TItle of Book: The Yiddish Policemen's Union
Author: Michael Chabon
Pages: I think 400 or so?
Grade: B
Buyability: 4/10
Status: Owned (freebie)
Well I've been ranting and raving over how awesome Mr. Chabon is in here for ages. And yet I gave him a B? How can this "be"? The truth of the matter is, getting through this book was hard, as it dealt quite lightly with death and family and I have been going through stuff with death and family lately - so reading the book made me be like...oh. Really?
Anyway the other problem was I am a massive fan of The Amazing Adventures of Kavalier and Clay (hereby known as K&C) his first book, a pulitzer prize winner, and therefore no book can ever measure up to. None. Especially not one by the same author. So yeah, I kept on comparing the two.
With that in mind, I *heart* Chabon's writing. It never fails to capture me - and I liked that he had shorter chapters this go-round. The endings of each chapter were brilliant, as they left you at a movie style cliffhanger that you just had to turn the page to read on about. I've tried to figure out what makes Chabon's writing so likable - he uses a lot of unique metaphors, he keeps the language simple, his characters have 'true' voices...but he's got that Rowling-esque something special, that author's voice that urges you to stay engaged and keep on keeping on.
The story in this book is probably what prevented the book from taking off. It follows a down-and-out policeman living in the district of Sitka, part of the Alaskan 'Israel' if you will - that was once a proposal by Roosevelt instead of giving the Jews Palestine post-WW2. Sitka and all of Alaska is on the brink of termination as a protected area, soon to be taken over by the resident natives once again. In the midst of all this, Detective Meyer Landsman is woken up one night to investigate a mysterious execution-style murder of one of the hotel's other occupants. The rest of the book is a fast-paced hunt by Landsman and his unwilling companions, including his new boss and former wife, BIna, as he tries to discover why this man was murdered...before he is murdered himself by the foes behind the whole thing.
The book combined so many elements - lots of Jewish mythology and culture - that I wasn't familiar with, but interested in. Yet unlike masters of the history-meets-action novel (cough Dan Brown), Chabon fails to clarify, or at least make it easy to follow and build up knowledge on, the history that is driving the seedy action throughout the story. The billions of characters don't make it any easier. What i did like was the fact, like a good movie, all of the little details came back to haunt or help Landsman in the latter half of the book. His dead sister, his fear of entering the tunnels, the string collection...every time I thought "okay why was that in there again?" within a chapter or two, as if Chabon had timed our conciousness to awaken at a particular time, all of a sudden that plot element would come back into play.
The Yiddish Policeman's Union is not flawed, so much as dense. It packs a lot in, much as K&C did, but it is rooted very heavily in Jewish culture, which I'm not familiar with. Still, I enjoyed reading it, and you will to - but if you're debating between this and K&C, the latter owns. Big time.
Showing posts with label freebie. Show all posts
Showing posts with label freebie. Show all posts
Monday, April 30, 2007
Monday, February 26, 2007
Book #6: Three Nights In Havana
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.
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.
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!
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