Thrity Thursdays or "The Space Between Us" Readalong

At last we come to the end of our readalong of Thrity Umrigar's The Space Between Us. It would be more accurate for me to say "Sadly" rather than "At last," to be honest. This was one of those books that you just don't want to reach the end of--and one that will stay with me.

Chapters 21-25
Well, I'd like to tell you about these final chapters but I can't without revealing too much and I so want you to read this book. It will have to suffice to say that "spaces" become so much more apparent and that certain truths are finally revealed.

A minor but important character, an Afghani balloon man that used to work on Chowpatty Beach, comes back in the final chapter. Umrigar previously wrote that he symbolized to Bhima how to live with loneliness. Here, his memory shows her how to live with strength:

"Bhima marvels at the paradox: A solitary man, an exile, a man without a country or a family, had still succeeded in creating dreamworlds for hundreds of children, had entered the homes of strangers with his creations of color and fantasy and magic. A man who would never again touch or kiss the sweet faces of his own children brought smiles to the faces of other people's children. Like a musician, the Pathan had learned how to make a song out of his loneliness. Like a magician, he had learned how to use sheer air to contort limp pieces of rubber into objects of happiness. Empty-handed, he had built a world."

My Thoughts:
Umrigar writes some of the most incredible characters. At the back of this book, she reveals why it was possible in this one - there really was a Bhima. She worked in the house that Umrigar grew up in "cleaning furniture she was not allowed to sit on, cooking food she was not allowed to share at the family dining table." Dinaz is a reflection of Umrigar herself--a young person who "sensed [Bhima's] essential goodness and dignity and stoic heroism." And Sera was born of watching her own aunts interact with Bhima.

Umrigar doesn't explore any new ground in this book. She is not the first person to write about class distinctions, poverty, and despair. Umrigar just does it better than most. She pulls you into the story and brings you down to a personal level that really makes you care about the characters and the story she is trying to tell.

Shadow of the Swords by Kamran Pasha - Guest Review

Shadow of the Swords by Kamran Pasha
390 pages
Published June 2010 by Simon Schuster Adult
Source: the publisher and FSB Associates

When Julie, from FSB Associates, contacted me about the possibility of reviewing Shadow of the Swords, my initial reaction was to decline. I've got so many books that I need to get to and this one didn't necessarily sound like something that might trip my trigger. But then I got to thinking that I do know someone who is very much interested in the Crusades. So I asked Julie if she would mind getting the opinion of a very bright 18 year old. She was game and when the book arrived and I saw the cover, which looks so much like something out of the video games Mini-me is so fond of, he was eager to get started.

Synopsis from the publisher:
The epic story of the Crusades from the Muslim point of view.

Okay--that doesn't give you much to go on, does it?! So here's a synopsis from Publisher's Weekly:
The bloodshed of the Third Crusade is vividly portrayed in Pasha’s second novel (Mother of All Believers), an excellent swords and sandals saga that takes in the action from an early Islamic perspective. Richard the Lionheart leads the armies of the European Crusaders, while Saladin commands the Muslim forces in Palestine. Both men are cunning and ruthless, and both are victims of the wiles of a beautiful young Jewish woman’s plotting—one man as her lover, the other as an enemy. Miriam is the niece of Maimonides, Saladin’s trusted physician, and she has the power and will to thwart one man’s plans and save the kingdom of the other.

I asked Mini-me to jot down his thoughts on the book and imagined that we would sit down together and work them into a review. But I liked what he did so much, that I'm going to give you his thoughts, largely unaltered other than to add a few of his thoughts that he shared with me along the way.

Liked:

- I enjoyed the vivid imagery created by the author.
- The characterization was in-depth and gave me a sense of connection to each character.
- The character development was very [central] in this novel. Each character changed vastly from the beginning to the end as they learned and gained new experiences.
- I liked that Pasha showed the story from multiple religious points of view.

Disliked:

- Sometimes I felt as thought the descriptions were overly wordy, making the reading process a bit slower.
- I felt that certain characteristics were repeated when it was not entirely needed such as writing again and again about Miriam's eyes and hair or Saladin's honorable nature.
- Occasionally I felt the book read a little like a romance. [Mama's comment--bear in mind, here, that this is the opinion of a young man who's primarily focused on the action.]

