The Lightning Thief: With Thoughts From My Class

The kids in my third grade class begged me to read me The Lightning Thief. One of the mothers actually bought it for me this Christmas. Reading for the Read-a-Myth Challenge and the Once Upon a Time Challenge 5 pushed me over the edge to read it aloud.

You've got to love Percy Jackson, our middle-school aged hero. He's got ADD, the typical angst of adolescence, and untypical parentage by having a human mother and Poseidon for his father. He's also got a quest:

You shall go west, and face the god who has turned.

You shall find what was stolen, and see it safely returned.

You shall be betrayed by one who calls you a friend.

And you shall fail to save what matters most, in the end.

I enjoyed his story. But what I most enjoyed about the story where the elements of mythology I was able to teach my class, from the famous brothers Poseidon, Zeus and Hades who descended from their father Cronus, to the war god Ares and Hade's Helm of Darkness. The kids were entranced, as you can from a few of their reviews below:

• I liked The Lightning Thief a lot because I learned a lot of mythology, and it was a mixture of sad and happy. My favorite characters are Perseus Jackson, Marybeth, and Grover. I like these friends because they all worked together on their quest. My favorite event was when Percy went to Olympus and saw his dad. I liked this event because Perseus finally saw his dad when he was looking for him. I learned that mythology is not real, and there are a lot of gods. ~Riya
• I loved The Lightning Thief because it was both action packed and funny. It was a great book. My favorite part was when he fought Ares. It was very cool when Ares and Percy were fighting. I liked the book better than the movie because it was original. ~Adrian
• I liked The Lightning Thief a lot. My favorite character was Percy Jackson because he is the son of a the sea god, and I like water. My favorite event was when Percy Jackson went to Olympus. I learned about not Greek mythology, but friendship and how it works. I really learned a lot, but that was the best thing I learned. ~Karthik

However, not everyone in my class liked it. Here's one more:

• I hated The Lightning Thief because it was really, really boring. I don't have a favorite character. And it made no sense to me. I don't like it because I don't like Greek mythology. Greek mythology and I don't go together. So this book is just not for me.  How could there be a son of the sea? There is only ONE True God. ~Angelin

So, I guess you'll have to read it yourself to find your own verdict. And after you do, there's a trivia game with ten questions to play and test your reading skills.

I know that most of my class will be reading the rest of the series over the summer, and that's a good thing.

The Penelopiad by Margaret Atwood

Amazing to me, how Margaret Atwood can take the wife of Odysseus straight out of the Greek myths, and by giving her a personality, as well as a voice, remind me of the women in my very favorite book of hers, The Robber Bride. For to me, as much as anything, The Penelopiad is about the wiles of Helen of Troy against the faithfulness of her cousin, Penelope.

Because Helen ran off with Paris and wouldn't, or couldn't, come back, Odysseus fulfills his oath and goes after her. Twenty long years he is gone; ten years in pursuit of Helen and ten years in pursuit of his own pleasures. Meanwhile, Penelope fends off her Suitors, promising that she will choose one when the shroud she is weaving is completed. Every night, she unravels a bit more to stave off the fulfillment of her promise.

Odysseus returns, disguised as a beggar. Penelope recognizes him, but fails to give up his identity. The twelve maids are hung, though they were raped by the Suitors to whom they were given because Penelope refused to defile her marriage bed.

Surely in all these ways the story Atwood tells follows what the myth has told. But her interpretation, the tension she creates between Penelope and Helen, is what fascinates me. Anyone can tell a myth; it takes Margaret to explore the complexities of women who betray other women.

'Oh, Penelope, you can't still be jealous," she says. "Surely we can be friends now! Why don't you come along with me to the upper world, next time I go? We could do a trip to Las Vegas. Girls' night out! But I forgot-that's not your style. You'd rather play the faithful little wifey, what with the weaving and so on. Bad me, I could never do it, I'd die of boredom. But you were always such a homebody."

Helen mocks, and teases, and belittles, never admitting the fact that she was the impetus for Odysseus leaving in the first place. She believes in her beauty, her ability to attract men, her flippant style, and she gives little care to how it affects those around her. How it has cost the twelve maidens their lives, and Penelope her marriage, but for her faithful allegiance.

