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Dec 22nd, 2024, 4:41am
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Topic: Books' Reviews (Read 1074 times) |
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nOrKAy
Premier Expert
 Happy Valley
# 130
If you don't like my apples, don't shake my tree!
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Books' Reviews
« on: Jan 11th, 2006, 5:18pm » |
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After posting what book were you reading under "What Are you Reading Right Now" thread, this is the next thread to post about the book we were reading.
Share the story of the book you have just read. Were you touched? Disappointed? Did you find it as just a waste of time reading it? What did you learn? What did you like about it, about the characters? Confusing?
Anything about the book, share and encourage others to read what you have read. 
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nOrKAy
Premier Expert
Happy Valley
# 130
If you don't like my apples, don't shake my tree!
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Posts: 2733
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Re: Books' Reviews
« Reply #1 on: Jan 11th, 2006, 5:23pm » |
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Here is a book I have just done reading.
Tess of the D'Urbervilles
by Thomas Hardy
This book is about a young woman who struggles to find her place in society. When it is discovered that the low-class Durbeyfield family is in reality the d'Urbervilles, the last of a famous blood line that dates back hundreds of years, the mother sends her eldest daughter, Tess, to beg money from relations with the obvious desire that Tess wed the rich Mr. d'Urberville. Thus begins a tale of woe in which a wealthy man cruely mistreats a poor girl. Tess is taken advantage of by Mr. d'Urberville and leaves his house, returning home to have their child, who subsequently dies. Throughout the rest of this fascinating novel, Tess is tormented by guilt at the thought of her impurity and vows to never marry. She is tested when she meets Angel, the clever son of a priest, and falls in love with him. After days of pleading, Tess gives in to Angel and consents to marry him. Angel deserts Tess when he finds the innocent country girl he fell in love with is not so pure. This touching story depicts how difficult it was being a woman in the 1800s.
Tess of the D'Urbervilles, is a story one can easily relate to. If anyone has ever suffered prejudice, then he/she will want to read this book. The book is also thought-provoking. "Tess" is also interesting in that the author gives the point of view of all the characters in it, not simply that of Tess. This means that the reader gets a better understanding of the plot. Thomas Hardy writes in an eloquent and descriptive manner.
"Tess of the D'Urbervilles" does have perceived flaws. It has been described by other other friends who have read it as rather verbose, but this is not the case, and that the details only add to the book. The plot is tragic, which might make it depressing to read. However, one finds that it is tragic in a beautiful and compelling sense, not in a sad sense.
Tess of the D'Urbervilles touched my heart.
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| « Last Edit: Jan 12th, 2006, 2:38am by nOrKAy » |
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Wicked_Witch
Premier Expert
 Manila
# 201
I'm not old, you are just younger. Hehehe!
 
 
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Re: Books' Reviews
« Reply #2 on: Jan 16th, 2006, 11:47am » |
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Just book reviews? I will have to wait till I am able to publish my story then.
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She who have not sinned may cast the first stone.
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nOrKAy
Premier Expert
Happy Valley
# 130
If you don't like my apples, don't shake my tree!
Gender:
Posts: 2733
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Re: Books' Reviews
« Reply #3 on: Sep 30th, 2006, 9:21am » |
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I was in the bookstore with a friend the other day and she pointed out a book to me.
Party of One: A Loner's Manifesto
They were unsuspecting. They were contradictions. They were the voices of the people. Their accomplishments attained the accolades of millions. And they were loners.
Maybe this was the way it was supposed to be. I've thought that perhaps my personality is too finical for anyone to tolerate. Or perhaps I've thought that pain and turmoil has shaped and then inaugurated me into a club where our mindsets are set apart from the others. Certain events change what you think is funny and what you think is deep. And until you find those who've seen through the same lens, you continue on alone. You compromise yourself to make acquaintances along the way, but seldom does anyone stay.
It's like we grew up in the same house, but he went out the back door, and I went through the front. - Truman Capote
Oh, and I feel like saying, to the people who have grown impatient with me. I'll make it worth the wait.
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Ligaya
Moderator
Certified
# 387
be RoCk ....be WiLd... ExPrEsS uR sElF!!!!
