Zorro by Isabel Allende

I am a huge Isabel Allende fan, so I had to run out and buy this book as soon as it was available. It was a fun read. I didn't know that much about the Zorro story, but the beauty is always her language and craft of storytelling. Another engaging Allende novel, although not my favorite.

Oyster by John Bigeunet

While scoring AP Literature essays in Daytona Beach this week, teachers were treated to a reading by John Biguenet. He read the first chapter of this novel and I was hooked. This is a powerful story of a rivalry between two shrimping families in Lousiana. I finished it on the plane on the way home and would recommend it as a fun summer read.

Riding the Bus with my Sister by Rachel Simon

I found this book on display at the local Borders store the Thursday before the Hallmark movie was to be on television. I started reading it and was drawn in by the voice of Rachel. It reminded me alot of Tuesdays with Morrie. A sad, sweet tale about the meaning of life.

The Dog of the Marriage by Amy Hempel

I have been teaching contemporary short fiction to my AP students to get them ready for anything on the upcoming AP test. I read on Chuck Palaniuk's web site that his writing was inflluenced by the work of Amy Hempel, so I added her to my syllabus. Then I read a review of this new collection of short stories in the New York Times Book Review last weekend and bought it (Borders Teacher's Appreciation Sale - YEA!) and read it in one sitting. These stories are moving and tricky. She is a master of minimalism and tends to play with her readers a bit. And the cover photo of her with her dog was taken by William Wegman.

Paula by Isabel Allende

This is perhaps one of the most moving books I have ever read, so when the retired Spanish teacher in our book club chose it, I was happy to reread it. It is a memoir that Allende wrote as her daughter, Paula, lay in a coma for many days. She wanted to tell the stories of Paula's life so she would have a roadmap of memory when she regained consciousness. I think I have read everything Isabel Allende has written to date and she remains one of my favorite story tellers. I have the awesome chance to hear her speak at the Cleveland Public Library last fall and she was fabulous and VERY short.

Encyclopedia of an Ordinary Life by Amy Krouse Rosenthal

What a refreshing find. This book is pure fun. I read it while waiting for a delayed flight at the Chicago airport and Amy Rosenthal's humorous look at her own life made me remember a lot of moments from my own. I especially like when I got to the page in the middle of the book full of white space and the one word - intermission.

Everything is Illuminated by Jonathan Safran Foer

I had been putting off reading this book for a long time. Now that Foer's name is everywhere with review of his new novel, I decided to take it along on our vacation to San Antonio. It was almost too demanding for a vacation book, but I really enjoyed it. I finished it on the plane on the way home and immediately wanted to find someone else who had read it so that I could help myself understand the ending. The various narrators are hard to follow - especially the one who is supposedly translating for the character named Safran. It reminded me of A Clockwork Orange and even seemed a bit like the magic realism of Marquez.

The Ha-Ha by Dave King

I read this book quickly during the first two days of spring break. It is very sad. The narrator is a mute who was injured in Vietnam. He is charged with taking care of his old girfriend's nine year old son while she goes to rehab. The theme seems to be that family is any group of people who care about and care for each other.

Me and Emma by Elizabeth Flock

This book was compared to The Secret Life of Bees which is a book I really love. The narrator is an eight year old girl who lives with her sister, Emma, their mother and their abusive stepfather. The voice of the narrator is so innocent and naive, even though her troubles are not.

Plan B: Further Thoughts on Faith by Anne LaMott

I love Anne LaMott and I was counting down the days until this book was available. I was not disappointed. Her prose is so lovely, but her subjects are very down to earth. She writes a lot in this book about raising her son as a single mother. Since I was so inspired by her pieces when my son was very young, I really connected to her struggles with the teenage "animal". She is harsh in her criticsm on Bush and frank with her thoughts about faith. I cried several times while reading this book. I love Anne LaMott.

Master Butchers Singing Club by Louise Erdrich

This was our book club selection for this month. I really like Louise Erdrich's work, so I was happy to read this book. David and I started listening to the audio in the car and it was REALLY slow. I read the first half of the book and did not think much of it. About half way through, the book picked up and I ended up liking it a lot. I think it is about contentment. The main character is a woman whose overcomes an alcoholic father, a homosexual man who poses as her husband and then the master butcher, whose sons she helps to raise after the death of his wife.

Baker Towers by Jennifer Haigh

Now playing in the ipod while I run, which I am not doing much since Winter just won't quit in Northeast Ohio. This is a beautiful story of a family in a mining town after WWII. The language is almost too lovely to listen to. I want to see these words on the page.

The Death and Life of Charlie St. Cloud by Ben Sherwood

This book sounded like a fun read, but it took me by surprise. It was more like a Nicholas Sparks novel than what I expected. Charlie had died once in a car accident which killed his brother, but the fireman on the scene brought him back to life. Now as an adult, Charlie works at the cemetery where his brother's spirit still lives. The plot twists when he meets Tess, a woman who may or may not be a spirit. I will be recommending this one to female students. It even had a little bit of a Lovely Bones feel to it. And the best part was it reminded me of an e. e. cummings poem I knew once upon a time.

dive for dreams

dive for dreams
or a slogan may topple you
(trees are their roots
and wind is wind)
trust your heart
if the seas catch fire
(and live by love
though the stars walk backward)
honour the past
but welcome the future
(and dance your death
away at the wedding)
never mind a world
with its villains or heroes
(for good likes girls
and tomorrow and the earth)
in spite of everything
which breathes and moves, since Doom
(with white longest hands
neating each crease)
will smooth entirely our minds
-before leaving my room
i turn, and (stooping
through the morning) kiss
this pillow, dear
where our heads lived and were.

silently if, out of not knowable

silently if, out of not knowable
night's utmost nothing,wanders a little guess
(only which is this world)more my life does
not leap than with the mystery your smile
sings or if(spiralling as luminous
they climb oblivion)voices who are dreams,
less into heaven certainly earth swims
than each my deeper death becomes your kiss
losing through you what seemed myself,i find
selves unimaginably mine;beyond
sorrow's own joys and hoping's very fears
yours is the light by which my spirit's born:
yours is the darkness of my soul's return
-you are my sun,my moon,and all my stars

Little Children by Tom Perrotta

We had a snow day today. Yippee!!! So I woke up and finished the last hundred pages of Little Children. It was a fun book about suburban playground moms and former jock dads. I really liked the part where the book group in the novel is discussing Madame Bovary. Near the end, I thought the book was going to end tragically, but luckily it did not. I enjoyed this read.

