Cassia Xiao is an impoverished girl whose aunt is determined to get her to Shanghai. Cassia has no objection to this and begs Madame Emerald, the owner of a fancy brothel, to take her on as a servant girl. Madame Emerald buys Cassia and does indeed set her up as a servant girl, but Cassia’s life is not grand until one of Madame Emerald’s lovers, Master Chang, takes a look at Cassia and sees something more. He doesn’t mind her unbound feet and takes her as his lover, insisted that she be set up like the other prostitutes, spending every day and night with her. They fall in love and Cassia is initiated into the secret Hong brotherhood. At one of these meetings, Master Chang is killed and Cassia falls from favor. It is only her determination that brings her back up from the streets to become one of Shanghai’s most revered figures.
Let me start off by saying that this book felt like it was taking me forever to read, although it only took me about a week in reality. The story is not bad at all when you look at it in summary. Cassia’s life would make for great fiction. On the whole, it reminded me of Memoirs of a Geisha; a tale of a slightly scandalous woman that is framed as if realistic but is actually fiction. The early 20th century Chinese setting was very interesting as well, particularly with the mafia-like “brotherhoods” and the difference between the country and the city. These are things I rarely come across in fiction.
The execution, however, for me left a lot to be desired. The prose is completely awkward. The dialogue is about as far from realistic as you can imagine. Worse, it was far more erotic than I’d bargained for and I’m sure some of the scenes should be up there as the worst written sex in fiction. I think the novel would have been far, far better off with just suggestion rather than going into the details.
I’m not sure if any of this is the fault of the translation or the original story and I know that I have been appalled by writing which other people don’t seem to mind in the past. So it might be just me. In all honesty, though, I really can’t recommend this book, except perhaps to look at the lovely cover. The model is the author herself.
I’m working hard to achieve my reading goal of 200 books this year. Starting out by reading as much as possible while I don’t have any work to do! So I’m up to four books, but the problem is, none of them have been particularly good. For example, I just finished a book called Nox Dormienda by Kelli Stanley. It’s publicized as Roman noir, a new mystery genre, as she tried to use noir language in ancient Rome, thinking they went together fairly well. And they do, surprisingly enough; the book reminded me a lot of film noir. The trouble is that I didn’t like it at all. I know the problem lays with me here because I have little patience for mysteries, but it sounded so interesting. Now I have to write a review when I think someone else would like this book much more than I did.
Next up is either Paul of Dune by Brian Herbert and Kevin J. Anderson (which I must read before Friday, it’s a heavy hardcover that just isn’t coming on a plane with me) or Mr. Cavendish, I Presume? by Julia Quinn. Vastly different books, but I hope I manage to enjoy both of them. Tomorrow I’m going into NYC to visit a friend, with long bus rides there and back, so I hope I get plenty of reading in!
Finally, a non-book-related completely geeky note. Way back in 2001 or 2002, I used to watch a TV channel called TechTV. My brother and I just loved it and we were very unhappy when it was bought by a gaming channel designed for teenagers - no more gadgets or geekery. They gradually eliminated our favorite personalities and shows. Today I discovered that many of them are on twitter, so I went through and followed my favorites. Yay for getting my geek news back!
Have a good week and once again, Happy New Year!
A dinner party held in celebration of Japanese businessman Katsumi Hosokawa, with his favorite opera singer Roxane Coss as entertainment, goes horribly awry when a group of terrorists capture all of the guests. Their target, the president, is not at the party. At a loss, the terrorists continue to hold the hostages and to everyone’s surprise, an entire world develops in this one large house.
This is a compelling and intricate novel, full of unexpected little details. I’m not sure that it’s realistic, but it tries its best to show us the universality of human nature. Terrorists got on just well with multi-millionaires; people are more than just their day jobs. I think that’s really what this book is about. People have vast dimensions that are invisible to those around them until crisis brings them out.
Not much else to say really; this book left me reeling for a few days and I struggled to get into my next read; I’m not sure I’ll call it one of my favorites of the year, but it’s deeply moving and I would definitely recommend it.
Buy Bel Canto
on Amazon today.
It’s a struggle to summarize this book because there are so many plot threads running through it. Dustfinger is still dead and Farid is determined to revive him, even if it requires working with the oily Orpheus. Mo becomes more and more like the Bluejay and not like the bookbinder he originally was. Resa becomes increasingly intent on returning to the real world. Elinor begins to hate her life among her books when she could be living in one. And Meggie? She’s still in love with Farid and mainly, very confused.
Like I said, there are almost too many plot threads running through this. It had been a while since the first two for me so it took me a good few pages to recall what was actually going on, let alone figure out who everyone was again. After that, the book dragged. I dreaded Elinor’s chapters in particular. The woman sat around complaining for a few pages each time until she finally got placed into the story, at which point she nearly vanished in the barrage of other characters. What was the point there? Meanwhile, Meggie, the supposed main character of this entire series, is relegated to the sidelines where her main focus is weeping about her father and worrying about who she actually loves. I read one professional review that said that while Cornelia Funke is actually a great storyteller, the books have lost their original focus. I agree with that.
That said, this book is still a great story once you get halfway into it, and it wraps up in a very satisfying way. I enjoyed the ending very much and I didn’t regret reading it or anything like that. I just didn’t quite get what I bargained for, and I can see the merit in wishing the story had ended with Inkheart. I think, however, that the series is still worth reading. It just has a few slow spots in the middle and I’m not sure it will keep a child’s interest. It did keep mine, though.
Buy Inkdeath
on Amazon.
