Books of 2017

I read 45 books in 2017! Part of me can't believe it. I've been so busy lately. I'm reading Stephen King's It right now. I had hoped to be done before the end of the year, but nope. I read a surprising amount of Romance this year. It is a genre I used to steer away from. I thoroughly enjoyed each of those stories, which I plan on posting about soon.

The best book I read this year might have been The Shadow Land. I was surprised by how much I loved it. I won it from Goodreads and I honestly don't know if I would have picked it up this year if not for the win. I loved everything about it. The characters were engaging. There was a really interesting mystery. A large part of the book took place in a time and place I wasn't very familiar with, but I ended up learning so much.

Actually, The Shadow Land might be tied with Unless for best book of the year. I loved Carol Shields' novel. I plan on reading it again. I just connected so much with the main character and felt so much for her daughter.

I read a few books from series by Sarah J. Maas. She is one of my favourite authors now. I am eagerly awaiting the next books in the Court of Thorns and Roses and Throne of Glass series.

King's Cage did not disappoint. I had been looking forward to Victoria Aveyard's latest and was beyond excited to read every word.

I started some great graphic novel series, Avengers Assemble, Wonder Woman: The New 52, Lumberjanes, and X-Men '92. I have more books from all of those series. I might take a break from It to read some of them.

The Rules of Magic and Anne of Green Gables both made me cry. 

Brave New World freaked me out.

A Study In Scarlet hooked me on Sherlock Holmes.

I'm really happy with the books I read this year. They called to different parts of me. There was love and magic, family and friends, parents and children. Looking at the image, I would read each of these books again (except one). I might read them all again sometime in the future. 

Plans for 2018? I'm going to finish the Queen of the Tearling series. I got my hands on the 2nd and 3rd books. I'll read more graphic novels. I might start the Ms. Marvel series. I might read something else from Carol Shields. I'm pretty sure I have The Stone Diaries. I will read more Romance, especially the books by Melissa Foster. I'll read some more Captain Underpants with my son. Looking again at the image, I realize I didn't ready any Margaret Atwood in 2017! Last month I got a copy of The Heart Goes Last, so that's definitely on the list too. 

So many reading plans, so little time....and it is only January 1st!

I hope everyone was happy with what they read in 2017 and that they have great books to look forward to in 2018!

Happy New Year!

Unless

Unless was art. From the first chapter, this simple, yet complex tale struck me on an artistic level. It fully deserves every award and accolade it has ever received. I don't even know if I can fully describe how much I loved it. Carol Shields' Unless is definitely one of my new favourite books. As I was reading it, I felt it happening, felt myself falling more and more into the story, the characters and the craft of the words. I felt myself fearing the end, fearing the reveal as to what caused Norah's change. Ends can make or break a book for me, but this ending was a bit surprising, but also sort of what I had hoped it what be. I say only a bit surprising, because if I think back to some of the things Reta talked about with her friends, her arc and the story's arc throughout the novel, it is not that surprising. I feel like subtle literary hints were dropped. Of course, they were expertly weaved into the story.

Part of me feels like, why didn't I read Unless years ago? I've only had this copy for about a year (that's not that long compared to some of the unread books I own), but it was published in 2002 and it's by a great Canadian author. I feel like maybe I aught to have read it when I first read The Handmaid's Tale. The other part of me, the maternal part I think, is glad I read it now. I connected with Reta. Though my children are much younger, I also struggle with finding stories, whether books, film or television, with strong female representation. Not just for my daughter, but for my son too. (I'm going to stop there before I get too political and I'll stick with Reta's story.) The letters that she writes grow more and more scathing. I really liked when she said, you couldn't include Virginia Woolf? (I'm paraphrasing.) But she was right and she was connecting it with trying to figure out what happened to Norah.

There's so much in Unless. Motherhood, marriage, women, friendship, mentorship, all ran throughout the story. I found myself questioning Reta's relationship with Danielle Westerman. I don't know if I liked her. Though I always tried to remember that she was 85 and had been used to a certain dynamic with Reta. Now there was a change. Not just with Reta's home life, but Reta had other projects she was working on too. I felt that Danielle expected Reta's feelings to always be like hers, and they weren't. I reminded me of a bit of a parent-child relationship, where you expect your adult child to be more like you than they actually are, then are surprised. Reta's editor was driving me a bit nuts too. He just wouldn't let her talk, she couldn't finish a sentence. All the changes he wanted to make were infuriating. Unless invoked strong emotions with every chapter. It was a great, consuming read. There are so many more aspects I could explore and I look forward to finding more in future readings.

Jane Austen

Recently, I read Mansfield Park, which once completed meant I had read all of Jane Austen's novels. I know there are other works I could read, but I wasn't sure if I wanted to, they are all either unfinished or Austen did not submit them for publication.  After reading Carol Shields' short biography of Austen, simply titled, Jane Austen, I'm definitely more curious about the other works. Though one of the things Shields' biography taught me was that Austen was an avid reviser, leaving manuscripts for years, then going back to them and revising, after having already made several revisions previously, before sending them for publication.

I didn't really know a lot about Jane Austen as a person when I read her novels.  I know she died relatively young, just forty.  She was unmarried, though there had been opportunity.  She became a spinster/maiden aunt by the end of her twenties - which is really ridiculous when you think of it now, but that's how things were then.  When I was shopping at a used bookstore, I came across Jane Austen, by Carol Shields.  It was a slim volume and I wondered why.  I also wanted to read more by Carol Shields.  Since I also wanted to know more about Austen, it seemed a perfect find.  Austen in August gave me the perfect time to read it.

