B&N Standouts

My thoughts on the best of Barnes & Noble's Review.

Five Books - John Updike

1. Couples
2. Rabbit Angstrom
3. More Matter
4. Roger's Version
5. Too Far to Go

I've never read Updike. If I could only choose one title I'd go for More Matter since it's all about literary criticism. An author's opinion of another author's work could definitely be interesting.


Spotlight - the must haves
Voluntary Madness by Norah Vincent, a memoir about being locked up in different mental institutions
It Itches by Franklin Habit, cartoons and light essays about knitting


The Long List - 50 Books, CDs, and DVDs featured weekly
My favorites are:
The Vagrants by Yiyun Li (I've already read it but it was good enough to mention again.)
The Last Days of the Romanovs by Helen Rappaport
The Pushcart Prize XXXIII by Bill Henderson

Puzzling Advice

Surprisingly insightful truisms found in the Penny Press Variety Puzzles 2006(my favorite is at the bottom):

"When the character of a man is not clear to you, look at his friends."

"It is better to undertake a large task and get it half done than to undertake nothing and get it all done."

"An impossibility does not disturb us until its accomplishment shows us what fools we were."

"Education is not preparation for life: education is life itself."

"Shun idleness. It is the rust that attaches itself to the most brilliant metals."

"Usually the primary function of education is to teach you how to study on your own."

"Idealism is fine but as it approaches reality the cost is prohibitive."

"Honesty is one part of eloquence; we persuade others by being in earnest ourselves."

"The trouble with most of us is that we would rather be ruined by praise than saved by criticism."

"Before following a leader it is wise to see if he is headed in the right direction."

"There are two sides to every story: the book and the movie."

Review: The Mighty Queens of Freeville

The Mighty Queens of Freeville
by Amy Dickinson

If you read book blogs you have likely read several reviews of this book already. I feel like I'm the last person to read it even though it was only released this month. I read the initial reviews and then I stopped reading them because I didn't want anyone else's opinions to influence my own. Armed with an opinion of my own I will now be able to harass all of you with comments on your reviews.

So, there is no mystery that this is the memoir of the author of the "Ask Amy" advice column as well as the host of NPR's "Talk of the Nation". The book opens with Amy's husband asking for a divorce when her daughter is just a toddler and continues through the raising of her daughter who is now a college student. There are many reflections back to Dickinson's childhood, being raised in a family of almost all women on a failing farm in the small town of Freeville, NY.

If you were to sit on the front porch sipping lemonade with the author as she told you her life story it would have the same feel as this book. The writing is simple, as if spoken. The tale she has to tell is reflective without being too emotional. She makes a point to not blast her ex-husband for leaving her or her father who left her mother, at least not too much. I think she tried very hard to not sacrifice these men that she loves for the sake of humor or vengeance or a nice turn of phrase. But she was always honest about what happened to her and how it effected her. The author gives the impression of being the everywoman that you might be friends with, that maybe lives next door.

It was a mellow kind of stroll through the life of what seems like a very normal woman and the unusually female dominated but supportive and loving family that has made her what she is today.

Buy this book at Amazon.

B&N Standouts

My thoughts on the best of Barnes & Nobles' Review.


Five Books - Abraham Lincoln

1. Team of Rivals by Doris Kearns Goodwin
2. Abraham Lincoln by Abraham Lincoln
3. Looking for Lincoln by Peter W. Kunhardt
4. Lincoln by Gore Vidal
5. Stealing Lincoln's Body by Thomas J. Craughwell

What better way to get to know the 16th President of the United States than through his own writings. My choice for this week would be the writings of Lincoln himself. There's nothing like source material to give you a true picture of the man and his time.




Featured Title - Lily Allen: The Same Everygirl After All

This article about the musical talents of Lily Allen, the undoubtedly British pop star with little name recognition here in the States, piqued my interest. I listened to snippets of her latest album(It's Not Me, It's You) and her most popular songs(Smile, The Fear). She has an interesting sound but it all sounds the same. And her age and immaturity show. I may buy a song but not the whole album.

Guest Books - Joan Rivers

A person I recognise (finally) shares her three favorite books. Can you believe Joan Rivers put War and Peace on her list? She also included Griffin and Sabine and Charlotte's Web.

