Author Topic: Fiction ~ Old ~ New ~ Best Sellers #2 (Read 776134 times)

Judy Laird · « **Reply #520 on:** April 07, 2010, 10:38:49 PM »

This is the place to talk about the works of fiction you are reading, whether they are new or old, and share your own opinions and reviews with interested readers.

Every week the new bestseller lists come out brimming with enticing looking books and rave reviews. How to choose?

Discussion Leader: Judy Laird

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Judy Laird · « **Reply #521 on:** April 07, 2010, 10:41:44 PM »

Well that post just went away, so irratating when I try to get fancy and lose the whole thing.
My thanks to who ever suggested the Lumby series, I put one on my kindle and have not enjoyed such good reading in forever. Just pure pleasure to read. kuddo's to whoever suggested it.

joangrimes · « **Reply #522 on:** April 07, 2010, 11:00:49 PM »

Oh that is great news about The Help being mad into a movie.. I can hardly wait to see the movie. I hope that they do it right. It is one of favorite books. I found it when I was visiting one of my favorite sports sites to participate in talking about my University of Alabama Football team. I immediately bought it for my Kindle and read it . Then I spread the news to everyone on SeniorLearn. Joan Grimes

Steph · « **Reply #523 on:** April 08, 2010, 05:53:31 AM »

I have been heartbroken that yet another young no talent has grabbed up a book series. Katherine Heigl is going to be Stephanie Plum.. Stephanie needs to be quite different in looks and worlds different in attitude, etc. Yet another book ruined by ego, I suspect.

mrssherlock · « **Reply #524 on:** April 08, 2010, 11:04:18 AM »

Ah, Joan, we have you to thank for one of the best reads ever.

Somewhere I read about The Swan Thieves by Elizabeth Kostova and am I glad I picked it up. This is one of those stories which are taking place in more than one time, told by more than one voice. Our narrator is a psychiatrist who is also a painter. His patient attempted to slash a painting; since his capture he has been mute though not catatonic. Investigation reveals that he is a famous painter himself. As the psychiatrist seeks answers to his muteness and his violence he delves into the man's history. Much more enticing than my description. this is not a thriller but an intellectual puzzle and immensely satisfying. http://www.amazon.com/Swan-Thieves-Novel-Elizabeth-Kostova/dp/0316065781

mabel1015j · « **Reply #525 on:** April 08, 2010, 01:23:42 PM »

No, Kathryn Heigl seems a little too "perfect" for Stephanie...........we'll find out how good an actor she is is she does that role.............

Reading Virgin Earth, follow-up to Earthly Joys, so far it's similar to EJ and great writing. She spent sev'l pages describing the lonilness and panic of J in the boondocks of colonial Virginia. How different from our going to the grocery store to get whatever we want to eat and having our energy piped to us, as opposed to having tobe sure that your fire doesn't go out, that you have dry wood of a size that will fit in your fireplace, eating cornmeal everyday with no seasonings, killing and cooking whatever protein you might be able to get - and all of it as you get more and more undernourished and weak...............she takes you right there............................jean

Steph · « **Reply #526 on:** April 09, 2010, 05:43:04 AM »

I have always marveled at our early pioneers. They set off for an unknown land, knowing they will never see their families again. They arrive,, must find a place to live.. build something to live in. figure out how to get food,, make friends with an unknown people.. Then forge forward onward to the west in many cases. What incredible courage this all took.

Babi · « **Reply #527 on:** April 09, 2010, 08:49:07 AM »

JEAN, my daughter Val loved Jean Auel's books. Do you consider Virgin Earth and Earthly Joys
to be of the same type? Different period, of course. If so, I'll recommend them to her.

mabel1015j · « **Reply #528 on:** April 09, 2010, 02:02:34 PM »

Yes, i think she might like at least Virgin Earth, since it's colonial America. The others are mostly set in Europe thru the 15th - thru 19th centuries - i think.........and very much about aristocracy and the people around the aristocracy. Others may have a better idea than i do .................jean

mrssherlock · « **Reply #529 on:** April 09, 2010, 03:08:14 PM »

More about The Swan Thieves: The artist who attempted to damage the painting of Leda at the Smithsonian has been painting one woman for years. He paints her in different poses, wearing 19th century style clothing but his skill makes her seem alive, caught in a moment between one movement and the next. He is still drawing her in the private mental hospital as his psychiatrist furnished hium with supplies: easel, paints, paper, charcoal, pencils, etc. His possessions when he was delivered to the hospital consisted only of a packet of letters, old and fragile, written by the same hand in French. While we are reading about him and his troubled life we are also given translations of the letters which recount the growing affection between a young woman artist and her husband's uncle, also an artist. This is a deliciously complex story, the characters are vividly portrayed as attractive and sympathetic. http://www.bookbrowse.com/mag/nm_reviews/?detail=135717kd
Elizabeth Kostova also wrote The Historian which I will read next.

