whoa baby!

I have one thing to say right now....

I started The Help last night.

It is amazing.

Amazing I tell you!

The kind of story that sucks you in on page 1.

I was late back from my lunch break today because I forgot the time--so buried in the book was I!

Those who are even taking longer than I to read it, must find themselves a copy as soon as possible.

Don't be hoping I will be giving it away on a "cleaning the shelves" give away.

Oh no. That won't be happening.

I am not that generous.

This one is a keeper!

Review: The Vanishing Act of Esme Lennox

Book: The Vanishing Act of Esme Lennox by Maggie O'Farrell
Finished: January 2010
Pages: 256
Challenges:
**Read & Review **A-Z **Rainbow Connection** New Authors** Reading From My Shelves**

What an interesting book--which I loved! It isn't very long, but it sure packs a wallop.

Set in Scotland starting in the 1920's, we are introduced to a family. A very snobby, proper family, living in India. Because of certain events, the family eventually migrates back to Scotland and the ancestral home--bringing with them their two daughters who are getting close to needing to be married off. Their names? Kitty and Esme.

Esme never has seemed to fit into proper society. She is a free spirit and headstrong--both factors which contribute to her finally being committed to a mental hospital.
For 60 years.
Where NO ONE ever visited her.

The story is also about Iris, Kitty's granddaughter, in present day. She is contacted by the mental hospital and told that the hospital is closing, her great Aunt Esme has been screened and rehabilitated and needs to be picked up! Iris has never even heard of her Aunt Esme.

The life of Esme is pieced together both in her own voice and in Kittys-written in that stream of consciousness style--because she has Alzheimer's. The web of this family, the coldness of Esme's parents, the story of what happened to Esme all make for a gripping story with a powerful, if not tragic ending.

The saddest part of reading this book, is knowing that things like this used to happen. It happened to women a lot back then--involuntary commitment by family members or a husband because they did not conform to society's view of them, or they didn't make someone happy or meet their expectations. Or maybe they were really depressed or suffered from menopause or postpartum depression. For many, many women, they did not deserve to be locked up in a mental hospital and subjected to the "treatments" that were used on them. I had a pharmacist tell me that she attended a conference one time that addressed this issue from our past. She said they have done studies and found that when the birth control pill was made available, which also ushered in the idea of hormone replacement for women in peri-menopause, the admissions of women to mental hospitals decreased dramatically. I wish I could remember the statistics she told me as they were very stunning.

Tidbits

• My book give-away is closed and all the winners have been notified by email. Thanks to everyone who took the time to enter it.
• I checked the mail today and found 6 books there waiting for me! All from paperbackswap.
• I had a doctor appointment to day. No pneumonia anymore.
• But, reactive airway disease is still going on. So, more inhalers for awhile.

Good Night all. Hope you all have a wonderful Tuesday.

What are you reading on Mondays? is hosted each week by J. Kaye's Book Blog.


What I finished and reviewed last week:
1. Yesterday Morning(a memoir) by Diana Athill
2. The Housekeeper and the Professor by Yoko Ogawa




What I am currently reading:

1. The Help












2. The Vanishing Act of Esme Lennox

Book Mingling

Musing Mondays is hosted by Rebecca at Just One More Page.

Today’s MUSING MONDAYS post is about borrowed books.
Where do you keep any books borrowed from friends or the library? Do they live with your own collection, or do you keep them separate? Do you monitor them in anyway.

Oh dear me. Borrowed books from the library must never mingle with my own books! That is a book fine disaster just waiting to happen for me. I don't get many books from friends as usually I am the one doing the lending. I have two rubbermaid basket/crate like things that I keep the library books in. Sometimes I don't get to them and they end up staying in my tote bag until it is time to return them. So yes--I do manage them and do not let them get lost amongst my bookshelves.

I had mail!

What's In Your Mailbox Monday is hosted each week by Marcia over at The Printed Page.

Many good ones entered my home this week! So much fun to look at my stacks...

From Paperbackswap:


This one has been on my wish list/must read list for quite some time.














I saw this one at Target last year and had put it on my wish list also.













This one I decided I must have after reading Molly's (from My Cozy Book Nook) review. Because of this one, I decided I have enough books to read for the Bibliophilic Books challenge which I promptly clicked on over to join!












This one is for the Book Awards challenge. There are still a gazillion holds on this book at my library so I decided to just get my own copy!














From 1/2 Price books while on a date with my husband tonight!

Every Mimi should have a copy of this book at their house! Delightful!!









Pure fun chick-lit













Because I love cookbooks and I love cooking!

Review: Yesterday Morning

Book: Yesterday Morning by Diana Athill
Pages: 168
Finished: January 2010
Challenges:
**A-Z** New Authors**Read & Review**Reading From My Shelves**Rainbow Connection**To-Be-Read**

From the inside cover:
Diana Athill was born in 1917. She was, for almost fifty years a director of the publishing house Andre Deutsch. Her other publications include three memoirs: After a Funeral, Instead of a Letter and Stet:an editor's life. She lives in London.

