Ecova
Flyer #7 Monday, June 4th, 2012
Greetings! Salutations! Grand Monday to you, fellow reading enthusiasts! Can you believe it? School is just about to let out and graduations abound! Much to do, and time challenges everywhere!
Web Bulletin/Community Board:
As you may notice, I have posted this newsletter to the Non-Business Community Board. It is to encourage people to pick a book and read a title they may not have had the chance to check out. We love to share!
As you have had a chance to see, Jennifer Karalfa and I created a Blog through Google Blogger. This is our way to post our comments on books we have read and have on-going conversations between meetings, as well as give others the opportunity to participate if they are not able to attend monthly meetings. I encourage everyone to join (you can use your YouTube account to sign in! No, you do not have to create a Gmail email account) and contribute!
What about Book List 2? Again, please be advised that this will not be released except upon demand via email. I have posted a page for Book List 2 on the Blog, and urge those participating in this list to check it out and post comments on each book there.
Email:
Attendance of meetings is encouraged, but not required. Please, join us on our NEW Ecova Book Club Blog! Newsletters will still arrive in your email box monthly, but this is where we can connect and discuss our reading picks.
Genre Interests:
Just a friendly reminder of what genres to expect to be posted on each list; List One will be posted publicly on the Non-Business Community Board in Outlook and is available for perusal on the Book Club Board by Loretta Sharbono’s desk in Data Entry. Book List Two is available upon request only. ~
List One:
Mystery Humor Science Fiction Fantasy
Historical Fiction Religious/Inspirational
Western Classics Seasonal Picks
List Two:
Erotica/Romance Sci-Fi/Fantasy True Crime Horror
Graphic Novels Non-Fiction Mystery Paranormal
Please remember that many authors can span several “genres” within a single novel. If your interest is in Science Fiction, please do not be deterred from reading a book that may be an Action Thriller Fantasy, and so on.
Starting June, I will be adding a new selection/highlight. It will be a “Series of the Month” blurb on a specific series, such as The Hunger Games Trilogy by Suzanne Collins, along with a current blog for the author(s) in question.
How are we doing for book selections on our lists? I would greatly appreciate your input! Just send me an email with any suggested reads you would like to see in an upcoming book list.
Heads up! I need your help for July’s Book List! We will be compiling a list of our favorite books. What this means? Just email me your favorite author/title and I will add it to the list! Don’t be shy! We won’t disclose who likes what, unless asked to. I can’t wait to see all your favorite picks!
Meeting Schedule:
As of this time, we will be meeting on the last Thursday of each month in the Spokane 5th Floor Lunch Room from 3 p.m. to 4 p.m. (just one time a month!) and kick back, discuss and laugh! If you are not able to attend, do not be disheartened! Your input is greatly appreciated and we encourage you to communicate with us via our Blog!
So! I challenge you to mark your calendar!
Our next meeting will be on Thursday, June 28th!
Where can I get a copy of that book?
There are many book stores in our neighborhoods, as well as libraries. If you find a title that you “just have to add to the home library”, be encouraged! Check your local library for used copies that have been retired from the public shelves! Browse the shelves of your neighborhood second hand book stores, such as Auntie’s Bookstore and 2nd Look Books! Of course, there are big book stores, like Barnes & Noble and Borders. Don’t forget the value of shopping online through venues like Half.com, Amazon.com, Ebay.com, and more. Not sure where to go? Just ask! We can help you locate that special book! Of course, you are not limited to just reading hard copies of any book you may find on these monthly lists. We encourage audiobooks! eBooks! Borrowing from your library! Buying second hand books! And, even pre-ordering upcoming releases! What can we say? WE LOVE ALL TYPES AND FORMATS OF BOOKS! Do you have any books to lend? Email me!
**Do you know of any local book sales or have any books you would like to sell or trade? Let us know and we will post it in our next newsletter!**
Book Event(s)
Know of any book signings? Is there an author that will be coming to town for a meet and greet? Let us know! Also! Watch for information on an upcoming Book Sale/Swap event!
What we were reading:
*April 2012 reading list was:
· The Supper of the Lamb: a Culinary Reflection by Robert Farrar Capon, Ruth Reichl
· The Poison Throne (Moorehawke Trilogy #1) by Celine Kiernan
· Please Don’t Eat the Daisies by Jean Kerr
· Stainless Steel Rat (Stainless Steel Rat #1) by Harry Harrison
· Snow Melts in Spring by Deborah Vogts
· The Alchemist’s Secret (Ben Hope #1) by Scott Mariani
Did you read any of these books? If so, what did you think? Let us know!
