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Category Archives: Reading Challenges

posts about various reading challenges

The Classics Club – May Meme

02 May

classicsclub1I haven’t really participated in the monthly meme’s being held by the Classics Club before, but I happened to be sitting at my computer pondering a blog post for today (to review or not to review is the question?) – when the email popped up with this months topic/discussion point. So what the heck – here it goes:

Tell us about the classic book(s) you’re reading this month. You can post about what you’re looking forward to reading in May, or post thoughts-in-progress on your current read(s).

For the most part since I have been doing this challenge, I have been picking books at random to read, depending on what kind of mood I am in. However, the stars seem to be aligning and I have 2 books on the pile that I plan to read/listen to this month – Dracula and Middlemarch.

Middlemarch is one of those books that even though it is on my list, I am scared to read since it is a chunker. However, it was voted on as a monthly group read in one of my Goodreads groups – and we have a whole reading plan laid out for it – so hopefully, I will finish. I plan to read it, however, I also have the audiobook cued up on my ipod should the need arise to listen (I tend to enjoy classics more that way).

The second book I have lined up for May is Dracula. I was originally going to hold off and do this one around Halloween and line it up with horror as a theme for the month. However, the audiobook of this popped as a nomination for the annual audiobook awards in the category that I am reviewing (multi-voiced narration) – so I plan to start listening to it as soon as I finish my current listen. I have to admit that I am excited but skeptical at the same time – I’ve never listened to a classic that has had more than one narrator before. So it will be something completely new for me.

Hopefully, May will be a successful month in working towards my classics challenge goal.

 
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Posted by on May 2, 2013 in classics challenge

 

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Classics Challenge – The Fellowship of the Ring – J.R.R. Tolkein

27 Jan

the fellowship of the ringThe Fellowship of the Ring
Author: JRR Tolkein
Series: #1 in the Lord of the Rings trilogy

Description:
One Ring to rule them all, One Ring to find them,
One Ring to bring them all and in the darkness bind them

In ancient times the Rings of Power were crafted by the Elven-smiths, and Sauron, the Dark Lord, forged the One Ring, filling it with his own power so that he could rule all others. But the One Ring was taken from him, and though he sought it throughout Middle-earth, it remained lost to him. After many ages it fell into the hands of Bilbo Baggins, as told in The Hobbit.

In a sleepy village in the Shire, young Frodo Baggins finds himself faced with an immense task, as his elderly cousin Bilbo entrusts the Ring to his care. Frodo must leave his home and make a perilous journey across Middle-earth to the Cracks of Doom, there to destroy the Ring and foil the Dark Lord in his evil purpose.

Why I chose this book:
I knew going into doing the classics challenge that I wanted to do some classics that were in a specific genre, rather than true classics (as many people would define them). So I chose to pick books that were seen as classics in the sci-fi/fantasy genres (I combined the 2, because there is often some overlap). However, I did use the Lord of the Rings as the listing, so I am planning on doing the entire trilogy – this is just the first installment.

Review:
Having never read these books, I remember standing in line at the movie theater while in college waiting to see the first of the books – and I was with a bunch of Tolkein fanatics (which made for some interesting viewing – I mean, they even spoke elvish…) But for some reason I never actually read the books. So similar to The Hobbit, when I saw that the audiobooks had been re-mastered and released, I jumped on the opportunity to get them – having loved Rob Inglis’ narration of the Hobbit. And he didn’t disappoint in The Fellowship of the Ring.

For me, the one thing that took me by surprise was the length of time that was actually encompassed in the book. From the movies you would have thought that Frodo ended up with the ring and almost immediately left on his journey – but in truth, there was actually a period of about 12 years between when he got it and he left on journey. There were also many things that didn’t quite make it into the movies (Tom Bombadil for one) – which added to the listening experience; and yet at the same time, proved that at its core, there was probably a lot of extraneous stuff in the book that wasn’t needed (and maybe if that was the case and it was reduced a bit more people may read/enjoy it – because it seemed a common complaint that I have seen is the length/meandering style of his writing).

