Family Plots: Love, Death & Tax Evasion by Mary Patrick Kavanaugh

Family Plots: Love, Death & Tax Evasion

by Mary Patrick Kavanaugh

Published October 27th 2008 by iUniverse.com 

Paperback, 300 pages

From GoodReads.com,

Family Plots is a fresh and funny autobiographical novel about a young mother trying against all odds to create a normal family life with her new husband, a criminal attorney, who—it turns out—is committing a few crimes of his own. The novel offers readers a wry, unsentimental account of a marriage barreling toward calamity. In an attempt to find romance, family, and financial stability, its struggling heroine stumbles into a world of pseudonyms, fake weddings, and hidden bank accounts. Events that land many of the players into the family cemetery plot also reveal unexpected secrets and stashes that manage, in small ways, to transform a tale of seeming tragedy into one of surprising healing and redemption.

Family Plots, which the author likes to call Pulp Fiction, a term which I found both funny and interesting is based on real events that happened in the author's life. She explains that she has changed the script of her life a bit, invented some dialogues, given a little more spice to her characters and made this book at once witty, suspenseful and just like the blurb says, healing.

Mary bought up in a disjointed family always yearned for a normal family with a loving husband who would be a charming father for her little princess Rachel. Mary knew Dan earlier as her boss, but  after a break of a few years, a child from a former college heart-throb and a life under unrelenting tower of debts later, she finds Dan again. Dan at once fits into the role of a family man. Mary decides to start over with Dan, to solve her debt issues and give Rachel the family and security that she never had. She gets a job and starts doing really well. Mary is ready to forgive all of his secretiveness and lies that Dan spurns up time to time when question about the legitimacy of his work and his friends, for the perfect family that she dreamed of.

Dan by profession is a criminal attorney and abandons his profession to pursue different business opportunities which almost always ended up in being disasters. He keeps everything locked behind drawers and Mary has no idea most of the times about what he is up to.

Feeling a kind of sympathy for Mary as she tried to bring meaning to Rachel and her lives was easy. But as the novel progresses one also ends up with a feeling of happiness for her successes. I however never understood her fixation with putting up with Dan. As Mary tried hard to keep her mind over matter, she gets into more trouble than she bargained for, with Dan.

I dived into this one, not knowing what really to expect out of it. It is the first autobiographical account I have read. I found it engrossing and at the same time witty. It is insightful and makes the most silliest moment seem really funny. There is also packed in a lot of insight in this little book which delivers in spite of the Sixteen Rejections it faced from the top NYC Publishers [ Mary I really liked the idea of having that written on the gold medallion that's on the cover, it caught my attention :-)]

Through small steps and constant struggle, we see Mary finally taking the right steps in the right direction but what about her better half?! This book is more suspenseful than you could imagine. There was always this feeling in me of wanting to know what went wrong next! Trust me not in a bad way but still, you know what I mean. For everything, it was worth seeing Mary coming out a winner in spite of ALL the odds.There were so many little things that really made me think... like this one ..

I thought about the time when I was seven and my dad handed me a crisp one hundred dollar bill. I clutched it greedily thinking of all the things I could buy. I'd take my best friend to Disney land, eat all the chocolate mint ice cream I wanted; buy new dresses, make-up, patent leather shoes, and still have money left for a case of Mystic Mints, which I would never share with Hank. I thought of so many things I could do with the money, and none of it included saving it. My dad cheered at all my ideas, then said, "Okay honey, Give it back.". What? I clung to the bill. "You didn't really think I was serious?" he said. Since then, I'd spent money faster than I got it.
- p.207

I am sure this is one book that will make a great gift this Christmas for anyone who needs to see the light at the end of the tunnel, who need to remember that whatever the odds, we only win if we are ready to fight them!

Such things and more make this book - spicy, sweet, mysterious and a good ride.

Thank you Dorothy of  Pump Up Your Book Promotion for giving me chance to review this book!

For more reviews :- 

Lisa's from Lit and Life

Kay's from Kay's Bookshelf

Soul Catcher by Leigh Bridger

Soul Catcher (The Outsider Series #1)

by Leigh Bridger

Published October 1st 2009 by BelleBooks, Inc.