I enjoyed this very straightforward and honest memoir of the author's early life growing up in the English countryside at the turn of the century. To be sure, her upbringing was very different from the child, at that time, being raised in a big city like London. With her words, she paints a very vivid picture of her childhood and family. While at times seeming idyllic, she does not spare us the sadness and pain experienced even amongst the privileges they enjoyed.

"If you took a group of octogenarians --let's say a hundred old reservoirs of experience-- my guess is that about a quarter of them would look as though their contents were mostly disagreeable: as though, if they were turned inside out, you would see disappointment, disapproval, pain. None of my family has looked like that, and neither do I. And my reluctant conclusion is that this is because of the privileges we all enjoyed as a result of being born into the upper reaches of the middle class, in the country. To take the simplest things first: we were fed on ample amounts of healthy food, all of it fresh, and we had access to up-to-date medical care and sanitation and were taught the basic rules of hygiene such as enough sleep, plenty of fresh air and exercise, and don't drink too much. On top of that we were given good educations so that we could keep our minds occupied and find interest in the a wide range of subjects, and enough leisure to indulge in enjoyable hobbies. And the standards of behaviour set by our forebears were reasonable, because they had not been over-privileged to the point of becoming arrogant or self-indulgent (that balance, I believe, has been important). In my generation, anyway, our childhood was directed with common sense as well as with love, and our surroundings were so secure and pleasant that we could be free of constant surveillance. And above all we lived in a place which we felt was ours and which we loved: we were rooted." Page 165

Review: The Housekeeper and the Professor

Book: The Housekeeper and the Professor by Yoko Ogawa
Pages: 180
Finished: January 2010
Challenges:
** New Authors ** Read & Review ** A-Z ** TwentyTen **

This is another one of those books that I have seen on multitudes of blogs being reviewed and and is one I might not ever have picked up to read, if not for the blog world.

It is lovely.
Everything about it is simply lovely:---- the storyline, the characters, the simple prose, the reverence for numbers and math, the concept of being human and treating other people well, the concept of living in the moment--all of it just drew me in and kept me reading. It is not a very long or difficult book, and if you are needing something uplifting to read, this little gem is the book for you. I will definitely be looking for other work by this author and this book will for sure be on my top list for 2010.

"Inevitably, the Professor repeated himself when he talked about prime numbers. But Root and I had promised each other that we would never tell him, even if we had heard the same thing several times before- a promise we took as seriously as our agreement to hide the truth about Enatsu. No matter how weary we were of hearing a story, we always made an effort to listen attentively. We felt we owed that to the Professor, who had put so much effort into treating the two of us as real mathematicians. But our main concern was to avoid confusing him. Any kind of uncertainty caused him pain, so we were determined to hide the time that had passed and the memories he'd lost. Biting our tongues was the least we could do." Page 61

From Publisher's Weekly:
Ogawa (The Diving Pool) weaves a poignant tale of beauty, heart and sorrow in her exquisite new novel. Narrated by the Housekeeper, the characters are known only as the Professor and Root, the Housekeepers 10-year-old son, nicknamed by the Professor because the shape of his hair and head remind the Professor of the square root symbol. A brilliant mathematician, the Professor was seriously injured in a car accident and his short-term memory only lasts for 80 minutes. He can remember his theorems and favorite baseball players, but the Housekeeper must reintroduce herself every morning, sometimes several times a day. The Professor, who adores Root, is able to connect with the child through baseball, and the Housekeeper learns how to work with him through the memory lapses until they can come together on common ground, at least for 80 minutes. In this gorgeous tale, Ogawa lifts the window shade to allow readers to observe the characters for a short while, then closes the shade.

Shameless Mimi.... again....

Our little bright eyes

Stretching after having been swaddled for her nap time!

Book Review: Benny and Shrimp

Book: Benny and Shrimp by Katarina Mazetti

Pages: 224 pages

Finished: January 2010

Challenges:

** Read & Review **TwentyTen** A-Z Challenge ** New Author **

I was so glad to finally get to read this book! To sum it up in one word, I would say, "quirky". The characters are quirky and the storyline/romance is quirky. This book was read and reviewed by lots and lots of other bloggers last year and I don't really have anything new to add to their thoughts. It is a story about love, and middle age, and loneliness, and attraction. The prose is a bit choppy, but I think that is because it is a translation of a book that was originally written in Swedish. The ending was a bit abrupt, but I did discover that a sequel was written which is not available in the U.S yet. I will be looking for it though, as I want to find out the next phase of Benny and Shrimp's lives and love!

Money in my pocket!

Does this not look fun?

"Wouldn't it be wonderful if we all could get paid to simply read books endlessly?