I have to admit that I’m a bit in 2 minds over whether I enjoyed it or not – for the most part I did, and the parts that were reflected in the movie, I was glad to see how they were described in writing; but at the same time – if I hadn’t been listening to the audiobook, I probably would have given up at some point because there were parts where it felt like I wasn’t going anywhere…

Rob Inglis once again nailed the narration from the voice distinction of the different Hobbits; to the continuous voicing of Gandalf (from The Hobbit), I was impressed. I think that my one comment would be, that at times, Gandalf and Aragon started to sound a bit similar to each other – but it wasn’t too overwhelming. I’m curious to start the next book and see how it turns out as compared to the movie and overall because I remember it not being my favorite…Overall, I would give FotR 3.5 stars, but rounding up to 4.

 
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Posted by on January 27, 2013 in Audiobook Review, classics challenge

 

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Classics Challenge Review – Mansfield Park – Jane Austen (@ourclassicsclub)

09 Jan

mansfield parkMansfield Park
Author: Jane Austen

Description:
‘We have all been more or less to blame …
every one of us, excepting Fanny’

Taken from the poverty of her parents’ home, Fanny Price is brought up with her rich cousins at Mansfield Park, acutely aware of her humble rank and with only her cousin Edmund as an ally. When Fanny’s uncle is absent in Antigua, Mary Crawford and her brother Henry arrive in the neighbourhood, bringing with them London glamour and a reckless taste for flirtation. As her female cousins vie for Henry’s attention, and even Edmund falls for Mary’s dazzling charms, only Fanny remains doubtful about the Crawfords’ influence and finds herself more isolated than ever. A subtle examination of social position and moral integrity, Mansfield Park is one of Jane Austen’s most profound works.

Why I Chose Mansfield Park?
My previous experiences with Jane Austen consisted of Pride and Prejudice (loved it) and Sense and Sensibility (ehhh, not so much). So I was curious to see how other books written by Ms Austen would play out in the scheme of things, so I added both Mansfield Park and Emma to my list of books for the challenge. It’ll be interesting to see how Emma plays out on my list of enjoyment.

Review:
I have to say that all of three Jane Austen’s that I have read so far (yes, I know that my education is sorely lacking) that this is my least favorite. In fact, I struggle to find anything even remotely good to say about it. Well, hang on, the narrator of the audiobook was good (that counts right?) There was something dislikeable about every single character – even Fanny Price, the supposed ‘heroine’ of the story.

While the story had a similar feel to Jane Eyre – well-off family takes in poor relative and raises her (forgetting the whole school for Jane, but just the dynamics in general) – at least in JE, it was obvious and to Jane’s face, how much she was disliked and looked-down upon. Whereas, even though it was obvious, the behavior of Mrs Norris (OMG, I wanted to beat her around the head – and you can see this in my twitter feeds) with how put upon they were because the family offered to take care of Fanny and how much she owes them. I just wanted to shove a sock in her mouth to shut her up – I mean, seriously woman, guilt trip much. Edmund was maybe the one character who had some slight redeeming qualities but even then, I wanted to tell him to grow a set and stand up to the family. And WTF – it was like I blinked and missed the whole “courtship” – I mean, i saw it coming – it was obvious – but a summation of 9 years in like a page…this is a pet peeve of mine in current romance, so I find it intriguing that it appears even in fiction from the 1800’s.

Thankfully, Joanna Ward’s narration turned a pretty crappy book into a slightly less than crappy listen. I found her narration soothing, even when I had my hands clutched around the steering wheel pretending like I was strangling one of the characters. Her female voices were all easily distinguishable and her male ones while not great, were passable – they didn’t make me want to turn off the audiobook at least (unlike some other narrators). I’ll be interested to see what other stuff she has narrated for future listens.

