Book #6
Title: Three Nights In Havana
Author: Robert Wright
Pages: 296
Grade: C-
Buyability: 2/10
Status: Owned (freebie)
This is another book I got through Harper Collins' First Look program. As noted below, I'm not a non-fiction reader so this one took a bit longer for me to trudge through. It wasn't bad but it wasn't great.
This book was a bit of a paradox for me - meaning I'm still not entirely sure what I thought about it. At times I was bored, at others I was enchanted and interested. To be perfectly honest, I'm not a 'non-fiction' reader in general, unless you count biographies, but I was curious to read Wright's tale of Fidel & Pierre -a relationship I hardly knew existed.
Well after reading this book I am still not sure it really existed. There were many questions I kept on asking myself as I read it:
- I have minimal background on a lot of the events leading up to Trudeau's visit to Cuba - but would the average reader picking up this book really want to trudge through the extensive historical background provided in the book (assuming they DO know more about the political climate of the era)?
- Is the book really about Fidel & Pierre or is it about Cuba & Canada (and to a degree the US)?
- Why would you write a book on the premise of Trudeau's visit causing so many shockwaves both personally and politically if the evidence to support either claim is relatively flimsy and speculative?
Ultimately I had to question what Wright's ultimate purpose was in writing this book, and although I applaud his research and the ability to put things in perspective - in particular Trudeau's critiqued foreign policy with Cuba in contrast with the US' policy during that time and since - I found it almost chore-like to make my way through the book at some points.
Overall I think this book has some merit if you are particularly interested in either one of the politicians or the cold war that is detailed in this book. That being said, Wright almost tries to cover too many things at once and therefore doesn't cover anything completely enough to satisfy what I would presume to be a typical reader of his book.
Monday, February 26, 2007
Thursday, February 15, 2007
Book #5: Survival of the Sickest by Dr. Sharon Moalem
Book #5
Title: Survival of the Sickest
Author: Dr. Sharon Moalem
Pages: 288
Grade: A
Buyability: 6/10
Status: Owned (freebie)
Do you ever look at your body and wonder how it works? Did you ever stop and think about the connection between body fat, tanning, and sunglasses? How about the links between cryogenics, tree frogs, the ice age and diabetes? Chances are you at least asked yourself the first of those questions, and if so, this book is an excellent (albeit a tad scary) look into just how complex your body really is.
Dr. Sharon Moalem is an expert in an emerging field known as evolutionary medicine - in short, how our bodies have adapted to the environment around us through natural selection and instinct.
The best thing about the book is its constant awareness of the reader. Although Survival of the Sickest could easily be enjoyed by any medical maven, it's just as easily read and loved by an average Jill like myself. The diction is very reader-friendly, with on exception. The chapter "Jump Into the Gene Pool" really turned me off - its style didn't seem to flow as well, perhaps because the subject matter was that much more complicated, but it really stuck out as a difficult to get through section of the book.
One of the ways Moalem makes the book readable is by adapting scientific and medical phenomena to pop culture or layman's terms. This has a mixed effect - in some cases I found it extremely helpful! In others, I found the writing to be cornball, hokey, and distracting. Overall though, Moalem does an excellent job of making the book readable.
Each chapter starts out with one large medical phenomena - either something common such as diabetes or death, or with something not-so-clear-cut which is explained through an anecdote, for example the blood disease hemochromatosis that the author himself is afflicted with. After that the story goes in several different directions, some which you question - where is this going - before wrapping it all up in a big flourishy bow at the end of each section. The book almost functions as a series of mini-medical movies it ties things together so well, at times in a very climactic way that makes you want to keep reading so you can figure out just what ice wine and tree frogs have in common with us. That's not to say the book shouldn't be read in chronological order - Moalem constantly refers back to past topics.
Finally, one thing I really enjoyed about the book was not only the fact it covered such huge topic areas (often combining ancient history with modern medicine in one fell swoop) but it also gave you some practical tips that could help on a day-to-day basis. Among them, limiting iron intake, being wary of sunglasses while tanning, and eating healthy while you are pregnant. These little tips are sprinkled throughout the book, although not explicity stated - which could actually help the reader, perhaps with a list at the end of what you can do NOW. Or it could be posted on Moalem's website for the book.
