Tinkers - Wendy's Review

He tinkered. Tin pots, wrought iron. Solder melted and cupped in a clay dam. Quicksilver patchwork. Occasionally, a pot hammered back flat, the tinkle of tin sibilant, tiny beneath the lid of the boreal forest. Tinkerbird, coppersmith, but mostly a brush and mop drummer. – from Tinkers, page 12 -

George Washington Crosby is eight days from death on the opening page of Tinkers - he is hallucinating and remembering, he is pondering his life and the life of his father. George has spent his life fixing clocks – and time plays a crucial role in this novel about fathers and sons, and connections with others. While George lays dying from cancer, he reflects on the small things which have made up his life, including the house he has lovingly built and the intricate details of clock repair.

Read the names etched onto the works: Ezra Bloxham – 1794; Geo. E. Tiggs – 1832; Thos. Flatchbart – 1912. Lift the darkened works from the case. Lower them into ammonia. Lift them out, nose burning, eyes watering, and see them shine and star through your tears. File the teeth. Punch the bushings. Load the spring. Fix the clock. Add your name. – from Tinkers, page 15 -

But Tinkers is not just George’s story…it is the story of three interconnected generations of men: George’s father Howard (an epileptic), and Howard’s father who suffered from dementia. Narrated alternatively between these three points of view, the story is nonlinear.

Howard is a dreamer and a tinker, a man who relishes the beauty of nature and spends whole days picking wildflowers and constructing art from twigs and grass. His seizures come when he least expects them, and eventually tear apart his fragile marriage. George’s memories of Howard are of a father often mysteriously late coming home, and one frightening episode of Howard seizing at Christmas dinner.

Howard’s father is a minister whose slow descent into dementia confuses his son who describes his father as ‘a strange, gentle man.‘ Howard’s loss of his father mirrors George’s loss of Howard.

Harding’s prose is like reading a long, narrative poem. Beautifully constructed sentences and stories within stories characterize Tinkers. Often the story feels like water in a river – rippled, unpredictable, dipping around corners and eddying around obstructions…and so, Harding’s use of water as a symbol in the novella seems appropriate.

The overriding themes of Harding’s Pulitzer Prize winning effort are that of time passing, the dreams of men, and the passage from life to death.

What of miniature boats constructed of birch bark and fallen leaves, launched onto cold water clear as air? How many fleets were pushed out toward the middles of ponds or sent down autumn brooks, holding treasures of acorns, or black feathers, or a puzzled mantis? Let those grassy crafts be listed alongside the iron hulls that cleave the sea, for they are all improvisations built from the daydreams of men, and all will perish, whether from ocean siege or October breeze. - from Tinkers, page 78 -

I enjoyed this slim book whose size belies the depth of the prose. This is a beautiful story which reads more like a meditation than a novel. Full of lyrical phrases, it is not always an easy book to understand, and yet it is a deeply satisfying read.

Readers who are not intimidated by literary novels which use symbolism and metaphor liberally to explore deeper issues, will want to read Tinkers. This is a novel which left me thinking about the characters long after I turned the final page.

Highly recommended.

Wendy's Books Read

UPDATE: January 3, 2009 - MY GOALS for 2009

My goal for 2009: 5 books from this list

• The Brief Wondrous Life of Oscar Wao, by Junot Diaz (winner 2008)
• The Known World, by Edward P. Jones (winner 2004)
• Empire Falls, by Richard Russo (winner 2002)
• Interpreter of Maladies, by Jhumpa Lahiri (winner 2000)
• American Pastoral, by Philip Roth (winner 1998)
• The Stone Diaries, by Carol Shield (winner 1995)
• A Thousand Acres, by Jane Smiley (winner 1992)
• Breathing Lessons, by Anned Tyler (winner 1989)
• Beloved, by Toni Morrison (winner 1988)
• The Optimist’s Daughter, by Eudora Welty (winner 1973)
• All The King’s Men, by Robert Penn Warren (winner 1947)
• The Magnificent Ambersons, by Booth Tarkington (winner 1919)

**********************

Read in 2005:

1999-The Hours, by Michael Cunningham (unrated; not reviewed)
1994-The Shipping News, by Annie Proulx (rated 4/5; not reviewed)
1986-Lonesome Dove, by Larry McMurtry (rated 5/5; not reviewed)

Read in 2006:

