The Sunday Salon: Life Books Challenge

There are a lot of things I could be doing on this rainy summer day. I could be napping or reading or peeling off wallpaper in the kitchen. Instead, I've finished something I've had in mind for some time now: I've created a Reading Challenge. I figure now that everyone is done with the 24-Hour Read-a-thon over at The Hidden Side of the Leaf, it's time for something new.


And so I've created the Life Books Challenge. It's something I've been mulling over for awhile—how certain books capture an element of our lives that somehow add definition. Serendipitous books. Books that hold memories that are part of who we are. I hope some of you will join my challenge. It's the first one I've created, and it may be a colossal failure; but I'd venture to guess other voracious readers can relate. Intrigued? Click on the link above to read more about the challenge and to join and send me some Sunday Salon love. Here's my own list for the challenge.

In other reading news, I finished and reviewed two books this week: the astounding I Have Lived a Thousand Years and the disappointing A Beginning, a Muddle, and an End. I am over halfway through Jhumpa Lahiri's Unaccustomed Earth, and I am absolutely blown away. Lahiri is a master of short story. I love every single thing about this collection except that I want each story to be a novel. More on this next week.

Until then, happy weekend! And come join my challenge!

My Life Books (Challenge Part I)

Here's what my own Life Books Challenge requests:

Part I: Choose Your Life Books
What are the books that, in some aspect, define you? Think about who you are in terms of spirituality, love, economics, values, worldview--the list could go on and on. These might be nonfiction, self-help, fiction, picture books, children's books, etc. Give us your life in books. To see my example, click here. After you've picked your life books, write a post and leave the link on Mr. Linky. Be sure to copy and paste the button above on your blog somewhere!

Part II: Discover Something New
Check out the blogs of other participants and find at least two titles to add to your TBR list. Let us know what books you are adding by linking a second time to Mr. Linky with (Something New) by your name.

Part III: Read the Books
When you've read the new books, write a review and leave a link to your post in the comments here.

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My Life Books

The Bible: (Everything) Patrick Henry is quoted as saying, "The Bible is worth all other books which have ever been printed." Daniel Webster wrote, "If there is anything in my thoughts or style to commend, the credit is due to my parents for instilling in me an early love of the Scriptures."
I can't say it any better than that.

To Kill a Mockingbird: (How to Live) For all the reasons why I love Harper Lee's one and only novel, click here.

One and Sonnets from the Portuguese: (Love and Marriage) More than any others, these two books represent Dr. H. to me. We've always quoted to each other from Elizabeth Barrett Browning's Sonnets from the Portuguese. Not just her most well-known, "How do I love thee? Let me count the ways," but the lesser known ones, as well. Richard Bach's One is probably not a well-known book, but for Dr. H and I, it spoke to the fear of our "what if" and to the relief of how it really all turned out. (You can read about our "Happy Ending" here.) Bach presents in this book the stories of what could have happened if the characters had made other choices; it's a book of parallel lives. What if, for example, I'd not stayed for summer school that last year? What if you'd chosen to go to a different restaurant that night? What if?

Crunchy Cons: (Politics, socioeconomics, the culture debate) This book by Rod Dreher was an “a ha” book throughout for me. In nearly every chapter I had those moments of thinking (or saying outloud and then reading passages to Dr. H.), “Yes! Exactly!” and “So THIS is what I am—and there are tons of people like me!” You can read the rest of my review here.

The Total Money Makeover: (Finances) Dave Ramsey's "proven plan for financial fitness" has changed the direction of our life. From a post on my home-life blog in 2006: " Dave's favorite word is FREEEEEDOOOOOOOMMMMMMMM, and we are tasting it. People have said to us, 'How can you stand to be strapped down to a budget?' As parents, we know that kids to better with a structured life. They have freedom in knowing what is expected of them. It's the same way with finances: we feel a sense of relief knowing that this is what we have to spend--and no more." Two years later, we are still digging ourselves out of debt, but we are closer every month. Freedom.