 
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Posted by on January 9, 2013 in classics challenge

 

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Moby Dick Big Read

01 Jan

Moby Dick Moby Dick is one of those books that I have been scared to read. I don’t know why, but I think mainly the size of it and what I have heard about it, have made me not want to read it. But then I read The Art of Fielding by Chad Harbach which used Melville’s works as a basis for the symbology in the book. It made me intrigued…

Then in late 2012, I saw the Moby Dick Big Read advertised – this was a program that saw each chapter of Moby Dick recorded by a different narrator and made available online for free (yes, free…). While the initial big read started in October 2012, I didn’t find out about it until after then, so decided to start my own read/listen of it on January 1, 2013.

If anyone is interested in reading/listening along, feel free to join in. We are going to use the study guide found HERE for discussion points, so the break down will be as follows:

Part 1 – Chapters 1-21 – Discussion questions to be posted around 20/21 January
Part 2 – Chapters 22-42 – Discussion questions to be posted around 10/11 February
Part 3 – Chapters 43-65 – Discussion questions to be posted around 5/6 March
Part 4 – Chapters 66-86 – Discussion questions to be posted around 26/27 March
Part 5 – Chapters 87-135 (end) – Discussion questions to be posted around 14/15 April

Hope to see you here – you are in for a whale of a tale (yes, a very bad pun, I know!) – sign-up below if you want to join in – I’m not savvy enough to figure out how to do a linky widget 😉

 
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Posted by on January 1, 2013 in classics challenge, Read-Along

 

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Classics Challenge – Anthem – Ayn Rand

29 Dec

anthemAnthem
Author: Ayn Rand

Description:
In Anthem, Rand examines a frightening future in which individuals have no name, no independence, and no values. Equality 7-2521 lives in the dark ages of the future where all decisions are made by committee, all people live in collectives, and all traces of individualism have been wiped out. Despite such a restrictive environment, the spark of individual thought and freedom still burns in him–a passion which he has been taught to call sinful. In a purely egalitarian world, Equality 7-2521 dares to stand apart from the herd–to think and choose for himself, to discover electricity, and to love the woman of his choice. Now he has been marked for death for committing the ultimate sin. In a world where the great “we” reign supreme, he has rediscovered the lost and holy word–“I.”

Why I choose this “classic”:
When I was putting together my list of books for this challenge, I knew that I wanted to include some Ayn Rand because her name had been mentioned so often in the 2012 election season. However, the sheer size of Atlas Shrugged and the Fountainhead scared me. But Anthem coming in at only a couple of hundred pages seemed do-able (and to test my mettle, I added fountainhead in one of my other categories). Anthem fit well into my dystopia theme – although the year is unmentioned.

Review:
This was a hard review to write – I actually finished the book back in the first week of December, but I knew that I wanted to mull over it a bit before posting my review – like I tend to do with many classics. The first thing that caught my eye/ear when I was listening (yes, this is an audiobook review) was the introduction that was written for the 50th anniversary edition by Leonard Peikoff. Peikoff is a philosopher and founder of the Ayn Rand Institute – he had some interesting things to say, not only about Rand’s philosophical leanings, but her experiences in general in the writing of the book – the fact that she completely re-wrote it prior to its release in the US in the 1940’s as she improved on her writing style. This introduction for me helped set the book and gave some foundation to it, which I think added to my thoughts on it. The most intriguing part of the intro was where Peikoff highlighted the fact that Anthem wasn’t the original name of the book, its working title (and the title I think more appropriate) was EGO…

When I heard that, my ears pricked up, because I realized while there was the ego that we refer to as he’s so egotistical, I thought about the ego theory developed by Freud. I’m not sure which one specifically she had in mind as she was writing the book because I think both could work – so that was an intriguing thought. For a book that was written back in the 1930’s/40’s – I appreciate that she didn’t write a specific year for the setting, just used an undisclosed future – because I’ve found if they set a year, and then you read that book after the setting and stuff hasn’t occurred it takes away from the intended affect.

