Rebecca - Daphne Du Maurier

Here's a fun fact: Rebecca was used by German soldiers as a code source during the second World War. Presumeably they didn't include the first chapter as a source though, as I can't imagine German high command had the need to send passionate descriptions of trees to each other.

Rebecca was one book that I'd been meaning to read for a long time, and it didn't disappoint me - but the first chapter just seemed like a gratuitous attempt to beef up the word count (and trust me, I know all about that). It just stood out - it had no real bearing on anything that came after and really irritated me!

Despite that, I did enjoy the book. I can see parallels with Jane Eyre, although I think I prefer Jane to the unnamed narrator here. I absolutely identified with the insecurity and unease of the narrator, and the story sucked me in completely, even if at times it felt a bit melodramatic. But I still prefer Jane Eyre. She has more substance to her.

REVIEW - HER FEARFUL SYMMETRY

"Her Fearful Symmetry" by Audrey Niffenegger
Product Description(Amazon.com)
Julia and Valentina Poole are twenty-year-old sisters with an intense attachment to each other. One morning the mailman delivers a thick envelope to their house in the suburbs of Chicago. Their English aunt Elspeth Noblin has died of cancer and left them her London apartment. There are two conditions for this inheritance: that they live in the flat for a year before they sell it and that their parents not enter it. Julia and Valentina are twins. So were the girls’ aunt Elspeth and their mother, Edie.
The girls move to Elspeth’s flat, which borders the vast Highgate Cemetery, where Christina Rossetti, George Eliot, Stella Gibbons, and other luminaries are buried. Julia and Valentina become involved with their living neighbors: Martin, a composer of crossword puzzles who suffers from crippling OCD, and Robert, Elspeth’s elusive lover, a scholar of the cemetery. They also discover that much is still alive in Highgate, including—perhaps—their aunt.
# Paperback: 406 pages
# Publisher: Scribner; Reprint edition (September 29, 2010)
# Language: English
# ISBN-10: 1439169012
# ISBN-13: 978-1439169018

MY THOUGHTS: This is my book clubs choice for September. I have wanted to read this book and I'm really glad I did. It was a very good book. I really liked all the characters. I really liked Martin a lot. I could feel for him. Does he get to leave his apartment? Does Robert get his Thesis done on Highgate Cemetery? As Julia and Valentina move to London they seem to grow apart. Valentina wants to be separate from Julia. With the help of their Aunt Elspeth's ghost they think of something that seems so impossible. But does it work? Will Valentina get her wish and be separate from Julia? You'll have to read the book to find out the outcome of this very interesting book.

Kira Kira by Cynthia Kadohata

Kira-Kira is one of those books that even though you may already know the ending you keep reading because it has really good voice.  Katie tells the story of her family. A Japanese American family in the 1960s living in Georgia.  She tells of her sister, Lynn, an older sister who shows Katie that everything "glitters", which is the meaning of kira kira. As you read Katie's story you see how Lynn becomes deathly ill and Katie has to take care of her and her brother. You see the hardships and struggles. You see the Japanese culture from her parents and the innocence of a young girl.  But, you also see that young girl mature and begin to see for herself kira kira in everything.  And as she sees the glitter, how she reminds the rest of her family that even though there are sad times, there is something to hope, something that glitters, something kira kira.

I love when I read a book and it causes me to want to research more about a topic. In this case, I wasn't wanting to research child illnesses, but chicken hatcheries in the 1960s. This was intriguing to me for some odd reason. I don't raise chickens (my grandparents did that and I seriously that smell still knocks me out just thinking about it), I have no desire to ever raise chickens (beside the smell factor, my husband would think I was off my rocker since we live in an apartment), but the details given about the hatcheries and the unions at that time made me want to research more.  So, off I go to google-land...

The Teahouse Fire by Ellis Avery

I enjoyed The Teahouse Fire. The story follow Aurelia as she travels from France to New York then to Japan. Determined to make her own luck, to change her fate, she finds herself in the Shin household, one of Japan's most famous tea families. The way the family accepts her as different but not a foreigner was truly a gift to her.  I love the contrast later when the Westerns come to Japan. The divide between adapting to the Western ways and keeping with tradition was fascinating to me. I really enjoyed The Teahouse Fire. I'm sad it took me so to read it.

Ten Cents a Dance by Christine Fletcher

Ten Cents a Dance by Christine Fletcher is a rich historical YA novel. Set before and during the early days of World War II, it follows hot-headed fifteen-year-old Ruby's transformation from innocent Catholic school girl to street-wise taxi dancer.

