jared a really long time to believe Melanie is still alive.  I really hated the violence Jared had toward Wanda.  Even if Mel was gone, taken by the Souls and never to return, how could he desecrate her body?  I think overall I preferred Jared over Ian (Team Jared, if you will), mostly based on Melanie’s memories of him, but I really wanted Wanda to just shake him and slap him across the face and tell him to stop being such a *BAD WORD* !!  I also really liked his inherent survival skills.  However, I really could have done without all the hitting.  Ian, to me, needed a little more grit.  I liked that he was so kind to Wanda, but he seemed to be too much of an opposite of his brother Kyle.  Side Note: REALLY liked the Sunny & Kyle storyline!!

I think the only reason this book is not technically considered to be YA is because of the violence, but I think any teen who has read the Twilight Saga has read The Host as well.  There is not a lot of gore and blood, per se, but a lot of domestic abuse toward Wanderer/Melanie when the humans still believed she had come to harm them or turn them in to the Souls.  Meyer continually made the point that humans, while able to have complex emotions, were naturally evil and violent toward one another and that the aliens or “Souls” were inherently good and that’s why they had taken over the earth.

Because he was a soul, by nature he was all things good: compassionate, patient, honest, virtuous, and full of love. -p. 3

But I think a major point was missed and I was really hoping Melanie would have stressed it to Wanda.  If the Souls were so good and revulsed away from guns and violence, why did they then not feel any remorse against taking over a human’s body?  And if that human’s mind did not cooperate (i.e. give way to the Soul) then they were discarded and considered useless.  The Souls did not account for the person inside, like Wanderer comes to realize through her human journey, so isn’t that essentially evil as well?  The person’s death may have been committed less violently than the way of the humans, yet it had the same end result.

I read on Melanie’s blog, I’m pretty sure she is unrelated to Mel in the book , that she would have really liked to have seen a map of the caves.  I so agree! Wouldn’t that be so awesome? I am discovering that I LOVE fantasy books with maps, but I’ll save that topic for another post.

I loved the ending and I really hope Meyer delivers with a trilogy.  They are tentatively titled The Soul and The Seeker.  I just hope they don’t disappoint me like the Twilight saga.  I LOVED Twilight, still really loved New Moon, really liked Eclipse, but was ultimately disappointed with Breaking Dawn (ummm, no review but I gave it a 3.5/5, which is pretty low on my generous scale).  I also really liked the graphic novel.

Quotes:

Life and love went on in the last human outpost on the planet Earth, but things did not stay exactly the same.  I was not the same. -p. 609

Perhaps there could be no joy on this planet without an equal weight of pain to balance it out on some unknown scale. -p. 609

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Review: Alice I Have Been

Alice I Have Been by Melanie Benjamin, Audio narrated by Samantha Eggar

Fiction, Published 2010

Challenges: Audio Book, You’ve Got Mail

Read: Sept 2010, 12 hrs (unabridged)

Verdict: 5/5

Book Blurb:

Few works of literature are as universally beloved as Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland. Now, in this spellbinding historical novel, we meet the young girl whose bright spirit sent her on an unforgettable trip down the rabbit hole–and the grown woman whose story is no less enthralling.

But oh my dear, I am tired of being Alice in Wonderland. Does it sound ungrateful?

Alice Liddell Hargreaves’s life has been a richly woven tapestry: As a young woman, wife, mother, and widow, she’s experienced intense passion, great privilege, and greater tragedy. But as she nears her eighty-first birthday, she knows that, to the world around her, she is and will always be only “Alice.” Her life was permanently dog-eared at one fateful moment in her tenth year–the golden summer day she urged a grown-up friend to write down one of his fanciful stories.

That story, a wild tale of rabbits, queens, and a precocious young child, becomes a sensation the world over. Its author, a shy, stuttering Oxford professor, does more than immortalize Alice–he changes her life forever. But even he cannot stop time, as much as he might like to. And as Alice’s childhood slips away, a peacetime of glittering balls and royal romances gives way to the urgent tide of war.

For Alice, the stakes could not be higher, for she is the mother of three grown sons, soldiers all. Yet even as she stands to lose everything she treasures, one part of her will always be the determined, undaunted Alice of the story, who discovered that life beyond the rabbit hole was an astonishing journey.

A love story and a literary mystery, Alice I Have Been brilliantly blends fact and fiction to capture the passionate spirit of a woman who was truly worthy of her fictional alter ego, in a world as captivating as the Wonderland only she could inspire.

From the Hardcover edition.

