Mailbox Monday

Hosted by Marcia at The Printed Page.

I'm always happy to have books arrive in the mail. I'm not accepting arcs and I rarely purchase books new so I usually can't participate in Mailbox Monday and it's one of my favourites.

In my mailbox this week:

Bookmooched:

The Wednesday Letters by Jason. F. Wright

"Jack and Laurel Cooper are two hardworking, loving Christian pillars of the community who die in each other's arms one night in the bed-and-breakfast that they own and operate. The event calls their three grown children home for the funeral, including their youngest son, a fugitive from the law who must face an outstanding warrant for his arrest and confront his one true love, now engaged to another man. As events unfold around the funeral, the three children discover a treasure trove of family history in the form of Wednesday letters-notes that Jack wrote to his wife every single week of their married lives. As they read, the children brush across the fabric of a devoted marriage that survived a devastating event kept secret all these years. It's a lovely story: heartening, wholesome, humorous, suspenseful and redemptive. It resonates with the true meaning of family and the life-healing power of forgiveness all wrapped up in a satisfying ending."

I'll let you know if it lives up to the product description.

The Attack****+ by Yasmina Khadra 

Already read but I wanted a copy to read again. A respected Muslim doctor at an Israeli hospital is told that the wounded patients pouring into emergency were the victim of a suicide bomb-set off by his wife. It's quite a story. I highly recommend it. I've also read The Swallows of Kabul and Dead Man's Share by this author and enjoyed them immensely.

The Blue Afternoon by William Boyd

Currently reading. I've always meant to read William Boyd and while this is one of his older ones (1994) I enjoy reading a writer's earlier works first. He also writes screenplays (A Good Man in Africa etc.) as well as novels. I'm 64 pages in, with a female architect as the main character, in Los Angeles in 1936. An old man shows up suddenly and claims to be her father. Boyd has captured the era just right and it's interesting so far.

Won:

Double Fault by Lionel Shriver

From Nicole at Linus's Blanket. I really liked We Need to Talk About Kevin so I'm looking forward to reading more of her work. Thank you Nicole.  

Drood by Dan Simmons

From Frances at Nonsuch Books. I really want to read this historical fiction about Dickens and his last writing. My son has started it so I'll have to wait. It's quite a tome. Thank you Frances.



Have you read any of these? Leave me your links if you've reviewed them. I'd love to read them.

Mailbox Monday

Hosted by Marcia at The Printed Page.

I broke down and ordered some new books for only the second time in two years. So you can tell that that I've lusted after them for some time.

In my mailbox this week:

Purchased:
Hiroshima, Mon Amour by Marguerite Duras France 1960 (112 pages)

A play in fact, that was produced as a film in 1959 and won acclaim around the world. I tried for two years to get it through Bookmooch and thought I'd succeeded but it went astray in the mail and never arrived. It's about a French woman who falls in love with a Japanese man-in 1957 after visiting Hiroshima. The book contains dozens of photographs from the film and it's hard not to look at them toward the end before I read it. I have never seen the movie, foreign films have never played where I live. At only 112 pages, including photos, I am saving it for a day when all the men are out of the house and I have some quiet.

Strange Comfort: Essays on the Work of Malcolm Lowry by Sherrill Grace Canada 2009 (223 pages)

Malcolm Lowry is the one writer that I wish everyone would read. I own and have read all of his books. Under the Volcano is the only one well know to many but his others are so beautifully written that I can't get enough of him. Hear Us O Lord from Heaven Thy Dwelling Place is as powerful a group of stories as you'll find. Dark as the Grave Wherein My Friend Is Laid, October Ferry to Gabriola, Lunar Caustic, and Ultramarine, are his other novels. If you've got something on your shelves by him that you haven't read, please do try him. He feeds something in me. I look forward to a long rainy day to enough these essays on his work.

American Jewish Fiction Guide by Josh Lambert US 2009 (200 pages)

An easy to read reference to hundreds of titles and authors, with several handy indices. Many of my favourites are discussed, though briefly. Cynthia Ozick, Chaim Potok, Tillie Olsen, Paul Auster, Leslie Fiedler; they're all there and many I have yet to read- Dara Horn, Francine Prose, et.al. I'm so excited about this one.



