en-US Mon, 20 Jun 2016 09:25:30 -0700 60 144 41 /images/layout/goodreads_logo_144.jpg 858534 344 A.A. Milne Tamara 5 4.53 1926
author: A.A. Milne
name: Tamara
average rating: 4.53
book published: 1926
rating: 5
read at:
date added: 2016/06/20
shelves: top-10, childrens-lit, fiction
review:
I'm itching to re-read this one. It's one of the few repeats I allow myself in a world overflowing with books.
]]> 13152194 The Rumpus, now revealed as Cheryl Strayed, author of the bestselling memoir Wild - is the person thousands turn to for advice.
Tiny Beautiful Things brings the best of Dear Sugar in one place and includes never-before-published columns and a new introduction by Steve Almond.  Rich with humor, insight, compassion - and absolute honesty - this book is a balm for everything life throws our way.]]> 354 Cheryl Strayed Tamara 5 My Review

Well, shit. This book was just about perfect in every way. Except for the excessive use of the term of endearment "sweet pea", but I'll forgive it.

Recommended reading for fans of StoryCorps, or you know, all humans.

Favorite Quotes

The best thing you can possibly do with your life is to tackle the motherfucking shit out of love.

You're in a pickle. You did things you didn't hope to do. You have not always been your best self. This means that you're like the rest.

Because no matter how experimental he is, his life isn't an experiment.

When bad things happen, often the only way back to wholeness is to take it all apart.

Acceptance asks only that you embrace what's true.

Even if you get the dream, you don't know if it will stay true.

Jump high and hard with intention and heart.

That both things could be true at once--my disbelief as well as my certainty--was the unification of the ancient and the future parts of me. It was everything I intended and yet still I was surprised by what I got.

Whatever happens to you belongs to you. Make it yours. Feed it to yourself even if it feels impossible to swallow. Let it nurture you, because it will. I have learned this over and over and over again.

Nobody's going to do your life for you.

What do you do when you don't know what to do about something? I talk to Mr. Sugar and my friends. I make lists. I attempt to analyze the situation from the perspective of my "best self"--the one that's generous, reasonable, forgiving, loving, bighearted, and grateful. I think really hard about what I'll wish I did a year from now. I map out the consequences of the various actions I could take. I ask what my motivations are, what my desires are, what my fears are, what I have to lose, and what I have to gain. I move toward the light, even if it's a hard direction in which to move. I trust myself. I keep the faith. I mess up sometimes.

I'll never know, and neither will you of the life you don't choose. We'll only know that whatever that sister life was, it was important and beautiful and not ours. It was the ghost ship that didn't carry us. There's nothing to do but salute it from the shore.

This is how you get unstuck...You reach. Not so you can walk away from the daughter you loved, but so you can live the life that is yours--the one that includes the sad loss of your daughter, but is not arrested by it. The one that eventually leads you to a place in which you not only grieve her, but also feel lucky to have had the privilege of loving her.]]> 4.26 2012
author: Cheryl Strayed
name: Tamara
average rating: 4.26
book published: 2012
rating: 5
read at: 2015/11/24
date added: 2015/12/23
shelves: book-club, being-human, non-fiction, top-10, crowd-pleasers
review:
My Review

Well, shit. This book was just about perfect in every way. Except for the excessive use of the term of endearment "sweet pea", but I'll forgive it.

Recommended reading for fans of StoryCorps, or you know, all humans.

Favorite Quotes

The best thing you can possibly do with your life is to tackle the motherfucking shit out of love.

You're in a pickle. You did things you didn't hope to do. You have not always been your best self. This means that you're like the rest.

Because no matter how experimental he is, his life isn't an experiment.

When bad things happen, often the only way back to wholeness is to take it all apart.

Acceptance asks only that you embrace what's true.

Even if you get the dream, you don't know if it will stay true.

Jump high and hard with intention and heart.

That both things could be true at once--my disbelief as well as my certainty--was the unification of the ancient and the future parts of me. It was everything I intended and yet still I was surprised by what I got.

Whatever happens to you belongs to you. Make it yours. Feed it to yourself even if it feels impossible to swallow. Let it nurture you, because it will. I have learned this over and over and over again.

Nobody's going to do your life for you.