Paperback, 320 pages

4 of 5!

Description

From the Gothic eccentricity of Asheville, North Carolina to the terrifying recesses of the Appalachian wilderness, from modern demonology to ancient Cherokee mythology, SOUL CATCHER follows the tormented journey of folk artist Livia Belane, who has been stalked through many lives by a sadistic and vengeful demon.

Livia and her loved ones, including her frontier-era soul mate and husband, Ian, a Soul Hunter, have never beaten the demon before. Now, in this life, he s found them again.

Wow... that was some read! I am not really sure, how to really kick-start this review...but I really think it was the kind of roller-coaster ride, I love once in a while!

Soul Catcher is the story of Livia, who is a soul catcher and Ian who is her soul-mate and a soul-hunter. In every life they find each other and are destined to fight the deamons. But one particular daemon tracks them down in every life and is bent on taking violent revenge everytime. For some reasons Livia doesn't want Ian to find her, but he finally gets to her and is not going to let go easily this time. Livia has to fight the ugly daemons but a more difficult war is inside her, she has to fist accept who she is and she has to save the world of beautiful souls by sending these daemons and there folks to place they deserve.

I loved all the characters. I loved Ian, who was the complete opposite of the introvert Livia. I loved the way author portrays him. I must admit the book started on a violent note and is grim for sometime, but then there are some very nice tender moments. I love all the boons, angels and the pogs. I love the Talking Rock... ok I love almost everything except for... the language, the F word is there in every other of Livia's dialogues, but I was not bothered by it like many other books. This one, actually showed the frustration that the modern Livia faced and her sarcasm towards her situation . But it gets OK towards the end. Then there are some really violent se*ual torture scenes. Oh my! I was so ANGRY when those happened and sad. That's the feeling, I think the author wanted to instill in the reader. Then there are some s*x scenes too, tender and most importantly they are not badly done. It is a requirement, the story needs it and it is done nicely. If you have issues with any of the above things that I mention, then I guess you would not want to read it... but despite of everything, I enjoyed it immensely.

It was a page-turner and it has some kick-ass action. I really liked the concept of souls passing on... I actually kind of feel like believing in it too... it is so much less painful.

oh Yes, I didn't like the cover, this was nothing that I imagined Livia to look like. :-)

I recieved this book through BBAW, where I requested the eBook! Thank you BBAW and thank you Bell Bridge Books for sending me the eBook to review.

Another note -

Coming in 2010

Soul Hunter Book 2,

The Outsider Series

Livia finds herself struggling to adjust to another new incarnation of Ian, this one doomed to be executed for heinous crimes. At the same time, she and Ian must battle the rising threat of a powerful new demon and the arrival of a Soul Hunter who has competed with Ian for Livia’s love over many centuries.

No points for guessing, that I will be grabbing that one as soon as I can find it! ;-)

Also reviewed by:

Wendy's Minding Spot
MariReads
Books Books and more Books
Novel Addiction
Maymay's Memos
Falling Off The Shelf
Gautami from everything distills into reading 

Attraction to Blue :o)

I LOVE the BLUE of the above cover!

I saw another [see right]  cover as well on the net, but I can't get a bigger Image... hmmmph! The Author website has the first cover ONLY.

This one was reviewed on S. Krishna's blog [ 4.5 stars out of 5]
From the back cover:

Though she lives in the shadow of her legendary landscape photographer father, and is the mother of a painter whose career is about to take off, Claire has carved out a practical existence as a commercial photographer. Her pictures may not be the stuff of genius, but they’ve paid for a good life.
But when her father dies, Claire loses faith in the work she has devoted her life to—and worse, begins to feel jealous of her daughter’s success. Then, as she helps prepare a retrospective of her famous father’s photographs, Claire uncovers revelations about him that change everything she believes about herself as a mother, a daughter, and an artist…

Which cover are you attracted to this week?!

Thank you Marcia for hosting this event!

A short Hiatus!

