Book 24 of my 2017 Reading Challenge
read from April 19 - 25
**I received a copy of this book via Blogging for Books and would like to thank the author and/or publisher for the opportunity to read and honestly review it**
Writing My Wrongs: Life, Death, and Redemption in an American Prison
by Shaka Senghor
Summary (via the book jacket)
In 1991, Shaka Senghor was sent to prison for second-degree murder. Today, he is a lecturer at universities, a leading voice on criminal justice reform, and an inspiration to thousands.
Shaka Senghor was raised in a middle-class neighborhood on Detroit's east side during the height of the 1980s crack epidemic. An honor roll student and a natural leader, he dreamed of becoming a doctor - but at age eleven, his parents' marriage began to unravel, and the beatings from his mother worsened, sending him on a downward spiral that saw him running away from home, turning to drug dealing to survive, and end up in prison for murder at the age of nineteen, fuming with anger and despair.
Writing My Wrongs is the story of what came next. During his nineteen-year incarceration, seven of which were spent in solitary confinement, Senghor discovered literature, meditation, self-examination, and the kindness of others - tools he used to confront the demons of his past, forgive the people who hurt him, and begin atoning for the wrongs he had committed. Upon his release at thirty-eight, Senghor became an activist and mentor to young men and women facing circumstances like his. Doing work int the community and having the courage to share his story led him to fellowships at the MIT Media Lab and the Kellogg Foundation and invitations to speak at events like TED and the Aspen Ideas Festival.
In equal turns, Writing My Wrongs is a page-turning portrait of life in the shadow of poverty, violence, and fear; an unforgettable story of redemption, reminding us that our worst deeds don't define us; and a compelling witness to our country's need for rethinking its approach to crime, prison, and the men and women sent there.
My Opinion
This book was very well-written and gave me a perspective that I don't normally get to hear about. The author is intelligent, didn't have the stereotypical missing father, and still got caught up in the "glamour" of drugs to thrive in his neighborhood, which sets him on a path to destruction. I couldn't fathom that I was reading about the experiences of a young teenage boy because it's so far out of my realm.
The author is very self-aware and did a lot of introspection. Even if the reasons weren't correct or ultimately defensible (he took a man's life), he was able to explain why it felt like the only option at the time in a way that was understandable yet not defensive or self-pitying. That's a fine line to walk and I'm definitely interested in reading his other books and watching his TED talk.
Side note: I can imagine how incredibly frustrating it would feel that he needed to complete a program in order to be considered for parole but the prison didn't have enough resources to provide the program to everyone that needed it in a timely manner.
A Few Quotes from the Book
"As long as there was a threat to my freedom, I acted like I was ready to change, but the moment I got free, I didn't care anymore. It would take ten years and a lot [of] misfortune for me to understand that real change comes only when you are completely and thoroughly disgusted with your actions and the consequences that they produce."
"That's how my relationship with Brenda began. You know, "Boy meets girl, girl asks boy to borrow a gun, boy and girl start dealing crack together.""
Sunday, May 7, 2017
Monday, April 24, 2017
The Girl Who Wrote in Silk
Book 23 of my 2017 Reading Challenge
read from April 19 - 24
The Girl Who Wrote in Silk by Kelli Estes
Summary (via the book jacket)
The smallest items can hold centuries of secrets...
Inara Erickson is exploring her deceased aunt's island estate when she find an elaborately stitched piece of fabric hidden in the house. As she peels back layer upon layer of the secrets it holds, Inara's life becomes interwoven with that of Mei Lien, a young Chinese girl mysteriously driven from her home a century before. Through the stories Mei Lien tells in silk, Inara uncovers a tragic truth that will shake her family to its core - and force her to make an impossible choice.
Inspired by true events, Kelli Estes's brilliant and atmospheric debut serves as a poignant tale of two women determined to do the right thing, and the power of our own stories.
My Opinion
The parts of the book in flashback were fascinating and wanting to know what happened to Mei Lien was the only thing that kept me reading. The parts of the book that took place in the present felt contrived with unnecessary drama and everything wrapped up way too neatly and coincidentally on all fronts.
Normally when I feel so up-and-down about a book I'll split the difference and rate it a neutral 3 stars but in this case, the "downs" were so down that I stuck with a 2.
I do agree with the author that the way we treated Chinese immigrants and people of Chinese descent in the late 1800's and early 1900's is a part of a history we should know more about.
Quote from the Book
"The longer [Inara] was here, the more she felt like a snake shedding its skin, like something tight and constricting was falling off her. For nine years she'd focused on her studies and her goals for the future, and now that her future was upon her, she wanted only to sink into the comfort of the past. Of this island."
