Late 2010 Book Reviews

Well, I didn't do too well on the rest of my summer reading folks. Although, not for lack of trying! Life has just been super busy! Isn't that what we all say?

I had down that I wanted to read:

The Girl With The Dragon Tattoo

CUNT

Water for Elephants

The One That I Want

In the last review, I had just finished reading The Last Song, and wanted to see the movie.

Two words: tear. jerker. Watch with an entire box of Kleenex. Seriously. Good good stuff. I cried when I read the book but the movie was worse....... see it.

Here is how the rest of the list went.......

The Girl With The Dragon Tattoo

Book Summary:
Cases rarely come much colder than the decades-old disappearance of teen heiress Harriet Vanger from her family's remote island retreat north of Stockholm, nor do fiction debuts hotter than this European bestseller by muckraking Swedish journalist Larsson. At once a strikingly original thriller and a vivisection of Sweden's dirty not-so-little secrets (as suggested by its original title, Men Who Hate Women), this first of a trilogy introduces a provocatively odd couple: disgraced financial journalist Mikael Blomkvist, freshly sentenced to jail for libeling a shady businessman, and the multipierced and tattooed Lisbeth Salander, a feral but vulnerable superhacker. Hired by octogenarian industrialist Henrik Vanger, who wants to find out what happened to his beloved great-niece before he dies, the duo gradually uncover a festering morass of familial corruption—at the same time, Larsson skillfully bares some of the similar horrors that have left Salander such a marked woman.
My Review:

yeah. Tried 3 times to get in to this book with no luck. Tabled until further notice.

cunt

Book Summary:

Somewhere between Valerie Solanas's bitter SCUM Manifesto and Eve Ensler's fanciful The Vagina Monologues lies this self-indulgent exercise in feminist reclamation. Striving to remove the negative connotations from a word usually used as a scathing insult, Muscio traces the history of the term "cunt" and asserts that it was once a term of respect before the patriarchy turned it into a profane, misogynistic epithet. This transformation, she insists, occurred as part of a conspiracy to make women feel a sense of self-loathing and uncleanness; only by reconnecting with love for their genitalia can women achieve personal and political power. Muscio muddles her work with rambling digressions, including those about utilizing sea sponges instead of tampons during menstruation, using herbal tea and visualization in order to miscarry an unwanted fetus and identifying with Imelda Marcos. What insights the book does provide must be discerned beneath Musico's jarring prose, which fluctuates between the academic and the colloquial, sometimes in the same paragraph. On responses to her manuscript, she writes, "Reactions to a book called Cunt always lead to an intense grilling. Ain't never encountered ambivalence." Although this work may constitute a move toward women's acceptance of themselves and their bodies, it is a very small step.

My Review:

I am all about female empowerment but this book was not for me. Needless to say after 2 chapters I discreetly returned it to the library.

Water For Elephants

HAVEN'T got to it yet! It's on the short list though.........

The One That I Want

Book Summary:

In the latest from Scotch (Time of My Life), a clichéd story of a baby-craving 30-something, gives way to an aching, honest look into the death and rebirth of relationships. Tilly Farmer is a high school guidance counselor who married her high school sweetheart, has never left her hometown of Westlake, Wash., and is sure that the key to her happiness is getting pregnant. When an unexpected encounter with an old grade school friend (now a psychic) leaves Tilly with the ability to see the future, what she foresees is not a baby but losing her husband to a job in Seattle. Though the far-fetched plot device feels tired, Scotch combines the fallout of Tilly's visions with the burdens of an alcoholic father, angry younger sister, and deceased mother to bring her character into focus. Scotch answers hard questions about the nature of personal identity and overwhelming loss with a wise, absorbing narrative.

My Review:

Great great book! Not at all how I expected it to go, which was a nice twist for me. Great winter time read.

Next up in the queue:


Eat Pray Love

I am in the third and final "chapter" of this book. PB Bought it for me for Christmas. I refused to watch it with him until I read the book first. Tee hee :) I really like it and can not wait to see the movie!

 Savor the Moment

This was also a gift from PB for Christmas. I am a tried and true Nora Roberts junkie, and can whip through a book of hers so fast it would make your head spin! Looking forward to book 3 in the set!

One for The Money 

This series I am interested to try. I think there are 17(?) so far. It is about detective Stephanie Plum..... I do like a mystery and I hear Janet Evanovich is a great writer.

So, that is where I am at. I also do some beta reading for a writer friend of mine and I enjoy all of her stuff as well. Check her out at http://www.shellistevens.com/

What did you read this summer, and what is up next on your list?