I was pretty excited to read Survival of the Sickest even prior to being chosen to review it. I'm not a medical person at all, and get kinda squeamish at most medical phenonmena (including a few in here...Guinea worms?) but for whatever reason the book intrigued me. I'm glad to say it continued to captivate me from cover to cover, and I'd highly recommend it to anyone!
Title: Survival of the Sickest
Author: Dr. Sharon Moalem
Pages: 288
Grade: A
Buyability: 6/10
Status: Owned (freebie)
Do you ever look at your body and wonder how it works? Did you ever stop and think about the connection between body fat, tanning, and sunglasses? How about the links between cryogenics, tree frogs, the ice age and diabetes? Chances are you at least asked yourself the first of those questions, and if so, this book is an excellent (albeit a tad scary) look into just how complex your body really is.
Dr. Sharon Moalem is an expert in an emerging field known as evolutionary medicine - in short, how our bodies have adapted to the environment around us through natural selection and instinct.
The best thing about the book is its constant awareness of the reader. Although Survival of the Sickest could easily be enjoyed by any medical maven, it's just as easily read and loved by an average Jill like myself. The diction is very reader-friendly, with on exception. The chapter "Jump Into the Gene Pool" really turned me off - its style didn't seem to flow as well, perhaps because the subject matter was that much more complicated, but it really stuck out as a difficult to get through section of the book.
One of the ways Moalem makes the book readable is by adapting scientific and medical phenomena to pop culture or layman's terms. This has a mixed effect - in some cases I found it extremely helpful! In others, I found the writing to be cornball, hokey, and distracting. Overall though, Moalem does an excellent job of making the book readable.
Each chapter starts out with one large medical phenomena - either something common such as diabetes or death, or with something not-so-clear-cut which is explained through an anecdote, for example the blood disease hemochromatosis that the author himself is afflicted with. After that the story goes in several different directions, some which you question - where is this going - before wrapping it all up in a big flourishy bow at the end of each section. The book almost functions as a series of mini-medical movies it ties things together so well, at times in a very climactic way that makes you want to keep reading so you can figure out just what ice wine and tree frogs have in common with us. That's not to say the book shouldn't be read in chronological order - Moalem constantly refers back to past topics.
Finally, one thing I really enjoyed about the book was not only the fact it covered such huge topic areas (often combining ancient history with modern medicine in one fell swoop) but it also gave you some practical tips that could help on a day-to-day basis. Among them, limiting iron intake, being wary of sunglasses while tanning, and eating healthy while you are pregnant. These little tips are sprinkled throughout the book, although not explicity stated - which could actually help the reader, perhaps with a list at the end of what you can do NOW. Or it could be posted on Moalem's website for the book.
I was pretty excited to read Survival of the Sickest even prior to being chosen to review it. I'm not a medical person at all, and get kinda squeamish at most medical phenonmena (including a few in here...Guinea worms?) but for whatever reason the book intrigued me. I'm glad to say it continued to captivate me from cover to cover, and I'd highly recommend it to anyone!
Tuesday, February 6, 2007
Book #4: The Bitch Posse by Martha O'Connor
Book #4
Title: The Bitch Posse
Author: Martha O'Connor
Pages: 341
Grade: A-
Buyability: 5/10
Status: Owned (gift)
This book made my skin crawl, my spine tingle, and most importantly - my heart break. Marth O'Connors debut into the literary world is a well-paced, interwoven story of three young women at two points in their life, shortly before graduating high school, and some tweleve years later as adults, no longer friends, but bound and tormented by a secret held between them all.
Each character is written with a lot of heart and empathy from O'Connor - there is a reason why the girls get into the trouble that they do. Rennie (Wren) Taylor is an honour student wanting to break out of her shell, and later on, a single teacher caught up in a dangerous pattern of sexual depravity. Cherry lives with her drug-addled mom and is forced to be both the adult and the best friend, and eventually she ends up in a mental institution, unsure of whether she belongs there. Amy Linnet is Little Miss Popular who breaks free from her life as a cheerleader to escape from the facade her alcoholic parents put on, ironically later on she is the one putting on the same facade in her troubled marriage.