Good-night Moon: (Parenthood) We've read hundreds of books to our children in the past 15 years, but this is the one that started it all. Margaret Wise Brown's classic bedtime book will always, for me, represent all the good things of being a mama.

Dumbing Us Down: (Education) Because homeschooling is a huge part of my life, this treatise on public education by John Taylor Gatto, a recipient of the NY State Teacher of the Year Award, speaks powerfully to me.

Eats, Shoots and Leaves: (Grammar freakiness) This is another one of those "a-ha!" books. It is a relief to find out that author Lynn Truss is also horrified by dangling modifiers. For my review, go here.

Apples: (Inheritance) Let me explain. My family is filled with generations of apple growers. Frank Browning's Apples traces the apple from the mountains of Kazahkstan to Cornell University to huge commercial growers and the little guys, too. I will always remember reading this, reading Browning's description of my father, and thinking, "Oh! That's my inheritance!" It's not money or books. My father's legacy is wrapped in the sweetest smelling fruit and handed down, seed by seed.

Phew! So that's my list. What are your life books?

Sunday Scribblings #117: Vision

My family does not have a vision statement. It is something of which I am occasionally made aware, with a twinge of guilt, at this time of year.

Let me explain. We're a homeschooling family, and thousands of new families decide to homeschool each year. In June and July, homeschooling organizations throughout the U.S. hold conventions. And at these conventions, new homeschoolers often attend workshops called something like, "Getting Started in Homeschooling."

Makes sense, right? So at these "Getting Started" type workshops, parents are often encouraged to write a family vision statement.

There are loads of "Getting Started" advice on websites, too. Like this from Trinity Prep School:

Developing a family vision statement .... or in my case, a paragraph, requires one to reflect on core family values. What is your vision for your family? Think long term .... what legacy do you want your children to pass onto THEIR children? Choosing action verbs in stating core values, creates an overall implementation plan.

And this one from Victory Coaching:

A well written family vision statement will answer life’s great questions: Why am I here (purpose)? Where am I going (vision)? How will I get there (mission)? What's important and right (values)? It is like a compass that guides your course. When referred to regularly, it helps to shape the goals you set and the decisions you make that will lead to your desired destination.

And so here's why we don't have a family vision statement: I think they are silly. For us. We are not the kind of family to create "an overall implementation plan." Oh, I could think of lots of "action verbs" that state our core values: Laugh. Love. Serve. Learn. Enjoy. Climb. Read. Smile. Encourage. Embrace. Believe. Imagine. Create. Breathe.

But a written vision statement? It's just not for us. It's not that we take one day at a time necessarily. We have basic goals. We make schedules. We have dreams and hopes for our children. But somehow the formality of a written vision statement seems too cumbersome and business-like.

Still, every year about this time I wonder: should we write a family vision statement? Nah. I'll stick with my list of action verbs.

(Need a weekly writing prompt? Check out Sunday Scribbling here!)

Book Review: A Beginning, a Muddle, and an End

I so much wanted to like this book by Avi, geared toward middle and teen readers. Subtitled "The Right Way to Write Writing," this is the tale of Avon the snail and Edward the ant as they pursue the way to write a good story. I was hoping that I might use this somehow in the next creative writing class that I teach. it begins well, with helpful maxims included at the end of most chapters, such as "In writing, telling what you're going to write is never as exciting as the doing."

And some bits were quite funny, like "Make sure that when you're writing about what you don't know as if you did know, conceal the fact that you don't know what you're doing." And "Most writers talk about writing way more than they actually write. Then, when they finally do write, they mostly write talk, not writing."

But then, somehow, the maxims got muddled and the bits of wit became too clever. For the first 50 pages, I thought, "Hmm, my daughter [age 10] might like this." But in the last 100 pages, I realized that Avi's cleverness was too clever, and she wouldn't really get it.

I feel sheepish critiquing the work of Newbery winner Avi. Really, I have little patience with puns and riddles. It's not that I don't appreciate humor--really, I find a lot of things hilarious. And perhaps I'm missing the whole point of the book: perhaps the Muddle in the middle of the title is the point. Regardless, this book fell flat for me. I won't be gleaning any brilliant suggestions from it for my future writers. But if you like a fast and clever read, you might enjoy this one.

