| Author |
Message |
Seamonkey
Moderator
09-07-2000
| Wednesday, October 29, 2014 - 5:10 pm 
Shorter chapters help. At home I can read at will, though I have so many distractions but with my patients, even with walking, I have some time when I'm sitting and waiting and cannot always, or usually cannot get wifi so of course I'm reading, but when they come out, they are usually ready to go or at least ready to talk, so I quickly bookmark and go.. so shorter chapters give some closure.
I finished Pay it Forward and I must say I clearly forgot much of the movie!! Good, sad, and not what I'd expected.
Then read a kindle short by Jodi Picoult Where There's Smoke which is connected to her novel leaving time which I'm now reading.
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Uncle_ricky
Member
07-02-2007
| Friday, October 31, 2014 - 10:33 am
Recent completions:
A Killer Life by Christine Vachon, which is an assortment of her film producer experiences in Hollywood. I read it mostly to learn about the production of one of my all-time favorite films, "Far from Heaven." She's very thorough with details and they're occasionally juicy, too.
The Farm by Tom Rob Smith. I'd not heard of Smith until I heard him interviewed on NPR describing this novel, his latest. Though it's fiction, the story was inspired by his own mother having a psychotic episode that turned his and his father's lives upside down. It's a very well-written page-turner and it kept me anxious to know how it turned out.
Role Models by John Waters. I had no idea he'd written this one and it's a collection of his essays about various celebrities (Johnny Mathis, Leslie Van Houten, etc.) -- I'm halfway through it and it's his usual blend of sarcastic wit and pop culture commentary. He makes me laugh repeatedly!
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Seamonkey
Moderator
09-07-2000
| Sunday, November 02, 2014 - 9:03 pm
Finished the Jodi Picoult, which did hold my interest and had some interesting twists.
Change of pace: Laughs, Love and Lucy: How I Came to Create the Most Popular Sitcom of All time by Jess Oppenheimer with Gregg Oppenheimer.
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Heckagirl631
Member
09-08-2010
| Monday, November 03, 2014 - 5:48 pm
Just finished re-reading "Skeleton Crew" by Stephen King. I probably first read it about 25 years ago. I remembered some of the stories quite well. Not sure what's next.
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Seamonkey
Moderator
09-07-2000
| Saturday, November 08, 2014 - 2:41 am
Uncle Ricky, did you watch the Olive Kittridge mini-series? Was the book as depressing as the HBO presentation?
Frances McDormand was excellent and I could appreciate the character's ironic humor but she was pretty rough ON other people, too and no one was allowed to be happy. I realize that the written version covers more stories and characters..
I never thought of Ann Tyler as so bleak.
I'm still reading Oppenheimer's book about early tv, especially his time with I Love Lucy and it really is fascinating. He's a good writer so it isn't just a string of name-dropping and trashing other people. And quite a collection of pictures and scripts and such.
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Merrysea
Moderator
08-13-2004
| Saturday, November 08, 2014 - 10:24 am
I really enjoyed Oppenheimer's book.
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Seamonkey
Moderator
09-07-2000
| Saturday, November 08, 2014 - 1:27 pm
I'm sure it was a labor of love for his son to take the book started by his dad, and use all the archives of scripts and such and get it written, because it is so worth reading. And he really made things come alive, too.
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Seamonkey
Moderator
09-07-2000
| Saturday, November 08, 2014 - 1:29 pm
I'm now reading a cancer memoir which will be for the journey she was on and the small town (the town that Lake Woebegone was based on) rallying to help.. but yikes the writing isn't so well done and she is even a teacher! But the heart is there and the book was free. What About the Hair Down There?. Should be a fast read.
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Rieann
Member
08-26-2006
| Sunday, November 09, 2014 - 3:13 pm
Just finished the page turner Dear Daughter by Elizabeth Little. I loved the snarky narrator. I'm still mulling over my thoughts on the ending. It may have just been the author's final zing towards the media and the cult of "celebrity".
I'm now starting The Good Girl by Mary Kubica
Oh, I also recently finished a good page turner called The Wicked Girls by Alex Marwood.
