The Land Of Women

Author Regina McBride.  (I was not able to find a direct Author site; the search kept pointing to the Publisher).

Publisher, Simon & Schuster, http://books.simonandschuster.com/Land-of-Women/Regina-McBride/9780743249577

Another Book Club choice, from my local area and it was quite the surprise.  Well out of the normal comfort sphere the group read, so I was delighted and then enchanted as I opened and started to read.

I wanted to quote everything I read; Regina McBride’s crafting of words and sentences, images and feelings is elegant and poetic.  Reading her work is like eating your favorite food, every snippet, every bite is savory and delicious, you don’t want it to end. 

Her Cast is small, only 6 that feature, that you will know intimately.  The supporting Cast is larger, but here too, the Author manages to breathe a vibrant life into each one; they may only appear for a few moments but they fill them fully.

Fabric webbed the story, binding itself from Mother to Daughter, spilling to life all around.  It described people, it defined both Jane and Fiona while it illustrated their lives. 

The Novel’s first sentence, “When she closes her eyes, Fiona recalls the pale smells of her mother’s skin and hair; a smell like new muslin washed in salt water and left to dry in the wind.” guides you softly through Fiona’s memories. 

Superstition and myth follow closely, entangling in Fiona’s life with men.  She cast charms and spells with her mother to bring her father back, her first boyfriend lived and recreated myth, while her last boyfriend dedicated his life to it, as had his Uncle before him. 

“In either place, it was the other he longed for …”  This is how Carlos describes his Uncle to Fiona, but also describes her Mother’s life and possibly hers as well.  For me, it defines the novel.

I want to go on, to tell everything, but this story won’t speak to all people and it’s best that you read it yourself. 

So read it, collect a few friends, open a crisp white wine, serve those delicious treats and indulge in your discussions.

—-

The above is an opinion of the Authors.

The French Gardener

Author; Santa Montefiore, http://www.santamontefiore.co.uk/

Publisher; Simon and Schuster, http://www.simonandschuster.com/

A ‘Happy Ever After’ story, depending …

… on your personal views of Marriage and Children: 

• If you believe that a Family should sacrifice values, morals, self-respect and trust to keep itself together, then plunk this firmly in the “Happily Ever After” section of your bookshelf and skip the next bullet. 
• If not, then file this on you bookshelf, pack it tightly with all the dysfunctional family self-help books you can borrow from the other people who are skipping this bullet, and hope something will seep through and help those fictional children from replicating their Parents behavior. 

That said, the novel packs pretty much everything marketable into it, take a breath; a little mystery, some angst, a love that spans a lifetime, a love in blossom, a love at risk, a love of opposites, take a breath, some moral jabbering, a few gems on how to raise children, the value of a well decorated home, why a woman should/should not work, take a breath, the challenges/excuses of a working Father, the question of trust between spouses, how a little love can change a child’s moral compass, and how a garden is a metaphor of life, take a breath, Santa Montefiore wraps it all into this 406 page novel.

You could say She missed the kitchen sink, but it’s in there too; the currently out of favor Ethnic Group is cleaning it and providing an excellent literary example of why you shouldn’t judge people. 

The novel is organized, flows easily and leaves you with time spent in a lightly entertaining way.  I’d happily hand this book over to someone looking for a beach read, who is expecting a lot of interruptions.

—-

The above is an opinion of the Authors.

Google Just Announced

Google is already happily in the eBook market, however they will be offering an OPEN solution to eBook purchases!

That’s good news.  Maybe.

Currently, Kindle and Nook are closed, restraining eBook purchases to their own sites. This allows them to bundle the cost of their wireless downloads into the cost of the eBook, since you never ‘see’ the cost, it appears ‘free’.

It’s not, you’re paying for it.

So, how is Google going to deliver that eBook to you if you have a Kindle or Nook?

I suspect it’s going to arrive much the same way as Google eBooks arrive today, over a wired connection to a computer. Unless, Google has worked out a payment plan for Kindle and Nook wireless access and sorted out a solution for Digital Rights Management across different platforms, now that would be News-worthy.

However, the Announcements don’t go into details so we’ll all have to wait until the mystery day arrives, sometime in the next two months ‘they’ say…

Here are some links for the Google Announcement:

BBC, http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/technology/10098111.stm

 eWeek, http://www.eweek.com/c/a/Search-Engines/Google-Editions-Launching-This-Summer-to-Challenge-Amazon-Apple-499110/

PCworld, http://www.pcworld.com/article/195636/googles_ebook_store_five_burning_questions.html

—-

The above is an opinion of the Authors.

A Confederacy Of Dunces

Publisher, Grove Press, www.groveatlantic.com.
Author, John Kennedy Toole, http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/John_Kennedy_Toole

I’ve struggled with this review simply because I don’t really know how to describe the book without turning everyone away and yet it’s amusing, delightful, charming, adorable and humorous.  Thus my quandary.