For those of you who haven’t been following this blog very long, you may not know that my younger brother passed away of non-Hodgkin’s lymphoma on December 7, 2005. He was only 18. Since then, my dad has been involved in raising money and running for the Leukemia and Lymphoma Society through Team in Training, an organization that collects money for research and treatment of those affected through donations supporting runners. I’d like to ask that you consider sponsoring him in his first full marathon. It doesn’t take much; every little donation helps. If you’ve been lucky enough to have them, think of how grateful you are to have had your family around you this holiday season and consider helping those who may not have theirs.
If you’d like to help, you can read more or donate on my dad’s website.
So … any Reading Resolutions? Say, specific books you plan to read? A plan to read more ____? Anything at all?
Name me at least ONE thing you’re looking forward to reading this year!
My main resolution is to read 200 books. I don’t know if I can do it, but I’m willing to give it a try. In reality, I’d just like to top this year’s total of 184. I’m sure that’s the most ever! One of my other goals is to re-read more. I have so many books I’d like to read over again, but with a now 300+ TBR pile, it’s nearly impossible to justify that to myself. So I want to focus more on what I want to read, not on what I’m supposed to be reading. That said, I’m also on a mission to clear out my ARCs. I think I’ve received almost everything I requested and plan to only ask for books I really want to read from this point forward. Before I go back to England, I’m trying to read all my outstanding books for review; i.e., the ones that have already been released. I still have a few there and those will be my first priority when I arrive.
Finally, I’d really like to complete some reading challenges! I failed miserably last year so I’m trying again. I have three small ones on tap, along with the big 200 one, and with the number of books I read, I really should be able to complete them.
I didn’t participate in this challenge, organized by Dawn at She Is Too Fond of Books, last time it ran, but I think this is the year for it! I already have five books by LT authors in my TBR pile, so it should be easy enough!
First, the rules:
- The LibraryThing Author Challenge 2009 runs from January 1 - December 31, 2009
- Join anytime now through 2009; last day to post reviews is December 31, 2009
- Make a list of 5 LT Authors and books that you’d like to read (keeping in mind that the list of possible authors is always growing, so your wish list may change)
- Crossovers with other Challenges are allowed
- Post your reviews on your blog and on LibraryThing
- Leave a comment on my LT Author Challenge 2009 Reviews post with a link to your review on your blog.
My list:
LibraryThing Author Challenge 2009
- The Master of Verona by David Blixt
- Hotel on the Corner of Bitter and Sweet by Jamie Ford
- The Coffee Trader by David Liss
- Silent on the Moor by Deanna Raybourn
- Lady Anne and the Howl in the Dark by Donna Lea Simpson
I’ve been seeing these posts everywhere, so it’s my turn! My list was extremely difficult to compose. I thought to do a best of each genre for a while, but in short, it was too hard! Instead I have multiple genres included here. So, the 10 new to me books I loved most in 2008, in no particular order:
And only one non-fiction book got the 5-star rating. That was John Adams by David McCullough. This was definitely the best pop history work I read all year and I think it deserves a read for anyone who is interested in American history.
This list has informed me that my best reading months were the summer ones and that despite my flow of ARCs, I really enjoy the books I choose for myself the most. It was hard to narrow down these 11 out of 184, but I think that shows I’ve had a great reading year. See my post on the sidebar for everything I’ve read in 2008.
Finally, Happy New Year! I can’t wait to start keeping track of books for 2009. Starting a new list is exciting and intimidating at the same time. Who knows what the new year will bring?
Ki’s husband and children died at the hands of harpys and her life has never been the same since. She cannot let them go. That is, until she meets a man named Vandien, who introduces conflict and companionship into her solitary life at a vivid contrast with her past encounters. On a trip which is reputed to be impossible over the mountains in winter, Ki is forced to confront the demons of her past and the impossible prospect of the future.
Megan Lindholm is another pen name of author Robin Hobb, whose works I absolutely adore. I believe this was written earlier and it certainly feels that way. It’s less epic and less of an intoxicating addiction. That doesn’t mean that it was bad. No, certainly not. This author just loves to torture her characters and Ki doesn’t escape at all. I think it may have hurt the story to have half of it told through flashbacks, but I’m not sure an adventure through snowy mountains would have been all that exciting on its own. It takes away some of the urgency for Ki to already be set in her ways and lonely, though of course we can still feel the heartrending pain of her loss in the writing. I guess what I’m trying to say here, and not saying very well, is that she writes better as Robin Hobb but this is still pretty good and I think I’d recommend it as a decent fantasy. It’s not going to be my favorite book ever, but I’d like to read the rest in the quartet.
Today’s question: Here is a list of the main areas of Library Thing:
1. Home (http://www.librarything.com/, before you log in)
2. Home (once you log in, contains Your Home, Your Profile, Connections, Recommendations, Reviews, Statistics, Clouds, Gallery, Memes)
3. Profile (Recent activity, tags, comments, members with your books)
4. Your Library
5. Your Tags
6. Add Books
7. Talk
8. Groups
9. Local
10. Search
11. Zeitgeist (Stats, Top Lists)
12. Tools (Widgets, Store)
13. Blog
What area are you most familiar with? What area is your favorite? What area are you curious about? Are there any that you have not really looked at?
First of all, thanks to Marie at the Boston Bibliophile for hosting Tuesday Thingers for so long, and more thanks and a welcome to Wendi at Wendi’s Book Corner for picking it up! I’m looking forward to your great questions, Wendi.
I think I’m most familiar with Talk and my home page. I like the initial home page, my statistics, and my reviews. I also spend a lot of time on Talk, but I’m a bit of a lurker. I don’t talk much but I like to find out what’s going on. I don’t really look much at the widgets/store, not since I put mine on my sidebar. I also don’t really look at the zeitgeist too often. It doesn’t seem to change regularly, so I don’t feel compelled to check it very much. I think I’d like to spend more time with LT local, but it rarely has information about my specific location. I liked it when I was in Boston, but it hasn’t been useful since then.