No man will ever kill himself for love of me. And no man ever did. Not that I would have wanted to inspire those kinds of suicides. I was not a man-eater, I was not a Siren, I was not like cousin Helen who loved to make conquests just to show she could. As soon as the man was grovelling, and it never took long, she'd stroll away without a backwards glance, giving that careless laugh of hers, as if she'd just been watching the palace midget standing ridiculously on his head.

I was a kind girl-kinder than Helen, or so I thought. I knew I would have to have something to offer instead of beauty. I was clever, everyone said so-in fact they said it so much that I found it discouraging-but cleverness is a quality a man likes to have in his wife as long as she is some distance away from him. Up close, he'll take kindness any day of the week, if there's nothing more alluring to be had.

For those of you who've only read Margaret Atwood's futuristic novels, such as The Handmaid's Tale, or Oryx and Crake, I beg you to read The Robber Bride. It is similar in so many ways to The Penelopiad, in that one woman is able to wreak havoc on all those around her and apparently come out unscathed. Who, then, is left to suffer?

The faithful one. Like Penelope.

For Bookfool, Whose Kitty Can Read. Whereas Ours Just Lives in Hope.

If you're going to take our dog, Henry, out for a walk, you just might have to look under the little table by the front door. Because that's where Samantha waits, longing to be invited.

She's a darling little kitty, given to my son when I didn't even like kitties. But she's grown on me, and now I love this little creature who sleeps at the foot of my bed.

She looks very much like Bookfool's Fiona:

Only, I've seen pictures where Fiona can read.

And I think she needs to teach Samantha. (Can we arrange some tutoring over the Summer, Bookfool?)

Time for Kids Big Book of How (Such a Great Book!)

It was so fun to teach today. Finally. It's been more than a difficult year, Chez Bellezza, as I've adhered to the tenets of the National Core Curriculum (when has anything national ever been good?), the Illinois State Standards, and the binders and binders of ridiculous nonsense from which I'm required to teach.

Don't get me wrong. I would never send the children in my class to fourth grade unprepared. I take their foundations of learning very seriously, and they have grown enormously in their writing skills, their reading comprehension and vocabulary, their mathematical problem solving. But, fun? We've been a little short on fun.

Last week, Goodman Media sent me The Time for Kids Big Book of How. Before I could even introduce it to my class, the boys were sneaking it off my desk to read behind theirs. I was constantly searching for that book, as I knew I wanted to develop a lesson from their section on 'Buildings'.

"If I gave you eight marshmallows," I said, "and fourteen pieces of spaghetti, how would you use them to design a bridge?" They spent last night thinking it over, and today we built models with mini-marshmallows and toothpicks.

Two hours of silence. Two hours of working. Two hours of hands-on, problem solving.

Then, I built the large one the book suggested. It was so much fun to have them gather around me, learn that the triangle and circle (of the spaghetti itself) are two of the strongest shapes, and see the book's model of a bridge taking shape. We were even able to hang 72 play-money pennies in an origami cup I quickly folded. You could see the spaghetti slowly bend under the weight, (not pictured here) how flexibility and strength were both at play.

I cannot recommend this book highly enough for children. For parents. For teachers. It has exciting chapters which cover a myriad of topics, outstanding photographs, and best of all (to me) a How To section for each chapter. Now I'm all excited wondering what we'll do next week.

Surely this is the way to teach Science. As well as read nonfiction.

Contents

Chapter 1: Animals

• Do Elephants Communicate?
• How Do Sharks Find Prey?
• How Do Chameleons Change Colors?
• How Does a Snake Inject its Venom?
• How Did the Dinosaurs Die Out?
• How Do Animals See At Night?
• How Does a Spider Spin its Web?
• How Do Honeybees Make Hives?
• How do Beavers Build Dams?
• HOW TO: Make Blubber
• HOW TO: Mark Your Territory

Chapter 2: Be Prepared

• How To Stay Safe in a Hurricane
• How to Stay Safe in a Storm
• How To Stay Safe During an Earthquake
• How to Stay Safe in a Fire
• How to Stay Safe During a Tornado
• How Does a Search Dog Find a Missing Person?
• HOW TO: Make a compass
• HOW TO: Make a survival kit