2005-Gilead, by Marilyn Robinson (rated 2.5/5; not reviewed)
1921-The Age of Innocence, by Edith Wharton (rated 4.75/5; not reviewed)

Read in 2007:

2007-The Road, by Cormac McCarthy (completed May 17, 2007; rated 5/5; reviewed here)
2006-March, by Geraldine Brooks (completed April 3, 2007; rated 4/5; reviewed here)
2003-Middlesex, by Jeffrey Eugenides (completed November 1, 2007; rated 4.5/5; reviewed here)
1983-The Color Purple, by Alice Walker (completed January 12, 2007; rated 4.75/5; reviewed here)
1961-To Kill a Mockingbird, by Harper Lee (completed March 21, 2007; rated 5/5; reviewed here)
1940-The Grapes of Wrath, by John Steinbeck (completed January 18, 2007; rated 5/5; reviewed here)
1932-The Good Earth, by Pearl Buck (completed November 28, 2007; rated 4.5/5; reviewed here)
1928-The Bridge of San Luis Rey, by Thornton Wilder (completed December 23, 2007); rated 3/5; reviewed here)

Read in 2008:

1925-So Big, by Edna Ferber (completed January 17, 2008; rated 5/5; reviewed here)
1972-Angle of Repose, by Wallace Stegner (completed April 17, 2008; rated 5/5; reviewed here)

Angle of Repose - Wendy's Book Review

What interests me in all these papers is not Susan Burling Ward the novelist and illustrator, and not Oliver Ward the engineer, and not the West they spend their lives in. What really interests me is how two such unlike particles clung together, and under what strains, rolling downhill into their future until they reached the angle of repose where I knew them. That’s where the interest is. That’s where the meaning will be if I find any. -From Angle of Repose, page 199-

Lyman Ward, a retired history professor and writer, returns to his grandparent’s home in Grass Valley, California - wheelchair bound and facing a progressive, crippling bone disease. His intent is to research his grandmother’s life through the news clippings and letters of her past. To write her story, Ward must fill in gaps, imagine conversations, and uncover the truths which lie hidden in Susan Burling Ward’s history. During this one hot, dry summer in a quest to know his grandmother, he will discover the meaning beneath the shadows of his own life.

Wallace Stegner penned Angle of Repose in 1971 for which he won the prestigious Pulitzer Prize. The novel - said to be his masterpiece - connects two points in American history…that of the late nineteenth century West with that of the turbulent, sometimes self-indulgent Vietnam era. Stegner creates complex and intriguing characters. Susan Burling (based on the historical figure of Mary Hallock Foote - a nineteenth century writer and illustrator) becomes an unlikely pioneer when she marries the quiet and ambitious dreamer Oliver Ward. Their adventures in mining camps and the vast wilderness of Mexico, Colorado, Idaho, and California create a backdrop of unbelievable beauty and isolation from which their lives unfold.

She guided her horse through willows and alders and runted birches, leaned and weaved until the brush ended and she broke into the open. She was at the edge of a meadow miles long, not a tree in it except for the wriggling line that marked the course of the Lake Fork. Stirrup-high grass flowed and flawed in the wind, and its motion revealed and hid and revealed again streaks and splashes of flowers-rust of paintbrush, blue of pentstemon, yellow of buttercups, scarlet of gilia, blue-tinged white of columbines. All around, rimming the valley, bare peaks patched with snow looked down from above the scalloped curve of timberline. -From Angle of Repose, page 237-

Angle of Repose is not simply an historical novel. It explores the idea of identity and how the past often intersects the present. When Lyman Ward explores his grandmother’s story, he is really seeking to find understanding in his own life.

Fooling around in the papers my grandparents, especially my grandmother, left behind, I get glimpses of lives close to mine, related to mine in ways I recognize but don’t completely comprehend. - From Angle of Repose, page 5-

Stegner’s prose is alluring, filled with gorgeous descriptions which engage the reader’s senses. His characters are bigger than life, but carry real flaws which allow the reader to identify with them; to nod in understanding; to empathize with their torments and cheer for their successes. I can understand why Angle of Repose is lauded, why it captured the Pulitzer and why readers are quick to recommend it. I found myself completely immersed in the lives of Susan, Oliver and Lyman Ward and I was sad to turn the last page of this sprawling and satisfying novel.

Highly recommended; a must read; rated 5/5.

