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G
jernigan
david gates
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| I can't believe I didn't review this before (I'll blame Kent). This is the DEFINITIVE how-do-I-put-this-right depressed/loser/depressed person/depths of depression book. If you want to feel good about your life, read this. It was well written, very very genuine (high praise from me), and just a great book. This one would be in my top 11 books - easily. The main character (I won't spoil it.) has the most fascinating life-changing (for the worse) moment EVER. This book is poetic, wry, and ultimately dive-y. Although it sort of trickles at the end (don't most books), it is soooooooo like drinking whisky every day and just giving up on silly dumb rat-race life. I also love this book because the main character loves Pamprin (one of my reasons to live before I got, as they say, on the Pill). Did I recommend it highly enough? I read it the same period (excuse the pun) that I read "The Bell Jar" and this book has tons of retention for me. It's also got rabbits. |
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reviewed by: kristen |
September 2000 [link] |
recommend
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complications: a surgeon's notes on an imperfect science
atul gawande
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This book is way more fascinating than its title suggests. Many of you may have read Gawande before. He is a regular contributor to the New Yorker, The Atlantic, and the Boston Globe Magazine. The chapters, or essays, in this book have mostly appeared elsewhere (several I had read in the NYer before I read them again here).
Gawande is a surgeon who teaches at Harvard. He is doing quite a bit of research on errors in surgery in an effort to improve many of the problems that plague American hospitals. Some of the things he discusses in the book are: 'Why does a small hernia specialty hospital in Canada have relatively miniscule number of complications compared to hospitals that do the same procedure here, and do hospital 'assembly lines' create burnout?', 'Do hospitals owe it to their patients to let them know that a the surgeon working on you will be doing this particular surgery for the very first time? -- if not, how will he ever learn?', 'Why good doctors go bad', etc.
The essays carry a little more weight and complexity since Gawande's own children have had medical problems that have created some conflicts within his own ethical belief system.
He is never dull, always incredibly insigntful, and completely sympathetic to the viewpoint of the patient. This guy, if he wanted to, could quit medicine and write medical thrillers (some of these pieces literally will have your heart racing to find out what happens (there is an amazing segment in which the author botches an emergency tracheotomy on a morbidly obese woman).
You may never want to enter a hospital again after reading some of these essays. But you may feel better knowing that some of the surgeons are as caring and as passionate about their work as this guy. |
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reviewed by: ericS |
April 2005 [link] |
recommend 1 thumbs up
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ce'st la vie!
suzy gershman
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| Separated into four sections, one for each season, Suzy heads to Paris, France after the death of her husband to start a new life. Each little essay is stocked with great tips on starting over in a foreign city. Lots of wonderful descriptions of meals, shopping and sight-seeing. It made me long for a chic Parisian cafe with a latte and chocolate croissant. |
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reviewed by: lisa may |
April 2005 [link] |
recommend
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divining women
kaye gibbons
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| Let me first say that I love love love Kaye Gibbons' "Charms for the Easy Life". I read it like 10 times a year. "Divining Women" is her first book in a few years and while it has all the simple details and lovely scenes and strong female characters, it was lacking the depth that her other novels have. This novel focuses on 22-year-old Mary who travels from D.C. to North Carolina just after WWII to help with her preggers Aunt Maureen who is married to her vile, jealous and spoiled Uncle Troop. Maureen has been beaten down by Troop's mental and verbal abuse for so long she can hardly stand on her own two feet. Mary helps her gain her strength to verbally and mentally fight back. All in all, a good book but it left me wanting more resolution at the end. |
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reviewed by: lisa may |
July 2004 [link] |
recommend
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memoirs of a geisha
arthur golden
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| I read a book I love! It may be because I adore the Zen landscape (see review for Rituals), but I could not put this book down. The point of view and tone seemed so accurate. I've been a little down on going to the gym, but I was reading this book whilst pedaling on my stationary bike, and it was 35 minutes before I checked the time (usually it's two minutes)! I was choosing reading this book as opposed to playing with my kitties and talking to friends and boyfriend. I feel like all those paintings that I've seen of geishas in Japanese restaurants now are so much more beautiful and complex. The book doesn't have a happy, pat ending, but it has such a real ending. |
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reviewed by: kristen |
September 2000 [link] |
recommend 1 thumbs up
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used and rare: travels in the book world
laurence and nancy goldstone