What did I like the most?  The Characters had their own ‘voice’ and that’s really hard to achieve, very few Authors have managed that feat.  Think about it, in most of the books you’ve read the dialogue structure and verbage is the same, you only know it’s different because identifiers are added; ‘he said’, ‘she answered’.  It’s because the dialogue is written by one person and they write like they think, and it’s very hard to think in a manner that is not native.

What else?  It’s FUNNY, deliciously dry, ‘tongue in cheek’ but dark at times shadowing into the ugly.

The Author developes the characters so succinctly and so fast you hardly realize it; then the story takes a turn and you just KNOW what’s going to happen.  You can see it coming and you don’t like it but you keep reading – like being  in traffic as you watch someone ahead do something stupid with their car and knowing you’ll have to pass that accident, you don’t want to and you have to.  John Kennedy Toole crafts the story such that you pass the carnage at the time that you can ‘see’ everyone made it out alive, bumped, bruised and perhaps a bit bloody, but all in all OK.  You grin as you see the characters stepping out of their cars;  a clown, a priest and a Vegas Show Girl…

I LOVED reading this, but I cringed a lot and had to pause and put it down.  By the time I was reaching the end I was anxious for the main character and utterly confused at how I wanted the Author to end the story.  I’m still not sure and I’ve been thinking about it for a week.

I’d describe this novel as ’comedy noir’.  It left me confused, unsure, vexed and yet desperate for others to experience the delicious humor.  But really, after this who would want to read it?  Who would possibly believe it is a delightful, amusing and original novel?

No one.

You’ll just have to go for it…

—-

The above article is the opinion of the Authors.

Worse than slow

My computer automatically updated its Microsoft OS yesterday.

Today, very little works well.

The connection is so slow it’s like the old dial-up.  I’ve unloaded the dishwasher, reloaded it and I’m still waiting. 

I connected my phone to update iTunes (I loaded six CD’s last night that I’d found in the car) and forced the stop on the ‘sync’ after 30 minutes.  It’s usually a 2-3 minute process.

Anyone know how to ‘uninstall’ a software update?

Sooo attached.

I am beginning to understand why people are so attached to their iPhones – they’re so capable.

It’s like carrying around a computer, phone, camera, music player, address book and note pad all in one little package.

And, it’s making me organized.

No longer do I have sticky-notes all over the place; the phone carries all my jotted notes.   It also keeps pictures of the business cards that I want for reference.  I can text, email, respond directly to web pages and surf the www.

I’ve loaded Shazam! so no music is out of reach, that tune you just heard?  Shazam! it and the artist, album and audio clip ‘pop-up’. 

My phone can answer almost any question put to it…

I had wanted an iPad, but the iPhone is way more useful!

Saved by the iPhone

We were downtown; a place I never go as I hate, hate, hate the tight roads, the one way’s, the volume of cars, people cutting across the roads and all that jazz. 

We were also late, due to an accident on the highway, one of 3 that we needed to take to get downtown.

We were lost.

I touched the map icon on the iPhone; after connecting, it located us and zeroed in – “go straight, take the 3rd right turn, go over the bridge and make a right.”  Time from turn on to located – less than 1 minute.

The Car-pilot followed my verbal instructions and we arrived for the Brunch only 10 minutes late.

And relaxed, not stressed about driving in circles.

The Car-pilot asked how I was liking the new phone, my comment was ‘it’s sooo easy!’

Good Lord! I’m hooked!

Car-man took me out for dinner. 

During that ‘together’ time, I played with my phone for all but the eating portion. 

I promptly read every e-mail the moment my phone chimed to say something had arrived.

I dazzled him with displays of Shazam!

I played the local doppler radar (weather radar) to prove it was sunny.

I checked the table for level.  It wasn’t.

I arranged a Brunch Date for Saturday and checked the menu’s of the downtown eateries, on their websites.

He threatened to get a bumper sticker for my car that reads “you can have my iPhone when you can pry it out of my cold, dead hands”

The Pleasing Hour

Credit-googlebooks.com

Author, Lily King
Publisher, Simon and Schuster, http://www.simonandschuster.com/

Each person brings to a book their experiences and character; they influence how you respond with the Author’s story. I love words and the images they create and I enjoy surprises. 

Lily King gave me little presents all through this novel, glimpses of daily life rendered as art, her characters created by interaction and behaviors; nothing brazenly explained.  Her narrative is whispered, the words create the images and become the dominant voice.  I remember the feelings and mood, the scenes and pictures; the structure was invisible to me.  

This is her first novel. 

—- 

This article is an opinion of the Author’s. 

© alias Hubbaloo and www.Hubbaloo.wordpress.com, October 2009, to Date. Unauthorized use and/or duplication of this material without express and written permission from this blog’s author and/or owner is strictly prohibited. Excerpts and links may be used, provided that full and clear credit is given to alias Hubbaloo and www.Hubbaloo.wordpress.com with appropriate and specific direction to the original content.