Monday, April 20, 2009
Water For Elephants by Sara Gruen
I read this on a friend's recommendation. The story is about a young man who joins a circus, having just gotten out of veterinary college. It's a good book, the type that swallows you up into another place. The characters are interesting and maybe the best part is simply learning about what circus life was like back in its heyday. The plot itself keeps a good pace although as things started to snowball towards the climax I started skipping paragraphs in order to get there faster. Guess I'm not one for suspense!
Friday, April 17, 2009
Stardust by Neil Gaiman
There are probably a few people who've read this book, seeing as I borrowed it from the family bookshelf. Neil Gaiman seems to be the It guy of fantasy these days, with his name popping up everywhere. Having read this book, I can say that he seems well-deserving of it.
Stardust, to me, had everything a classic fantasy novel should have, with a magical world that is both long ago and far away but with enough here-and-now to give it a sense of timelessness yet also of having taken place not-so-long ago. The villains are appropriately wicked, there are plenty of magical elements, and the plot keeps a brisk pace without leaving out any of the elements that make for a satisfying read. I definitely found it both amusing and engaging!
Stardust, to me, had everything a classic fantasy novel should have, with a magical world that is both long ago and far away but with enough here-and-now to give it a sense of timelessness yet also of having taken place not-so-long ago. The villains are appropriately wicked, there are plenty of magical elements, and the plot keeps a brisk pace without leaving out any of the elements that make for a satisfying read. I definitely found it both amusing and engaging!
Through Black Spruce by Joseph Boyden
I borrowed this book from the library on the basis that it won the Giller Prize, having read all of last year's nominees which, although weren't all necessarily my type of book, were all very well-written, good reads (and last year's Giller Prize winner made it into the ranks of my all-time favourite books.) This year's winner did not disappoint and was engaging from page one.
Set in Moosonee, far in northern Ontario near James Bay, the story alternates between an old Cree bush pilot and his niece, jumping from past to present to follow their paths to the current circumstances. Mixed in is a lot of story about life in this small town far north in Ontario, I enjoyed the descriptions of hunting, fishing, and trapping and the beauty and isolation of the surrounding wilderness. The story revolves around an old rivalry between two families in the town and the two main characters, Will Bird who battles with the sorrows of his past and tries to protect his loved ones, and his niece Annie Bird who goes south to search for her disappeared sister and for her own identity. It's beautifully written and a pleasure to read and the characters are well-developed and engaging. I enjoyed it so much that I am going to reserve all of this authour's other books for future reading! Read it!
Set in Moosonee, far in northern Ontario near James Bay, the story alternates between an old Cree bush pilot and his niece, jumping from past to present to follow their paths to the current circumstances. Mixed in is a lot of story about life in this small town far north in Ontario, I enjoyed the descriptions of hunting, fishing, and trapping and the beauty and isolation of the surrounding wilderness. The story revolves around an old rivalry between two families in the town and the two main characters, Will Bird who battles with the sorrows of his past and tries to protect his loved ones, and his niece Annie Bird who goes south to search for her disappeared sister and for her own identity. It's beautifully written and a pleasure to read and the characters are well-developed and engaging. I enjoyed it so much that I am going to reserve all of this authour's other books for future reading! Read it!
Animal, Vegetable, Miracle by Barbara Kingsolver
"Barbara Kingsolver and her family sweep readers along on their journey away from the industrial-food pipeline to a rural life in which they vow to buy only food raised in their own neighborhood, grow it themselves, or learn to live without it." -from inside book jacket-
I was inspired by some of Tach's reads about the food industry to do a little reading in this area too, figuring that I enjoy reading about cooking and nutrition, and this book was a pretty good introduction. Barbara Kingsolver is a fiction novelist so this non-fiction memoir about her family's commitment to eating only locally-grown food for one year was as engaging as a good fiction novel. It's a nice, broad read on the US food industry as it intersects with the farming industry and the politics, economics, and energy costs involved in bringing food to today's table, going into all kinds of topics such as local eating, food security, sustainable farming, food policy, organic versus conventional farming, fair trade, nutrition, big business, and preserving farming traditions and heirloom seeds. The book doesn't go into so much depth as to overwhelm you but I think it gives enough information to really motivate change and provides some good resources for further research, too.
If you're interested in the local food movement and understanding why it's important, this is a good book choice. If you are already well-read on this topic then maybe not so much. The authour undertook this project around the same time as other local food projects such as the authours of the 100 Mile Diet and Gary Paul Nabhan's local food project in the Arizona desert, but Kingsolver wanted to prove that you didn't have to be an extremist to eat local (that being said, some people might not consider homemade cheese-making and turkey-breeding exactly typical of the average person) and I would say that it is written for a general audience. I did find her to be a tad too earnest at times (y'know- such a noble, valiant quest and all) but I guess that comes with the enthusiasm of any new project. All in all a pretty good read!