La Piece de Resistance:

On Sledge and Horseback to Outcast Siberian Lepers by Kate Marsden UK 1892 (243 pages)

I've had a personal interest in leprosy since I was a child and loved what few books (especially novels) that I could find on the subject. I found this on e-bay some years ago at an exorbitant price. One of the online book sellers had one left and while I dithered about the price someone else purchased it. There ensued a long period when none were available. I knew I was waiting for another press run as soon as it appeared on a university curriculum in women's studies. I mean what a virago. This is her personal account of a daunting voyage and her work with the suffering in Russia, only one of the places she served the sick and dying. A nice new copy is now in my hands and once I start it, nothing will distract me.

Arc:
The Apple by Penelope J. Holt US 2009 (180 pages)

The author asked me to review this one, probably because of my interest in Jewish Holocaust history and literature. I'm not accepting arcs but how could I resist hearing the facts after that shamozzle about Herman Rosenblat's memoir being canceled? And that is a cover that I would buy a book for, a rare thing for me.

"Based on real events, The Apple tells Herman Rosenblat's story of survival, his Holocaust tale of love, and also the story behind the story. What was the real love and which the dream of love that kept the boy, Herman, alive in the ghettoes and Nazi concentration and slave-labor camps of Poland and Germany? Why did Herman construct his singular account as he did? And is it ever permissible for a survivor to intersperse fact with fiction in order to tolerate personal history?"

Personally, I would have read Herman Rosenblat's memoir and not cared a fig to find out that parts of it were fiction. For one thing, a good story is a good story (assuming that it was). Secondly, I've read a ton of fiction by Holocaust survivors in which they used their personal experience as part of it. It's a privilege to hear what those who can bear to even write about it have to say-either way. I look forward to what The Apple has to tell us.

Won:
A Perfectly Good Family by Lionel Shriver US 1996 (293 pages)

From The Olive Reader, the Harper Perennial blog. I was very impressed with We Need to Talk About Kevin. I'm definitely going to read more of her books, including her new one, So Much for That (Hardcover), to be released by Harper on March 9, 2010. Thank you Harper Perenniel. A Perfectly Good Family will keep me busy until then- while I look for more ways of winning, swapping etc. for her other books. I'm so excited I don't where to start.

Do any of these interest you? Leave a link to any you've reviewed. I'd love to read them.

Mailbox Monday

Hosted by Marcia at The Printed Page.

I haven't done an MM post since July because I haven't been accepting arcs. This post is different. You read it here first. I purchased books, brand new books. My last book purchase was in June, 2008. When I go about two years without finding a book that I really want, through a library, book swap, beg, borrow, or...well not that far, I am forced to buy them. I spend just enough to get free delivery. So...

In my mailbox this week:

Purchased (and completed):

Ticknor*** by Sheila Heti 2005 Canada, 109 pages Hardcover, House of Anansi Press.Inc.

Recommended by Mark Sarvas at The Elegant Variation.

I think I needed to know more about these prominent, wealthy American historians and their writings to appreciate what Sarvas called "a mordantly funny anti-history", a novel "as dense and textured as a truffle". The story consists of an inner dialogue by George Ticknor, while walking to dinner (carrying a pie) to William Prescott's home on a rainy night in Boston in the mid nineteenth century. I think dense is on the part of this reader for biting off more than she could chew. Why Heti, according to the back cover, "has taken their story and twisted it into an original tale of jealousy and heartache in the lifelong friendship between two men" I couldn't say. She does tell us in an author's note that "Ticknor was inspired by the "Life of William Hickling Prescott" by George Ticknor (Philadelphia, PA: J. P. Lipincott Company 1863). Certain phrases have been borrowed from that book, and from the work of other writers, including Florence Nightingale, Marie Stopes, and Sofia Tolstoy." Well, that explains everything. A story, even about real people, needn't be true, but it needs to be interesting in some way- even to someone who doesn't already have the history, biography, and Cliff Notes under her belt. It was okay, but not the delightful read it was for Sarvas and company. With109 pages, and told in simple language, Ticknor was certainly no struggle to read, but it wasn't much fun either. Having just finished Mrs.Dalloway and reading 25 reviews and all the comments on said reviews, I now appreciate that literature needs more than one reading. Or a special interest. But I'm going to leave that to some else and pass thisbook on to any reader who thinks this might be up their alley. Claim it in the comments and it's yours.