Apprentice to the Flower Poet Z by Debra Weinstein

I thoroughly enjoyed this book but I wonder whether it would be very appealing to someone who had not read much poetry. There are numerous references to Emily Dickinson, James Joyce, Virginia Woolf and others. The characters read more like caricatures of writers and literary wannabes. I would recommend this book to English majors and would-be poets.

More Thoughts on Hypocrite in a Pouffy White Dress

I have had three female students read this book in the last two weeks since I began recommending it. They each read the book in a few days and have already asked for recommendations of more books of this type. I think there is something in this book that speaks to fiesty young women. I really enjoy seeing a book ignite conversation the way that this one seems to be doing.

The Piano Teacher by Elfriede Jelinek

Oh my - oh my. This book was disturbing in a Lolita-sort of way. I thought I ought to read something by the latest Nobel Prize winner and since I had seen the cover of the video several times in the aisle at Blockbuster, I knew I should read the book before I rented the movie. I began reading the book on Friday night and finished it in almost a single sitting on Saturday, then watched the movie Saturday night. It is a very compelling, yet disturbing story about a sexually repressed piano teacher who lives alone with her stern mother. When a young male student falls in love with her, she places sadistic and unusual demands on him as a lover until their romance careens out of control in the end. I felt slimy after a day of this, but I have to say the writing was lovely. Metaphor upon metaphor upon metaphor.

Case Histories by Kate Atkinson

I had read Atkinson's first novel a summer or two ago and really enjoyed reading a contemporary British novel with all of the vernacular. I looked forward to this one because it had been getting such favorable reviews. It reads almost like a detective story - three separate cases presented in the first three chapters with unrelated characters - so you have to keep track of each separate story line until they all come together through the private investigator who handles all of the cases. I enjoyed the mystery, which kept me interested until the very end.

Hypocrite in a Pouffy White Dress by Susan Jane Gilman

Yesterday, David and I found a new bookstore in Peninsula called the Blue Heron Bookstore. It used to be a mangy antique store and it has been fixed up with beautiful wooden shelves and a great display area with a fireplace and big chairs. It has a two story tree house in the kids bookroom. But the store is small, and independent and has a feel of warmth and luxury. I saw this book on a display stand and it looked like something I should get to remember our stop at this lovely store by. Plus, it had a recommendation blurb on the cover from Frank McCourt. I started it this morning and have not put it down. I have been laughing out loud. David has already had to listen to me read enough of it that he is advising I finish it quickly since he feels like he is living with the narrator. I love it.

Because of Winn Dixie by Kate DiCamillo

Thank goodness I have a daughter in the 5th grade who still allows her mother to read to her at bedtime. Without her I would not have been exposed to the magic of Lemony Snicket's Series of Unfortunate Incidents, which we devoured before going to see the excellent movie. Now with another movie on the horizon, we are reading Because of Winn Dixie.
We had read Tale of Despereaux last year and loved it. I am loving the narrative voice of young Opal. And the movie stars both Cicely Tyson and Dave Matthews. I can't wait.

Sex Lives of Cannibals by J. Maarten Troost

This is the book club selection for February for our book club. It is really a travelogue by a guy who went with his girlfriend to live on an atoll in the Pacific without any of the comforts of home. There are pages about the natives using the ocean as a toilet and pages about having nothing to eat but fish. And pages about not having beer. It is quite funny. No real pages about sex lives, though.

Our Kind by Kate Walbert

The winter the way it has been here in Ohio, I read this book in one evening by the fire the very day it came from Amazon in a shipment with my daughter's new Lemony Snicket book. The story of middle aged women in the 50's didn't touch me directly but I like the use of different narrators for different sections of the novel.

The Last Song of Dusk by Siddharth Dhanvant Shanghvi

This beautiful book took me by surprise. I was initially intrigued by the cover and then when I read that the author has been compared to Allende, Marquez and Roy - three of my favorites - I knew I had to buy it. I couldn't put it down. It is a tale of love and terror, full of magical realism and almost too lush prose. The author claims to have read a lot of Rilke when he was young, and I picked that up too. I wanted to start reading it again the moment I finished, and that happens very rarely.

Gilead by Marilynn Robinson

Another Christmas present from David, this book has taken me a while to read. It is beautifully written but very slow and meant to be savored. The narrator is an aging minister who writes a long letter to his young son about his past and his faith. I was particularly interested in this book because of all of the ministers in my family. When he talks about boxes of sermons that represent a lifetime of thought , I think of my grandfather, who I have only met through the words he left behind. Robinson teaches at Iowa Writers Workshop and was one of Salvatore Scibona's instructors when he was a student there. He gave me a copy of Robinson's Housekeeping. This makes her a special writer in my mind.

The Full Cleveland by Terry Reed

This was such a fun read for someone who grew up in Cleveland in the 1970's. I enjoyed the naive narrator and the escapades on the Rapid and through town. Best line - "Shaker Heights isn't a community, it is a realm."