In a search for rare books, writer Helene Hanff pens a letter to Marks & Co. booksellers in London, hoping that they’ll have what she so desires. Her initial letter sparks two decades of communication between her and the employees of the bookstore, particularly Frank Doel, who answers that letter and becomes a dear penpal to her. In The Duchess of Bloomsbury Street, Hanff finally makes a trip to London to promote the newly published 84 Charing Cross Road, visiting all the sights which had become familiar to her through the letters and through films.
It was almost inevitable that this book would let me down. My expectations were so, so high, given that this is a book for book lovers and countless people assured me that if I loved The Guernsey Literary and Potato Peel Pie Society, I would love this too. And I did, but not as much, which was in itself disappointing. Yes, it is a totally charming and endearing story. I loved when Hanff grew so fond of the London employees that she sent them packages of hard-to-get items just after World War II when everything was still rationed. The time period felt real to me through these people that had lived through it. And of course this is certainly a book for book lovers, as Hanff’s passion for them especially shines through and definitely makes me feel like I should be reading all the books she’d read.
Unfortunately, though, I found Hanff slightly abrasive. She had a strange habit of suddenly writing in lower case, which I just didn’t understand, and she seemed to me very much like a loud American stereotype, particularly in comparison to the more somber British writers. I think I would have preferred more letters, too. There were gaps of years between some of the letters, and clearly there had been some correspondence over those years because they’d reply to one another. I kept feeling like I was missing something, and the book was so short that more letters could have been included easily.
I feel like there’s something wrong with me because I didn’t love this as much as everyone else does. All those five star reviews, everyone saying that book lovers can’t not love this book – well, clearly I should have waited and let my expectations die down a bit! There’s also the fact that the ending was spoiled for me by the back cover, which I almost never read but in this case did. That certainly hurt the book as it robbed me of the true emotional impact it could have had.
It was with a little bit of surprise that I then found myself loving the second book, The Duchess of Bloomsbury Street. I’d hardly heard of this one, as everyone focuses on the first. But here, Hanff actually travels to London, even though she’s just had a hysterectomy and is in considerable pain. Watching her discover London – and England – was like doing it for myself all over again. And if you don’t think I got as excited and moved as she did, just ask my husband, who was there (and confused by me) for most of it!
Is it strange that I related far more to her passion for British history than I did to her passion for books? Because I certainly did. She’s a very different reader than me, and I’m sure that has something to do with it. In any case, there is something magical about a place you’ve read about in history books coming to life, and I could palpably feel her excitement. I know what it’s like to walk along paths I’d previously only dreamed of walking on, places where history that I love happened, where writers that I love wrote, where generations of other people have sat and dreamed and thought and changed the world. It’s awe-inspiring, and that’s what I loved about this book. I can still remember that thrilling first vision of green that was England from my plane window and there Hanff and I turned out to have quite a bit in common after all. And I found her visit to Marks & Co extremely moving – it closes down by the time she finally gets to see it – and her visits with her correspondents were touching and sweet. I liked her a lot better in this second book and I wonder now if I should reread the first with this new perspective.
Both of these books are worth your time. Don’t let expectations get to you and take it as it comes – and DON’T read the back cover!
I am an Amazon Associate. I purchased these books.
Jung Chang’s grandmother, Yu-fang, was a member of the last generation of Chinese women to have her feet bound. Her feet were bound so late, in fact, that her younger sister didn’t have to endure the painful process at all. Moreover, she was beautiful, and her father decided that for her to be a concubine to a rich man was better than for her to be a wife to a poor man, and as a result she hardly knew her first “husband” even though she gave him a daughter. That daughter, born Bao Qin but later named De-hong by Yu-fang’s second husband Dr. Xia, was Jung’s mother, and one of the first to become a communist. Jung herself lived through both the idealization of Chairman Mao and was intelligent enough to eventually realize that Communist China was not the paradise that she had been promised her entire life, and used her study of English to finally leave the country.
This book was absolutely fascinating. I was completely spellbound by it. Chinese society changed so much over this period of years. Just considering the difference between the early life of Jung’s grandmother and her own youth was immeasurably vast. I had never learned about any of this before, and I found the history fascinating. I really want to learn more now and I am definitely planning on seeking out some history on 20th century China.