So Big - Wendy's Review

"How big is my baby?" Selina would demand, senselessly. "How big is my man?" The child would momentarily cease to poke plump fingers into the rich black loam. He would smile a gummy though slightly weary smile and stretch wide his arms. She, too, would open her tired arms wide, wide. Then they would say in a duet, his mouth a puckered pink petal, hers quivering with tenderness and a certain amusement, "So-o-o-o big!" with the voice soaring on the prolonged vowel and dropping suddenly with the second word. - From So Big, page 2 -

Edna Ferber's Pulitzer Prize winning novel - So Big - is a superbly crafted novel and one I could not put down for long.

When Selina Peake's father is murdered, the teenager is faced with fleeing from the bustling streets of Chicago to Vermont to live with her stuffy aunts; or to strike out on her own to seek a life of adventure. She chooses a life of her own which takes her into the insulated farm country south of Chicago to live with Dutch farmer, his wife and three children. There she discovers the simplicity of farm life while teaching the young children of the community. Selina is brilliantly portrayed - a delicately boned, strong willed woman with sparkling eyes who sees beauty in everything - including the purple and green cabbages which provide sustenance for the hard-working farmers and their families. Even after marrying the solid and reliable Pervus DeLong and finding herself working long and difficult days as a farmer's wife, Selina never loses her vision of beauty.

There was born in Selina at this time a feeling for the land that she was never to lose. Perhaps the child within her had something to do with this. She was aware of a feeling of kinship with the earth; an illusion of splendour, or fulfillment. Sometimes, in a moment's respite from her work about the house, she would stand in the kitchen doorway, her flushed face turned toward the fields. Wave on wave of green, wave on wave, until the waves melted into each other and became a verdant sea. - From So Big, page 84 -

Ferber's novel is not just about Selina's voyage through life - her struggles and dreams, challenges and triumphs - but it encompasses a larger theme...namely that of living a life of beauty and joy vs. a life of material success. Selina's enduring spirit and vision of life never fails her throughout the story. One of the most memorable scenes for me was when Selina is widowed and facing the failure of her farm. She does what a woman of her community had never done - she drives a team of horses to market on the streets of Chicago.

"Never in my life did I hear of such a thing!" Selina turned the horses' heads toward the city. "You'd be surprised, Jan, to know of all the things you're going to hear of some day that you've never heard of before." - From So Big, page 115 -

Selina's son, Dirk (aka: Sobig) represents the flip side to the life she has chosen. By all definitions, he becomes successful - holding down a high paying job and living among the wealthy. But, Ferber carefully and succinctly shows the reader why this kind of success does not necessarily lead to happiness.

Ferber's novel has rich characterizations and a strong sense of place. Exquisitely crafted and lovingly plotted, it is story that is worthy of the Pulitzer. I will be reading more of this amazing author's work in the future.

Highly recommended; rated 5/5.

The Bridge of San Luis Rey - Wendy's Review

Some say that we shall never know and that to the gods we are like the flies that the boys kill on a summer day, and some say, on the contrary, that the very sparrows do not lose a feather that has not been brushed away by the finger of God. - From The Bridge of San Luis Rey, page 9 -

Thornton Wilder earned the Pulitzer Prize in 1928 for The Bridge of San Luis Rey, which has been called his masterpiece. The novella (only 107 pages) begins in the summer of 1714 when a bridge of great construction fails and plunges five people to their deaths in the gorge below. A witness to the tragedy, Brother Juniper, embarks on a quest to prove divine intervention by exploring (in great depth) the lives of the people killed.

The book is essentially a lesson in philosophy - exploring the meaning of love, the twists and turns of one's life amid the greater scheme of things, and whether death is fate or God's plan. There are not any real answers to any of the questions - just the questions.

Wilder writes in old fashioned language and the novella is set in a foreign country with all the subtle references to politics and religion of the time. I admit to getting dragged down in it all and struggled to slog through and finish the book.

Wilder's character development is one of the strengths of the book; and Wilder does this within a very few pages which speaks to his gift as a writer. My favorite characters were the twins Esteban and Manual and I think Wilder does an apt job of presenting their relationship to each other and the devastation of loss that occurs between them. Wilder connects all the central characters to each other...something that took me by surprise...sort of like the six degrees of separation theory. Because of this I expected a resolution to the ultimate question: Could it have been fate that plunged these people to their deaths? Or something larger? But, Wilder apparently never intended to provide an answer. In the afterword of the book I read, the publisher shares a letter from Wilder to one of his readers:

'The book is not supposed to solve. A vague comfort is supposed to hover above the unanswered questions, but it is not a theorem with its Q.E.D. The book is supposed to be as puzzling and distressing as the news that five of your friends died in an automobile accident.'