Book Review: I Have Lived a Thousand Years

Livia Bitton-Jackson was once Elli Friedmann, a carefree 13-year-old who is just becoming interested in boys, who experiences typical relationship difficulties with her mother, who adores her father. But in March 0f 1944, she became one of millions of Holocaust victims, and this is her story of unbelievable survival in the worst of circumstances. From "Hey Jew Girl, Jew Girl" to "Can I Keep My Poems, Please" to Auschwitz to "Mommy, There's a Worm in Your Soup" to "It's an American Plane," the chapters are short, gripping, graphic, and heartbreaking.

I came away from this book astonished, once again, at the ability of someone to maintain faith, hope, and perseverance in the face of cruelty and suffering. In the ghetto, before concentration camps, Elli sees the good:

"For the first time in my life, I am happy to be a Jew. And I am happy to share this particular condition of Jewishness. The handsome boys, lively women, beautiful babies, gray-bearded old men—all in the same yard of oppression, together."

In other places, Elli thanks God for respite from tragedy: the ability to drink filthy water, her mother's healing, a breath of air. Truly remarkable.

This book listed for young adult readers, but adults should not pass this up. This book, Zusak's The Book Thief and Elie Wiesel's Night, make a powerful trilogy of Holocaust reading. Another Holocaust memoir I've read in the past year is The Nazi Officer's Wife, which tells the story of how the author became a "U-boat": an Austrian Jew who went underground and emerged in Munich as an Aryan. All of these memoirs are painful, heartwrenching reads, but I think they are essential. We cannot become complacent; we cannot relegate these events to history.

The Sunday Salon: Lists and Pondering the Classics

I saw this interesting list on The Magic Lasso's Sunday Salon post and was intrigued. These books, according to Entertainment Weekly, are the new classics (1983-2008). The books in red are the ones I've read. A handful of the others are on my reading list, but that leaves a lot I may need to add to my TBR list. Maybe. The thing is, a lot of the books that I have read on this list-- apparently considered "new classics"--are not among my favorite books. For example, Into Thin Air was great--but a classic? And why Black Water and A Thousand Acres? On the other hand, I'd agree with The Kite Runner, Poisonwood Bible, and The Glass Castle.

This all goes back to the question: what is a classic? What makes a book a classic? This was one of the first topics of discussion in the American Lit class I taught this past year. I loved hearing their answers, ranging from "it's fun to read" to "it's long and old." When preparing for the class, I asked this question on my other blog last year, and here are some of the responses:

* Classic literature holds a universal truth.

* Classic literature speaks beyond the story. The story is but the context, the setting in which some universal truth, or universal human condition can be explored. true - many novels do this, but may not couch the universality in a compelling story. others may be great stories, but not contain that grain of universal truth. GREAT writers are able to do both.

* Books are classics if they meet one of the following criteria:
1) Part of the card game "Authors"
2 If the books smells like it belonged in my grandmother's library (she only kept books that were good to read).
3) If you had to read the book in your 9th or 10th grade English class and spent weeks talking about the symbolism in the book (Great Expectations, To Kill A Mockingbird and ...yes The Scarlett Letter).

* A book is classic if:
1. It serves as a standard of excellence in literature.
2. Or it is symbolic of a specific style in literature. (Didn't like "A Catcher in the Rye," but they do make you read it in high school.)
3. Or if I read it in high school and cannot possibly live without a copy in my home -- which is a challenge, because I think everyone else should read it and keep lending mine out. I have ordered so many copies of "The Little Prince" by Antoine de St. Exupery and continue to believe that no life is complete and no grown-up truly grown-up until it has been read, embraced and understood.

* The first thing that came to my mind, in trying to embrace more modern literature lately (and not finding much of worth, to be honest), is thatit does not have gratuitous explicit cheap love scenes or nasty unnecessary foul language.