Frybabe · « **Reply #530 on:** April 09, 2010, 06:02:59 PM »

Mrssherlock, let me know how you like The Historian when you get to it. I gave that to my sister two years ago for her birthday. She hasn't read it yet. And she loves Vampire movies and Ann Rice books. The Swan Thieves sounds more interesting to me.

Gumtree · « **Reply #531 on:** April 10, 2010, 04:38:18 AM »

I tried the Historian - read about 2/3rds of it before I threw it at the wall. It seemed very repetitious and would have been better being cut by half. I'm not into vampire stuff at all and it was making me feel sick!

Steph · « **Reply #532 on:** April 10, 2010, 06:47:11 AM »

Depends on the vampires, I would guess. I love Charlaine Harris series on Sookie.. There is a sense of humor as well as vampire, werewolves, etc. I also like Patricia Briggs, who writes more about the werewolves and the fey( fairies), but also has vampires as villains mostly.I used to like Laurell Hamilton until she decided sex is the big seller and dived into all sorts of stupidity on sex.

Babi · « **Reply #533 on:** April 10, 2010, 09:16:31 AM »

Thanks, JEAN. If a book is part of a series, VAL likes to start at the
beginning. Does this series follow the same woman throughout?

mabel1015j · « **Reply #534 on:** April 10, 2010, 11:45:58 AM »

The first book is Earthly Joys which is about John Tradescant, who eventully was the gardener for CharlesII, the second book is Virgin Earth which is about the son J Tradescant who comes to Virginia in the 1600's to see what plants and trees are in the colony and then returns when he is in danger during the revolution against Chas II. The author is PHillipa Gregory who, i think, is a very good writer, developing characters and doing in depth research of the period she is writing about................i'm sure others here have read her books and may comment on her writing...............jean

Steph · « **Reply #535 on:** April 11, 2010, 06:19:15 AM »

Phillippa Gregory writes mostly historical novels based in England, but the one where someone comes here sounds sort of different.
I am still on my fantasy kick and am reading a Patricia Briggs.. I like her. She has a certain flair for description and her vampires, werewolves, fairies, etc are so human at times and then suddenly not at all. Interesting.

Babi · « **Reply #536 on:** April 11, 2010, 09:22:25 AM »

The name Philippa Gregory is familiar to me,JEAN. I'm sure I must have read
some of her work, tho' I couldn't tell you what just now. Thanks for
answering my questions.

JoanK · « **Reply #537 on:** April 11, 2010, 02:41:20 PM »

My daughter keeps lending me one of her historical novels, saying I'm going to like it. But so far, I haven't been able to get through it.

Steph · « **Reply #538 on:** April 12, 2010, 05:47:37 AM »

Gregory has quite a gift for making her novels interesting. Even though with the Queens and royalty , you know what happened, it is still fun to watch her take on it.

JimNT · « **Reply #539 on:** April 17, 2010, 03:31:41 PM »

I just started Infinite Jest by David Foster Wallace and haven't read enough to opine but it was discussed in glowing terms on an NPR show. So far, it's slow go and definitely not my taste but I'll continue awhile to give it a fair shake. Has anyone read or even heard of this book? Please give me your take.

Steph · « **Reply #540 on:** April 18, 2010, 05:58:37 AM »

Not an author I have ever heard of.. But then there are so many authors..

mrssherlock · « **Reply #541 on:** April 18, 2010, 09:37:42 AM »

Some people have said they give an author 50 pages and if they aren't caught up in the story by then they quit.

Judy Laird · « **Reply #542 on:** April 18, 2010, 01:31:54 PM »

I think 50 pages is a good idea. Somehow I think I am obligated to finish a book once I start and I need to quit it.

I am so Glad Pat mentioned the Lumbey Series in her book bites. I have enjoyed them so much I hope some others try them.

maryz · « **Reply #543 on:** April 18, 2010, 05:31:22 PM »

I never feel obligated to finish a book. I don't give it a certain number of pages - but if I reach a place where I decide I don't really care what happens to the characters, then I quit and move on to something else. Life is too short, and there are too many other books to read.

CallieOK · « **Reply #544 on:** April 18, 2010, 07:54:15 PM »

I'm the same way - except I can never resist reading the last chapter so I at least know how it ends. Naughty me!

nlhome · « **Reply #545 on:** April 18, 2010, 08:37:57 PM »

Callie, I too sneak in the last chapter so I know how a disappointing book ends. Sometimes, though, I go back and finish reading it after all, because I am interested in why a book ends the way it does.

