Another bookish update...
Finished the last two Ox-Tales books. Stupidly left one of them at home which means that it's slightly tricky to remember exactly which stories were my favourites. I may have to go back and edit this one to fix that.
Book 29 of 2010 - Ox-Tales: Fire - Mark Haddon, Geoff Dyer, Victoria Hislop, Sebastien Faulks, John le Carre, Xiaolu Guo, William Sutcliffe, Ali Smith, Lionel Shriver, Jeanette Winterson
30/03/10 - 31/03/10
This is the one which I forgot to bring down to the shop with me, so I can't actually remember exactly which ones were my favourites. As far as I can remember it grew on me gradually, I wasn't sure about the first couple but the more I read, the more I liked.
I'll come back and edit in my favourites later.
The one that really did surprise me was the Ali Smith one. I had been certain that I wouldn't enjoy it because I really struggled reading The Accidental for the book club last year. I was convinced that I would find the same thing with this one, but I actually quite enjoyed myself.
I want to say that I really liked William Sutcliffe's as well, but I can't remember for sure so I'll check and come back!
Edited:
So I remembered to bring it with me today...
Mark Haddon's, The Island, grew on me. I think I was equal parts interested and loved it, and disturbed by it. It took me a while to figure it out, then I realised that it was making reference to (I think) a Greek myth. The girl's brother was the Minotaur. I felt really sorry for her being stranded there and I desperately wanted for there to be some way for her to survive. I was more than a little squicked out at the bits where she was injured, first her finger and then her leg. I wasn't sure about the ending, but on the whole I liked it.
Playing With... by Geoff Dyer was good. It was a lovely simple little story. There's not much that I can really say about it, but I did enjoy it. It was one of those ones that sort of made me think about whether I'd had any experiences that I could categorise like that.
Aflame In Athens by Victoria Hislop was another good one. I didn't get as into it as the previous two, I think part of that is because I didn't have the same university experience as was described there. I've never been to a student protest and I couldn't really figure out the relationship between Irini, her boyfriend and her boyfriend's flatmate.
Sebastian Faulks's story, A Family Evening didn't really bother me either way. It was alright, but as I said before, it's an extract from a longer story and I've just found those ones harder to get in to. Perhaps it's because there's some sort of background which I just don't know about, purely because I've not picked up the book myself. If I was reading the novel itself, presumably I'd be able to read the blurb on the back and find out a little bit more of what was going to happen to help myself get more involved in the story.
The King Who Never Spoke by John le Carre was lovely. When I first started it, I wasn't sure what it was going to be. But it was a lovely little story. A sort of fairy tale. Strange to draw comparisons, but it reminded me a little of the film, The Tale of Despereaux. In my mind as I was reading it was played out in a similar sort of style. I loved that it had a moral message to it that was really strong but not overdone, if that makes sense.
I loved this bit:
Thus many mixed marriages occurred, and many children were born who didn't know who they were supposed to hate, so they didn't bother to hate anyone.
Into The World by Xiaolu Guo didn't really do much for me, although it did kind of remind me of The White Tiger.
William Sutcliffe's Sandcastles: A Negotiation I did enjoy, which is a bit of a surprise because it's from a work-in-progress but I didn't have any of the problems following what was going on that I've had with some other the other novel extracts. Perhaps because this one felt like a neat little story rather than a small part of something bigger. I really felt for Phil and I was so pleased for him when he seemed to be doing things right. I was nervous when he left Ben behind on the beach and I, sitting on the boat reading this book, felt proper terror when he dozed off in the room. This would be one that I'd be tempted to look out for and read in it's entirety.
I enjoyed Ali Smith's story, Last. I didn't really expect to like it and although it wasn't my absolute favourite, I did get into it very quickly. I liked the way that things were described and the use of words, especially in the final few paragraphs.
Lionel Shriver's Long Time, No See was another one from a longer story and once again I just couldn't really get into it. I do wonder whether I would have felt the same if they'd made a note at the end of the story to say whether or not it was an extract or a complete story, I'm not sure if I was going into reading them with negative feelings because I knew I wasn't getting the complete story or something.
The final story, Dog Days by Jeanette Winterson just made me sad, I mean, it was a nice story about a dog, but it depressed me with the ending. I kind of wish that this one and Sandcastles: A Negotiation had been the other way around. I mean, they're equally bleak endings, but at least there was an element of happiness earlier in the William Sutcliffe story whereas this one was quite sad from the start.
Book 30 of 2010 - Ox-Tales: Water - Esther Freud, David Park, Hari Kunzru, Zoe Heller, William Boyd, Michel Faber, Joanne Trollope, Giles Foden, Michael Morpurgo
31/03/10 - 01/04/10
Now this one I do have sitting right next to me right now, which makes writing up my thoughts on it about a hundred times easier.