I guess I'm into thrillers about damaged people of late. lol
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Uncle_ricky
Member
07-02-2007
| Sunday, November 09, 2014 - 11:06 pm
Thanks for asking, Sea. I recorded all the episodes last weekend and was all set to watch them when Seth (husband) asks "What's this 'Olive Kitteridge' you recorded?" So I had to explain how I'd just read the book and was looking forward to the miniseries. "You're going to watch it without me??" I told him I didn't think he'd be interested. But, no, he was interested. So we had to postpone watching it because we had so many other things recorded!
We watched the first hour today and Seth liked it enough to want to watch the entire series. Interestingly, he watched "Transparent" on Amazon Prime without me then announced he loved it and that I should watch it. So that's what I've been doing all week. (It is quite good, by the way.)
Anyway, back to "OK" -- the book was definitely not a "feel good" book. Olive's blunt outlook on life took a little bit getting used to, but Strout did such a good job of making her just sympathetic enough that I was able to overlook Olive's really rough edges. In the adaptation, Frances McDormand captures everything I imagined would be needed to play Olive. Ms. McDormand optioned the book herself shortly after its publication, so she's been wanting to play Olive for quite a while. She was interviewed on NPR and explained how much the book and playing the part meant to her.
I agree that Anne Tyler isn't nearly as bleak, but many of Tyler's characters are similarly direct/matter-of-fact/blunt as Olive is - I guess they can be described as more charming Olives.
In general, I really like stories that feature hard-to-like characters because that presents a greater challenge to the writer to make them compelling. And I've always been drawn to bleak stories and characters - just a personal preference. That explains why Dostoyevsky and especially Thomas Hardy are my absolute favorites -- I just love the way they force the reader to feel the characters as well as the stories.
And no one writes bleak as deftly as Anita Brookner. Oy vey! She's the queen of bleak, hands down. She's written over 20 novels and every single one of them features lonely women who are either unlucky at love or are otherwise so disagreeable that finding a mate is nothing short of impossible. Ms. Brookner has been accused of basically writing the same book over and over and she freely admits that that's totally accurate! Her command of the English language is so amazing, it doesn't matter (at least to me) that the stories are elaborately sad and depressing. I'm in hog heaven with books like that. I once recommended one of her books to one of my best friends and he scolded me later, "How could you do that to me??? That had to be the most depressing book ever written!!!" Oh, well. We all have our favorites, right?
Sorry for the freakishly long "love letter" to downbeat books and writers! 
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Seamonkey
Moderator
09-07-2000
| Monday, November 10, 2014 - 7:56 pm
Well I knew that Frances had played the role extremely well.. you could see a sense of humor hiding in there, in her eyes.. but it sounds like she was also accurate for that character.
I can appreciate the bleak but don't want to visit quite as often as you do, I'd guess ;)
But I lean more that way than rainbows and unicorns and happily ever after books and such.
One of my favorite movies is Secrets and Lies which certainly isn't rainbow-like but had some wonderful acting.
And just last night I watched August Osage County, which was well acted but oh so bleak.. and probably more poignant knowing of the recent death of one of the cast which was mental health related, though her dad still holds out that it wasn't suicide.
The cancer memoir got better. I realize I bought it partly because it was based on a caringbridge journal and I follow many people on that sight. And she also followed Zach Sobiech as I did, so had some links as his journey paralleled and diverged from hers, sadly.
Now starting Miraculous Journey by Anne and Whitley Strieber.. about her death/return experience while an aneurysm was bursting (and at the time of writing she was facing death by brain tumor.
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Uncle_ricky
Member
07-02-2007
| Tuesday, November 11, 2014 - 12:36 am
Totally loved "Secrets & Lies" (the director, Mike Leigh is a total genius; his films are all tremendous achievements) - I saw it three times - so delicious. And "August Osage County" was way too short. Those confrontational family scenes were precisely the type of scenes that I savor above all others. Books, plays, TV shows and films with psychological warfare like that I can watch endlessly.
But I like the happily-ever-after stories, too! 