What do you do when you don't know what to do about something? I talk to Mr. Sugar and my friends. I make lists. I attempt to analyze the situation from the perspective of my "best self"--the one that's generous, reasonable, forgiving, loving, bighearted, and grateful. I think really hard about what I'll wish I did a year from now. I map out the consequences of the various actions I could take. I ask what my motivations are, what my desires are, what my fears are, what I have to lose, and what I have to gain. I move toward the light, even if it's a hard direction in which to move. I trust myself. I keep the faith. I mess up sometimes.

I'll never know, and neither will you of the life you don't choose. We'll only know that whatever that sister life was, it was important and beautiful and not ours. It was the ghost ship that didn't carry us. There's nothing to do but salute it from the shore.

This is how you get unstuck...You reach. Not so you can walk away from the daughter you loved, but so you can live the life that is yours--the one that includes the sad loss of your daughter, but is not arrested by it. The one that eventually leads you to a place in which you not only grieve her, but also feel lucky to have had the privilege of loving her.
]]> 136251
In this final, seventh installment of the Harry Potter series, J.K. Rowling unveils in spectacular fashion the answers to the many questions that have been so eagerly awaited.]]> 759 J.K. Rowling Tamara 5 Review from July 2007

The perfect end to an epic series.

Review from October 2014

I mean, I could say it's not perfect. But it kind of is.

Favorite Quotes

It is a curious thing, Harry, but perhaps those who are best suited to power are those who have never sought it. Those who, like you, have leadership thrust upon them, and take up the mantle because they must, and find to their own surprise that they wear it well.]]> 4.61 2007
author: J.K. Rowling
name: Tamara
average rating: 4.61
book published: 2007
rating: 5
read at: 2014/10/13
date added: 2014/10/18
shelves: crowd-pleasers, top-10, childrens-lit, fiction
review:
Review from July 2007

The perfect end to an epic series.

Review from October 2014

I mean, I could say it's not perfect. But it kind of is.

Favorite Quotes

It is a curious thing, Harry, but perhaps those who are best suited to power are those who have never sought it. Those who, like you, have leadership thrust upon them, and take up the mantle because they must, and find to their own surprise that they wear it well.
]]> 40440
The enigmatic Winter has spent six decades creating various outlandish life histories for herself -- all of them inventions that have brought her fame and fortune but have kept her violent and tragic past a secret. Now old and ailing, she at last wants to tell the truth about her extraordinary life. She summons biographer Margaret Lea, a young woman for whom the secret of her own birth, hidden by those who loved her most, remains an ever-present pain. Struck by a curious parallel between Miss Winter's story and her own, Margaret takes on the commission.

As Vida disinters the life she meant to bury for good, Margaret is mesmerized. It is a tale of gothic strangeness featuring the Angelfield family, including the beautiful and willful Isabelle, the feral twins Adeline and Emmeline, a ghost, a governess, a topiary garden and a devastating fire.

Margaret succumbs to the power of Vida's storytelling but remains suspicious of the author's sincerity. She demands the truth from Vida, and together they confront the ghosts that have haunted them while becoming, finally, transformed by the truth themselves.

The Thirteenth Tale is a love letter to reading, a book for the feral reader in all of us, a return to that rich vein of storytelling that our parents loved and that we loved as children. Diane Setterfield will keep you guessing, make you wonder, move you to tears and laughter and, in the end, deposit you breathless yet satisfied back upon the shore of your everyday life.]]> 406 Diane Setterfield 0743298020 Tamara 5
Favorite Quotes:

All children mythologize their birth. It is a universal trait. You want to know someone? Heart, mind and soul? Ask him to tell you about when he was born. What you get won’t be the truth; it will be a story. And nothing is more telling than a story.

I never read without making sure I am in a secure position. I have been like this ever since the age of seven when, sitting on a high wall and reading The Water Babies, I was so seduced by the descriptions of underwater life that I unconsciously relaxed my muscles. Instead of being held buoyant by the water that so vividly surrounded me in my mind, I plummeted to the ground and knocked myself out…Reading can be dangerous.”


