What's In a Name 2 & What's In a Name 3

I have completed another challenge for 2009. What's In a Name 2 was a lot of fun, especially putting the titles together. Finding appropriate books was a challenge in itself. Here's what I read:

1. The Actor and the Housewife by Shannon Hale ('profession' in the title)

2. Nightwalker by Heather Graham (time of day)

3. Father Melancholy's Daughter by Gail Godwin (a relative)

4. The Fourth Hand by John Irving (a body part)

5. House of Sand and Fog by Andre Dubus III (a building)

6. The Plague by Albert Camus (a medical condition)

The two books I enjoyed the most were Nightwalker and Father Melancholy's Daughter. Both authors were new to me and I am certain to read a lot more from them. Ms. Graham is the one I will read when I need a paranormal mystery fix and Ms. Godwin will be my companion when I need to read something deep. a little bit sad and always with food for thought.

The most disappointing books was House of Sand and Fog. I had heard so many wonderful things about it before I read the book and I think that my expectations might have been too high. Whatever the reason, the book certainly didn't live up to the hype it got in my opinion. For the first half it dragged too much and the ending felt somehow unfulfilling.

Because I liked this challenge so much, I of course decided to sign up for What's In a Name 3. It is hosted by Beth F. from Beth Fish Reads and even has its own blog.

Here are the rules:

Between January 1 and December 31, 2010, read one book in each of the following categories:

A book with a food in the title

A book with a body of water in the title

A book with a title(queen, president) in the title

A book with a plant in the title

A book with a place name(city, country) in the title

A book with a music term in the title

Other things to consider:

Books may be any form (audio, print, e-book).

Books may overlap other challenges.

Books may not overlap categories; you need a different book for each category.

Creativity for matching the categories is allowed.

You do not have to make a list of books before hand.

You do not have to read through the categories in any particular order.

There will be a single prize at the end of the challenge. Readers who complete the challenge and write up a wrap-up post (or wrap-up comment) are eligible. I'll figure out a way to make it international.

I do not have the list ready yet but will put it here once I figure out the titles. The rules are pretty easy and from what I understand, it will be a very popular challenge in 2010.

2-in-1: Nightwalker & The Elephant Keeper

1. Nightwalker by Heather Graham *

This was my first encounter with Ms. Graham's writing. All I knew about her was that she wrote in a few different genres, including romance and thriller. Nightwalker is a paranormal thriller, taking place in Las Vegas. Jessy Sparhawk, part Native American, cares for her beloved grandfather while living paycheck to paycheck. One day she decides to try her luck gambling as she is really desperate for money. When she's done playing the biggest shock is yet to come. A body of a dead man with a knife in his back falls right on Jessy. Private detective, Dillon Wolf, is accidentally right in the same place and he takes it upon himself to figure out what exactly happened, not realizing that Jessy will be playing an important role in the whole investigation. Of course, it doesn't hurt that she is a stunning woman. Where's the paranormal, you ask? Ha! Mr. Wolf is part Native American as well and he is also a nightwalker, a person who sees and is visited by ghosts. One of these ghosts will help him solve the mystery that turns out to be a lot more than just a dead body in a casino. And it's a mystery that will cost lives.

Thanks to Nightwalker I fell under Heather Graham's spell. It's a great thriller for cold winter days when you really don't feel like doing anything but curling up with an engaging story that will keep you occupied enough to forget about an ugly day outside. The author wove the plot so skillfully that I literally couldn't put the book away and as a result I read it in one day. Thank goodness I was sick in bed and had an excuse to do nothing but read. The thing that really got me to liking Ms. Graham's style was that the romance part was tasteful and that the character of Jessy was not predictable at all and for once I got a heroine who acted the way I imagine real life people act. No such cliches as saying 'no' when you mean 'yes', or being superficially coquettish. I have to be honest, I was pleasantly surprised to see that Jessy and Dillon were such likable characters. Every element in Nightwalker was blended nicely (romance, thriller & paranormal) so I didn't feel overwhelmed or confused about what the story was really about. I am definitely stocking up more of Heather Graham's books for next year.

2. The Elephant Keeper by Christopher Nicholson **

I am usually not a big fan of books with animals as main characters. I decided to break away from this pattern and read The Elephant Keeper, especially that the description mentioned it to be 'a magical adventure'. The novel is set in 18th century England and the story is told by Tom Page, a keeper of two elephants he named Timothy and Jenny. By pure accident, Tom found himself to be their main caregiver since the day they arrived in England. The elephants were still pretty much babies and on the verge of dying. However, under the careful eye of Tom and his undivided attention, Timothy and Jenny survived. And Tom's life took an unexpected turn as he falls in love with the two animals and slowly but surely removes himself from the world of people.