This is a memoir, though, and it was the story of these women that really cemented my love for the entire book. I was incredibly impressed by how intelligent and strong they all were. From Yu-fang’s ingenuity in kidnapping her daughter away from her first husband’s vindictive wife to Jung’s mother’s struggles with a husband that put communism before his family, these women took the abuse and rolled with it, keeping their integrity and honor and love for one another intact through almost insurmountable hardships. Moreover, Jung’s parents must have been complicit in some of the horrid things that the communist regime supported – we know her father executed people, she says so – yet they too realize what they’ve done is wrong. The second half of the book is mainly Jung’s own memoir, and I found it fascinating that despite all the hardships communism had dealt her family that she still was completely in the thrall of Chairman Mao. She didn’t know about them, of course, but it seems inconceivable to me that anyone could believe his lies. It’s hard to realize that these were the only words she ever heard, and thus she had no choice. It’s amazing that she eventually realized that she wanted to get out of China, let alone that she accomplished it.
This book is long, but I found the entire thing completely enthralling. The writing is plain and there is a lot of history info-dumping, but it’s such a compelling story that I managed to read half of it (350 pages) in a single day. I can’t recommend Wild Swans enough. I highly recommend this, and it would be a great choice for the Women Unbound challenge, which is what I read it for. I also have to thank Eva, because without her recommendation I might never have discovered it!
I am an Amazon Associate. I borrowed this book from my local library.
This is a collection of humorous essays drawn from the author’s life, covering fun topics from his elementary school speech counselor to the time a Frenchman thought he was a thief and went happily on in English about it to his girlfriend, not realizing that Sedaris was an American and understood every word he said. Through his high drug years, his failed stint as a teacher, and even the time he almost saw a girl get killed, David Sedaris makes his readers laugh even as sometimes we know we really shouldn’t.
I had such a strange experience with this book. It was my last choice for the read-a-thon and even though I wasn’t that tired, at first I didn’t find it all that funny. I read the first few essays a little perplexed. When I tried imagining someone reading the book out loud to me, I thought it was more entertaining, but still, sort of “eh.” This mirrored the experience my husband had had with it a few weeks ago when he was looking for a humorous read. Then, all of a sudden, it became hilarious. I’m not sure whether I got used to Sedaris’s writing or whether the later stories were just funnier than the earlier ones, but I began laughing out loud more and more often. And now that I’ve finished, I want to read more of his work. I think for once an audiobook might be better; a lot of people have remarked that Sedaris is funnier in person.
I’ve lost most of the grasp of this book as it’s been a while and I’d read so much during the read-a-thon, so I’m just going to leave it at that. Me Talk Pretty One Day is definitely a funny read; if it starts off not so much, keep reading, and hopefully you will also suddenly realize that this man is hilarious.
With a careful touch of humor and her own personal subjectivity, author Isabel Allende takes her readers on a tour of the Chile of her childhood, the Chile that she knew for the earliest years of her life. This memoir reads as a meandering journey throughout the history of Allende’s family and her own girlhood, when she became a feminist before she even knew what a feminist was. Overall, the book reads like an enchanting conversation about a foreign country and a family that never ceases to be interesting and informative.
Isabel Allende has been one of my favorite authors since I read Daughter of Fortunein high school, an instant favorite with me. I have since read a number of her works, most recently The Sum of Our Days, her latest memoir. I was really looking forward to this book and I wasn’t at all disappointed. An account of her earlier life mixed with a history of Chile from her perspective, it’s both interesting from a historical and a human interest point of view. I knew very little about Chile, and I was fascinated by her accounts of the people she knew and the character of the nation. She does say that everything she writes is completely subjective, but this is a memoir, so it’s perfectly acceptable. She also has some interesting reflections on memoirs; everyone remembers everything differently, and she writes that she cannot help but inject her own nostalgia and feelings into her recollections of the past.
Allende as a girl is charming and fascinating. I loved that she said she was a feminist before she knew what one was. Her desire to be independent, and not subservient to a man, outlasted the period when she was indeed like that. Her account of her own adolescence is hilarious. She gives her own family a magic touch, writing about ghosts and spirits, and while part of me rejects that because it doesn’t match my own beliefs about the world, the other part of me was enchanted by her stories. The House of the Spirits is one of her books that I haven’t yet read and this immediately made me want to read it, as it’s based on her family.