]]> 3.96 2006
author: Diane Setterfield
name: Tamara
average rating: 3.96
book published: 2006
rating: 5
read at: 2007/03/01
date added: 2014/07/31
shelves: crowd-pleasers, top-10, fiction
review:
The best English mystery/ fiction novel I've ever read! There is a lot of twin lore going around recently, and this does nothing but add to the fantasy. An extremely well crafted tale.

Favorite Quotes:

All children mythologize their birth. It is a universal trait. You want to know someone? Heart, mind and soul? Ask him to tell you about when he was born. What you get won’t be the truth; it will be a story. And nothing is more telling than a story.

I never read without making sure I am in a secure position. I have been like this ever since the age of seven when, sitting on a high wall and reading The Water Babies, I was so seduced by the descriptions of underwater life that I unconsciously relaxed my muscles. Instead of being held buoyant by the water that so vividly surrounded me in my mind, I plummeted to the ground and knocked myself out…Reading can be dangerous.”



]]> 2657 "Shoot all the bluejays you want, if you can hit 'em, but remember it's a sin to kill a mockingbird."

A lawyer's advice to his children as he defends the real mockingbird of Harper Lee's classic novel - a black man charged with the rape of a white girl. Through the young eyes of Scout and Jem Finch, Harper Lee explores with exuberant humour the irrationality of adult attitudes to race and class in the Deep South of the 1930s. The conscience of a town steeped in prejudice, violence and hypocrisy is pricked by the stamina of one man's struggle for justice. But the weight of history will only tolerate so much.

"To Kill A Mockingbird" became both an instant bestseller and a critical success when it was first published in 1960. It went on to win the Pulitzer Prize in 1961 and was later made into an Academy Award-winning film.]]> 323 Harper Lee 0060935464 Tamara 5 My Review

Simple and complex in the same breath. Whenever you wonder what it takes to be human, turn to this.

P.S. Given that the name Harper is making a comeback, Calpurnia, Jem, Dill & Atticus should also be given some serious consideration.

Favorite Quotes

Summer was on the way; Jem and I awaited it with impatience. Summer was our best season; it was sleeping on the back screened porch in cots, or trying to sleep in the treehouse; summer was everything good to eat; it was a thousand colors in a parched landscape; but most of all, summer was Dill.

Naw, Jem, I think there's just one kind of folks. Folks.

[Atticus' closing remarks to the jury. Bawl.]

He put on his hat. "Now I may be wrong, of course, but I think he's very alive. Shows all the symptoms of it. Go have a look at him, and when I come back we'll get together and decide.

]]> 4.25 1960
author: Harper Lee
name: Tamara
average rating: 4.25
book published: 1960
rating: 5
read at: 2014/06/21
date added: 2014/06/21
shelves: being-human, crowd-pleasers, fiction, top-10
review:
My Review

Simple and complex in the same breath. Whenever you wonder what it takes to be human, turn to this.

P.S. Given that the name Harper is making a comeback, Calpurnia, Jem, Dill & Atticus should also be given some serious consideration.

Favorite Quotes

Summer was on the way; Jem and I awaited it with impatience. Summer was our best season; it was sleeping on the back screened porch in cots, or trying to sleep in the treehouse; summer was everything good to eat; it was a thousand colors in a parched landscape; but most of all, summer was Dill.

Naw, Jem, I think there's just one kind of folks. Folks.

[Atticus' closing remarks to the jury. Bawl.]

He put on his hat. "Now I may be wrong, of course, but I think he's very alive. Shows all the symptoms of it. Go have a look at him, and when I come back we'll get together and decide.


]]> 8909152 "Hi, I'm the guy who reads your e-mail, and also, I love you..."

Beth Fremont and Jennifer Scribner-Snyder know that somebody is monitoring their work e-mail. (Everybody in the newsroom knows. It's company policy.) But they can't quite bring themselves to take it seriously. They go on sending each other endless and endlessly hilarious e-mails, discussing every aspect of their personal lives.

Meanwhile, Lincoln O'Neill can't believe this is his job now—reading other people's e-mail. When he applied to be "internet security officer," he pictured himself building firewalls and crushing hackers—not writing up a report every time a sports reporter forwards a dirty joke.

When Lincoln comes across Beth's and Jennifer's messages, he knows he should turn them in. But he can't help being entertained—and captivated—by their stories.

