More entries - at last....
Jul. 29th, 2007 04:30 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
kyburg7. The Kitchen God's Wife by Amy Tan.
Ghad, it took me long enough to get around to this one. I took The Joy Luck Club overseas with me as a last-minute purchase back in 1989 or so - the year I got stuck in Greece in a strike for four days with little money, less food and no contact with the outside world. I must have read it 12 times. I could. I love her style, her attention to detail - and this novel was no different, telling the story entirely in first person narrative, switching back and forth between two people - and managing to get the story told, and telling you everything about the person telling the tale at the same time. Incredible stuff.
8. Forever Lily by Beth Nonte Russell.
One of the books on the 'recommended for you because your adopting from China' list - whose, nevermind - as a companion piece to the next book on the list (see below). And what a pair of bookends. This book is well-written, but the eternal new-age bunny-fuffery about this accidental adoption (I have to believe it's a true story, the adoptive mother is the one writing the book) being the product of past karma between two near strangers - one, the adoptive parent going to China to pick up her child, and the woman she choses as her traveling companion. The intended parent gets the cold feet of her lifetime, and asks her near-stranger companion to take the child in her place. Mind you, the book is nicely done. And I have to believe the story is true.
9.China Ghosts by Jeff Gammage.
Finally, someone wrote my book. Seriously. You really want a look inside this process, this is the book you buy. Compared to the book above, this is a journalist's stripped-down, no-nonsense, this is how it came down and this is how it felt report from someone not only went there, went back there in every fashion at his disposal...on behalf of his daughter. Achingly aware of the losses she took on, with no say in how she was to be placed - he tells the tale of how his adoption was planned, the whys (and sometime, even he says - this happened. Why, doesn't matter. It did.) and how they went through it. How they perceived the process. How he tried to get any kind of information at all on her birth parents...and why. Nice guy. I'd have him over for tea.
10. Those Who Save Us by Jenna Blum.
What a book to read after those last two. The culture is different, but the loss of a culture at the hands of Americans is a common thread between this one and the prior two. It's the story of a mother and daughter, their remembrances and experiences...as survivors of WWII Germany. Not as concentration camp survivors, no - they were the ones the books rarely tell about. What the normal person on the street went though - and what they did to survive. The daughter is the child of a Jew the mother hid in her house, but never told her daughter about. When turned out on her own, she is taken in by a member of the German resistance...and go read the book.
At the end, the mother can't speak of her experiences. Will not. Go read this book.
*whew*
If manga counted, I'd be done now. Since I don't think that's fair, onward to the next batch!
Ghad, it took me long enough to get around to this one. I took The Joy Luck Club overseas with me as a last-minute purchase back in 1989 or so - the year I got stuck in Greece in a strike for four days with little money, less food and no contact with the outside world. I must have read it 12 times. I could. I love her style, her attention to detail - and this novel was no different, telling the story entirely in first person narrative, switching back and forth between two people - and managing to get the story told, and telling you everything about the person telling the tale at the same time. Incredible stuff.
8. Forever Lily by Beth Nonte Russell.
One of the books on the 'recommended for you because your adopting from China' list - whose, nevermind - as a companion piece to the next book on the list (see below). And what a pair of bookends. This book is well-written, but the eternal new-age bunny-fuffery about this accidental adoption (I have to believe it's a true story, the adoptive mother is the one writing the book) being the product of past karma between two near strangers - one, the adoptive parent going to China to pick up her child, and the woman she choses as her traveling companion. The intended parent gets the cold feet of her lifetime, and asks her near-stranger companion to take the child in her place. Mind you, the book is nicely done. And I have to believe the story is true.
9.China Ghosts by Jeff Gammage.
Finally, someone wrote my book. Seriously. You really want a look inside this process, this is the book you buy. Compared to the book above, this is a journalist's stripped-down, no-nonsense, this is how it came down and this is how it felt report from someone not only went there, went back there in every fashion at his disposal...on behalf of his daughter. Achingly aware of the losses she took on, with no say in how she was to be placed - he tells the tale of how his adoption was planned, the whys (and sometime, even he says - this happened. Why, doesn't matter. It did.) and how they went through it. How they perceived the process. How he tried to get any kind of information at all on her birth parents...and why. Nice guy. I'd have him over for tea.
10. Those Who Save Us by Jenna Blum.
What a book to read after those last two. The culture is different, but the loss of a culture at the hands of Americans is a common thread between this one and the prior two. It's the story of a mother and daughter, their remembrances and experiences...as survivors of WWII Germany. Not as concentration camp survivors, no - they were the ones the books rarely tell about. What the normal person on the street went though - and what they did to survive. The daughter is the child of a Jew the mother hid in her house, but never told her daughter about. When turned out on her own, she is taken in by a member of the German resistance...and go read the book.
At the end, the mother can't speak of her experiences. Will not. Go read this book.
*whew*
If manga counted, I'd be done now. Since I don't think that's fair, onward to the next batch!
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no subject
Date: 2007-07-30 01:34 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2007-07-30 04:57 pm (UTC)Magister Magi Negima - if you can get past the fact the main character loses her clothes OFTEN (and often complains about just that - whyyyy me?!) - it has more to simply look at and take in than the average. It takes me hours to simply look at the artwork, let alone read the bloody things....
xxxHolic and Tsubasa...just because.
What have you been reading?
no subject
Date: 2007-07-31 12:33 am (UTC)In addition, I'm reading Fruits Basket, just finished Kare Kano (kind of cheesy ending) a couple months ago, and when I can find it, am reading Chrno Crusade.
Tej's reading the prequel to GTO, although I couldn't really get into it. Loved the GTO series proper though.
I still need to finish RG Veda, and maybe give Yotsuba another try. Although ADV is really behind translating that one.
That's about it off the top of my head.