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I've been negligent and now this is a very long list. :)



Shakespeare's Wife, by Germaine Greer - This was somewhat uneven. Greer's main goal is to challenge all the scholarly assumptions that have been made about Ann Hathaway over the years: that she seduced Shakespeare, that she trapped him into a loveless marriage, that he ran off to London to get away from her, that she was illiterate and probably had no idea about his work...... She uses a lot of Stratfordian records to show that most of those scenarios were highly unlikely. (For example, if he had absconded to London, it would have been considered desertion, and was punishable by law. Not a good idea for someone in a high-profile public position.) She paints a picture of what everyday life might have been like for a woman living in a small town of that era, which was really interesting. And you have to support someone actually using the available evidence to support their conclusions, instead of just Making Stuff Up. But there are chapters that get bogged down in too much details - local politics and suchlike - which got boring, and were thusly skipped

Ghost Circles, Treasure Hunters and Crown of Horns, Bone Volumes 7-9, by Jeff Smith - I have nothing intelligent to say, just SQUEE! I don't even know what to say about this series, except that I loved it!

Atonement, by Ian McEwan - This is overall a pretty good book, but it has its uneven moments. It's a gorgeous start, but after a while it stretches into slow and draggy...... and then, just in time, things start happening with a boom. The momentum was much improved after that, and I had trouble putting it down, even in sections that frustrated me a little. Still, I cannot imagine how you would make this into a movie (I haven't seen it) without losing everything that is interesting about this book - especially the first section, which consists of overlapping narrative perspectives, so you see That Day (from which everything else in the book stems) from every conceivable angle. The ending was okay, perhaps a little vague - but thought-provoking.

A Week in October, by Elzabeth Subercaseaux - (This was an Early Reviewer book, through LibraryThing.) A man finds a notebook in which his wife has been writing - but he's not sure if it's a diary or a novel, as it seems to have elements of both. One chapter would be the wife's words, and the next would tell about the husband reading it and about his reactions. A somewhat uneven book, though it has its interesting moments. I don't really like magical realism very much, and so those parts did not sit well with me. But it's a fascinating premise - and the central mystery (is it real, or is it fiction?) kept me reading until the final "twist".

Kindred, by Octavia Butler - This was unbelievably good. A basic time travel scenario - a black woman from 1976 is repeatedly carried back in time to the first half of the 19th century, to protect an ancestor of hers (and ensure that the next generation is born, so that she can someday be born as well). Most of the book is about her efforts to come to terms with life as a black woman / as a slave (because it's almost impossible for her to be anything else) in the historical period - of course, she struggles quite a bit, but also realizes that there are certain things she must do in order to just survive. The contrast between her modern life and the historical one is huge. I think this is one of the best time-travel books I've ever read that really deals with the *psychological* effects. The slavery sections are pretty graphic and horrible - somewhat hard to read - but to good effect. It makes me wonder what sorts of things my ancestors might have endured on a daily basis that I would have trouble just wrapping my mind around..... Highly recommended.

Dragons in the Waters, by Madeleine L'Engle - This is definitely one of her weaker books. As a mystery it's pretty lame, there isn't great character development, and the point is.... well, I'm not sure.

Camille (a.k.a. La Dame aux Camelias), by Alexandre Dumas, fils - I've wanted to read this ever since I was in La Traviata. I have not read a lot of French novels - and to a person used to 19th century *British* novels, this was sort of shocking. Courtesans! Implied sex! Woo! A typical 19th-century frame narrative set-up, but it is nevertheless fairly short and a quick read. The plot is so-so: definitely a product of the age. Still, if you like this sort of thing, and I do, it's pretty good. :) (I read this in English, because my French isn't *nearly* good enough.)

And I haven't quite finished this last one - but I'm 10 pages from the end, so you still get it listed here:
The Fortune Cookie Chronicles: Adventures in the World of Chinese Food, by Jennifer 8. Lee - This is the perfect book for my mother (about China and about food), so I thought I'd kind of try it out for her. It's lots of fun and very interesting. Lee explores a lot of the behind-the-scenes stuff of Chinese restaurants: who really invented fortune cookies? where do those take-out containers come from? Who was General Tso and what's up with his chicken? The question that is probably the heart of the book is, What makes a Chinese restaurant truly authentic, and what does that mean? A lot of comparisons of American Chinese food to Chinese Chinese food, and what the differences are and why. A lot of facts work their way in - about the Chinese immigrant experience in the U.S. and elsewhere, about regional food preferences (like, on a global scale). She goes off on a quest to find "the greatest Chinese restaurant in the world" - with some decently interesting criteria, and writes about a restaurant in Paris where the chef/owner asks everyone "How hungry are you?" and "Is there anything you don't eat?" and then personally decides what to make for you. I totally want to go there and try that. :) Warning: this book may make you very very hungry. I was craving Kung Pao Chicken like crazy all day yesterday (though I ended up eating Thai last night instead).
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