So here is the list of new classics according to Entertainment Weekly:

1. The Road , Cormac McCarthy (2006)
2. Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire, J.K. Rowling (2000)
3. Beloved, Toni Morrison (1987)
4. The Liars' Club, Mary Karr (1995)
5. American Pastoral, Philip Roth (1997)
6. Mystic River, Dennis Lehane (2001)

7. Maus, Art Spiegelman (1986/1991)

8. Selected Stories, Alice Munro (1996)
9. Cold Mountain, Charles Frazier (1997)
10. The Wind-Up Bird Chronicle, Haruki Murakami (1997)
11. Into Thin Air, Jon Krakauer (1997)
12. Blindness, José Saramago (1998)
13. Watchmen, Alan Moore and Dave Gibbons (1986-87)
14. Black Water, Joyce Carol Oates (1992)
15. A Heartbreaking Work of Staggering Genius, Dave Eggers (2000)
16. The Handmaid's Tale, Margaret Atwood (1986)
17. Love in the Time of Cholera, Gabriel García Márquez (1988)
18. Rabbit at Rest, John Updike (1990)
19. On Beauty, Zadie Smith (2005)
20. Bridget Jones's Diary, Helen Fielding (1998)
21. On Writing, Stephen King (2000)
22. The Brief Wondrous Life of Oscar Wao, Junot Díaz (2007)
23. The Ghost Road, Pat Barker (1996)
24. Lonesome Dove, Larry McMurtry (1985)
25. The Joy Luck Club, Amy Tan (1989)
26. Neuromancer, William Gibson (1984)
27. Possession, A.S. Byatt (1990)
28. Naked, David Sedaris (1997)
29. Bel Canto, Anne Patchett (2001)
30. Case Histories, Kate Atkinson (2004)
31. The Things They Carried, Tim O'Brien (1990)
32. Parting the Waters, Taylor Branch (1988)
33. The Year of Magical Thinking, Joan Didion (2005)
34. The Lovely Bones, Alice Sebold (2002)
35. The Line of Beauty, Alan Hollinghurst (2004)
36. Angela's Ashes, Frank McCourt (1996)
37. Persepolis, Marjane Satrapi (2003)
38. Birds of America, Lorrie Moore (1998)
39. Interpreter of Maladies, Jhumpa Lahiri (2000)
40. His Dark Materials, Philip Pullman (1995-2000)
41. The House on Mango Street, Sandra Cisneros (1984)
42. LaBrava, Elmore Leonard (1983)
43. Borrowed Time, Paul Monette (1988)
44. Praying for Sheetrock, Melissa Fay Greene (1991)
45. Eva Luna, Isabel Allende (1988)
46. Sandman, Neil Gaiman (1988-1996)
47. World's Fair, E.L. Doctorow (1985)
48. The Poisonwood Bible, Barbara Kingsolver (1998)
49. Clockers, Richard Price (1992)
50. The Corrections, Jonathan Franzen (2001)
51. The Journalist and the Murderer, Janet Malcom (1990)
52. Waiting to Exhale, Terry McMillan (1992)
53. The Amazing Adventures of Kavalier & Clay, Michael Chabon (2000)
54. Jimmy Corrigan, Chris Ware (2000)
55. The Glass Castle, Jeannette Walls (2006)
56. The Night Manager, John le Carré (1993)
57. The Bonfire of the Vanities, Tom Wolfe (1987)
58. Drop City, TC Boyle (2003)
59. Krik? Krak! Edwidge Danticat (1995)
60. Nickel & Dimed, Barbara Ehrenreich (2001)
61. Money, Martin Amis (1985)
62. Last Train To Memphis, Peter Guralnick (1994)
63. Pastoralia, George Saunders (2000)
64. Underworld, Don DeLillo (1997)
65. The Giver, Lois Lowry (1993)
66. A Supposedly Fun Thing I’ll Never Do Again, David Foster Wallace (1997)
67. The Kite Runner, Khaled Hosseini (2003)
68. Fun Home, Alison Bechdel (2006)
69. Secret History, Donna Tartt (1992)
70. Cloud Atlas, David Mitchell (2004)
71. The Spirit Catches You and You Fall Down, Ann Fadiman (1997)
72. The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night-Time, Mark Haddon (2003)
73. A Prayer for Owen Meany, John Irving (1989)
74. Friday Night Lights, H.G. Bissinger (1990)
75. Cathedral, Raymond Carver (1983)
76. A Sight for Sore Eyes, Ruth Rendell (1998)
77. The Remains of the Day, Kazuo Ishiguro (1989)
78. Eat, Pray, Love, Elizabeth Gilbert (2006)
79. The Tipping Point, Malcolm Gladwell (2000)
80. Bright Lights, Big City, Jay McInerney (1984)
81. Backlash, Susan Faludi (1991)
82. Atonement, Ian McEwan (2002)
83. The Stone Diaries, Carol Shields (1994)
84. Holes, Louis Sachar (1998)
85. Gilead, Marilynne Robinson (2004)
86. And the Band Played On, Randy Shilts (1987)
87. The Ruins, Scott Smith (2006)
88. High Fidelity, Nick Hornby (1995)
89. Close Range, Annie Proulx (1999)
90. Comfort Me With Apples, Ruth Reichl (2001)
91. Random Family, Adrian Nicole LeBlanc (2003)
92. Presumed Innocent, Scott Turow (1987)
93. A Thousand Acres, Jane Smiley (1991)
94. Fast Food Nation, Eric Schlosser (2001)
95. Kaaterskill Falls, Allegra Goodman (1998)
96. The Da Vinci Code, Dan Brown (2003)
97. Jesus’ Son, Denis Johnson (1992)
98. The Predators' Ball, Connie Bruck (1988)
99. Practical Magic, Alice Hoffman (1995)
100. America (the Book), Jon Stewart/Daily Show (2004)