Summary (via the book jacket)
The smallest items can hold centuries of secrets...
Inara Erickson is exploring her deceased aunt's island estate when she find an elaborately stitched piece of fabric hidden in the house. As she peels back layer upon layer of the secrets it holds, Inara's life becomes interwoven with that of Mei Lien, a young Chinese girl mysteriously driven from her home a century before. Through the stories Mei Lien tells in silk, Inara uncovers a tragic truth that will shake her family to its core - and force her to make an impossible choice.
Inspired by true events, Kelli Estes's brilliant and atmospheric debut serves as a poignant tale of two women determined to do the right thing, and the power of our own stories.
My Opinion
The parts of the book in flashback were fascinating and wanting to know what happened to Mei Lien was the only thing that kept me reading. The parts of the book that took place in the present felt contrived with unnecessary drama and everything wrapped up way too neatly and coincidentally on all fronts.
Normally when I feel so up-and-down about a book I'll split the difference and rate it a neutral 3 stars but in this case, the "downs" were so down that I stuck with a 2.
I do agree with the author that the way we treated Chinese immigrants and people of Chinese descent in the late 1800's and early 1900's is a part of a history we should know more about.
Quote from the Book
"The longer [Inara] was here, the more she felt like a snake shedding its skin, like something tight and constricting was falling off her. For nine years she'd focused on her studies and her goals for the future, and now that her future was upon her, she wanted only to sink into the comfort of the past. Of this island."
Wednesday, April 19, 2017
The Winter Fortress
Book 22 of my 2017 Reading Challenge
read from March 13 - April 16
The Winter Fortress: The Epic Mission to Sabotage Hitler's Atomic Bomb
by Neal Bascomb
Summary (via Goodreads)
It's 1942 and the Nazis are racing to build an atomic bomb. They have the physicists. They have the will. What they don't have is enough "heavy water", an essential ingredient for their nuclear designs. For two years, the Nazis have occupied Norway, and with it the Vemork hydroelectric plant, a massive industrial complex nestled on a precipice of a gorge. Vemork is the world's sole supplier of heavy water, and under the threat of death, its engineers pushed production into overtime.
For the Allies, Vemork must be destroyed. But how would they reach the castle fortress high in a mountainous valley? The answer became the most dramatic commando raid of the war. The British Special Operations Executive together a brilliant scientist and eleven refugee Norwegian commandos, who, with little more than parachutes, skis, and Tommy Guns, would destroy Hitler's nuclear ambitions and help end the reign of the Third Reich.
Based on exhaustive research and never-before-seen diaries and letters of the saboteurs, The Winter Fortress is a compulsively readable narrative about a group of young men who endured soul-crushing setbacks and Gestapo hunts and survived in one of the coldest, most inhospitable places on earth to save the world from destruction.
My Opinion
This book covered an aspect of the war I wasn't familiar with at all and it amazes me that there is still so much I can learn about WWII. What they went through was mind-boggling but I wasn't truly invested. Maybe it would've been better if I'd read it faster but I never really got a good handle on who was who.
Unexpected observation: I could handle the descriptions of torture but reading about how they ate the eyelid fat of reindeer made me super queasy.
A Few Quotes from the Book
"Microphotographs of building blueprints, detailed drawings of equipment, and production figures followed. It was everything one might need to build a heavy water plant, or indeed to destroy the only one in existence."
"[Ronneberg] echoed the words Tronstad had told them all before they left for the mission: "Remember: What we do in the next hour will be a chapter of history for a hundred years to come...Together we will make it a worthy one." "
read from March 13 - April 16
The Winter Fortress: The Epic Mission to Sabotage Hitler's Atomic Bomb
by Neal Bascomb
Summary (via Goodreads)
It's 1942 and the Nazis are racing to build an atomic bomb. They have the physicists. They have the will. What they don't have is enough "heavy water", an essential ingredient for their nuclear designs. For two years, the Nazis have occupied Norway, and with it the Vemork hydroelectric plant, a massive industrial complex nestled on a precipice of a gorge. Vemork is the world's sole supplier of heavy water, and under the threat of death, its engineers pushed production into overtime.
For the Allies, Vemork must be destroyed. But how would they reach the castle fortress high in a mountainous valley? The answer became the most dramatic commando raid of the war. The British Special Operations Executive together a brilliant scientist and eleven refugee Norwegian commandos, who, with little more than parachutes, skis, and Tommy Guns, would destroy Hitler's nuclear ambitions and help end the reign of the Third Reich.