Sounds interesting, doesn't it? Well, it was okay in the beginning even though the style of writing (Tom's weird grammar with author's attempt to use the language as it may have been used in the times the story was set) took some getting used to. It also took me a while to get interested in the story of raising two elephants, the way Tom recounts his life as elephant keeper seemed emotionally distant to me and therefore I couldn't quite believe that he was all that devoted to Timothy and Jenny. But still, there was something in the story (probably the novelty of reading about elephants) that kept me going. Unfortunately, when I got about half-way through, the relationship between Tom Page and his female elephant, Jenny became just plain weird to me. I don't want to spoil anything for those of you who might want to read it but when a man starts talking to an animal and receives answers and the conversations take on an intimate character, and when that same man starts having sexually suggestive dreams featuring the animal I have to start questioning the sanity of the whole novel. Which by the way, was not pitched as a fantasy but historical fiction. I did finish The Elephant Keeper because when I am already half done with a book I go on until the end, but it left me feeling slightly put off.

* I received Nightwalker as an autographed copy from the author during the BEA'09 signing.

** I won The Elephant Keeper from Library Thing Early Reviewer program of which I am a member.

Time to be honest.

I have been honored with this award by two wonderful girls whose blogs are quite different but equally interesting and really worth reading: Teddyree from The Eclectic Reader & Sharazad from The Dangerous Pages Review.

The award is for those bloggers who write from the heart. The rules are to pass it along to seven bloggers and then list 10 honest things about myself.

Here's who I'm giving it to:

1. Blodeuedd from Book girl of Mur-y-Castell

2. April from Cafe of Dreams

3. Jo-Jo from Jo-Jo loves to read!!!

4. Dar from Peeking Between the Pages

5. Amy from The House of Seven Tails

6. Aarti from B O O K L U S T

7. Dorte from DJs krimiblog

The hardest part is coming. It's time to fess up:

1. Despite loving my current country (United States), I do still miss Poland and get homesick.

2. I am a loner and prefer my own company to the company of other people.

3. About two years ago, I got rid of all my credit cards (I had too many & it got me in trouble) and have been using cash only since.

4. I don't like watching movies, 99% of the time I wait for DVD editions and then borrow them from library if for some ungodly reason I want to watch any. I don't spend money on movies.

5. I absolutely hate exercising, especially jogging.

6. I don't like cooking and avoid it as much as possible even though it has been suggested to me as a therapeutic activity. Cooking does not interest me in any way.

7. I also don't like shopping for clothes. I know exactly what size I am and what I want, so when I go to the store I head straight for what's needed, take it to the register and I'm gone.

8. The point above is partially due to my fear of crowds. I get panicky and anxious with too many people around me.

9. I love summer and hot weather. The hotter, the better. As a matter of fact, I wouldn't mind if there were no seasons at all (no snow ever is fine by me).

10. I suck at math and am in fact so horrible at it that my ten-year-old daughter can't get any help from me as far as math homework goes (yes, 5th grade math is too much for me).

Alice I Have Been by Melanie Benjamin

I will tell you a secret. Up until Alice I Have Been appeared on the horizon, I had no idea that there really was a girl named Alice and that Lewis Carroll (Reverend Charles Lutwidge Dodgson) had known her in real life before he decided to write Alice's Adventures in Wonderland. I also didn't know that Mr. Dodgson was a photographer who primarily took pictures of young girls. I guess it's just one more example of why reading is so important and how it's never too late to learn something new. When the opportunity to read Melanie Benjamin's fictionalized story about Alice Pleasance Lidell presented itself, I took it and ran with it.

Alice I Have Been is a novel recounting the life of real Alice as it might have been. It is told by Alice herself, who is now eighty eight years old with a baggage of experiences that shaped her whole life. The author takes us through the childhood years when Alice, together with her two sisters lived in Oxford in the second half of 19th century. Alice was a wild, nonconformist child who preferred spending afternoons with beloved Mr. Dodgson to sitting quietly and learning the etiquette of young girls. Alice's childhood is privileged and mostly happy until things get out of control, until tragedy strikes and one life comes to an end as another begins. We accompany Alice on her real adventures as she innocently contends with her older sister Ina for the affection of Mr. Dodgson, as she is being loved and courted by a member of royal family, and as she finally gets to live away from her critical mother and from the illusion of dubious fame as Alice in Wonderland.

This a picture of Alice taken by Charles Lutwidge Dodgson aka Lewis Carroll when Alice was seven years old.