Chapter 3: Sports

• How Does an Arena Change an Ice Rink into a Basketball Court?
• How Are Baseball Bats Made?
• How Does Hockey Equipment Keep Players Safe?
• How Do You Do a Skateboard Trick Called an Ollie?
• How Do You Do the Snowboarding Trick Called Butter?
• How do Ice Skaters Spin so Fast?
• How can You 'Stay Upright on a Surfboard?
• How can You Prevent Sports Injures?
• How Do Bicycle Gears Make You Go Faster?
• How Does Motion Capture Technology Help Athletes?
• HOW TO: Make a High-Bounce Ball
• HOW TO: Find the Sweet Spot on a Bat

Chapter 4: Buildings

• How Were The Egyptian Pyramids Built?
• How Was Mount "Rushmore Built?
• How Does the "Panama Canal Work?
• How Was a Bridge Built Across the Colorado River?
• HOW TO: Build a Spaghetti Bridge
• HOW TO: Build a Pyramid

Chapter 5: Science

• How Do Scientists Uncover and Remove Fossils From a Dig?
• How are Oil Spills Cleaned Up?
• How Are Birds Cleaned Up After an Oil Spill?
• How do Roller Coasters Go Up and Down?
• How Do Optical Illusions Trick Our Eyes?
• How is a Fireworks Show Staged?
• How Does an Iceberg Form?
• HOW TO: Make a Rain Forest
• HOW TO: Grow Crystals

Chapter 6: Transportation

• How Do Submarines Work?
• How Does a Hybrid Car Work?
• How are Tunnels Dug?
• How does a Maglev Train Work?
• HOW TO: Make a Baking-Soda Boat
• HOW TO: Make a Paper Airplane

Chapter 7: Home Tech

• How Does a Microwave Oven Cook Food?
• How Does a Lock Work?
• How Does a Toilet Flush Away Waste?
• How Does a Zipper Zip?
• How Does a Refrigerator Keep Food Cold?
• How Can a Virus Make You Sick?
• How Does Wi-Fi Connect to the Internet?
• HOW TO: Make a Camera
• HOW TO: Make a Periscope

Chapter 8: Food

• How Does Popcorn Pop?
• How Does Bread Rise?
• How is Chocolate Made?
• How is Ice Cream Made?
• How do Chili Peppers Make Your Mouth Burn?
• HOW TO: Make Ice Cream
• HOW TO: Make Pizza

Chapter 9: Space

• How Can We Protect Earth From Big Space Rocks?
• How Will the Juno Probe Uncover Jupiter's Secrets?
• How Do Astronauts Train?
• How Does The Sun Stay Hot?
• How Do We Know If There's Another Earth Out There?
• HOW TO: Build a Planetarium
• HOW TO: Launch a Rocket

Chapter 10: The Human Body

• How Does the Stomach Digest Food?
• How Do We Cry?
• How Do Medicines Work?
• How Do Eyeglasses Help Us See Better?
• How Does the Body Fight Germs?
• How Does Loud Music Hurt Your Hearing?
• HOW TO: Make a Stethoscope
• HOW TO: Find Your Dominant Eye

Chapter 11: Going Green

• How Are Computers and Other Electronics Recycled?
• How Can You Make Your House Greener?
• How Do Wind Turbines Make Electricity?
• HOW TO: Make Your Own Landfill
• HOW TO: Make Recycled Paper

Kicking Off Armchair BEA: Who Are You?

So sad that I can never attend the BEA (Book Expo America) or the BBC (Book Bloggers Convention). Not only is it held in New York (far, far away from Chicago), it's when I'm wrapping up the school year for my third graders (May 23-27). Happily, there's the Armchair BEA...where all of us can attend vicariously. The question for today's kickoff asks, "Who are you and how do you blog?"

I never meant to be a book blogger. I didn't even know there were such a thing as book bloggers when I began my blog in 2006. It was pure, joyful, exhilarating chance that I came across Les, Bookfool, and Booklogged. Finally, I knew I had a topic about which I could write with unceasing passion.