By the time Lincoln realizes he's falling for Beth, it's way too late to introduce himself.

What would he say . . . ?]]> 323 Rainbow Rowell Tamara 5 crowd-pleasers, top-10 My Reviews

I want to read every novel Rainbow Rowell has ever written. Oh, wait. I just did. Damnit, hurry up and publish Landline already!

Favorite Quotes

There's a chill in the air that lifts my heart and makes my hair stand on end. Every moment feels meant for me. In October, I'm the star of my own movie...October, baptize me with leaves! Swaddle me in corduroy and nurse me with split pea soup. October, tuck tiny candy bars in my pockets and carve my smile into a thousand pumpkins.

[p136-7 = one of the best explanations of a breakup, ever]

It's always weird to go from my mom to Mitch. It doesn't seem like I should have been able to get to this life from my old one, like there aren't even roads between those two places.

She laughed. It was better than he could have imagined. Like a giggle falling off its chair.

I didn't know love could leave the lights on all the time...I thought it took more naps...Or blinked. I didn't know it could just go on and on like this without falling off an edge.

]]> 3.86 2011
author: Rainbow Rowell
name: Tamara
average rating: 3.86
book published: 2011
rating: 5
read at: 2014/01/18
date added: 2014/04/21
shelves: crowd-pleasers, top-10
review:
My Reviews

I want to read every novel Rainbow Rowell has ever written. Oh, wait. I just did. Damnit, hurry up and publish Landline already!

Favorite Quotes

There's a chill in the air that lifts my heart and makes my hair stand on end. Every moment feels meant for me. In October, I'm the star of my own movie...October, baptize me with leaves! Swaddle me in corduroy and nurse me with split pea soup. October, tuck tiny candy bars in my pockets and carve my smile into a thousand pumpkins.

[p136-7 = one of the best explanations of a breakup, ever]

It's always weird to go from my mom to Mitch. It doesn't seem like I should have been able to get to this life from my old one, like there aren't even roads between those two places.

She laughed. It was better than he could have imagined. Like a giggle falling off its chair.

I didn't know love could leave the lights on all the time...I thought it took more naps...Or blinked. I didn't know it could just go on and on like this without falling off an edge.


]]> 19063 Librarian's note: An alternate cover edition can be found here

It is 1939. Nazi Germany. The country is holding its breath. Death has never been busier, and will be busier still.

By her brother's graveside, Liesel's life is changed when she picks up a single object, partially hidden in the snow. It is The Gravedigger's Handbook, left behind there by accident, and it is her first act of book thievery. So begins a love affair with books and words, as Liesel, with the help of her accordian-playing foster father, learns to read. Soon she is stealing books from Nazi book-burnings, the mayor's wife's library, wherever there are books to be found.

But these are dangerous times. When Liesel's foster family hides a Jew in their basement, Liesel's world is both opened up, and closed down.

In superbly crafted writing that burns with intensity, award-winning author Markus Zusak has given us one of the most enduring stories of our time.

(Note: this title was not published as YA fiction)]]> 592 Markus Zusak Tamara 5
If you love to read and if you love to care about the characters you read about and if you love to eat words like they're ice cream and if you love to have your heart broken and mended on the same page, this book is for you.

This story is narrated by Death during World War II, and it is the story of a young German girl who comes of age during one of the most horrific times in recent history. Death has a personality. If something bad is about to happen, Death warns you ahead of time. My favorite part is when "he" stomps on a framed picture of Hitler on his way to retrieve a thousand souls from a bomb raid. Death is trying to understand the human race as much as the humans are. When "his" job becomes unbearable, he watches the color of the sky as he gathers the souls and carries them away. The descriptions of the sky are like nothing I've ever read.

A few quotes: In years to come, he would be a giver of bread, not a stealer - proof again of the contradictory human being. So much good, so much evil. Just add water. p.164

The town that afternoon was covered in a yellow mist, which stroked the rooftops as if they were pets and filled up the streets like a bath. p.247

He was more a black suit than a man. His face was a mustache. p.413

He does something to me, that boy. Every time. It's his only detriment. he steps on my heart. He makes me cry. p.531

There was once a strange, small man. He decided three important details about his life:
1. He would part his hair from the opposite side to everyone else.
2. He would make himself a small, strange mustache.
3. He would one day rule the world.
...Yes, the Fuhrer decided that he would rule the world with words. p.445




]]> 4.38 2005
author: Markus Zusak
name: Tamara
average rating: 4.38
book published: 2005
rating: 5
read at: 2007/08/01
date added: 2013/12/04
shelves: crowd-pleasers, top-10, teen, fiction
review:
I give this 5 stars, BUT there is a disclaimer: If you want a fast read, this book is not for you. If you only like happy endings this book is not for you. If you don't like experimental fiction, this book is not for you.

