Uncle Tom's Cabin

http://www.barnesandnoble.com/w/uncle-toms-cabin-harriet-beecher-stowe/1100025188?ean=9781593081218

One thing I've started to do is attempt to read classic books I've never read before.  I'm finding my visual vocabulary and speech needs some work, and shifting my reading syntax gears, majorly, is in order to fully comprehend this particular work.

 

I grew up in a movie theater, as my father was a manager for several years, and watching black and white films, and black and white TV, from the 40’s and 50’s, was just what it was, black and white...where the South was depicted in black and white...giving the same speech patterns and actions of people that Stowe uses in her writing of this book.  The one thing I can do is visualize, easily, these sets of actions and emotions she places on her pages.

 

There is an introduction and notes by Amanda Claybaugh, and a chronological listing of world events during the time of Harriet Beecher Stowe’s life, which gives insight to the writing of this book.  This book is over four hundred pages, and I’m barely into forty of them, so I have a ways to go.  But, already, I get what this writer is trying to convey to her readers.  It’s powerful in its concept.  I see, now, why the dividing line existed(s) between people and states, because of this story.

I’ve watched a few programs presented by a PBS station on the history of blacks and whites in the public eye...tracing their history back as far as they can go.  These people are amazed at their heritage, their linage, and how slavery brought them to present day.  I find it all not just fascinating, but historically revealing, telling us more than just an order of birth, but showing bloodlines that cross all boundaries.

I hope to continue to write a fuller review of this story, once I finish reading...and digesting it all.

A Review - The Shoemaker's Wife, a novel by Adriana Trigiani

I rarely write a review right after I've read the book, but in this case I really need to.

I've read Trigiani's novels, Brava Valentine, and Very Valentine, and loved them for several reasons.  The tale, of course, but the humor, and the serious introspection that accompanied them. Those two books told a story that was easy to digest, in contrast to this last novel, The Shoemaker's Wife.

I'm not saying that this wasn't a wonderful story, in-and-of-itself, but after traversing through 470 pages of maudlin reminiscing, characters' dying scenes, one after another; characters dredging back memories to the point of, "Just get me to the next paragraph without another memory throwing me into melancholy, please!"   

Skimming, off and on, and especially at the end, drove me through the heart wrenching past, was unavoidable.  I hate having to skim!  But do I need to hear the same story repeated, again?

Adriana Trigiani can tell a compelling story, in detail after detail, but I ran out of patience with detail, and Kleenex, by the time I reached the end.  In my emotional state, I was ready to sail the book to the far corners of Italy.."Go home!", I yelled...wherever the hell home is.

I know there is more to say about this book, but at the moment I'm dog tired.  After spending a lifetime with these characters who yearned for what could never be - wanting the future, no, wanting the past; wanting that job, wanting that person in their life.......no, we have to live in the present, no it's time to go home....What country?  What town?  What city?

Now, I'm going to bed.

A Review - The Warmest December, a novel by Bernice L McFadden

Read an excerpt, Chapter 1, here:http://www.barnesandnoble.com/w/warmest-december-bernice-l-mcfadden/1101064287?ean=9781617750359

WOW is an understatement!

POWERFUL!  GRIPPING! Entering your heart without hesitation, Bernice L. McFadden takes you through a daughter’s alcoholic family life, from present to past, to present, finding a forgiveness that tears at your skin, demanding to be there, owning its residency.  A must read for anyone who takes real literature seriously.

         McFadden’s exemplary writing and compelling story will hold onto you until you turn the last page - I felt every last word, from beginning to end.

Laughter of The Wind

mocking

taunting

come here

go there

listen to the wind

the voice laughs in my face

full blown strength gutting my image

stripping, smearing me the length of the field

no flowers, just spikes sticking out of the ground

you wait for me to appear

you whisper to me sweetly

you soak me up like a sponge

I’m lost to your voice completely

brace yourself, the wind tells me

as I careen around the edges of my fate

laugh, wind, go ahead and laugh!

your thorny nettles settle deep within my skin

quietly I wait

for a tender sound

you pick me up

to throw me down

Reading and Writing

I find I don't read like most everyone else. That can sometimes be a plus, or sometimes a minus. I plod along at the pace that the writing sets for me.  I read with a tempo that comes from the words and punctuation on the page.  And maybe it's my age, or maybe experience, or maybe it’s just the place I find myself in at this moment in my life.

After being on the Barnes & Noble book discussion boards for over a decade, I find I’ve grown extremely analytical, and sensitive to finding out just why I do (or don't) like either an author's writing, or a story.  This can proceed into the extreme.        

I’m finding I no longer can sort through (delicately pick and choose) my words on a book discussion, I go directly to the point, and it may mean tearing a throat out in the process.  It’s not personal, just a clinical dissection, which can harm a discussion as I cut to the chase.  I feel I can no longer participate on these discussions.  But, it's for a number of reasons, not just this one.  

A novel should be about life, at least in my estimation.  A novel should be about the truths of that life of those characters.  A novel should take you along a journey of self discovery....for better, or for worse, those characters should make a real impression on you.

And now, being part of a critique writers group, I’ve been given even more reasons to delve into what words should, or should not do for a reader - Finding out what a writer wants to accomplish in their writing, that's important to me - And through this process it helps me to learn more about myself as a person, not just as a writer.  Analysis doesn’t stop with just the words on a page, for me it goes deeper.  My own writing reveals who and what I am, a soul I can no longer hold onto.