Diwali is tommorow and we have a LONG weekend ahead!
So I will be out of pocket for the next 3 days :)

See you all on Monday :)

Let the Light light the darkness!
Let the Light penetrate your visions of unhappiness..
Let this day bring the best of spirits to you and your family.


A very Happy DIWALI!

Hooked right NOW to...

My God, what kind of cologne did he use? He smelled good. Warm and fresh, like a memory . . . the high mountain balds in springtime, when the rhododendron blooms. Like sky and granite and sunshine and earth; a view across endless blue mountain ridges. Daddy, Momma, Alex and I had picnicked in one of those high mountain meadows one spring. That painfully sweet memory, long hidden, suddenly seemed as vivid as my own breath.
-p 34. "Soul Catcher" by Leigh Bridger

Forgive me my friends! I have again did the stupid thing! I meant to read just a few pages to get the "feel" of the book! And well, I can't put it down now! The fact that it is an e-book, is sad because I can't carry it around and I miss reading this when the computer has to be switched off for obvious reasons.

Have you read this one? I am loving it so far.

Wednesday Cover Attraction!

I saw the below 2 book covers on A Bookshelf Monstrosity blog. There are some other book covers I liked too... but this one.. I loved!

From Harper Collins Site,

Book Description

The acclaimed author of Vinegar Hill returns with a story of two unlikely romances—one historical, the other modern-day—separated by thousands of miles and well over a century.
Battling feelings of loss and apathy in the wake of a painful divorce, novelist Jeanette struggles to complete a book about the long-term relationship between Clara Schumann, a celebrated pianist and the wife of the composer Robert Schumann, and her husband's protégé, the handsome young composer Johannes Brahms. Although this legendary love triangle has been studied exhaustively, Jeanette—herself a gifted pianist—wonders about the enduring nature of Clara and Johannes's lifelong attachment. Were they just "best friends," as both steadfastly claimed? Or was the relationship complicated by desires that may or may not have been consummated?
Through a chance encounter, Jeanette meets Hart, a mysterious, worldly entrepreneur who is a native of Clara's birthplace, Leipzig, Germany. Hart's casual help with translations quickly blossoms into something more. There are things about men and women, he insists, that do not change. The two embark on a whirlwind emotional journey that leads Jeanette across Germany and Switzerland to a crossroads similar to that faced by Clara Schumann—also a mother, also an artist—more than a century earlier.
Accompanied by photographs, sketches, and notes from past and present, A. Manette Ansay's original blend of fiction and history captures the timeless nature of love and friendship between women and men.

The 2nd one is ~~

I couldn't find a description on the Random House site of this one. 

Thank you Marcia for hosting this weekly event!
What covers did you LOVE this week?!

Wishing!

I read about so MANY books on your blogs... that it is hard to keep a tab on what I really really want.

So on Tuesdays, you will get to know if I liked any book I read about.. liked ti so much that it tempted me to buy it!

This is for my own reference, so that I can remember, where I heard about the book :)

I just kind of thought of this post today after reading Jill's review of Making it Up by Penelope Lively! I love the book covers of this book! wow!

Excerpt from Jill's review -

Before last month, I had never heard of Penelope Lively. Then I read Melanie’s review of Making It Up and was intrigued. And then I read Making It Up and was impressed.  So thanks to Melanie for her excellent review and inspiring me to check out a new author.

When I read Jill's review, I really wanted to read this book. I love this cover of it best :).

About the book -  

Making It Up, Booker Prize-winning author Penelope Lively's cleverly termed "anti-memoir," is an enthralling examination of how both fate and free will can dramatically alter the lives of each and every one of us. Each of Lively's expertly crafted stories reveals the life she could have lived, had she, or another, chosen a different path. Yet in answering a series of "what if" questions, Lively does more than indulge her imagination; rather, she challenges her readers to examine the consequences of both the significant, and the seemingly trivial decisions we make every day.

Each of the stories in Making It Up deals with a different stage of Lively's life, and examines fictional alternatives to the roads she and others traveled. The Mozambique Channel charts the course of Shirley, a British nanny who accompanies her employer's family to Capetown following the German invasion of Egypt in 1942. In reality, Lively's family emigrated to Palestine; in this alternative universe, the family encounters tragedy on the open seas. The Battle of the Imjin River sends Lively's husband off to fight in the Korean War, thus changing his fate and in turn her destiny. Most compelling of all is Comet, in which the fictional Lively's untimely death is the catalyst for a half sister's second chance at love.