Wish you could Wouldn't it be wonderful if we all could get paid to simply read books endlessly. Wish you could some how be rewarded for all the time and effort you put in completing reading challenges, (of course other than your own personal satisfaction, which by no means should be devalued!)

Well, why not read a plethora of books, and just pay yourself for a job well done?!"

Click here to see the rest of the details about this challenge with pay backs! Last year I could have ended up with $53 and the year before somewhere around $70! To spend on myself. Probably for more books!!!

Note: I need to go find $7 dollars to safely hide in my underwear drawer because I have had a wonderful month of reading so far, due to that pesky case of pneumonia. I have finished 7 books so far, and there is still more time in January to finish more!! I am really liking this pay-myself -for -reading thing!!!

Interesting article

I found this article while reading The Guardian today and though it was quite interesting in light of the Newberry winners just recently being announced.

A Wrinkle in Time, well worth two Newberry medals.



For the record, I was "one of those girls, who read L'Engle when I was small" ! ;)




Madeleine L'Engle in 1946

In honor of....

..A.A. Milne.
Born, January 18, 1882

"Sometimes, if you stand on the bottom rail of a bridge and lean over to watch the river slipping slowly away beneath you, you will suddenly know everything there is to be known."

" The trick to succeeding at Poohsticks is letting your stick drop in a twitchy sort of way."


"When going round a spinney of larch trees Tracking Something, be sure it isn't your own footprints you are following."

Quick Bullets

• For those worried, I found some jeans yesterday!
• I cleaned up the bookshelves, book piles on the floor and in the crates in my bedroom last night.
• I re-activated my paperbackswap.com account and posted a bunch of books.
• I now have 12 books that need to be mailed out tomorrow!
• One of my favorite background websites: Delightful Dots. I love, love her designs!
• I get to babysit my little Adelaide today for the first time. :)

Monday Love

What's In Your Mailbox Monday is hosted each week by Marcia over at The Printed Page.
I have had a very busy mailbox the past two weeks. I am overcome with the truth of the adage, "So many books, so little time"! These books have arrived via paperbackswap.com, amazon and thrift store shopping.


































































































Most of these books are for specific challenges--the Graphic Novel Challenge, Reading the Seasons, Book Awards, and Awesome Author. There are 2 from Elinor Lipman and I had picked her for an Awesome Author pick. I had planned to read My Latest Grievance but then I read some reviews of it and some of her others and she tends to get very mixed reviews! The one book that consistently got rave reviews was The Inn at Lake Devine, so I am thinking I will read this one by her first.

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Musing Mondays is hosted by Rebecca at Just One More Page.

Today’s MUSING MONDAYS post is about tidy reading around people. When is it inappropriate to read in front of others? Is it ever appropriate?

Oh wow! I read in front of people all the time! In my car, at restaurants when I am alone, in waiting rooms, in line at the post office, waiting for my sons' concerts to begin...the list goes on. I even read during commercial breaks when I am watching t.v.
The interesting thing is how much I have been noticing other people reading around me. I had been thinking that reading was some how dying, but I don't think so. I have to laugh sometimes because I notice people reading who don't always look the type to be carrying a book around in public in case they have a free minute.

The one consistent time I don't feel right about reading is when we are all sitting together at the dinner table. I want that time to be a time of conversation and connecting as a family. But, as my two youngest kiddos are getting older,with crazy busy lives of teenagers, it is becoming more and more often that dinner is just my husband and I. Sometimes if we are both really engrossed in a book we will read at the table together.


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What are you reading on Mondays? is hosted each week by J. Kaye's Book Blog.

What I am reading:

























What I need to write a review for:
Benny and Shrimp

Weekend Cooking

Weekend Cooking is hosted by Beth Fish Reads each week and offers a unique way to merge booking with cooking! I have not participated in the event before today, but decided it was time. I love to cook. Better yet, I love to eat. I also seem to like cookbooks, and I know this because the shelf in my house holding them all is sagging. Badly.

But today, I am not going to write about a particular cookbook. Instead I am going to link to a couple of simply divine recipes. It has been a very dreary, rainy month of January for us here in the Seattle area. Add to that the long lasting case of pneumonia I have had, and you find me craving comfort foods.
One in particular.
One that I have searched for and tried many, many different recipes for, trying to find the perfect one. The perfect recipe for homemade macaroni & cheese!

Recently I stumbled upon a blog which provided the recipe for Paula Deen's sons' recipe. The next night I served that recipe to my family and they all agreed it was the best I had ever made. Follow the link (above) and be prepared to salivate.

Then today I was dwelling on macaroni and cheese again and decided to check out what the Pioneer Woman had for a recipe. I figured she would have a recipe--it just seems like the kind of thing she would like. I did find her recipe, here.
Holey Moley! I can' t stop thinking aboug it!
And tomorrow night I am going to prepare it.
It has a pound of cheese in it, so it will not be for the faint of heart.
But, it is oh-so- sure to be comforting!