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Is no one reading A DISCOVERY OF WITCHES?

I'm 1/2 way through my second pass and just loving it.

East Texas Parrothead wrote:

drunkpirate66 wrote:

East Texas Parrothead wrote:

drunkpirate66 wrote: Women have no soul out of the kitchen. Not Franzen's fault. I am surprised they got more then a foot - note, honestly.

(I am in trouble now . . . .)

In all seriousness, I disagree somewhat with your statement. The entire foundation of the book is based on a female's journal. Her perspective. Her actions setting forth the main struggle and conflict in the novel. In THAT regard . . . women are very well represented.

I'm middle-aged ... and my female friends who read it are middle-aged. No one I know acts like Patty Berglund. I think that's why it didn't resonate with us. Or maybe it's a Southern thing.

The male friends who've read it thought it was well done, but have commented that it was pretty bleak.

It's interesting to hear different perspectives on it.

No argument here. I will, however, offer this thought . . . there is a ton of stuff that happens in Freedom that is not grounded in reality or meant to be. The two lead male characters (rock star and West Virginia liberal land buyer upper) have unrealistic jobs and interactions. Not to mention the son and his buying and selling for United State military . . . really? So as much as I agree that the lead female character acts in a manner not common to most . . . I think we can agree that most all of the characters are quite above (or below) the normal baseline for society. I do think that the female lead has the most power and/or influence. Without her, and her journal and analysis of prior events, much of the plot is non - existent. The effect woman have on men in Freedom greatly outweighs the effect the men have on them. Its all point of view - I suppose.

It really has been interesting to hear people's reactions to the book. It just wasn't for me.

So is this what a real live book club is all about? I like it!

A few years back I heard a story on NPR about Franzen and his new book, "The Discomfort Zone." http://www.npr.org/templates/story/stor ... Id=5768730

"Writer Jonathan Franzen's massive 2001 bestseller The Corrections was based, in part, on his own life. His new book is a memoir, The Discomfort Zone: A Personal History. Franzen explores his middle-class upbringing in 1970s Missouri, as well as events in his adulthood, such as the death of his mother, his affinity for bird-watching and his marriage."

And from the NY Times:http://www.nytimes.com/2006/08/29/books/29kaku.html

"In fact Mr. Franzen is so focused on talking about his younger self that he fails (with one or two exceptions) to make other people come alive. His family — which seems to have provided considerable fodder for the dysfunctional family in “The Corrections” — emerges as a blur: his parents are sketched in a desultory fashion in these pages; his siblings are drawn in an equally offhand manner. The town of Webster Groves where he grew up — “in the middle of the country in the middle of the golden age of the American middle class” — is rendered with a lot less detail than the Midwestern suburb conjured up in “The Corrections,” and his later peregrinations around the country feel strangely disembodied as well."

At this point in the book I feel the body of Franzen's work is tightly knitted together, but I've a ways to go.

Tequila Revenge wrote:

East Texas Parrothead wrote:

drunkpirate66 wrote:

East Texas Parrothead wrote:

drunkpirate66 wrote: Women have no soul out of the kitchen. Not Franzen's fault. I am surprised they got more then a foot - note, honestly.

(I am in trouble now . . . .)

In all seriousness, I disagree somewhat with your statement. The entire foundation of the book is based on a female's journal. Her perspective. Her actions setting forth the main struggle and conflict in the novel. In THAT regard . . . women are very well represented.

I'm middle-aged ... and my female friends who read it are middle-aged. No one I know acts like Patty Berglund. I think that's why it didn't resonate with us. Or maybe it's a Southern thing.

The male friends who've read it thought it was well done, but have commented that it was pretty bleak.

It's interesting to hear different perspectives on it.

No argument here. I will, however, offer this thought . . . there is a ton of stuff that happens in Freedom that is not grounded in reality or meant to be. The two lead male characters (rock star and West Virginia liberal land buyer upper) have unrealistic jobs and interactions. Not to mention the son and his buying and selling for United State military . . . really? So as much as I agree that the lead female character acts in a manner not common to most . . . I think we can agree that most all of the characters are quite above (or below) the normal baseline for society. I do think that the female lead has the most power and/or influence. Without her, and her journal and analysis of prior events, much of the plot is non - existent. The effect woman have on men in Freedom greatly outweighs the effect the men have on them. Its all point of view - I suppose.

It really has been interesting to hear people's reactions to the book. It just wasn't for me.

So is this what a real live book club is all about? I like it!

A few years back I heard a story on NPR about Franzen and his new book, "The Discomfort Zone." http://www.npr.org/templates/story/stor ... Id=5768730

"Writer Jonathan Franzen's massive 2001 bestseller The Corrections was based, in part, on his own life. His new book is a memoir, The Discomfort Zone: A Personal History. Franzen explores his middle-class upbringing in 1970s Missouri, as well as events in his adulthood, such as the death of his mother, his affinity for bird-watching and his marriage."

