Friday Favorites - "The Little Old Lady Who Was Not Afraid of Anything"

I know, I know--it's not Friday. But I had to wait to post this until Halloween and now Halloween is minutes from over and I almost missed it. I don't even have little children to get into costumes and out into the neighborhood to use as an excuse for my lateness.


My pick this week is Linda Williams' The Little Old Lady Who Was Not Afraid Of Anything. My mom first found this book for my niece when she was very little. She loved it so much that a copy soon made it to my house. It is simply charming. At two years old, this was my son's favorite book. We made it interactive. The little old lady, out on a walk is confronted by a series of clothing items. Each makes a "sound" (although shake, shake is not really a sound). When we started reading the book, I did the "sounds" myself but soon my son was joining in the fun and I would let him read the sound words. By the time he was three, he could "read' this book himself. Although beloved by all three of my children, it was my oldest who truly loved this book. Tonight my fourteen-year-old and I read it together!

Beyond the fun factor, the book has a wonder message about being brave and facing fears. It teaches children that sometimes things aren't as scary as we might think they are. My copy is falling apart. But it will continue to be a part of Halloween for years to come.

Friday Favorite - Chesapeake by James Michener

In what may be a first, my Friday Favorite this time was never made into a movie. My choice this week is James Michener's Chesapeake, a novel that spans 400 years, making a movie adaptation all but impossible. Complicating matters even more would be the fact that there are no people in a good part of the book. I've seen movies done from the point of view of a cat or a dog, but I'm guessing that filmmakers have really shied away from trying to get the point of view of Canadian geese down on film.

The book is entirely set in an area scarely more than 10 miles square, in and around the Chesapeake Bay in Maryland. It opens before the Europeans discovered the area then follows their arrival and the settling of the land right up until the time the book was written (it was published in 1986). About 10 years ago, I discovered that my husbands' ancestors had settled very near this area and was so excited to already have a picture in my head of what the land must have been like when they first arrived.

Michener is the master of combining research and story; twenty years after reading the book, I still remember what this book said about the migratory patterns of the geese and how they are able to navigate their way. At almost 1100 pages, this was by far and away one of the longest books I had read up until this point in my life, but I don't ever remember feeling as though it was an insurmountable obstacle. In fact, I enjoyed it so much, I later picked up a couple more Michener novels.

Michener's first novel was Tales of the South Pacific, which was made into the Broadway musical and movie "South Pacific" and which won the Pulitzer Prize in 1948.

Friday Favorite

About now you're probably starting to wonder if I read any books that aren't made into movies because, once again, my Friday Favorite has been made into a movie, Stella Gibbons' Cold Comfort Farm. Although I'll bet most of you haven't heard of the movie. The movie, released in 1996, stars Kate Beckinsale, Rufus Sewell, and Ian McKellan. I love this movie so I was excited to see that it was originally a book. Then I was nervous. What if I hated the book and it ruined the movie? Hurray! The book had every bit of the charm, wit and whimsy of the movie--or, more accurately, the movie had every bit of the book's charm, wit and whimsy since the book was originally published in 1932.

Flora Poste is a young society lady who suddenly finds herself an orphan. She most definitely does not want to get a job so decides she will need to live off her relatives. But which ones? After rejecting a number of offers, Flora chooses to move to Cold Comfort Farm, home of the Starkadders because she feels that they will provide her with a project. To say that the people on Cold Comfort Farm are a bunch of country bumpkins is an understatement. But Flora immediately sets to work to make their lives "better," although her motives are not altruistic.

The book is a wonderful satire of the melodramas of D. H. Lawrence and Thomas Hardy and a parody of the rural novels so popular at the time it was written. Okay--that sounds boring doesn't it? Pretend like you didn't just read the names Lawrence and Hardy because you don't have to have been depressed by them to enjoy this book. The characters in this book are wonderful--a recluse aunt, a hellfire preacher, and an oversexed cousin obsessed with the "talkies" (who also happens to be in charge of the farm's bull). Even the names will make you laugh: Ada Doom, Elfin, Urk and the cows are Feckless, Pointless, Aimless and Graceless while the bull is Big Business. This book is just great fun! It's a shame that Gibbon's other works are no longer in print.

Friday Favorites

John Irving has recently released a new book which made me think of my all-time favorite Irving book, The World According To Garp. I know most of you would pick Owen Meany, but for me, Garp was king of the Irving works.

 This is the story of T. S. Garp, bastard son of nurse Jennie Fields. The story is as much about Jennie, really, as it is about Garp. Garp lives something of a traditional life--he marries, he becomes a loving father, and he pursues a career as an author. Jennie, on the other hand, becomes a feminist leader, after writing a book about her own life. This pulls Garp into an interesting new world.

Irving creates the most unusual and eccentric characters and conjures up worlds that are both fantastic and very real. In "Garp" Irving brilliantly blends humor and tragedy. In a key scene, there is a terrible accident that results in severe injuries, death and almost ends Garp's marriage. But the accident itself will make the reader laugh with the absurdity of it. As the reader will continue to do throughout the book, despite the heaviness of the situations. It's what Irving does best; it's what keeps us reading his books.

In 1982, the book was made into a movie starring Robin Williams, Glenn Close and John Lithgow. If you don't have the inclination to read the book, see the movie. It really captures the story wonderfully.