The Luzhin Defense**** by Vladimir Nabokov 1964 US, 256 pages Paperback, Vintage International, first English edition. Originally published 1930 France, in Russian

I saw the filmed version once with John Tarturro in the lead and he was brilliant. I didn't know then that it was a Nabokov novel, which they now publish under the title "The Defense" but I had to read it.

Not in the library, not available in swaps, etc. Worse, I couldn't even find one to purchase with the original title. Harrumph, as they say in books. It's about a young chessmaster in whose "obsessive mind the game of chess gradually supplants the world of reality". I loved reading it, but now I have to take back my assertion that no film is ever equal to the book for me. Mind you, I never see a film before reading a book, unless I don't know it's already a book. I love stories about genius social misfits. This was Nabokov's third book, he published 25 that I know of. The title comes from a chess strategy that the main character, Luzhin (rhymes with illusion) creates in the story to beat his greatest rival. Reading about Russians and Russian emigres or the world of chess is already interesting for me, so I enjoyed the story very much.

Currently reading:

Moby Dick by Herman Melville 1851 US, 707 pages Paperback, Barnes & Nobles Classics

For Moby Dick Monday hosted by Ti at Book Chatter.

I read the first 150 pages in a library copy that had a terrific 50 page introduction and extras like maps, diagrams, explanatory notes, and a "Glossary of Nautical Terms", etc. It was a Penguin Classic. This one has a much shorter introduction by a different author, but that gives me something new to read and learn from anyway. There are no maps or diagrams in this edition but there is a "Dictionary of Sea Terms" (are we dumbing down the classics now?). I've had a ball reading this high seas adventure of whaling and terror. Here are my thoughts on Moby Dick from last Monday. Reading it with a group is the perfect way to experience what is for some a more difficult book. We are proceeding at four pages per day so there's still time to join us if you're thinking about it. I will be posting my thoughts again on the book next Monday.

To Be Read:

The Waves by Virginia Woolf 1925 UK, 241 pages Paperback, My Penguin

For the Woolf in Winter reading group. I found the other three novels for this challenge in my stacks but needed this one. I ordered a Penguin paperback and I was so looking forward to it. What I got was a UK Penguin- with a blank cover. I'm supposed to do my own cover art! I kid you not. I featured it in Wednesday's Cover Attraction. You have got to go take a look. I'm thinking of writing up a whole post about it since I've found out more about this goofy idea in recent days. If there's any interest in this topic let me know in the comments and I'll whip a post about it.

Rain and Other South Sea Stories by W. Somerset Maugham 1921 UK, 164 pages Paperback, Dover Thrift Edition

I read Maugham stories a lot when I was young. I've wanted to join some of the challenges like Short Story Monday at The Book Mine Set but I've never reviewed short stories and thought I probably wouldn't be very good at it. The truth is I had to make my book order total $39 by purchasing one more book.

I do like to read really good short stories so I naturally fell back on those I know but haven't read in 30 years. Rain came immediately to mind and I don't own any of Maugham's collections. You probably know the title story through one of the three American filmed versions, starring Gloria Swanson, Joan Crawford or Rita Hayworth. In those days it had what they call a surprise ending. I was shocked. I got this new edition for no more than The Waves cost me- and they even threw in a cover. When I'm done with Woolf and Melville I am going to savour this collection, pretending I'm hiding in the loft of the barn where my sisters can't find me, on a long lazy summer afternoon, reliving the memories.

Won, also for the first time in months:

The Museum of Innocence by Orhan Pamuk 2008 Turkey, 536 pages; first English translation 2009 UK Faber and Faber

From Kim at Reading Matters.

