Archive for the ‘Conceptual: for grown ups’ Category
Friday, January 12th, 2007
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| Author: | Carole Matthews |
| Reading Level (Conceptual): | For grown-ups
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| Reading Level (Vocabulary): | For grown-ups
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| Genre: | fiction |
| Year of publication: | 2005 |
"There are pink tents and pink high-heels on the cover of that book, Mom. Are you reduced to reading chic-lit?," my most opinionated daughter demanded. Don't know how exactly I ended up reading With Or Without You, but there I was. And, once you start reading a book like this, it's easier to just finish it than it is to put it down.
And, yes, the standard required elements of chic-lit are provided:
- Insecure heroine
- So-so job
- Unfulfilling romantic life
- Moralistic philosophizing
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The thing that struck me about the plot was that the author must have been able to pay for at least one, possibly several, trips to the Himalayas, perhaps from the profits on her previous pink best-seller and she did clearly learn from those trips. And, no doubt, she with clear conscience deducted the full costs of all those trips once the book was published.
So, not the best book I ever read, but might prove inspirational for aspiring young women authors.
-- Emily Berk |
If you found this review helpful and/or interesting, consider supporting our book habit: Buy this book!: With Or Without You |
Posted in Conceptual: for grown ups, Female protagonist, Fiction, Reading level: Grown up | Comments Closed
Saturday, December 30th, 2006
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| Author: | Anne Tyler |
| Reading Level (Conceptual): | For grown-ups
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| Reading Level (Vocabulary): | For grown-ups
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| Genre: | fiction, historical |
| Year of publication: | 2004 |
Thing is, most marriages in the USA are "amateur", aren't they? In fact, most decisions made by anyone, especially in his or her personal life, are going to be made amateurly, and some better than others. And just because a decision is sudden, that does not always mean that it was wrong.
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After reading one of Anne Tyler's novels, we know so much about the characters that we feel that, if the character walked past us in a shopping mall, we might recognize him or her. And Tyler doesn't have to tell us much about each character to work her magic. This one wears a red coat; that one has a limp. In this way are decisions made and in this way are people known, both in Tyler's novels and in real life.
A heartbreaking occurrence in many Tyler novels is the sudden disappearance of a child or teenager, through death or other circumstance, and the repercussions of that disappearance on the parents. The disappearance described in this novel is cruel, believable, and utterly wrenching.
-- Emily Berk
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If you found this review helpful and/or interesting, consider supporting our book habit: Buy this book!: Amateur Marriage, The |
Posted in Child-raising, Conceptual: for grown ups, Culture, Fiction, History, Reading level: Grown up | Comments Closed
Monday, November 27th, 2006
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| Author: | Kathleen Tyau |
| Reading Level (Conceptual): | For grown-ups
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| Reading Level (Vocabulary): | For grown-ups
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| Genre: | fiction, historical |
| Year of publication: | 2000 |
The Chinese-Hawaiian narrator tells, in her own (sometimes-pidgin) words, what it was like to come of age as an Oriental, but not Japanese, in Hawaii in the days just before and after Pearl Harbor. Eye opening. |
-- Emily Berk |
If you found this review helpful and/or interesting, consider supporting our book habit: Buy this book!: Makai |
Posted in Conceptual: for grown ups, Culture, Female protagonist, Fiction, History, Reading level: Grown up | Comments Closed
Sunday, October 29th, 2006
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| Author: | Martha Sherrill |
| Reading Level (Conceptual): | For grown-ups
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| Reading Level (Vocabulary): | For grown-ups
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| Genre: | fiction |
| Year of publication: | 2006 |
Not a travel book (Ruin can be taken to mean many things in the story, including the last name of the girl narrator), but a fairy tale about parenting in the maelstrom of drugs, sexual freedom, alcohol, style, and serial divorce that was California in the 1970's (and perhaps still today).
The moral of the story? Perhaps that teaching one's children to observe closely and act on their observations is more important than preaching a strict morality that is no longer adhered to by grown-ups, teenagers, or even those who preach it.
-- Emily Berk
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If you found this review helpful and/or interesting, consider supporting our book habit: Buy this book!: Ruins of California, The |
Posted in Child-raising, Conceptual: for grown ups, Culture, Female protagonist, Fiction, Gifted, History, Parenting gifted children, Reading level: Grown up | Comments Closed
Tuesday, October 17th, 2006
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| Author: | Carol Shields |
| Reading Level (Conceptual): | For grown-ups
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| Reading Level (Vocabulary): | For grown-ups
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| Genre: | fiction |
| Year of publication: | 1997 |
Larry Weller is a pretty ordinary guy, who has fallen into a profession, also his obsession, as a designer of labyrinths. In this novel, Carol Shields, whose work always captivates me, tells Larry's story, from cradle through a momentous mid-life party. (See also my review of Unless.) |
Shields convincingly explains how Larry falls into his first marriage and a career as a floral designer, then transitions to a marriage of more depth with a feminist scholar, and steers toward his bliss as a master maze designer.
We learn that one can wander through one's life as if in a maze, and find treasures in unexpected places. Although, since we are highly aware that a maze designer may have carefully planned our discoveries, we can't be sure that we come across the treasures we find by chance.
Very lovely, although the physical descriptions of marital life go on and on and a bit too poetically for my taste.