At the end of most narratives, Lively makes a point of reminding readers that while these stories are fictional, they are not impossible. Perhaps is this sense of endless possibility, so expertly conveyed by this talented veteran, that makes this collection so completely riveting. In the end, we are all the ones "for whom things might have spun off elsewhere, who might have become someone else." --Gisele Toueg

So which is your favorite cover of all the 3? There is one more... but I didn't like it much :)
Well Thank you Jill, awesome review!
And which blogger made you want to buy a book this week?!


And yes, Penelope Lively has been nominated 3 times for Booker Prize and won it once for Moon Tiger in 1987!

Horrible cover ;)

What are you doing on Monday?!

Monday is here! Hope your week is full of joy, lights and happiness! It is DIWALI TIME! YAY!

So this week, you can expect me to do nothing but celebrate! :-)

I finished NOTHING last week. But well I did finish Things Fall Apart by Chinua Achebe!
I started Nicholas Sparks True Believer
I am STILL reading Dan Brown's The Lost Symbol!

ahh... this week will be full of cleaning the house, making it shine, shopping for Laxmi Puja.. and going shopping ;) :)

Diwali this year is officially on Oct 17th :-)

Sunday Surprises!

Aren't they just adorable! The babies :)

 click on the pic to see the enlarged pic

This pic was taken in Kerala [ Southern India ] . Nidhi, her family and me were on our way to boating and these adorable little ones with there mom were eating grass... couldn't resist clicking there pics! Interestingly this pic is taken on 31st Dec, 2008, a day before my marriage ;)

Things Fall Apart by Chinua Achebe

Things Fall Apart
by Chinua Achebe
First published in 1958
Paperback, 224 Pages

Lliterary awards

Margaret Wong Memorial Prize

From GoodReads.com,

THINGS FALL APART tells two overlapping, intertwining stories, both of which center around Okonkwo, a “strong man” of an Ibo village in Nigeria. The first of these stories traces Okonkwo's fall from grace with the tribal world in which he lives, and in its classical purity of line and economical beauty it provides us with a powerful fable about the immemorial conflict between the individual and society. The second story, which is as modern as the first is ancient, and which elevates the book to a tragic plane, concerns the clash of cultures and the destruction of Okonkwo's world through the arrival of aggressive, proselytizing European missionaries. These twin dramas are perfectly harmonized, and they are modulated by an awareness capable of encompassing at once the life of nature, human history, and the mysterious compulsions of the soul. THINGS FALL APART is the most illuminating and permanent monument we have to the modern African experience as seen from within.

Everyone knows about Things Fall Apart, it is the book that is believed to have opened the mystical world of Africa to the mordern world.

Turning and turning in the widening gyre The falcon cannot hear the falconer; Things Fall Apart ; the center cannot hold; Mere anarchy is loosed upon the world.
—W. B. Yeats, “The Second Coming”

This book is recognized as a literary classic and is taught and read everywhere in the English-speaking world. The novel has been translated into at least forty-five languages and has sold several million copies. A year after publication, the book won the Margaret Wong Memorial Prize, a major literary award.
- From CliffsNotes.com

It has been a great experience reading this one. For the first part of the novel, I thought, it would be difficult to remember all the African words, but amazingly I got used to it. Almost everyone knows the story and the main protagonist Okonkwo.

In young Okonkwo's young life, he loathed his father for his failures. Okonkwo, had to fend for his family from a very young age. With his valor and fear of failure,  he became the youngest wrestler and was well-known in his clan, Umuofi. His fear of failure, made him lead his family, through tough work, he never showed any emotion of love. Even when he was given Ikemefuna.He deals with him the same way he deals with his other sons. He also deals with his sorrow for Ikemefuna in the same way and comes out of it. But despite all this, he unknowingly commits a mistake because of which he has to leave his clan for 7 years.