N

CallieOK · « **Reply #546 on:** April 18, 2010, 11:18:45 PM »

I enjoy seeing how an author moves the story along - even if I've figured out how it's going to end.
The hardest thing is not to peek ahead when I can't figure it out! But...even if I do, I still have to find out how it happened.

Steph · « **Reply #547 on:** April 19, 2010, 05:43:51 AM »

I always feel a bit guilty when I stop reading a book, but sometimes they are just not at all anything that I care about. I have to feeling something for the characters..

Babi · « **Reply #548 on:** April 19, 2010, 09:18:16 AM »

I don't feel the least bit guilty about not finishing a book. If I can't spend my time now reading
just what I enjoy, when can I? Some authors are simply not to my taste. I'm sure they're not
bothered in the least.

mrssherlock · « **Reply #549 on:** April 19, 2010, 11:17:36 AM »

Good point, Babi. It is only ourselves we harm with negative feelings, isn't it? Instead of spitting and sputtering when an author insults my intelligence, I can deprive myself of the dubious pleasure of reading that author.

Saving Ceecee Honeycutt is Beth Hoffman's tale of a young girl's coming of age. Her mother is psychotic bi-polar and lives in fantasy reliving her supreme achievement, winning the title of Miss Georgia Vidalia Onion of 1951. Mother refuses to take her meds, refuses to seek help for her disorder, and Ceecee's father has written-off the family though he puts in periodic appearances. Ceecee is the caretaker and when her mother is killed by a car as she darts across the street, Ceecee loses both her reason for living and her only friend, 80 plus year old neighbor, Mrs Odell. This may sound grim and unappealing but Ceecee is worth hanging in for. Her Great Aunt arrives from Savannah to take Ceecee home with her and Ceecee's life really begins. Hoffman deftly serves up the horrors of Ceecee's early life without overwhelming either the character or the reader and when Ceecee begins to find love and acceptance her true character begins to show itself as the intelligent, funny, little girl who had to keep picking up the pieces left behind from her mother's antics.

Judy Laird · « **Reply #550 on:** April 19, 2010, 03:51:58 PM »

Jackie I loved that book. Of course its about the south, I'll read anything about the south

Steph · « **Reply #551 on:** April 20, 2010, 05:55:07 AM »

Saving CeeCEe sounds like fun.. Like Judy I love books on the south..

Babi · « **Reply #552 on:** April 20, 2010, 08:56:40 AM »

Yeah, that does sound good, JACKIE. It would make a nice change from my recent reading,
too.

mrssherlock · « **Reply #553 on:** April 20, 2010, 11:43:55 AM »

The Three Weissmanns of Westport is a semi-lighthearted romp through the vicissitudes of middle- and senior-aged women. Betty and Joseph, married for 48 years, live in a gorgeous apartment with Central Park as their front yard. Betty's two daughters from her first marriage, are successful businesswomen. When Joseph falls in love with his VP and informs Betty that they have irreconcilable differences and Betty must leave the apartment and she will receive no money until the details of the divorce are worked out, Betty's daughters step in and move with her to a dilapidated cottage in Westport. Sounds dreary, doesn't it? Author Catherine Schine works magic on the banal plot and, to quote the jacket, "The novel is a playful, devoted, loose-jointed homage to Jane Austen's beloved Sense and Sensibility . . ."

CallieOK · « **Reply #554 on:** April 20, 2010, 12:17:03 PM »

Jackie - this one sounds interesting. I love the play on words in the title "Three Weissmanns"/Three Wise Men.

Gumtree · « **Reply #555 on:** April 20, 2010, 01:03:06 PM »

That sounds just what I'm inthe mood for - will look for it tomorrow - Thanks Mrs S

mrssherlock · « **Reply #556 on:** April 20, 2010, 03:39:40 PM »

I think this one would make a good discussion. Let me know what you think. Schine is not an author I've read before but now I'll read her other books.

CallieOK · « **Reply #557 on:** April 21, 2010, 12:11:08 AM »

I have reserved "The Three Weissmanns..." and look forward to reading it.

Steph · « **Reply #558 on:** April 21, 2010, 05:47:11 AM »

Hmm, will look for that one at B and N to see if I like the reading.. Strange plot. 48 years,, that is way too long to give orders to move to.

Babi · « **Reply #559 on:** April 21, 2010, 08:39:28 AM »

Yeah, STEPH. You would think in 48 years he might have noticed those 'irreconcilable differences" sooner. $:-\$
I'm going to check my library for that one, JACKIE. Ceecee Honeycutt, too. I do need
some upbeat reading.

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Author Topic: Fiction ~ Old ~ New ~ Best Sellers #2 (Read 776134 times)