Writing Style:

- I felt that for a novel set in the location that this book takes place in and for the time period involved, this writing style worked very effectively. Pasha made sure that the reader was aware of the setting in which each particular chapter was taking place.

[It's interesting that this is his view now. Early on he was telling me that he thought the book was, perhaps, overwritten. But evidently it began to work for him.]

Favorite Character:

- Maimondes was probably my favorite character. He was a character who faced many conflicts relating to his religious views, his morals and his family and friends. He was able to overcome these conflicts and learn from them even into his old age.

From the Prologue:

"They were supposed to have been safe. The coastline of Sinai was guarded by the Sultan's men. The handsome new Sultan who had swept into Cairo and overthrown its ailing king, ending the Shiite dynasty of the Fatimids and restoring Egypt to the fold of Sunni Islam. She should have been too young to understand these complex matters of state, but her father had always insisted that Jewish children should be well versed in the politics of the day. For it was the curse of her people that the changing winds of nations inevitably brought with them storms of tragedy and exile.

There had been many who had feared that the new Sultan would persecute the Jews for supporting the heretic kings who had ruled Egypt in defiance of the Caliph of Baghdad. But he had proven to be a wise man, and had reached out in friendship to the People of the Book. The Jews had found in the Sultan a patron and a protector, and her own uncle had been welcomed into the court as the ruler's personal physician.

How she wished her uncle had been with them today. Perhaps he could have saved them from the warriors of Christ who had descended on their caravan like locusts. Stanched the flow of blood from amputated limbs. Applied his special salves on the burns inflicted by flaming arrows. Maybe if he had been with them, the others would have lived. "

Thanks, Mini-me, for reading "Shadow of the Swords" and reviewing it!

Mama Shepp's Family Recommends: Alan Furst

The Rhodies have, once again, come through with a recommendation that doesn't include just a single book but a whole catalog. So if you find you love the author, you will be at no loss for more titles to read!

"Mama Shepp take note, as well as other readers. We have from the first been adoring fans of Alan Furst who writes spy novels set in Eastern Europe in the period from WWI to WWII."




" We just finished his most recent ("Spies of the Balkans") and think it may be our favorite of the lot. Ten titles so far, and we hope he will be good for ten more. I can only think to compare him with Graham Greene in style and mood. His characters are inevitably interesting and his plots, while intricate, are easily followed.These are not who dunnits; not cozys, not loaded with silliness like the James Bond books or charming eccentrics like the John LeCarre novel. "




"People fall in love, betray, kill and die, survive the grim life of their times or fail to do so. He does a wonderful job of conveying the look and feel of places and historic Do begin with "Night Soldiers" because there is occasionally some carry-over of one or another character. However, each book will stand on its merits."





Patrick Anderson, book reviewer for the Washington Post, has this to say about Furst and his latest:

"I read my first Alan Furst novel nine years ago and urged Book World's readers to do themselves a favor and seek out everything this talented writer had in print. Now, having read Furst's 11th and latest novel, Spies of the Balkans, I find that my advice holds. About all that has changed since 2001 is that Furst was relatively unknown then, and today he is widely recognized as one of the finest spy novelists active."

Thrity Thursdays or "The Space Between Us" Readalong (Friday Version!)

Welcome to the Friday edition of Thrity Thursday! This is what happens when you agree to a review date without checking your calendar. At least my fellow readers were on top of things:

Ti at Book Chatter
Dar at Peeking Between The Pages
Staci at Life In The Thumb
Kathy at Mommy's Reading
Booksync at Book In The City
Bailey at The Window Seat Reader
Mari at Bookworm With A View
Amy at The House of Seven Tails

Chapters 16-20
In these chapters, we find that Maya and Bhima have taken to walking down to the beach every evening and it's reviving Maya and softening Bhima. It's also giving Bhima time to reflect on the past.
"They say that when something is very beautiful, the Gods of Jealousy notice it. Then, they must destroy it. Even if it's their own creation, it's beauty begins to make them jealous and they are afraid it will overshadow them. So they destroy the very temples that they have built."
We learn the story of how Bhima's once wonderful marriage was torn apart after Gopal suffered an accident at work and began drinking heavily.
"..it was then that she knew the gods had played a trick--they had kept Gopal alive, but they had taken away that essential something that makes a man want to keep on living. Gopal was like an empty shell of a clock whose insides had been removed. There was nothing to keep him ticking anymore."