What we are reading now:
Starting this month, you will find that there will be one title assigned per month for the reading schedule. There will be an attached list of other books/titles you may find interesting to read. As always, you are most welcome to read any, or all of the books listed below. All comments are appreciated and encouraged!
**May Reading Pick!**
Paradise Lost
By John Milton
In Paradise Lost, Milton produced poem of epic scale, conjuring up a vast, awe-inspiring cosmos and ranging across huge tracts of space and time. And yet, in putting a charismatic Satan and naked Adam and Eve at the centre of this story, he also created an intensely human tragedy on the Fall of Man. Written when Milton was in his fifties – blind, bitterly disappointed by the Restoration and briefly in danger of execution – Paradise Lost’s apparent ambivalence towards authority has led to intense debate about whether it manages to ‘justify the ways of God to men’, or exposes the cruelty of Christianity.
John Leonard’s revised edition of Paradise Lost contains full notes, elucidating Milton’s biblical, classical and historical allusions and discussing his vivid, highly original use of language and blank verse.
John Leonard’s revised edition of Paradise Lost contains full notes, elucidating Milton’s biblical, classical and historical allusions and discussing his vivid, highly original use of language and blank verse.
**May 2012 reading list is:
Let the Great World Spin
by Colum McCann
This novel follows the fortunes of a menagerie of New Yorkers through a day in 1974--the day of Philippe Petit's death-defying tightrope walk between the newly built Twin Towers.
The Lotus Eaters
By Tatjana Soli
A unique and sweeping debut novel of an American female combat photographer in the Vietnam War, as she captures the wrenching chaos and finds herself torn between the love of two men.
On a stifling day in 1975, the North Vietnamese army is poised to roll into Saigon. As the fall of the city begins, two lovers make their way through the streets to escape to a new life. Helen Adams, and American photojournalist, must take leave of a war she is addicted to and a devastated country she has come to love. Linh, the Vietnamese man who loves her, must grapple with his own conflicted loyalties of heart and homeland. As they race to leave, they play out a drama of devotion and betrayal that spins them back through twelve war-torn years, beginning in the splendor of Angkor Wat, with their mentor, larger-than-life war correspondent Sam Darrow, once Helen’s infuriating love and fiercest competitor, and Linh’s secret keeper, boss and truest friend.
Tatjana Soli paints a searing portrait of an American woman’s struggle and triumph in Vietnam, a stirring canvas contrasting the wrenching horror of war and the treacherous narcotic of obsession with the redemptive power of love. Readers will be transfixed by this stunning novel of passion, duty and ambition among the ruins of war.
Mind’s Eye (Inspector Van Veeteren #1)
By Hakan Nesser
The highly anticipated first novel in the Inspector Van Veeteren series in now available in English. At last, American readers will be able to enjoy, from its very beginnings, this addictive series by one of Europe’s most beloved and best-selling crime writers.
Chief Inspector Van Veeteren knew that murder cases were never as open-and-shut as this one: Janek Mitter woke one morning with a brutal hangover and discovered his wife of three months lying facedown in the bathtub, dead. With only the flimsiest excuse as his defense, he is found guilty of a drunken crime of passion and imprisoned in a mental institution.
But Van Veeteren’s suspicions about the identity of the killer are borne out when Mitter also becomes a murder victim. Now the chief inspector launches a full-scale investigation of the two slayings. But it may only be the unspoken secrets of the dead–revealed in a mysterious letter that Mitter wrote shortly before his death–that will finally allow Van Veeteren to unmask the killer and expose the shocking root of this sordid violence.
Chief Inspector Van Veeteren knew that murder cases were never as open-and-shut as this one: Janek Mitter woke one morning with a brutal hangover and discovered his wife of three months lying facedown in the bathtub, dead. With only the flimsiest excuse as his defense, he is found guilty of a drunken crime of passion and imprisoned in a mental institution.
But Van Veeteren’s suspicions about the identity of the killer are borne out when Mitter also becomes a murder victim. Now the chief inspector launches a full-scale investigation of the two slayings. But it may only be the unspoken secrets of the dead–revealed in a mysterious letter that Mitter wrote shortly before his death–that will finally allow Van Veeteren to unmask the killer and expose the shocking root of this sordid violence.
