Becky's Books –

The Winter of Frankie Machine
by Don Winslow
2006 / 320 pages
read by Dennis Boutsikaris 9h 12m
rating: B / crime

Why would anyone want Frank Machianno,  a bait-shop owner and aging surf-bum in San Diego,  dead?   He’s a nice guy – runs a complex bunch of small businesses,  is good to his ex-wife and daughter,  great to his girlfriend.

But he hasn’t always been what he is now-  his past includes having been a surf-bum and hit man,  two usually unrelated occupations,  but now the past has come >>>MORE>>>

Americanah
by Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie (Nigeria/US)
2013/ 496 pages
rating: 9.5 / contemp. immigrant fiction

I read both of  Adiche’s prior novels,  Purple Hibiscus and Half a Yellow Sun,  years ago – when they were published to much acclaim.  This one is better,  Adiche has matured,  she has a message – or two.   I haven’t read her short story collection,  The Thing Around Your Neck –  I probably should.

The story here starts in the US where Ifemubu, a well-educated,  professional 30-something Nigerian-American woman is preparing to leave the US >>>>MORE>>>>

The Second Chair  (Dismas Hardy #10)
by John Lescroart (US)
2003 / 624 pages
read by David Colacci – 14h 11m
rating:  A / crime fiction

I was reading he Dismas Hardy books in order until I came to the Robert Lawrence narrations.  No.  This doesn’t work.  So I skipped #s 8 and 9 and dropped into #10 rather than put up with a grating voice.    It looks like the publisher/producer agreed because #s 10-14 (the series to date)  all use Colacci to read.

Anyway –  Harding finds himself once again with >>>>MORE>>>>

Life After Life
by Kate Atkinson (Brit)
2013 / 544 pages
read by Fenella Woolgar 15h 34m
rating:   6   – historical-speculative fiction

Well,  I’m 2 hours into this and so far nothing has happened at all –  only a foreshadowing kind of preface and a baby dying in Chapter 1.  I’ve heard good things about this book.

So what we have here so far is a nice upper middle class British family during the first years of the 20th century – nicely historical,  Sylvie (mom) is kind of fun character >>>>MORE>>>>

The House of the Dead
by Fyodor Dostoevsky (Russia)
1862 / (Kindle – about 300 pages?)
Rating  9/  (classic fiction)

(This was/is also published as “Memoirs from the House of  The Dead”  and “Notes from the Dead House.”)

I’m reading this masterpiece for the second time.   Between readings (like about 6 months ago)   I read Solzhenitsyn’s One Day in the Life of Ivan Denisovich (1962) and for some time,  basically in the first chapters of House of the Dead,  I couldn’t get a comparison >>>>MORE>>>>

The Golem and the Jinni
by Helene Wecker (US)
2013 / 496 pages
read by George Guidell
Rating 7 –   historical fantasy

I can’t help myself –  “Once upon a time in New York…”  there arrived, separately,  a golem and a jinni.   Actually,  the year is 1899.   The golem was created to be a companion to a very lonely man in Germany who then emigrated to the US but died en route.   The jinni was from wherever jinnis come from – Syria in this case  -he had been in held in captivity and forgotten but then >>>>MORE>>>>

At some point  last week I realized I had some time on my hands before July 1 when I could start on my next scheduled reads – (see READING NEXT).  I was real tired of crime novels.  I also realized I had a big stack of unread books on my TBR (to be read)  shelves I’d been meaning to get to.   I’d already read 17  books in June but …  I started checking those books out and read a couple of them – Okay –

Then the weather turned HOT here – (110+ F.)  and I tend to stay indoors – more time to read.   Something clicked and I read a few of the TBR pile (I was saving those for retirement but I’ve been retired 2 years now – ’bout time!)    So now I was within mere sentences of reading 100 books in the first 6 months of 2013.
** See my spreadsheet at:  Google Docs Bek’s Books 2013

So  I read a couple more of these slim little things which had waited so long,  and got to 98 books.   But by this time it was June 30 and I gave up – no way I could read 2 books today.   Wait!  I noticed I’d forgot to enter Beowulf which I read a few days ago and so then the count was 99 books – this was at about 8 AM.

Well,  how could a good bookwormie girl such as myself resist that?  I checked my TBR pile – no… they’re all too complex for a one-sitting read.  I checked to see if there was a short book I’d consider re-reading.  (I do that anyway from time to time.)

And there,  Dear Reader,  mis-shelved with my “best of the best” books was Hemingway’s  “The Old Man and the Sea.”   And it’s only 124 pages long – I can do this – (actually,  how can I  NOT do this? – See prior post. )

I’m satisfied – both with the book and getting to 100 books.

One good thing this did for me was to really check those TBR books out carefully – I’ve got a  couple selections for July and August going.   When I get to the 10th- 15th or the 25th-30th of a month I can read one or two of them –  categories:  Native Americans,  Don DeLillo – ??.    On my scheduled reads (for reading groups)  I won’t allow myself to go more than a couple weeks in advance – I sometimes do it anyway but in general I try to hold back.

