Margaret Atwood: MaddAddam (MaddAddam Trilogy #3) (review)

Posted on March 14, 2014 by christinasr

If you look at a basic hierarchy of needs, you’ll find things like food and water at the bottom with safety on the next level. In some ways, this is what the two first books in the MaddAddam trilogy was about. The world fell apart and we followed a few people and saw them carve out a way to survive, securing their basic needs. But in this third book, they are beginning to be able to strive for bigger and better things like beginning to create a foundation for a way to live together, the beginnings of a society for both Crakers and plain old-fashioned humans.
Granted, the world is not safe. Three men who have served time in the Painball tournament, a tournament where murderers are pitted against each other and the survivors are released, are doing what they can to satisfy their needs, no matter how depraved.
These men are a constant threat for our settlers in this book. Other than that, this is mostly the book of Toby and Zeb. The Crakers have added Zeb to their pantheon of gods and this means that Toby has an excuse to get Zeb to tell her his life story and we get to listen in on this as well which fills out even more of the puzzle we have been working on fitting together throughout the first two books.
What I absolutely loved in this book, was, whenever it was story time for the Crakers. Each evening, preferably, they want a new story and these stories are part of their mythology, their way of understanding the world. Whoever tells the story has to put on Jimmy-the-Snowman’s red cap, eat the fish (or frog) brought by the Crakers and then tell them a story about Crake, Oryx, Zeb – or maybe Fuck, the special helper you call whenever you are in trouble. I absolutely adored reading these stories and how the story teller, Toby on most occasions, are really struggling to keep the Crakers from breaking out singing whenever the name Crake is mentioned and is really trying to explain the Crakers what’s going on as well as tell them stories from the past.
At later points, a young Craker named Blackbeard starts telling the stories and Atwood does a masterful job of changing the voice of the story teller while at the same time letting some things be a stable of the story telling. Both Jimmy and Toby has repeatedly been asking the Crakers to stop singing when they tell stories, and of course when Blackbeard is telling a story, he says the same things even though he too is a Craker and used to the singing.
I also really loved the Pigoons, the Pig Ones. After having seen animals reduced to what was needed to create meat in the first book, it is amazing to see these half pigs/half humans express themselves, care for each other and work together with the humans to eliminate a threat.
The ending of this book was sad, yet hopeful. I am torn between thinking that the ending was a very brave move on Atwood’s side and the only way this trilogy could possibly end. Either way it was a very fitting end to an amazing trilogy. A lot of things were explained but not quite everything. I’m still trying to piece together why Crake did what he did to Oryx and also, the importance of this girl who plays a somewhat small role but is still important enough to be in the title of the first book and be the mother of all animals in the Craker mythology.
Whereas the focus in the first two books was on survival and how they ended up in this dystopic world, this book is more about living. This means building relationships, making long-term solutions for their lives as well as teaching the Crakers things. Not only teaching them their history through story telling but also teaching writing and the importance of caring about books. What Toby learns Blackbeard is similar to the practice in Medieval cloisters where the monks copied the books when they read it so the words were spread. Particularly the Bible, of course.
It is interesting how Crake tried to remove all what we normally consider human qualities from the Crakers and yet, some parts were impossible to remove if they were to have anything resembling a working mind. He couldn’t do away with the singing – they became mindless bag of bones if he did. So what this book also is, is a comment on what makes us humans. The Crakers are humans too and they need to have both their singing and their stories, their faith, to exist. In a time where we often focus more on making money and on productivity than on almost anything else and where the world is being destroyed, it is necessary that we are reminded of what makes us humans and not just shells of flesh. We need the arts, the humanities, philosophy – we need all that to be the best we can be.

‘If a nation’s culture survives, so too does the nation.’
Jan Mládek

First lines: In the beginning, you lived inside the Egg. That is where Crake made you. Yes, good, kind Crake. Please stop singing or I can’t go on with the story.