Based on exhaustive research and never-before-seen diaries and letters of the saboteurs, The Winter Fortress is a compulsively readable narrative about a group of young men who endured soul-crushing setbacks and Gestapo hunts and survived in one of the coldest, most inhospitable places on earth to save the world from destruction.
My Opinion
This book covered an aspect of the war I wasn't familiar with at all and it amazes me that there is still so much I can learn about WWII. What they went through was mind-boggling but I wasn't truly invested. Maybe it would've been better if I'd read it faster but I never really got a good handle on who was who.
Unexpected observation: I could handle the descriptions of torture but reading about how they ate the eyelid fat of reindeer made me super queasy.
A Few Quotes from the Book
"Microphotographs of building blueprints, detailed drawings of equipment, and production figures followed. It was everything one might need to build a heavy water plant, or indeed to destroy the only one in existence."
"[Ronneberg] echoed the words Tronstad had told them all before they left for the mission: "Remember: What we do in the next hour will be a chapter of history for a hundred years to come...Together we will make it a worthy one." "
Sunday, April 16, 2017
They May Not Mean To, But They Do
Book 21 of my 2017 Reading Challenge
read from March 26 - April 16
They May Not Mean To, But They Do by Cathleen Schine
Summary (via Goodreads)
The Bergman clan has always stuck together, growing as it incorporated in-laws, ex-in-laws, and same-sex spouses. But families don't just grow, they grow old, and the clan's matriarch, Joy, is not slipping into old age with the quiet grace her children, Molly and Daniel, would have wished. When Joy's beloved husband dies, Molly and Daniel have no shortage of solutions for their mother's loneliness and despair, but there is one challenge they did not count on: the reappearance of an ardent suitor from Joy's college days. And they didn't count on Joy herself, a mother suddenly as willful and rebellious as their own kids.
My Opinion
This book is like people-watching because it's a book about a regular family. There's drama but no huge problem and an ending that wasn't really an ending but was fitting for the book. It's like reading a snapshot of how one family came together to handle the death of their husband/father and the balance between grieving and continuing to live their daily lives.
It's a quick read while it's happening but not very memorable when it's over (not an insult).
I felt the words, including this passage as Joy (the widowed mother) returned to her apartment after a trip to visit her daughter:
"The sadness was there, waiting for her in the apartment. I'm sorry, Joy said to the sadness. I'm sorry I had to leave you behind for so long. But, believe me, the blue skies never fooled me, you were in my thoughts, in my heart, every minute. She looked out the window at the rain and the wet trees and the bleary spots of red taillights and white headlights. I'm home, she said, with relief, to the emptiness."
Quote from the Book
"Joy woke up and, as usual, Aaron was dead."
read from March 26 - April 16
They May Not Mean To, But They Do by Cathleen Schine
Summary (via Goodreads)
The Bergman clan has always stuck together, growing as it incorporated in-laws, ex-in-laws, and same-sex spouses. But families don't just grow, they grow old, and the clan's matriarch, Joy, is not slipping into old age with the quiet grace her children, Molly and Daniel, would have wished. When Joy's beloved husband dies, Molly and Daniel have no shortage of solutions for their mother's loneliness and despair, but there is one challenge they did not count on: the reappearance of an ardent suitor from Joy's college days. And they didn't count on Joy herself, a mother suddenly as willful and rebellious as their own kids.
My Opinion
This book is like people-watching because it's a book about a regular family. There's drama but no huge problem and an ending that wasn't really an ending but was fitting for the book. It's like reading a snapshot of how one family came together to handle the death of their husband/father and the balance between grieving and continuing to live their daily lives.
It's a quick read while it's happening but not very memorable when it's over (not an insult).
I felt the words, including this passage as Joy (the widowed mother) returned to her apartment after a trip to visit her daughter:
"The sadness was there, waiting for her in the apartment. I'm sorry, Joy said to the sadness. I'm sorry I had to leave you behind for so long. But, believe me, the blue skies never fooled me, you were in my thoughts, in my heart, every minute. She looked out the window at the rain and the wet trees and the bleary spots of red taillights and white headlights. I'm home, she said, with relief, to the emptiness."
Quote from the Book
"Joy woke up and, as usual, Aaron was dead."
Wednesday, March 22, 2017
My Best Friend's Exorcism
Book 20 of my 2017 Reading Challenge
read from March 13 - 22
My Best Friend's Exorcism by Grady Hendrix
Summary (via Goodreads)
Abby and Gretchen have been best friends since fifth grade, when they bonded over a shared love of E.T., roller-skating parties, and scratch-and-sniff stickers. But when they arrive at high school, things change. Gretchen begins to act...different. And as the strange coincidences and bizarre behavior start to pile up, Abby realizes there's only one possible explanation: Gretchen, her favorite person in the world, has a demon living inside her. And Abby is not about to let anyone or anything come between her and her best friend. With help from some unlikely allies, Abby embarks on a quest to save Gretchen. But is their friendship powerful enough to beat the devil?