Blessed Are the Cheesemakers
By Sarah-Kate Lynch
Set on a small Irish dairy farm, this tender and funny debut novel follows two lost souls as they try to carve out new lives amid a colorful cast of characters reminiscent of those in the hit film Waking Ned Divine. Abby has been estranged from the family farm since her rebellious mother ran off with her when she was a small child. Kit is a burned out New York stockbroker who's down on his luck. But that's all about to change, now that he and Abby have converged on the farm just in time to help Corrie and Fee, two old cheesemakers in a time of need. Full of delightful and quirky characters--from dairy cows who only give their best product to pregnant, vegetarian teens to an odd collection of whiskey-soaked men and broken-hearted women who find refuge under Corrie and Fee's roof--BLESSED ARE THE CHEESEMAKERS is an irresistible tale about taking life's spilled milk and turning it into the best cheese in the world.
The Buddha in the Attic
By Julie Otsuka
Julie Otsuka’s long awaited follow-up to When the Emperor Was Divine (“To watch Emperor catching on with teachers and students in vast numbers is to grasp what must have happened at the outset for novels like Lord of the Flies and To Kill a Mockingbird” —The New York Times) is a tour de force of economy and precision, a novel that tells the story of a group of young women brought over from Japan to San Francisco as ‘picture brides’ nearly a century ago.
In eight incantatory sections, The Buddha in the Attic traces their extraordinary lives, from their arduous journey by boat, where they exchange photographs of their husbands, imagining uncertain futures in an unknown land; to their arrival in San Francisco and their tremulous first nights as new wives; to their backbreaking work picking fruit in the fields and scrubbing the floors of white women; to their struggles to master a new language and a new culture; to their experiences in childbirth, and then as mothers, raising children who will ultimately reject their heritage and their history; to the deracinating arrival of war.
In eight incantatory sections, The Buddha in the Attic traces their extraordinary lives, from their arduous journey by boat, where they exchange photographs of their husbands, imagining uncertain futures in an unknown land; to their arrival in San Francisco and their tremulous first nights as new wives; to their backbreaking work picking fruit in the fields and scrubbing the floors of white women; to their struggles to master a new language and a new culture; to their experiences in childbirth, and then as mothers, raising children who will ultimately reject their heritage and their history; to the deracinating arrival of war.
The Patience Stone
By Atiq Rahimi
In Persian folklore, Syngue Sabour is the name of a magical black stone, a patience stone, which absorbs the plight of those who confide in it. It is believed that the day it explodes, after having received too much hardship and pain, will be the day of the Apocalypse. But here, the Syngue Sabour is not a stone but rather a man lying brain-dead with a bullet lodged in his neck. His wife is with him, sitting by his side. But she resents him for having sacrificed her to the war, for never being able to resist the call to arms, for wanting to be a hero, and in the end, after all was said and done, for being incapacitated in a small skirmish. Yet she cares, and she speaks to him. She even talks to him more and more, opening up her deepest desires, pains, and secrets. While in the streets rival factions clash and soldiers are looting and killing around her, she speaks of her life, never knowing if her husband really hears. And it is an extraordinary confession, without restraint, about sex and love and her anger against a man who never understood her, who mistreated her, who never showed her any respect or kindness. Her admission releases the weight of oppression of marital, social, and religious norms, and she leads her story up to the great secret that is unthinkable in a country such as Afghanistan. Winner of the Prix Goncourt, The Patience Stone captures with great courage and spare, poetic, prose the reality of everyday life for an intelligent woman under the oppressive weight of the Taliban regime in Afghanistan.
The Twentieth Wife (Taj Mahal Trilogy #1)
By Indu Sundaresan
Based on the life of an actual empress of the Mughal empire, the woman for whom the Taj Mahal was built, "The Twentieth Wife" blends historical reality with the rich imaginings of a fairy tale, providing a fascinating portrait of one woman's defiant life behind the veil.
A Cup of Friendship
By Deborah Rodriguez
After hard luck and some bad choices, Sunny has finally found a place to call home — it just happens to be in the middle of a war zone.
The thirty-eight-year-old American’s pride and joy is the Kabul Coffee House, where she brings hospitality to the expatriates, misfits, missionaries, and mercenaries who stroll through its doors. She’s especially grateful that the busy days allow her to forget Tommy, the love of her life, who left her in pursuit of money and adventure.