Title: MaddAddam
Author: Margaret Atwood
Publisher: Virago
Year: 2013
Pages: 394 pages
Source: Own collection
Stars: 5 stars out of 5

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Margaret Atwood: The Year of the Flood (MaddAddam Trilogy) (review)

Posted on March 9, 2014 by christinasr

‘According to Adam One, the Fall of Man was multidimensional. The ancestral primates fell out of the trees; then they fell from vegetarianism into meat-eating. Then they fell from instinct into reason, and thus into technology; from simple signals into complex grammar, and thus into humanity: from firelessness into fire, and thence into weaponry; and from seasonal mating into an incessant sexual twitching. Then they fell from a joyous life in the moment into the anxious contemplation of the vanished past and the distant future.’ (p. 224)
What exactly is going on? Why am I reading about someone named Toby? And some stripper named Ren? Supposedly this is the second book in the MaddAddam trilogy, so where is Snowman, Oryx and Crake?
Well, yeah, I guess I know where Oryx and Crake are and why they are not exactly playing first fiddle in this book. But we kind of left Snowman in a situation which could turn both good and bad in the first book of the trilogy, Oryx & Crake, so why are we not reading about him?
Oh well, I guess both Toby and Ren are kind of interesting and … what’s this? There’s some connections between them – and to Snowman aka Jimmy. And to Crake. Interesting.
So this is the story of Toby and Ren. Ren is working as a stripper/hooker at Scales and Tails while Toby is working at a spa. Both are lucky and survives the plague we heard about in the first book, the plague that Crake caused. Both have a past as God’s Gardeners, a sort of vegetarian eco-sect who grows it’s own vegetables and lives on a roof top, being careful not to attract too much attention to themselves.
These Adams and Eves are not your everyday mad cultist but rather an extremely intelligent bunch of scientists. Their teachings are actually really interesting. Each day has it’s own saint, various people they pay tribute to. People who worked for the environment, for the preservation of species, for clean air. Each part of the books begin with a sermon by Adam One as well as a song from the gardeners’ oral hymnbook.
And their biggest fear is the waterless flood aka the plague Crake unleashed.
Not only did I think it was really interesting to hear about the mythology put together by Adam One and the gardeners, I was again fascinated by Margaret Atwood’s skills as a writer. In this trilogy, she is amazing at just slowly revealing information a little at a time and jumping back and forth in time. She did it in the first book and she does it again in this one. Add to this, that the characters we had gotten so interested in in the first book, are not a huge presence in this one. But even though this is so, she manages to give us a lot of information about Crake and Snowman which explains a lot about the events in the first book as she lets us look at them through the eyes of other characters. After spending the entire first book seing the world through Jimmy’s eyes, it is so fascinating to now see this world as well as Jimmy through the eyes of someone else. And this book is told solely from female view points in contrast to the male perspective in the first book. It is in fact a parallel story, telling the same events but filling in some blanks because it’s told by other characters who have new information for us that helps us understand what exactly is going on.
Add to this a whole new set of interesting characters in this one. Gardeners like Zeb, Pilar, Amanda and of course Adam One and our two main characters Toby and Ren as well as real creepy guys like Blanco, the guy Toby is rescued from by the Gardeners. And of course the Crakers. Zeb in particular is interesting as he is second in command but doesn’t really seem like a gardener.
I absolutely loved this book. I think Atwood has written an extremely clever trilogy which manages to be both a timely comment on the way we choose to live now and the way we abuse our world as well as being extremely clever books that hook you right in and keep your interest. I can’t wait to read the third novel and finally find out exactly what MaddAddam is and get the final pieces to the puzzle. I have a feeling that this series will only improve with each reread and I’m diving right in to MaddAddam.

First lines: In the early morning Toby climbs up to the rooftop to watch the sunrise. She uses a mop handle for balance: the elevator stopped working some time ago and the back stairs are slick with damp, and if she slips and topples there won’t be anyone to pick her up.

Title: The Year of the Flood
Author: Margaret Atwood
Publisher: Virago
Year: 2010
Pages: 518 pages
Source: Own collection
Stars: 5 stars out of 5

Related post:

Margaret Atwood: Oryx & Crake (MaddAddam Trilogy #1) (review)

