Friday, July 23, 2010

What We're Reading

On the way up to Portland, I zipped through Aimee Bender's The Impossible Sadness of Lemon Cake. While I longed for more scenes of the MC's "super power" over the feelings ("empty," :hollow," "rushed,") in food, I appreciated her struggle with it, and the unfolding family conflict. Dialogue was good, setting was perfect, and a near-decade passed smoothly, though I did get hung up on the fragments that popped up every so often. This was a sad book, and I like sad books (I think there's depth in suffering), and one scene made me particularly teary. I love a young, wise narrator, and I also admire a book with a question as the conclusion.

Then there's this:
which Reesie (9)and me are reading together. Tom Angleberger writes a hilarious stack of stories about MC Tommy's deciding whether paper puppet Yoda is real or not. We giggle, we cringe, Rees begs to read one more chapter. Even Chewbacca makes a guest appearance, and every so often, we get to use the Yoda voice. What's not to like?

Dominic (12) has this going on:
I don't know anything about it, other than it's written by Carl Hiaason, and it must be good, because Dominic was reading it last night in the dark, instead of watching a family movie.




Daney (11) has to be on her 153rd library book review form. She's trying to win an iPod Nano, but even if she weren't, she'd still be devouring everything she could get her hands on (more on this in a later post). Daney whips through words so fast, I had to creep in her room while she was sleeping, to see what she has right now. While there's a huge pile by her bed of Hardy Boys, a Dangerous Sea Creatures guide, and The Girl Who Could Fly, there's also my copy of The Particular Sadness of Lemon Cake (again, more later), and I know for sure she's a couple discs into Jay Asher's Thirteen Reasons Why, which his writing partner gave me a couple years ago when we were roommates at a conference.









And Dave? Just those graphs and charts that show how his stock is faring, as well as an occasional page of flashlights in a firefighting catalog, and maybe a Sports Illustrated article or two.

4 comments:

Valerie Geary said...

I'm halfway through The Lemon Cake right now.... and it's just delicious! Glad to know I still have a lot to look forward to with it!

Anonymous said...

impossible? i think you mean particular.

Jennie Englund said...

Yes, definitely keep reading, Valerie!

And Yes, "Anonymous," it IS particular! (I think I was too focused on the cake part to worry about the modifier.)

Cooking by Charles said...

Great post