Some of the themes in this reminded me of ones that have appeared in more recent dystopian fiction – for example, the assigning of jobs has shown up in The Giver (Lois Lowry) and the Matched Trilogy (Ally Condie) – and yet, it had its own uniqueness still. I had to chuckle at the part where he (Equality 7-2521) discovered electricity and when presented with the information, the world council was afraid that with that, the candle-makers would be put out of work…kind of reminded me of working in the federal government where at times there are remarkable amounts of redundancies and you question the need for them, but people continue to argue that they are needed…

I have a hard time figuring out who exactly I would recommend this to, because it wouldn’t be to most of my reading buddies. Maybe anyone interested in philosophy; people who are looking for thought-provoking reads…I shall have to ponder that some more. Would I read this again – I don’t think so, but it was intriguing and now I am kind of curious to see what Rand wrote in the Fountainhead…but i’m not quite ready to read it yet – maybe in the next year or so. Even with my abundance of reading, I need to review my critical thinking skills before tackling it.

 
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Posted by on December 29, 2012 in classics challenge

 

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Review – The Meeting Point – Lucy Caldwell

19 Dec

the meeting pointThe Meeting Point
Author: Lucy Caldwell
Challenge: ATW80 – Bahrain

Description:
When Euan and Ruth set off with their young daughter to live in Bahrain, it is meant to be an experience and adventure they will cherish. But on the night they arrive, Ruth discovers the truth behind the missionary work Euan has planned and feels her world start to crumble. Far from home, and with events spiralling towards war in nearby Iraq, she starts to question her faith – in Euan, in their marriage and in all she has held dear.

With Euan so often away, she is confined to their guarded compound with her neighbours and, in particular, Noor, a troubled teenager recently returned to Bahrain to live with her father. Confronted by temptations and doubt, each must make choices that could change all of their lives for ever. Compelling, passionate and deeply resonant, The Meeting Point is a novel about idealism and innocence, about the unexpected turns life can take and the dangers and chances that await us.

Review:
I have to admit that I was looking forward to reading this book when I picked it for my Around the World in 80 books challenge. Over the last 8 years in the military, I have had the opportunity to visit Bahrain several times (and loved every visit), so I was really looking forward to reading a book set there and seeing how much I recognized of the country. Unfortunately, I was disappointed with the result. The vast majority of the book (probably about 75%) was set in the compound where Ruth and Euan were staying while in Bahrain. Now I know that recently Bahrain hasn’t been the safest place in the world to be, but prior to the “Arab Spring” as it is called, it was a great place to visit. There was so much to do and see. so the fact that there was really only one place highlighted that was visited during the book (the Tree of Life), it was like, oh well, she can google – that’s awesome…maybe I am being too harsh, but it always sucks when you are looking forward to reading something and it is disappointing. Ruth, as a character just pissed me off (sorry for the expletive), she was like a doormat to Euan – I guess she was supposed to be the submissive wife – but she wasn’t even that…she just drove me nuts.

The aspect of the religion in the book didn’t bother me that much, because I was able to see where it was heading. But it is still fustrating to see that in the 21st century, people still believe in trying to convert others to their beliefs – yes, I know – I shouldn’t be surprised, but it is still fustrating. Especially in middle eastern countries like Bahrain and Saudi Arabia (where some of the characters actions took place without every actually being there). The mystery as to what was going on with the Bahraini girl (Noor), seemed under developed and just thrown in for some conflict and to add another character for interaction purposes.

I would have a hard time recommending this book to anyone and I know that I won’t be looking at any of her stuff in the future. I am actually considering possibly looking into another book on Bahrain to replace this one because I was so disappointed.