If you love to read and if you love to care about the characters you read about and if you love to eat words like they're ice cream and if you love to have your heart broken and mended on the same page, this book is for you.

This story is narrated by Death during World War II, and it is the story of a young German girl who comes of age during one of the most horrific times in recent history. Death has a personality. If something bad is about to happen, Death warns you ahead of time. My favorite part is when "he" stomps on a framed picture of Hitler on his way to retrieve a thousand souls from a bomb raid. Death is trying to understand the human race as much as the humans are. When "his" job becomes unbearable, he watches the color of the sky as he gathers the souls and carries them away. The descriptions of the sky are like nothing I've ever read.

A few quotes: In years to come, he would be a giver of bread, not a stealer - proof again of the contradictory human being. So much good, so much evil. Just add water. p.164

The town that afternoon was covered in a yellow mist, which stroked the rooftops as if they were pets and filled up the streets like a bath. p.247

He was more a black suit than a man. His face was a mustache. p.413

He does something to me, that boy. Every time. It's his only detriment. he steps on my heart. He makes me cry. p.531

There was once a strange, small man. He decided three important details about his life:
1. He would part his hair from the opposite side to everyone else.
2. He would make himself a small, strange mustache.
3. He would one day rule the world.
...Yes, the Fuhrer decided that he would rule the world with words. p.445





]]> 14891 A Tree Grows in Brooklyn is a poignant and moving tale filled with compassion and cruelty, laughter and heartache, crowded with life and people and incident. The story of young, sensitive, and idealistic Francie Nolan and her bittersweet formative years in the slums of Williamsburg has enchanted and inspired millions of readers for more than sixty years. By turns overwhelming, sublime, heartbreaking, and uplifting, the daily experiences of the unforgettable Nolans are raw with honesty and tenderly threaded with family connectedness -- in a work of literary art that brilliantly captures a unique time and place as well as incredibly rich moments of universal experience.]]> 496 Betty Smith 0061120073 Tamara 5
"I need someone," thought Francie desperately. "I need someone. I need to hold somebody close. And I need more than this holding. I need someone to understand how I feel at a time like now. And the understanding must be part of the holding. I love mama and Neeley and Laurie. But I need someone to love in a different way than I love them."

"She went out and took a last long look at the shabby little library. She knew she would never see it again. Eyes changed after they looked at new things. If in the years to be, she were to come back, her new eyes might make everything seem different from the way she saw it now. The way it was now was the way she wanted to remember it."

"When Francie added a sum, she would fix a little story to go with the result. If the answer was 924, it meant that the little boy and girl were being minded by company while the rest of the family went out. When a number such as 1024 appeared, it meant that all the little children were playing together in the yard."]]> 4.29 1943
author: Betty Smith
name: Tamara
average rating: 4.29
book published: 1943
rating: 5
read at: 2006/01/01
date added: 2008/10/20
shelves: fiction, crowd-pleasers, top-10
review:
Favorite Quotes:

"I need someone," thought Francie desperately. "I need someone. I need to hold somebody close. And I need more than this holding. I need someone to understand how I feel at a time like now. And the understanding must be part of the holding. I love mama and Neeley and Laurie. But I need someone to love in a different way than I love them."

"She went out and took a last long look at the shabby little library. She knew she would never see it again. Eyes changed after they looked at new things. If in the years to be, she were to come back, her new eyes might make everything seem different from the way she saw it now. The way it was now was the way she wanted to remember it."

"When Francie added a sum, she would fix a little story to go with the result. If the answer was 924, it meant that the little boy and girl were being minded by company while the rest of the family went out. When a number such as 1024 appeared, it meant that all the little children were playing together in the yard."
]]> 22628 offers a unique perspective. But there comes a time to see
what it looks like from the dance floor.