I feel a bit self conscious writing so blatantly about myself, as if I resemble the Brian Andreas' StoryPeople character who says, "We haven't much time so let's just talk about me."

But, here's a short list before I end the post:

• I can never remember a time when I didn't believe in God.
• I can never remember a time when I didn't know how to read.
• I can never remember a time when I didn't disdain sports (except for cycling and canoeing).
• I can never remember a time when I didn't want to be a teacher.
• I can never remember a time when I didn't long to wear cherry red lipstick.

A bizarre collection of facts, to be sure, but there you have it: me in a nutshell. Except I totally forgot to write about what I like to read best (although I'll read anything but romance):

• Classic literature
• Japanese literature
• Children's literature
• The Bible

Sorry, I just can't seem to get inspired about writing a whole autobiography tonight. This short post will have to suffice, which is good because it gives you plenty of time to read more introductions here. And, thanks for visiting.

Mailbox Monday

Into my mailbox this week came two exciting books:

The first is Mercy by Jussi Adler-Olsen. It comes from Penguin with the following praise for its author and his book: 

• Winner of the Reader's Book Award (Denmark) 2010
• Danish Thriller of the Year 2010
• Winner of the Golden Laurels award-Denmark's top literary accolade
• Winner of the Glass Key Award 2010 for best Nordic Crime Thriller, previously awarded to Jo Nesbo, Stieg Larsson and Henning Mankell

In Denmark, Mercy hit No. 1 in the bestsellers list and remained in the Top 3 for over a year.

Featuring a diverse cast of exceptionally well-crafted characters and a terrifying premise, prepare to beg for mercy as Denmark's king of crime fiction is translated into English for the very first time...

Sometimes you get a second chance. Carl Morck used to be a good homicide detective. One of Copenhagen's best, in fact. Then a bullet almost took his life. Two of his colleagues weren't so lucky, and Carl, because he didn't draw his gun, blames himself. Now his erratic behaviour is going to cost him his job. It's just a matter of time.

So promotion is the last thing he expects. Newly created Department Q deals with 'cases of special focus'. His former colleagues think it's a joke-a- home for hopeless cases. Carl, leading it, will fit right in. Except that his first case is that of missing politician Merete Lynggaard. She vanished five years ago. Everyone assumes she's dead. Everyone assumes it's a waste of time.

Everyone, that is, except Carl. Because Merete isn't dead-at least not yet.

The second is Sea Escape by Lynn Griffin sent by Simon and Schuster.

In Sea Escape, wounds of love, sacrifice and betrayal are veiled in mystery until the discovery of private letters reveals long-hidden secrets that set a grieving daughter free to forgive her mother, he father, and ultimately herself. With clear vision into the tender complexities of the female heart, Lynne Griffin has artfully crafted a rich, multigenerational story." ~Beth Hoffman, bestselling author of Saving CeeCee Honeycutt

So excited for Summer to begin so I can read all day...did you have anything exciting in your mailbox?

Find more Mailbox Monday treasures here.

The Particular Sadness of Lemon Cake by Aimee Bender (With Her Recipe)

You'd think a book with such a bright cover, with such a sweet picture of a lemon cake with chocolate frosting, would be a book about something light. Something easy to swallow. Something palatable.

But it's about sorrows almost too heavy to bear, and how is it, exactly, that we manage to cope with day to day life at all?

They say there is a grain of truth in every jest, and I feel the same about magical realism. That element may sound fantastic, unbelievable, impossible, but the more I read books with magical realism in them (Kafka On The Shore, Of Bees and Mist), the more I discover that they contain more truth than fantasy. And so it is with our heroine, who can taste what people are feeling when she eats what they've prepared.

Can't we taste more than the flavors? When we concentrate on the person, on the nuances and unsaid parts, we can often find an element of sadness. Anger. Joy or hope. (Even the psalmist said, "Taste the Lord and see that He is good." Psalm 34:8)

In the shadow of the slice of cake is a girl. Or, is it her mother? Or, is it a couple standing so closely together you can't even tell them apart? It is, perhaps, a brother and a sister who have each found their own way to live in this all too painful world.