 
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Re: Books' Reviews
« Reply #4 on: Feb 6th, 2007, 3:22pm » |
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ROCK CLIMBING BOOK
Whether you're a beginner bouldering a low-angled face or an experienced climber attempting to flash a route on-sight, Rock Climbing will help you explore one of the world's fastest growing activities safely and successfully.
Author Phil Watts, an expert climber and instructor for more than 15 years, is an enthusiastic and insightful teacher. He covers the basic techniques in four styles of free rock climbing: bouldering, top-roping, traditional leading, and sport leading. The book contains 47 full-color photos that demonstrate correct climbing techniques for moving over rock faces, cracks, and overhangs. Readers also learn
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We come to love not by finding a perfect person, but by learning to see an imperfect person perfectly. *bad_day_me*
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Ligaya
Moderator
Certified
# 387
be RoCk ....be WiLd... ExPrEsS uR sElF!!!!
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Posts: 676
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Re: Books' Reviews
« Reply #5 on: Feb 8th, 2007, 3:08pm » |
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when a man loves a woman
by:Alina Adams
Alina Adams made quite a splash with her last contemporary, Annie’s Wild Ride. More than a few romance readers -- this one included -- thought it was one of the most compelling contemporary romances of 1998. Thus, expectations run high for When a Man Loves a Woman. Are these expectations met? Yes and no. This is a very good contemporary romance with an interesting premise and well developed characters. If it lacks the originality of Annie, it nevertheless is a fine book.
As the back blurb notes, this book asks the question, “Can a man and a woman really be just friends?” The answer seems to be no. But there is an underlying message that may seem foreign to this society where personal gratification at any cost has become its motto. Honor and duty may require that friendship is the only proper relationship even when a man loves a woman.
James Elliot and Deborah Brody met in medical school. Assigned as lab partners, they became each other’s study partner, confidant, cheerleader, sounding board, and best friend as they navigated the extreme demands of their chosen profession. Perhaps they could have been more, but three weeks before she started medical school, Deb married Max Brody, a real prince among men who is totally supportive of his new wife’s ambitions.
Twenty years later, Elliot and Brody, as they call each other, are still best friends and colleagues. Elliot is head of the pediatric trauma unit at a large Los Angeles hospital and Brody is the head of pediatric neurosurgery. Their colleagues wonder about their relationship, but indeed they are “just friends.”
Then Max dies suddenly of a heart attack. Again, to quote the back blurb, “Still reeling from her husband’s sudden death, Deborah turns to Elliot in passion and grief.” The genie is out of the bottle and can’t be forced back in. Their relationship has altered. Elliot knows what he wants; he has loved Deb for twenty years. Deborah is obviously more conflicted. Loyal to the man she married, the man who loved and supported her, the man she did love, she has never dared examine her real feelings for her best friend or his real feelings for her.
Complicating their relationship are hospital politics which Adams paints with a deft hand. The ruthless competition for limited funding among all the ambitious doctors with their own agendas is undoubtedly all too true to life, but it causes problems for Elliot and Brody.
As in her previous book, Adams excels at creating the background to her story. Just as in Annie, the reader entered the world of Air Force pilots, here we come to enter the world of modern medicine and the lives of the doctors who deal daily with crises that we can only imagine. The psyches of those men and women who take their scalpels to cut into human flesh become a little more comprehensible, thanks to the author’s descriptive gifts.
Still, what matters most in this book are the characters and their relationship. The conflict that almost tears Brody and Elliot apart strikes me as completely believable. It is compounded of Brody’s fears and insecurities and Elliot’s pride and his own fears. I suppose some readers may fault some of Brody’s actions, some of her responses. But even when I found her behavior ill-considered, I understood where she was coming from. This is the mark of a good author.
There was some controversy about the ending of Annie. Many online readers expressed doubts that the hero and heroine, despite their love, could indeed live happily ever after, given their radically different personalities. There is no such ambiguity here. Once Brody and Elliot work through the very real problems that Adams details so effectively, it becomes clear that while a man and a woman can indeed be just friends if necessary, real friendship is the strongest foundation for love.
