Audio books and good bloggers

I would love three recommendations from you:

1. What audio books would interest my preschoolers? They love Charlotte's Web and Stuart Little and Dr. Seuss and I am getting sick of all three so I need more ideas. Must have clever dialogue and a good, wholesome, non-violent plot.

2. I would love good bloggers who write write well and are funny. (Because you can write well and not be funny, or you can be funny and not write well.) I'd like some bloggers who are both. Or, if not funny, then witty or charming. Or interesting. The topic isn't as important to me as the quality of writing.

3. Does anyone follow any other book blogs? Because I'd love to find a handful of blogs who have good book recommendations. Requirements: they can't read smut. No smut. And no froof. And If these bloggers tell me that Nicholas Sparks or Jack Weyland is the best author that they've ever read, I will say, "No thank you." I will say it nicely, but I will say no.

Best Way to Find New Books

My favorite way to find new books is to go the bookstore. There they will be, lined up, ready for you to purchase.

I usually don't want to buy books, I'm just looking for a good read. So I make a list and head to the library---or better yet, a list and I get online and request them from the library.

The problem with the library is that they don't want you to buy the books, so they don' t have to market them. In that way, a library is like a secret club, waiting for you to indoctrinate yourself.

The downside of looking for new books at the bookstore is that the bookstore people usually haven't read them. "Is Little Bee any good?" I ask.

"What?" says the minimum wage clerk.

"Little Bee," I say. "It's right here."

"Oh. I haven't read it."

Thanks a lot. That's helpful.

A librarian could tell me more is my guess. So look at the bookstore, find it at the library, and then come back---right here---and tell me if you found anything good.

By the way, Mel, I know you are out there. Dash me a list sometime of the things you like. Long, long ago you were filed in my Hard-to-Get-On list of women with good literary taste. I'd love to hear your suggestions.

The Forgotten Garden

Go find a copy of The Forgotten Garden by Kate Morton. Sigh before you open it. Relax. Stretch out in down dog if you must to get all limber. Breathe in, open the book, and read to your heart's content.

It's like knowing you like tulips, and sending you to Filoli in April. It's like having you tell me you are craving dark chocolate and guiding you to Ghardelli Square. It's like knowing you are a cupcake fiend, blindfolding you, and landing at Kara's Cupcakes.

It's like The Secret Garden for grown-ups. It will take you back to the first time you read The Secret Garden by Burnett, and the childhood bliss of learning about Mary and Collin and all the rest. You will go back to the bliss, but not to your gangly phase, and that will make you so happy.

Good plot. Lovely writing. Hint of mystery. Madmen. Old castles. Secret keys. Lost loves. Found loves. Wicked Stepmother figures. Fairy tales. Secrets buried. It's got it all.

I do believe Anne with an E would like this book. I certainly did.

Forest Lover

When I was doing some grading a few years ago, grading 8th grade essays . . . I went nearly crazy because some of the kids couldn't get away from some idiotic way they learned in the 4th or 5th grade to start essays: Their intros were. Three. Words. Like:

Faith. Hope. Love. This is what it's all about.

Adventure. Confusion. Mystery. This book had it all.

Life. Death. Chocolate. What more is there?

Boring. Boring. Boring. I'd ding these for lack of originality.

Ding.

Dong.

Sometimes I find books that rely on what the author thinks is a tried and true method. I always ding them in my head . . . like the old "the main character comes to an understanding of ________ as she discovers her own sensuality."

It's been done.

It's been overdone.

It's burned to a crisp and smoking up the kitchen it's been done so many times.

And, so sorry to say, this is what happened with Susan Vhreeland's Forest Lover, about the artist Emily Carr who painted the art of the people who inhabited Canada. I really was interested in the art. The people. The culture. The conflict. The change.

I could care less, truly, about what Vhreeland thought was going on with Emily's sensuality discoveries.

As far as the book goes, the prose is uninteresting. Word choice is unstellar.

In other words . . . what I thought was . . .

Too much lover, not enough forest.

Laura asked

Laura asked whether I'd recommend Hotel on the Corner or Middle Place for a book group. I'd say it depends. If you are looking for a book that everyone will like to read, do Hotel: this is for the "That was so nice, where are the treats?" book group. But for the group that likes to discuss, do Middle Place. Strong, good themes to talk about.

But with Middle Place, you might have to skip around page 90 if you edit for content. As always, not sure what . . . I skipped what I saw coming.