Again, it was a bit of a mixed bag. There were some stories which I loved and didn't want to end and there were others that I found myself checking to see how many pages there were until the next one. Of course there were some which I started out not being too keen on but which grew on me as I got deeper into them.
The first, Rice Cakes and Starbucks, by Esther Freud was one of my favourites. It was a nice gentle, family sort of story. The ending was interested and a little unexpected, but pleasant at the same time. Maybe I've been reading too much chick-lit or something, but I was expecting it to go a different way to what it did and I was pleasantly surprised by that.
David Park's, Crossing The River, didn't grab me at first. It was a bit odd and I couldn't put my finger on it, but then, all of a sudden, I realised that it was talking about the underworld and crossing the river, paying the ferryman and all that. And suddenly I loved it. It was also a little ironic that I was sitting on the ferry reading it at the time (although my coins stayed safely in my purse for the duration ^_^). It was a clever little story, sort of sad, and I ended up wanting to know more about where those people were going when they got to the other side of the river, though at the same time I'm glad we didn't find out.
Kaltes Klares Wasser by Hari Kunzru didn't really appeal to me. I understood it, I knew what he was saying about malaria because my Dad had a teacher at school who had relapses of it or something. But I just couldn't get into it in the same way as some of the others.
What She Did On Her Summer Vacation by Zoe Heller wasn't one of my favourites, but I enjoyed it. It was easy to get into and after the somewhat confusing style of the previous story it was nice and easy to follow (even if there were a couple of alarming bit in it).
William Boyd's Bethany-Next-The-Sea was good. Not quite up there with my favourites, but I did enjoy it. I could appreciate the thing about Bethany's character gradually getting cut out of the film and the director whose project was slowly being manipulated away from what he wanted. Okay, so it's not something I've experienced myself on a film set, but you get elements of things like that whenever you have to work with a group of people who are seeing things differently to you. I liked the way that the story was told and the descriptions of the seaside.
Walking After Midnight by Michel Faber didn't really grab me at first. I couldn't understand exactly what was going on (which I think I felt a lot with the stories in this series which were excerpts from books already in progress). Then I found myself suspecting that they weren't on Earth any more and from there I really got into it. I remember studying a poem at school which was about people getting teleported to a new world after Earth died and arriving there with scars and marks from people who had died years before... or something like that, I'll need to look it up but I think it was a Scottish poet. Somehow it reminded me of that. Despite not liking it to begin with, I think I'd be tempted to pick up the finished book at some point.
Joanna Trollope's story, The Piano Man, interests me. Again it's from a larger story but I didn't have that feeling of not understanding what was going on. It sounds interesting, maybe not the sort of thing that I would usually read but interesting nonetheless. The general idea is good and I'm curious to know what happens next, do the daughters discover that their parents were never married? What is the 'real' wife's reaction to the other family? Will Chrissie be eligible for any support or will she be unmentioned in the will? The title of the book it is taken from is The Other Family and I assumed that the 'real' wife and son were the other family but now I can't help but won't if Chrissie herself and her daughters will be other family. I kind of want to read it to find out.
(One Last) Throw Of The Dice by Giles Foden is an alternative ending to a book I have never read. I was a little bit interested in the idea of the Pykerete boat, mainly because I saw them making one on Mythbusters and heard a bit about 'ice boats' on Q.I. But I couldn't really care about the characters because I didn't know enough about them. I admit that I skim-read that one because by about halfway through I was confused about who was who and what they were meant to be doing. I'm sure I would have appreciated it more if I had read the original story before. That said, it was the only story which I really disliked out of the whole book, so not too bad.
I really need to read Michael Morpurgo's book Running Wild, the final story is an extract from it titled Look At Me, I Need A Smile. I vaguely remember hearing about Running Wild possibly on BBC News or maybe on a TV book club. I'm tempted to choose it for my next book club choice. I knew that it was set during the Boxing Day tsunami, but I didn't realise that this was an extract from that book. I've only read a handful of Michael Morpurgo's stories and they never disappoint me, so this one has just given me a taster and I really want more. On the whole it was a great way to end the book, if the final two stories had been the other way round I may have felt a little disappointed, but it really ended well.
So now I'm onto Nat's book tree book. I like to start a new book at the beginning of a month. It seems right somehow, though I can't say why. New month, new start, new book. It's neat and tidy.
I also nipped to the library because after checking online this morning I realised that whoever had had Deadly Intent out had returned it. So I took The Red Dahlia and Clean Cut back and swapped them over. The librarian who served me last week was dealing with someone else but when she spotted me she laughed and said I was getting through them quickly. Hopefully that means I'm fully stocked with books for the Easter weekend though. And if all else fails, then I'm on to the Harry Potter series.