Sera also reflects back on Feroz's last days. Sera is shocked when Viraf calls Feroz a "king" immediately after his death and realizes that as soon as someone dies we begin to forget their faults.

My Thoughts
It was so difficult to watch Bhima's life crumble around her. Umrigar touches on the issues of business versus workers, illiteracy, and classism. When Gopal is injured at work, he is taken to the government hospital and develops an infection. The hospital is not really treating the infection until Bhima asks for Feroz and Sera to step in and help. Bhima, who is by now acutely aware of how much she suffers because of her illiteracy, at first believes that Feroz is able to wield power because of his education. But when she sees a doctor cowered by him, she is forced to confront the fact that it may have happened because Feroz is Parsi, since the doctor is also educated. I couldn't imagine how hard it must have been for her to realize that there was a chance that even with an education, her son might never be able to rise to the top, something she had pinned her hopes for the future on.

Next week: the final chapters. I'm so grateful that so many of you encouraged me to read this book--it is every bit as good as you said it was! If you haven't read it, I highly recommend that you do.

Seven Year Switch by Claire Cook

Seven Year Switch by Claire Cook
256 pages
Published June 2010 by Hyperion
Source: the publisher and Pump Up Your Book Promotions

Meet Jill, single mother of ten-year-old Anastasia, who teaches a cooking class one day a week at a senior center, does consulting work, and also works for "Great Girlfriend Getaways" as the webmaster and eight-hour-a-day phone answerer (yes, I know that's not a word!). Jill's been on her own since Anastasia's father disappeared to join the Peace Corp, leaving Jill destitute. It's not so much that she likes things they way they are now but Jill's gotten used to them. Then one day, at the end of her cooking class, Seth, Anastasia's father, appears in the doorway. Seven years later.

"There are seven types of intelligence and seven habits for highly effective people. Hollywood has Seventh Heaven and The Seven Year Itch. There's even a New Age notion that every seven years you shed your skin and become a completely new person, sort of a seven year switch."

Jill wants nothing to do with him but knows that Anastasia, or Asia as her father calls her, has more and more been wanting a father. So Jill allows Seth back into their lives and Seth and Asia hit it off so well that soon both of them are imagining what life might be like if they were all a family again. But Jill isn't so wild about the idea. She knows that if Seth were even five minutes late getting home, she'd be worried that he had left them again. And there's the matter of Billy, a guy she's doing some consulting work for who she also happens to have just started dating.

When the chance to be the group leader for a trip to Costa Rica comes along, Jill jumps at the chance to get away from it all and that may be just what she needs. Meanwhile, Seth is left behind to care for his daughter--and that may be just what he needs as well.

Claire Cook is also the author of "Must Love Dogs." I admit I haven't read that but I love the movie starring Diane Lane and John Cusack. I figured that anyone who wrote the book for that must write books that I would enjoy so I jumped at the chance to read this. And it was just the thing to get me back on track. It's fun, light, and a quick read with the predictable love triangle, quirky friend and struggle to balance it all. But Cook made it all work for me. The characters are fun and, for the most part, believable and you can't help but cheer for Jill even though you aren't really sure which way you're hoping things will turn out.

Here's what other authors are saying about the book:
With wit and tenderness, Claire Cook sweeps us into the life of Jill Murray, a feisty single mom trying to stitch together a future after being abandoned by her husband. This is a delightful story of love, loss, and the surprising events that healed her heart. I cheered for Jill the entire way. (Beth Hoffman, author of Saving CeeCee Honeycutt)

A perfect beach read. Claire Cook once again demonstrates that she's a master in creating funny, warm, relatable characters you root for from the very first page. (Allison Winn Scotch, New York Times bestselling author of The One That I Want and Time of My Life)

Thanks to Dorothy and Pump Up Your Book Promotions for including me on this tour!