My Thoughts:

What a tragic and haunting tale.  I really enjoyed the narrator. She creates a slow, twisting, engrossing, and often disturbing tale of Alice Liddell and her Mr. Dodgson.  An incident that occurred when she was only seven continues to haunt her long after childhood.  It even prevents her from marrying the love of her life.  I often wondered while listening to this audio, what events were true and which ones were embellished.  Supposedly the real Alice Liddell did not have a love affair with the Prince Leopold, the youngest son of Queen Victoria, but she does in the book.  While I really loved his character and their love story in the book, he was initially only enamored by the idea of meeting Alice of Wonderland.  While I do not doubt his love for Alice, I felt that she often felt she had to live up to his high expectations, to be someone she was not.  I truly felt sorry for her husband, Reginal Hargreaves, because he loved her for who she was and didn’t really care about the whole Wonderland phenomenon.

I thought the most poignant discovery that Alice made was when she finally realizes, after most of her loved ones are gone, that she truly loved the life she lived.  She spent so much of her life with regrets and hate toward those she felt did her wrong or didn’t love her enough.  She never really lived in the moment because she was so sad that she wasn’t living the life she wanted, a life that she feels was essentially stolen from her by Mr. Dodgson.

I think that any story that leaves you wanted to frantically seek out the “true” story should be considered a hit.  I’m left feeling that I want to hear Mr. Dodgson’s side of the story.  Alice’s story often felt like it came from a very narrow rabbit hole; she was either unable or unwilling to see the truth from every angle.

Quotes:

I suppose at some point we must choose which memories to hold on to, and which ones to let go. -Alice of Wonderland to Peter of Neverland

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Review: Darwin in a Nutshell

Darwin in a Nutshell written and narrated by Peter Whitfield

Nonfiction – biography/science/history, Published 2009

Challenges: Audio Book Challenge, Science Book Challenge, Summer Reading Challenge

Read Aug 2010, 2 hrs (unabridged)

4/5

Book Blurb:

“In a little over an hour, Whitfield presents a biography of Charles Darwin and an overview of his life’s work.”
Charles Darwin, father of evolution, was one of the greatest pioneers in science. His five-year voyage on The Beagle, his visit to the Galapagos Islands, his careful work in noting small differences of fauna on different islands – all led to the concept of natural selection, which radically changed the way mankind and the animal world was viewed. But what kind of man was Darwin, and why did he keep his conclusions secret for so many years? In this clear but informative account, Peter Whitfield sets Darwin in the 19th-century society from which he sprang, and considers the effect of his ideas on the 21st century.

My Thoughts:

As a student of geology, I thought this short synopsis of Darwin’s life was very enjoyable, especially learning about his growing up years and how he landed the job on the Beagle.  The main point that is stressed by Whitfield is that despite mainstream beliefs of Darwin, he was in fact a devout Christian, who certainly never stressed the idea of man evolving from the ape.  He in fact avoided this radical comparison, not wanting to upset his readers.  His journeys as a naturalist, focused mostly on the geology, having taken Charles Lyell’s Principle of Geology, instead of the islands’ biology  It was not until he noticed separate species living on the different islands that the idea of natural selection came about.  This is definitely a very broad based biography, but a good starting off point if interested in Darwin’s life and works.

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Review: Life of Pi

Life of Pi by Yann Martel, Audio narrated by Jeff Woodman

Fiction – Adventure/Survival, Published 2002

Challenges: Audio Book Challenge, Summer ’10 21 Reading Challenge

Read: July 2010, 11 hrs (unabridged)

Verdict: 4.2/5

Book Blurb:

A boy

A tiger

And the vast Pacific Ocean

This is a novel of such rare and wondrous storytelling that it may, as one character claims, make you believe in God.

Can a reader reasonably ask for anything more?

My Thoughts:

I felt that the beginning of the story was sooo long and didn’t understand the reason behind it…I wanted adventure and I wanted it now!  But I’m glad, of course, that I continued through the beginning because it truly creates a better understanding of Pi’s trials and adventures.  I listened to the audio, but since I also own the illustrated edition,  I made sure to look through the beautiful pictures as well.

The story is told from Pi’s point-of-view, looking back to his childhood in the 1970s when he still lived in India. Pi’s father runs the local zoo in Pondicherry so he knows everything about the animals.  He studies them and knows how dangerous they are, despite how cute they might appear.

Pi loves God and he seeks Him in every way possible.  He comes from an untraditional Indian family, but they are traditionally Hindu.  Yet Pi seeks the Christian and Muslim faiths as well as reaching back to his Hindu traditions.  This was one of my favorite passages in the book:

The pandit spoke first.  “Mr. Patel, Piscine’s piety is admirable.  In these troubled times it’s good to see a boy so keen on God.  We all agree on that.”  The imam and the priest nodded.  “But he can’t be a Hindu, a Christian, and a Muslim.  It’s impossible.  He must choose.”