This is when, the story takes an interesting turn. This is when we see the change in th e Igbo culture. This is when we "watch" the Missionaries, Christainity slowly walking into there clan demanding a change in there centuries-old beliefs and traditions. They build churches, they bring in a new government and they totally wipe-out  a whole clan spreading fear and anxiety among the other clans. Okonkwo doesn't take this change lightly. Chinua Achebe gracefully takes us through the troubled times in Nigeria, he opens a world, that had been unknown to a new modern world.

I feel that a novella cannot be successful, if you don't feel for the characters. And I really felt for Okonkwo. I really felt sad for him when he had to "deal" with Ikemefuna, his adopted son. I felt for his own son, Nwoye and for all the many characters.

This is one novella, I enjoyed and I hope you too!
Hubby dear bought this for me last year! And well I am GLAD, I finally picked it up!

Complete Booker Prize Challenge (1990 – Present)

This post is a total rip-off of Krishna's post, so if you have read that one... you can shout plagiarism! But then, I am sure Krishna doesn't mind ;)

For the ORIGINAL complete post, go here!
I am just going to put the list here of the Man Booker Prize Winners and short-Listed fellas! At the rate of my reading, I guess I will be able to finish this list when I reach 50, I am optimistic there.

BOLD -- Prize Winners
Strike through - Books Already read by Moi!
Italics - TBR , the books I own and have not read

Best of the Booker:

1. Midnight’s Children – Salman Rushdie
2. The Siege of Krishapur – J.G. Farrell
3. The Conservationist – Nadine Gordimer
4. Oscar and Lucinda – Peter Carey
5. The Ghost Road – Pat Barker
6. Disgrace – J.M. Coetzee

2009:

1. Wolf Hall – Hilary Mantel
2. Summertime – J.M. Coetzee
3. The Quickening Maze – Adam Foulds
4. The Children’s Book – A.S. Byatt
5. The Glass Room – Simon Mawer
6. The Little Stranger – Sarah Waters

2008:

1. The White Tiger – Aravind Adiga
2. The Secret Scripture – Sebastian Barry
3. Sea of Poppies – Amitav Ghosh
4. The Clothes on Their Backs – Linda Grant
5. The Northern Clemency – Philip Hensher
6. A Fraction of the Whole – Steve Toltz

2007:

1. The Gathering – Anne Enright
2. Darkmans – Nicola Barker
3. The Reluctant Fundamentalist – Mohsin Hamid 
4. Mister Pip – Lloyd Jones 
5. On Chesil Beach – Ian McEwan
6. Animal’s People – Indra Sinha

2006:

1. The Inheritance of Loss – Kiran Desai
2. The Secret River – Kate Grenville
3. Carry Me Down – M.J. Hyland
4. In the Country of Men – Hisham Matar
5. Mother’s Milk – Edward St. Aubyn
6. The Night Watch – Sarah Waters

2005:

1. The Sea – John Banville
2. Arthur and George – Julian Barnes
3. A Long, Long Way – Sebastian Barry
4. Never Let Me Go – Kazuo Ishiguro
5. On Beauty – Zadie Smith
6. The Accidental – Ali Smith

2004:

1. The Line of Beauty – Alan Hollinghurst
2. Bitter Fruit – Achmat Dangor
3. The Electric Michelangelo – Sarah Faber
4. Cloud Atlas – David Mitchell
5. The Master – Colm Toibin
6. I’ll Go To Bed At Noon – Gerard Woodward

2003:

1. Vernon God Little – DBC Pierre
2. Brick Lane – Monica Ali
3. Oryx and Crake – Margaret Atwood
4. The Good Doctor – Damon Galgut
5. Notes on a Scandal – Zoe Heller
6. Astonishing Splashes of Color – Claire Morrall

2002:

1. Life of Pi – Yann Martel
2. Family Matters – Rohinton Mistry
3. Unless – Carol Shields
4. The Story of Lucy Gault – William Trevor
5. Fingersmith – Sarah Waters
6. Dirt Music – Tom Winton

2001:

1. True History of the Kelly Gang – Peter Carey
2. Atonement – Ian McEwan
3. Oxygen – Andrew Miller
4. number9dream – David Mitchell
5. The Dark Room – Rachel Seiffert
6. Hotel World – Ali Smith

2000:

1. The Blind Assassin – Margaret Atwood
2. The Hiding Place – Trezza Azzopardi
3. The Keepers of the Truth – Michael Collins
4. When We Were Orphans – Kazuo Ishiguro
5. English Passengers – Matthew Kneale
6. The Deposition of Father McGreevy – Brian O’Doherty

1999:

1. Disgrace – J.M. Coetzee
2. Fasting, Feasting – Anita Desai
3. Headlong – Michael Frayn
4. The Map of Love – Ahdaf Soueif
5. The Blackwater Lightship – Colm Toibin
6. Our Fathers – Andrew O’Hagan

1998:

1. Amsterdam – Ian McEwan
2. Master Georgie – Beryl Bainbridge
3. England England – Julian Barnes
4. The Industry of Souls – Martin Booth
5. Breakfast on Pluto – Patrick McCabe
6. The Restraint of Beasts – Magnus Mills

1997:

1. The God of Small Things – Arundhati Roy
2. Quarantine – Jim Crace
3. The Underground Man – Mick Jackson
4. Grace Notes – Bernard MacLaverty
5. Europa – Tim Parks
6. The Essence of the Thing – Madeleine St. John

1996:

1. Last Orders – Graham Swift
2. Alias Grace – Margaret Atwood
3. Every Man for Himself – Beryl Bainbridge
4. Reading in the Dark – Seamus Deane
5. The Orchard on Fire – Shena Mckay
6. A Fine Balance – Rohinton Mistry

1995:

1. The Ghost Road – Pat Barker
2. In Every Face I Met – Justin Cartwright
3. The Moor’s Last Sigh – Salman Rushdie
4. Morality Play – Barry Unsworth
5. The Riders – Tim Winton

1994:

1. How Late It Was, How Late – James Kelman
2. Beside the Ocean of Time – George Mackay Brown
3. Reef – Romesh Gunesekera
4. Paradise – Abdulrazak Gurnah
5. The Folding Star – Alan Hollinghurst
6. Knowledge of Angels – Jill Paton Walsh

1993:

1. Paddy Clarke Ha Ha Ha – Roddy Doyle
2. Under the Frog – Tibor Fischer
3. Scar Tissue – Michael Ignatieff
4. Remembering Babylon – David Malouf
5. Crossing the River – Caryl Phillip
6. The Stone Diaries – Carol Shields

1992:

1. The English Patient – Michael Ondaatje
2. Sacred Hunger – Barry Unsworth
3. Serenity House – Christopher Hope
4. The Butcher Boy – Patrick McCabe
5. Black Dogs – Ian McEwan
6. Daughters of the House – Michele Roberts

1991:

1. The Famished Road – Ben Okri
2. Time’s Arrow – Martin Amis
3. The Van – Roddy Doyle
4. Such a Long Journey – Rohinton Mistry
5. The Redundancy of Courage – Timothy Mo
6. Reading Turgenev (from Two Lives) – William Tevor

1990:

1. Possession – A.S. Byatt
2. An Awfully Big Adventure – Beryl Bainbridge
3. The Gate of Angels – Penelope Fitzgerald
4. Amongst Women – John McGahern
5. Lies of Silence – Brian Moore
6. Soloman Gursky Was Here – Mordecai Richler

It feels good, after making LISTS! And then I blame Krishna for this :)! It is ok, this is my favorite hobbies. Next up you will see a post on Pulitzer prze winners in the coming days. Ah well, I have stopped reading for challenges, I think I will not finish anything on time ;). So I am creating my own challenges! I know, I am crazy!

Have a good day everyone!

Wednesday Cover Attraction

Ah! It is again that time of the month when I am, well... a little LAZY :D

So what do I do at this time?

Well I make lists, I THINK about what to read, and I just go to blogs and spend time posting useless comments and so on.. BUT then I don't READ BOOKS :-D

I feel ultra-cool after cribbing!