Perhaps had this been a non fiction philosophy text, I could accept Wilder's cop out on this issue. But, this is a work of fiction and I wanted the character of Brother Juniper to at least come to his own conclusion. Instead, the reader is left with an odd feeling of detachment.

Because this has been touted as a great work of literature, I wanted not only to like it, but to "get it." I'm sorry to say, neither of those things happened.

Not recommended; rated a generous 3/5.

The Good Earth - Wendy's Review

Moving together in perfect rhythm, without a word, hour after hour, he fell into a union with her which took the pain from his labor. He had no articulate thought of anything; there was only this perfect sympathy of movement, of turning this earth of theirs over and over to the sun, this earth which formed their home and fed their bodies and made their gods. The earth lay rich and dark, and fell apart lightly under the points of their hoes. Sometimes they turned up a bit of brick, a splinter of wood. It was nothing. Some time, in some age, bodies of men and women had been buried there, houses had stood there, had fallen, and gone back into the earth. So would also their house, some time, return to earth, their bodies also. Each had his turn at this earth. They worked on, moving together - together - producing the fruit of this earth - speechless in their movement together. -From The Good Earth, page 31-

Pearl Buck's novel The Good Earth was published in 1931 and won a Pulitzer Prize in 1932. It has been surrounded by controversy (mostly in China where Buck's work was banned for many years because of the perceived vilification of the Chinese people and their leaders). Having arrived in China as the child of missionaries, Buck grew to love the country. In 1935 she returned to the United States with hope of one day returning to the Orient...but this was never to be. She was denounced by the Chinese government in 1960 as "a proponent of American cultural imperialism." Later, just nine months before her death, her visa to return to the country of her childhood was denied. In 1938 she became the first American woman to win the Nobel Prize for literature. More about Buck's life and work can be found in this excellent article published by Mike Meyer of the New York Times.

The Good Earth is the saga of Wang Lung, who is a poor farmer dependent on the land for his survival, and his extended family. The novel begins with this complex character as a young man when he marries a slave girl, and then follows him as he grows into a man with a family and wealth beyond his imaginings. Wang Lung is a man with a compassionate heart. I was touched by the love of his children, especially that of his developmentally delayed oldest daughter who he calls "the poor fool." In one scene, the family is faced with starvation and Wang Lung gives up his own food for his daughter...something that would have been highly unusual at that time in China.

Only a few of the beans did Wang Lung hide in his own hand and these he put into his own mouth and he chewed them into a soft pulp and then putting his lips to the lips of his daughter he pushed into her mouth the food, and watching her small lips move, he felt himself fed. -From The Good Earth, page 85-

Later, as he gains wealth, Wang Lung loses his path - and his inner goodness is challenged.

Wang Lung's pragmatic wife O-Lan represents the strength of the Chinese women during a time when women were considered to be a man's possession and slave. Throughout the novel, the idea of the cyclical nature of life is repeated, establishing a natural rhythm for the story.

Buck writes in simple prose which reads more like the oral tradition of story telling than a novel. Her understanding of character is evident throughout - and no character is all good or all evil.

I immediately was captivated by Buck's story; and even though at times the abuse and mistreatment of women was hard to read, I found I could not put the book down for long.

Buck wrote two sequels to The Good Earth: Sons (1931) and A House Divided (1935). I have put both on my wish list for future reading.

The Good Earth is a book I can highly recommend for its insight into Chinese culture during the early part of the 20th century, and for its high readability. Rated 4.5/5; my original review here.

Middlesex - Wendy's Book Review

I feel a direct line extending from that girl with her knees steepled beneath the hotel blankets to this person writing now in an Aeron chair. Hers was the duty to live out a mythical life in the actual world, mine to tell about it now. -From Middlesex, page 424-

Jeffrey Eugenides Pulitzer Prize winning masterpiece, Middlesex, is a rich family saga spanning three generations and takes the reader from Greece to Detroit on a whirlwind ride of rich, original language and spot on characterization. The story of Calliope Stephanides - an American born intersex individual with strong Greek heritage - is narrated by Cal...Calliope's adult male counterpart.