I have no ambition to get 200 books this year – this happened this one time.  I like to read what I like to read  and books are often over 50o pages or they’re very dense and take longer.    I’ll be happy with 120 books for the year if  the rest of my time is spent in good health, good company,  good food,  good whatever – happy and enjoying life.   Most likely I’ll hit 160 or so.  (Last year was 159 with 77 in the last half of the year.)

The Old Man and the Sea
by Ernest Hemingway (US)
1952/124 pages
Rating:   9.5 / classic

Oh my.  I saw this and realized that I read this so long ago I couldn’t remember the ending –  I’m thinking high school!   And I’d never reread it because I wasn’t all that crazy about it back then (true of many  books I read for school).   But it’s only 124 pages long – I can do this – (actually,  how can I  NOT do this? – See next post -)

Okay,  so “The Old Man and the Sea” will >>>>MORE>>>>

Beowulf
by anonymous –
8th century?/3182 lines
Rating  9/classic – Scandinavian heroic myth

I have no idea why this book was sitting in my shelves – I probably bought it at some point – a long time ago.   It’s short,  only 57 pages long,  but the language is very difficult – and it’s not always easy to just figure out what’s going on.

Hrothgar, the lord of the Danes has built >>>>MORE>>>>

The Teahouse
by Lao She  (Manchu-Chinese)
1957 / 197 pages (bi-lingual/but a good intro)
Rating: 9 /   historical play

What treasures I’m finding on my TBR shelves!   This is a play purchased prior to my trip to China.  It never got read and sat on the shelf for about 10 years.  I read it now and I read the introduction and checked some info about Lao She on the net (not much there).

The play itself is a statement on the 20th century history and culture >>>>MORE>>>>

Poppa John
by Larry Woiwode  (US)
1980/204 pages
rating: 8 –  literary Christian

These days Larry Woiwode,  North Dakota’s poet laureate,   lives west of Jamestown, ND  where he raises horses.  In the late 1960s and early ’70s he lived in New York,  published quite a lot and won awards,  etc.    Now he publishes a book from time to time,  usually memoirs with a subtle but definite Christian message, often coupled with death.    I’m not a Christian (not traditional anyway) >>>>MORE>>>>

Waiting For the Barbarians
by J. M. Coetzee (South Africa/Australia)
1980/152 pages
Rating:   8.5 –  20th century political fiction

In an Empire there arise border disputes with the barbarians who live in the forests and deserts outside the gates.  Troops are sent to the fort at the border.   The 1st person narrative is told  by theunnamed Magistrate at the fort.

When the Empire troops bring in a band of barbarians for torture and questioning the Magistrate helps a blind girl they leave behind. >>>>MORE>>>>

Fly Away Peter
by David Malouf  (Australia)
1982 / 134 pages
rating:  7.5 / historical fiction

This stayed on my tbr shelf for so long because for some reason I thought it was by O.E. Rolvaag and the third of his trilogy which started with Giants in the Earth.  Wrong.  That was Peter Victorious,  the second in the trilogy,  and I’ve read it – the third is Their Father’s God.   Nevertheless,  I had Fly Away, Peter next to >>>>MORE>>>> 

The Zen Teachings of Jesus
by Kenneth S. Leong
1998 /239 pages
rating: 5    religion

I’ve had this on my shelves for a long time – probably a decade.  I know I bought it fully intending to read it but … Finally here,  the last few days of June, 2013,  I get the chance –  better late…

So getting involved with the first couple chapters I’m finding nothing new – in fact some of the language is a bit dated (“soulfulness”)  >>>MORE>>>>

Scenes From Village Life
by Amos Oz  (Israel)
2009 / 192 pages
Rating:  9 /literary -short stories

In the fictional village of Tel Ilan,  situated in the hills of Menashe south and east of Haifa,  times are changing – actually times have been changing for awhile.    This is a book of 8 very subtly  interwoven stories about the lives of kinda-sorta average people,  with a deep vein of strangeness of the “grotesque,” where the reader identifies with the character,  but then realizes there’s a kind of disgust there as well.   The characters of one story might wander through the story of another character.  There is a first person who seems to tell most >>>>MORE>>>>

The Immense Journey
by Loren Eiseley  (US)
1957 – 152 pages
Rating;  9 / literary -classic natural science

I got this book from a friend several years ago and am finally getting around to it.  It’s a classic written by a giant thinker in the fields of anthropology,  education, philosophy , and natural science.  The book fits in quite well with The Forest Unseen by David George Haskell as well as Pilgrim at Tinker Creek by Annie Dillard (and which I read prior to this blog).  But where Haskell  >>>>MORE>>>>

Stagecoach Heyday in the San Joaquin Valley 1853-1876
by William Harland Boyd (US)
1983 / 74 pages
Rating 5 / history

This is a real honest-to-god hard-cover little book published by the Kern County Historical Society.   I have no idea how it got on my shelves but in spite of the fact that neither Porterville nor the Tule River is mentioned,   it was interesting in it’s own dry little way.   There are plenty of black and white illustrations.

I have a feeling it was originally some kind of masters thesis project  >>>>MORE>>>>