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A Banned Book: Fun Home

2006, Banned Books, Books in Bed, Comics & Graphic Novels, Favorites, GLBT, Non-Fiction /

I don’t really DO graphic novels (or comics). They just aren’t my thing, I know that and I avoid them. But when I heard Fun Home was being challenged and banned, I decided to give it a try. I do like Dykes to Watch Out For, in small doses, so I had high hopes for Fun Home.

High hopes indeed. Fun Home is excellent. And it totally needed to be a graphic novel instead of just a written word piece. What a family, what a story, what a terrific job Bechdel did telling her story.

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There Is No Me Without You

2 Comments / 2006, Books in Bed, Favorites, Non-Fiction /

Sigh, Sigh, Sigh, Sigh. There Is No Me Without You is a difficult book. Difficult because it’s a reminder of how little most of us are doing to solve huge problems. It’s a reminder of how little difference we are making in the world.

Everyone should read this, and books like it – and then DO something. And while you’re at it, go read Mary’s interview with the author. And visit Mary’s family – her family has made a difference in Africa.

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The Coroner’s Journal

2 Comments / 2006, Books in Bed, Favorites, Non-Fiction /

Like they always say, truth is stranger than fiction. The Coroner’s Journal proves that completely. Louis Cataldie is one of the most interesting characters ever to grace the pages of a book and he’s a real live person. The crimes, often felt like something out of a horror novel or a whodunit, but those were real crimes. Truth is definitely stranger than fiction.

I would like to meet Cataladie over a cup of coffee and a hot donut someday, the stories he can tell and the fact that he still seems to be pretty sane after all that he’s been through. Amazing

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Acorna’s Children

2006, Books in Bed, Favorites, Fiction, Sci Fi and Fantasy /

Have I mentioned I am not an Anne McCaffrey fan? Well I’m not, except for the Acorna series. That, I like. Probably because the first one I “read” was on audio and it lured me in, but after half dozen (or more) of these, I’m still enjoying them. Acorna’s Children was just what I needed after a string of non-fiction. It just doesn’t get any better than inter-gallactic unicorn type creatures saving the universe, particularly when the heroes tend to be women and children.

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The Masque of the Black Tulip

4 Comments / 2006, Books in Bed, Favorites, Fiction /

Woohooo, The Masque of the Black Tulip is full of women spies! Gotta love that. It is also just as excellent as the Secret History of the Pink Carnation.

I thought I would be disappointed that there was not more about Richard and Amy and Jane but I wasn’t. Miles and Henrietta and the rest of the Londoners held their own and then some. I might actually have liked this one more than the Pink Carnation – does that ever happen with sequels?

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The Devil’s Feather

1 Comment / 2006, Books in Bed, Favorites, Fiction, Mystery /

I love Minette Walters. After reading Devil’s Feather I am tempted to ignore Inheritance of Loss a bit longer and read another Walters that is calling me from the “to be read” shelf. But I won’t, I’ll read Inheritance now and then get back to Walters!

I think TW said that The Devil’s Feather was boring. I’m not sure why she found it boring. The initial area of the book, the foreshadowing so to speak, was a little slow – but once the bad guy got really bad, it was anything BUT boring.

I liked both Connie and Jess quite a bit. I disliked Dr Peter from start to finish but that’s ok – which says something about Minette Walters… that I can dislike a major character, one who has solid relationships with the two main characters that I love, and not hold it against the author – that never happens.

(Terrorism abounds in this book. Rape, torture – it’s pretty ugly. If you’ve got personal “triggers”, this may not be the book for you.)

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The Birth House

2 Comments / 2006, Books in Bed, Favorites, Feminism, Fiction /

It’s been a long time since I put off sleep to finish a book. Sleep trumps just about everything right now, my life is just like that. That all changed last night when I found myself closing the final pages of The Birth House at 1:44am.

Sassymonkey and others have been raving about The Birth House for ages. My library, as wonderful as it is, didn’t have it and I couldn’t get it through inter-library loan. So Sassymonkey, she surprised me with it. At first, I was grouchy about that. I owe her a seriously large package and I’m horrible about mailing things. And here she is, sending me package after package after package – making me feel more guilty with each knock on the door by the postman. Also, I’m behind on my reading. How dare she send me books I am dying to read? HMPH.

TW picked up The Birth House before I had a chance. And she read it straight through, staying up long after I’d fallen asleep. This also made me grouchy. TW read MY book BEFORE I had a CHANCE. HMPH. And then she had the nerve to talk about how AMAZING it was. HMPH again.

I decided to ignore the huge stack of library books waiting to go back and picked up The Birth House on Wednesday evening. I read the prologue and promptly went to sleep wondering why this was a book to rave about… the prologue wasn’t. On Thursday evening, I picked up The Birth House and read 12 pages and promptly went to sleep wondering if I was going to be sorely disappointed in this book. I picked up The Birth House on Friday evening and read it straight through – every single page, stopping only to run over and pick up Michelle at 11:30pm and bring her home (whining about her cutting into my reading time).

The Birth House – awesome. Maybe the best book ever written. OK OK not the best book ever written but still, wonderful – spectacular – extraordinay (to borrow TW’s description). And by a Canadian, too. I mean really, Canadian writers rarely grab me and keep me – but Ami McKay, AWESOME.

Buy the book. Read the book. Give it to friends and family. Man, I might have to read it again today! Oh wait, I can’t, I need to read Inheritance of Loss, darn it.

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The Booker Prize

3 Comments / Favorites, Fiction, Reading Lists /

Well, as suspected, Inheritance of Loss is the 2006 Booker Prize winner. I haven’t read it yet and now that it has won I have some irrational desire NOT to read it. Weird, eh? Ah well, it is on my shelf waiting patiently so I will give it a go… after I finish Carry Me Down. (In the Company of Men is still on my reserve list at the library and I will read that too, eventually.)


I would like to thank the folks who blogged about the short listed books on the Man Booker Prize Blog. I really enjoyed reading their thoughts about each of the books and following their progress through the stacks.

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