Book 29 of 2010 - Ox-Tales: Fire - Mark Haddon, Geoff Dyer, Victoria Hislop, Sebastien Faulks, John le Carre, Xiaolu Guo, William Sutcliffe, Ali Smith, Lionel Shriver, Jeanette Winterson
30/03/10 - 31/03/10
This is the one which I forgot to bring down to the shop with me, so I can't actually remember exactly which ones were my favourites. As far as I can remember it grew on me gradually, I wasn't sure about the first couple but the more I read, the more I liked.
I'll come back and edit in my favourites later.
The one that really did surprise me was the Ali Smith one. I had been certain that I wouldn't enjoy it because I really struggled reading The Accidental for the book club last year. I was convinced that I would find the same thing with this one, but I actually quite enjoyed myself.
I want to say that I really liked William Sutcliffe's as well, but I can't remember for sure so I'll check and come back!
Edited:
So I remembered to bring it with me today...
Mark Haddon's, The Island, grew on me. I think I was equal parts interested and loved it, and disturbed by it. It took me a while to figure it out, then I realised that it was making reference to (I think) a Greek myth. The girl's brother was the Minotaur. I felt really sorry for her being stranded there and I desperately wanted for there to be some way for her to survive. I was more than a little squicked out at the bits where she was injured, first her finger and then her leg. I wasn't sure about the ending, but on the whole I liked it.
Playing With... by Geoff Dyer was good. It was a lovely simple little story. There's not much that I can really say about it, but I did enjoy it. It was one of those ones that sort of made me think about whether I'd had any experiences that I could categorise like that.
Aflame In Athens by Victoria Hislop was another good one. I didn't get as into it as the previous two, I think part of that is because I didn't have the same university experience as was described there. I've never been to a student protest and I couldn't really figure out the relationship between Irini, her boyfriend and her boyfriend's flatmate.
Sebastian Faulks's story, A Family Evening didn't really bother me either way. It was alright, but as I said before, it's an extract from a longer story and I've just found those ones harder to get in to. Perhaps it's because there's some sort of background which I just don't know about, purely because I've not picked up the book myself. If I was reading the novel itself, presumably I'd be able to read the blurb on the back and find out a little bit more of what was going to happen to help myself get more involved in the story.
The King Who Never Spoke by John le Carre was lovely. When I first started it, I wasn't sure what it was going to be. But it was a lovely little story. A sort of fairy tale. Strange to draw comparisons, but it reminded me a little of the film, The Tale of Despereaux. In my mind as I was reading it was played out in a similar sort of style. I loved that it had a moral message to it that was really strong but not overdone, if that makes sense.
I loved this bit:
Thus many mixed marriages occurred, and many children were born who didn't know who they were supposed to hate, so they didn't bother to hate anyone.
Into The World by Xiaolu Guo didn't really do much for me, although it did kind of remind me of The White Tiger.
William Sutcliffe's Sandcastles: A Negotiation I did enjoy, which is a bit of a surprise because it's from a work-in-progress but I didn't have any of the problems following what was going on that I've had with some other the other novel extracts. Perhaps because this one felt like a neat little story rather than a small part of something bigger. I really felt for Phil and I was so pleased for him when he seemed to be doing things right. I was nervous when he left Ben behind on the beach and I, sitting on the boat reading this book, felt proper terror when he dozed off in the room. This would be one that I'd be tempted to look out for and read in it's entirety.
I enjoyed Ali Smith's story, Last. I didn't really expect to like it and although it wasn't my absolute favourite, I did get into it very quickly. I liked the way that things were described and the use of words, especially in the final few paragraphs.
Lionel Shriver's Long Time, No See was another one from a longer story and once again I just couldn't really get into it. I do wonder whether I would have felt the same if they'd made a note at the end of the story to say whether or not it was an extract or a complete story, I'm not sure if I was going into reading them with negative feelings because I knew I wasn't getting the complete story or something.
The final story, Dog Days by Jeanette Winterson just made me sad, I mean, it was a nice story about a dog, but it depressed me with the ending. I kind of wish that this one and Sandcastles: A Negotiation had been the other way around. I mean, they're equally bleak endings, but at least there was an element of happiness earlier in the William Sutcliffe story whereas this one was quite sad from the start.
Book 30 of 2010 - Ox-Tales: Water - Esther Freud, David Park, Hari Kunzru, Zoe Heller, William Boyd, Michel Faber, Joanne Trollope, Giles Foden, Michael Morpurgo
31/03/10 - 01/04/10
Now this one I do have sitting right next to me right now, which makes writing up my thoughts on it about a hundred times easier.