I am so thrilled to have such a beautiful tome to sit and relax with. That very book, an unread library copy due the next day and not renewable, was sitting on my desk when she emailed me that I'd won it. Serendipity do da. Pamuk is a Nobel author (2006). I have read his Snow and enjoyed it very much. Thank you Kim, I don't want to even think about what it cost you mail to book that heavy but I will cherish it.

What came in the mail that's got you excited about reading?

Mailbox Monday

Hosted by Marcia at The Printed Page

In the mail this week:

The Kabul Beauty School by Deborah Rodriguez

non fiction (2008), set in Afghanistan

via Bookmooch

The Mysteries of Glass by Sue Gee

also via bookmooch

The Book of Unholy Mischief by Ellen Newmark

a gift from Marcia at The Printed Page

Thank you Marcia

31 Hours by Masha Hamilton

Hardcover:240 pages

Unbridled Books (September 8, 2009)

ISBN-10: 1932961836

ISBN-13: 978-1932961836

Jonas is isolated in an apartment near the Brooklyn Bridge, and on a devastatingly confused path toward violence. His parents and his girlfriend have just 31 hours to reach him. A woman in New York awakens knowing, as deeply as a mother's blood can know, that her grown son is in danger. She has not heard from him in weeks. His name is Jonas. His girlfriend, Vic, doesn't know what she has done wrong, but Jonas won't answer his cell phone. We soon learn that Jonas is isolated in a safe-house apartment in New York City, pondering his conversion to Islam and his experiences training in Pakistan, preparing for the violent action he has been instructed to take in 31 hours. Jonas's absence from the lives of those who love him causes a cascade of events, and as the novel moves through the streets and subways of New York we come to know intimately the lives of its characters.

Doesn't this sound like an exciting story? I received 31 Hours from Caitlin at Unbridled Books. (She's a sweetheart as publicists go. You might get an arc if there are any left, by asking nicely.) Watch for my review in September.

About the Author: 31 Hours is Masha Hamilton's fourth novel, following the acclaimed The Camel Bookmobile. She is also a journalist who has reported most recently from Afghanistan, and from the Middle East, Russia and Africa. She lives in Brooklyn.

I read and reviewed The Camel Bookmobile, which I enjoyed immensely. I am also a reader for the Camel Book Drive in the The Year of Readers 2009 charity effort.

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What did you get in the mail that's interesting?

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Please leave comments or links if you've read or reviewed any of these books. I'd love to read them.

What are you reading on Mondays? July 27

Hosted by J. Kaye at J. Kaye's Book Blog.

Books completed last week:

75.Little Bee****+ by Chris Cleave (UK) (272 pages) Reviewed
76.The Weight of Heaven****+ by Thrity Umrigar (India)(367 pages)
77.Molly Fox's Birthday**** by Deirdre Madden (Ireland)(232 pages)
78.The Angel's Game****+ by Carlos Ruiz Zafon (Spain)(531pages)

Review of Molly Fox's Birthday to be posted on Thursday, July 30.

Forewords about The Angel's Game/Afterwords to follow soon.

Currently Reading:

Three Men in a Boat by Jerome K. Jerome
Maggie: A Girl of the Streets by Stephen Crane
Ulysses...the Irish one

Next up:

And Let the Earth Tremble at its Centers by Gonzalo Celorio (Mexico)
Nada by Carmen Laforet (Spain)
Into The Beautiful North by Luis Alberto Urrea (Mexico)
A Lucky Child by Thomas Buergenthal (US)
The Entropy of Aaron Rosclatt by James Sandham (Canada)

What are you reading this week? I welcome questions, comments, opinions, reading recommendations, links to books I've read, reviewed or mentioned. I'd love to read them.
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Mailbox Monday

Hosted by Marcia at The Printed Page.

Wins:

Janeology by Karen Harrington

I tried to win one of these in several giveaways over the past few months and never did. Then I looked around Ms. Harrington's site and found another chance to win one by answering a question or two. I was a little cheeky with my answer, but technically still correct and she gave me one! I know she might have given me an ARC if I'd asked nicely but then I'd feel pressured to get a review done and my health suffers even more when I'm under pressure. I'm really looking forward to this story. I can't imagine taking on this subject in fiction. But I see that it averages a little more than 4 stars out of five at LibraryThing. There are a lot of well known books of literature that don't score that rating on LT. So I have high hopes. It's about a mother who kills her children, that's all I know.