This haunting novel about the dilemma of passivity vs. passion marks the stunning debut of a provocative new voice in contemporary fiction: The Perks of Being A WALLFLOWER

This is the story of what it's like to grow up in high school. More intimate than a diary, Charlie's letters are singular and unique, hilarious and devastating. We may not know where he lives. We may not know to whom he is writing. All we know is the world he shares. Caught between trying to live his life and trying to run from it puts him on a strange course through uncharted territory. The world of first dates and mixed tapes, family dramas and new friends. The world of sex, drugs, and The Rocky Horror Picture Show, when all one requires is that the perfect song on that perfect drive to feel infinite.

Through Charlie, Stephen Chbosky has created a deeply affecting coming-of-age story, a powerful novel that will spirit you back to those wild and poignant roller coaster days known as growing up.

(back cover)]]> 213 Stephen Chbosky Tamara 5 top-10, teen, fiction 4.24 1999
author: Stephen Chbosky
name: Tamara
average rating: 4.24
book published: 1999
rating: 5
read at:
date added: 2008/06/04
shelves: top-10, teen, fiction
review:
Jules reminded me of this. What a great reading experience I had with this one. I stayed up all night and read it straight through, watching the sun rise from my reading nook. I think that is the only time I've ever done that with a book. (If you don't know, I am a slowwwww reader.)
]]> 14050 537 Audrey Niffenegger 0965818675 Tamara 5
The ability of the author to convince me of an epic love within a matter of pages was thoroughly impressive.

Time travel books can usually fall into two pitfalls: lack of character development and/or too much focus on the hows and whys of time travel. This book avoided both. The story unfolds artfully, giving you just enough information at every point to force you to look forward and backward in time to piece everything together.

If you can tell by reading my past reviews, I have a slight obsession with the idea of memory. And this book didn't let me down. Henry's ability to time travel is mostly based on memory and his own experiences in life. I was afraid there was going to be a lot of "shock value" time travel, forcing Henry to be in random places to witness famous events or meet famous people. Instead, you spend the entire book immersed in Henry and Clare's love for each other.

My favorite quotes (with the disclaimer that the whole is much much greater than the parts):

"[S]ome people, me included, believe that punk is just the most recent manifestation of this, this spirit, this feeling, you know, that things aren't right and that in fact things are so wrong that the only thing we can do is to say Fuck It, over and over again, really loud, until someone stops us."

"I dream that Clare and I are walking through a museum...We look at the paintings, but they aren't really paintings, they're poems, poems somehow given physical manifestation. 'Look,' I say to Clare, 'there's an Emily Dickinson,' The heart asks pleasure first: And then excuse from pain... She stands in front of the bright yellow poem and seems to warm herself by it...she is standing before a poem, a tiny white poem tucked into a corner. She is weeping. As I come up behind her I see the poem: Now I lay me down to sleep, I pray the Lord my soul to keep, If I should die before I wake, I pray the Lord my soul to take.

Love After Love

The time will come
when, with elation,
you will greet yourself arriving
at your own door, in your own mirror,
and each will smile at the other's welcome,

and say, sit here. Eat.
You will love again the stranger who was your self.
Give wine. Give bread. Give back your heart
to itself, to the stranger who has loved you

all your life, whom you ignored
for another, who knows you by heart.
Take down the love letters from the bookself,

the photographs, the desperate notes,
peel your own image from the mirror.
Sit. Feast on your life.

-Derek Walcott
(poem at beginning of book)
]]> 3.90 2003
author: Audrey Niffenegger
name: Tamara
average rating: 3.90
book published: 2003
rating: 5
read at: 2007/11/01
date added: 2007/12/02
shelves: crowd-pleasers, top-10, fiction
review:
I loved this book from beginning to end.

The ability of the author to convince me of an epic love within a matter of pages was thoroughly impressive.

Time travel books can usually fall into two pitfalls: lack of character development and/or too much focus on the hows and whys of time travel. This book avoided both. The story unfolds artfully, giving you just enough information at every point to force you to look forward and backward in time to piece everything together.

