What I Learned About Politics: Inside the Rise – and Collapse – of Nova Scotia’s NDP Government by Graham Steele (2014)

I got this book from the library a few weeks ago. I knew it was brand new, and they had it prominently displayed because it was both new and local. Obviously I scooped it up right away.

I only found out the next day from a friend who was at the book launch that the launch was actually happening while I was at the library! My local library is on. the. ball.

Anyway, this is a memoir-ish account from the former finance minister of our previous provincial government. It was the first time the NDP had formed government in any of the Atlantic provinces! Exciting stuff. And then they sort of crashed and burned.

This book has lots of interesting anecdotes and little bits of inside information. Steele does a really good job, I think, of making a book about backroom politics clear and captivating and easy to follow.

I think it’d be neat for someone to read this book who isn’t from Nova Scotia and isn’t aware of this government’s legacy. I’d be interested in hearing what they thought about it.

All My Puny Sorrows by Miriam Toews (2014)

So I started reading this book a few nights ago, and it was so good that I was planning on spending my Friday evening curled up on the couch until it was done. Which is exactly what I did, but I had to contend with my roommates having an impromptu get-together with buddies of theirs to eat pie. As in, they showed up at the door, pies in hand, right when I was getting to the saddest part. (All My Puny Sorrows is about a woman who’s trying to keep her suicidal concert pianist sister from killing herself; it’s loosely based on the author’s real life. So yeah, it’s a tear-jerker.) Luckily my roommates’ friends brought two pies (blueberry AND lemon meringue) and they were all pretty focused on those, so I could basically just cry in the corner without anyone noticing. I think.

Odd Girl Out by Ann Bannon (1957)

This is the first of the so-called “Beebo Brinker” series of novels, although there’s no mention of Beebo Brinker (a character) in this book. This series, written in the late fifties and early sixties, was apparently one of the first that focused on lesbians, and Odd Girl Out was notable in that it was one of the only books of the time where the lesbian protagonist lives happily ever after, so to speak.

Even in modern-er pop culture, lesbian and bisexual characters are often raped or murdered (e.g. Tara on Buffy the Vampire Slayer), fired or arrested (e.g. the lesbian teachers who were fired in Annie on My Mind), played for laughs or mentally unstable (e.g. serial killer Aileen Wuornos in Monster), or the characters or their sexuality is written out all together (e.g. Jess and Jules, rather than ending up together, have a crush on their male coach in Bend it Like Beckham). The other option is that the finished, published product is banned or otherwise censored, like The Miseducation of Cameron Post, which I reviewed a few months ago, before it was dropped from a summer reading list in at least one school district. Even though it’s really good!

Anyway.

Odd Girl Out focuses on Laura Landon, a shy, unassuming, unsure-of-herelf first-year college student. Laura develops a crush and starts a relationship with one of her roommates, Beth Cullison, a senior student who’s smart, interesting, outgoing, funny, president of the student union, etc. etc. I won’t give away the ending if you haven’t already read it, but I will say “score one for the introverts!”

The woman behind “Ann Bannon” (a pseudonym) was a lesbian married to a man in the 1950s, and wrote these books as a form of escape. She started writing them when she was only 22 years old. (And what am I doing with my life?) They were some of the most popular “pulp fiction” (cheap paperback novels, often purchased in drug stores, train stations, etc.) ever published, and Odd Girl Out was the second-best-selling paperback of 1957. Bannon wasn’t even aware of this until many years later when they were reprinted, several times over. They were also included in LGBTQ and lesbian-specific anthologies, as well as on university reading lists.

I just stumbled upon this book at my local library, where it was sitting innocently on a shelf. I hadn’t heard of it before, but I picked it up anyway. I’m happy I did, as I enjoyed it immensely. (I stayed up until 3 a.m. reading it.)

The Silkworm by Robert Galbraith (2014)

This is the newest novel from mystery writer Robert Galbraith (which, for anyone still out of the loop, is a pen name used by J.K. Rowling, of Harry Potter fame). I thought it was excellent. I read the whole thing in one day, if that’s any indication to you.

Here's a picture of me reading with the kitties.

Gulp: Adventures on the Alimentary Canal by Mary Roach (2013)

If you’ve never read any of Mary Roach’s books, I highly recommend them. Her use of footnotes is excellent. (They might even be the best part of her books.)

Gulp is about eating and digestion. Her other books cover sex, death, and space travel, among other things. Roach has done a tonne of research and seems to revel in asking experts the way-out-there questions. She’s funny without sacrificing accuracy and scientific principles, and she has no qualms about grossing her readers out (lucky for me, as I like gross things and find them endlessly interesting).

As an aside — did you see this story from earlier in the week on a kid who had 232 teeth removed?! I was disappointed that there were no pics, but fortunately a kind person on twitter sent me a shot of the x-ray.

That aside is why blog posts need footnotes. Anyway, this was an A+ book and your kids (or inner kid) will probably appreciate all the poop jokes.