Her history of Chile includes a small measure of politics and some observations about the fate of nations, particularly during her period as an exile. She contrasts her own Chilean attitudes with those of the people in the places she’s lived throughout exile, as well as those of modern Chileans. While her censure of the American government for uprooting her cousin Salvador Allende is clear, it’s also clear that she still manages to love her adopted country. This is an interesting juxtaposition of attitudes and makes something that could have been offensive into an interesting section of the text that makes her readers think.
I really enjoyed My Invented Country. I would recommend it for anyone who enjoys memoirs.
Eve Brown had always said that she wanted to go into the Peace Corps. Two years out of college, she figured it was time to take the plunge. With a boyfriend, she hardly expected to fall for her Peace Corps recruiter, but fall she did, and spent most of the months before her assignment trying to get him to love her so much that he begged her to stay. Of course, he did not, and off Eve went, if only to satisfy John’s expectations of her. She fled a year later, unable to cope with Ecuador, only to find herself heading to Uganda as John’s bride before very long, set on changing the world just a little bit.
This memoir is basically a joy to read. Eve’s life is spectacularly eventful and she writes about it with the proper touch of humor while somehow still conveying how different and difficult life in third-world countries is. In Ecuador, for example, Eve lives in the city and manages to see her friends quite frequently and gets luxuries sent from her family at home. Her life seems almost normal, until she interacts with the little lost boys, taking them home and giving them toothbrushes, or travels to one of the villages and sees all the rundown shacks without running water or toilets. Until the event which leads to her departure, Eve writes about everything with a light-hearted voice which makes her experience simultaneously scary and entertaining.
Similarly, her love story with John is serious but also hilarious. There is very little as funny as her Jewish mother asking her newly minted boyfriend if he’d shtupped her daughter yet, or Eve’s determination to get him to marry her. Somehow she even makes the stupidly hard separation of long distance relationships entertaining, which impressed me because I know how terrible it is and I could never write about it with any sort of humor.
I loved the book even more when Eve and John got to Uganda. I really felt like they were making some sort of little difference in those people’s lives and it was fascinating to read about a totally foreign culture; even more so to learn how they became completely accustomed to it and realized they couldn’t really feel at home again in the United States. It’s just so outside my experience but this memoir made me feel as though I could have been there too.
In short, I really loved First Comes Love, Then Comes Malaria. I love reading about women who are changing the world and accomplishing goals in their own ways, no matter how big or small the goals are. Eve tries to educate people about AIDS and even though she doesn’t always succeed, she does achieve many of her other goals throughout the book, as does her husband. It’s inspiring to read about them and I really recommend this to everyone.
When mapmakers of the distant past came to the end of the known world, they would inscribe “Here There Be Sea Monsters.” When Tori Murden McClure attempted to row solo across the Atlantic Ocean in a 23 foot plywood boat with no motor or sail, she had no idea what kind of monsters she would find. Despite deep solitude and perilous conditions, McClure was a loner determined to prove what one person with a mission can do. But when she is brought to her knees by the worst hurricane season in the history of the North Atlantic, she must signal for help and go home in what she thinks is disgrace.
Back in Kentucky, her life begins to change in unexpected ways. She falls in love and learns to embrace her own vulnerability. So with her friends and her lover, she devises a strategy that will carry her to the opposite shore. With a wry sense of humor and a strong voice, McClure gives readers a true memoir of an explorer who maps her world with rare emotional honesty.
As with most memoirs, this one doesn’t just cover Tori’s journey across the Atlantic but flashes back through her life and her motivations for embarking on such a difficult and dangerous trip. She writes about her brother, mentally disabled and abused, the fights that she got into as a child, her entry into a more prestigious academic world and her successful attempt to embrace her own talents. Tori is a remarkable woman and in the pages of this memoir, she explains in clear, compelling language both her life and her journeys across the Atlantic Ocean.