Resume

We now resume our previous book broadcast.

I see from my stats that the people in the United States have given up on me and think that I've quit blogging. Seems most of my readers are in India.

Hello, India readers.

I actually have been reading lots of books, even though I haven't been blogging about them. I know that I was purposefully vague about what was happening, exactly, with my daughter. That was intentional. I'm shy about revealing everything to people that I don't know---I'm even shy about giving all the details to people that I DO know. But I will tell you this: prognosis is good. We are winning our medical battles. The road will be long, and the way hilly, but we will make it. Nothing that my daughter has will hinder her life. We just have to get through this next little bit.

Enough said. On to the matter at hand: BOOKS!

Here's a summary of what I've read in the past four months.

1. The Gift of Asher Lev by Chaim Potok. I can never get all the way through this one when Potok starts getting really technical about abstract art, which is about in the middle of the book. Then I have to put it down because my Humanities 101 class in college only covered so much. I do like the continuing story of Asher Lev, though, as this is a sequel to My Name is Asher Lev, which I loved. This reading, I especially resonated with Asher's wife, Devora, who asks again and again: Do you think there is a plan, my Asher? There must be a plan.

I was asking myself the same question at the time about the plan. With Devora, I hope there is a plan.

2. The Secret Life of Bees by an author I can't remember. But the book is popular enough. You can find the author. This was my second reading of Bees, and I got it this time. In the book, a young girl longs for her mother, named Deborah. Since I was reading this on the nights that I'd left my daughter in the hospital, I was longing for my daughter.

I understood the longing in the book this time. I understood it really well. Good book. Find a copy.

3. The Partly Cloudy Patriot by Sarah Vowell. Unlike me, Vowell is a political die-hard liberal.

She and I see just about every issue in politics from completely different perspectives. But she is one mighty fine writer and I liked reading this book of essays about her reflections on events in American history. She's funny. I especially liked her essay on the presidential libraries.

Katy, have you read this? If not, find a copy. You'd probably be able to use some in your class if you ever teach American history.

4. Sarah's Quilt by Nancy E. Turner. As you'll recall, I loved These is My Words, the prequel to this book. When I started Sarah's Quilt, I almost put it down because . . . alas, alas, there was no Jack, why read the book at all? But it didn't take me long before I was hooked again, reading this fictional narrative about Sarah Prine in the 1900 Arizona territories. Loved it. I laughed. I cried. Writing is good. Story is good. Two thumbs up.

5. The Hunger Games, Catching Fire, and Mockingjay by Suzanne Collins---a trilogy on the YA scene. Plot, all plot. Writing gets better as the series goes on. But GOOD. I'd recommend it if you are looking for a roller coaster literary ride. SHWOOSH!---there you go. I was captivated, and that's hard to do.

6. Dreaming Water by Gail Tsukiyama. I was expecting absolutely nothing from this book because it's been on the NY bestseller list, and I usually find that I strike against the book. I find that what appeals to the masses usually doesn't appeal to me. So I was pleasantly surprised when I actually liked this book. In it, a mother/daughter pair deal with the daughter's illness and their husband/father's passing. Takes place over a twenty-four hour time period, which is an interesting convention to use for a novel. And here, it works.

Like I said, I didn't expect much. But was pleased to get quite a bit.

7. Waiting for Snow in Havana by Carlos Eire, about a boy in Cuba, growing up in 1962 when there was a lot of political turmoil. The story was interesting enough, but I got bored with Eire's way of telling it. Didn't finish. If you are interested in Cuba, try this. If not, don't bother.

8. Antonio's Gun and Delfino's Dream: True Tales of Mexican Migration by Sam Quinones. Although I don't agree with some of Quinones conclusions about the immigration issue, I did appreciate his treatment of the subject as he told the stories of individuals who leave Mexico to come the US. I read the chapters about the people that I found interesting. Some people I found boring, so I skipped them.

Solid writing. Good subject choice.

9. The Space Between Us by Thrity Umrigar. I had tried this before, and couldn't get through it, but I gave Space another shot.

Another shot which missed.

It just has so much potential, this story, about two women from vastly different lives and castes in India. My problem is that you know who the father of Maya's baby is by the time you are on page twenty. And since that's the main "mystery" of the book, what's the point?

10. The Year of Magical Thinking by Joan Didion. This book is about Joan's husband dying and how she deals with it. It was too depressing for me because of where I was in our medical journey. So I put it down. The writing is delicious, though, and satisfying. I'll go back to this one, and enjoy it. Later.

