Category: Early Review

Dancing to “Almendra”

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Montero, Mayra; translated by Edith Grossman. Dancing to “Almendra” : A Novel. New York: Picador, 2005.

Can I say the cover alone got me? I’m not a big fan of hippos and there, on the cover is a dead hippo. Brilliant. Or, as someone else told me recently, “hippos are jerks.” But, that is either here nor there as far as the plot of Dancing to “Almendra” is concerned.

Here is the benign review I put on LibraryThing:This is a convoluted tale about a young reporter looking to make it big in pre-Castro Cuba’s world of journalism. Characters are drawn as tragic, eccentric, needy and sometimes self-absorbed.
At the center is Joaquin Porrata, the weak-willed entertainment reporter, sent to cover the death of a hippo at the zoo. He finds himself entangled in a much darker plot. There is the mafia (to which the death of the hippo is directly related), eccentric circus performers with leprosy and amputations, a zoo keeper with too many nicknames who chops up horses as food for the zoo carnivores, prostitution, violence, and even a murder that hits closer to home than Joaquin bargained for.
On the other side of the story is Yolanda (she also has other names). As the one-armed, former assistant to a magician with leprosy, her story is just as tragic. While Joaquin and Yolanda’s stories do not mesh well with the plot, the telling of both sides enhances the story of their romance.
Because I read a translation of Dancing to Almendra I cannot be sure Mayra Montero’s language is all her own. While the voice moves masterfully between Joaquin and Yolanda, direct translations could be lost in description.

Not too exciting but I’m paranoid I’m not a team player. More on that later.

Favorite (weird) line: “with a voice like hysterical glass” (p 4). What, exactly, does that mean?

Jerusalem Diet

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Besserman, Judith and Emily Budick. The Jerusalem Diet: Guided Imagery and Personal Path to Weight Control. Jerusalem: Green Publishing, 2007.

The very first thing I liked about this book was the statement that it is not a conventional “diet” book. Yay for that! It’s a book about making choices. Sometimes, in the world of nutrition and eating better, it is better to not think in terms of dieting; instead think in terms of getting healthier. Period.
The second thing I liked about this book is the disclaimer about gender. Right in the introduction the subject of why women are ‘targeted’ is addressed. The authors are quick to point out that while men have benefited from their methods, the conversation of this book is directed toward women because a woman’s reasons for dieting differ from a man’s.
Other points made in The Jerusalem Diet seemed to be common sense. A lot of conversation covers emotional eating and how food takes the place of other wants and desires. This is something any dieter has definitely heard before. The recommendation to start a food diary seems commonplace as well. Doesn’t Weight Watchers encourage the same awareness of dietary intake?
The main focus of The Jerusalem Diet is the use of imagery, or guided visualization. Throughout the book there are 43 different imagery exercises to be practiced during both the dieting and maintaining stage of weight loss. The exercises are conveniently indexed in the back as well. There is a pleasant mix of “lecture” and storytelling between exercises. Besserman and Budick share the experiences of their patients, which results in personalizing the “how to-ness” of the rest of the book.
One final addition to the book is a list of soup recipes designed to promote weight loss. It isn’t clear why the program is called the Jerusalem Diet other than the fact Besserman practices in Jerusalem and Budick teaches at the Hebrew University of Jerusalem.

*Disclaimer: while reading The Jerusalem Diet for review I also practiced what it preached to see how effective it was in helping me with my dietary concerns. Stay tuned because I’m still working on it!

February Is…

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heartWhen you think of the month of February what do you think of? I think of Valentine’s Day and how much I hate the Hallmark Holiday. I think of how I survived another year being me…and how I can’t wait to be me for another year. I think of National History month, National Friendship month, National Theater Month, National Science month, and the birthdays of Jonathan Letham, Ross Thomas, Russell Hoban, and Ian Banks. Lots and lots of reading for the month of February. Unfortunately, all of this will have to be put on hold while I read other things. LibraryThing has me tied up with:

  • The Jerusalem Diet: Guided Imagery and the Personal Path to Weight Control by Judith Besserman and Emily Budick
  • Dancing to “Almendra”: A Novel by Mayra Montero
  • and a third book coming soon.

Here’s where I’ll try after I am done with those:

  • American Century – by Harord Evans
  • Defiant Hero – by Suzanne Brockmann
  • His Excellency – by Joseph Ellis
  • Bright Young Things – by Amanda Vail

I just found out that American Century is over 700 pages long and is a nemesis subject of mine: history. Ugh. So, I anticipate I won’t get to any of the others this February. Maybe next year!

Have You Found Her

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Erlbaum, Janice. Have You Found Her, A Memoir. New York: Villard Books, 2008.

