A Thousand Splendid Suns by Khaled Hosseini

A Thousand Splendid Suns is the second best-selling novel from Khaled Hosseini. His first book, Kite Runner, also reached the NY Times Best Seller list depicting the life of two boys from Afghanistan. This novel follows the same setting, but tells the story of two women . It is an amazing story of friendship. But this novel is so much more. As a woman, and an American citizen, it reminds me how truly lucky I am to have been born in this country. The basic rights that we take for granted, women in Afghanistan and other countries around the world are not privy to. Their abuse is so dramatic, and Hosseini tells their story so well, it feels like the reader is along for every devastating blow, literally.

From the Publisher: It's difficult to imagine a harder first act to follow than The Kite Runner: a debut novel by an unknown writer about a country many readers knew little about that has gone on to have over four million copies in print worldwide. But when preview copies of Khaled Hosseini's second novel, A Thousand Splendid Suns, started circulating at Amazon.com, readers reacted with a unanimous enthusiasm that few of us could remember seeing before. As special as The Kite Runner was, those readers said, A Thousand Splendid Suns is more so, bringing Hosseini's compassionate storytelling and his sense of personal and national tragedy to a tale of two women that is weighted equally with despair and grave hope.
Rating: 5 out of 5*****

The Help

Set in Jackson, Mississippi in 1962, during the peak of the Civil Rights Movement, this read questions the value to friendships while looking a race relations. It takes the form of three voices, two African-American maids and one white woman, who together, try to make a huge change to a society where change doesn't come easily. Miss Skeeter, the caucasian woman, and her "elite" white friends meet weekly for their bridge games, which often leads to a venting session about the "help", their black maids. Miss Skeeter decides to author a book, with the assistance of two black maids, to uncover the secret life of black maids and the women they work for. Aibileen and Minny begin to share draw dropping stories of how mistreated they are by their bosses. All three women have so much to lose, including their lives, possibly. Will they have the courage to see the book to publication? What will be the consequences of writing against the white women of the town? Funny and heartwarming, this book allows it's readers to question how they treat and are treated by the opposite race.

I fell in love with this book frankly because I lived in Jackson for 10 years. Several of the places in the book are places that I not only visited, but are central to the city. This includes a shout out to Millsaps College, my alma mater. I had the opportunity to meet the author, who was also a Jackson resident. Though I was not impressed by her demeanor, (she was a bit snobby) her work was such a joy to read, I forgave her first impression.

From the publisher: What perfect timing for this optimistic, uplifting debut novel set during the nascent civil rights movement in Jackson, Miss., where black women were trusted to raise white children but not to polish the household silver. Eugenia Skeeter Phelan is just home from college in 1962, and, anxious to become a writer, is advised to hone her chops by writing about what disturbs you. The budding social activist begins to collect the stories of the black women on whom the country club sets relies and mistrusts enlisting the help of Aibileen, a maid who's raised 17 children, and Aibileen's best friend Minny, who's found herself unemployed more than a few times after mouthing off to her white employers. The book Skeeter puts together based on their stories is scathing and shocking, bringing pride and hope to the black community, while giving Skeeter the courage to break down her personal boundaries and pursue her dreams. Assured and layered, full of heart and history, this one has bestseller written all over it.

Rating: 3 out of 5*****

The Wednesday Letters by Jason Wright

This is one of my favorite books that I have ever read. And after 31 years, that's a lot of books.


I've given it or suggested it to almost everyone I know and they have equally enjoyed it.


Quick story on how I came to read this book:


As you know I work at a bookstore. When this book first came out, as I was placing it on the shelf, I dropped one book and it fell open to the back cover. Glued to the back cover was a simple little envelope with a handwritten letter on the inside. My curiosity peeked, as I had never seen this before, I took out the letter and the greeting read, Dear Rain.







"OMG!" I thought, "Someone has written a message for me, and placed it in the back of this book. (Conceded much?) Alas, the letter was not written to me, but instead one of the characters in the book. But since I was already interested, I wanted to see what the book was about.



The story is based on a man and woman who die together in their bed one evening. (Don't worry, I didn't spoil the ending. You find this out during the first chapter. It seems that all through their marriage, the husband has written his wife a letter, every Wednesday since the first week as man and wife. Years later, after their parents death, their children return to their childhood home to bury their parents and find these letters. In reading them, they discover the life and love that their parents shared, while struggling to overcome their own skeletons. During this journey, the uncover a dark family secret that the parents kept from them. But just as the secret is revealed, an even bigger one is unleashed, that threatens to break their familial ties.