**Be sure to check out this giveaway on Claire's site!**

Go to http://ClaireCook.com to win a beach bag filled with all 7 of my novels, plus a beach towel!!

Hearts On A String: A Novel by Kris Radish

Hearts On a String by Kris Radish
336 pages
Published May 2010 by Bantam
Source: the publisher and TLC Book Tours

Five women meet in the bathroom of the airport in Tampa when they all pitch in to try to save one woman's cell phone that's become jammed in a toilet. Two of them women have just discovered that one knows the others husband but otherwise they are all complete strangers. While they're in the midst of the rescue, an announcement comes over the airport intercom stating that all outgoing flights have been canceled due to a storm which seems to be effecting enough major airports to shut down all air travel. One of the women suggests that they all return to the suite she just vacated, which she knows for a fact is still empty and ride out the wait there. Things only go from bad to worse--the storm suddenly shifts and hits Tampa; it turns out that Cathy, who knew Nan's husband, was actually having an affair with him; and an attendee at a Para-Psychic Professional conference taking place in the hotel seems to know more about the youngest woman, Holly, than she is comfortable with. And Cathy's not the only one hiding a secret. Let the bonding--or cat fighting--begin.

I really wanted to like this book. But almost from the beginning, my eyes started rolling in disbelief and they never stopped. The whole set up to put these women together seemed so contrived, I didn't buy that one storm was going to cause such a massive shutdown of airports in the U.S., and I found it even harder to believe that the storm suddenly hit Florida with such fury. More than once I tagged a passage with a sticky note that simply said "really???" For example:

"...they all took a ridiculous chance to help a stranger by willingly participating in this Airside A restroom event."

A ridiculous chance? Really???

I didn't find it hard to believe that a group of women would decide to group together to share a hotel room to ride out a storm--even a group of total strangers. Women do that. But these women weren't even really getting along in the bathroom so why they would choose to spend a couple of days together? And that's the question each of them kept asking themselves again...and again...and again. And for some reason Radish keeps suggesting that staying together was a dangerous decision.

Occasionally I found a passage that made me really think that Radish could do better. The very idea that all women are connected by a string:

"It allows women to lean into one another and find a sister when they need one. The string can never be broken. You can use it to pull yourself up, to pull yourself forward, or to steady the place where you must remain."
Or this description of friendship:

"Women who have someone who understands the pace of their moods, their list of regrets and longings, the reasons why they let go of some things and cling to others. Women who know that the call will always be answered without hesitation. Women who can at any given moment fill the hollow pit of loneliness that sometimes cripples them."

And I could completely relate to this passage about motherhood:

"That absolutely lovely feeling when everyone is home and safe and the doors are locked and the house is clean and for just a few hours there is the scent of calm happiness everywhere she turns."

Radish is also the author of "Annie Freeman's Fabulous Traveling Funeral" and I remember reading reviews of that book. If you read that one, what did you think of it.

Connect with Radish, check out her website, follow her on Twitter or Facebook or follow her blog.


For other opinions of "Hearts On A String" check out this list of blogs.

Travels With The Shepps - Part 2

Since this was a working holiday for The Big Guy, the kids and I spent a lot of time around the hotel--with an XBox and laptop it wasn't always easy to get them out of the room but the pool and patio with its waterfall were great draws and great places for me to read.


Of course, no visit to the Black Hills would be complete without a visit to Mount Rushmore and we made sure to get there in time to hike, visit the museum, and be awed by the lighting ceremony.


While we were in near Custer, we kept seeing signs in the parks that said "Buffaloes Are Dangerous Do Not Approach." But until the last day we were there, the only buffalo we had seen were the art pieces we had seen all over Custer. Then, on our way out of the area, we finally came across a small herd of the real thing. I was in heaven!



Last stop on the trip (well, except for the required gas station and bathroom breaks) was in Alliance, Nebraska, home of Carhenge. Yes, those are all real cars--the ones in the foreground are arranged to resemble England's Stonehenge. Sadly, I was in "let's just get home now" mode and didn't have much of an appreciation for Carhenge.




And now you are released from having to look at any more vacation pictures--even though The Big Guy thinks there are a lot of other things worth sharing. Luckily for you, he has no idea how to add a post to this blog!