Middlesex is a tragic story which is comically portrayed using Greek mythology. Eugenides is a talented writer - his vivid descriptions are filled with the lush sensations of life. The characters who people this wonderful novel are fully developed; their flaws and imperfections revealed even through the names they are given: The Object (Calliope's teenage love interest), Chapter Eleven (Cal's brother), and a vast array of other characters based on mythical stories. Even the title of the book is steeped in symbolism.

Middlesex! Did anybody ever live in a house as strange? As sci-fi? As futuristic and outdated at the same time? A house that was more like communism, better in theory than reality? -From Middlesex, page 258-

The novel is essentially two stories: the history of a Greek family who carries a recessive gene; and the coming of age story of the main character - Calliope. At times it was easy to forget that this huge novel was written by a man. Eugenides wonderful insight into the thoughts of an awkward, self-conscious teenage girl is finely illustrated in this scene in the locker room after a field hockey game:

In front of me girls were entering and exiting the showers. The flashes of nakedness were like shouts going off. A year or so earlier these same girls had been porcelain figurines, gingerly dipping their toes into the disinfectant basin at the public pool. Now they were magnificent creatures. Moving through the humid air, I felt like a snorkeler. On I came, kicking my heavy, padded legs and gaping through the goalie mask at the fantastic underwater life all around me. Sea anemones sprouted from between my classmates' legs. They came in all colors, black, brown, electric yellow, vivid red. higher up, their breasts bobbed like jellyfish, softly pulsing, tipped with stinging pink. Everything was waving int he current, feeding on microscopic plankton, growing bigger by the minute. The shy, plump girls were like sea lions, lurking in the depths. -From Middlesex, page 297-

The novel is an exploration of immigration and the split loyalties that immigrants face. Eugenides parallels this theme with that of identity in general using the pain of adolescence and the confusion of sexual identity as spring boards to delve into the human psyche.

Middlesex is a vividly imaginative novel - epic in its scope and sensitively wrought. It is well deserving of the Pulitzer Prize.

Highly recommended; rated 4.5/5; read my original review here.

The Grapes of Wrath - Wendy's Review

In the souls of the people the grapes of wrath are filling and growing heavy, growing heavy for the vintage. -From the Grapes of Wrath, page 349-

In John Steinbeck's most renown novel, The Grapes of Wrath, Tom Joad gets released from prison and returns to a home decimated by technology:

"Le's look in the house. She's all pushed out a shape. Something knocked the hell out of her." They walked slowly toward the sagging house. Two of the supports of the porch roof were pushed out so that the roof flopped down on one end. And the house-corner was crushed in. Through a maze of splintered wood the room at the corner was visible. The front door hung open inward, and a low strong gate across the front door hung outward on leather hinges. -From The Grapes of Wrath, page 41-

Thus, this sweeping novel takes us on a journey with the Joad family as they join thousands of migrant workers seeking a better life in the West. Steinbeck fills his novel with homespun characters and the bitter reality of life in the 1930s during the Great Dust Bowl migration.

This novel has been banned, burned and challenged since its publication in 1939 for reasons such as "vulgar language" and "sexual references." In addition, Steinbeck angered many for his honest depiction of the political and economic landscape in the 1930s, where large landowners artificially inflated the cost of goods by destroying surpluses and drove down wages by luring thousands of workers to a California that could not support their numbers.

Steinbeck is a genius at characterization and using symbolism to draw images for the reader. Tom Joad represents all the survivors who joined together and found strength in numbers; who fought back when the future looked the bleakest; who rose up to fight for their families; and who refused to lose dignity even while camping in Hoovervilles.

The women who people this novel are wonderful - strong, authentic, the glue that holds the family together. Ma Joad's tough, realistic character drives the novel and tugs at the reader's heartstrings:

She seemed to know, to accept, to welcome her position, the citadel of the family, the strong place that could not be taken. And since old Tom and the children could not know hurt or fear unless she acknowledged hurt and fear, she had practiced denying them in herself. And since, when a joyful thing happened, they looked to see whether joy was on her, it was her habit to build up laughter out of inadequate materials. But better than joy was calm. Imperturbability could be depended upon. And from her great and humble position in the family she had taken dignity and a clean calm beauty. From her position as healer, her hands had grown sure and cool and quiet; from her position as arbiter she had become as remote and faultless in judgment as a goddess. She seemed to know that if she swayed the family shook, and if she ever really deeply wavered or despaired the family would fall, the family will to function would be gone. - From The Grapes of Wrath, page 74-

Beautiful descriptions of a desolate country; use of symbolism; amazing characterization; compelling dialogue; a vivid and honest portrayal of the family; and an ending which will shock…are all reasons why Steinbeck's The Grapes of Wrath is one of the few great American novels. A must read. The Joad family will stick with the reader long after the final page has been turned.