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Mamie316
Member
07-08-2003
| Tuesday, November 11, 2014 - 10:24 am
Rieann, I liked Good Girl and Dear Daughter. I have The Wicked Girls in the TBR pile.
I just started two books. Gracefully Grayson by Ami Polonsky is about a 12-year-old boy who's always felt he was born in the wrong body. He meets a new friend who helps him become who he always should have been.
I am also reading As You Wish (Inconceivable Tales From the Making of The Princess Bride) by Cary Elwes. One of my all-time favorites and I am looking forward to hearing how Westley and the cast came to be.
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Seamonkey
Moderator
09-07-2000
| Tuesday, November 11, 2014 - 12:15 pm
LOL, Uncle Ricky.. I wasn't displeased to have August: Osage County end, but I sure appreciated the acting.
I've seen Secrets & Lies quite a few times.
Of course a classic was Who's Afraid of Virginia Woolf? With Burton and Taylor, Sandy Dennis.. wow..
The book I'm reading.. Anne and Whitley Streiber of course are authors and controversial for sure, but they certainly can express themselves.. they take turns writing in it and it tells of their love story and the fears around her aneurism and the messages she received while "dead" and now the horrible situation of not just having glioblastoma multiforme, but cells for gliosarcoma (worse, though both are terminal) AND melanoma!
But Anne is alive and kicking .. at the time of the aneurism, 2004, their son was engaged and Anne wanted more than anything to live to see him marry and to have children and that has happened, so they feel if she goes now, which seems inevitable, at least she saw this.
Interesting so far.
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Uncle_ricky
Member
07-02-2007
| Tuesday, November 11, 2014 - 12:44 pm
That Miraculous Journey does sound interesting - thanks for the additional background. Two things I dread happening to me when no one's around: an aneurysm and choking on a piece of food. It's amazing she can write about hers!
And you're, once again, totally right: Taylor, Burton, Dennis & Segal in WAOVW - oh my goodness! That thing is like candy, only better!!
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Jimmer
Moderator
08-30-2000
| Tuesday, November 11, 2014 - 1:07 pm
I don't generally enjoy bleak books but oddly enough that only makes me all the more interested in this discussion. I was always under the impression that you liked them Sea and Uncle_ricky clearly does. I'm wondering if you can further explain what you like about them?
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Seamonkey
Moderator
09-07-2000
| Tuesday, November 11, 2014 - 1:17 pm
Jimmer, for me, I like realism and life is often bleak.. I don't want a steady diet of that by any means, but I do read quite a lot of non-fiction and that can be bleak or now, of course.
So if bleak is real, or rings true.. as in August: Osage County.. where you have the terribly dysfunctional alcoholic matriarch, played by Meryl Streep SO well.. with a batch of dysfunctional daughters and a passive also dysfunctional husband.. and sister.. the whole family!! But sad as it is, it rings true for me.. family secrets included.
Secrets & Lies of course stars British actress Brenda Blethyn, who is marvelous, as an adult with a REALLY unhappy daughter, who gave up an infant for adoption when she was really young and the daughter, who is biracial and was raised by professional people and very happy, seeks out her birthmom, who is not of an educated class.. and lots of secrets come out.. all the acting is excellent.
I had more trouble with The Goldfinch because I couldn't find much, if anything, to like about several of the characters and they seemed more mean that sad, I guess. Still, the writing was excellent.
Uncle Ricky.. they are definitely interesting people. Whitley wrote about his alien encounter and is a friend of Art Bell. Worth reading and very real in terms of the health care system too so far. They had Kaiser but managed to get into UCLA which they were told was critical in her case.
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Mak1
Member
08-11-2002
| Wednesday, November 12, 2014 - 8:02 pm
I haven't posted in here for a while and just had fun catching up with the interesting conversations.
I recently read the Richard Castle book Deadly Heat. If you like the show, you'd probably enjoy the Nikki Heat series. It's easy to recognize the characters even with the names changed. This story was much more intense than many of the tv programs, though.
