Moonlight Downs
Posted: 2020/01/22 Filed under: Book Reviews, E-Books, Fiction, Lust To Go | Tags: 2020, Adrian Hyland, australia, book lust iii, book review, Fiction, january, mystery, series Leave a commentHyland, Adrian. Moonlight Downs. New York: Soho Press, 2008.
Reason read: Believe it or not, I have no idea why I started reading this in January.
Emily Tempest is finally home after a long twelve-year absence. Half white and half Aboriginal, she must relearn her place in the landscape; to re-establish old relationships with the community and people she used to love. But, at the same time she is a pesky armchair detective, always poking her nose where it shouldn’t be. When a beloved member of the Moonlight Downs mob is murdered, Emily goes on the hunt to find his killer. It’s personal because Emily has an extra special relationship with the victim’s daughter.
Confessional: all throughout the book, when Emily was fearing for her life I thought it was an exaggeration until a few more people die. The amount of violence towards the end of the book was surprising.
Another confessional: you will appreciate Hyland’s glossary of Aboriginal words in the beginning of the book.
As an aside, I love it when there are little tiny overlaps in my books. I am reading about the Bacardi family in Cuba in another book. In Moonlight Downs a Cuban shows up in Australia.
Confessional: I kept a running list of all the characters I met in Moonlight Downs.
Best and only quote of the book, “As the fury subsided it made room for questions” (p 142).
Author fact: Hyland has lived and worked among the Indigenous people of Australia.
Book trivia: Moonlight Downs is the first Emily Tempest mystery in the series. It was published as Diamond Dove in Australia. As an aside, I am also reading Gunshot Road for the Challenge.
Nancy said: Pearl included Moonlight Downs in a list of more Australian fiction that “absolutely shouldn’t be missed” (Book Lust To Go p 30).
BookLust Twist: from Book Lust To Go in the chapter called “Australia, the Land of Oz: Fiction” (p 29).
September Psycho
Posted: 2019/10/07 Filed under: audio book, E-Books, Early Review, Fiction, NonFiction | Tags: australia, biography, childhood, coming of age, crime, david chadwick, Early Review, Fiction, football, Geraldine Brooks, horror, Irving Stone, Isaac Asimov, japan, Lee Child, Letters, librarything, Madj Hoomin, memoir, Michelangelo, middle east, movie, mystery, NonFiction, political, science fiction, series, sports, Stephen King, Tony Earley, travel, ward just Leave a commentI don’t even know where to begin with September. It was the month from hell in more ways than one. The only good news is that I was able to run twice as many miles as last month. That counts for something as it saves my sanity just a little bit more than if I didn’t do anything at all.
Here are the books:
Fiction:
- In the City of Fear by Ward Just
- Jim, The Boy by Tony Earley
- The Shining by Stephen King
Nonfiction:
- Thank You and OK! by David Chadwick
- Foreign Correspondence by Geraldine Brooks
- Ayatollah Begs to Differ by Madj Hoomin
- Agony and Ecstasy by Irving Stone
Series continuations:
- Tripwire by Lee Child
- Foundation and Earth by Isaac Asimov
Early Review for LibraryThing:
- My Life on the Line by Ryan O’Callaghan
Foreign Correspondence
Posted: 2019/09/09 Filed under: Book Reviews, Lust To Go, NonFiction | Tags: 2019, australia, book lust iii, book review, Geraldine Brooks, memoir, NonFiction, september, writing Leave a commentBrooks, Geraldine. Foreign Correspondence: a Pen Pal’s Journey From Down Under to All Over. Thorndike, Maine: Thorndike Press, 1998.
Reason read: International Reading Day is on September 8th.
Brooks started writing to pen pals when she was ten years old. [As an aside, I think I was around the same age when I formed my letter-writing habit.] Finding all of Brooks’s pen pal letters prompted her to wonder if she could find their authors some thirty some odd years later. Where were these forty-something year olds? Who were they now as adults and what lives were they living? Before she launches on her journey to find lost relations, Brooks spends some time remembering her own childhood and how each pen pal played a part in it. As a kid she yearned to get away from boring Australia with its lack of culture and panache. As a good girl, she recalls her fear of her father’s lack of participation in Catholic worship and how it might send him to hell and yet she herself wanted to be a rebel; “to kiss boys, take drugs, be hauled by the hair into a police van at an antiwar protest” (p 78). She remembers wanting to expand her religious horizons with the letters she would write and receive. Those pen pals would bring Brooks full circle by reminding her of her roots and just how far she has come as an adult.
Quote I liked, “We have grown older together, trapped in the aspic of our age gap” (p 59) and “It’s unfortunate to arrive at an Arab summit in Casablanca only to find that your underwear is touring sub-Saharan Africa without you” (p 142).