This was a profoundly moving book. I will be thinking about it for a long, long time.

Find other reviews from Fizzy Thoughts,  Bookfan, S. Krishna's Books, Stuff As Dreams Are Made On, Col Reads, New Century Reading, Estella's Revenge. If you reviewed it, let me know so I can add you to the links.

Quotes particularly striking to me:

"Truth was, it was hard to see George eat those cookie halves without hesitation. Without tasting even a speck of the hurry in Janet's oatmeal, which was so rushed it was like eating the calendar of an executive, or without catching a glimpse of the punching bag tucked beside every chocolate chip. I was so jealous, already, of everyone else's mouth." (p. 64-5)

"There's a kind of show a kid can do, for a parent-a show of pain, to try to announce something, and in my crying, in the desperate, blabbering, awful mouth-clawing, I had hoped to get something across. Had it come across, any of it? Nope." (p. 95)

 "Many kids, it seemed, would find out that their parents were flawed, messed up people later in life, and I didn't appreciate getting to know it all so strong and early." (p. 117)

 "To see someone you love, in a bad setting, is one of the great barometers of gratitude." (p. 201)

Finally, here is Aimee Bender's lemon cake which I made tonight:

Lemon Cake (Cake au citron)
10 tablespoons butter, plus a little extra for greasing the pan
2½ cups all-purpose flour, plus a little extra for flouring the greased pan
2 cups confectioners' sugar, plus 1 heaping tablespoon if you decide to make syrup
Grated zest of 1 organic lemon
3 large eggs
½ cup milk, warmed in a small saucepan
1 teaspoon baking powder
1 tablespoon lemon juice (optional)

1. Dice the butter and melt it in the microwave at low power.

 2. Use a pastry brush to grease the bottom and sides of a 10-inch round cake pan with butter. Sprinkle the pan with flour, turn it all around to spread the flour evenly, and tap out any excess.

 3. Preheat the oven to 350°F.

 4. Sift the sugar into a bowl. Add the lemon zest. Mix the sugar and zest well with your fingers, then whisk in the eggs. When the eggs and sugar are thoroughly combined, whisk in the melted butter and warm milk. Add the flour and baking powder, whisking constantly throughout.

 5. Pour the batter into the prepared cake pan and bake for 8 minutes. Lower the heat to 300°F and cook about 40 minutes more. The cake is finished when the blade of a knife inserted in its center comes out dry.

 6. Remove the finished cake from the oven, unmold it onto a cooling rack, and let cool.

 7. Just after cooking you can, if you like, use a pastry brush to coat the cake with syrup. Just boil 4 tablespoons water with 1 heaping tablespoon confectioners' sugar for a couple of minutes. Allow it to cool, then stir in 1 tablespoon lemon juice. Brush the syrup on the still-warm cake.

 Yield: 6 to 8 servings

 Thanks to The BookClub Cookbook for giving us this treat!

Northanger Abbey by Jane Austen

Okay, if I'm going to be perfectly frank? I had a hard time getting through Northanger Abbey. Catherine, while sweet, is a bit of a ninny. Obsessed with the novel, The Mysteries of Udolpho, and Mr. Tilney, she was concerned with very little of consequence beyond her imagination.

"I never look at it," said Catherine, as they walked along the side of the river, "without thinking of the south of France."

"You have been abroad then?" said Henry, a little surprised.

"Oh! No, I only mean what I have read about. It always puts me in mind of the country that Emily and her father travelled through, in The Mysteries of Udolpho. But you never read novels, I dare say?" (p. 88)

Now, nobody loves a good novel more than I. But, Jane Austen seems to poke fun of those who mock her very craft by saying they are silly things, then she goes ahead and creates a silly female character.

I had no patience for Catherine. While it was endearing to read of her friendship with Eleanor, and her romance with Henry Tilney ("Friendship is certainly the finest balm for the pangs of disappointed love."), it was annoying to endure her fantasies while staying at Northanger Abbey. Too reminiscent of Jane Eyre, in my opinion, is her pondering what the General has done with his dead wife. Perhaps, Catherine wonders, she is not dead at all; merely locked away and fed inglorious meals.

