Hot Ice

I didn’t expect that an RA Favorite book would be a “romance novel”… well I guess why not?  The wide array of books have always surprised and engaged me, and now for the romance genre.  Nora Robert’s Hot Ice tells the tale of an heiress, Whitney McAllistar, who by chance gets involved in a very complicated theft of the gems of 1700s French leader Marie Antoinette.  Whitney is in her car when super thief, Douglas Lord, jumps into her car to elude the men trying to kill him, as Lord has double-crossed the bad guys in order to save his own life.  Thus begins the race to the finish line for the gems in this race around the world.  Bad guys vs. bad guys and a woman who shows she is up for the challenge by joining Doug in this high stakes murder to the finish.  Of course what would a romance novel be without a hot steamy exchange between the two people who don’t like each other, Doug and the heiress!  During their escape from the “badder” guys, Doug and Whitney hop off trains, ride in a boat through a crocodile infested water, walk through mountains and deserts and so much more!  In the end the good guys – Whitney’s father and the men trying to save the gems – win over evil.  Whitney who has fallen for Lord is able to keep him from being turned over to the authorities when she shows how he has actually worked to save the gems, hoping that this will bring him closer to her.  The next morning when she wakes up in bed thinking Lord is by her side, he leaves a message that he needs to go back to his old ways as a thief.  Ah, but isn’t this a romance novel?  Yes, it is… guess who comes back and proposes with a portion of the necklace on her engagement ring?  Is this written with a tight little bow around it?  Damn straight.  I guess this is what you would call beach reading.  Well for me, I hope I don’t end up on that beach again.  A very predictable – I’ve read this book somewhere before --- style.  I guess someone has to read those grocery store stand books.  Sorry, this is not for me…. 

The House of the Scorpion

It’s sci-fi time, The House of the Scorpion by Nancy Farmer.  The story focuses on the life of Matt, who learns he is a clone of the drug lord, El Patron, and the leader of Opium (love the name, huh?), which is located south of the border, between US and Mexico.  El Patron uses illegal immigrants who have chips implanted in their brains to follow his instructions. Matt was cloned so that as El Patron gets older he can take Matt’s organs as his own will begin to fail.  Matt was raised in his early years by the surrogate mother, Celia, who serves as a cook at the mansion of El Patron.  Matt goes through some brutality whenever people realize he is a clone, such as being placed in a room with no bathroom facilities and no human interaction, being treated like an animal.  He is set free from the location when El Patron finds what was happening to him and banishes those who have hurt him.  Matt regains his human qualities and begins to have an attraction to the daughter of the local senator, Maria.  Matt is cultivated to be cultured and smart as El Patron wants the best possible “replacement parts” he can get.  Unfortunately El Patron suffers a heart attack and needs to take Matt’s organs, BUT, he has been fooled by the surrogate mother, who has been giving Matt small amounts of arsenic!!  This means the organs would not do any good for El Patron.  During the argument with Maria, he has another attack and dies!  Matt is to be put to death, but escapes to the Aztlan where the “lost boys” or orphans are located.  Matt ends up being seen as the smart kid who can lead them, and he goes against the evil “Keepers.”.  Matt ends up being the hero and coming back to his father’s land and “cleaning things up”… but like all good sci-fi’s there seemingly is a to be continued! Ugh!  Watch out for more I am told, though not confirmed. As sci-fi doesn’t end all “tied up,” does it?  This was a good read.  Lots of twists.  Strong character and story development.  The author does an outstanding job of keeping the reader guessing and engaged in what could be our future someday…..  makes you think what will come of cloning, will it be used for good or bad?  Pick this one up.  Award winning book too!