“I don’t think it’s a crime, but I suppose you’re right,” Father replied.

The three murmered agreement and looked heavenward, as did Father, whence they felt the decision must come.  Mother looked at me.

A silence fell heavily on my shoulders.

“Hmmm, Piscine?”  Mother nudged me.  “How do you feel about the question?”

“Bapu Gandhi said, ‘All religions are true.’  I just want to love God,” I blurted out… -Ch. 23

Then one day Pi’s father decides to sell the zoo and take his family to Canada to pursue a better life.  There are only a few zoo animals left and they are going on the barge boat with the Patel family.  Then the shipwreck happens.  It happens so fast that before Pi knows what’s what, he is thrown onto a lifeboat.

I will say that Pi’s adventure is gruesome, to say the least, but what can you expect with a Bengal tiger, a zebra, an orangutan, and a hyena as your boat-mates?  It is here that his father’s many lessons on animal instinct and behaviors come in handy. The animal instinct is always kill or be killed and it is only the prey who forget this lesson.

But are the animals really on the lifeboat and apart of Pi’s journey or are they figments of his imagination so that he can better deal with the cruelty of the “survival of the fittest” situation he is now in?  Pi will leave you thinking about him long after the end of his high seas adventure.

Overall I loved Pi’s story and I think I would definitely choose the animal one – it seems nicer somehow.  I will say though that the whole stop on the island weirded me out and made me think of the trippy cemetery scene in Easy Rider…seriously it makes no sense.  At least in the movie you knew they were on acid.  And if you haven’t seen Easy Rider (1969), well…you should.

Quotes:

My greatest wish – other than salvation – was to have a book.  A long book with a never-ending story.  One I could read again and again, with new eyes and a fresh understanding each time.  -Ch. 73

My name isn’t the end of the story about my name.  When your name is Bob no one asks you, “How do you spell that?”  Not so with Piscine Molitor Patel. -Ch. 5

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Review: McMurtry’s Sin Killer – A Sin of A Book!

Sin Killer by Larry McMurtry, Audio narrated by Alfred Molina

The Berrybender Narratives #1

Fiction – Historical/Westerns, Published 2002

Challenges: Audio Book Challenge, Series Challenge IV

Read June 2010

2/5

Book Blurb:

From Pulitzer Prize-winning author Larry McMurtry comes the first leg of an epic journey through the early American frontier, introducing a pioneer family the likes of which you will never forget.

It is 1830, and the Berrybender family — rich, aristocratic, English, and hopelessly out of place — is on its way up the Missouri River to see the untamed West as it begins to open up. With irascible determination — and a great deal of outright chaos — the party experiences both the awesome majesty and brutal savagery of the unexplored land, from buffalo stampedes and natural disasters to Indian raids and encounters with frontiersmen and trappers, explorers, pioneers, and one part-time preacher known as “the Sin Killer.” Packed with breathtaking adventure, charming romance, and a sense of humor stretching clear over the horizon, Sin Killer is a truly unique view of the West that could only come from the boundless skill and imagination of Larry McMurtry.

Thoughts:

Don’t expect another Lonesome Dove with this one.  Sin Killer begins with a farcical English dignitary family headed north up the Missouri River on a barge.  It’s a large crew on the barge, including Lord Berrybender, 6 of his 14 ‘legitimate’ children, his mistress, hired guides as well as several Indian chiefs returning from Washington, as well as various servants who can in no way tend to all the Berrybenders’ needs.  One of the central characters is Lord Berrybender’s eldest and most eligible daughter, Tasmin, who quickly falls in love with a frontier man, Jim “Sin Killer” Snow.  He is very harsh with Tasmin’s sinful ways.  The Berrybenders often leave the barge to folly around on the American frontier and disaster usually follows.  There are many mishaps and kidnapping from the Indians and Lord Berrybender is truly a mess! He’s out for all the American exotic hides, but has no sense in his skull at all.  At the end of this book, the unsightly crew who is missing many of their original numbers, are headed to the Yellowstone Fort for the winter.

This is the first in a tetrology, however, I just cannot imagine following along with the crazy Berrybenders.  I really just cannot imagine that there will be any of them left by the end of the fourth book!  While I love the Lonesome Dove stories, I did not enjoy this folly of a book too much.  I think the only reason I finished this audio was that the narrator was truly great and I just had to find out how many of the characters would meet their untimely demise before the end.

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