Thank you Ms. Harrington.

Pigs in Heaven by Barbara Kingsolver

I was supposed to get The Bean Trees but this arrived. No worries, I'll read it too. I do have a copy of The Poisonwood Bible, which I got in a lot of Oprah Club books I bid for at E-bay, $40 for 23 books (including shipping)! I have yet to read Kingsolver but everyone says she's good so I'll get to it one of these days.

From Color Online. Thank you L.


Flight From the Enchanter by Iris Murdoch

Bookmooched: all the way from Texas, thank you Donna.

I now own 17 of Murdoch's novels and have read 4. I've been slowly collecting them through swapping, many are quite old but I don't mind a bit. I began reading her and liked each one. Then I discovered that Nancy Pearl of Book Lust lists all (or close to all) of Murdoch's novels as must reads. Anyone else enjoy her books? Would a post about those I've read interest anyone?

If you've reviewed any, please leave me a link. Feel free to leave links to reviews of any book I've read, reviewed or mentioned. I'd love to read them. Questions, comments, opinions, including dissenting ones, and good reading recommendations are always welcomed.

Mailbox Monday

Hosted by Marcia at The Printed Page.

In the mailbox this week:



Mooched:

20 Fragments of a Ravenous Youth by Xiaolu Guo (2008)

Fiction, 204 pages; translated from the Chinese.

Village of Stone (2004) by the same author is one of my favourite novels. I can't recommend it enough. I wanted to read this and her first novel written in English, A Concise Chinese-English dictionary for Lovers (2007). 20 Fragments arrived this week all the way from Australia. Thank you Pam.




The Gift Nobody Wants by Dr. Paul Brand with Philip Yancey (1993)

Non fiction, 340 pages; subtitled Why We Hurt and What We Can Do About It.

It's a surgeon's experience of a lifetime of working with people with leprosy around the world and what he learned about pain. Leprosy has been an interest of mine since childhood and I live with chronic pain. Mine is an old copy, it has been reprinted recently as The Gift of Pain and said to have helped people who read it. Also acquired via Bookmooch.

What reading goodies arrived in your mailbox this week?

Todays other posts: What Are You Reading on Mondays?
Musing Mondays:Outstanding favorites read this year.

Mailbox Monday

Hosted by Marcia at The Printed Page.

In the mail (or on the porch) this week...

Mooched:

The Stillborn by Zaynab Alkali (1984) from UK via Bookmooch, thank you Graham. Fiction from Nigeria that centers around young Li, "as she struggles for independence against the traditional values of the family, home, marriage and the lure of the city and all it can offer."

Arc:

How Shall I Tell the Dog by Miles Kington (2009) UK nonfiction memoir from Newmarket Press, through LibraryThing. ARCs available to Canada have been virtually devoid of good fiction lately so I must have put down for this.

Won!

Breath, Eyes, Memory by Edwidge Danticat (1994)

The first novel by this Haitian America author. And an Oprah Club Pick. She's written several books since but I'm going to start with this one. I won this book at Color Online, thank you L.

The Asian Five at All About n:

Free Food for Millionaires by Min Jin Lee

Trail of Crumbs by Kim Sunee

The Fortune Cookie Chronicles by Jennifer Lee

Transparency by Frances Hwang

Strangers from a Different Shore by Ronald Takaki

Thank you Nely and Hachette Books!

These have just arrived and I haven't had time to look at them in detail. I will be featuring these 5 Asian authors' books in next Sunday's (June 21) New Crayons' post.

What came in your mailbox this week?

Opinions, questions, links to reviews, recommendations of good literary fiction, books news, etc. are encouraged.

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Today's other posts:What are You reading on Monday? and Musing Mondays

Mailbox Monday

Monday Mailbox is hosted by Marcia at The Printed Page.