And from the NY Times:http://www.nytimes.com/2006/08/29/books/29kaku.html

"In fact Mr. Franzen is so focused on talking about his younger self that he fails (with one or two exceptions) to make other people come alive. His family — which seems to have provided considerable fodder for the dysfunctional family in “The Corrections” — emerges as a blur: his parents are sketched in a desultory fashion in these pages; his siblings are drawn in an equally offhand manner. The town of Webster Groves where he grew up — “in the middle of the country in the middle of the golden age of the American middle class” — is rendered with a lot less detail than the Midwestern suburb conjured up in “The Corrections,” and his later peregrinations around the country feel strangely disembodied as well."

At this point in the book I feel the body of Franzen's work is tightly knitted together, but I've a ways to go.

Curious to hear your thoughts as you go. I feel that he took a huge risk having a character like Patty setting the plot in motion with her actions detailed in her journal. She is not a strong character (thanks Jack) but without her there is no story. I agree that the plot holds together nicely which must have been a massive challenge considering the subject matter, interpersonal dynamics, and social issues presented.

[/quote]Curious to hear your thoughts as you go. I feel that he took a huge risk having a character like Patty setting the plot in motion with her actions detailed in her journal. She is not a strong character (thanks Jack) but without her there is no story. I agree that the plot holds together nicely which must have been a massive challenge considering the subject matter, interpersonal dynamics, and social issues presented[/quote]

Is Patty not a strong character or not a strong person? Does her personal make up lack because her poor parental relationships during her childhood and Franzen translates that into what some consider, "not a strong character?" Do you think Franzen took out the broad brush and painted Patty as the good girl looking for the bad boy relationship?

Currently reading Door Into Summer (classic Heinlein, but dated) while I'm waiting on a copy of Starship Troopers, same author.

Tequila Revenge wrote:

Curious to hear your thoughts as you go. I feel that he took a huge risk having a character like Patty setting the plot in motion with her actions detailed in her journal. She is not a strong character (thanks Jack) but without her there is no story. I agree that the plot holds together nicely which must have been a massive challenge considering the subject matter, interpersonal dynamics, and social issues presented[/quote]

Is Patty not a strong character or not a strong person? Does her personal make up lack because her poor parental relationships during her childhood and Franzen translates that into what some consider, "not a strong character?" Do you think Franzen took out the broad brush and painted Patty as the good girl looking for the bad boy relationship?[/quote]


Some here think that she is not a well - developed character . . . or not as well developed as the male characters in the book. My argument to this is Franzen lets you know just enough about her to develop insight towards why the male characters are so effected by her and her actions. The "bro's before ho's" mentality certainly does not exist in Franzen's Freedom. In that regard, Patty has depth and strength. She might be morally bankrupt . . . but without her actions there is little plot.

East Texas Parrothead wrote:Is no one reading A DISCOVERY OF WITCHES?

I'm 1/2 way through my second pass and just loving it.

BTT ... I can't believe no one's talking about this yet ... I'm almost finished re-reading it and still loving the story and characters.

]

THE FIFTH WITNESS, Michael Connelly's new LINCOLN LAWYER book, hits the shelves tomorrow. It'll make a great film.

East Texas Parrothead wrote:]

THE FIFTH WITNESS, Michael Connelly's new LINCOLN LAWYER book, hits the shelves tomorrow. It'll make a great film.

I just got done with Lincoln Lawyer..LOVED IT!. Next one on the list is Discovery of Witches...

GARNETBIMBO & BIG DAD wrote:

East Texas Parrothead wrote:]

THE FIFTH WITNESS, Michael Connelly's new LINCOLN LAWYER book, hits the shelves tomorrow. It'll make a great film.

I just got done with Lincoln Lawyer..LOVED IT!. Next one on the list is Discovery of Witches...

I re-read it last week ... the new one is good, too.

Hope you like DISCOVERY. I'm just about done with the second reading. Hate that I have to wait a year for the second installment.

Read Elizabeth Berg's new release yesterday.

Can't say I liked it. The one before this was a disappointment, too.

Oh, well.

Currently reading Unfamiliar Fishes, by Sarah Vowell, a smart-alecky but quite informative history of the Hawaiian Islands.

Been on a big Carl Hiaasen kick lately.Reading NATIVE TONGUE right now.Recently finished BASKET CASE,SKIN TIGHT, and STORMY WEATHER.

ParrotheadRPB wrote:Been on a big Carl Hiaasen kick lately.Reading NATIVE TONGUE right now.Recently finished BASKET CASE,SKIN TIGHT, and STORMY WEATHER.

Can't go wrong with Carl! I think I might pull a few from his backlist and mix them in with my current to-be-read list.

Just did a Q&A with two women who put together a fabulous Texas Steakhouse cookbook.



Here's a link to the story.

http://www.myssnews.com/mysslife/review ... -beef.html

Thought some would find this interesting.

April 14, 2011 From, "The Writer's Almanac."

It was on this day in 1939 that John Steinbeck's (books by this author) novel The Grapes of Wrath was published. His wife, Carol, came up with the title, from "The Battle Hymn of the Republic": "Mine eyes have seen the glory of the coming of the Lord;/He is trampling out the vintage where the grapes of wrath are stored."