Friday Favorite

Maybe you've seen the movie version of Pat Conroy's "The Prince of Tides" starring Nick Nolte and Babara Streisand. Maybe you liked it, maybe you didn't. I saw it after I read the book. I'm afraid that's generally a bad thing for me to do. While the movie does get in most of the important aspects of the novel, it does not being to capture the emotion of the novel. Conroy's book has it's flaws, to be sure, but it is incredibly gripping and it's descriptions of South Carolina's Low Country are amazingly vivid.

Publisher's Weekly has this summary: Henry Wingo is a shrimper who fishes the seas off the South Carolina coast and regularly squanders what little money he amasses in farcical business schemes; his beautiful wife, Lila, is both his victim and a manipulative and guilt-inflicting mother. The story is narrated by one of the children, Tom Wingo, a former high school teacher and coach, now out of work after a nervous breakdown. Tom alternately recalls his growing-up years on isolated Melrose Island, then switches to the present in Manhattan, where his twin sister and renowned poet, Savannah, is recovering from a suicide attempt. One secret at the heart of this tale is the fate of their older brother Luke; we know he is dead, but the circumstances are slowly revealed. Also kept veiled is what happened on the island that day, a grisly scene of horror, rape and carnage that eventually explains much of the sorrow, pain and emotional alienation endured by the Wingo siblings.

I read this before I had children, when I was still young, and I just could not imagine parents treating their children the way Henry and Lila handle their children. I just had to keep telling myself that it was just a story. I'm old enough now to know that things like this happen to children every day. But I still cannot understand why.

Friday Favorites

Two new favorites this week. I discovered, a few weeks back, Learnoutloud.com while searching for free online books to listen to. This site has links to all of the Librovox books as well a many other sites for classic books and a lot of great links to author speeches. So far I've been listened to Edith Wharton's "Ethan Frome," Mark Twain's "Tom Sawyer," William Shakespeare's "Romeo and Juliet, and an wonderful speech by Isabel Allende among others.

Since the fall, I've been reading more and more book blogs, hence the inspiration for me to start my own. I've now lost track of the number of blogs I'm following. There are some really great places to get book reviews, learn about new books, read author interviews and even make new friends. Coming in September, there will be a whole week devoted to book bloggers. For more information, check out http://www.bookbloggerappreciationweek.com. Here's some information from the site:

Last year over 400 blogs came together to celebrate the art of book blogging during the first ever Book Blogger Appreciation Week! I am so pleased to announce that the second annual Book Blogger Appreciation Week will be taking place September 14-18.
WHO Anyone who blogs about books is invited to participate. In fact, we want everyone who blogs about books and reading to be a part of this week!
WHAT A week where we come together, celebrate the contribution and hard work of book bloggers in promoting a culture of literacy, connecting readers to books and authors, and recogonizing the best among us with the Second Annual BBAW Awards. There will be special guest posts, daily blogging themes, and giveaways.
WHEN September 14-18, 2009
WHERE Here at the new Book Blogger Appreciation Week Blog! (Please note that this year there are three separate blogs and feeds—one for the main event, one for giveaways, and one for awards.)
WHY Because books matter. In a world full of options, the people talking about books pour hard work, time, energy, and money into creating a community around the written word. I, Amy, the founder of Book Blogger Appreciation Week love this community of bloggers and want to shower my appreciation on you!

Friday Favorites

My Friday fave this week is Plainsong by Kent Haruf. If you've ever lived in the Midwest (and by Midwest I do not mean Ohio or Indiana which are in no way in the western part of the US) you will be able to recognize these small town characters.

Amazon.com gives this synopsis: Tom Guthrie is a high school teacher whose wife can't--or won't--get out of bed; the McPherons are two bachelor brothers who know little about the world beyond their farm gate; Victoria Roubideaux is a pregnant 17-year-old with no place to turn. Their lives parallel each other in much the same way any small-town lives would--until Maggie Jones, another teacher, makes them intersect. Even as she tries to draw Guthrie out of his black cloud, she sends Victoria to live with the two elderly McPheron brothers, who know far more about cattle than about teenage girls. Trying to console her when she think she's hurt her baby, the best lie they can come up with is this: "I knew of a heifer we had one time that was carrying a calf, and she got a length of fencewire down her some way and it never hurt her or the calf."

There's not a lot of suspense in this book (although one scene with a bully and Tom Guthrie's boys had me on the afraid to read on but unable to put the book down) but the relationships are wonderful, the dialogue to terrific and the characters are memorable, particularly the McPheron brothers. The writing is beautiful but uncomplicated. Chapters that alternate between the various characters' storylines pull the reader along. This was a book I was sorry to have end.

Friday Favorites

I found this fantastic graphic at At Home With Books. Each week she uses it when she reviews one of her favorite books from the past, which I think is a terrific idea. If all goes well, my goal is to do this every Friday.

My pick this week is "Fried Green Tomatoes At The Whistle Stop Cafe" by Fannie Flagg.
Flagg tells the story of two women who form an unlikely friendship; one is an elderly woman, Mrs. Threadgoode, living in a nursing home, the other is a middle-aged woman, Evelyn, who is in the throes of a midlife identity crisis. Mrs. Threadgoode begins telling Evelyn the tale of two other women--tomboy Idgie and her friend Ruth. In the 1930's Idgie and Ruth ran the Whistle Stop Cafe in a small Southern town. The book takes the reader back and forth in time.

The characters are, figuratively speaking, black or white; there is no gray as far as character is concerned. But there is enough "bad" in this book to keep the book from getting too sugary. And the book does deal with some big subjects including racism, homosexuality, and spousal abuse. Only a hard-hearted person would not find themselves cheering for Idgie, Ruth, Big George, Ninny, and Evelyn.