Monday, January 12, 2009

Do books really have worms? I've never noticed...

Good reads! I have spent the majority of my "off" time catching up on my reading and thought I would share the love.

Woman Warrior was the first book I came upon after spouting off my list.
Woman Warrior is a nonfictional memoir by Maxine Hong Kingston. It's divided into 5 separate, but interlinked stories about women and ghosts (not the jump out and scare you kind...) in the writers life. She added elements of fiction to really give each story an elaborate, rich backdrop. (Things like following a bird across a mountaintop into a world where this child grows up only catching glimpses of her family from an old mans cup.) Kingston is Asian American and in the book she tells stories from her own and her mothers point of view. The characters are amazing. There is even a story about a girl who becomes a "warrior" of sort and her mother and father carve the names of those who have wronged them onto her back with a knife. She avenges those evil ones.

The stories, separately, are beautifully woven and I truly enjoyed this read, even though I am not sure how many others might find it as fascinating as I did.

Next, I came upon The Secret Life of Bees. This story is set in South Carolina during the Integration Act. Our main character Lily, lives with her awful father T. Ray and she and her housekeeper Rosaleen, escape possible death and a lifetime of kneeling on grits, after a run in with some of the towns' nastiest racists. They escape to Tiberon, SC. where they are taken in by the marvelous beekeeping Boatwright sisters to discover more about Lily's dead mother and her past there in Tiberon.

This story was inspiring and I would tell anyone who loves a heartwarming, quick read to go out and find it. It's truly an amazing story.

I just started Wally Lamb's She's Come Undone, and I am already loving it. Stay tuned for more book reviews!

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