As in most romance novels, everything works out perfectly in the end, but it was all too trite for me.

In this round of Austen vs. Dickens? Most certainly Dickens has my vote.

Or, perhaps, Ms. Radcliffe, once I've read The Mysteries of Udolpho.

Find more reviews on Austen or Dickens this month at The Classics Circuit.

Inspected, Neglected, Rejected

Yesterday I received an email from Christian Women Online telling me that the link to Dolce Bellezza has been removed from their database.

It didn't tell why, exactly, it just listed three possible reasons as to how this could be so:

1) Inappropriate content.
2) Wrong category.
3) Irrelevant or not pertaining to our web site.
 
Now, I know that I don't write inappropriate content. I don't even sneak around bad words like Jabril did when he said, "Mrs. Smith, Jerod said the 'a' word with 'hole' at the end".
 
I may have the wrong category in that I don't write daily about my life in the Lord.
 
But, irrelevant, or not pertaining to their web site? Did they not notice my 46 day Lenten read of only The Bible? Don't they see that I put scripture in my posts, and even in my About page, which have direct links to the verses themselves using RefTagger? Don't they recognize that my heart is for the Lord?
 
I've been trying not to worry about it, but it makes me sad. It also makes me understand how Christians get hurt by other Christians, when really we should be sticking up for each other.

Sunday Salon: Want To Join Us in an Atwood Read?

My friend Col and I are planning on reading Margaret Atwood's The Penelopiad together, and we want to invite you to join us. We'll be reading it the week of May 23 through May 28, 2011, with a review to be posted on Monday, May 30. Of course, if anything strikes our fancy before the 30th, we may post on that as well.

If you're reading for the Read-a-Myth Challenge, or the Once Upon a Time 5 Challenge, this would be a perfect fit.

Here are some reviews to further pique your curiosity:

“In this exquisitely poised book, Atwood blends intimate humour with a finely tempered outrage at the terrible injustice of the maids, phrasing both in language as potent as a curse.” –Sunday Times (UK)

“Penelope flies with the help of the sardonic, dead-pan voice Atwood lends her, a tone — half Dorothy Parker, half Desperate Housewives.” –The Independent (UK)

“Alter[s] one’s point of view toward [the story], imbuing it with a modern sensibility yet revealing some eternal truths about men, women, and the issue of power, including the power to shape a narrative. . . . Atwood shows with intelligence and wit just how complicated and unpretty love can be.” –O, The Oprah Magazine

"Along with her presentation of the hallucinatory maids and Penelope’s straight talk about her husband, her girly laments about the ferocious competition of Helen and her queenly worries about fending off the suitors, Atwood’s brilliance emerges in the skillful way she has woven her own research on the anthropological underpinnings of Homer’s epic into the patterns of her own stylized version of the poem. . . . A fascinating and rather attractive version of this old, old story, a creation tale about the founding of our civilization meant to be heard over and over and over.” –Chicago Tribune

Will you join us?

The Virginian by Owen Wister

I don't have words for how much I love this book. It is the kind of book which you think about first thing in the morning because it's the last thing you were thinking about before you went to bed the night before. You almost feel as if you were living in Wyoming, in 1902, and riding with this cowboy in real life.

The Virginian isn't loud. Full of words or empty bravado. He isn't forceful or aggressive or unjust.

He is quiet. Full of reason and wisdom. He is independent and strong and brave.

We never know him as anything other than the Virginian. But, we could call him by many other names:  Skilled marksman. Faithful lover. Hero.

I read this book for C. B. James' Western challenge. It's not a genre I normally pick up. But, I have a strong affinity for this life because I am a cattleman's daughter. How well I remember going into the country with my father, being hoisted up on rough wooden fences, watching the daring of men on their horses, being sheltered from vocabulary which was not to be spoken in front of women or children. I thought that everyone's father was just that brave. I thought everyone's husband was just that true. I thought the good guys always win, and the Virginian reminds me that they do.

It will definitely be in my top ten list for the year, and quite possibly for my life.

(Here is a list of the best Western novels from the Western Writers of America. I wouldn't have put The Virginian near the bottom. But, I haven't read Cormac McCarthy yet. Have you read any from the list?)