The Grapes of Wrath tells the story of the Joads, a family of "Okie" sharecroppers who leave their home in Oklahoma for the promise of a better life in California. Steinbeck was inspired to write the book after he was sent on assignment by Fortune magazine to visit the tenement camps in California, an assignment he soon gave up, saying, "I don't like the audience." He agreed to go around with a photographer for Life because he liked the idea of photographs. On March 7th, 1938, he wrote to his agent, Elizabeth Otis: "I'm sorry but I simply can't make money on these people. That applies to your query about an article for a national magazine. The suffering is too great for me to cash in on it. I hope this doesn't sound either quixotic or martyrish to you. A short trip into the fields where the water is a foot deep in the tents and the children are up on the beds and there is no food and no fire, and the county has taken off all of the nurses because 'the problem is so great that we can't do anything about it.' So they do nothing. And we found a boy in jail for a felony because he stole two old radiators because his mother was starving to death and in stealing them he broke a little padlock on a shed. We'll either spring him or the district attorney will do the rest of his life explaining. But you see what I mean. It is the most heartbreaking thing in the world. If Life does use the stuff there will be lots of pictures and swell ones. It will give you an idea of the kind of people they are and the kind of faces. I break myself every time I go out because the argument that one person's effort can't really do anything doesn't seem to apply when you come on a bunch of starving children and you have a little money. I can't rationalize it for myself anyway. So don't get me a job for a slick. I want to put a tag of shame on the greedy bastards who are responsible for this."

For a while, he thought his best chance of delivering that tag of shame was through newspapers. But they were only so effective, and Life didn't publish the piece. So Steinbeck started to work on a novel. He gave himself a deadline of 100 days, and he stuck to it. He kept a journal as he worked, and in his 97th entry he imagined that his main character, Tom Joad, was there with him — he wrote: "'Tom! Tom! Tom!' I know. It wasn't him. Yes, I think I can go on now. In fact, I feel stronger. Much stronger. Funny where the energy comes from. Now to work, only now it isn't work any more." But by the 100th entry, he wrote: "I am so dizzy I can hardly see the page." And then, later in the day: "Finished this day — and I hope to God it's good." That was October 26th, 1938.

Steinbeck reworked The Grapes of Wrath over and over, and it was published on this day in 1939. Plenty of people objected to its political agenda, especially the Associated Farmers of California, who called it "a pack of lies," and not all critics appreciated it either — one called it a "mess of silly propagands [...] and scatagorical talk," another complained that "social awareness outruns artistic skill." In The New Yorker, Clifton Fadiman insisted that the ending was terrible, but then he declared that it might be the Great American Novel. It won the Pulitzer Prize and it was a huge best seller. By the end of April, it was selling 2,500 copies a day, and it was the highest-selling book of 1939, with about half a million copies sold by the end of the year.

Steinbeck didn't expect the book to be popular — he told Otis, "It is a mean, nasty book and if I could make it nastier I would." In the ending, after the Joad family has fallen apart and the pregnant daughter Rose of Sharon delivers a stillborn baby, she breastfeeds a starving man. When his editor suggested he changed the ending, Steinbeck was furious. He said: "I am sorry but I cannot change that ending. It is casual — there is no fruity climax, it is not more important than any other part of the book — if there is a symbol, it is a survival symbol not a love symbol, it must be an accident, it must be a stranger, and it must be quick. To build this stranger into the structure of the book would be to warp the whole meaning of the book. The fact that the Joads don't know him, don't care about him, have no ties to him — that is the emphasis. The giving of the breast has no more sentiment than the giving of a piece of bread. [...] You know that I have never been touchy about changes, but I have too many thousands of hours on this book, every incident has been too carefully chosen and its weight judged and fitted. The balance is there. One other thing — I am not writing a satisfying story. I've done my damndest to rip a reader's nerves to rags, I don't want him satisfied." (less)

Baldacci's new book, THE SIXTH MAN, debuts Tuesday.

I think it's a rip-roaring ride ... and I love the characters of James Hawkes and Kelly Paul. I hope they team up in future books.

Here's the first of a two-part interview with Baldacci ...
http://www.myssnews.com/mysslife/review ... -mind.html

bravedave wrote:Currently reading Door Into Summer (classic Heinlein, but dated) while I'm waiting on a copy of Starship Troopers, same author.

I LOOOOOOOOOOOOOVE both of these. Door might very well have been the first Heinlein I read.....certainly not the last. Troopers is just awesome. I've read it over & over.......even use a few lines out of it on a regular basis. I think it would make a FANTASTIC movie!!!!!!!

Staredge wrote:

bravedave wrote:Currently reading Door Into Summer (classic Heinlein, but dated) while I'm waiting on a copy of Starship Troopers, same author.

I LOOOOOOOOOOOOOVE both of these. Door might very well have been the first Heinlein I read.....certainly not the last. Troopers is just awesome. I've read it over & over.......even use a few lines out of it on a regular basis. I think it would make a FANTASTIC movie!!!!!!!

So did Paul Verhoeven. I never saw it but I didn't get a good impression of it at the time (1997).

The Girl With the Dragon Tattoo
Wow