February 2014 – monthly update

Posted on March 4, 2014 by christinasr

So February has been a frustrating month. It seems I just couldn’t find time to read all that much. I have been working a lot all month and have just been too tired. In January, I read whenever I could find time and read through 6 books and lots of pages. This month I have unfortunately prioritized watching sucky tv more. I think it is sometimes easier to just vegetate in front of the tv when you are overworked and stressed out instead of picking up a book even though you know that in the end, you will enjoy the book more.
But still, I did read 5 books this month and I have still read some amazing good books this month. The first one was Erin Morgenstern’s The Night Circus which I had postponed reading but absolutely loved when I finally got around to it. The setting in this book was breathtaking and so lovely and I was just blown away by it. An entire black and white circus suddenly appearing out of nowhere and just spellbinding it’s audience. I also really liked the story in this book and the characters and I am really looking forward to Erin Morgenstern’s next novel.
My other favorite novel this month was A.S. Byatt’s Possession. I watched her give a lecture back in 2005 and I was so impressed by her. So impressed that I actually got scared. She is just so clever and knowledgable and I have been really scared that I wasn’t able to get her books. But then I read her The Children’s Book a while ago and really liked it and I watched the movie version of Possession and decided to put the book on my list of reading goals for this year. And then I actually read it. And loved it. It’s a wonderful intelligent book and a beautiful love story. I was so engrossed by the romance of Christabel LaMotte and Randolph Ash. Talk about star-crossed lovers! Add to this that it is a literary mystery with beautiful writing. This is going to be one of my favorite novels of the year – and I can’t wait to reread it. I think it will be one of my favorite novels of all time. It is so intelligent that it can stand to be reread over and over.
It seems that I should learn from this experience not to postpone novels that I really want to read because I’m scared of not being able to get them or scared they are not able to live up to my expectations. I should just read whatever I want when I want it. I might have to work a bit on this before I accomplish doing so!
I also began the MaddAddam trilogy by Margaret Atwood. I will not say too much about this novel or this series here before I’ve read the entire trilogy but I will say that Oryx & Crake is quite an accomplishment and the more I think about it, the more impressed I am. I am reading the second part of this trilogy right now, The Year of the Flood, and I’m just getting more and more impressed. This is clever writing!
My complete list of novels read in February look like this:

Last year I read about 50 pages a day. This year, I wanted to do better. My goal was 100 pages a day. Sadly, February has been the month where it dropped. Not only below 100 but actually below 90 (although I ended the month just above 90 pages a day). I know it’s silly getting caught up in numbers and that the important thing is the reading experience. I know I should care more about reading amazing books and taking the time to really enjoy them than care about the amount of books I read. Still, I can’t help it. I want to read many books and therefore I want to read a lot of pages each day. And I just haven’t read all that many pages in February and it depresses me like hell, especially since I could have read so much more if I had just kept on prioritizing reading above other relaxing pastimes.
I’m actually a bit amused that I feel this way because five books in a month is excellent given my current schedule. I think I will have to think quite a bit about whether this focusing on pages a day is actually benefitting me or rather stressing me out. Five books is good – especially since these weren’t short books and they were really good books.

Related post:

January 2014 – monthly update

Margaret Atwood: Oryx & Crake (The MaddAddam Trilogy #1) (review)