I was fascinated by all the boat details mentioned in this book. The book has a diagram of Tori’s boat at the front and throughout she explains just what she’s doing when she rows, where her stuff is, how she feels in her tiny cabin, and so on. Every gory detail about the blisters on her hands, on her feet, her various aches and pains, and so on are included to really make us feel the pain she’s in. This is especially so during the hurricane; we don’t find out what’s causing all the problems at the time, but it seemed fairly obvious to me. The boat capsizes a ridiculous number of times and Tori is thrown about her little cabin. At one point, she thinks about ending it because she is in so much pain, very alone, and her demons have come out to get her. Luckily, she doesn’t, and the next day calls for rescue. I was actually relieved for her.
Tori’s emotional development is quite moving as well. Between stories of her difficult childhood and independent adolescence and early adulthood, it’s hard to believe that she opens herself up to others as much as she does by the end of her memoir. Her personal growth while she’s out alone on the boat is valuable not only to her but to us as well. She faces down her demons and wins; I would hope that most of us need not end up in a hurricane in the middle of the Atlantic Ocean to do the same ourselves!
I enjoyed this memoir far more than I was expecting to. It’s well written, compelling, and packs a punch for a book that’s about a woman rowing alone across the ocean. Tori has lived an exciting and eventful life and it’s extremely encouraging to read about a woman who achieves her dreams through hard work and determination. In a world consumed with celebrity memoirs, this is a breath of fresh air and certainly worth your time.
In college, Donovan Campbell went to a training camp for the US Marine Corps. He thought it would look good on his resume and provide him with some experience. He never had any intention of joining the Marines in actuality. When he graduated from Princeton, Donovan realized that he wanted to do something more with his life than work in an office. He wanted to do something that mattered. So he joined the Marine Corps for real. Leaving his young wife Christy behind, Donovan was required to train his 40-man infantry platoon in record speed as they prepared for their deployment in Iraq. The platoon, named Joker One, was relieved when they were stationed in Ramadi, as it had been relatively quiet. Ramadi did not stay quiet. During his months in Iraq, Donovan’s leadership and quick thinking were tested and questioned time and time again, but his greatest constant remained his love for his men. This book is in part his tribute to them.
I was amazed by how this story of war in Iraq could pull me in. Even when, at times, terminology was confusing and I had to flip to the glossary at the back, I never regretted picking it up and perhaps most surprisingly, I didn’t want to put it down. It would be wrong to call this an exciting book, given the horrific events that happen herein, but it was a moving, astonishing memoir. The love shared between Donovan and his men, their extremely strong friendship, is what powers their mission and this narrative. I was with them when they met, during their training, and while they fought for their lives against insurgents they could hardly distinguish from regular Iraqis.
Joker One is a way for those of us who have never experienced war, who may even be against the war (though never against the soldiers), to get a hint of what living in Iraq must be like. Donovan describes in detail the 50-80 lb gear that they are required to wear, the constant heat in mid-summer, the indifference and sometimes hatred that the Iraqis feel towards the American soldiers, the fear of running for his life and the anguish when one of his men is injured or killed because of a decision he made. The Marines hardly sleep and their lives are in constant danger from bombs tossed against their compound. Men are injured and killed and the platoon shrinks, week by week and month by month. I am more than ever astonished by the courage and strength it must take to volunteer for this and I admire the men in this book for their fortitude and honor.
With all the strife and pain in this book, I was frankly amazed by how easy it was to read. I suspect the author has a gift; he is educated and it shows. He is a worthy choice to put a voice to this compelling story and to reveal to us the sacrifices that men make every day in Iraq as well as the friendship, respect, and love that can grow between them. I am glad I chose to read this book. Ignorance is never a virtue and it is extremely important to understand what is happening in the world around us. Joker One was a fabulous choice.
In 1966, at the age of 16, our unnamed heroine leaves her native Istanbul and signs up as a migrant worker in Germany. Lying about her age, she gets work on an assembly line in West Berlin making radios, and lives in a women’s factory hostel.
THE BRIDGE OF THE GOLDEN HORN is a witty, picaresque account of a precocious teenager refusing to become wise; of a hectic four years lived between Berlin and Istanbul; of a young woman who is obsessed by theatre, film, poetry and left-wing politics.
While this book was interesting, I’m not sure it was my cup of tea. I think “hectic” is a fantastic way to start off describing it. We breeze through quite a bit of the narrator’s life and it’s hard to be sure what it meant. Despite the quick pace of events, the book felt very, very slow. Since it was a memoir (or a semi-autobiographical novel, as I see elsewhere), I expected to feel some sort of attachment for the main character, but it was surprisingly difficult. I certainly thought her journey was interesting. How many stories take place within a Cold War-era Berlin factory? Or in Istanbul? Not very many, at least not many that I read.