If you can tell by reading my past reviews, I have a slight obsession with the idea of memory. And this book didn't let me down. Henry's ability to time travel is mostly based on memory and his own experiences in life. I was afraid there was going to be a lot of "shock value" time travel, forcing Henry to be in random places to witness famous events or meet famous people. Instead, you spend the entire book immersed in Henry and Clare's love for each other.

My favorite quotes (with the disclaimer that the whole is much much greater than the parts):

"[S]ome people, me included, believe that punk is just the most recent manifestation of this, this spirit, this feeling, you know, that things aren't right and that in fact things are so wrong that the only thing we can do is to say Fuck It, over and over again, really loud, until someone stops us."

"I dream that Clare and I are walking through a museum...We look at the paintings, but they aren't really paintings, they're poems, poems somehow given physical manifestation. 'Look,' I say to Clare, 'there's an Emily Dickinson,' The heart asks pleasure first: And then excuse from pain... She stands in front of the bright yellow poem and seems to warm herself by it...she is standing before a poem, a tiny white poem tucked into a corner. She is weeping. As I come up behind her I see the poem: Now I lay me down to sleep, I pray the Lord my soul to keep, If I should die before I wake, I pray the Lord my soul to take.

Love After Love

The time will come
when, with elation,
you will greet yourself arriving
at your own door, in your own mirror,
and each will smile at the other's welcome,

and say, sit here. Eat.
You will love again the stranger who was your self.
Give wine. Give bread. Give back your heart
to itself, to the stranger who has loved you

all your life, whom you ignored
for another, who knows you by heart.
Take down the love letters from the bookself,

the photographs, the desperate notes,
peel your own image from the mirror.
Sit. Feast on your life.

-Derek Walcott
(poem at beginning of book)

]]> 15171
To three-year-old Zippy, it made perfect sense to strike a bargain with her father to keep her baby bottle—never mind that when she did, it was the first time she'd ever spoken. In her nonplussed family, Zippy has the perfect supporting cast: her beautiful yet dour brother, Danny, a seeker of the true faith; her sweetly sensible sister, Lindy, who wins the local beauty pageant; her mother, Delonda, who dispenses wisdom from the corner of the couch; and her father, Bob Jarvis, who never met a bet he didn't like.

Whether describing a serious case of chicken love, another episode with the evil Edythe across the street, or the night Zippy's dad borrowed thirty-six coon dogs and a raccoon to prove to the complaining neighbors just how quiet his two dogs were, Kimmel treats readers to a heroine who is wonderfully sweet and shy as she navigates the quirky adult world surrounding Zippy.]]> 275 Haven Kimmel 0965030067 Tamara 5
Paired with She Got Up Off the Couch, these are two irreplaceable memoirs about growing up in small town Indiana. Kimmel’s quirkiness is endearing as she takes on such challenges as eating an entire bag of carrots and raising a pet chicken. Never have snippets of memories seemed so ethereal.

Reviewed for Westerville Magazine. ]]> 3.79 2001
author: Haven Kimmel
name: Tamara
average rating: 3.79
book published: 2001
rating: 5
read at: 2006/01/01
date added: 2007/09/15
shelves: crowd-pleasers, top-10, fiction
review:
An all-time favorite.

Paired with She Got Up Off the Couch, these are two irreplaceable memoirs about growing up in small town Indiana. Kimmel’s quirkiness is endearing as she takes on such challenges as eating an entire bag of carrots and raising a pet chicken. Never have snippets of memories seemed so ethereal.

Reviewed for Westerville Magazine.
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This deluxe volume brings all of the Pooh stories together in one full-colour, large-format book. The texts are complete and unabridged, and all of the illustrations, each gloriously recoloured, are included. Here are the beloved stories of Pooh stuck in Rabbit's doorway, of gloomy Eeyore and his nearly forgotten birthday, of playing Poohsticks on the bridge, and so many more.]]> 353 A.A. Milne 0525444475 Tamara 5 4.39 1926
author: A.A. Milne
name: Tamara
average rating: 4.39
book published: 1926
rating: 5
read at:
date added: 2007/09/15
shelves: crowd-pleasers, top-10, fiction, childrens-lit
review:
One of my top 5 favorite books of all time. I think it's about time for another reading. Like going to the doctor, one should visit Winnie every one to two years to ensure good mental health.
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