The Long List - 50 books, CDs, and DVDs featured weekly

Only one new title that looked interesting this week:
The First Person and other stories by Ali Smith

An Impressive Family

This article from NEWS.scotsman.com about a family who opens a used book store to give their 21 year old son, Brian, a sufferer of Asperger Syndrome, a job and a sense of purpose in life is a touching example of what family is all about. The family is supporting their son by allowing him to support himself. Not only will the Broughton Street Book Shop help Brian but a portion of their profits will be donated at the end of the year to National Autistic Society.

Birthday Blessings

Just looking at that cupcake makes me happy.

I love celebrating my birthday. It's one of those joys that carried over from childhood that never lost its magic for me. Aging doesn't bother me much(except for the winkles) as long as year after year I can be surrounded by friends and loved ones who enjoy my company as much as I enjoy theirs. For me, it's a sad day indeed if it can't be spent doing something I love with someone I love. Today, I got just what I wished for.

There was shopping, eating, smiling, laughing, more shopping, and lots of yummy chocolate, from the heart shaped box of Reese's Peanut Butter Cups to the Dove Chocolate rose to the Baskin Ribbon's chocolate peanut butter ice cream. Can you tell I like my chocolate and peanut butter to be on intimate terms with each other? I did a little bit of everything I enjoy the most, including browsing my favorite used book store.

For me the best part of having a birthday is being able to share as much of it with others as I can so I'd like to wish each of you a Happy Unbirthday that is just as glorious as my birthday has been. May you be blest with good food, good company, and lots of happiness.

B&N Standouts

My thoughts on the best of Barnes & Nobles' Review.

Five Books - Romance

1. The Yiddish Policemen's Union by Michael Chabon
2. Casanova by Ian Kelly
3. The New InterCourses by Martha Hopkins
4. War for the Oaks by Emma Bull
5. What I Did for Love by Susan Elizabeth Phillips

I am totally disappointed in this week's selections. But I am eying that biography of the world's best known lover, Casanova. It's going onto the TBR list right now.


The Long List - 50 of the best books, CDs and DVDs

My favorites:
Cutting for Stone by Abraham Verghese (this one happens to be sitting right next to me)
The Mighty Queens of Freeville by Amy Dickinson (this one is next to me too)
Embracing the Wide Sky by Daniel Tammet
A Hell of Mercy by Tim Farrington

Review: The Vagrants

The Vagrants
by Yiyun Li

"A day of equality it was, or so it had occurred to Teacher Gu many times when he had pondered the date, the spring equinox, and again the thought came to him: Their daughter's life would end on this day, when neither the sun not its shadow reigned."

Because I could not say it better, I present you with the cover copy:
Brilliant and illuminating, this astonishing debut novel by the award-winning writer Yiyun Li is set in China in the late 1970s, when Beijing was rocked by the Democratic Wall Monument, an anti-Communist groundswell designed to move China beyond the dark shadow of the Cultural Revolution toward a more enlightened and open society. In this powerful and beautiful story, we follow a group of people in a small town during this dramatic and harrowing time, the era that was a forebear of the Tiananmen Square uprising.

Whoa! What a book! The above blurb makes it sound heavy or political but I was surprised at how easy it was to whip through 100 pages. It touches on the politics of the time but it is not about them and only gives enough to make the story move forward in an engaging fashion. It is really about the execution of a counterrevolutionary and how that affects each person in the town of Muddy River. My understanding was never hindered by my ignorance of the history of China in the 70s. It was written to be accessible to everyone.

This book is a character-lover's dream. There are so many different persons involved in the story that the reader would be wise to keep a list nearby to keep the names straight. What was amazing is that each character was completely different from every other character. They all had unique eyes with which to look at the world. They all felt real and interesting. Ms. Li must be a great observer of people to have conjured up all these personalities. They are brilliant.

Be prepared for an unpleasant story. The lives of the town's people are hard. Most of the characters are bottom of the barrel lower-class with no hope of changing their situations. The subject matter is depressing with a capital D. Just when I thought something good was going to happen to someone, it all unraveled leaving things worse off than when they started. Yet it was all presented in a way that felt authentic.

In case you need it spelled out, the book was phenomenal. I recommend it to those who like their literature to really say something. It is not necessarily for the faint of heart. There are a scene or two that are grueling to get through but it is worth the effort.

Buy this book at Amazon.

I Am Ingrid

I think this one hit me spot on. What a great quiz! Thanks for sharing it Kristina.