My Opinion
So many points for originality. This was definitely not like anything I'd read before, it was so easy to get sucked into, and I look forward to reading the author again. The format was great too, like a yearbook with lots of inscriptions and doodles. I'm not sure if the electronic version would have that so I recommend finding a print copy to get the full experience. The title of each chapter was the name of a song so I started each one with a little memory pop as an added bonus.
I didn't love the fallout after the exorcism; the way everything played out fell flat for me. Also, I didn't notice as I was reading but now that I'm thinking about it, there were some loose threads that I would've liked resolution on.
This was a great description of friends growing apart: "There was no falling-out, no great tragedy, just a hundred thousand trivial moments they didn't share, each one an inch of distance between them, and eventually those inches added up to miles."
A Few Quotes from the Book
"Something was changing inside Gretchen. Maybe it was the acid, maybe it was Andy, maybe it was her parents, maybe it was something worse. Whatever it was, Abby had to keep trying. She couldn't abandon her friend because soon Gretchen would be ready to talk. Any minute now she'd look up from her daybook and say, "I have to tell you something serious.""
"Turning eighteen doesn't determine when you become an adult in Charleston...The day you become an adult is the day you learn that in Charleston, the worse something is, the less attention it receives."
read from March 13 - 22
My Best Friend's Exorcism by Grady Hendrix
Summary (via Goodreads)
Abby and Gretchen have been best friends since fifth grade, when they bonded over a shared love of E.T., roller-skating parties, and scratch-and-sniff stickers. But when they arrive at high school, things change. Gretchen begins to act...different. And as the strange coincidences and bizarre behavior start to pile up, Abby realizes there's only one possible explanation: Gretchen, her favorite person in the world, has a demon living inside her. And Abby is not about to let anyone or anything come between her and her best friend. With help from some unlikely allies, Abby embarks on a quest to save Gretchen. But is their friendship powerful enough to beat the devil?
My Opinion
So many points for originality. This was definitely not like anything I'd read before, it was so easy to get sucked into, and I look forward to reading the author again. The format was great too, like a yearbook with lots of inscriptions and doodles. I'm not sure if the electronic version would have that so I recommend finding a print copy to get the full experience. The title of each chapter was the name of a song so I started each one with a little memory pop as an added bonus.
I didn't love the fallout after the exorcism; the way everything played out fell flat for me. Also, I didn't notice as I was reading but now that I'm thinking about it, there were some loose threads that I would've liked resolution on.
This was a great description of friends growing apart: "There was no falling-out, no great tragedy, just a hundred thousand trivial moments they didn't share, each one an inch of distance between them, and eventually those inches added up to miles."
A Few Quotes from the Book
"Something was changing inside Gretchen. Maybe it was the acid, maybe it was Andy, maybe it was her parents, maybe it was something worse. Whatever it was, Abby had to keep trying. She couldn't abandon her friend because soon Gretchen would be ready to talk. Any minute now she'd look up from her daybook and say, "I have to tell you something serious.""
"Turning eighteen doesn't determine when you become an adult in Charleston...The day you become an adult is the day you learn that in Charleston, the worse something is, the less attention it receives."
Monday, March 13, 2017
Ghost Boy
Book 19 of my 2017 Reading Challenge
read from March 2 - 13
Ghost Boy: the Miraculous Escape of a Misdiagnosed Boy Trapped Inside His Own Body by Martin Pistorius
Summary (via the book jacket)
In January of 1988, Martin Pistorius came home from school complaining of a sore throat. He never went back. Within a year, Martin had degenerated into a mute quadriplegic. By his fourteenth birthday he was a hollow shell, unseeing and unknowing; he spent his days at a care center, sitting blank in front of the television while his family waited for him to die.
And then his mind came up for air.
For an unimaginable ten years, Martin would be completely conscious while trapped inside his unresponsive body, secretly aware of everything happening around him, and utterly powerless to communicate it.
Ghost Boy is Martin's story, as written, - shockingly and triumphantly - by Martin himself. With unflinching candor, Martin describes the chilling details of life as a secretly lucid vegetable - from the perversion of some who believed him to be brain dead, to the grace of those who sought recognition in his eyes.
For an age when prolonged illness and misdiagnoses are too common, Ghost Boy is the hopeful story of a discarded life awakening from passivity to action, despair to hope, captivity to freedom.