Author fact: According to Brooks’s memoir, she had a budding acting career early in life.
Book trivia: Brooks includes touching photographs of her family as well as the pen pals who shaped her life.
Nancy said: Pearl mentioned an interview with Brooks. I had to ask the Seattle Channel if they could rerelease the video because it was over ten years old. I am happy to say they consented and even though the interview didn’t mention Foreign Correspondence I enjoyed it very much. As an aside, the interview focused on People of the Book (not on my list).
BookLust Twist: from Book Lust To Go in the chapter called “Australia, the Land of Oz” (p 26).
Month for Women
Posted: 2019/02/01 Filed under: E-Books, Early Review, Fiction, NonFiction, Poetry | Tags: australia, Barbara Kingsolver, biography, birds, books, Carrie Brown, childrens book, Connie Willis, Dana Stabenow, David Allen Sibley, Dorothy Dunnett, Early Review, Edgardo Rodriguez Julia, fantasy, Fiction, Frederick Busch, Glory Edim, historical, Isaac Asimov, Julia Blackburn, Laurie King, librarything, lists, Lynda Barry, medicine, meditation, Michelle Dean, mystery, Patricia Carrington, Philip Pullman, reading, Sana Goldberg, science fiction, series, Tom Standage Leave a commentI definitely didn’t do this on purpose because I never structure my reading this way, but January turned out to be a month of mostly woman authors (notated with a ‘w’). I am including the books I started in January but have not finished. Because they are not Challenge books they do not need to be finished in the same month. And. And! And, I have started running again. After a six month hiatus, I think I am back! Sort of.
Fiction:
- A Cold-Blooded Business by Dana Stabenow (w & EB)
- The Beekeeper’s Apprentice by Laurie R. King (w & AB)
- Firewatch by Connie Willis (w & EB)
- The Good Times are Killing Me by Lynda Barry
- Lamb in Love by Carrie Brown (w & EB)
- Foundation by Isaac Asimov (AB)
- Take This Man by Frederick Busch
- ADDED: The Renunciation by Edgardo Rodriguez Julia
Nonfiction:
- Daisy Bates in the Desert by Julia Blackburn
- The Sibley Guide to Bird Life and Behavior edited by Chris Elphick, John Dunning & David Allen Sibley
- The Turk by Tom Standage
- ADDED: Freedom in Meditation by Patricia Carrington
Series continuations:
- Amber Spyglass by Philip Pullman
- To Lie with Lions by Dorothy Dunnett
Early Review Program for LibraryThing:
- Well-Read Black Girl by Glory Edim
- How to be a Patient by Sana Goldberg – not finished yet
For Fun:
- Sharp by Michelle Dean – not finished yet
- Flight Behavior by Barbara Kingsolver – not finished yet
Daisy Bates in the Desert
Posted: 2019/01/22 Filed under: Book Reviews, Lust To Go, NonFiction | Tags: 2019, australia, biography, book lust iii, book review, Daisy Bates, january, Julia Blackburn, NonFiction Leave a commentBlackburn, Julia. Daisy Bates in the Desert: A Woman’s Life Among the Aborigines. New York: Vintage Departures, 1995.
Reason read: Australia Day is January 26th.
Julia Blackburn became fascinated by Daisy Bates quite by accident. In the beginning of her book Blackburn imagines Ms. Bates’s feelings and memories but by the middle of the book there is an odd shift in perspective and suddenly Blackburn assumes the role of Bates, talking in the first person as if she IS Daisy Bates. It was a little unsettling until I settled into the narrative…and then she switches back.
Through Blackburn’s words Daisy Bates became this larger than life figure; a woman trying to save the natives of Australia. At times it was difficult for me to understand her motives or her successes, but I learned to understand her passions. She truly cared for the people of the desert.
Line I had to quote, “I suppose it would have been awkward to pack and easily broken and anyway the skull of a good friend would not provide much comfort when one was feeling lonely” (p 95). On a personal note, when my first cat was ailing I seriously considered taking her to a taxidermist for eternal preservation. I loved her that much.
Another line I liked, “The sky was breathing; I could feel the cavity of the night expanding and contracting around me as if I was in the belly of the universe” (p 122). I feel that way about Monhegan sometimes.
As an aside, I am not sure what to do with the image of naked women with dingo puppies tied about their waists.
Author fact: Blackburn wrote several books which won awards. The most successful were Thin Paths and The Leper’s Companions. Neither are on my Challenge list.
Book trivia: Disappointingly there are not a lot of pictures of Daisy Bates. The best one is of her on a swing.
Nancy said: Pearl called Daisy Bates in the Desert “fabulous” (Book Lust To Go p 28)
BookLust Twist: from Book Lust To Go in the chapter called “Australia, the Land of Oz” (p 26).