Highly recommended. Rated 5/5. To read my original review, go here.

Following are some of my favorite passages from the novel.

About the countryside:

66 is the path of a people in flight, refugees from dust and shrinking land, from the thunder of tractors and shrinking ownership, from the desert's slow northward invasion, from the twisting winds that howl up out of Texas, from the floods that bring no richness to the land and steal what little richness is there. From all of these the people are in flight, and they come into 66 from the tributary side roads, from the wagon tracks and the rutted country roads. 66 is the mother road, the road of flight. -page 118-

About Granma:

Behind him hobbled Granma, who had survived only because she was as mean as her husband. She had held her own with a shrill ferocious religiosity that was a lecherous and as savage as anything Grampa could offer. Once, after a meeting, while she was still speaking in tongue, she fired both barrels of a shotgun at her husband, ripping one of his buttocks nearly off, and after that he admired her and did not try to torture her as children torture bugs. As she walked she hiked her Mother Hubbard up to her knees, and she bleated her shrill terrible war cry: "Pu-raise Gawd fur victory." -page 78-

About symbolism (the turtle):

He came over the grass leaving a beaten trail behind him, and the hill, which was the highway embankment, reared up ahead of him. For a moment he stopped, his head held high. He blinked and looked up and down. At last he started to climb the embankment. -page 14-15-

About community:

In the evening a strange thing happened: the twenty families became one family, the children were the children of all. The loss of home became one loss, and the golden time in the West was a dream. And it might be that a sick child threw despair into the hearts of twenty families, of a hundred people; that a birth there in a tent kept a hundred people quiet and awestruck through the night and filled a hundred people with the birth-joy in the morning. A family which the night before had been lost and fearful might search its goods to find a present for a new baby. -page 193-

To Kill A Mockingbird - Wendy's Review

"Mockingbirds don't do one thing but make music for us to enjoy. They don't eat up people's gardens, don't nest in corncribs, they don't do one thing but sing their hearts out for us. That's why it's a sin to kill a mockingbird." - From To Kill A Mockingbird, page 103 -

What can I say about To Kill A Mockingbird that hasn't already been said a million times? Harper Lee's beautiful novel set in the sleepy county of Macomb, Alabama in the 1930s defines the adage 'still waters run deep.' Scout Finch, a vibrant, curious tomboy narrates the story which spans a period of nearly three years beginning when she is six years old. The cast of characters is vast and enjoyable. From Atticus Finch (Scout's father who is a man of decency and honesty), to Jem Fitch (Scout's brother, striving to follow his father's example), to Dill (Jem and Scout's summertime companion who embodies a sense of adventure and mischief), to Tom Robinson (the black man falsely accused of rape), to Miss Maudie (Scout's next door neighbor with a heart of gold and the best cake in the country), and finally to Boo Radley (the mysterious next door neighbor who hasn't been seen in twenty-five years), Lee weaves a tale that latches onto the reader and never lets go.

Lee doesn't restrict herself to merely telling a story. She includes astounding insight into the roots of racism and the idea that one man's courage to stand up against inequality may be all that's needed to begin to shatter the beliefs that sustain hatred.

Perhaps what is so inviting about this novel is that its narrator is only a child. Scout Finch brings to the book an innocence and perception which only children share. Her reflections, void of the internal restraints that inhibit adults, bring a truthfulness to the novel that resonates with the reader.

This is a book I will read again…and again. It is a timeless classic, beautifully written and one I highly recommend. Rated 5/5. To read my original review, go here.

Favorite Passages

About Courage: I wanted you to see what real courage is, instead of getting the idea that courage is a man with a gun in his hand. It's when you know you're licked before you begin but you begin anyway and you see it through no matter what. You rarely win, but sometimes you do. - From To Kill A Mockingbird, page 128 -

About The Love of Reading: Until I feared I would lose it, I never loved to read. One does not love breathing. -From To Kill A Mockingbird, page 20-

About Racism: If there's just one kind of folks, why can't they get along with each other? If they're all alike, why do they go out of their way to despise each other? -From To Kill A Mockingbird, page 259-

The Color Purple - Wendy's Review

You better not never tell nobody but God. It'd kill your mammy.