So which ones that I haven't read should I add to my TBR list?

And speaking of my TBR list, I've added several new titles the past few weeks. Most of these are gleaned from fellow book bloggers.

Glimpses of the Moon by Edith Wharton (reviewed by Caribous Mom)
Loving Frank by N. Horan
Namesake, The by Jhumpari Lahiri
Beautiful Boy
Briar Rose by Jane Yolen (Reviewed at Maw Books)
Sentimental, Heartbroken Rednecks by Greg Bottoms (Reviewed by Sage)
Mudbound by Hillary Jordan (Reviewed by Just Another Blogger)
My Cousin Rachel by Daphne du Maurier (Reviewed by Reading to Know)
Dedication by Emma McLaughling and Nicola Strauss (Reviewed by Bookstack)

If you've reviewed any of those as well, send me your link and I'll post it on my TBR list.

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And finally, in other reading news, this week I posted a review of Deborah Weisgall's The World Before Her, revisted the Books Around the World challenge that I've neglected for several months (thanks to Weekly Geeks for that inspiration), and last night finished reading the phenomenal memoir of growing up in the Holocaust by Livia Bitton-Jackson, I Have Lived a Thousand Years. I've not yet reviewed it, but it was terrifying and amazing.

Next up on my reading list: A Beginning, a Muddle and an End by Avi, a young adult writing guide which promises "the right way to write righting." I think it'll be a great tool for the upcoming writing classes (middle school) I'll be teaching this year.

(Want to participate in The Sunday Salon? Read all about it and sign up here.)

Books Around the World Challenge

This week's Weekly Geeks challenge is to organize any challenges. While I'm generally afraid of getting too consumed by challenges and deadlines, The Books Around the World Challenge appeals to me tremendously. I started this back in November but haven't been terribly dedicated about keeping up with it. I needed a challenge to remind me of my challenge!

Being a huge fan of Sonlight as the main course of our homeschooling, I have developed quite a taste for learning about other cultures via literature. The premise of this challenge is to read a book for each country in the world. The book should help us learn something about that country and not just be one written by somebody who lives there. I believe there are something like 193 countries in the world, so this challenge should take a few years. That suits my lackadaisical approach to reading challenges.

And so, here is the list thus far. Obviously many countries are missing. If you have a book for a country either listed here or not listed, please let me know. The books with an asterisk are ones that were suggested didn't look particularly appealing to me, and the ones linked or in italics are ones I've read. So help!