After that, I read a delightful little novel, The Storied Life of A. J. Fikry by Gabrielle Zevin. Mr Fikry is a recent young widower who runs a small bookstore on an island. He is grieving and grumpy when we first meet him. Apparently, he never was a "warm and fuzzy" type. An amazing, surprising delivery to the store changes his life forever. I really like the setting, as the story takes place mostly in the bookstore with many book and short story references. The characters are believable. Though parts of the story are a bit predictable, there are interesting twists and turns along the way. I like books that show character development and real-life situations. I really, really liked this one!
Now I'm starting Close Your Eyes, Hold Hands by Chris Bohjalian. It's pretty grim so far. It is narrated by a teen-aged girl, homeless following a meltdown at the nuclear plant in a small Vermont town which was run by her dad.
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Seamonkey
Moderator
09-07-2000
| Wednesday, November 12, 2014 - 8:19 pm
He's a good writer, from the books I have read and the Bookstore one sounds sweet. I'll see if they fit my price range (I just have SO many books I own that I want to read, but am constantly adding, of course.
I'm deeper into Miraculous Journey and wow.. Whitley had to be miraculous in his own way to advocate for his wife.. frustrating and amazing.. so devoted though.. and their son was pretty much there for them too.
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Seamonkey
Moderator
09-07-2000
| Thursday, November 13, 2014 - 8:11 pm
Finished.. she's on a special diet and some chemo meds and other supplements and two specific kinds of cannabis .. very low carb and low sugar because her cancers love that (my patient with melanoma is also on extremely low sugar at the suggestion of his oncologist) and one of the medical marijuanas she is on is felt to inhibit brain tumors, which is what she has. I'm so glad she is supported in that extra treatment.
Now taking a rest and reading a sweet memoir Growing Up Country: Memories of an Iowa Farm Girl.
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Spoton
Member
09-16-2005
| Friday, November 14, 2014 - 10:25 pm
Just want to share my opinion of one recent read, "Zoo" by James Patterson (but not really written by him as he doesn't seem to "write" any of his books).
I can only say WORST BOOK EVER!! Seriously - I have read libraries of books and never ran across anything so, well, crap-tastic.
Now I see that there is a movie being made based on this book. Oh dear Lord spare us the cinematic version of this literary horror.
Before you are tempted to spend time or money on this "novel" I suggest you first read at least this one review.
Www.schlockmercenary.com/blog/zoo.book.review
Or one of many more reviews out there.
just sayin'...
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Uncle_ricky
Member
07-02-2007
| Saturday, November 15, 2014 - 1:05 am
Thanks for the warning, Spoton. I've never had any interest in Mr. Patterson and I'll definitely be avoiding him thanks to your vivid review.
I recently experienced something similar when I "took the bait" and decided to risk reading Brutal Youth by Anthony Breznican. It's been heavily promoted all year on the L.A. Public Library's website - I checked it out despite not having read any reviews. It was 412 pages and felt like 812 -- I can't say it was awful, but the experience of reading it certainly was. Oh, well - these things happen.
I'm now enthralled with Child 44 by Tom Rob Smith. This is the book that made him famous and so far I can understand why - I'm halfway through the 435 pages. I'll be surprised if the story collapses in the second half - I hope not, because it's the first of a trilogy!
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Teachmichigan
Member
07-22-2001
| Saturday, November 15, 2014 - 8:21 am
I've read the first two of the the Child 44 series, but didn't realize there was a third one. LOVED them, so thanks for the heads up!
****off to search Amazon --- just what I need, another book!****
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Uncle_ricky
Member
07-02-2007
| Saturday, November 15, 2014 - 8:57 am
You're welcome, Teach! And in case you're not already aware, the film version of Child 44 will be released next April. I have studiously avoided the cast names because I don't want to picture their faces as I read the book.
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Teachmichigan
Member
07-22-2001
| Saturday, November 15, 2014 - 12:27 pm
I didn't know that either! Gracias, otra vez! During the school year, I don't watch as much TV (recorded shows only and no commercials), and I haven't even had time to finish the books I started in August. However, I WILL look forward to the movie AND the third book as soon as Christmas break arrives.
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