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| i literally wanted to eat this book it was so excellent. the authors write about their forays into book collecting and intermingle the prose with stories of book histories and eccentrics in the book collecting world. the most they spend on a book is $700 (and it's a special first edition) but they search for many used hardbacks to complete their personal library and most of them cost no more than $25. after reading this i decided to make a list of all my favorites that i wanted in hardback and will start scouring used bookstores TODAY! |
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reviewed by: lisa may |
March 2003 [link] |
recommend
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sammy's hill
kristin gore
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| I was pleasently surprised by "Sammy's Hill". I was a little leery of a book written by Al Gore's daughter only because I had to wonder - was it published just because she's Al Gore's daughter? After finishing the book, I can cheerily say it was published on its own merit. One reason I knew it was a potentially good book was because Matt Groening wrote a cover blurb for it. Also, I remembered that Kristin Gore wrote for "Futurama" so it had to be a little funny, right? Okay, with that introduction, I will tell you that the book is hilarious and really sweet and I enjoyed every minute of it. The story follows Samantha Joyce, a 26-year-old health policy analyst working on "the Hill" for a senator. I hate to say that it was an American-style Bridget Jones, but it was certainly in that genre what with Sammy's trials and tribulations in her professional and personal life. How could you not love a character that plays the card/drinking game "Asshole" with her parents? |
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reviewed by: lisa may |
December 2004 [link] |
recommend
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personal history
katharine graham
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| This tome runs to 688 engaging pages. Katharine Graham is the owner and publisher of The Washington Post and her auto-biography is her account of her family's life with the paper. I always love reading about society in the early 1900s, especially rich society and this is chock full of it. Notable parts of the book include the legendary black and white ball given by Truman Capote in her honor and the inside story on Woodward and Bernstein's Watergate expose. Despite her mousy beginnings, being overshadowed by her husband, kay ends up kicking ass when she takes over the paper. An excellent addition to your summer book list. |
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reviewed by: lisa may |
April 2004 [link] |
recommend
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the lost city of z
david grann
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| David Grann throughly researched this adventurous tale of Colonel Fawcett and his dream of finding the Lost City of Z, rumored to exist in the Amazon. After several journeys to map South America, Fawcett finally sets out to find "Z" and is never heard from again. That was over 80 years ago and since then numerous people have set off in search of Fawcett's remains or whereabouts or to find "Z" themselves and some of them have also never been heard from again. Grann eventually makes his way into the Amazon to meet with a tribe that claims to have last seen Fawcett all those years ago. Grann's modern day trip (with modern conveniences like a satellite phone) juxtaposed with Fawcett's early travels is fascinating - it's hard to imagine what Fawcett and his party endured during his explorations. Even more fascinating is that the tribe is virtually unchanged from Fawcett's time. This story was apparently just optioned by Brad Pitt and Paramount Pictures. Fun! |
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reviewed by: lisa may |
October 2009 [link] |
recommend
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spygirl: true adventures from my life as a private eye
amy gray
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| Cute and funny and a quick read. Although, it's more her dating adventures while being a private investigator in NYC than anything else it was still enjoyable. A couple things work out a little too conveniently in the book but that's what creative liberties are all about. Basically, being a PI is my dream job: spending the day researching on the internet, covert stalking and lots of drinking with people named Assman. Whoo-hooo! |
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reviewed by: lisa may |
February 2004 [link] |
recommend
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bloodroot
amy greene
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| The plant bloodroot is a gorgeous white flower with toxic root sap that runs red, hence the name bloodroot. The book "Bloodroot" is about toxic family roots and relationships and couldn't have a more apt name. This is one of my favorites books so far of 2010. Set in rural and poor Appalachia, the book is broken up into sections told from the view of different characters. The first set of characters give you the back story of their own lives. The next set of characters gives you a little more back story and then a little bit more of the story to chew on. Wonderfully written and heartbreaking, the story revolves around the wild and spirited Myra Odom and her life with her Granny on Bloodroot Mountain. She then meets and marries the crazy and mean John Odom and life changes forever for her as well as her kin. Full of great southern writing – you gotta love a novel that mentions buying a Coke and a packet of peanuts to pour into it! |
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reviewed by: lisa may |
March 2010 [link] |
recommend
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the lobster chronicles: life on a very small island
linda greenlaw
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This second book on fishing details Greenlaw's life as a lobster fisherman (as she notes in her first bestseller "The Hungry Ocean" - I am a woman. I am a fisherman... I am not a fisherwoman, fisherlady, or fishergirl. If anything else, I am a thirty-seven-year-old tomboy. It's a word I have never outgrown.)