Posted on March 3, 2014 by christinasr

The world as we know it, is falling apart. We have almost used all the oil, the poles are melting, animals are dying, there’s not enough food to feed everyone – and yet it seems we don’t really care enough to do something about it.
For Snowman, the time where it was possible to do something, has long passed. And even though it was tried to solve the world’s problems, well, he’s the last of his kind, living on his own, sleeping in a tree and taking care of the Crakers.
But why are Snowman living alone and how can he be the last of his kind when he’s human, for gods sake?! Well, that’s not something Atwood just reveals to us. Slowly, slowly, she reveals what has been going on and why Snowman has ended up this way. And who the Crakers are.
By jumping back and forth between Snowman’s childhood and his current life, we start to discover what has been going on. As a child, Snowman was a normal boy named Jimmy. He spend a lot of time with best friend Crake, playing computer games, watching wars, executions and porn – all the things of normal boyhood. But even though they live in one of the compounds, one of the safe places, not everything is as it should be. For starters, Crake is living with his mother and her new husband after his father had an accident and fell to his death. But maybe it wasn’t an accident. And why has Jimmy’s mother quit her job and is just staying home, doing nothing? That is, until she disappears and take Jimmy’s pet animal with him?
There’s no question that Crake is the smart one of the two. But just how smart he is, well, that actually shocked me. Or, rather, it shocked me what he chose to do with all his intelligence. There are definitely a couple of twists in this one, that I didn’t see coming.
Before starting this, I knew that Margaret Atwood is an excellent author. I have read and reread Alias Grace and I’ve read The Handmaid’s Tale – and I’ve enjoyed them both so much. Excellent, excellent books. And this is another one. Atwood is quickly closing in on the elusive list of my favorite authors. Only five authors on it so far but Atwood is definitely in the running.
And not just because this book was really good. Also because she tackles some big issues, she does it in an fascinating way and she’s just such a clever author. She reveals the true scope of things so very slowly in this book. You are constantly left guessing, she’s peeling away layer after layer until finally everything is revealed and you are left completely speechless and having to read that one key scene over and over to realize that yes, that’s what happened and yes, she did do that.
This is definitely one scary book. When looking over my notes, I see a lot of questions at first and then it goes quickly through bafflement and bewilderment to holy cow territory and just poor what the fuck. When she finally explains what the Crakers are and explains the Paradice Project, I was just floored. I couldn’t believe that anybody could or would take science this far – yet I totally buy into the premise of the book and that there are scientists who would do things like this if they had the skills. This following scene gave me the creeps – and it actually got worse from there: What they were looking at was a large bulblike object that seemed to be covered with stippled whitish-yellow skin. Out of it came twenty thick fleshy tubes, and at the end of each tube another bulb was growing.
“What the hell is it?” said Jimmy.
“Those are chickens,” said Crake. “Chicken arts. Just the breasts, on this one. They’ve got ones that specialize in drumsticks too, twelve to a growth unit.”
“But there aren’t any heads,” said Jimmy. He grasped the concept /…/ but this thing was going to far. At least the pigoons of his childhood hadn’t lacked heads.
“That’s the head in the middle,” said the woman. “There’s a mouth opening at the top, they dump the nutrients in there. No eyes or beak or anything, they don’t need those.”
“This is horrible,” said Jimmy. The thing was a nightmare. It was like an animal-protein tuber.
“Picture the sea-anemone body plan,” said Crake. “That helps.”
“But what’s it thinking?” said Jimmy.
The woman gave her jocular woodpecker yodel, and explained that they’d removed all the brain functions that had nothing to do with digestion, assimilation, and growth. (p. 237-238).
Is that nasty or what? Then imagine what they are able to do with humans…
This is a good book. It’s a clever book. It’s a book that hooks you in while you are slowly learning the lengths humans are willing to go to to survive. And if any one man stands a chance of stopping it. And who exactly that man might be.

First lines: Snowman wakes before dawn. He lies unmoving, listening to the tide coming in, wave after wave sloshing over the various barricades, wish-wash, wish-wash, the rhythm of heartbeat. He would so like to believe he is still sleep.

Title: Oryx & Crake
Author: Margaret Atwood
Publisher: Virago
Year: 2003
Pages: 436 pages
Source: Own collection
Stars: 5 stars out of 5

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Book Buying 2014 #2

Posted on February 8, 2014 by christinasr

Luckily I didn’t sign up for any challenge to not buy books this year. Because I just went crazy in my favorite Danish bookstore and well, I bought about a billion books. The thing I did right – or wrong, depending on your point of view – was to make a list of books I wanted. This was in part compiled of the list I made of the books I missed in 2013. And well, armed with a list and then exposed to all the other amazing books in the store, I just went nuts and assembled to huge piles – which my boyfriend didn’t even want to help me carry, because he thought he thought I had to experience the consequences of buying giant piles of books. He caved later – I’m sure I won’t.
So here are all the amazingness I bought. Who said you couldn’t buy happiness?

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Joyce Carol Oates: Carthage. So Joyce Carol Oates is one of my favorite authors and I sometimes forget why exactly but when I then pick up one of her books, I’m just blown away by her writing skills. She is just an amazing writer and this book about a girl who goes missing, possibly because of a disabled Iraqi veteran, sounds amazing.
Jasper Fforde: The Eyre Affair, The Well of Lost Plots and Lost in a Good Books: I’ve read the first book in the Thursday Next series, The Eyre Affair, and I loved it and have been wanting to read the rest ever since. So when I saw the entire series at the store, I almost bought them all but well, I sort of tried to be just a bit responsible and only bought the first three…
Carol Rifka Brunt: Tell the Wolves I’m Home. This book just sounds amazing. It takes place in the 80s and deals with AIDS and homosexuality in a time, when these things weren’t well-known parts of everyday life. June looses her uncle to this illness, she knows nothing about and doesn’t quite understand and then suddenly she notices a strange man attending her uncle’s funeral and a bit later he tries to get in touch with her. I’ve only heard good things about this and I want to read this one soon.