This All Happened: A Fictional Memoir by Michael Winter (2000)

“A fictional memoir” is a good way to describe this book. Laid out as a series of diary entries written over the course of a year, our protagonist (Gabe) explains his major life events, big struggles and decisions, as well as the everyday kind of stuff. Gabe struggles to write his novel; tries to figure out what he’s doing with his life; tries to figure out if Lydia’s really into him or if they’re really going to get married; watches his friends get married, get divorced, have babies.

Really though, it’s the everyday, mundane activities that make this book as good as it is. Canoe trips and barbeques with his friends, beers at The Ship, walking up and down the hill in front of his house, bike rides, trips to the Fluvarium, bickering with his girlfriend, kitchen parties. Even the silliest little things are described so beautifully, so delicately, with the prettiest prose. It’s lovely to read.

And as an added bonus, it’s a snapshot of the city I spent my university years in and where my parents and all my family are from. St. John’s is one of my favourite cities in the world, and although I don’t live there now, I could see myself ending up there one day. I recognized so many specific buildings and bars and gardens in this book (they mentioned a restaurant my former housemate’s family owns!), which is of course particular to people who know the city… but I think there’s something universal about this book — anyone could recognize so many of the personalities and characteristics without knowing the people or the place.

(And seriously, go back and read that wiki link on St. John’s and look at all the pics — then you’ll understand why I miss it, and maybe even convince yourself to go!)

Orange is the New Black: My Year in a Women’s Prison: A Memoir by Piper Kerman (2010)

I had already seen the Netflix series based on this book, which is strange for me — I almost always read the book first. But I really had no choice, as I basically mainlined the whole first season in a single day. This book is a memoir, mostly based on real-life events (some names and details were changed), while the series is kinda sorta based on the memoir.

Orange Is The New Black. photo via: http://comingsoon.net/nextraimages/orangeisblackheader.jpg

Many of the scenes that take place in the first season of Orange Is The New Black appear in the book in some form, and a lot of the characters are identifiable as pieces of characters in the book. I suppose you want to make the TV version as big a hit as possible, so you include the most provocative and intriguing personality characteristics, amalgamating them into bigger/better/bolder/brasher characters, and you leave out the stuff that’s a little more run-of-the-mill. A+ on making the Netflix adaptation as entertaining as it is, while staying true-ish (emphasis on the ish) to real life.

If you like reading non-fiction, sociological studies, or memoirs, you’ll probably find this book interesting. If you liked the show (and you’re excited out of your mind that the new season is out next week! I know I am!), you’ll probably find this book interesting. The book and the show are both interesting in totally different ways, if that makes any sense.

Explanations/Excuses for Absence

So I actually just moved! Not across the country or anything, but from the suburbs into the city. I’ve been taking some time to get settled in, buy furniture, etc. Not that I’ve not been reading. I’ve read a bunch of decorating books over the last few weeks. They were mostly okay, although they all kind of run together in my mind now. Some were more DIY and realistic and others were for, like, mansions. Which I obviously have not moved into. (Just a decently-sized apartment.) When my new library card from the city library comes in the mail, I’ll be sure to stock up again! It’s long past time for me to get my hands and eyes on a new book.

The Rosie Project: A Novel by Graeme Simsion (2013)

Pink Sweetheart Roses. Source: muffet1 via deviantart

You know when you stay up super late because you started a book, and you just have to finish it before going to bed?

It’s almost 1 a.m. local time, and I just finished this book. I’m still processing. I can’t sleep yet, so I figured I’d blog about it instead.

You know when a book is so good that as soon as you’ve read the last page, you want to flip it over and start from the beginning again? Even though you figured out the plot twist halfway through and you know how the story ends?

I have to work in the morning, so I can’t re-read this right away. But it’s still a newbie at the library, and pretty popular (and for good reason) so it’s only a seven-day loan. Which gives me ’til Saturday. I only started this book on my lunch break today, so I’ve got plenty of time to re-read it before it goes back to the library. Maybe even twice.

The Rosie Project just reminds me so much of ME, and it reminds me so much of SO MANY PEOPLE I KNOW, and it’s like it explains so many things about the human condition, and yet I’ve got more questions now than I did before. I kind of teared up at one little section towards the end, and I don’t know why, of all the scenes or sentences or phrasings, that was the section my brain went for.

More questions to answer. More thoughts to ponder. Not sure if I’ll fall asleep with my brain on like this… maybe I’ll start re-reading Rosie again right now. (Rosie is the name of one of the main characters, by the way.)

Dolls Behaving Badly: A Novel for Every Woman Who’s Earned a Little Fun by Cinthia Ritchie (2013)

This was a perfectly good book until I got to the end and there were Discussion Questions. As in a book club. Is that really a thing people do? Like, not just for the wine? It seems like all that talk would ruin the story, just like grade-school book reports did. I don’t really understand how the author and/or editor(s) think this book is so high-falutin and literary it needs reading group discussion questions at the end, and yet saw fit to put blow-up dolls on the cover (and it’s a really good cover! Good imagery and symbolism; totally appropriate for the story! So eye-catching I picked it up, even though I’d never heard of the book or the author!).

But yeah.

Discussion Questions.

*swigs wine*