The book follows an interesting pattern of narrative that rotates between the characters, the time period, and the point of view. Rennie might kick off the book in the present tense using third-person narrative, but the next section Cherry might jump in as a troubled high school senior writing in first person, followed by Amy as an adult in third person and so on...instead of creating a jarring effect, the swapping narratives helps contextualize the two periods of time in the girls lives. There is a certain amount of naivete that comes through in the first-person teenage viewpoint, and a certain amount of wiseness in the third person.
I can't reveal too much about the plot other than to say these girls are hitting hard stages in their lives at both ends of the spectrum - as teenagers and as adults. Each section offers a delicious climax that invites you to read on, to find out what will happen to each girl within each time period in their lives, but also to fill in the puzzle pieces about their deep, dark shared secret.
That's not to say the book is perfect. Quite frankly I'm afraid of Martha O'Connor. I felt like the prose and the characters were directly derived from her own opinions, that she felt as though everyone that reads the book would judge it like the characters in the book are judged. I also didn't care much for the character of Cherry - until the big secret is revealed. She is underwritten emotionally and there is a few disconnects in her plot line, again until you find out what the big secret is - however by the time you find out what the secret is, the book abruptly (and understandably) ends, leaving the reading to fill in the pieces.
Overall I enjoyed this book. I was a bit put off by the first couple of chapters, and I'd definitely say heed the opening warnings about how dark the story is - but if you're willing to keep an open mind and just enjoy some excellent, heartfelt, entrancing writing then you'll like this book.
Title: The Bitch Posse
Author: Martha O'Connor
Pages: 341
Grade: A-
Buyability: 5/10
Status: Owned (gift)
This book made my skin crawl, my spine tingle, and most importantly - my heart break. Marth O'Connors debut into the literary world is a well-paced, interwoven story of three young women at two points in their life, shortly before graduating high school, and some tweleve years later as adults, no longer friends, but bound and tormented by a secret held between them all.
Each character is written with a lot of heart and empathy from O'Connor - there is a reason why the girls get into the trouble that they do. Rennie (Wren) Taylor is an honour student wanting to break out of her shell, and later on, a single teacher caught up in a dangerous pattern of sexual depravity. Cherry lives with her drug-addled mom and is forced to be both the adult and the best friend, and eventually she ends up in a mental institution, unsure of whether she belongs there. Amy Linnet is Little Miss Popular who breaks free from her life as a cheerleader to escape from the facade her alcoholic parents put on, ironically later on she is the one putting on the same facade in her troubled marriage.
The book follows an interesting pattern of narrative that rotates between the characters, the time period, and the point of view. Rennie might kick off the book in the present tense using third-person narrative, but the next section Cherry might jump in as a troubled high school senior writing in first person, followed by Amy as an adult in third person and so on...instead of creating a jarring effect, the swapping narratives helps contextualize the two periods of time in the girls lives. There is a certain amount of naivete that comes through in the first-person teenage viewpoint, and a certain amount of wiseness in the third person.
I can't reveal too much about the plot other than to say these girls are hitting hard stages in their lives at both ends of the spectrum - as teenagers and as adults. Each section offers a delicious climax that invites you to read on, to find out what will happen to each girl within each time period in their lives, but also to fill in the puzzle pieces about their deep, dark shared secret.
That's not to say the book is perfect. Quite frankly I'm afraid of Martha O'Connor. I felt like the prose and the characters were directly derived from her own opinions, that she felt as though everyone that reads the book would judge it like the characters in the book are judged. I also didn't care much for the character of Cherry - until the big secret is revealed. She is underwritten emotionally and there is a few disconnects in her plot line, again until you find out what the big secret is - however by the time you find out what the secret is, the book abruptly (and understandably) ends, leaving the reading to fill in the pieces.
Overall I enjoyed this book. I was a bit put off by the first couple of chapters, and I'd definitely say heed the opening warnings about how dark the story is - but if you're willing to keep an open mind and just enjoy some excellent, heartfelt, entrancing writing then you'll like this book.
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