 
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Posted by on December 19, 2012 in Around the World in 80 Books, Book Review

 

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Classics Challenge – A Tree Grows in Brooklyn – Betty Smith

08 Nov

A Tree Grows in Brooklyn
Author: Betty Smith
Classics Challenge Sub-topic: Coming of Age

Book Description:
The story of young, sensitive, and idealistic Francie Nolan and her bittersweet formative years in the slums of Williamsburg has enchanted and inspired millions of readers for more than sixty years. By turns overwhelming, sublime, heartbreaking, and uplifting, the daily experiences of the unforgettable Nolans are raw with honesty and tenderly threaded with family connectedness — in a work of literary art that brilliantly captures a unique time and place as well as incredibly rich moments of universal experience.

Review:
I probably never would have put this book on my challenge to read list if it hadn’t shown up as a group read in one of my various goodreads groups. But now that I have read it, I can’t believe that I hadn’t before. And come to think of it, I don’t recall even really hearing about it – although apparently it is still used on school reading lists. (My library has all the reading list books separated from the standard YA, so they are easy to find).

A Tree Grows in Brooklyn is such a simple tale – the story of Francie growing up in Williamsburg, a part of New York (although every time I see that town name, I think of Williamsburg, VA). She goes through the same trials that most kids do – going to school, dealing with boys, first love, but on top of all that, an alcoholic father and being exceptionally poor. I loved seeing her mother (who some reviews describe as being cruel, although I don’t agree) teaching Francie and her brother about the value of money and saving towards a goal (with the tin cup that they nailed in the cupboard at each house they moved to). Or the love of learning that she inspired in them, through Shakespeare and the bible.

Even now, over 60 years since it was originally written, I can see how kids can relate to the going-ons. Not necessarily the time period specific, but the general themes of growing up and finding your place in the world. Being the sucker that I am for happy endings, I wonder what would happen if a sequel was ever written – What did Francie end up doing with her life – Did she finish going to college? Did she get over her first love and subsequent first heartbreak? But at the same time, I don’t want to know because I can imagine various different endings all I want and a sequel would change that.

This is a book that I would recommend to pretty much anyone, but I do think that teenage girls would enjoy it the most because of the themes and the characters.

 
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Posted by on November 8, 2012 in classics challenge

 

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Review – Weeding the Flowerbeds – Sarah Mkhonza

30 Oct

Weeding the Flowerbeds
Author: Sarah Mkhonza

Book Description:
Weeding the Flowerbeds is a memoir of boarding school at Manzini Nazarene High School in Swaziland, a country in Southern Africa. In this book Sarah explores life in the boarding school at Manzini Nazarene High School, a school that produced many graduates. She explores life in an educational institution where growing up is takes place under strict hostel rules in the seventies. As young Swazi girls Bulelo, Sisile and Makhosi grow up learning about life and Christianity. They learn to love school and also to appreciate writing and literature. All the time they feel as if they are being pushed in a certain direction and it is one of the teachers Mr. Fields and others who come to the school and make them understand the importance of choosing to be free in ones spirit. With all that education they leave the school and go and live their lives

Review
As I continue my around the world in reading travels, I’ve found it harder and harder to find books for some of the more random countries. Swaziland is one of those countries – no, not Switzerland (I swear, I can spell), but Swaziland, a small country in southern Africa. But when I was browsing other blogs, I found someone else doing an around the world challenge and she also read this book as part of her challenge. It wasn’t an easy book to find (I eventually had to cave and buy it from Amazon), but it was an interesting read.

A fictionalized memoir of three girls in a church run boarding school, it details their adventures over several years, as they progress through the levels prior to graduation. I liked the idea of the book, however, to me the execution was lacking. There was quite a bit of redundancy in the writing (repeating the same information in multiple places in the same chapter) and some times where what is being said is contradicted in the next paragraph (for example, in one paragraph she is doing push-ups, then talking about how she did the best in that set of sit-ups and then back to talking about push-ups). I think this is something that a good editor could have fixed – but as the author is a professor herself, I don’t know how much it was edited prior to release. I do find it interesting that there are very few reviews for the book out there (zero on Amazon, 1 on goodreads – aside from mine).