I really had mixed feelings while reading the book. I admit, I was caught under the spell of Ms. Benjamin's writing. I think she truly captured the life Alice may have lived, at least I didn't once question it and that's about as much as you can do in judging the authenticity in historical fiction. Most of the characters were real, most of events in Alice's life were also real and by the end of the book I felt that real Alice had a lot richer life than what Lewis Carroll imagined for her. What caused me to feel ambivalent in the end was that my image of Lewis Carroll as this innocent, lovable almost Santa Claus-like person crumbled and I wasn't ready for that. There appeared to be some gossip of a scandal concerning young Miss Alice and Mr. Dodgson and looking at the photographs taken by him, I have to say that there is indeed some impropriety in them. I don't want to come out and say that Lewis Carroll was a pedophile, but there certainly seemed to be more to his love of children than I originally thought. But that's really nothing to do with the author's talent. I think that Melanie did a great job by subtly portraying this relationship between a girl and an adult that might or might not have had any sexual undertones.

The second half of the book and second half of Alice's life is what I enjoyed the most. It was the most emotional for me and I could really sympathize with this young girl and then a wife and a mother just trying to get away from forever being Alice in Wonderland and to build a life in which she is known, loved and respected as a real woman and not a child from a story. I even caught myself admiring this strong character and wondering if that's who she really was. Life didn't spare Alice misery, tears and tragedy but life was also good to her in many ways. She emerged from a scandal and from a broken heart as a different woman who knew what she wanted and how to be finally happy. It was truly an adventure to read Alice I Have Been where many emotions were evoked and that's what I think makes for a story worth reading.

*******

I have received this review copy of Alice I Have Been from the Shelf Awareness program.

Alice I Have Been by Melanie Benjamin will be published in January 2010 by Bantam Dell Publishing Group.

2-in-1 : The Book Shopper & Tattoo Machine

In this edition of 2-in-1 I will be writing about two memoirs. But the genre is pretty much all these two books have in common.

1. The Book Shopper. A Life in Review by Murray Browne *

I acquired this book while chatting with Mr. Paul Dry whom I met at Book Expo America 2009. I am mentioning this fact first because Mr. Dry is a publisher and his company, Paul Dry Books, Inc put out The Book Shopper and also because he was probably one of the nicest, most courteous people I met there. I felt Mr. Dry was genuinely interested in what I had to say and we really had a nice, intelligent chat. On that premise I accepted Murray Browne's book with a promise of reading it and further sharing my thoughts about it on my blog.

The Book Shopper is pretty much a short, to the point memoir of one person who loves books (not just reading them) and even though he is hesitant to call himself a true bibliophile, Mr. Browne's life pretty much revolves around books. The book's title is self-explanatory because it is mostly reflective of what we'll find inside: the author's experiences and knowledge concerning shopping for books in all kinds of places. Mr. Browne mentions bits and pieces of his 'other' private life but mainly he wants us, readers, to maybe learn something from his adventures in book shopping and to share our mutual love for books.

I honestly enjoyed myself reading The Book Shopper. It is a quick and easy read but filled with passion for books. And because I have this passion, I also like and feel connected to anyone who wants to write about it and does it exponentially better than I would. Even though I didn't necessarily agree with Mr. Browne's book choices (yes, there is a list of books he recommends), I was pleasantly surprised at the accuracy of some of his observations about bookstores, about people who love books and about people who work in used bookstores. It was a lot of fun to read

this witty recounting of one person's journey through the world of book shopping and if you are looking for something light but intelligent to read, this might be the book.

2. Tattoo Machine. Tall Tales, True Stories, and My Life in Ink by Jeff Johnson **

This is a memoir about...surprise, surprise...tattoos. Jeff Johnson is a tattoo artist (or a tattooer) who decided to put his experiences in tattoo world on paper. I wanted to read the book because I have a tattoo and even though it's the only one I ever will have (that's right, getting tattoos is not addictive and a person can live with just one), I am fascinated by them. Jeff Johnson tells a story of what tattoo artists really think of us, peons wanting to have one and how his life revolved around tattoo shops, pranks, drugs, sex and all the cliches one might expect from someone who does tattoos.

The book was okay. That's it. I did smirk here and there but I was mostly left dissatisfied and felt at times outright offended by Mr. Johnson. His attitude of 'I'm better than you are because I am a tattoo artist' really grated on my nerves. As you probably can tell from the last sentence in the previous paragraph, I was being intentionally snarky. Truth be told, if you want to read about the world of tattooing from the insider, you may want to read this one but I would recommend perusing the library instead of a bookstore. The content is from time to time quite interesting, some incidents from Mr. Johnson's life funny but I mostly had a feeling that the author felt lost himself while writing the book, because it felt disjointed at times, there were chapters or fragments within a chapter for which I couldn't quite I understand the reason. They mostly felt like 'fillers' just to meet the word requirements. Anyway, it's not a horrible book, it is readable but because of the tone of superiority, I took it personally and feel mostly negative about it.

* I received this book from the publisher for review.

** I won this book through GoodReads giveaway program.