I love historical novels. The setting in this book was incredible. Even though I sometimes found myself so angry at Ruby I wanted to hurl the book across the room, in hindsight this was part of the book's charm. Ruby has to be the way she is, or she wouldn't have the guts to make the (stupid) decisions that make this story work. Nobody can call Ruby weak. She drops out of school to work the only job she can find -- at a meat packing factory where she has to bloody her knuckles every day jamming pigs' feet into jars. She does this because her widowed mother can't work anymore due to crippling arthritis. Her motivation comes from wanting to give her mother and sister -- and herself -- a better life than what they have in the Chicago tenements.

When Ruby meets bad-boy Paulie, an irresistible wanna-be gangster, he tells her she could earn money taxi-dancing, where men pay ten cents a dance to cha-cha with a pretty girl. Ruby figures out a good lie so her mother will let her be out all night and takes the bait. After that, it's a non-stop roller coaster for Ruby as she negotiates the seedy Chicago night-life. She finds independence, but gets herself in a lot of trouble in the process.

 I thought Fletcher bit off a big chunk with this book -- but she chewed it with aplomb. She successfully portrays a very provocative coming-of-age story and does it all in the context of an era that's rich and intriguing. Win-win, in my opinion.

Life of Pi - Yann Martel

For some reason this book took me ages to read, but that I think was more to do with its physical size than anything else.

I'll be honest, I wasn't expecting to like this book. Some books just seem daunting and impregnable (Jonathan Franzen!), but this book was amazing. Most of the book takes place in a lifeboat in the ocean with Pi and Richard Parker, but at no point did I lose interest. It's one of those books that leaves you feeling exhausted.

My most favourite part is the last chapter, which I won't go into for anti-spoiler purposes but it left me thinking about the value of a good story. Life of Pi is definitely that.

Another book that I read that turns out not to be on my list is 20,000 Leagues Under the Sea by Jules Verne. If you've got Moby Dick on your reading horizon then I would recommend reading this one as well. Despite the pages and pages of Professor Annorax naming the types of marine life he sees through the window, I really enjoyed it. There are a lot of unanswered questions at the end - why Captain Nemo throws his life away to live beneath the sea for one - but I didn't feel cheated. I thought it was pretty similar to Moby Dick but not quite so severe.

Next up is either Bleak House or Rebecca.

Middlemarch by George Eliot

Yea! Finally done with Middlemarch. It wasn't that I didn't enjoy it. It was a long book and it took me almost a month to read. I summarized my thoughts halfway last week but I thought I would talk a little about the characters and why I liked or didn't like them.
Dorothea-Probably my favorite character in the book. Dorothea longs for a life different that she has. She longs to be poor (or maybe just not as rich). She wants to learn more and not be constrained by what's right for women to learn. Dorothea speaks her mind overall and, in my mind, is the most steady of the characters.
Mr Casaubon-I liked Mr Casaubon at the beginning. Over time, I pitied him. Here's this older gentleman, doing ok in life. He meets this young woman who wants to be his companion and assist him with his writings. After marrying Dorothea, it seemed like he didn't know what to do with her. Honestly I think he probably would have been better off with a secretary than a wife.
Mr Brooks-This man's speech patterns annoyed the crap out of me. Overall nice man, just never looked forward to him speaking.
Celia-Not as much substance as Dorothea. But she served as a nice opposite to Dorothea. Celia was happy to get married, have babies, and do as expected by the rest of society.
Rosamond-Similar to Celia. She was a good opposite to Dorothea as well. I did want to write her off but she proved helpful at the end. After she marries Mr Lydgate, Rosy has to learn that life sometimes isn't as easy as it was when you live with your folks.
Fred & Mary-Probably my favorite couple. I loved the evolution of "them". I was excited by their happy ending in the Finale. I also liked her mother and father. Could have read a book about the Garths on their own happily.
Will-My favorite male character. In the beginning he seemed like a shyster but redeemed himself in my eyes by refusing Mr Bulstrode's money and attempting to leave Dorothea to live her life without his interference.
Overall I enjoyed Middlemarch. Especially the last half. Once I understood what was going on and what Eliot was trying to do (the life of a town's inhabitants and how they affect each other), I relaxed and enjoyed Middlemarch. It's a beautiful story of love, family, honor, trust, patience, and society.