--Jean Mason
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We come to love not by finding a perfect person, but by learning to see an imperfect person perfectly. *bad_day_me*
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teagirl
Beginner
 Wellington
# 1046
carpe diem
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Posts: 87
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Re: Book Review
« Reply #6 on: Dec 15th, 2008, 3:47pm » |
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The Namesake by Jhumpa Lahiri
I've "discovered" Jhumpa Lahiri in her book, a short story collection, titled "The Interpreter of Maladies" and was very much impressed with her style of writing and her insight into her characters' identity. So impressed was I that I reserved her other books in the library and read "The Namesake" with delight.
It's a story of an American born to Bengali parents, Gogol Ganguli. Named after Nikolai Gogol, the Russian "mad genius" in the literary world and writer of the very famous "The Overcoat"; Gogol Ganguli resented his parents' choice of name for him. He felt that other people were making fun of his name, but truth be told, no other person was cruel to Ganguli except Ganguli himself.
I enjoyed the book until I was two-thirds way into it; when suddenly there seemed to be a shift in its fluidity with Lahiri bringing another voice to the "stream of consciousness" style that she had started. The voice, that of Gogol Ganguli's wife, Moussomi, was like a frayed thread in the smooth silk of Ganguli's thoughts. It was so sudden and without warning, that it took over the storyline and short-changed Gogol Ganguli a proper denouement.
Nevertheless, Jhumpa Lahiri's fluidity and keen insight on the lives of "strangers in a strange land" still make this book a "nice" read.
My rating: ***/*****
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| « Last Edit: Dec 15th, 2008, 3:47pm by teagirl » |
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I love to sing in the shower. I'm good, too! All my shampoos think so.
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teagirl
Beginner
Wellington
# 1046
carpe diem
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Posts: 87
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The Memory Keeper's Daughter: A Review
« Reply #7 on: Jan 10th, 2009, 10:12pm » |
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The Memory Keeper's Daughter by Kim Edwards
David Henry is a physician whose wife bore him fraternal twins, a healthy baby boy and the other twin, a girl, with Down's Syndrome. He asked the attending nurse to give the baby away, but instead she kept the baby, named Phoebe, and raised her as her own. Meanwhile, Henry's wife, Norah, was told that the baby died at childbirth.
The story is not at all original, unfortunately. In the book "Princess Daisy" by Judith Krantz, Daisy was also born a twin, but her sister, Danielle, had some sort of abnormality that her father, a Russian aristocrat, gave Danielle away while telling his wife that the child died at childbirth. Kim Edwards, however, went beyond and explored how the characters' lives would be greatly affected where Judith Krantz stopped at the Russian's wife leaving him upon knowing the existence of the "special" child.
I didn't like The Memory Keeper's Daugher. For me, it was a very excruciating read as Kim Edwards was excessively descriptive and verbose. Even when the character was going inside the bedroom, she would write in detail how the hand would flick at the light switch. She also described in detail “smooth, silky skin, swan-like neck, pink shell ears, lustrous cascading hair of gold,” etc. etc. and I felt like I was reading a thicker version of Mills & Boon without the love scenes written in. The story ended conveniently for the characters and for Kim Edwards. Nothing in these pages will blow you away.
**/*****
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I love to sing in the shower. I'm good, too! All my shampoos think so.
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teagirl
Beginner
Wellington
# 1046
carpe diem
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Posts: 87
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Book Review
« Reply #8 on: Jan 18th, 2009, 8:32pm » |
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She's Come Undone by Wally Lamb
Smart-mouthed and conflicted, that's who Dolores Price is, the protagonist in this book by Wally Lamb. Coming from divorced parents, overly religious grandparent, raped at thirteen, bullied at school, with no real time activities except hanging out with Roberta, a tattoo artist, and watching television all the time and eating, it was no wonder that Dolores ballooned to almost 300 lbs and with mental problems. But she managed to come out triumphant from out of it all.
The book was enjoyable to read, easy, and the characters unforgettable. What was so amazing was how Wally Lamb, a man, easily was able to make you believe about his heroine, how she thinks and how she acts! A man privy to all those about femininity and womanhood writing without judgment or patronising voice and managing to be cheered by the opposite sex? I'd say he's a modern literary genius.
4/5
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| « Last Edit: Jan 18th, 2009, 8:35pm by teagirl » |
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I love to sing in the shower. I'm good, too! All my shampoos think so.
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