Your result for Are You a Jackie or a Marilyn? Or Someone Else? Mad Men-era Female Icon Quiz...

You Are an Ingrid!

You are an Ingrid -- "I am unique"

Ingrids have sensitive feelings and are warm and perceptive.

How to Get Along with Me

• * Give me plenty of compliments. They mean a lot to me.


• * Be a supportive friend or partner. Help me to learn to love and value myself.


• * Respect me for my special gifts of intuition and vision.


• * Though I don't always want to be cheered up when I'm feeling melancholy, I sometimes like to have someone lighten me up a little.


• * Don't tell me I'm too sensitive or that I'm overreacting!

What I Like About Being an Ingrid

• * my ability to find meaning in life and to experience feeling at a deep level


• * my ability to establish warm connections with people


• * admiring what is noble, truthful, and beautiful in life


• * my creativity, intuition, and sense of humor


• * being unique and being seen as unique by others


• * having aesthetic sensibilities


• * being able to easily pick up the feelings of people around me

What's Hard About Being an Ingrid

• * experiencing dark moods of emptiness and despair


• * feelings of self-hatred and shame; believing I don't deserve to be loved


• * feeling guilty when I disappoint people


• * feeling hurt or attacked when someone misunderstands me


• * expecting too much from myself and life


• * fearing being abandoned


• * obsessing over resentments


• * longing for what I don't have

Ingrids as Children Often

• * have active imaginations: play creatively alone or organize playmates in original games


• * are very sensitive


• * feel that they don't fit in


• * believe they are missing something that other people have


• * attach themselves to idealized teachers, heroes, artists, etc.


• * become antiauthoritarian or rebellious when criticized or not understood


• * feel lonely or abandoned (perhaps as a result of a death or their parents' divorce)

Ingrids as Parents

• * help their children become who they really are


• * support their children's creativity and originality


• * are good at helping their children get in touch with their feelings


• * are sometimes overly critical or overly protective


• * are usually very good with children if not too self-absorbed

Take Are You a Jackie or a Marilyn? Or Someone Else? Mad Men-era Female Icon Quiz at HelloQuizzy

Drinking with Friends

This is an idea I love. The New Yorker's Book Bench Blog has a new feature called Lit Spirits. "A weekly feature by the mixologist Michael Cecconi, pairing cocktails with characters from literature." The book of choice for Jan. 30th was Smilla Sense of Snow by Peter Hoeg. The drink it inspired, Frozen Siberian, is a mixture of Vodka and Kahlua blended with ice, topped with half-whipped cream. YUM! I'll have to ask the bartender (aka my hubby) to prepare me a sample. I'll let you know how it turns out.

Past literary inspiration include Catcher in the Rye, The Bonfire of the Vanities, and Winnie the Pooh.

Review: Hotel on the Corner of Bitter and Sweet

Hotel on the Corner of Bitter and Sweet
by Jamie Ford

When the long boarded up Panama Hotel near downtown Seattle is bought and opened in 1986, Henry Lee's past is also opened and laid bare before him. A widow after years of taking care of a dying beloved wife, Henry must now enlist the help of his college aged son, Marty, to find a piece of his past buried in the basement of the hotel that was the storage grounds for Japanese families rounded up for encampment after the bombing of Pearl Harbor in 1942, the year that Henry, a Chinese boy, fell in love with Keiko, a Japanese girl. It was also the year that his father disowned him.

Jamie Fords writing doesn't really compare with that of Sebastian Barry in The Secret Scriptures. It wasn't lyrical. It didn't make my heart flutter. It had a totally different effect on me. It disappeared from before my eyes to be replaced with living images of people and places. I call it reading but it felt more like watching a movie. It was the language of a storyteller. And I am sure that this will some day be made into a movie. If it is I will be among the first in line at the ticket counter.

Henry was such a lovable character. His attitude of quiet resignation was sad but understandable. It was clear that he tried hard to do what was right whenever he could. But as he told himself, sometimes you had to choose between what was right and what was best, which often meant making one sacrifice or another. Love or family honor? And what does it mean to be American anyway?

The relationships drive this story. There is Henry and his father, a stanch old Chinese man who hates Japan for waging war on his beloved home country. There is also Henry's mother who is obedient but finds ways to bend the rules because of her love for her son. Then there is the bond between Henry and Keiko, two Asian kids in an otherwise white school who share a love of Jazz and experience "the war years" together. And finally there is Henry's relationship with his own son, a tug-of-war between traditional and contemporary lifestyles.