In the mail this week:

Testimony by Anita Shreve (2008) A lovely paperback copy from Valerie at Hachette Books. I will be posting a giveaway of five copies for my readers very soon.

I've read five previous novels by Shreve and was never disappointed so I look forward to this one too.

The Girl Who Stopped Swimming (2009) by Joshilyn Jackson. Also from Valerie after my recent giveaway. Thanks again Valerie.

The 25th Hour by David Benioff (2000) from Tanabata at In Spring it is the Dawn who held a Spring Cleaning Giveaway. Thank you Nat.

Summer World: a season of bounty by Bernd Heinrich (2009) from Kristi at Passion For the Page who was kind enough to pass it on to me after she read and reviewed it here. It will be one of my four choices for the Reading Through the Seasons Challenge. I read Ravens in Winter by the same author and thought it was a riveting read. I highly recommend it. I hope this one is good too.

*I have a nice new paperback copy (not an ARC) of The Girl Who Stopped Swimming by Joshilyn jackson that I am willing to send to anyone who'll do a guest review for me on my blog. Just say you want it and email your mailing address.

What did you get in the mail this week that's got you excited about reading?

Mailbox Monday

Hosted by Marcia at The Printed Page.

In the mailbox this week:

Stone's Fall by Iain Pears (2009) 800pgs. Pb ARC from Spiegel & Grau.

I read Pear's An Instance of the Fingerpost, an historical mystery set in 1663 at Oxford University, England and absolutely loved it. His next three books were art mysteries. Stone's Fall is a return to his historical mysteries and takes us from London to Paris to Venice in the late 19th and early twentieth century. I can't wait to read it.

Acquired through Bookmooch:

The Waiting Time by Sara Banerji

Winter Birds by Jamie Langston Turner (for the Reading Through the Seasons challenge)

A Spanish Lover by Joanna Trollope

An Audience of Chairs****+ by Joan Clark (completed)

I loved it. Highly recommended.

What did you get in the mail this week?

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Recent Posts:

"25 Books That Caused a Commotion"

March in Review

Weekly Geeks 13 Poetry

Book Meme
Giveaway: The Girl Who Stopped Swimming until April 19
Thursday Tea (new meme) Review of Jacob's Room by Virginia Woolf
Library Loot
Weekly Geeks 12 Leave review links

Mailbox Monday

Hosted by Marcia at The Printed Page.

In the mailbox this week:

Lost and Found by Carolyn Parkhurst 372 pgs. Pb - won from Sally at Book Critiques. Thank you Sally.

The Inhabited World by David 277 pgs. Pb - via Bookmooch.

Faces in the Water by Janet Frame (New Zealand) 254 pgs. Pb - via Bookmooch from a fellow Canuck, thank you Kitty.

Little Bee****+ by Chris Cleave (UK) HC ARC 271 pgs.

- LT Early Reviewers book, set in Nigeria, already completed and Highly Recommended.

Also in the mail this week: This beautiful Book Buddy, which I won from Kathrin at Book Club Classics. Thank you Kathrin.

What did the man with the dog biscuits in his pocket bring you?

Mailbox Monday

Hosted by Marcia at The Printed Page.

Only two this week. I'm not requesting any ARCs but they are still requesting me, so to speak. I find it difficult to say no to books of literary fiction when asked nicely.

The Household Guide to Dying by Debra Adelaide ARC

I was going to turn down the request to review it thinking it was non fiction. Despite the unlikely title it is a novel. Terminal illness and family are the sum of what I know about it. I prefer not to know any details of a story before I read it. I want everything to surprise me. The author is from Australia and I've never had a bad experience with an Aussie novel yet so I'll give it a go and let you know what I think.

A Thousand Rooms of Dream and Fear by Atiq Rahimi

Via Bookmooch from my friend in Dubai. Set in Afghanistan, translated from the Dari language. I look forward to this one for any of the Lost in Translation, Diversity, London 2012, Cultures, Numbers, or New Authors reading challenges.

What did you get in the mail this week?

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My daily quotes for Weekly Geeks. Try them, you'll like them:

Author's quote #3 Monday

Author's quote #2 Sunday

Author's quote #1 Saturday