Intrigued? So was I. One of the best stories I've read. It really gets you thinking about your own family and the relationship you share with them. A must read!

From the publisher: In the wake of his bestselling Christmas Jars comes a sweetly crafted story from Wright, a Virginia businessman. Jack and Laurel Cooper are two hardworking, loving Christian pillars of the community who die in each other's arms one night in the bed-and-breakfast that they own and operate. The event calls their three grown children home for the funeral, including their youngest son, a fugitive from the law who must face an outstanding warrant for his arrest and confront his one true love, now engaged to another man. As events unfold around the funeral, the three children discover a treasure trove of family history in the form of Wednesday letters-notes that Jack wrote to his wife every single week of their married lives. As they read, the children brush across the fabric of a devoted marriage that survived a devastating event kept secret all these years. It's a lovely story: heartening, wholesome, humorous, suspenseful and redemptive. It resonates with the true meaning of family and the life-healing power of forgiveness all wrapped up in a satisfying ending.
Rating: 4 out of 5*****

Animal Husbandy by Laura Zigman

Laura Zigman has been one of my favorite authors since I read this book in 2000. The book eventually became a movie, "Someone Like You" starring, Ashley Judd, Greg Kinnear, and Hugh Jackman.

The premis of the book (and the movie) is that a man is like a bull. Once a bull has relations with a cow, it will never go back to that cow. This cow becomes the "old cow" and the bull then looks for a "new cow" to satisfy its needs.

Now while I don't enjoy women becoming compared to "cows" (or hefiers, as the case may be), I thought this was an interesting comparision. One that, upon reflection, I found to be quite a substantial theory. If you plan to pick up this quick and interesting read, I suggest the book first, Ashley Judd does a great job as the heroine. But Sexiest Man Alive, Hugh Jackman, walks around with shirt off a lot in the movie as well. I say, pick them up both for a rainy weekend of sitting on the couch and relaxing.

From the Publisher -

"If someone asked me a year ago why I thought it was that men leave women and never come back, I would have said this: New Cow. New Cow is short for New Cow Theory, which is short for Old Cow-New Cow Theory, which, of course, is short for the sad sorry truth that men leave woman and never come back because all they really want is New Cow. But no one asked me then. If someone asked me now I would have a different answer. I would roll my eyes, look toward the ceiling, raise both hands and shake them toward the heavens the way old Italian women do, and say this: They will never make sense; you will never understand them."
Welcome to the case file labeled "love" of one Jane Goodall--no, not the Jane Goodall, but a late-night TV producer who turns to the annals of animal behavior for an explanation when true love goes suddenly, inexplicably wrong. It began as a simple Cow meets Bull story: he was the young producer with the washboard stomach and the J-Crew good-looks, she the co-worker with her heart on the shelf. They met for drinks, fell in love, looked together for a cozy one-bedroom apartment on the Upper East Side, and then suddenly, in only the third month of their post-copulatory phase, Ray Brown was gone. Not gone gone, but lost to that jungle of unreturned phone calls known as unrequited love. So Jane Goodall, with the help of Freud, Darwin, and her own menagerie of lovelorn friends--a broken-hearted womanizer named Eddie, her best friend Joan, who for the past two years has been dating her boss, a man engaged to another woman, and David, who shares with Jane both a taste for good-looking men and a terminal case of bad luck--delves into the mystery of the male animal.

Rating : 3 out of 5 *****

Welcome!

I have created this blog for readers. Since you are reading this blog, it's obvious that you 1) can read and 2) enjoy reading my blogs and my writing.

Because I work at a book store, my family and friends are constantly asking me for suggestions on books. (Teachers are also looking for books that they can read in class as a class novel.) So I am writing this blog to cover every one's request. Things that will be covered: Books I love, Books in waiting (to read) Books that I have that will never read (so if you want my copy, let me know) and finally Books that Other People suggest. (through friends, family and of course Oprah.

So please enjoy and comment on the books that I choose, if you love it or if you hate it. And if you have suggestions please feel free to contribute!

Happy Reading!