Sevgi’s goal in life is to become an actress. She’s willing to do more or less anything to get there. Saving money for theatre school is the purpose of her time in Berlin, but she also does plenty of other things in order to fit the image of actress. This includes many attempts at giving up her virginity, which she calls her “diamond”. Several men tell her that she is too young for sex, but she persists in thinking that her diamond is holding her back. This is just one of the occurrences which made me struggle to relate to her. When she does give up that diamond, she sleeps with men indiscriminately, often practicing her acting skills by faking her pleasure.
Something I did enjoy here was the book’s focus on literature, although not necessarily the political outcome of Sevgi’s learning. Sevgi is determined to educate herself, beginning with a book received from the communist hostel warden and continuing throughout her life. Books are treasures. By the end of the novel, however, it seemed that all of Sevgi’s learning, in fact her whole journey, was centered on teaching her to become a communist. While communism at its core is an interesting ideology, I found it hard to sympathize with someone who ignored the fact that communist countries regularly turn into dictatorships and continued following an idealized belief which has little to no real world value.
I suspect that were I older, I would have found more to enjoy in this book. If I’d lived through the events referenced in the USA, I would perhaps have been better able to draw connections and enjoy the allusions sprinkled throughout. As it stands, though, I found this book difficult to get through and at times, very much over my head. I can’t recommend it.
When Isabel Allende’s daughter Paula passed away, her entire life and family structure changed out of necessity. This book, written to Paula, is mainly about that family, changing and growing and loving, interspersed with her own feelings and successes. We get an inside look at her writing, her beliefs, and how she does it all. This book truly sums up the days of her family.
I found this book extremely compelling. I’ve read and loved several of Allende’s books and having an insight into her life was amazing for me. I knew so very little about her. I also found it relevant to my own life because I’ve watched my mother deal with her grief over losing my brother and so I felt deeply for Isabel as well. It’s impossibly hard. I’ve actually recommended that my mom read this book because I found it heartening; Isabel finds meaning in her life even though the hole is always there.
Isabel paints the characters of her family in a way that makes us feel like we know them, that we could bump into them on the street. I was amazed at some of the intimate details she revealed and am not sure I could deal with the world knowing such things about me, but by the end of the memoir, they are our friends too, and we want them to get through their own individual struggles and hardships.
I’d very much recommend this memoir. Not only is it an insight into Isabel’s life, but she highlights many issues that she and her family members struggle with. I think many people would not only enjoy this work but benefit from thinking about what she has to say.
The women in Amy’s family always end up raising their children alone. Almost without exception, the men leave. Thus Amy finds herself in a family full of women, yet still hopeful that her marriage will be better than all the rest. She moves to London with her journalist husband and they have a child together. Amy misses him, but thinks everything is okay until he leaves her and she discovers that he has a girlfriend. Amy flees to the bosom of her all-female family and sets about getting her life back together.
I thought it was really sad that their marriage didn’t work out and that they used their family histories as an excuse. To me it seems fairly obvious that a job like his would be a strain on any family, especially a couple that wasn’t used to dealing with it. With Amy all on her own as a single mother in a foreign country with a single friend, what were they expecting? I also expected this to be a bit more about Amy’s family, and while they were on the fringes of the story, they were certainly secondary to Amy’s main struggle to figure out how to be a single mother. She and her daughter have a wonderful relationship and it’s nice to see a teenage daughter not hating her mother for once (although tantrums come with the territory). Amy’s rise to fame as the new “Ann Landers” is anything but ordinary, but this is still a sweet story of a mother’s attempt to come to terms with her life, get on her own two feet, and alternately help and be supported by her family. Oh, and I loved the ending, very cutely done and its brevity was appreciated.
Overall, recommended if you like memoirs or heart-warming stories about families. I’d put this as a solid “good”. You’re not going to regret reading it, but it isn’t going to be your favorite book ever.
To my surprise, my copy of 84 Charing Cross Road included The Duchess of Bloomsbury Street as well, so I figured I’d review them both together, as they sort of go together anyway.
on Amazon.
on Amazon.
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