The Sisterhood of the Traveling Pants

Two books in a row that are focused on the “female experience”…  this one is called the The Sisterhood of the Traveling Pants by Ann Brashares.  If you have not cried in a while, this one should do it for you, and I’m not a female!  Note: I did lose my first time to a female at RISK tonight at NYU.  Maybe it was finishing the book?  Doubt it.  Imagine 4 young best friends aged 15—Lena Kaligaris, Tibby Rollins, Bridget Vreeland, and Carmen Lowell, who will be apart for their first summer ever.  What will connect them while each has their own adventure?  A pair of jeans!  The story begins just before the summer of the girl’s junior year when Carmen finds a pair of jeans, and they fit each girl, perfectly... which makes the girls think they are magical and will be used as a means to connect with each other at their different part of the world (Lena visiting her grandparents in Greece, Carmen to South Carolina to visit her Dad - who left her town the year before, Bridget to Mexico for a summer camp, and Tibby stayed home to work at the local drugstore - Wallman’s).  Each of the girls has their own “coming of age” experience and share it as they send the magical pants to the next girl on the list.  Each girl is challenged by an issue that makes them go from a teenager to a young adult.  For instance the girls experience: parental divorce and the introduction of a step-mother; the inability to communicate and share truth from perception in a foreign land; losing one’s virginity; and one dealing with unexpected friendship which ends in death.  This in many respects was a teenage version of a movie like Terms of Endearment, Beaches, My Girl, The Notebook, Steel Magnolias… you get the picture, huh?   So much here for the reader to remember your youth and the “best friends” you thought would never leave you.  Sad thing is… they eventually do, for almost all of us.  But this book lets us dream and reconnect with those days.  What a really solid book for any age, though it is focused on the young adult age range.  This is a really short book that I listened to on the ipod.  The characters were rich, the story engaging, and overall a wonderful book.  Read it when you are in one of those “reminiscing” moods. 

Women of Brewster Place

Gloria Naylor presents life for the African American woman living in a housing development in a seedy part of an unnamed town in her work called Women of Brewster Place.  The play is set in the 1950s when racial tensions were beginning to rise throughout the nation during the Civil Rights era.  The book is written in seven sections about the life of the woman whom the chapter is titled, yet many of the women appear in other’s stories and are intertwined by Kiswana Browne, a young woman from the suburbs who gives up her family’s wealth to assist the tenants of Brewster Place to fight against their absentee landlord for improved housing.  Kiswana tries to bring the women together raising funds to organize the movement.  Other women whom are chronicled include:  Mattie Michael, Etta Mae Johnson, Lucielia "Ciel" Turner, Cora Lee, Lorraine, and Theresa.  There is a great deal of pain and anguish in a number of stories which include: the tragic loss of one’s child; a mother with six children with no husband, though five different fathers; and the introduction of lesbian lovers who are “outed” by their neighbors with a very tragic ending.  The stories all read well and the characters give one a real insight into the quality and life of women during the time.  The ending was quite surprising and to me very unexpected.  The brutal murder of one of the women only underlies the difficultly our country has, and continues to experience, as it relates to tolerance and inclusion of all members into our society.  I really thought the stories were engaging and gave a glimpse into what it is like as a single woman and person of color during these tumultuous times.   This was a short, quick read.  This book challenges one to really think deeply about the state of racial and homosexual communities in our country.  Well written book.  Worth a read.

Love, Dishonor, Marry, Die, Cherish, Perish

Sometimes you read a book and you say, hmmm… ok, brilliant writing, but not my “cup of tea.”  I remember sitting in my Poetry course as an English major in undergrad at Fordham U and thinking, “hmm ok, great writing, but really, I don’t get it.”  Had some of the same feelings on this one from David Rakoff’s book called Love, Dishonor, Marry, Die, Cherish, Perish, though there were a number of short “sections” that I did get and was “in awe,” but as a whole piece, left me a bit over my head.  Rakoff is best known from his work on This American Life (an NPR hour long radio show hosted by Ira Glass).  Rakoff was able to draw upon his many writings for the show and use some of this in his book.  Rakoff wrote the book right before his death at the young age of 47 from a long bout with cancer, which he also had earlier in his life.  The book, which I listened to on audiobook, was read by Rakoff just weeks before his death.  The vignettes captured and fulfilled all of the words in the title, from exhilaration (love) to all of the emotions that come with “dying”.  The book is written in verse, I am in awe of anyone who could write like that, but again, so tied to the novel, hard to really engage the way I wish I could, but maybe just not capable?  Not sure.  But hey, can this guy rhyme and write in couplet or what?  Yes, he can.  This book is for those whose moods are deeply moved by the words that you couldn’t write but knew it when you read it.  This is a very short read, but takes a while to get the most out of it.  I wish I could really get into it, I feel as if I am missing something – starting from the first moment to the last period.  When I say, I don’t get it, I don’t mean that I don’t get WHY the author writes it, it’s more about finding the line throughout and connecting the “dots” …  hmmm or maybe the dots being connected really doesn’t matter?  I think it’s starting to come together now …. Yes, still in awe!