Again, it was a bit of a mixed bag. There were some stories which I loved and didn't want to end and there were others that I found myself checking to see how many pages there were until the next one. Of course there were some which I started out not being too keen on but which grew on me as I got deeper into them.
The first, Rice Cakes and Starbucks, by Esther Freud was one of my favourites. It was a nice gentle, family sort of story. The ending was interested and a little unexpected, but pleasant at the same time. Maybe I've been reading too much chick-lit or something, but I was expecting it to go a different way to what it did and I was pleasantly surprised by that.
David Park's, Crossing The River, didn't grab me at first. It was a bit odd and I couldn't put my finger on it, but then, all of a sudden, I realised that it was talking about the underworld and crossing the river, paying the ferryman and all that. And suddenly I loved it. It was also a little ironic that I was sitting on the ferry reading it at the time (although my coins stayed safely in my purse for the duration ^_^). It was a clever little story, sort of sad, and I ended up wanting to know more about where those people were going when they got to the other side of the river, though at the same time I'm glad we didn't find out.
Kaltes Klares Wasser by Hari Kunzru didn't really appeal to me. I understood it, I knew what he was saying about malaria because my Dad had a teacher at school who had relapses of it or something. But I just couldn't get into it in the same way as some of the others.
What She Did On Her Summer Vacation by Zoe Heller wasn't one of my favourites, but I enjoyed it. It was easy to get into and after the somewhat confusing style of the previous story it was nice and easy to follow (even if there were a couple of alarming bit in it).
William Boyd's Bethany-Next-The-Sea was good. Not quite up there with my favourites, but I did enjoy it. I could appreciate the thing about Bethany's character gradually getting cut out of the film and the director whose project was slowly being manipulated away from what he wanted. Okay, so it's not something I've experienced myself on a film set, but you get elements of things like that whenever you have to work with a group of people who are seeing things differently to you. I liked the way that the story was told and the descriptions of the seaside.
Walking After Midnight by Michel Faber didn't really grab me at first. I couldn't understand exactly what was going on (which I think I felt a lot with the stories in this series which were excerpts from books already in progress). Then I found myself suspecting that they weren't on Earth any more and from there I really got into it. I remember studying a poem at school which was about people getting teleported to a new world after Earth died and arriving there with scars and marks from people who had died years before... or something like that, I'll need to look it up but I think it was a Scottish poet. Somehow it reminded me of that. Despite not liking it to begin with, I think I'd be tempted to pick up the finished book at some point.
Joanna Trollope's story, The Piano Man, interests me. Again it's from a larger story but I didn't have that feeling of not understanding what was going on. It sounds interesting, maybe not the sort of thing that I would usually read but interesting nonetheless. The general idea is good and I'm curious to know what happens next, do the daughters discover that their parents were never married? What is the 'real' wife's reaction to the other family? Will Chrissie be eligible for any support or will she be unmentioned in the will? The title of the book it is taken from is The Other Family and I assumed that the 'real' wife and son were the other family but now I can't help but won't if Chrissie herself and her daughters will be other family. I kind of want to read it to find out.
(One Last) Throw Of The Dice by Giles Foden is an alternative ending to a book I have never read. I was a little bit interested in the idea of the Pykerete boat, mainly because I saw them making one on Mythbusters and heard a bit about 'ice boats' on Q.I. But I couldn't really care about the characters because I didn't know enough about them. I admit that I skim-read that one because by about halfway through I was confused about who was who and what they were meant to be doing. I'm sure I would have appreciated it more if I had read the original story before. That said, it was the only story which I really disliked out of the whole book, so not too bad.
I really need to read Michael Morpurgo's book Running Wild, the final story is an extract from it titled Look At Me, I Need A Smile. I vaguely remember hearing about Running Wild possibly on BBC News or maybe on a TV book club. I'm tempted to choose it for my next book club choice. I knew that it was set during the Boxing Day tsunami, but I didn't realise that this was an extract from that book. I've only read a handful of Michael Morpurgo's stories and they never disappoint me, so this one has just given me a taster and I really want more. On the whole it was a great way to end the book, if the final two stories had been the other way round I may have felt a little disappointed, but it really ended well.
So now I'm onto Nat's book tree book. I like to start a new book at the beginning of a month. It seems right somehow, though I can't say why. New month, new start, new book. It's neat and tidy.
I also nipped to the library because after checking online this morning I realised that whoever had had Deadly Intent out had returned it. So I took The Red Dahlia and Clean Cut back and swapped them over. The librarian who served me last week was dealing with someone else but when she spotted me she laughed and said I was getting through them quickly. Hopefully that means I'm fully stocked with books for the Easter weekend though. And if all else fails, then I'm on to the Harry Potter series.