:Find Becky's thoughts here.

The Paper Garden by Molly Peacock (With Give-Away)

Mary Delany (1700-1788), whose work is exhibited in the British Museum, created over 900 paper "mosaicks" of botanicals which she began creating at the age of 72.

In telling her story, Molly Peacock connected certain events of Mary's life with specific pieces she'd scissored out of paper. For example, when we read of Mary being married to Alexander Pendarves, quite against her will but not her uncle's, Molly points out the features in the following mosiac:

Rosa gallica, July 1780

In the context of the finished collage, the hole is less than a hundredth of the parts, and you might not notice it at first. (Can you see it in the bottom row of the leaves?) It is as round as a bullet hole. Could she have used a paper punch? No, a magnifying glass reveals the hole was hand cut. Is it absurd to put the whole turning episode of a woman's life into a single composition she made so many years later? It's no news to anyone that we make art of of the substance of our lives. Still, is the hole that very moment? Better to resort to a simile; the hole is like that moment. George Lansdowne bit into his niece's life. When she was eighty, she replicated a hole, a cut circle representing an insect bite. Yet a real insect bite, though round, is also jagged. Mrs. Delaney certainly could have cut in a more irregular way. Instead, she made a perfect piercing.

I am fascinated by this book on so many levels. Not only does it tell the true story of an artist, it gives us glimpses into the author's life as well; it is through their stories that we as readers can piece together meaning for our own lives. Quotes like these were particularly inspiring to me:

"Who doesn't hold out the hope of starting a memorable project at a grand old age? A life's work is always unfinished and requires creativity till the day a person dies. Even if you've managed major accomplishments throughout your life and don't really need a model for making a mark, you do need one for enriching an ongoing existence."

"It's nearly impossible to see the shape of your life as you are living it, swimming through the bobbing detritus of the everyday. But occasionally huge events scissor your living into a shape, and you feel it sharply. At these moments, lived life takes on the feel of a found novel, as if you were a character in a piece of fiction, your author reaching in to cut you from one section, then paste you into another."

"But whatever the composition of the dry crystals she ground with a mortar and pestle, then mixed with liquid and adhesive, its source is something burnt. Carbon. Organic. Ashes. Is being burnt a requisite for the making of art? Personally, I don't think it is. But art is poultice for a burn. It is a privilege to have, somewhere within you, a capacity for making something speak from your own seared experience."

The Paper Garden is an exquisite book, written by Molly Peacock with as much care and attention to detail as the artist Mary Delany used in creating her mosaics. Both are done on paper. Both are an artistic expression of the lessons they learned through the lives they led. I was thoroughly fascinated by each of them.

Bloomsbury publishers are offering to send a copy to one reader (U.S. or Canada only, please). Simply leave a comment for a chance to win, and I will pull a winner one week from today.

Update: Winner of The Paper Garden is Frances of Nonsuch Book. Congratultions, Frances!

Ordinary Thunderstorms

"So what if there were risks--everything in his life was risky, and once you accepted that risk element then another kind of strategic, worldly, impromptu thinking came into play that had nothing to do with reason but everything to do with the person you were and the life you were living."

This novel has a chilling premise which brings up many things I've taken for granted, including the way big business is run, as well as how I live my most ordinary life.

What if I was in the wrong place at the wrong time, framed for a murder I didn't commit and had no way to prove otherwise? What would I do then?

We follow the decisions of Adam Kindred, in such a situation, who must live by his wits to escape with his life. On his journey he encounters The Church of John Christ, a prostitute and her son, and a police woman who does more than serve and protect. In a separate arena are a hired assassin, and a company fighting to save its profits, each with its own agenda.

What would you do to escape? Are we saved by our own personal efforts, those who love us, or the power that right has over wrong? These are some of the questions which William Boyd explores in his novel Ordinary Thunderstorms.

Which shows that one's life may not be so ordinary after all.

Find more thoughts about this novel on the TLC Book Tour site.

One Book, Two Book, Three Book, Four...

Seen at Rochester Reader, Books as Food, and originating at Stuck in A Book, we have a "quick bit of fun" regarding our reading status...