For seventeen years she was the captain of a boat that fished for swordfish. Now she returns to the island she grew up on in Maine to harvest lobsters and possibly settle down - which proves to be difficult since there are only 40 full-time residents on the island, Isle Au Haut. Filled with interesting stories about the townspeople and facts about lobstering this quick little read is very satisfying.
You should read "The Hungry Ocean", too.
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reviewed by: lisa may |
January 2003 [link] |
recommend
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the confessions of max tivoli
andrew sean greer
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| Max Tivoli was born with a rare complication: mentally he ages like the rest of us but on the outside he ages backwards. When he was born, he looked like a little old man but his body grows younger as his mind grows older. When he's 70, he looks like a 12 year old boy. The story is told as Max writes out his memoirs before his mind gets too old. He tells his lifestory, recounts his one true love and ruminates over the frustrations of watching everyone grow old around him while he gets younger. He reaches a golden age of looking like he's in his 20s but actually being in his 40s but this stage doesn't last for long and the results are heartbreaking. Although this is a Today Show Book Club book I still highly reccommend it - the prose is breathtaking and the story is truly original. |
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reviewed by: lisa may |
January 2005 [link] |
recommend
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man with a load of mischief
martha grimes
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| Martha is a guilty pleasure. I only read Richard Jury mysteries as I find the rest suck. This book is one I believe that takes place just before Christmas. I remember liking it the best. These books are all named after pubs (and I love pubs. It’s five on Friday whilst I write this.) The best part of her books is that they have a lovely cast of characters and a handsome lonely detective as the main one. AND I’m a huge anglophile. These take place in England. |
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reviewed by: kristen |
September 2000 [link] |
recommend
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rainbow’s end, the
martha grimes
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| I was in the library just feeling guilty because what I really wanted to do was read some comfortable British mystery, but what I felt I should be doing was be writing a book of my own (yes that’s one of my dreams). I knew that I had read all of the Inspector Wexford series by Ruth Rendell, but I thought surely there was a Martha Grimes Inspector Jury book I hadn’t read. Ahhh. This was the last book on the shelf that I hadn’t read. It is now my favorite one too (besides the Christmas one). The characters had more soul than they have had in earlier books. Inspector Jury himself seemed to be in soul searching funk. It was the usual solace in a English village, but this time Jury went to New Mexico. Good read. |
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reviewed by: kristen |
October 2000 [link] |
recommend
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water for elephants
sara gruen
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| No doubt you've seen this book everywhere. It's all the rage. Is it worthy? Yes, as it's well-written and Gruen's topic of circuses in the 1930s is fascinating and well-researched. Jacob is the narrator and he's either "ninety or ninety-three". He spends his time at the nursing home recollecting his time with the Benzini Brothers Most Spectacular Show on Earth, which he ran away with after his parents died in a car accident and left him broke and alone. He falls for one of the performers who is married to an abusive and crazy animal trainer and it sets off a sad, downward spiral of effecting many lives and results in the demise of the circus. There's a happy sub-ending and then a weird final ending - he runs away to the circus AGAIN at age 90 (or 93) - a little shmaltzy for me but it didn't make the book any less fantastic. |
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reviewed by: lisa may |
July 2007 [link] |
recommend
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the many lives & secret sorrows of josephine b.
sandra gulland
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| A fantabulous historical fiction novel, the first in a series of three books, following the complex and rich life of Josephine Bonaparte, Napoleon's wife. Told through diary form, we meet her at age 14 and the first book takes us through the French Revolution and up to the time she meets Napoleon. It is quite an intriguing adventure - history buffs will love it for the wonderful details from that time period; fiction fans will love it for the incredible story and in-depth characters. Can't wait to devour the next two books! |
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reviewed by: lisa may |
April 2005 [link] |
recommend
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house of cards
some guy
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Soooooo, my husband bought me another "joke" book for my birthday. As with the others (Dr. Who, Vulcan's Pride, and Spock), I read it. It was like reading a par tv-show. Oh by the way, this book is about my new love, Farscape. There were no new character revelations, deeper insights, nope just another "episode" of the kids' adventures. It was the worst of the joke books (the Dr. Who one was the best). I'm not even glad I've read it except for the fact that now my curiousity is satisfied. The book was full of "see, I, your author, KNOW every nuance of the show" moments, but nothing new. nothing deep.
Great! Now I've done a book review (my first in ages, and I should really be working on my schoolwork - tis true). |
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reviewed by: kristen |
November 2001 [link] |
recommend
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