11. Still Life with Rice by Helie Lee, about a young woman's Korean ancestory, And The Street of A Thousand Blossoms by Tsukiyama. I wasn't especially impressed with either. Can't remember why--that was how little impression they made. Don't feel the need to go back.

12. The Prize Winner of Defiance, Ohio, about a woman who writes for jingle contest in the 1950's. There's nothing of literary substance in this one. It's cute. Like dogs who wear sweaters are cute. It's cute like smiley face stickers are cute. It's cute like "Baby on Board" signs on cars are cute.

If you are at a beach house one day, and you are suntanned and drinking a lot of orange juice and club soda, and you are expecting nothing but fluff and you find this on a bookshelf, give it a shot.

13. Hotel on the Corner of Bitter and Sweet by Jamie Ford. I made the mistake of reading all the criticism that people posted on the reviews on Amazon.com about this book. Lots of people didn't like it because of the anachronistic errors (like the Internet in 1986). And I can say, yes, there are errors like that in this book. It just shows that Ford has a lousy editor who didn't check for that stuff. But I liked the book anyway. Good story---about a man who once was a boy who watched his love go to a Japanese internment camp. Good characters. Endearing. Developing writing---good for a debut. Ford will get better.

I'd recommend this book. I liked it. Good book club selection, too.

14. The Middle Place by Kelly Corrigan. Here is a gem! Corrigan explores what it means to be a daughter. And a parent. At the same time. What it means to fight cancer. What it means to watch your father fight cancer. What it means to dream. To have your dreams come true. To have your dreams dashed. To fight. To surrender.

Sometimes in my reading, I find a book I need to buy.

This one I need to buy . . . so I have something lend when people ask me for a good book.

***So there you go. That's where I've been, more or less, for the past four months. Hope there are one or two to intrigue you. Enjoy.

Blessings

In the city of San Felipe, on the island of Fogo, I never saw a Catholic priest. I heard their voices transmitted via radio waves every Saturday night. The only people who had radios were the people who owned the bars---mass coming out of a bar, great. So I knew the Catholic priests were on the island. What I did see, occasionally, was the work of the matriarchs of the Catholic parish. Usually women in their 50's and 60's, usually women of some means, usually educated, always respected. They rarely let us in their homes, but I saw their faith and their work.

Once I saw one of these women walk the road where we were. The children clamored around her and she smiled down at them. I was close enough to hear her interaction with one of the children there. He was five or six, and squirrely. He obviously wanted to be near her, but wasn't paying rapt attention. She got his attention and said to him, "Recebe bencao." Receive the blessing. He raised his chin and she touched his head. It was holy, that touch. I didn't understand the culture behind it, but I understood the meaning. Receive the blessing.

When women meet Danielle, like the lovely chaplain at Lucille Packard's Children's Hospital, or the wonderful woman who brought me dinner from her daughter (my friend) two nights ago, so often, in parting, they reach out to touch her. They put a hand on her little chest and say, "Blessings. Blessings to you."

Yes, Danielle, receive the blessing.

So often on this road that won't end in the foreseeable future and which has a blurry past, I have had people tell me that they are praying for my little lady. People I know well. People I don't know well. People who love my parents. People who have only seen me once. Or twice. Or every day. They pray.

My daughter, receive the blessings.

The only time I've snagged on the word "blessing" on this journey is when people hear of what we're going through and they say, in sincere compassion, "We were just so blessed to have healthy children. I can't imagine what this is like for you," and "It's a blessing my child never had to go though this." And it is a blessing to have healthy children. A blessing for us that our two boys just came home . . . no surgery . . . no IV's . . . no agony.

But what I want to say, and eventually will find the words to tell these blessed people is that God has blessed us with Danielle. She is a blessing, come how she did. I'm not at the point yet where I think this experience is a blessing. I may never get there. What I want to tell them is that it is, indeed, a blessing to have Gerber baby born to you. But it also a blessing to have a child who comes to you who needs something more.

When I remember this, the doubt and fear that has swirled so fiercely, parts for a moment. And that is when I feel closest to God. For a moment there is quiet and peace. For a moment, I'm not afraid. And for a moment, I feel Father say to me: "Deborah, my daughter, receive this blessing."

Receive the blessing.

Receive the blessing.

Receive the blessing.