My Opinion
This was well-written and captivating. It was like a horror movie when he was describing the time between when he became aware and when he was able to communicate; that would be a claustrophobic nightmare.
Quote from the Book
"As hands clap my back and congratulations are given, I sit amid the noise and movement and realize that people want to hear the story of the boy who came back from the dead. It amazes them - it amazes me too."
read from March 2 - 13
Ghost Boy: the Miraculous Escape of a Misdiagnosed Boy Trapped Inside His Own Body by Martin Pistorius
Summary (via the book jacket)
In January of 1988, Martin Pistorius came home from school complaining of a sore throat. He never went back. Within a year, Martin had degenerated into a mute quadriplegic. By his fourteenth birthday he was a hollow shell, unseeing and unknowing; he spent his days at a care center, sitting blank in front of the television while his family waited for him to die.
And then his mind came up for air.
For an unimaginable ten years, Martin would be completely conscious while trapped inside his unresponsive body, secretly aware of everything happening around him, and utterly powerless to communicate it.
Ghost Boy is Martin's story, as written, - shockingly and triumphantly - by Martin himself. With unflinching candor, Martin describes the chilling details of life as a secretly lucid vegetable - from the perversion of some who believed him to be brain dead, to the grace of those who sought recognition in his eyes.
For an age when prolonged illness and misdiagnoses are too common, Ghost Boy is the hopeful story of a discarded life awakening from passivity to action, despair to hope, captivity to freedom.
My Opinion
This was well-written and captivating. It was like a horror movie when he was describing the time between when he became aware and when he was able to communicate; that would be a claustrophobic nightmare.
Quote from the Book
"As hands clap my back and congratulations are given, I sit amid the noise and movement and realize that people want to hear the story of the boy who came back from the dead. It amazes them - it amazes me too."
Ash & Bramble
Book 18 of my 2017 Reading Challenge
read from February 28 - March 13
Ash & Bramble by Sarah Prineas
Book 1 of the Ash & Bramble series
Summary (via Goodreads)
A prince.
A ball.
A glass slipper left behind at the stroke of midnight.
The tale is told and retold, twisted and tweaked, snipped and stretched, as it leads to happily ever after.
But it is not the true Story.
A dark fortress.
A past forgotten.
A life of servitude.
No one has ever broken free of the Godmother's terrible stone prison until a girl named Pin attempts a breathless, daring escape. But she discovers that what seems to be freedom is a prison of another kind, one that entangles her in a story that leads to a prince, a kiss, and a clock striking midnight. To unravel herself from this new life, Pin must choose between a prince and another - the one who helped her before and would give his life for her. Torn, the only thing for her to do is trade in the glass slipper for a sword and find her own destiny.
My Opinion
My 14-year-old daughter read this and liked it. Both she and I plan to read the next book in the series.
I thought it was fine but I don't have much to say about it.
A Few Quotes from the Book
"I know nothing about the Before. I don't know my name or where I came from, but I do know that I am a person who asks questions and risks pushing against the boundaries of obedience."
"They will not take Marya's body down. It will hang there, this lesson.
But here is the irony: the lesson I am learning is not at all what they intend. Their lesson has made me even more determined to escape."
"That was part of Story's power, wasn't it? People always wanted to find out what happens next."
read from February 28 - March 13
Ash & Bramble by Sarah Prineas
Book 1 of the Ash & Bramble series
Summary (via Goodreads)
A prince.
A ball.
A glass slipper left behind at the stroke of midnight.
The tale is told and retold, twisted and tweaked, snipped and stretched, as it leads to happily ever after.
But it is not the true Story.
A dark fortress.
A past forgotten.
A life of servitude.
No one has ever broken free of the Godmother's terrible stone prison until a girl named Pin attempts a breathless, daring escape. But she discovers that what seems to be freedom is a prison of another kind, one that entangles her in a story that leads to a prince, a kiss, and a clock striking midnight. To unravel herself from this new life, Pin must choose between a prince and another - the one who helped her before and would give his life for her. Torn, the only thing for her to do is trade in the glass slipper for a sword and find her own destiny.
My Opinion
My 14-year-old daughter read this and liked it. Both she and I plan to read the next book in the series.
I thought it was fine but I don't have much to say about it.
A Few Quotes from the Book
"I know nothing about the Before. I don't know my name or where I came from, but I do know that I am a person who asks questions and risks pushing against the boundaries of obedience."
"They will not take Marya's body down. It will hang there, this lesson.
But here is the irony: the lesson I am learning is not at all what they intend. Their lesson has made me even more determined to escape."
"That was part of Story's power, wasn't it? People always wanted to find out what happens next."
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