So begins The Color Purple, a novel set in the deep south and told in the voice of a young black girl named Celie. Alice Walker brings Celie to life through her letters to God. Celie's words tell of unspeakable horrors - her rape at the hands of her stepfather, her marriage to an older man who beats her, the loss of almost everyone dear to her. But, then her husband's lover arrives and teaches Celie what it means to be courageous in the face of pain, and most importantly what it means to love and be loved.

The Color Purple is a splendid novel full of pain and joy, tears and laughter, love and hate. It is an American Classic that should be mandatory reading for all of us.

Highly recommended; rated 4.75/5

To read my original review, go here.

March - Wendy's Review

I simply ask you to see that there is only one thing to do when we fall, and that is to get up, and go on with the life that is set in front of us, and try to do the good of which our hands are capable for the people who come in our way. -From March, page 268-

In Louisa May Alcott's novel Little Women, one character - Mr. March - is absent and only exists in the reader's imagination. Geraldine Brooks re-imagines this character within the pages of March. Part history and part love story, this novel is a carefully wrought tale of one man's journey through America's most devastating war.

The novel is told primarily through the voice of Mr. March, sometimes through his letters home to his wife and daughters, sometimes through flashbacks. But the most powerful sections of the story are the portrayals of violence and loss.

The current bore him away from me feet first. He was prone on the surface for a moment, his arms stretched out to me. I swam hard, but just as I came within reach a wave, turning back upon a sunken rock, caught his legs and pushed the lower half of his body under, so that it seemed he stood upright in the river for a moment. The current spun him round, a full turn, his arms thrown upward with the abandon of a Gypsy dancer. The firing, high on the bluff, had loosed showers of foliage, so that he swirled in concert with the sunshine-colored leaves. He was face to face with me again when the water sucked him under. -From March, page 7-

The echoes of Mr. March's experiences continue to resonate beyond the battlefield, infiltrating his marriage and idealistic view of the world. With gripping descriptions, Brooks creates a compelling story which is hard to put down. This Pulitzer prize winning novel leaves the reader with questions such as: How do the realities of war and loss unhinge a man's ideals? And can we ever be the same after such a life changing experience?

The narrative tension and fine story development of March sticks with the reader long after the final page has been turned.

Recommended; rated 4/5

To read my original review, go here.

The Road - Wendy's Review

He woke before dawn and watched the gray day break. Slow and half opaque. He rose while the boy slept and pulled on his shoes and wrapped in his blanket he walked out through the trees. He descended into a gryke in the stone and there he crouched coughing and he coughed for a long time. Then he just knelt in the ashes. he raisedhis face to the paling day. Are you there? he whispered. Will I see you at the last? Have you a neck by which to throttle you? Have you a heart? Damn you eternally have you a soul? Oh God, he whispered. Oh God. -From The Road, page 10-

Cormac McCarthy just won The Pulitzer Prize for The Road, a novel of profound bleakness and beauty which almost defies definition. I was worried about reading this book, which has garnered praise but has also been described as dark and depressing. It is dystopian literature which I usually avoid because the genre always struck me as so pessimistic. That being said, The Road blew me away and will make my list for one of the best books I've read in 2007.

The story appears to be a simple one: a father and his young son are traveling along a road somewhere in America after a devastating event which has killed almost every living thing and left the world in a gray haze of floating ash and weird weather. There are "bad guys" and there are horrors; there are moments of sheer terror which seem to be nightmares instead of actual life. Layered beneath this story is a larger story - one about a boy and his father and the love they share, one about faith and hope and the will to survive. It is heartbreaking and beautiful and written in an unembellished language which somehow makes it that much more powerful.

I found myself compulsively turning the pages, unable to stop reading the story. I would lay the book down, and then pick it up only moment later. Just a few more pages. McCarthy carries the reader along on this journey, looking for the hope around every curve in the road, holding their breath, wondering if God has survived the devastation after all.

McCarthy uses metaphor and symbolism throughout the novel - the fire which the boy carries inside him (is this spiritualism? hope? humanity?), and the road itself - to just name two. This is a deep book, one that deserves to be discussed and thought about. It is certainly worthy of the Pulitzer.

Highly recommended. Rated 5/5

To read my original review go here.