Brandon Sanderson: The Final Empire (Mistborn Book One). I first heard of Brandon Sanderson when he was chosen to finish the Wheel of Time series after Robert Jordan died. He seems to be a really great fantasy writer and the Mistborn series is seemingly universally loved so I can’t wait to read it. Still, I only bought the first volume because I wanted to check it out for myself before committing to the whole thing.
Hannah Kent: Burial Rites. This one has been making it’s way all over the blogging world. Everyone has read it, it seems. And no wonder, it sounds amazing. Hannah Kent went to Iceland as a teenager and heard the story of the last woman executed in Iceland and that inspired her to write this book. It reminds me of Alias Grace and everybody seem to love it so I am really looking forward to it.
Leigh Bardugo: Siege and Storm (The Grisha book 2). I loved the first book in this series. It was a great thrilling ride and I can’t wait to find out what happens to Alina and Mal when the Darkling catches up with them – as I’m sure he will.This is pure fantasy brain candy and I’m looking forward to diving into this second book.
Chang-Rae Lee: On Such a Full Sea. I heard an interview with Chang-Rae Lee where he said he wanted to write a book about Chinese factory workers and did all the research and somehow ended up writing a dystopian fantasy novel instead. I have read several books about China and taking place in China and I so want to read this book.
Helene Wecker: The Golem and the Djinni. I first heard about this on the New York Times Books podcast and it sounds like a wonderful combination of fantastic elements, mythology, love and great storytelling. I’ve been fascinating by Golems ever since we were in Prague and heard about them so this one is another book I’m looking forward to.

Margaret Atwood: Oryx & Crake, The Year of the Flood and MaddAddam. So I’ve read Alias Grace and The Handmaid’s Tale by Atwood but nothing else and really want to read more because she write great and very interesting books so I’ve been wanting to read this series ever since it started coming out but kept myself waiting until the entire trilogy was out. And I’m really looking forward to find out who Snowman, Oryx and Crake are.
Connie Willis: Blackout and All Clear. Historical fiction, time traveling – it seems to be rather popular to combine these two. Just think of the Outlander series and Kindred by Octavia Butler. It’s about a time travel lab in 2060 who goes bad to WWII and it sounds amazing and so many people have recommended it to me so another one I’m really looking forward to.

Salman Rushdie: Haroun and Luka. I really like Salman Rushdie and I loved reading his autobiography of the years of the Fatwa, Joseph Anton. And what he wrote about especially Haroun and the Sea of Stories made me really want to read it. Especially since he wrote the book to his son. So it’s supposedly an easier book than most of Rushdie’s books and it sounds imaginative and wonderful. And as a bonus, when you turn the book over, you get Luka and the Fire of Life so two books in one.

So yeah, these were the only books I bought. Yeah. I’m not sure I’m exactly proud of myself but I’m very much excited about all of these. Such good books. And I’m actually already almost done with the first of these – Joyce Carol Oates’ Carthage. Loving it. Hopefully all the rest of these are as good – and I’m pretty sure that at least a bunch of them are. So happy reading to me!

Related post:

Book Buying 2014 #1

Top Ten Books I Wouldn’t Mind Santa Bringing Me

Posted on December 24, 2013 by christinasr

The tree is is ready, reindeer food has been thrown in the garden and cookies and chocolate are waiting for Santa next to the tree. We are ready for him to show up and decorate our tree and put our presents beneath the tree.
Because that’s our tradition in our home. Santa decorates our tree and brings the presents while we sleep. The family arrive at 3 PM and then we eat, sing Christmas carols while walking around the tree and then we exchange gifts at about 6 PM or so – and then for the rest of the evening…
So this is the list of the books I hope to find tonight.
As always, the Top Ten Tuesday is hosted by The Broke and the Bookish.