I often say “I couldn’t put it down” to describe a page turner; a really good book. I just finished Janice Erlbaum’s Have You Found Her and I have to say first, it only took me six hours to read. Only six hours because not only was it a real page turner, but it was a too-good-to-stop page turner. It was a roller coaster of a read. Emotional and unpredictable. I felt every one of Janice’s highs and lows like they were happening to me.
To sum up the plot is to sell it short. To say it is the story of a woman’s journey through a relationship with a troubled homeless teen is to leave out the heartaches, the loves and hates, the hardness of being homeless, the despair of addictions. In addition to asking “what next?” from chapter to chapter the reader is also left asking “how is this possible?” Janice’s experiences are so fantastic and her feelings vibrate so strongly that every page is a live wire of tension. This is not your typical “soul searching” memoir for the author, her subject…or the reader.
I only found one discrepancy with the detail. Janice finds out her homeless friend has been discharged from a hospital back into the care of the shelter where Janice is a volunteer. Because if “rules” Janice must wait two days until her schedule volunteer day (Wednesday) before she can seek out the girl. Yet, when Janice arrives at the shelter she says she knows Sam was discharged on Wednesday when in fact, according to detail, it would have been a Monday (page 73). This is a small oversight in an otherwise fascinating and haunting story.

Red Zone Blues

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Escobar, Pepe. Red Zone Blues: A Snapshot of Baghdad During the Surge. Ann Arbor: Nimble Books, L.L.C., 2007.

The following was what I posted on LibraryThing  a while ago. I forgot that it has a place here as well.

Red Zone Blues was like reading something by a politically focused Anthony Bourdain. Escabar’s language was gritty, sarcastic, and colorful. His opinions are not veiled in the least. The prologue seemed to be added just for shock value, something to get the reader revved up for more. Each subsequent chapter was short, like a stand-alone essay, written with sarcasm and thought-provoking observation. While the “essays” seemed disjointed, each was a mere glimpse into a certain time period of Iraq: a refugee’s visa troubles, a road-side arrest, the sniper infested society just to name a few. Each chapter was a quick and dirty peep show of the culture, the people and politics of Iraq. It left you wanting more, squirming all the while.

** This blog has the tag “RandomHouse” even though it is not a Random House publication. When I first started the Early Reviewer program I thought I would be reviewing titles only published through Random House (and thus created the tag). I needed a tag that would differentiate book reviews written for the Book Lust challenge from those written for the Early Reviewer program. **

The Guardians

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The GuardiansCastillo, Ana. The Guardians. New York: Random House, 2007.

I received this book as one of those Early Reviewer books from Librarything.
Four different first-person voices tell the story of The Guardian. Regina (middle-aged, sassy entreprenuer looking after her brother’s son, Gabo), Gabo (Regina’s nephew. Serious, religious, older than his 16 years, heaviest on the Spanish, started running with a tough crowd), Miguel (a teacher and activist, has a laid back way of looking at the world around him, sizes people up accurately, has an interest in Regina), El Abuelo Milton (Miguel’s grandfather. He is described as being blind but can see Regina clear enough to call her a Helen of Troy goddess), The voices are accurate for each character. True to the elderly, Milton is always thinking about the past, Miquel remembers his activism days, Gabo searches for religious expression, and Regina tries to hold everything together.

The premise of this story is these four characters join together to solve the mystery of Gabo’s missing father after he disappears while crossing the Mexican border. Intertwined in the plot are political statements about drugs, the environment, gangs, immigration; as well as humanitarian statements about culture, relationships, families and community.

I find it interesting that Regina & Gabo both mention how avocados are the only thing Regina can’t grow in her garden. They also both mention changing the dog’s name. It’s as if both are trying to make excuses for these things.

Literary references mentioned:

  • One Hundred Years of Solitude by Garcia Marquez,
  • 1968: The Year That Rocked the World by Mark Kurlinsky,
  • Communist Manifesto by Friedrich Engels and Karl Marx,
  • The Idiot, Crime and Punishment, The Brothers Karamazov and The Gambler by Dostoyevsky,
  • Das Kapital by Karl Marx,
  • The Jungle by Upton Sinclair,
  • The Underdogs by Mariano Azuela,
  • Things Fall Apart by Achebe, and
  • The Second Coming by Yeats.

I know I’m not supposed to quote the book until it’s been published, but I can’t help it. I identified with Regina the most because all my favorite quotes came from her. “Not knowing when you are being teased also comes from being alone for inordinate amounts of time” (p 49). “Not being elegant doesn’t mean you don’t have class” (p 138). “No dream is too big when you are that young” (208).

Pardon the Interruption

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I may have to put the Book Lust project on hold every now and then. Come to think of it, I’ll have to admend my BL “rules” as well. Here’s what happened. A few weeks ago LibraryThing sent me a private comment…they said they were looking for people to be involved in their Early Reviewers Program. 500 out of 215,981 members would be chosen to receive pre-publication copies of Random House titles as long as they post reviews on LibraryThing after reading them. We wouldn’t be paid for our reviews but we would get free books. How cool is that? I don’t get paid for the reviews I already write so what the hey? Sounds like fun only it will cut into my BookLust Challenge.
Today, I found out that I have been chosen to receive a book! Since there are 500 members and only 5 books to chose from, I was convinced I would be in the “sooner or LATER” group – as in “sooner or later you’ll get a book to review…but not right now.”

I’ve been told the RH book should be here within a week. That means As I Lay Dying and Aspects of the Novel will hang in the balance between unfinished and finished until the RH assignment is finished.