Working alongside Sunny is the maternal Halajan, who vividly recalls the days before the Taliban and now must hide a modern romance from her ultratraditional son — who, unbeknownst to her, is facing his own religious doubts. Into the café come Isabel, a British journalist on the trail of a risky story; Jack, who left his family back home in Michigan to earn “danger pay” as a consultant; and Candace, a wealthy and well-connected American whose desire to help threatens to cloud her judgment.
When Yazmina, a young Afghan from a remote village, is kidnapped and left on a city street pregnant and alone, Sunny welcomes her into the café and gives her a home — but Yazmina hides a secret that could put all their lives in jeopardy.
As this group of men and women discover that there’s more to one another than meets the eye, they’ll form an unlikely friendship that will change not only their own lives but the lives of an entire country.
As this group of men and women discover that there’s more to one another than meets the eye, they’ll form an unlikely friendship that will change not only their own lives but the lives of an entire country.
Brimming with Deborah Rodriguez’s remarkable gift for depicting the nuances of life in Kabul, and filled with vibrant characters that readers will truly care about, A Cup of Friendship is the best kind of fiction—full of heart yet smart and thought-provoking.
Love’s Magic (Boadicea #1)
by Traci E. Hall
While her sisters are tall and beautiful, Celestia Montehue is the misfit in a royal family—petite, with one green and one blue eye. The only thing she has in common with her ancestors is her magical healing ability. Fearing no one will ever accept her, she vows never to marry. Meanwhile, Nicholas Le Blanc, a haunted man, was trained as a knight but his childhood has convinced him he is a bastard. He is captured while on crusade and eventually forced to kill for his freedom. An arranged marriage between the two does not bode happiness, nor does Celestia's new home—a broken-down keep haunted by the ghost of Nicholas' mother. Soon a curse is set upon them, and they must decide if their love will save them or, ultimately, doom them.
Flight of the Intruder (Jake Grafton #1)
by Stephen Coonts
A-6's were called Intruders. Their pilots tackled assignments of dazzling complexity and flew them with daring and dispatch. But they paid a price...in lost lives, disillusion, incredible tension. They had one reward -- exhilaration -- worth the whole candle. You share the airmen's special brand of comradery, the one stabilizing force in an otherwise precarious life, that only an insider knows.
"Documentary and dramatic, FLIGHT OF THE INTRUDER is to the novel what TOP GUN was to film." (B-O-T Editorial Review Board)
1st to Die (Women’s Murder Club #1)
by James Patterson
Inspector Lindsay Boxer of the San Francisco Police Department suddenly finds herself in the middle of two horrifying situations: The first is that she s just learned she has an often-fatal blood disease. The second is a double homicide case she s now heading up that involves the murder of newlyweds on their wedding night. Burdened with Chris Raleigh, a new partner reassigned from the mayor s office, Lindsay finds that she has too much to deal with and turns to her best friend, Claire, the head ME on the case. Claire offers helpful advice and human, friendly contact amid a job filled with violence, cruelty, and fear.
Soon a fledgling newspaper reporter, Cindy, makes contact with Lindsay looking for a career-making story. Although Lindsay can t officially comment on the case, the two women form a rapport, and Cindy joins Lindsay and Claire for their weekly meeting. When a second pair of newlyweds is murdered, and later a third, the investigation leads to a prominent crime writer, Nicholas Jenks, who has a history of spousal abuse and a predilection for kinky, dangerous sex games. With the help of an understanding assistant D.A., Jill Bernhardt, Lindsay tries to make a case against Jenks, who even had an affair with one of the slain women. Eventually Jill joins the Murder Club, and the four ladies share private interdepartmental information in an effort to track and stop the killer before he strikes again.
Soon a fledgling newspaper reporter, Cindy, makes contact with Lindsay looking for a career-making story. Although Lindsay can t officially comment on the case, the two women form a rapport, and Cindy joins Lindsay and Claire for their weekly meeting. When a second pair of newlyweds is murdered, and later a third, the investigation leads to a prominent crime writer, Nicholas Jenks, who has a history of spousal abuse and a predilection for kinky, dangerous sex games. With the help of an understanding assistant D.A., Jill Bernhardt, Lindsay tries to make a case against Jenks, who even had an affair with one of the slain women. Eventually Jill joins the Murder Club, and the four ladies share private interdepartmental information in an effort to track and stop the killer before he strikes again.
~READ! It feeds the mind!~