I was inspired by some of Tach's reads about the food industry to do a little reading in this area too, figuring that I enjoy reading about cooking and nutrition, and this book was a pretty good introduction. Barbara Kingsolver is a fiction novelist so this non-fiction memoir about her family's commitment to eating only locally-grown food for one year was as engaging as a good fiction novel. It's a nice, broad read on the US food industry as it intersects with the farming industry and the politics, economics, and energy costs involved in bringing food to today's table, going into all kinds of topics such as local eating, food security, sustainable farming, food policy, organic versus conventional farming, fair trade, nutrition, big business, and preserving farming traditions and heirloom seeds. The book doesn't go into so much depth as to overwhelm you but I think it gives enough information to really motivate change and provides some good resources for further research, too.
If you're interested in the local food movement and understanding why it's important, this is a good book choice. If you are already well-read on this topic then maybe not so much. The authour undertook this project around the same time as other local food projects such as the authours of the 100 Mile Diet and Gary Paul Nabhan's local food project in the Arizona desert, but Kingsolver wanted to prove that you didn't have to be an extremist to eat local (that being said, some people might not consider homemade cheese-making and turkey-breeding exactly typical of the average person) and I would say that it is written for a general audience. I did find her to be a tad too earnest at times (y'know- such a noble, valiant quest and all) but I guess that comes with the enthusiasm of any new project. All in all a pretty good read!
Tuesday, December 23, 2008
Too Close For Comfort : Canada's Future Within Fortress North America
Written by Maude Barlow.
I read this book from the recommendation from Dad. I must admit that it is a great expose of the neo-conservative and evangelical christian movement of the past 30 years and the impacts those movements have had on government, economics and social welfare. Being a bit more liberal minded myself, I found this book was the most frustrating book I have read in a long time.
To me the value of reading this book was the knowledge it provided. If people aren't aware of just how far business men, politicians and religious activists are willing to take things, then those people will surely get their way. Current events may suggest that the political tides are turning but this is a legacy that should not be forgotten.
I read this book from the recommendation from Dad. I must admit that it is a great expose of the neo-conservative and evangelical christian movement of the past 30 years and the impacts those movements have had on government, economics and social welfare. Being a bit more liberal minded myself, I found this book was the most frustrating book I have read in a long time.
To me the value of reading this book was the knowledge it provided. If people aren't aware of just how far business men, politicians and religious activists are willing to take things, then those people will surely get their way. Current events may suggest that the political tides are turning but this is a legacy that should not be forgotten.
Saturday, November 29, 2008
Diamond Grill - by Fred Wah
Fred Wah is a western Canadian authour who has written a number of books. Diamond Grill is published by NeWest Press (Edmonton), which also published books by Thomas Wharton and Hiromi Goto- that may be where I first heard of Fred Wah because I like to look for books by Canadian authours, I think because I enjoy recognizing the familiar landscapes. Diamond Grill is the authour's memoir about working in his family's Chinese restaurant in the 1950's in Nelson, BC. It is really more of a collection of memories, each one ranging from a half-page to a couple of pages, gathered together to form a story. I read the book years ago and remember enjoying it and wanted to reread it being more familiar with Nelson now. There isn't much focus on the setting, as the novel is concerned more with the cafe's daily rhythms, the authour's memories of his father, the role of ancestry in identity, and the authour's feelings of not quite fitting in anywhere, feeling neither white enough nor Chinese enough but rather somewhere in the middle. This was the first book of Wah's that I read and I really enjoyed it; I believe (can't remember which) I've read others of his and found them also to be very good.
It was also fun to glean a few tidbits of life in Nelson in the 50's, such as that there were a half a dozen Chinese restaurants in town (where did they go?) and a Chinatown area on Lake Street; Wait's News got the first soft-serve ice cream machine in 1953, and there was once a Kootenay Tofu company sometime around the 60's or 70's (no longer in existence so far as I can tell and not associated with Silver King). A good, quick read!
It was also fun to glean a few tidbits of life in Nelson in the 50's, such as that there were a half a dozen Chinese restaurants in town (where did they go?) and a Chinatown area on Lake Street; Wait's News got the first soft-serve ice cream machine in 1953, and there was once a Kootenay Tofu company sometime around the 60's or 70's (no longer in existence so far as I can tell and not associated with Silver King). A good, quick read!
Thursday, November 20, 2008
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