Afghanistan
The Bookseller of Kabul (Asne Seierstad) (review here)
The Kite Runner
A Thousand Splendid Suns

Antarctica
*Decipher (Stel Pavlou)

Argentina
THE MINISTRY OF SPECIAL CASES. By Nathan Englander.

Australia
A Town Like Alice (Neville Shute)
Mutant Message from Down Under by Marlo Morgan (already read)

Bolivia
*I Am a Taxi (Deborah Ellis)

Botswana
The No. 1 Ladies Detective Agency

Brazil
*Keeper (Mal Peet)
Child of the Dark: The Diary of Carolina Maria de Jesus

Cambodia
The Stones Cry Out: A Cambodian Childhood by Molyda Szymusiak

Canada
Crow Lake
The Other Side of the Bridge (Mary Lawson)
The Stone Diaries (Carol Shields)
Latitude of Melt (Joan Clark)
The Way the Crow Flies by Ann-Marie Macdonald

Chile
Portrait in Sepia

China
Snow Flower and the Secret Fan
Peony in Love
The Bonesetter's Daughter by Amy Tan (review here)

Colombia
Love in the Time of Cholera by Gabriel Garcia Marquez (already read but should re-read)

Congo:
The Poisonwood Bible (Barbara Kingsolver)--already read

Croatia
The Bridge on the Drina by Ivo Andriæ

Cuba
*Our Man in Havana (Graham Greene)
DANCING TO “ALMENDRA.” By Mayra Montero.

Egypt
*Napoleon’s Pyramids (William Dietrich)
DOWN THE NILE: Alone in a Fisherman’s Skiff. By Rosemary Mahoney.
Mara, Daughter of the Nile (already read)

England
Black Swan Green (David Mitchell)
On Chesil Beach by Ian McEwan
Atonement by Ian McEwan

France
Chocolat (Joanne Harris)

Germany
The Book Thief
The Nazi Officer's Wife

Greece

Haiti
BROTHER, I’M DYING. By Edwidge Danticat.

Hong Kong
The Language of Threads (Gail Tsukiyama)

Iceland

India
Beneath a Marble Sky (John Shors)
Great Hedge of India : The Search for the Living Barrier That Divided a Nation by Roy Moxham (already read)

Iran
Veil of Roses (Laura Fitgerald)
THE SEPTEMBERS OF SHIRAZ. By Dalia Sofer.
Persepolis 1 & 2 by Marjane Strapi (reviews here)

Ireland
An Irish Country Doctor (Patrick Taylor)

Israel

Italy
A Thread of Grade (Mary Doria Russell)

Japan

Kenya

Laos

Libya
IN THE COUNTRY OF MEN. By Hisham Matar.

Lebanon

Morocco
Stolen Lives: Twenty Years in a Desert Jail (Malika Oufkir)

New Zealand
The Bone People (Keri Hulme)

Nigeria
Purple Hibiscus (Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie)

Norway
OUT STEALING HORSES. By Per Petterson.

Pakistan

Portugal
Alentejo Blue (Monical Ali)

Russia
The Madonnas of Leningrad (Debra Dean)
The Endless Steppe by Esther Hautzig

Rwanda
Left to Tell: One Woman's Story of Surviving the Rwandan Holocaust. (Imaclee Ilibigiza)
We Wish To Tell You That Tomorrow We Will Be Killed With Our Families by Philip Gourevitch

Scotland
*My Heart’s in the Lowlands (Liz Curtis Higgs)
Rob Roy by Sir Walter Scott

Sierra-Leone
LONG WAY GONE: Memoirs of a Boy Soldier. By Ishmael Beah.

Somalia
KNOTS. By Nuruddin Farah.

Spain
*The Shadow of the Wind (Carlos Ruiz Zafon)

Sweden
Astrid and Veronika by Linda Olsson

Switzerland

Tibet/India
Daughter of the Mountains by Louise Rankin (already read)

Turkey

Wales
How Green Was My Valley by Richard Llewellyn (already read)