The book I'm currently reading:  The Paper Garden by Molly Peacock, a fascinating book about Mary Delany whose mosiacs of botanicals from the 1700's are still on display in the British Museum.

The last book I finished: Ordinary Thunderstorms by William Boyd, a novel where being in the wrong place at the wrong time can have disastrous consequences in one's life.

The next book I want to read: The Lake by Banana Yoshimoto, the newest release from this fabulous Japanese author. More give-aways coming in my Japanese Literature Challenge 5 to begin this June.

The last book I bought: The Virginian by Owen Wister, for C. B. James' challenge, as I hear it's a definitive Western novel.

The last book that was given to me: Little Boy Lost by Marghanita Laski from Nymeth at Things Mean A Lot as my Persephone Secret Santa. It moved me to tears in a good way.

And you? Are you willing to play?

The Violets of March by Sarah Jio

The house lights were dark. Could he have already gone? I gasped at the thought. Our timing had always been dreadful, so why did I expect anything different on this night? Still, the pain surged out of my heart like an electric shock. I turned back to the trail, and I would have raced up the embankment to my car had it not been for the glimmer of light purple petals underfoot. I shook my head. Wood violets? I hadn't seen them since I was a girl, when they appeared one summer in my grandmother's garden. I'd never noticed them on Elliot's property. What were they doing here?

Many on the island, me included, believed that these flowers had mystical powers, that they could heal wounds of the heart and the body, mend rifts in friendships, even bring about good fortune. I knelt down and ran my hand along the carpet of dusty purple nestled into pale green leaves.

When author Sarah Jio sent me this novel, I knew it would be the perfect read for one of my book clubs. Sure enough, they were immediately excited about it once they heard that it is a "mix (of) a love story, history, and a mystery" as Jodi Picoult raved.

The Violets of March was exactly the book I needed to get me out of a reading slump I've endured since Spring Break ended several weeks ago. It holds an intricate blend of characters and plot, which is seamlessly interwoven into a multi-layered tale of redemption and healing. I was unable to guess the outcome up to the very last pages, and it is a rare novel which is able to lead me down a path unaware of my final destination.

But, as I closed the cover last night it was with a great sense of satisfaction. I could sleep easily knowing that our heroine had made all the discoveries about herself and the past which she needed in order to guide her decisions for the future. She will not repeat the same mistakes her so similar grandmother did before her. She will, I believe, benefit from the wood violets of Bainbridge Island, the words of Esther's faded red velvet journal, and the love of those with whom she's now surrounded.

So Many Books, And Too Much Time

I thought that when I'd given myself permission to pick up literature again my reading would fall back into place so easily.

Books upon books upon books. Surrounding myself with thousands of them, picking them up and possibly even discarding them, like the mayor in Chocolat whom they find lying in the storefront window Easter morning after he's gorged himself on sweets for hours.

But, I can't seem to get my reading thing going.

I wonder if it's because the kids are taking every last piece out of me at school, or if I'm just out of practice, or if it's time to abandon blogging in order to only read for awhile.

Do you have such slumps?

Better yet, do you have a cure?

Mailbox Monday: The Persephone Biannually

It's always exciting when The Persephone Biannually arrives in my mailbox. Inside are updates on things going on in the Persephone world, such as the publication of three new titles this April: Miss Buncle Married by De Stevenson, Midsummer Night in the Workhouse by Diana Athill, and The Sack of Bath by Adam Fergusson.

There is a listing of the 93 Persephone book titles available, a short story by Diana Athill entitled "The Real Thing", and articles on Sicily as well as Bath.

So honored to be included in this Spring's edition along with bloggers Rebecca Reads, Paperback Reader, Books and Chocolate, Iris on Books, Fleur Fisher, Book Snob, Desperate Reader, chasing bawa, A Book Sanctuary, Savidge Reads, Sasha & the Silverfish, Harriet Devine's Blog and Stuck in a Book.

Looking forward to the titles they've recommended which I haven't yet read, perusing the magazine from cover to cover, and quite probably ordering a few more books for my collection. The delights of this British bookshop are endless.

Find more Mailbox Mondays at Mari Reads for the month of May.