Edith Wharton: The Age of Innocence. Each year, my boyfriend gifts me a Classic which I then read sometime before next Christmas. This Christmas Classic is one of our traditions and Iove it. This year I have wished for my first Edith Wharton. Previous Christmas Classics have included War and Peace, Les Misérables and Madame Bovary.
Stephen King: The Shinging & Doctor Sleep. I love The Shining but I don’t own it and with it’s sequel being published this year, of course I have high hopes to find these two under the tree.
Donna Tartt: The Goldfinch. I love Donna Tartt’s books. She takes forever to write them but they are worth the wait. And The Goldfinch sounds so wonderful, I can hardly contain myself. So, so want!
Kahled Hosseini: And the Mountains Echoed. Third novel from Hosseini. Another of this year’s big books. I own, have read and loved The Kite Runner and I want to read both this one and the previous one, A Thousand Splendid Suns.
Walter Moers and John Brownjohn: The 13 1/2 Lives of Captain Bluebear (Zamonia #1). Because of SJ, I seriously hope to get this one. If not, I have to order it for myself. The fourth book in this series is called The City of Dreaming Books, for crying out loud. I have to read these!!!
Margaret Atwood: Oryx and Crake, The Year of the Flood & MaddAddam. (See how I managed to make this a very long Top Ten?) I want to explore Margaret Atwood’s books. That was actually one of my goals for this year and I haven’t done so… But I really want to read this trilogy so fingers crossed that it will be there and I can dig into it before New Years!
Karl Ove Knausgaard: My Struggle. I have been postponing reading these – or maybe rather trying to avoid reading them. But I keep hearing about how amazing this series are so I promise to stop trying to avoid them and instead embrace them. It’s sort of a modern Proust – so what’s not to like? (says the girl who’ve read one book of the 14 books Danish translation…!)
Féliz J. Palma: The Map of the Sky. I loved The Map of Time. I keep saying it was a wild ride and it was and I want more books that are like that so I’m hoping the sequel will be too.
Andrea J. Buchanan (ed.): It’s a Girl: Women Writers on Raising Daughters
and
Peggy Orenstein: Cinderella Ate My Daughter. Both of these books for pretty much the same reason. I have girls, two of them in fact, and I really want them to grow up to be independent, strong and with confidence in their own abilities. And since I am a book person, of course I read books about raising kids, raising girls.

(I actually have more wishes but I forced myself to stick with ten – or almost sticking to ten…)
Have a very Merry and beautiful Christmas – hopefully filled with books (and family, love, laughter and all that stuff, but books too!)

Related posts:

Top Ten Books On My Winter TBR

Posted on December 10, 2013 by christinasr

This is a difficult list to make. I sort of have two lists in my head. One with the books I really want to read – and the other with books I ought to read because they are part of my goal for the year. Even though there’s not much left of 2013, I’m not willing yet to give up completing my goal so I’ve chosen to write the second list (with bits from the first list thrown in!).
As always, the Top Ten Tuesday is hosted by The Broke and the Bookish.

John Irving: Widow for One Year. Each year I set a goal of reading a book by each of my favorite authors. I only need to finish this one to have completed this goal and I’ve already read about a third of it and so far I love it.
Anne Frank: The Diary of a Young Girl. I have been postponing this for years. I’m not sure why I keep on procrastinating on this one but I think I have to read it this year or I never will. And it’s one of those books that you really ought to read and I think I will appreciate it so there’s really no reason to not just get on with it.
Doctor Who and Philosophy. I try to read some non-fiction every year and I haven’t been doing very good this year. So I’m currently working my way through this one. It seems fitting since it’s the Doctor Who 50th Anniversary Year to be reading this book.
VC Andrews: Flowers in the Attic. So when I saw that my book twin Heather had joined the Insatiable Book Sluts blog and was hosting a readalong, I was immediately interested. Of course. So I plan on reading this book even though I’ve never heard of it before. It sounds like a great read and something that will give me a breather before I tackle some more of the leftovers from my list of reading goals.
Thomas Ligotti: Teatro Grotesco. Every year my boyfriend, my best friend and me challenge each other and decides a book for each of the others. I have already read the one my boyfriend chose for me (Martin Amis: Lionel Asbo) but I need to read this one as well. And I have to admit – I have zero interest in it. It’s short stories, it’s horror. Sighs.
Don DeLillo: Underworld. And if that one wasn’t bad enough, there’s this huge novel by Don DeLillo. I have a hard time with DeLillo. I really don’t get him. I sense there’s something – but I can’t quite understand what he’s bring to do with his novels. And this one I’ve already tried to read but failed. And I never fail at finishing books. So I dread this one. A lot!
Frederick Copleston: A History of Philosophy. And there’s this one … I was intimidating to begin it and I’m still intimidated by it … I’m really not sure if I will get through this one this year!
Margaret Atwood. I have on my list that I have to read something from Margaret Atwood this year and I really want to! I just don’t own anything by her so I’m hoping to receive some of her books for Christmas.
Arthur Conan Doyle: The Complete Sherlock Holmes. So I have read – and enjoyed – about 30% of this one. But – I still have to read 70% more. And it’s been a long while since I read it so I am actually planning to start at the beginning… I’m starting to feel like I have been a bit too optimistic about what I was able to read this year!
Some sort of non-fiction. At this point I’m not sure what this last book will be about – or whether I will even make it this far…