Shields' writing is fluid and insightful.  The book is structured around Austen's writing life, as Shields tells us about what was happening in Austen's life while she was creating her various novels.  I like that Shields didn't just record everything chronologically.  I like that the focus of the book was her writing and what affected it, the inspiration behind it, as well as the frequency in which Austen wrote. It's a little sad, her early life, but once she finally had Sense and Sensibility published, she was happier.  The end was sad too.  It's interesting through her letters, accounts of her health, and the way her aunt and cousin died, people guess that Austen died of breast cancer.  At least, that's the theory that Shields ascribes to; there are others.  Austen died too soon, with works left unwritten, unfinished.  I wonder if she would have revised Persuasion* more if she had the time. Shields gives the impression of Austen racing to finish the work before the end. 

Shields includes at the end of the biography, her sources. It is a nice list of further reading. I'd like read what nephew James Edward Austen-Leigh wrote of his aunt. I've also heard that Claire Tomalin's Jane Austen, A Life is quite good. Though the real source of pleasure for me will be Jane Austen's six finished novels.  I've enjoyed all her books and look forward to re-reading them. I very much enjoyed Shields' Jane Austen.  It is an easy read and illuminating volume.

*I just read my old post on Persuasion.  It's so short!  Written in November 2006, I had only been blogging for a few months, before these wordy things I post know ;)  I definitely need to re-read Persuasion.  Also, Sense and Sensibility, which I read before I started blogging.

Why Have I Read Only One Book By So Many Authors?

I recently started asking myself the question that is the title to this post, why have I read only one book by so many authors?  There are authors, who after reading one of their books, I say I'm going to read more by them, but don't. They range from classic to contemporary, from serious literature to genre fiction, from very famous to lesser known.  I decided to compile a list:

Nick Hornby - A Long Way Down

Hanan Al-Shaykh - Only In London

Zora Neale Hurston - Their Eyes Were Watching God

Anna Davis - Cheet

Jeanette Winterson - Weight

Edith Wharton - Ethan Frome

Carol Shields - Dressing Up For The Carnival

Salman Rushdie - Haroun and the Sea of Stories

Audrey Niffenegger - The Time Traveler's Wife

Rohinton Mistry - Family Matters

Rabindranath Maharaj - The Book of Ifs and Buts

Stieg Larsson - The Girl With the Dragon Tattoo

Elizabeth Hay - Small Change

Francesca Lia Block - The Rose and the Beast

Karen Armstrong - A Short History of Myth

There were more, but these were the ones that stood out the most.  I liked all of these books, loved some of them. I intended (and still do) to read more by these authors.  Why haven't I yet?  I'm not sure. For many of these authors, I already own another book by them. Why are they still unread?  The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo is the first book in a trilogy and I have the other two books!  It's embarrassing. Why haven't I read Salman Rushdie's Fury or Audrey Niffenegger's Her Fearful Symmetry or Edith Wharton's The House of Mirth?  Can someone tell me?

I own a lot of books. An insane, bordering on hoarder, amount of books. Are they too distracting?  I don't know if I lack focus; I have read Family Matters and Their Eyes Were Watching God. Do I want to read ALL the authors, even if I can't read all the authors' books? Maybe something like that. 

I recently read The Last Policeman, by Ben H. Winters. Will I be reading more by him? 

Word of The Week!

Last week I found myself without a lot of free time. The week before, I actually had no new words. I seem to be making up for it this week.

From Stieg Larsson’s The Girl With The Dragon Tattoo:

[Greek] Amphora, (pbk, pg 58) – An amphora is a type of vase with two handles and a long, narrow neck.

Avuncular, (pbk, pg 67) – Pertaining to an uncle. A kind uncle.

From Carol Shield’s short story, Stop! (in the collection Dressing Up For The Carnival:

Anathema, (hc, pg 62) – Originally it meant something lifted up as a gift to the gods. It has come to mean something/someone that has been formally set apart or exiled. It makes sense in the case of the Queen.

Triannulus, (hc, pg 62) – I can’t find it…. In the story, they speak of the third Triannulus of her reign. I think it means the third era or stage of her reign.

From Ahab’s The Republic of Gilead:

Undergird (posted 10-10-10) – To strengthen from beneath. It can be used in engineering terms and in moral terms.

There are a lot of interesting words this week. I liked the stories and posts the words came from. Will I use any of them in the future? I don’t know.

Stop!, By: Carol Shields

Stop! was a fantastic little story by Carol Shields. I have it in her collection Dressing Up For The Carnival but I believe it can also be found in her Collected Stories.

Stop! follows the Queen. What she is the queen of, we don’t know. We learn that because of her “allergies” the Queen grows more and more reclusive. It seemed to me that she was a hypochondriac. Is the physician taking advantage of this, I wonder? The Queen retreats more and more from the world, from her children and the King. It’s interesting how the Queen’s perception of the world keeps her from doing the simplest of things. Stop! is the kind of short story that opens you up to what else the author has written.

After reading this short story, I wonder why I haven’t read any of her novels. I really aught to read The Stone Diaries. For those that don’t know, Carol Shields died of breast cancer in 2003 at the age of 68.

Short Story Monday is hosted by John Mutford at The Book Mine Set.