I think this is a good read if someone is interested in learning about life in the smaller African countries and the role that the various religious organizations have played in the developing nations. however, because of issues that I had with it, I can’t give it more than 2 stars.

 
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Posted by on October 30, 2012 in Around the World in 80 Books, Book Review

 

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Classics Challenge Review – The Chocolate War – Robert Cormier

29 Oct

The Chocolate War
Author: Robert Cormier

Narrator: Frank Muller
Run Time:5hrs and 34 minutes

Book Description:
Jerry Renault ponders the question on the poster in his locker: Do I dare disturb the universe? Refusing to sell chocolates in the annual Trinity school fund-raiser may not seem like a radical thing to do. But when Jerry challenges a secret school society called The Vigils, his defiant act turns into an all-out war. Now the only question is: Who will survive?

Review
When I originally picked The Chocolate War by Robert Cormier to read for my 50 classics in 5 years challenge, I thought that it was because I had read it as a teen and wanted to re-read it to see how my opinion of it had changed over the years. However, I soon discovered that it wasn’t the book that I thought it was…(and unfortunately, I still haven’t figured out what that damn book it yet!!). But at the same time, I am glad that I chose to read/listen to it, but have decided that I need to pick up the second one (Beyond the Chocolate War), because I wasn’t all that impressed with the ending – it was too vague and unfinished for me.

However, the quote that continually shows up through the book – “dare I disturb the universe” is key to the events that unfolded through-out the course of the book. It is a question that so many people who engage in social protest ask themselves – is that one small action I might engage in, worth it. Will I succeed in what I am about to do? What are the consequences for me engaging in this action? It was interesting to hear, in the authors own words, how he came up with the idea for the book (his son who refused to sell school chocolates) and how his various what-if scenarios played out in the development of the various characters. Not only does the theme of social protest appear through-out but the idea of the role of bullying in society.

It was bullying by the group called the Vigils that started the chain of events that led to the events that occurred in the books; it was the bullying of Brother Leon of many of the students at the school that led to the culture where the Vigils flourished and were allowed to behave as they did. Like i mentioned above however, my main problem with how the book finished was that there was no real ending – the good guy (in this case, Jerry) didn’t prevail, we were kind of left wondering what happened or worse yet, left with the impression that evil will prevail and that it will beat good out every time. So I am curious to see what happens in the second book.

I found the narration by Frank Muller interesting – it seemed much more like a performance than the straight reading of a book. This isn’t something that I often run into when listening, so it was interesting. At first it was weird, but it kind of grew on me as the book progressed. He did have a good ability to have some fear inspiring voices like his rendition of Brother Leon. i have to say though, that since the entire cast of characters are male, there was really no way for me to judge how his female voices would sound – so I would be curious to listen to other narrations by him to find out how he renders those.

If the other books in my classics challenge are as thought provoking as this one, I look forward to reading more.

 
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Posted by on October 29, 2012 in Audiobook Review, classics challenge

 

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Reading Around the World

24 May

Sometime last year (but I can’t remember when), I posted an update about my goal to read around the world. It was a challenge for one of my goodreads groups and I have slowly been plugging away at it. Today I sat down to take a look at my tally. In the last 20 months, I have read books set in 113 countries around the world. Some of them have been relatively easy reads and others more in depth (I now have a new appreciation for the Russian authors after reading some of their stuff). My goal is to keep reading until I hit every single country.

The map of my travels looks something like this (the blue is the countries I have visited in my reading travels):

Reading Around the World
Make yours @ BigHugeLabs.com

This goal has also made me think about places I would love to visit. Being in the Navy, I have had the opportunity to travel to many different places – from Jordan and Oman to Italy and Spain. I have even crossed the equator and become a Shellback – an age old tradition. But there are so many other places I would love to visit – mostly in the Asia/South America area, since I really haven’t been to many of those yet.

What about everyone out there? If you could visit any one place in the world what would it be? What is one place you wouldn’t want to visit?

 
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Posted by on May 24, 2012 in Around the World in 80 Books

 

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