So that’s it for me. If I’ll make it through these books this year, I will be thrilled and absolutely ecstatic. Unfortunately, the chances of that happening are really very low indeed. But I’ll try! Luckily there’s not that many work days left this year and I have a rather long Christmas holiday so if I just prioritize reading every day for the rest of the year, maybe I have a small chance… Well, not really, but it’s fun to try!

Related posts:

Top Ten Authors Who Deserve More Recognition

Posted on July 16, 2013 by christinasr

I’ve been taking a break from Top Ten Tuesday, in part because I haven’t been blogging, but also because the topics haven’t felt right for me or my blog. At times, the topics are very ya focused and I don’t read a lot of ya so these topics don’t speak that much to me. However, this Tuesday the theme is authors who deserve more recognition and I love that. I like being giving the opportunity to praise authors whom I love but nobody else does (it’s a bit silly since I can praise them every day on this blog but nevermind. Today is the day.) As always, the Top Ten Tuesday is hosted by The Broke and the Bookish.

Joyce Carol Oates. I know Joyce Carol Oates might seem like a odd choice but for some reason, it seems to me that she is not regarded as highly as her (male) colleagues John Updike, Philip Roth and others. I don’t know if this is in any way gender related and I’m not going to claim that’s why but I do think it’s wrong that she’s not mentioned when people talk about the Nobel prize for instance – like Roth is every year. I’m not saying Roth doesn’t deserve the praise – he blows me away when I read him – but I love Oates and she deserves just as much praise and as many accolades.
Georges Perec. I’ve only read Life – a User’s Manual by Perec and it’s a strange novel, detailing the lives of the people living in an apartment building in Paris. I loved it so much. Perec has both written a novel without using the letter ‘e’ and a novel where ‘e’ is the only vowel used. I really want to read more by him because he’s is such a strange and fascinating author and I definitely think he deserves a lot more recognition while at the same time I admit that he’s not for everyone.
Mark Helprin. Maybe I am speaking more for the recognition of the novel Winter’s Tale than Mark Helprin. Winter’s Tale is just such an amazingly wonderful and lyrical novel that is simply an experience I would hate to have been without. I don’t know much about Mark Helprin otherwise – I think maybe he’s a Republican Governor or something but this is not felt in his work. And I appreciate that. Too much politic can ruin a novel. I found this book unread in a secondhand bookstore and I had never heard of the book or author before that so I want to encourage everyone to read this one.
Félix J. Palma. For a wild ride, Palma is your guy. Light sci fi elements, fictional and real characters co-mingling, great story telling. The Map of Time lived completely up to my expectations and was just such a great thrilling ride. I can’t wait to read the follow up novel, The Map of the Sky.
Donna Tartt. Donna Tartt is a very slow writer who have only published two books so far (the third one coming out later this year). I’ve read both The Secret History and The Little Friend and really enjoyed them both. I’m really looking forward to her next novel and hopes that it is as great as the first two. So please try her out.
Jack Vance. I see a lot of readers and bloggers enjoying retelling of fairy tales and for people who enjoys these, Vance’s Lyonesse series is one not to miss. It’s a wonderful wonderful series of three novels with princes and princesses, lost lovers, lost children, fairies, wars, intrigue and everything a fairy tale lover enjoys. It’s really a beautiful book, all three volumes of it, and I loved it. Vance is also a sci fi writer and I really want to explore these as well.
Steven Hall. Hall is the author of one novel, I think, The Raw Shark Texts which is an incredibly imaginative novel about a man who has lost his memory but keeps receiving letters from himself. A man on the run from a mysterious word shark – who even appears on the pages. A book that plays with both the story and the way it’s told in ways which resembles the ways Jonathan Safran Foer plays. Highly, highly recommended.

So that was 7 authors you should give some love. Finally, three authors I need to read more. Authors, that for some reason or other I don’t read enough.