-- Emily Berk |
If you found this review helpful and/or interesting, consider supporting our book habit: Buy this book!: Larry's Party |
Posted in Conceptual: for grown ups, Culture, Fiction, Reading level: Grown up | Comments Closed
Tuesday, October 17th, 2006
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| Author: | Carol Shields |
| Reading Level (Conceptual): | For grown-ups
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| Reading Level (Vocabulary): | For grown-ups
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| Genre: | fiction |
| Year of publication: | 2002 |
"What did Cinderella's mother die of?," my daughter asked me, when she was 4. I myself had never troubled to think about this. But I came to realize that, in stories for children, from fairy tales to adventures to Walt Disney musicals, the mothers' presence is usually notable for its absence. Their deaths are required so that plots can unfold.
And yet, I have recently come across a few novels that consider thoughtfully the role(s) a mother may play in her daughter's future. In the two grimmest, White Oleander and The Book of Ruth, the power of the mothers to destroy their daughters despite great distance, time, and, in the case of White Oleander, despite tall prison walls, is absolute.
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Unless and What To Keep convey more nuanced messages. In Unless, a mother is beside herself at her daughter's transformation from promising college student into street person. Eventually, the mother reassures herself that not every activity she undertakes is invested with deep meaning and that she is not responsible for every anguish that afflicts every member of her family. ... |
This book is more fully reviewed in our discussion of some books about the relationships between moms and their daughters. |
| Similar books |
If you found this review helpful and/or interesting, consider supporting our book habit: Buy this book!: Unless |
Posted in Child-raising, Conceptual: for grown ups, Culture, Fiction, History, Reading level: Grown up | Comments Closed
Monday, September 18th, 2006
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| Author: | Julia Alvarez |
| Reading Level (Conceptual): | For grown-ups
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| Reading Level (Vocabulary): | For grown-ups
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| Genre: | fiction, historical |
| Year of publication: | 1991 |
Sometimes, by escaping a dreadful danger, people find themselves safe, but not happy. The Garcia Girls is a touching reminder that the situation in which you meet people might not, on its surface, tell you much about who they are or what they've suffered. |
-- Emily Berk |
If you found this review helpful and/or interesting, consider supporting our book habit: Buy this book!: How the Garcia Girls Lost Their Accent |
Posted in Conceptual: for grown ups, Fiction, History, Reading level: Grown up | Comments Closed
Wednesday, August 2nd, 2006
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| Author: | A.S. Byatt |
| Reading Level (Conceptual): | For grown-ups
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| Reading Level (Vocabulary): | For grown-ups
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| Genre: | fiction |
| Year of publication: | 1990 |
Intricate and, yes, romantic, story of the work and loves of a motley community of poets and researchers, in this century and in the past all exploring pieces of a literary puzzle.
These nerdy people, all obsessed with doing the arcane thing that they do very well, figure out how to combine their efforts for the good of the group and themselves.
Not for children, but similar in theme, although vastly more ambitious than, Dragonfly. Highly recommended for gifted adults. |
Reading about how these gifted people connect intellectually and re-combine romantically, how they work together to solve the mysteries of the past and of their own hearts -- well, it's like wandering through a strange but beautiful garden.
In many discussions about academia, the intellectual pursuits, the single-minded pettiness of people who are deeply interested in -- let's face it -- minutia -- are ridiculed. But in Byatt's treatment -- not really a novel, but a combination of prose, poetry, excerpts from first-person narratives (pseudo-historical documents), we come to admire nearly every character in the book, obsessions, prejudices, intellectual prowess, and all.
Winner of the 1990 Booker Prize |
If you found this review helpful and/or interesting, consider supporting our book habit: Buy this book!: Possession: A Romance |
Posted in Biography, Conceptual: for grown ups, Culture, Fairy tales, Female protagonist, Fiction, Gifted, History, Reading level: Grown up | Comments Closed
Sunday, July 30th, 2006
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| Author: | Perri Klass |
| Reading Level (Conceptual): | For grown-ups
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| Reading Level (Vocabulary): | For grown-ups
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| Genre: | Non-fiction |
| Year of publication: | 2003 |
reviewed by An Asperger's Parent
This is a book for parents of kids who have, or resemble those who have, any of several closely related, and confusingly similar, challenges: Asperger's Syndrome, Pervasive Developmental Disability - Not Otherwise Specified (PDD-NOS), Nonverbal Learning Disorder, Sensory Integration Dysfunction. But it's about the kids, not the disorders.
This is NOT the book to provide an in-depth understanding of any one of these diagnostic categories. For that purpose, a book more focused on whichever condition you're concerned about will probably serve you better. For example, my own favorite scholarly resource on Asperger's Syndrome is Asperger Syndrome (Guilford Press, 2000), a collection of articles edited by Drs. Klin, Volkmar and Sparrow of Yale.
What Quirky Kids does, and from my perspective does better than any other publication I'm seen, is to serve as a wise, perceptive and sympathetic counselor and friend for parents of kids who are in this spectrum. It speaks respectfully and helpfully about the whole range of real-world issues, including schools, helpful and non-so-helpful friends, maintaining your own mental health, balancing the needs of multiple kids when one or more has exceptional needs, genuinely appreciating your kid's strengths and quirks, understanding the aches and long-term worries. |
Where so many of the books I've read and helping professionals with whom we've consulted, seem to illustrate the parable of the six blind men describing the elephant, Drs. Klass and Costello, the authors of "Quirky Kids," seem to see, and appreciate, the whole beast. I'm REALLY glad I found this book, and I warmly recommend it to parents for whom these issues are relevant. |
If you found this review helpful and/or interesting, consider supporting our book habit: Buy this book!: Quirky Kids : Understanding and Helping Your Child Who Doesn't Fit In- When to Worry and When Not to Worry |
Posted in Child-raising, Conceptual: for grown ups, Culture, Gifted, Reading level: Grown up, Science | Comments Closed
