To outsiders who wish to be in

If you're reading this and you'd like to join our little collective, please contact Linz. I, along with Kris and Nes, form a kind of ad hoc executive committee for this site. If all three of us are willing, we'll add you.

At the time of this post, we are not currently accepting anyone new, but try me sometime because we're variable people, at best.

Also, if you don't know how to contact Linz, that means we don't know who you are. For the sake of simplicity, no strangers on this site. If you really think this is unfair, then you can tell me when you find me.

Good luck.

A little flat, but still good.

I've recently read three books and had the same reaction to all of them. I'm not sure whether this is a coincidence of selection or a reflection of my mood, but caveat reader if you choose to read any of these books!

Spadework by Timothy Findley is a good book to read if you're a Findley fan or a rabid outsider of the Stratford Festival, like myself. The book was a pleasure to read, the characters are well developed...but I can't place my finger on it. It wasn't a great read. It's certainly a good read, and excellent fair if you're looking for something for a long trip, but it never made itself into greatness. The heterosexual relationships were all a little flat and passionless. You could argue that this works with the motif of failing relations, but it made it hard to care about the outcomes of the ...problems. (Can't give away the plot!) Final verdict is that it will become a member of the cottage library, which consists of books that are good to read on the dock with a beer; but it won't become part of my library as I doubt I'll ever need to refer to it again. It's a pity, as Not Wanted on the Voyage is quite a good book - but I'll leave that to Nes to review.

One of my leftovers from university, E.M. Forster's A Passage to India, was my next book. I have to admit that I was really excited about this one. The course it was from, Modern British History, was one of my absolute favourite courses, taught by the professor that I hold in the highest esteem. Geoffrey is probably 80% of the reason I've considered applying to do postgraduate work in English. To top that off, I've enjoyed the other works I've read by Forster, Howard's End being my favourite. Let's end the preliminary excitement with my personal love of colonial fiction of India, and you can see that this book had a lot to live up to. I can see exactly why is fell a little flat.
I was deeply intrigued by the plot, and the British/Indian tension in the early 20th century is always a good background. the characters were completely in keeping with what i've come to expect from Forster; Brits of quiet desperation that get trapped by their social circumstances. It's a good read if you're patient and you've an interest in the subject, but I'd advise you to skip it if you're not really into it. While there is some really intriguing reading, there is a lot of dry dialogue in between. I hear there's a movie - maybe that will be more to one's liking.

Finally, I've finished Victor Hugo's oeuvre, Les Miserables. I received a gorgeous little copy as a gift a while ago, but I haven't been able to read it until now. To begin with, it is a classic, and reading it is everything that reading a classic is: long, sometimes dull, but ultimately rewarding. If you're a serious reader and you like the story, go for it! There are so many people who only merit 'sidelines' in the musical who get more extensive treatment here. But this is not for the faint of heart! There are seven chapters (which I skipped without shame) discussin what happened at the battle of Waterloo. I am a big fan of the story of Les Mis, which I read in short form long before I heard or saw the musical. I fell in love after seeing Les misérables du vingtième siècle in my French class, and I've been gearing up to read the original book ever since. If you are never going to read the book, at least see Les misérables du vingtième siècle - with a large box of tissues. It's available with subtitles, for the non-frogified among us. As for the book, it still does not replace my favourite classic as the most rewarding read I've ever had. That dubious honour goes to George Eliot's Middlemarch. That book nearly killed me to read it, and I still think it's great. Les Mis is just another dusty old tome worth taking off the shelf if you have the time.

But enough of books that failed to impress me as I thought they would. I am currently into the second of Jasper Fforde's Thursday Next series, and I am already engrossed!

My questions to you, dear readers: What is the best "classic" you've read? What is the most disappointing book you've ever read?

Introductory review

I am the one that is going overseas. I'm looking forward to swapping titles while I'm on the road.

I'm not really sure how to introduce myself, so I guess I'll start with a book suggestion: Hopeful Monsters, by Hiromi Goto. Goto is a Japanese-Canadian woman, and this book is a collection of her short stories. She also has a novel, Kappa Child, which I've also read and recommend. Her writing style is poetic and insightful, and clever. Her stories in Hopeful Monsters are outwardly simple, but essentially complex and revealing of her characters. It's the kind of collection that I can read again and again, finding new elements with each read.

Some of the stories in Hopeful Monsters touch on similar themes in Kappa Child, but in very unique ways, so that Goto's writing is not redundant. Some of these themes include: lesbianism, childbirth, post-partam depression, alienation, mother-daughter relationships, miscommunication, fear, love, and family tension.

Despite these themes, the stories in Monsters are not all bleak: many of them offer room for growth and expansion; new lessons are learned, and the feeling is positive. Not everything can end happily, however, and some of her stories reflect that reality, as well.

Anyway, I hope you ladies enjoy these books, and enjoy Goto's work as much as I do.

Welcome Folks!

This is the beginning of a new endevour for a group of avid readers who have been doing something along these lines for a few years now.

Brief Bio: Once upon a time, about five years ago, a group of girls started university. Little did they know it then, but they were all destined to become friends and fall prey to a dangerous addiction - reading intelligent books. As the friendship grew with time, they shared their addiction by recommending books to each other, and then talking about the books. This was no Oprah Book Club, as the reviews often involved swearing and telling each other off for picking stupid books in addition to the more accepted custom of sharing favourite passages and talking about character development. It grew to become a bookshare, where the girls would send a copy of the book from person to person, with each person endevouring to supply at least one "must-read" each summer.
Now that all these girls had graduated from their undergraduates degrees and had become women in their own right, they were finding it harder to keep up the UnBookClub. They no longer lived in the same idyllic university town! They valiantly marched on, now sending books through mail and exchanging books whenever they met. When the news came that one of their number would be leaving the country for an exotic teaching job, new distress broke out. As efficient as the postal service tries to be within Canada, these women knew that international book sending was beyond acceptable. Also, travelling to see each other simply to say that they did or didn't like the book was ludicrious.
A new plan was born. Having previously used Blogger for a group journal, they decided to try something new. They would use the internet to share their addiction with each other so they wouldn't feel so separated by time and space.

This blog is by invitation only, and comments are only for members. If you like books, pick up anything that we've recommended - we're all Honours English majors, so I think that makes us professional readers.

Welcome to Book Snobs.