Gabriel García Márquez. I loved Love in the Time of Cholera and have bought One Hundred Years of Solitude. But I haven’t read any else. And I can’t explain why. So he’s on my list of authors I need to dedicate more time too.
Margaret Atwood. I have read and loved two of Atwood’s books, Alias Grace and The Handmaid’s Tale. But for some reason, even though the blurbs to her books always sound fascinating, I never get around to actually reading more by her. I really, really need to do so!
José Saramago. I looooved Blindness. I really really did. It was such a great novel. Since I have been keeping an eye out for Saramago, adding titles to my wish list – but I haven’t bought or read another novel by him. I need to fix that too!

So that was my Top Ten for this week. Have I convinced you to read any of them? Do you agree with me about the authors I need to pay more attention to? (Don’t worry – the list doesn’t stop there…!)

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Top Ten Favorite Kick-Ass Heroines

Posted on October 30, 2012 by christinasr

Favorite kick-ass heroines? Wow. When I read that topic, I was just lost. Don’t they belong in YA novels or in urban fantasy or something like that? I suddenly couldn’t remember having read a single book with kick-ass heroines in it. Or do I? Maybe a kick-ass heroine doesn’t have to be someone who kicks down bad guys and fight for her life day in and day out. Maybe kick-ass can mean something else – or someone else. I don’t know. I don’t think that I need to read certain genres to read books with kick-ass heroines in them – it is just that impression the term ‘kick-ass heroines’ gives me. Anyway, my list tries to incorporate some more unusual kick-ass heroines… I don’t know if I succeeded or not – we’ll see.

As usual, the Top Ten Tuesday is hosted by The Broke and the Bookish.

Ronja from Ronia, the Robber’s Daughter by Astrid Lindgren. Yes, Ronja, the girl from the children’s book. Her father is strong and a leader of men. But he has no chance against Ronja. When he doesn’t want her to hang out with the son of his worst enemy, she packs up and leaves his castle and goes to live in a cave. She trains horses, she heals horses, she teaches her father about friendship. She’s tough and loving and she’s the literary character, I named my first child after.
Offred from The Handmaid’s Tale by Margaret Atwood. Offred is a woman living in a dystopic world where women who can have babies, are valuable and are kept as a kind of breeding cows for wealthy men in power. Offred still remembers her life before, her life with her husband and daughter – and she does what she has to do to live.
The mother from Room by Emma Donoghue. This mother has been kidnapped, kept in a single room for years, raped over and over. She has a son by her rapist – and she manages to bring her and her child away from the kidnapper and to safety. Even though things get complicated in the outside world, she’s still pretty amazing for doing what she had to to rescue her child.
The mother, Eva, from We Need To Talk About Kevin by Lionel Shriver. Eva fights the worst kind of demons – her own self-doubts, her failure as a mother. And she really has some huge doubts to fight after her son turned out to be a high school killer. We get to know her through the letters she writes her husband, detailing her life and her thoughts as her son was born and grew up.
Alexia Tarabotti from The Parasol Protectorate series by Gail Carriger. Alexia is special – she has an ability to turn werewolves and vampires human just by touching her. She has an even bigger ability to get into trouble. But whatever happens, she always comes out on top – although not always with her dignity intact. But give her a parasol and she’s ready for everything.
Hermione Granger from The Harry Potter Series by J.K. Rowling. Hermione. Oh, nerdy geeky Hermione. She’s just a book nerd as first but she sure shows every desired kick-ass heroine ability in the later books.
Lauralanthalasa (Laurana) from The DragonLance series by Margaret Weis and Tracy Hickman and others. Yes, I know I said I would avoid this kind of kick-ass heroines but I just couldn’t. I could have chosen a lot of different female characters from this shared world series – Tika or Goldmoon just to mention a few – but I chose Laurana, the Golden General. This beautiful and very spoiled princess who falls in love with a half-elf and has to work extremely hard to make it through various challenges and hardships to win the man she loves. She goes on to fight as a general for what she believes in and to stand by the side of her son when he needs her the most – playing a huge part in several resistances, always fighting for her beloved Elven people.
Katniss Everden from The Hunger Games trilogy by Suzanne Collins. How could I not mention Katniss? She fights against unbeatable odds and comes out on top. She’s tough, she’s taking care of her family and the people she loves. She’s both clever and sneaky – and lucky! She fulfills every part of the kick-ass heroine job description!