In a word, I found this novel to be satisfying. I think everyone ought to read it. Highly recommend.

Buy this book at Amazon.

B&N Standouts

My husband has been trying to get me to read "Review", B&N's e-zine but to me it's like opening a Sunday newspaper. It's so massive and filled with so much information that I get overwhelmed just thinking about where to start. There are so many different features to it that I become the proverbial deer in the headlights and end up putting it aside "for another day" that never really arrives.

But lately I've been allowing myself a few minutes here and there to wander through it and determine which parts are worth my time and which I just don't have any interest in, just as I would do with a newspaper. Remove the classifieds, the political section, real estate and sports. Read the lifestyle, culture and comics. Sounds good to me.

So with this in mind I'd like to start a weekly feature here in Educating Petunia where I share with my readers what looks interesting to me in all that Review has to offer. I'm aim for Wednesdays as B&N Standouts days and see what happens.

So, without further ado, I bring you B&N Standouts.


Five Books - African-American Voices in honor of Black History Month

1. Letters from Black America by by Pamela Newkirk
2. Song of Solomon by Toni Morrison
3. The Chaneysville Incident by David Bradley
4. The Women of Brewster Place by Gloria Naylor
5. A Slave No More by David Blight

If I had to choose just one I would probably pick up A Slave No More. It contains two memoirs from slaves that self emancipated along with an analysis of their works by the author. While I'm certainly a fiction lover I do appreciate good source material when I come across it.




Interview - Tom Stoppard
A very interesting look at what goes into creating an original play as opposed to that of a "translated" one.




The Long List - 50 books, CDs, and DVDs featured weekly
Of the 50, these piqued my interest the most:

• The Fire Gospel by Michael Faber
• Sing Them Home Stephanie Kallos
• The Man in the Picture by Susan Hill
• Banquet at Delmonico's by Barry Werth
• What have You Changed Your Mind About? by John Brockman

Review: The Secret Scripture

The Secret Scriptures
by Sebastian Barry

When I found this at the library I knew I had to put all other books aside and read it. All the praise you've heard about it is true. The lyrical prose floats around you and settles on your tongue like a cool spring breeze. It's masterfully done.

Within the covers of this novel you will find the memoirs of Roseanne, a 100 year old woman that has been a guest in a mental hospital for most of her life. She is painstakingly writing out her life story for her doctor, then squirreling it away until just the right time to share it. As the readers we are privileged to read a section at a time as she tells us of her much admired father, her deranged mother and her troubled marriage. But interspersed with this autobiography are the diary entries of the man who is trying to assess her mental state, Dr. Grene, a man whose own life is messy. He often doubts his effectiveness and contradicts himself in a foamy sea of self-consciousness. Soon he is doing whatever it takes to find out about this woman, not so he can send her away but because of a driving need to know the truth.

But the bigger picture is whether or not truth is knowable. When history is subjective and memory is questionable, can we ever really know anything with confidence?

I hate to make such a comparison but the storyline was so similar to The Vanishing Act of Esme Lennox, dealing with an elderly woman locked up in her youth in a mental hospital and the slow uncovering of the facts about her life. But, though I liked the character of Esme, these books are fundamentally different. The writing, well I've already shared my feelings about Barry's ability to write well which is on a much higher level than in Esme Lennox. The characters in The Secret Scriptures are complete and worthy of the readers time and emotional investment which is not something I could say for Esme Lennox either. If you are considering reading both of these books, put Esme Lennox away and devote yourself fully to enjoying The Secret Scriptures. You will be much please with your selection.

There is a lot to this book that would make it a wonderful choice for discussion. Each scene could be picked apart to get at the juicy morsel at its core. I plan to reread it at some point, moving much slower through the text, taking note of special words and ideas that represent truths about life. This is the perfect book for studying in that manner. I wonder what a college professor would have to say about it?

While I was reading it The Secret Scriptures won the Costa Award. From their website:

"The Costa Book Awards is one of the most prestigious and popular literary prizes in the UK and recognises some of the most enjoyable books of the year by writers based in the UK and Ireland."

It was also short listed for the Man Booker Award for 2008. It is a book well deserving of awards and accolades. It was a pleasure to read. Thank you Mr. Barry. I'll be looking for more from you in the future.

Buy this book at Amazon.