The above book is from My Lady Amy of Passages of the Past! She has a wonderful blog, and I hope she opens your passage to the past too :)

A little something about the book, copied over from her blog, 

Release Date:  February 1, 2010

In Greek mythology, Alcestis is known as the good wife; she loved her husband so much that she died to save his life and was sent to the underworld in his place. In this poetic and vividly imagined debut, Katharine Beutner gives voice to the woman behind the ideal, bringing to life the world of Mycenaean Greece, a world peopled by capricious gods, where royal women are confined to the palace grounds and passed as possessions from father to husband.

Alcestis tells of a childhood spent with her sisters in the bedchamber where her mother died giving birth to her and of her marriage at the age of fifteen to Admetus, the young king of Pherae, a man she barely knows, who is kind but whose heart belongs to a god. She also tells the part of the story that’s never been told: What happened to Alcestis in the three days she spent in the underworld before being rescued by Heracles? In the realm of the dead, Alcestis falls in love with the goddess Persephone and discovers the true horror and beauty of death.

Thank You Marcia for hosting Wednesday Cover Attractions!

Monday is here Again!

I read A Thousand Splendid Suns and LOVED IT!
In the last Monday post I told you... I had started The Lost Symbol by Dan Brown.. still reading that! And with that.. I have also started Chinua Achebe's Things Fall Apart!

Talking about Things Fall Apart, I am actually liking it! I have never before read anything about an African tribe and this is a new experience. But something I have noticed, is that however old and distant tribe is from my world, the basic things are the same. I will write a review on this in the coming week. For making you READ this one, I would love to mention that this one is a small and fast read [224 pages]. So go ahead and pick it up.

Head over to J. Kaye's to see what everone else is reading~!

Coorg continued...

Remember the Coorg pic I posted last time?! Ok! So this is a continuation... This is another view from the top of the stairs of the temple at  Talacauvery near Coorg in Karnataka State in India. There in the middle do you see a pond kind of thing? That's the origin of River Cauvery! A more closer pic of it ~~

Yep! A whole river coming out of such a small pool.. it is AMAZING right?!

Pics are all taken by hubby dearest :D, so thanks to him for taking some b'ful shots :)

Dewey's Books Challenge

For a while I have been thinking, that it would have been great IF Dewey's lovely blog would have NOT gone down. I would have loved to go there and edit my list of books or just hangout on her blog...
Most of you know, that I had a old blog that got deleted, as I was going through the old posts on that blog, I found this post in which I have listed some books for Dewey's challenge. I thought if all of us who have made lists like that, can come and put them all together... we might have a huge list of books that Dewey read!! I don't know, if anyone has done this, but if it has been done, I would love to contribute ~~

I have gone through her archives till Aug, 2006 - and here is my list so far~~

1. Into the Forest by Jean Hegland
2. The Corrections by Jonathan Franzen
3. The Virgin Blue by Tracy Chevalier
4. The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night-Time by Mark Haddon
5. Property by Valerie Martin
6. Birth of Venus by Sarah Dunant
7. Year of Wonders by Geraldine Brooks
8. Saturday by Ian McEwan
9. The World According to Garp BY John Irving
10. Speak by Laurie Halse Anderson
11. Catalyst by Laurie Halse Anderson
12. Kindred by Octavia Butler
13. The Little Women by Katharine Weber
14. A Thousand Splendid Suns by Khaled Hosseini
15. An Abundance of Katherines by John Green
16. Looking for Alaska by John Green
17. East of Eden by John Steinbeck
18. Purple Hibiscus by Chimimanda Ngozi Adichie

=========================================

The above list of books are my fav recommendations from Dewey, and so they will remain for me to choose my next books!
But I have decided on the 5 books I am going to read!

1. Half of a Yellow Sun by Chimimanda Ngozi Adichie
2. Just Listen by Sarah Dessen [ review ]
   
3. Atonement by Ian Ewan
   
4. Suite Française by Irène Némirovsky
5. A Thousand Splendid Suns by Khaled Hosseini [review]
   

If you had created a list, you can leave the info here...
Let's see, if I can do this :)
Challenge Blog is here!
Have a good day! I am done with 2 of 5 :)